Newspaper Page Text
$he ^fiercer Cluster
MERCER UNIVERSITY. MACON, GEORGIA
May 11, 1962
Larry Maioriello
EDITOR
Yvonne Hooves
BUSINESS MANAGER
Volume XLII, No. 2f>
Robert H. Hurt
MANAGING EDITOR
John Krueger
NEWS EDITOR
Executive Editors
HI I III A McGLAUN
BETSY LIVINGSTON
JEANE FULWOOD
Staff Photographer
WARD LOWRANCE
Associate Editors
GRANGER RICKS
HUGH LAWSON
NELL HITCHCOCK
RONALD CARR
Feature Editor
TIM GILL
Social Editor
MARY JANB CARTHR
Contributing Editors
ELAINE HUDSON
ANNE JOHNSON
LEE GOING
HANNA SAAD
News Staff: Karen Kennedy, Ixiy
Knight, Dick Shiver, Carolyn Arnold.
Kaye Wells, Dana Poole, Ann Walk
er, Cynthia Adams, Katie Koellner
Arnold Brawner, Margaret Smith,
Lynda Shaw, and Gayle Cox.
Editorial Assistants: Judy Kennerly,
Mary Payne,
Business Staff: Genie Ashurst, Jean
Smith.
Sports Staff: Jack C. Fincher, Bobby
Lamb, Jara Key.
Open Stacks Are Better
Mercer's library facilities have long been the subject of criticism
from professors, students and Cluster editors. It appears now that plans
are under progress to alleviate this fault The recent gift by Dr. W. G.
Lee is needed and appreciated in that part of the funds have been marked
for improved library facilities. There have been other so-marked gifts in
recent years, for the need is ap|>arent.
Ii is hoped that when the improver! library facilities are added they
will include open stacks—if only for the reason that someone browsing
through the stacks (in itself a pursuit so soothing, ami yet stimulating,
as to obviate further reasons) may chance upon a gem of learning which
he would never have come upon from the call desk.
The Students' Center
The courtyard in the center of the Student Center has taken on a
festive aura recently—receptions on several occasions for Students, Four
Preps, faculty, evaluating committees and others.
Now with the addition of wrought iron furniture and sun umbrellas
and the rumors that a walkway and entrance to the Co-op is in the offing
a suitable name for the area would Is- appropriate. We suggest "the
Co-opcabana."
Letters To The Editor
Dear Editor:
Ever since the first bit of publicity was released a few weeks ago
concerning the White Citizen’s Council of. New Orleans’ “sending"
Negroes to the North, there has been a long succession of violent,, one
sided indignant tirades against these White Citizens for their “inhumani
ty.” It seems to me that those who would so quickly condemn the White
t’l'i/.ens of New Orleans for “packin’ up and sendin’ them pore niggers
north" are missing the main issue. Is not the “inhumanity” of the actions'
of this extreme segregationist group the thing that raises the firr of
those who sympathize with the plight of the colored race? If so, then'
would someone please tell me what is inhuman about helping a person,
colored or white, to better himself? How many Negroes would be able to
go north and get a job as a handyman, making $100 per week? Indeed,
how many whites could do it?
I have no illusions as to the benevolence of the White Citizens group
in New Orleans. I know that their main desire is to get rid of as many
Negroes as possible, and that their intent is somewhat leas than honor
able. HI T—The fact remains that they are not SENDING any Negroe*
or anybody else north. The Negroes WANT to go; the White Citizen*
Council makes it possible. True, things are bad in the South for the
Negro, and he would probably fare better in the north, though that is a
debatable point. Hut is it wrong to help anyone to move from a place
where he cannot provide for his family properly to a city where he may
do so? It would he vastly different If the Negroe* were FORCED to go
or if they were solicited to go. The fact is, though, that they VOLUN
TEERED for this free fare north and got it.
Thank you, A1 Dale
Kudos
Dear Editor:
Please accept my sincere congratulations to Mr. Lee Going for a
highly thought-provoking column, “The Changing Scene.” He treater!
an emotionally charged subject with a realism that affords us a mo
ment of sanity in a world of military mania and glorification of wars.
Again, thanks for a job well done.
Jim F. Jordan
Bulletin Lists New Rates
Prospective summer school students who have been able to scan the
new Summer Bulletin may have noticed what seems to he an unuaual
tuition scale. A student who registers for ten hours in the first seaaion
Will have to pay $138.50 for tuition. However, a student who also takes
ten hours, but splits it, taking five hours in the first session and five
hours in the second session, will be charged $62.00 per five-hour course;
i.e. a total of $124.00. So apparently by some simple manipulation a stu
dent might acquire the same number of hours as another student, but
save himself $14.50. $14.50 will buy a lot of note paper.
LARRY MAIORIEUO
7
A Student Paper
The inevitable has happened. Try as I might I
could delay it only so long. But now Rithia has
left. She has packed up her marking pencil and
her fan and her wisp of stray hair and her endless
supply of energy and resourcefulness, and like
the whirlwind that she is has left behind her a
partial vacuum in the Cluster office. The Cluster
will sorely miss her. joke as you will about co-ed
editors.
The Cluster has had faults this past year—
some because of, some in spite of, its staff—but
one fault it had not was lack of capable leader
ship. Nor did the Cluster suffer from lack of di
rection. Abstruse at times, yes. But uncertain,
never.
The question has been posed to me several
times in the past few weeks. "What will be your
editorial policy?” I had thought out many prg
found and clever answers to this, but now afti
one week I can sincerely say that my main polic 1
will simply be to get out a paper once a wee| ^
I had no idea what an overwhelming Job it ia
organize a staff of capable people and put out i
paper on schedule. It takes a staggering amoui 1
of copy to fill four small pages. And when 'h 1
deadline approaches, typographical errors
faulty composition shrink into relative inaignUI ■
cance. And actually if the paper comes out re|
ularly it will necessarily be fulfilling ita mai *
purposes for being, i.e. giving interested student »
an opportunity to learn how a paper works, an
giving to the other atudenta the news that ha
been reported.
But either way the paper ia primarily for th d
students!
LIE GOING
A Letter From Mercer
Dear Charlie,
I finished my "inspection tour" of Mercer to
day and will leave for Athens in the morning.
After looking over the U. of Georgia campus.
I will drive on to Atlanta to see Emory Univer
sity and then drive home on Wednesday. I'll give
you a thorough briefing on all three schools upon
my arrival, but I thought that I would give you
the run-down on Mercer by letter so that you
might be thinking it over. I certainly hope that
your folks will let you come up to college with
me in September. I like Georgia but I’m not par-
ticluarly anxious to be up here by myself.
Well, enough of that! Now on with the briefing.
I arrived at Mercer early Thursday afternoon.
Don't know if Mercer is short of students this
year or not but the administration gave me a
royal welcome and fixed me up with a place to
stay in one of the fraternity suites. I’m sorry
that 1 cannot tell you which one hut as you know
each of them uses those Hebrew letters to desig
nate their fraternity, and. not being from Miami,
I can’t read Hebrew. I did figure it out that
they had something to do with nature since most
of them are named for animals At Mercer they
have the Lions, Lambs. Bears, Snakes. Mules,
Cows, Bigs, etc. There was one fraternity that I
visited which was not named for an animal I don't
know ita name but while I was there they sang
their Fraternity song for me—it started off.
We re the Great. Big, (Ugh!) Hairy-Chested
Men”—Well, all the guys were short, slim, ami
wore glasses so I decided that they were pulling
my leg and so I left.
cepted with alacrity. I waa introduced to ail th B
guy* but never learned any of their names sine ,
it is the custom at Mercer to be called by a nick (
name—and this fraternity really had some dill is
believe me. They were called Mole, Stud, Runt
Groundhog, Bear, Tub, Rabbi, and everythin
else under the sun including three boys name
“pledge”—I still haven't figured out if then
three were members of the fraternity or jus
waited on tables.
But anyway, the next day I attended thre
classes to see what it is like. My first class wa
al eight in the morning. It was a history class
the lecture was on the “Early Middle Ages'
was very good and the profeasor was very inter]
rating—he only confused me on two points— *
did not know that Thomas Hobbes lived in tha
period or that they had a birth control problem
The second class was Christianity (New Tests
ment). The discussion that day was on “Sal
tion by Grace." and I thought it was very phili
wa ,
1
I was invited by the “Snakes” to sit with them
st the evening meal and since their table is lo
cated in the vicinity of the sorority tables I ac-
sophical. The professor quoted some very learm
theologians like Bultmann, Tillich, Barth, an
Niebuhr (the whole family) to prove his point,
can't say that I understood much of it but theAtj
I'm not very philosophical minded, only thing I „)
know about the subject is what it says in ,h 4ll
Bible. The third class was Introduction to Edu ir „
cation—this one really got me—everyone sai
around in a little circle and shot the bull for
hour. However, I was very impressed with everyJj,
thing I saw. I think the other schools will havi , (
to go some to beat Mercer,
Guess I had better close. Say hello to the gan| ^
at lakeland Hi. and I hope to see you all Wed
nesday.
Your Friend.
Ed
TIM GILL
ipc
R.
Movies - Better Than Ever
In the twentieth century, movies, rather than
stage productions, have been one of the primary
sources of public entertainment. It is unfortunate
that though movies stand as a wondrous technical
and inventive phenomenon, they hardly repre
sent a genuinely artistic medium.
As it is now, the movie producer, relying al
ways on the public's susceptibility to sheer sensa
tionalism and capacity for titillation, capitalizes
on the public by providing it with practically an
endless succession of second-rate productions,
perhaps coming up every now and then with one
that could be tanned first-rate, though this is
rare. Generally, it would seem, the avergae movie
producer and his associates have but one aim in
view which is this: to provide as many movies as
possible to the public as cheaply as possible, so
that the dividends derived from them will enable
once again the production of new films for the
public at a relatively low and inexpensive rate
with the venture usually proving enormously
profitable for themselves.
Now this can only result in the production of
films that are, for the most part, of a bad qualiyt,
though it would be wrong to say all were bad.
The fact remains, however, that the adaptation
of many an excellent play and novel to the screen
has often resulted in such a gross misrepresenta
tion of a particular work’s main line of plot and
the writer's intention that the actual film bears
only the slightest resemblance to the original
source from which it waa derived. This comes
about not only by the deliberate alteration of
the plot hut also by such a complete deliniatioi
of the subject matter that instead of conveying at on
nearly as |>osaible to the audience the manner il Ml
which the work was originally conceived and si b
sequently executed, it presents rather a versi
so hackneyed, so incomplete, and so flimsy thsl
though the emotions may be aroused the intellect *
is sea rely stimulated. Good movies, then, an w
usually those that basically adhere to the stan
dards of the work from which taken so that tlx ®
intellect is neither subordinated to the emotion! f
nor the emotions to the intellect, but both acting
as reciprocal agents in order that the effect pro ,DV,
dueed upon the audience may be harmonious S'»i
not discursive, complete instead of incomplete.
!a i - ■
But certainly society's indifference to aesthetx 1 11
h.- |
values and ita general adoption of the usual I
don't-care" type of attitude in regard to what il 11
published in newspapers, magazines, periodicals S ‘
etc. aa well aa to what ia portrayed pictoriallj 01
contribute as much in tha long run to the ever " m
increasing output of dull and unsatisfying movie
productions and shoddy publications aa do the lew
psychological but seemingly more unalterable
factors such aa those previously mentioned. Until
the teste of society changes it ia unreasonable
to believe ita forma of entortainmsnt will change.
One thing that might halp to improve ita task
somewhat, however, would be the establishment ^
of more legitimate theatres. This would make il • p
poesihle for life to be treated seriously once agail WrK
and would certainly help to counterbalance the „| a
somewhat facetious and unrealistic treatment lib iU e(
is being gives in the films produced today.
Th!
too,