Wheaton College - Nike Yearbook (Norton, MA)

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Sophomore Hop brought the continental atmosphere of a sidewalk cafe with striped awnings, checked tablecloths, travel posters, flower pots, and the French waitresses of a Parisian boite. We next turned our attention to Mummers’ Play. Betsey Schadt, Master of Revels, led the Mummers through Emerson and Everett shrieking “‘Hail to Britannia’ which echoed down the nights and down the days of winter vacation. For weeks after Agna Enters appeared at Wheaton we made dramatic entrances into classrooms and dram- atic exits from C.G.A. cabinet meetings. The Seniors at work Parks returned from abroad and were serenad- ed on a snowy night by the entire student body. Vaudeville, ‘‘Yearning for Learning,’’ was produced in February with Dr. Lange and Miss Faries in conspicuous roles. “‘Gee, Must Be Love,”’ written by Dorothy Fisher and Janet McKenna, achieved an instant and lasting success. Our Pegasus rings were pre- sented to us during a lull in the Tacky party. When officers were announced we found mem- bers of our class in every organization, among them Eleanor Wells, Editor of Nixes. There was something particularly beautiful about that part of the year following Easter vacation:—the bittersweet quality of spring after a long severe winter, the nostalgic fra- grance of the baby’s breath and the spires of lilac behind Everett. We found it along the brook that runs through the pines, and in the white, white fields where we picked daisies for the Class Day daisy chain. But perhaps our spring centered about May Day, when Constance Anderson was crowned one of the loveliest May Queens Wheaton has yet seen; when members of the class walked in the Court and danced before the Queen’s throne in the Dimple. The most turbulent year since the Treaty of Versailles had brought Democracy face to face with Dictatorship. Nazi persecution and triumphs, the “‘peace’’ of Munich, reinforce- ment of the Maginot line, found complement here in the States in political purges, in the struggles for reform and recovery. Editorials in college newspapers asked for a united front against the forces of prejudice and propag- ganda. We were surer now of ourselves, more selective, less apt to rationalize. Just as geo- metric figures had become a philosophy and poetry had become an emotion, we began to be able to see through a glass darkly beyond the external order of things to their essential reality. We had no sooner arrived on campus as juniors than a hurricane passed through Nor- ton, taking with it part of Larcom roof and Dr. Park's weathervane, as well as completely destroying the college pines. Miss Osborne ear

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Front Door for Seniors cally over campus, and fruit night at the Bates theatre in Attleboro. We made the acquaintance of the gardener, learned about late permissions, wore beer jackets and dirty saddle shoes with cultivated nonchalance. Correct in green and white, we filed into Chapel on Founder's Day to hear Professor Lyman Kittredge speak on ‘‘Hamlet.’’ Mary Cameron Buford was awarded a silver cup as victor of the tennis tournament, and the class of ’40 won the interclass tennis tournament. At this point fate stepped in and delivered several packages to the post office box of the junior president. Investigation proved that the contents were intact: Betty Conant, Mary Cam Buford, Mary Ann Hessentahler, Ger- trude Jenks, and Elizabeth King were un- wrapped and proved to be our class officers. We were amazed to find nine of our mem- bers participating in Riding Meet, while three freshmen made the undefeated varsity hockey team. Although strongly individual- istic, we all remembered certain things about that first semester: the rain falling softly as we sang “‘Follow the Gleam”’ at Candlelight service, a ted branch glimpsed through the Library window, the Christmas story, and standing in the snow around the lighted Christmas tree after Nativity. Our introduction to the rituals of exam time resulted in a Freshman Honor Roll of five students, who strove to Establish Aca- demic Standing for the class criticized as too social. We applauded the McCallum-Cahalane team at Geneva supper and again at Vaude- ville, ““Left Swing,’’ which was also memor- able for the superb characterization of the B’s by Dorothy Mountain and Adele Mills. Particularly vivid in our minds are the fiery mass meeting concerning News and the Cal- endar Committee, and the equally fiery June day of the European history exam in the Doll’s House. . The troubled years, the clouded years con- tinued. Hatred and injustice grew in the Eastern hemisphere, the League faltered, and Japan began to pour troops into China. The government, harassed by the labor situation, formed a peace policy of Watchful Isolation with Tolerance toward warring nations. College students everywhere were aware of the tremendous problems facing the nation’s leaders. Returning to Wheaton with grave sophomore responsibilities, we felt also the challenge to learn, to absorb wisdom, to analyze and decipher our minds. Slowly, during the year, we began to think more clearly, to puzzle out the macrocosmic and microcosmic relationships which lead to an integrated understanding of man. We again entered the Chapel in green sweaters on Founders’ Day to hear Lewis Mumford talk on “‘Modern Architecture,”’ and took part in the Barrie evening of Foun- ders’ Day Plays that night. One noon a russet clad messenger summoned passers-by to Hebe Court, where sophomores were holding an unveiling ceremony with statues of Roman mythology. As the sheets dropped from each figure in classic dress, the new officers ap- peared: Mary Cam Buford, Mary Ann Hess- entahler, Eleanor Wells, Ruth Warren, and Betsey Schadt. During the fall we paid Libe fines, worked in Nursery school, went to Boston Saturday on the C.G.A. bus and came back with a corsage of violets to wear to church the next morning. [ 26 | %

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atrived immediately afterward to advocate up-swept hair, posture classes, and the poise that would electrify men into sudden pro- posals. Recovering from the effects of mud packs and mild baths, we took time out to pass judgment on five convicts in a chain gang —the bars and stripes forever. . .Sentenced in court to a year’s hard labor as the new class officers were Mary Ann Hessentahler, Betsey Schadt, Virginia Ely, Alison Kimpton, and Marianna Rehling. Howard Mumford Jones, the Founders’ Day speaker, discussed ““The Weight of Our Humility,’’ which called forth much comment among the English majors. That evening the class presented ‘Grown Up’’ written by Beth Fiske, directed by Marion Hubbell, and enjoyed by everyone. One of the high lights of the fall was the junior-freshman bacon bat. We received regular letters from Ellen Bamberger and Luella Davis, studying in France, and from Mary Carpenter who spent the year at Exeter in England. Several juniors took part in the Dance Symposium, and our president did nobly at the Al Warner-Lovin Bloom “‘In- formation Please.’’ Juniors also appeared in Nativity Play during Christmas week. In January Ruth Warren received the gold Phi Beta Kappa key, which merited a special song all for herself. People went away for long week ends on the snow trains and came back on crutches. Hanya-Holm came and conquered Wheaton to such an extent that she made a return engagement for Vaudeville in the person of Helen Kingsley. ‘‘Hysteria Repeats Itself,’’ featuring Mrs. Korsch, Mrs. Potter-Potter and Prudence Olivia Ballantine, was a tremendous success with “‘This Is a Song, Without Any Words’’—as the piéce de resistance. At election time five juniors: Priscilla Howard, Ruth Darnell, Marion Hubbell, Jeanne Adams, and Betty Shaw took over the offices of C.G.A., Y.W.C.A., D.A., A.A., and News for better or for worse. One of the most violent room-choosings in history took place on a mild April evening. Junior-Senior Prom moved from the Gym to a Manhattan penthouse with skyscrapers, neon lights, and the Hudson river gleaming beyond the roof. There were triangular blue and silver lights, a chromium Brenda Frazier bar, and collapsible pine trees along the stage ....Names in the news included Beth Fiske who was chosen as Geneva scholar with Natalie Fairchild as alternate; with Betty Conant they sailed on the Volendam at the end of June. Marion Hubbell played the lead in the Harvard-Wheaton play ‘‘Arms and the Man,”’ and Harriot Gallagher was elected Head of the Dance Group. .. . Four (4) juniors won athletic honors in the form of a white blazer: Betty Conant, Bertinia Dickson, Barbara Lathrope, and Janet MacPherson. Hilde Richard was accepted as the recipient of the Refugee scholarship Fund, and the semester ended with the college excited about S.A.B. to be started during the sum- mer under the direction of Messrs. Horn- bostle and Bennett. Two decades after Versailles a European war was declared whose reverberations shake the foundations of the earth. The union of totalitarian Germany and the Soviet Union was a staggering blow to democracies every- where. In the time of the blackout of hopes of the peoples of a continent, the government has restated our neutrality, made great efforts toward defense at home. As seniors the class of 1940 have found a very real responsibility in equipping themselves to take their place in a world torn by strife. Affirmation has be- come the keyword in the new creed. The year began auspiciously at Birchmont, which set the tone for subsequent ‘‘game nights’’ in the Sem, and achieved new goals in the C.G.A. policy. At Chapel the senior officers: Betty Conant, Mary Ann Hessentah- ler, Julia Billings, Ruth Haslam, and Mari- anna Rehling, wearing caps and gowns and carrying white roses, led the class in the front door for the first time! We attended Founder’s Day to hear Mary Ellen Chase speak on “‘The Author and His Reader’’: we helped win Riding Meet for the fourth con- secutive time, and aided in lengthening the Christmas vacation by a day. We thought [ 28 ]