Bryn Mawr College - Bryn Mawr Yearbook (Bryn Mawr, PA)

Page 18 text:

THE 1923 CLASS BOOK iUg laugljirr, ©li, ffl% lauglffrr! Supreme Court of the United States Washington, D. C. My dear Miss Ruth: Your father, an old friend of mine, has sent me your note to him in which you ask him to procure from me an article on Helen Taft, an appreciation in lighter vein . Really this asks more than I am capable of. I do appreciate Helen in all veins serious and light, but being her father, family modesty should make me hesitate to comply with your request. I have often been asked to write impossible articles on impossible subjects. I have usually found in such cases that the person who asks and suggests has something definite in mind and ought to have written it without seeking expression of it through another. More than this, though Helen is now in London with her husband and her baby engaged in research on which to base theses for Ph. D. degrees for all three, she will return next Fall and I would not dare expose myself to her criticism of anything which 1. in my innocency of the higher standard of criticism of the educated female mind, might say in praise of her. I might dwell on features of her character and incidents of her career which she would wish to minimize or ignore, or I might fail to laud traits and talents that I have not discovered, but which she with her better opportunity for observations and after conference with her husband properly appraises. Surely you would not wish to introduce into our now happy fanr ' ly relations any such possibility of disturbance. For these reasons, my dear Miss Ruth, I must ask you to excuse me from essaying the difficult and dangerous task you would impose. I know the im- portance which you emphasize in your note to your father, of making the 1923 Class Book of Bryn Mawr a success, but you would not, I am sure, sacrifice the possibility of my future happiness in attaining it. With best wishes. Sincerely yours, Wm. H. Taft. Note: — Mr. Taft has since retracted and given us carte blanche. 14

Page 17 text:

THE 1923 CLASS BOOK Animal nng cf 1923 Our animal song is a glorious thing. Though just a bid hard for a human to sing — However we sing it when shadows are stealing About us at even — when most we are feeling Essentially sacred and touched by the thought That for our Green Griffin we ever have fought. ' Twas in the far past that we first learned that song. We practiced it low and we practiced it long, We practiced it long because we were dumb And we practiced it low for we thought there were some Odd hundred inquisitive sophomore ears Just waiting to track down our secret, Our fears Were ungrounded, ' tis sad to relate, For though with a foresight both clever and great We secretly crept as a class to the vil And whispered the tune at K. Shumway ' s until The wonderful words, ' mountain goat you are free We ' ll follow the green flame till eternity, ' Did tremble quite easily forth from our lips. Then the guard at the window peeks out, quickly dips At the sight of an innocent girl walking by, For a moment we wait, then as easy as pie We steal from the house and creep home through the by-ways, With our secret quite safe, and yet History says With its cruel disregard of our masterful skill, In protecting our song, — and the truth rankles still — That the sophomores had voted quite one week before Not to sleuth us at all, sleuthing being a bore And much too rah-rah and collegiate. Here ends The tale of our song and its griffin, dear friends. 13

Page 19 text:

THE 1923 CLASS BOOK I ' m just a wee woman. And you ask me to run like A great swift horse Down the field ! How tender a thing is a woman ' s Hand — and you ask Me to carry this great rough I -og of a hockey stick ! How charming a thing is the gentle Rise and fall of a woman ' s chest As she breathes — and softly sighs — And you ask me to run till I heave and gasp like a Great strangled beast! How lovely a thing is A woman in repose and at peace — And you ask me to become all Warlike and agitated And make bold and unshapely motions. Hockey is not for wee women. 15