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Page 11 text:
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'Qflnd Silent foe Watched By Pat Gangwer and Francis Ross Then, I wondered where we would be in five years- but it is as though nothing had happened and those five years were only a terrible realistic dream .... Lee Johnson's band was playing again-it was a 1946 Varsity. Yet it seemed that time had suddenly spun backwards and had come to rest that first year before the war. Benny Course at the piano, T. D. Wheat and Vale Page, Paul Steg, Joe Turner, and Gene Kenney sing- ing the throbbing popular tune . . . on the floor, other familiar faces, lvo Mersmann, Elmer Carpenter, Allen Mauderly, Bernard Taylor, Harry Levinson, Gene Byer, Bob Mott, Findley Hartzler, Ed Shupe, Harold Brooks, Curtis Fischer, Sam Butterfield, and Bob Stauffer -- men that in the interim had been only well remembered names, or faces in an annual. Yet those five years were not a dream. They began with confusion and fear. Men were suddenly leaving. No one noticed at first. We said goodbye to Bill and John on Friday and on Sunday Jim came to dinner before leaving at two. Jack and Shorty were leaving the next week and Bob was planning to take the streamliner, Tuesday. One by one they left, some with fanfare, some quietly with only one or two saying goodbye. By Spring, 1943, they were all gone, only a handful re- maining to finish work for their degrees in May. And Silent Joe began his reign of silence-a silence that watched the cadets flood the campus, stationing guards around the buildings, and holding retreat on the athletic field, watched the long lines file into the Hornet's Nest, now a mess hall for five hundred hungry men who soon would don the wings of fliers, bombar- diers, gunners, navigators, carrying defense across the oceans. lt was a silence that watched the girls take over and step into the over-sized shoes left by the men: president of the Student Councl, editor of THE BULLETIN, president of Xi Phi, leader of the dance band, president of S. C, A., chairman of freshman week, editor of THE SUNFLOWERQ watched the girls begin to pull and work, and saw that the shoes were ably filled, even though each had three or four pairs. And still, maintaining the silence, Silent Joe watched as the last strains of the Air Corps Song died away in the distance and the heavy shimmering haze of sum- mer settled down on the campus protecting it from the deafening silnece left by the departing men. But there was only a year of this silence-a year of the shrill voices of women in the classrooms and Madame Presidents in the club rooms, a year of strange uniforms arriving for dances, and, like Cinderella, departing again at twelve. A year of war bond drives, service flags, and war stamp admissions to programs and plays. Then Silent Joe spoke again-Long searching notes breaking through the years, ringing at dawn to tell a sleeping restless world that peace had come in Europe. Three months later came the second peace. lt was 1945. The freshmen girls who watched the men leave were now seniors, and their faces turned eagerly toward the trains and buses. Hopeful voices spoke of the men who would be coming backl- The clock has spun backwards, but the men are wearing battleiackets now and a small gold eagle has replaced the frat pins. The Greek organizations and Mu Ep are back, paddles and pledge pins are in evi- dence, but the Veteran's Club holds much of the power and interest. The men belong to clubs and honor 7 organizations once more, but their write-ups read During his four years of service, he was with the- Now it is 1946, a year of beginning again. A year when Silent .loe will once more speak of the victorious Hornets. But those Hornets 'have brought the battle grounds back to the stadium and the loud ringing notes will speak of touchdowns instead of vanquished armies. By Harry Levinson History will say that we closed our books, left our classes, and marched off to fight for our country. Be- fore long there will be a halo about that event, the aura of patriotism and self-sacrifice, the excitement of turning from pen to sword. But there is more to the story than that. As now, the days before war were quiet and filled with every rich gift that nature could give in four seasons. There was satisfaction in the mellow odor of burning leaves, stimulation in the chilly whiteness of winter's first snow. There was a deep, thrilling feeling of well-being attached to verdant trees and the color of myriad blossoms. There was peace in the serenity of the clouds and security in the unending expanse of blueness called the heavens. There was inspiration in the dignity of the atmosphere in which we lived and love in the friendships we had built. When suddenly out of the ever-rumbling clouds of international discord there came that blow which shat- tered our world, we gazed on shattered pieces uncom- prehendingly. Slowly we started to pick our paths- those long trails which somehow challange each man before he can see life through, and by ones and twos and threes we took leave with final fond glances at the treasure house that was to'hold our hopes until we returned. From then on there was danger attached to the smell of smoke, misery and discomfort hidden in the whiteness of snow, death and pain under the leaves and behind the blossoms. Out of the clouds came bullets and bombs and the endless expanse of the heavens joined with the almost endless expanse of the seas to encompass our loneliness with a vacuum of blue. There was fear and blood and disgust in the atmosphere and in the friendships we tried to mold there was frustration as newly made friends fell. As it must at times, the world tired of the gamut it had set for itself and ceased its masochistic barbarism. Weary, heartsick men, covered with the dust of all the Earth and ingrained with its multiple troubles and trag- edies, turned toward home. Now, as then, the days are quiet and filled with every rich gift that nature can give. Once more we have taken from the treasure house our hopes, bound up in the ties that have linked us to each other while we were gone, and added to them the inspiration in- herent in our atmosphere, the challenge bequeathed by friends who could not return. Historians may postulate, idolators may paint their golden halos, but none will ever touch the core of that relationship which bound each of us to Emporia State. For that relationship comes from ioint experiences, the excitement of fall football and the beauty of spring ro- mance, the color of formal dances and the gayety of political parades, the verbosity of evening bull sessions, and the discipline of classroom instruction, and above all, from the sheer satisfaction of living with each other. Thank God it hasn't changed.
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Page 12 text:
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DR. DAVID LANE MACFAELANE Young enough to appreciate the prob- lems that interweave a stuclent's life--- Old enough, with a worlcl's experience to balance and iuolge, to weed out the triv- ial, to meet the serious and clifficult--- ISI
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