Occidental College - La Encina Yearbook (Los Angeles, CA)

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And for those who dimbed this year above undergraduate status there was the discovery of Miss Sarah Young and her work as Alumni Chairman. Faculty leaves have taken from Occidental this year two popular and respected presences in the persons of Mr. Thomas R. Adam of the political science department, and Dr. Alfred Y. Fisher of the English department. The more permanent lode-stone of marriage lured Miss Elizabeth Gilliland from speech courses, and Mr. Burton Richardson left the department of physics for a research nearer to his heart than teaching. But it was not all a matter of exodus, as to the science laboratories and mathematics class- rooms came Mr. V. Bollman and Professor Charles Alexander, while in speech education Miss Gilliland was replaced by Dr. Fleda Brigham. Psychology, now emerged from curricular growing pains into a full-fledged major, found a new chief protagonist in Dr. Wilbur Hulin. The queen science, philosophy, revamped herself, too, upon the refreshing provocation of Mrs. Cornelia Le Boutillier ' s assumption of teaching duties. Balanced on a see-saw of divergent opinions, student body president Guy Nunn, vice- president Alice McDowell and the Executive Council bounced through a tranquil season of student activity and politics with no greater upset approached than the bomb shell possibility .of men and women undergraduates being seated side by side during compulsory chapels. Besides being student body president, Guy Nunn found time within the same year to captain the football team, be elected to Phi Beta Kappa and win a Rhodes ' Scholarship. Vice-presi- dent Alice McDowell achieved both a reputation for gracefully bustling, and making of every A.S.O.C. affair a smoothly turned out product. Helen Hornberger, secretary, wrote a readable hand, attended to all student-body correspondence and hibernated between Execu- tive Council meetings in the music chapel. In February came elections again, and the presidency moved once more to the white house on the corner in the person of Charles Hutchins, while the eminence of vice-presi- dency went to Mary Lou Carr. The scribe ' s duties become those of Catheryn Riseborough, but theirs is a reign that belongs to next year. To Janet Anderson, Peggy Houghton, Virginia Hedges, and Phyllis Cochran, as officers of the Associated Women Students, came the call of the aesthetic as they sponsored the Procession of Lanterns, the benevolence of the Big Sister plan and the May Day Fete. Once they did lower themselves to masculine cooperation and decorated the College Union for the Coed Hop. With pulchritude and personality running an unprecedented high, hazel-eyed Alice McDowell, brunettes Mary Derthick and Peggy Houghton, and titian-haired Martha Messick vied for the honor of May Queen with the prize going to Martha Messick. 20

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fund is sufficient, of a men ' s dormitory in honor oi Dr. Roheit Freeman. This fund is not yet fuJJy subscribed but we have every expectation that in the course ot a year, that money will be sufficient to build this very much needed structure. 7. Other appropriations and support enabhng the college to curb and groom the entire periphery, in which we have the assured cooperation oi the City Council, looking to the paving ot the entire Campus Road. In addition to the improvement oi the physical plant and the increase oi endowment, this year has been an occasion oi self scrutiny and constructive criticism oi the college in all its parts. It is very important ior the Row and fulfillment oi an institution like Occidental that there shall he periodic times oi such self examination, looking to larger services and increased significance. Committees oi the Faculty are at work studying the curriculum, the standards oi admission and classification, the relationships that exist among educational forces, the responsibilities oi the college with reference to the secondary education field, and the possibilities oi the college in mutual obligations and satisfactions with reference to our larger community. I think we will look hack on this year and mark it as the occasion in which the real meaning and power and inspiration oi the small residence college shall become clearly recognized and taken advantage oi ior the development oi education, the good oi the individual and the general social satisfaction. Sincerely, Remsen D. Bird Yet inwardly, too, the administrators have been keeping careful physician ' s fingers on the student pulse. Dr. Cleland served in his capacity of Dean of the College for the first semester of 1936-1937. Then, wooed too ardently by the muse historical, he obtained a year ' s leave of absence for research at the Huntington Library. Dr. Coons, Dean of Men, cheerfully assumed a double role and filled Dr. Cleland ' s position. Bringing a wide experience and an unusual depth of understanding of the coed ' s prob- lems, Mrs. Le Boutillier entered Occidental to become the new Dean of Women, with Mrs. Pipal withdrawing to the more congenial task of Social Chairman. To Miss Brady as always flocked the timorous freshmen and confused seniors with matters of majors and minors and problems of scholasticism. Mr. McLain, true to the sturdy dependability of his name, held fast the college purse strings and in his office of Comptroller did his usual much to insure the school of a succeeding fifty years of financial stability. Whenever a particlar job was hard to catalogue but happened to involve a varying but definite degree of worry it was sent to the office of the Graduate Manager, Theodore Brodhead. 19

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Under the smiling leadership of President Jerrj ' Isett, the Associated Men Students marched resolutely each Wednesday to compulsory chapel, put over with huge success a Men ' s High School day, a Men ' s Stag and diverse smaller activities for men only. Lack of ardent belligerency on the part of either of the lower classes made it hard for their elder brothers to decide upon the supremacy of either class other than that evidenced one sunny autumn afternoon when the neophytes lethargically did win a muddy tug-o-war. Because of the example set by President Fred Lindsley ' s perspiring brow, the Freshmen raised and guarded an adequate Pomona bonfire which fortunately proved to be a truly prophetic funeral pyre for the blue-feathered sagehen. More luckless was the sophomores ' plight who, under the dominance of President Bob Ryf, made an unorthodox raid upon the Pomona rally fire only to be caught in abundant numbers and treated to tonsorial experiments by enthusiastic amateurs. The Junior Class rested well through the presidency of Charles Hutchins, and it is even whispered that they as a unit indulged in two social affairs, a Junior-Freshman dinner dance and the Junior-Senior Prom. But here it is intimated that the impetus for those two functions came from the vitality of other classes while the Juniors remained as usual sophisticatedly inert. Besides the conventional ditch-day, and commencement time activities, the Seniors were caught, capped and gowned early this year in April, in fact, to take part in the academic pro- cessions that marked much of the color in Founder ' s Week of this fiftieth year. They marched as a body behind President Arthur Hagen. Exactly how mighty the pen may be on the Occidental campus is questionable, but The Occidental under editor Bill Burt tasted public opinion as to favorite swing bands, fought a few bumps out of the road west of the library, and engaged in a presidential straw vote that was as embarrassing as the Literary Digest ' s. Active in exciting student interest in the paper were political columnist Bob Barrett, society editor Betty Schweitzer, and sport ' s editor Don McKenny. In February, James Krulish was elected into editorship with the only obvious change that of the social column passing from Delta to Zeta hands. That the two editors ' hearts were in their work was displayed by the more frequent large issues of eight instead of six column editions. Casting itself free from all previous tradition, taking a historical theme, assuming an informal mood, La Encina promised to be at least original in both form and context. Taking the prerogative that his editorship gave him. Jack Webb watched his grades plunge a whole grade point within a half of semester and then announced that he had a book that was dif- ferent. To the fact of this annual ' s physical completeness, he is indebted beyond all measure to three particular people: assistant editor, Jane Frampton; art editor, Peggy Houghton; and 21