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

Page 11 text:

The Formal Madhinerr In the production of bachelors of arts, the term Bryn Mawr College may imply many different parts of the organization. From the most formal and legal point of view, however, it is to the Corporation that our tuitions are paid, to them that endowment money is entrusted, and it is by them that faculty are hired, buildings kept in order, and the final diplomas awarded. In practice, however, the student may pass from her entrance as raw material through the entire process until she emerges as a finished A.B. without any awareness of the Corporation. For four years she may be nourished physically and intellectually by their thoughtful provision and never know about them. For all the undergraduate knows, the College Council presides fully and representatively over her collegiate destiny, but above all is the Corporation, unknown and hitherto unsung. Once upon a time there was a man named Joseph W. Taylor. He lived in Woodlands, in the county of Burlington, State of New Jersey, and he was as good as he was beautiful. In his will he devised and bequeathed a great deal of property and wealth for a female college in the rolling beautiful country of Bryn Mawr, State of Pennsylvania. He also designed Tavlor Hall. Then one thing led to another and the first thing it led to was a Corporation. This is a beneficent body of Quakers who own, run, govern, and partially support the college. Because they felt that thirteen Quakers ' points of view would not cover all the needs of a female college they appointed themselves and some other people to a Board of Directors. The Board includes faculty and alumnae and six civilians. This group is subdivided into five committees who see that the grass is cut, the bills are paid, the library books return unscathed, and that everyone is happv and orderly. There is also a Committee on the Religious Life of the College. This busy board provides an army of people to carry out the plans of Joseph W. Taylor. There is, of course, the faculty. Their function is self- evident. There are many other indispensable branches of the service, all designed to make us happy, healthy, and very learned, by the time they are through with us. The library is full of efficient workers who pick up the books, straighten the files, soothe the freshmen, and see that fair play predominates in the reserve room. The vast dim complexity of the stacks finds them unafraid. Another department handles the cuisine and the bodily comforts of the college. From their neat, quiet headquarters they see that the college is pro- vided with such fantastic things as 291 pounds of roast beef and 110 pounds of shelled peas, 78 quarts of ice cream a day, and 11,218 half-pints of milk twice a month. They see that the food is cooked, served, eaten, and cleaned up. They 7 181 470

Page 10 text:

At its monthly dinner the College Council dis- cusses campus problems. The Council includes the President, the Dean, non-resident and faculty representatives, the editor of the Netvs, the director-in-residence, the presidents of the four classes, the Alumnae Association, the Grad- uate Club, the Self-Government Association, the Bryn Mawr League, the Undergraduate Associa- tion and the Athletic Association, together with the directors of Admissions, Physical Education and Halls.

Page 12 text:

The Board of Directors consists of the thirteen members of the Corporation, the President of the College, five directors of the Alumnae Association, and six others whose membership is appropriate and useful to the college. They supervise and control the academic work of the college, fix the salaries and duties of the professors, care for the college property, have charge of all matters pertaining to student fees. also are responsible for clean sheets every week on each little white bed. It is their personal fault if the plumbing misbehaves, if the fires smoke, if the door knobs fall off. Mice and cockroaches are laid at their door. In this herculean task they are assisted by a legion of maidsandporters. These cheerfully tend the furnaces and the plumbing, kill the varmints, sweep up bushels of cigarette stubs, make all those beds, carry bags, answer bells, order taxis, and smile while they do it. They even sing and give plays. The building and grounds committee has been particularly prominent during the generation of the class of 1940. Mr. Stokes, its chairman, appears at all ground-breakings. And he it was who provided so many narcissi and daffodils that we were allowed to pick them. 8