University of Nebraska Lincoln - Cornhusker Yearbook (Lincoln, NE)

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,ONDON AIR TOLL 00; DOCKS PARALV 4 With our diplomas framed and hanging on the wall across from us, we, the class of 1 944, will take a little while to reflect on the four years of playing, studying, laughing, and facing cer- tain misfortunes on which we have just lowered the final curtain. In these four years we have learned what it means to be a loyal Cornhusker — but, let ' s start at the beginning of our college life. I shall endeavor to remain in school and to be loyal to the school and its purposes and traditions — repeated 1500 of us at the acceptance of the Freshman Oath in the Coliseum September 25, 1 940. We ' d been through the confusion of registration and a week of school — yes, we knew where Sosh was — and we could already make class in time to meet the professor at the door. While we were bombarded with UN propaganda: get your fresh- man caps, buy your CORNHUSKERS here, — the Nazi lufte- waffe was futilely trying to bomb Britain to her knees. Herman Goering himself flew over London to see how his bombardiers had paralyzed the dock system and sent the list of fatalities soar- ing to 600 killed and thousands injured — the Nazi eagle was a haughty bird during the fall of 1940 — and day and night were equally dark to the Englishmen, who were spending half of every day m the air raid shelters. The English couldn ' t appreciate the beauties of fall that year; they were busy dodging bombs and writing the 1 940 counterpart of Waterloo and the sinking of the Spanish Armada. But in Ne- braska as fall began to gild the trees a golden brown UN foot- ballers went in for heavy scrimmage. How good were the Cornhuskers to be m 1940? While we awaited the answer, a question of the future foreign policy of the United States was be- ing decided. On the day we observed all-university church night the Rome-Berlin axis was extended to Tokyo. WAR YEAR OLD i Wu«J w

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But the war didn ' t worry Nebraska students — even the peace time draft registration on October 16 failed to arouse much inter- est — a few boys registered, but the war stayed away from the University of Nebraska. October brought Homecoming to UN and while we bombarded the Mizzou Tiger into submission, Lon- don was still being plastered by hundreds of tons of Nazi bombs. The close of October brought the Cornhuskers into the sports spotlight — Missouri and Indiana had been beaten — and Minnesota had won by so narrow a margin. The sports writers began to whispser Those boys had something! When Roosevelt won his third term, with Nebraska one of nine dissenting states, Comhusker football players had won three big games. National and state politics held the public spotlight, but for us, the UN election talk was the subject of heated debate — Barbs and Liberals Split As Class Officer Filings Open — was the headline in the Rag. The campus spotlight soon swung away from politics and back to the gridiron, where Nebraska had won the remainder of the games on the football slate. There had been one more game to play when rumors of a bowl bid became numerous. It was December 2, a cold, wintry day when the suspense was broken-ROSE BOWL BID ACCEPTED-read the headlines of the Lincoln papers, even the war news took second place. For twenty-four hours Lincoln was in a turmoil, classes were dismissed, students did the famous snake dance up O Street and invaded the theaters shouting, Rally! Rally! Enthusiasm had reached its peak, it was Nebraska ' s first bowl bid in the history of the school. Kos iCP . C u ( f : ' v.o »