Michigan State University - Red Cedar Log Yearbook (East Lansing, MI)

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A Efii WEREN ' T MANY WEEKS IN THE WINTER term of your year but there was enough time to allow Paul Banyan ' s beard to grow for the annual Foresters ' Shindig. AAU held its national meet and the Spartans took first place on their own ground. The campus, you ' ll remember, was white as cake icing. Coeds trotted hurriedly from class to class bundled up in powder blue ski suits. They looked impractical and attractive, their faces fresh and red. You got into spirited snowball fights in front of South Campbell. You felt like a twelve year old skipping school. At night, if the moon was full and you were leaving the library for home, campus land- marks were as distinct as turn-of-the-century silhou- ettes, only crystal bright and blue. You knocked the snow from your boots, undressed, hopped into bed, and looked out of the window until you fell asleep. Winter at State gave you the chance to be an individual star in your own right. Equipment was no trouble if you could bum a pair of skates from your roommate, and the ice when it did come, was free of charge. If you could forsake the exhilarating activity out- of-doors, the concert and lecture stage presented the best. The Minneapolis Symphony, Licia Albanese, and Vladimir Horowitz brought you to the Audito- rium. Jussi Bjoerling brought you to your feet. The eloquent lectures of Max Eastman and Lowell Thomas brought you to your senses. Theta Alpha Phi produced the sell-out play Dark of the Moon. Burl Ives sang about Venezuela and Aunt Rhody, the real articles of American balladry. Gene Krupa played his danceable rhythms for two nights of J-Hop festivities, and played them As You Like It. The extra-late permission was hard to believe. Breakfast in the wee hours found Lansing restaurants in a turmoil of tuxedos and formals. It was the big event of Winter ' 49.