University of Kansas - Jayhawker Yearbook (Lawrence, KS)

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OCTOBER cipitated serious action on the part of the Men ' s Student Council. A constitution which was written for the Council gave to that organization direct over- sight of the Hill traditions, but it also specified in a further clause that these customs were not to be enforced by resorting to physical or punitive methods of any sort. To police against abuses the constitution delegated to Sachem and to the K-men the prerogative of enforcing the letter of the law. The constitution was too long to put into the K Book in its entirety; con- sequently it was condensed, and through this process was also deleted of the very clause which positively denied the Council the right of using physical punish- ment to enforce traditions. With the changing of personnel from year to year not only in the Council, but in the school as a whole, the original constitution was soon lost from sight. Then the K-men adopted paddling and resorted unknowingly to the very type of abuse that had been their duty, given by the constitu- tion, to keep out. Under this status K. U. tradition history proceeded until the school year of 1925-26. Again the foreboding clouds of the problem of freshman discipline darkened the horizon of the University picture. The freshmen protested against the spurious intentions behind many of the disciplinary measures used to maintain tradi- tions. Their protest became so active that it threatened to manifest itself in the burning of their caps publicly at the homecoming game with Missouri. Fortunately a few foresighted faculty members realized the immen- sity of this threat and managed to bring about an understanding between the freshman class and the Men ' s Student Council. Each went half way to meet the demands of the other; the freshman induction cere- mony was introduced, with the cap being placed on the representative of the freshman class as a symbolic gesture of honor by the Chancellor. The Men ' s Student Council lived up to its promises in eradicating some of the objectionable features of the freshman discipline, but the problem of real impor- tance, the actual paddling, was soon back again. Last year the K-men voluntarily abdicated t heir rights An outstanding ce efcration of last year to wield the club after a combined public opinion, with the editorial policy of the Kansan and a virtual storm of protest by the faculty, expressed itself as being disfavorable to the custom. Thus following three periods of crisis, 1909, 1919, and 1925, the recent action of the freshmen finally has reverted to the origi- nal purposes of the cap tradition as first intended. The freshman cap affair is only a part of the whole body of customs and historic practices which consti- Tiro froth talk it over tutes what we call traditions; yet the story of its development, culminating in this last incident, goes far in pointing the way in which our traditions now are trending. In spite of the unwarranted fears of many persons to the effect that we are losing all the worthwhile traditions of the school, a conjuncture of the cap-donning incident with other circumstances shows that we decidedly are not forfeiting our heritage. Rather would it appear that for the first time in years we now are falling back into a line of development which is in conformity with the true traditions of the University as originally instigated. To comprehend fully the previous statement it is necessary to realize the type of traditions K. U. has cherished and fostered in accordance with its purposes and ideals. From its incipience Kansas University has been singularly renowned for its love of culture. Its adher- ence to this ideal has been responsible for the place it has gained among the universities of the mid-West. From the first there was built up a spirit, an esprit de corps, concordant with this ideal. Emanating from (Continued on Page 76)

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OCTOBER Two Poems In the Italian quarter, Chicago: He burned at dawn Tonight smoke lies over his street like the hair of an old woman, drifts in dry, straight hanks across the sidewalk like the hair of an old, old woman let down in the morning. And two comer lights glimmer bleakly like the rheumy eyes of a woman; eyes of ancient and grief-struck woman weeping in the darkness . . . He must have been lying when he told them how, lifelong, he KNEW no mother. Kenneth Lewis There are spirits in a camp ire. Oh yes there are. I ' ve oflen seen them there. ]ust sitting and staring into the embers after a day in the open In a camp of lumber-jacks, miners, or forest rangers; Just silting and staring while an old man tells a story Or a young man sings a song. If you wait long enough, you ' re sure to see them there . . . Not when the flames are still hungry, and leap in the smoke- sweet air, ravening. But after they are sufficed a little, returned a little, and the ashes start to glow: Then the spirits come Slyly, shyly from under the birch logs blue-green and purple flickerings The long dead souls of Indian chiefs and trappers, The old scouts, and the pioneers . . . The hard spots gone, MeHou ' ed now by the years and the desert, And replaced by the musk-sweet fragrance Of sage-brush blowing purple, and dawns on the painted moun- tains. Quid of course, just breathing there a moment . . . Then they are gone. This is their one remembrance, their one returning . . . Reincarnate in the sacred thing they loved, they come again. A camp ire is holy to a true woods lover, And these men found divinity about it. I tell you, there are spirits in a camp ire . . . Ghosts of long dead woodsmen, come again. Kenneth Lewis