University of Chicago - Cap and Gown Yearbook (Chicago, IL)

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EDITORS5 PREFACE Yearbooks are usually static things. The same groups, the same activi- ties, often the same faces appear in every issue, year after year. Only the black-hordered dedication to some boodler who willed $3,000,000.00 to establish a foundation promoting good government and reverent reli- gion ever varies. The average annual also gives the impression that all is peaches-and- cream at dear alma mater. Only about the fat football player who tripped over his own shoelace on the five-yard line in the championship game, or about the neighborhood lavern-keeper who was caught watering the stock is there ever a hint of controversy. The yearbook, frankly, is different, as this campus is different. A universityeany universityeis alive, and often kicking. This one more so. This book recognizes that there are fundamental differences between Kimpton and Hutchins, between Democrats and Republicans, between I.S.L. and S.E.P., etc. Thanks to an enlightened policy on the extra- curriculum1 it does not hesitate to discuss them. 4 Michael J. F. Rogers

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Also, this yearbook attempts to pin-pointj highlight the outstanding events of 1954-55eth0se events which distinguish this year from all the others. In most annuals one may determine the year by measuring the receded hairvline of his favorite professor, or notingr the edition of his $8.75 required-reading textbook which the University press just pub- lished. Great events Occurred on this campus this year. Some of them-such as the opening of the ABA. Bar Center or the appointment of the first permanent F.T.S. Dean are milestones in the development of the Uni- versity. Othersrwsuch as a Chancellofs chance remark, or a good-bye party for all ex-Editor of Cap and Gown-will be trotted-out in future years Hike the family photograph albumJ laughed-at, discusset, then tucked away again. Cap and Gown is the family photograph album of the University of Chicago. It is a memoryiwof names, faces, events. But the Editors feel that it should serve more than this memorial function of traditional year- books. Cap and Gown. they feel, has an obligation to scrutinize. where stands the University, what events preceded its present position, what may be. ex- pected to follow from it. One current runs through every discussion of the University: the changes wrought by the Kimplon Ad- ministration. Often this discussion is marked by short-temper, epithets, myopia. This current is the theme of the 1955 Cap amt Gown. As in French law courts, it will be discussed without malice, without hatred, with- out fear. The discussion may he followed through a special introductory sec- tion viewing the overall aspects of the change in the extra-cun'iculum, and through the various other articles on the administration, curriculum, and extra-curriculum. It is too early to determine the accuracy of the prophe- cies and predictions, though, of course, there will he caustic comment from some segments of the campus. In discussing controversy, contro- versy can hardly be avoided. This, then, was 1954-55: PAUL A. HOFFMAN PEIICHAEL J. F. ROGERS Paul A. Hottman