Scholastic SCHOLASTIC Dec
a a o ' a a B'a a aa o'B'B'B"a'B"6'B"a"Bin> B'aa'o'airB'a'oin V^jSIHllttS^lldB ^"'*'o"*"tt"*"*"*"'*'« c'o o'*"tt"«'«"aTaTnnrB"a"a"(nra"(rK
% o o THE INDISPENSABLE
o ionoon FOO^ MAINCOAT® z Weather, even Michiana weadier, poses no problem for the Maincoat® with its zip-in liner of 100% Alpaca. The shell is 65% Dacron*/35% cotton for wash and wear convenience and, as an added feature, the entire coat is treated with Ze PeP for re t sistance to stains. This coat serves you long and well. In Oystei-, Natural and Black. $65 with Alpaca zip-out lining *DuPont's reg. T.M.
Use fhe exclusive CAMPUS SHOP WAY fo buy ..
i you wear and enjoy yoiu" apparel now, when your need is greatest; you pay t ONE-THIRD ONE-THIRD ONE-THIRD • • in June in August in July
Never a service or carrying charge fJU»SL9JL9.9JB.9 9 9.0.0 9 ff 0 0 01 GILBERT'S I O.P O.g.P P.P.0 0 9.P P P.P.OJ>,PJ>,PXg
ON THE CAMPUS... NOTRE DAME tfl-flfl'6"6" CREATED FOR MEN ON THE GO i i o e i *» ? THE FLOATER ... BY BATES z This shearling lined boot has fireside warmth with the added advantage of water repellency and feather lightness. Michiana has the kind of weather that the Floater was designed for. Choose Black or Spanish Moss. $19.95 sizes 13 & 14, $20.95 m-qj>.fl.fl-g.g-fl.9JLg,gj-pj>-oj-gj iSLSLSLSJiaJiSLJlSLPASJU_ l GILBERT'S ON THE CAMPUS... NOTRE DAME s The parables is. of ^5 100,000\ (copies first f \ printing/ by ROBERT L. SHORT Perfect symbol Charlie Brown, Snoopy, Lucy, Linus, and Schroeder of the love you sliare dramatize new parables to Being with each other, doing things together . . . knowing that fit our times. your affection is growing into precious and enduring love. Happily, all these cherished moments will be forever symbolized by your Cloth, $4.95 / Paper, $1.95 diamond engagement ring. At all bookstores If the name. Keepsake, is in the ring and on the tag, you are assured of fine quality and lasting satisfaction. The engagement \f^ Harper eP Row diamond is flawless,o f superb color, and precise modem cut. Your Keepsake Jeweler will assist you in making your selection . . . He's 1817 in the yellow pages, under "Jewelers." REGISTERED Original House of Pizza DIAMOND RINGS ROCCO'S Corner South Bend Ave & St. Louis (on bus route) Italian and American Food • Try our delicious Steak Sandwiches • Pizza, Beer and Wine Carry-outs: 233-0872 LEE CROWN ROYALTY R. K. MUELLER, INC. Rings from $100 to $10,000. Illmtiations enlarged to show Ixauty of detail. » Trademark reg. A. H. Pond Company, Inc., Est. 1892. NATIONALLY ADVCRTISED rHO W TO PLAN YOUR ENGAGEMENT AND WEDDING i Please send new 20-page booklet, "How To Plan Your Engage I Keepsake ment and Wedding" and new 12-page full color folder, both for only 25c. Also, send special offer of beautiful 44-page Bride's Book. DIAMOND RINGS F-6e OMEGA - nSSOT - lULOVA I Name- ELGIN WATCHES AND RINGS SPEIDEL AND KREISLER WATCH BANDS I Address- EXPERT WATCH AND JEWELRY REPAIRING I 218 SOUTH MICHIGAN STREET I City- CilLL—233-4200—CilLL I State- -Zip- I KEEPSAKE DIAMOND RINGS. BOX 90, SYRACUSE, N. Y. 13201 I : The Scholastic SCHOLASTIC Dec. 6, 1968 / Notre Dame, Indiana / Vol. 110, No. 10 Educational FEATURES Radio is a A CHRISTMAS CHILDHOOD / Patrick Kavanagh 15 JIMMY AND THE ANGEL 16 TOMMY STARTS TO THINK 17 BORE JEFFREY AND THE CHOO-CHOO 18 TOMMY'S FAMILY ALBUM 20 Well, yes. If you find the A CHRISTMAS VISION DOWNTOV^N / Richard Moran .. 23 best of serious music, from THE SCHOLASTICS FIRST ANNUAL SECOND GRADE Praetorius to Stockhausen, boring; if you can't find any CHRISTMAS SPIRIT ESSAY CONTEST 24 thing of interest in sjmi- TIMMY KILLS'EM DEAD 26 phonies, sonatas, operas, bal CHRISTMAS AT OUR HOUSE 28 lets, oratorios, concertos or SATURDAY MORNINGS AT PHIL'S 30 songs. THE SONS OF PULASKI 32 If, in addition, progi'essive JOEL MANEUVERS THE MISTLETOE 33 rock leaves you cold, if you AT CHRISTMAS / Frank O'Malley 34 can listen to names like Jef ferson Airplane, Moby Grape, Buffalo Springfield. H. P. Lovecraft, or Jimi Hendrix DEPARTMENTS without the faintest glimmer of recognition. If it doesn't Letters 6 matter to you that Captain EDITORIAL 8 Electric's new record was premiered on an educational PASSING GIFTS AROUND 10 station. ON OTHER CHRISTMASES 12 REEFER 13 If you're not at all interested in -Jazz, folk music, Indian music, the avant-garde, dra Ed/tor-in-ch/ef / WILLIAM CULLEN Managing Editor / TIMOTHY UNGER ma. If you couldn't find a little joy in listening to Dick Executive Editor / JOEL GARREAU Gregory rapping about the Associate Editors / THOMAS HENEHAN, TONY INGRAFFEA, MARTItv) McNAMARA U.S. for 30 minutes, or in Art Director / DAVID HESKIN Coordinating Editor / JOHN DUDAS David Moynihan describing Photography Editor / DENNIS MALLOY Copy Editor / STEPHEN KRCHMA the Coleman report, or in Art Editor / KIM KRISTOFF Assistarit Copy Editor / TIMOTHY MANNION specials about Acid, the Pres Sports Editor / WILLIAM SWEENEY idency, bhies and rock, poli Contributing Editors / FRANK BLUNDO, KATHLEEN CARBINE, STEVEN NOVAK, THOMAS tics, and just about every PAYNE thing else. And if you don't Business / PETER MclNERNEY want the news, not just from Circu/otion / TIMOTHY SCHLINDWEIN the United States viewpoint, Public Relations / RICHARD LAVELY but as described in the for Faco;ty Advisor / FRANK O'MALLEY eign press. Contributors / JAMES FULLIN, PHILIP KUKIELSKI, RICHARD MORAN, RAYMOND SERAFIN, If none of that does anything KATHLEEN SHEERAN, JOHN WALBECK for you, you're right—educa Writers / George Arkedis, Morilyn Becker, Thomas Booker, Barry Breen, Kathy Callan, Tom Card, tional radio is a bore. James Coburn, Adrianne Coyne, Steve Duok, Michael Fallon, David Finley, Joseph Furjonic, Kathy Gibbons, Cynthia Golan, Bill Golden, Terry Goodwin, Maureen Gore, Len Groszek, Mark Hannahan, Lynne Houck, Dave Hirschboeck, Robert Keefe, John Keyes, Tom Knowles, Timothy Murphy, John Norton, Jim Petelle, Mark Seeberg, Jody Tigani, Joseph Tynan, Robert Vodnal, Jim Werner, John Zipprich. Copy and Layout / Robert Devita, Kerry Durr, Andrea Magazzu, Chuck Nelson, David O'Brien, Kevin O'Conneli, Mary Jane Sullivan, Lee Poterson. Artists and Photographers / Douglas Allaire, Mortine Befhards, Zack Brown, Terry Wwyer, Steve Kogge, Michael McClear, James McDonald, Fred Quiros, Ole Skorstein, Stefonie Stanitz, Richard Walsh. WSND-FM Business and Circulation / Bob Burke, James Grady, Mark Kearns, Robert McGrath, Joan Mclnerney, Jan Tocks. Second class postage paid at Notre Dome, Ind. 46556. The magazine is represented for 88.9 lyiliz national advertising by National Educational Advertising Services, 360 Lexington Avenue, New York, New York 10017. Published weekly during the school year, except during vacation and exominotion periods, the SCHOLASTIC is printed at Ave Maria Press, Notre Dame, Ind. 46556. The fubscription rate is $5.00 o year (including all issues and the FOOTBALL REVIEW). Please address all manuscripts to the SCHOLASTIC, Notre Dame, Indiana 46556. All unsolicited material becomes the property of the SCHOLASTIC. December 6, 1968 letters The SCHOLASTIC welcomes letters the students. And so long as the Uni lapse, and our freedom along with it. from its readers on all topics of cur versity extends this service to both Nothing could be more obvious to rent concern. Letters sliould be ad community and students it seems to me than that. dressed to William Gullen, Editor- me that it has no choice but to In the final analysis what I am in-chief; Scholastic; Notre Dame, follow a rule of neutrality. pleading for is tolerance, even for Indiana 46556. Such a rule of neutraUty seems the ideas and pohcies we despise. mandatory since reasonable men dis If this is necessary for a democracy PAYING FOR SPIRIT agree about the moral legitimacy of to survive, how much more neces EDITOR: the pohcies and practices of certain sary is it for the survival of the What is happening to Notre Dame corporations and government institu University. (In this connection I am Sports when we have to pay to show tions, not to mention the total arbi reminded of the remark of a very oui' spirit? We can't even cheer our trariness of isolating Dow and CIA wise man—Justice Oliver W. Holmes basketball team on in an intrasquad for special treatment. It seems to me —^who once said that it is "the mark game without paying our fifty cent that another group of students could of a civilized man to doubt his own admission. This is not to mention become equally outraged over the first premises." If we were to sub the twelve dollars for a season ticket closed society of General Motors — scribe to this view we would not be (which does not include three home whose policies affect our lives every so inclined to impose our notions of games during the Christmas vaca bit as much as an Asian land war— right and wrong upon others.) A tion) and the admission price for or the production of automobiles University is a very delicate mech two freshman football games. It's that take the lives of far more in anism. It is the ordy institution of ridiculous. After all, these athletic nocent men, women, and children our society whose very existence teams are representing Notre Dame than have been incinerated by Dow's depends upon mutual trust among and are therefore our teams. We napeilm in Vietnam. (In fact, one its constituent units — administra should be encouraged and not dis can think of hterally dozens of in tion, faculty, and students — and couraged from attending games. stitutions and corporations in this tolerance of other men's views and So I ask you, "Why must we pay to country whose hnks to the Vietnam ideas. The University is the only show our spirit?" war are far greater than Dow's.) genuine marketplace of ideas in our Dave Bauman For every student or faculty mem society; it is the last preserve of 175 DiUon ber in this University community intellectual independence and, I am who does not morally approve of almost driven to say, integrity. It is CONFRONTATION Dow or CIA, you wiU find one who a place where men can elevate them EDITOR: does. In this situation simple pru selves to the level of their humanity, I yield to no one in my opposition dence would seem to dictate a uni and the place where we can still to the Vietnam war. Yet, as a versity policy of neutrality, unless find traces of some tradition of member of the Faculty Senate, I am one subscribes to the notion that it civility. The tactic of confrontation, prepared to support a resolution ap- is right and just for one segment of hke the tactic of shutting off a proving disciplinary sanctions the University—a minority at that speaker's voice, is a rejection of all against students who, on the ground —^to impose its views of social and this, however lofty or benign the of their hostility toward that war, political morality on the rest. In purpose. The use of muscle power interfere v/ith the normal processes fact, we do not even give that right to support brain power has no place of the academic community. to a majority. in a University community. I do I do not share the CIA's con The liberal argument against con not say that confrontation is an ception of the public intei'est any frontation — in an open and free improper tactic to use in the political more than I share General Motor's academic community—^is based also community, so long as men are mo or Dow's conception of the public on practical grounds. The student tivated by mored purpose and intel interest. But I don't think that gives lay-ins may well have precipitated lectual conviction, and are wilUng to me or anyone else the right to ex violence on this campus, not between take the consequences^ of their clude the CIA, General Motors, or themselves and the recruiters or the actions if they lose. But it is im Dow from this campus, unless one Administration of the University, proper in £in academic community is willing to argue that it is im but between themselves and their v/here the only kind of power that proper for a University to cooperate fellow students. Suppose that an reaUy counts is the power of reason. with any governmental or business other group of students, equally con It seems to me "that these general organization. But to my knowledge vinced of the morality of the prac principles could easily have been no student has made such an argu tices of Dow and CIA, had been apphed by the students involved in ment. This question must therefore equaEy determined to insure access the lay-in. It is no argument to say be treated within the framework of to the recruitors. You need no im that the recruiters should have pre the University's current policy with agination to know what would have sented their views in an open forum. respect to recruiting on campus. happened. A free imiversity com Certainly, that does not justify the That policy is to allow representa munity—or for that matter a free tactic of confrontation. In any case, tives of lawfully recognized organ society—is based on certain proced my assumption is that students as izations and professions—corpora ures. It is this procedural context convinced as the lay-ins of their tions, government agencies etc.—to that reaUy gives meaning to both moral certitude would have blocked use campus facilities for the purpose freedom of expression and moral access no matter what the outcome of recruiting students. This is not commitment. Should this structure of such a discussion. Had they any only the University's way of serving fall the University as a center of imagination, they might have the commimity, but also of serving independent thought will also col dressed up in their Sunday best The Scholastic and gotten in line for interviews, of leadership. As we see the issue, cerned enough to involve "ourselves" and then engaged the recruiters in none but this tempered position with composing these extremes to some interesting conversation. Fi could be consistent with true lead gether—within ourselves. To con nally, they might have used any ership within the University com tribute to composing a society where number of forums on campus in munity, since a) the community has we all are everything. Where we aU order to discuss the poUcies and not declared itself, and b) the basic are FREE. By LAW. In Peace! practices of Dow and CIA. issue at stake has not been exam John T. Schroder Donald P. Kommers ined. Without addressing ourselves Dept. of Government and to these basic issues, can we hope to International Studies preserve the University community TO THOSE WHO ^Vn.L LISTEN as an open society? EDITOR: Michael G. Macaulay "None die but the brave." That CLEARLY TYRANNY Lloyd A. Wagner was the joke with which he would EDITOR: Graduate Students, reassure me when we talked. And we Father Hesburgh's letter to the Department of Government talked a lot — over Notre Dame faculty and students of Notre Dame beers and imder the Indiana suns. ignores the basic issue at stake in But after four years of ROTC and the Dow-CIA demonstrations and EDITOR: another year of training, he left for uses a very questionable argimient Last Friday night the cops found Vietnam. But don't worry, he would for opposing disruptive demonstra me lying on the sidewalk in front say, for none die but the brave! tions of this kind. of the Senior Bar. Why? I don't We talked of the difiSculties and' There is no question that the know. Except that I had just been the success he had as an army in freedom of action of others was ob completely blitzed. For no reason at fantry leader. He led a platoon of structed and that there was an all, in view of several spectators, and smart bo^^s at Notre Dame and a imposition of personal convictions at the hands of five Negro assailants! company of uneducated ones in upon others. This we grant. Father WHY are our Negro brethren so training. And we talked of the neces Hesburgh conceded the sincerity of hostile this fall? WHAT are we able sity, the futility, and the sadness the demonstrators' motives, and he to do about it? WHEN? These of war in Southeast Asia. Fortunate asserts that their action is "com questions I have presented lately to thing, that none die but the brave! pletely out of order" in a free socie several average citizens. The South So he could leave the Coke-and- ty like the University. However, Bend employer: "Let them eat hot-dog stand which he had set up there was no examination of the cake!" The South Bend employee: in front of Sorin for the home demonstrators' purposes or of their "Kiss me, I'm Polish!" And the man games. He could leave the Dan goals. It was assumed that their in the street: "Git me a gun, and O'Neil he admired so much. He could purpose was disruption of the Uni win one for Wallace!" But only the go to lead his part of the 196th In versity system when in fact it may local cop possesses the most truly fantry Brigade on its perimeter of have been the preservation of the enlightened answer: "Just get a gang the Central Highlands, numerous University as a humanistic institu of Notre Dame football players, yards south of the DMZ. Dropping tion, not simply a mechanism of stake out sonie freshman as a decoy, his M-1, he could applaud the bomb self-serving bureaucracy. and when they jump him, you guys ing halt. He could write home to Our president stressed the sin lay into them." his book-bound cousins about the cerity of the demonstrators' motives, Yet, nobody offered "themselves" shrieks, shrapnel, and shudders of a but he did not address himself to for any involvement. Three patrol war. And I could join him in phi the possible validity of their position cars were already on the scene be losophizing on the honor and the nor did he appear, from the letter, fore me—but did nothing. And folks guUt of the American position. But concerned with it. On the contrary, passing by were there as it happened I could not finally join him, for none he addressed himself exclusively to —but also did nothing. So don't pity die but the brave. a secondary argument: "the first other incidents as being that much One was bom, one was chosen. duty of the whole University com different: when Frankie's was And one was sent. One accepted the munity, as an open society, is to leveled by a herd of bat and club debated wisdom and the studied de preserve its own right to be. ..." fighters or v/hen the countless other cision of his culture's leaders. Father Hesburgh assumes that Golden Domers are beaten and Lt. Kevin E. Burke, 05539311, the demonstration was "clearly robbed almost every weekend—even APO San Francisco. Home address: tyranny." He then proceeds to ask in their own house. (simply) Anita, Iowa. A 1967 gradu the community to "declare itself" Life is no easy solution. Yet, ate of the University and the against this sort of activity. The burdened with such problems as ROTC of Notre Dame. A man of question comes to mind, what if these, no wonder people are attracted emotion and of compassion. KiHed, the community fails to "establish to the opposing poles of extremes Vietnam dawn, November 20, 1968. its standards" or estabhshes stan today. Here are the fast, pat, and And so, for what it is worth, you dards not in harmony with the sug easy answers. In one corner: the text-troubled scholars of contempor gestions of the president? How wiU man of Wallace politics, and Babitt ary activity, you tribal gods who this relate to the "great difference social values. And in the other: the guide sharp arrows, final Fates that between leadership and tyranny?" man of hippie apohtics. Playboy sometimes grind so sudden. Remem The president shows concern that morals, and Marxist social values. ber: None die but the brave! his lack of unilateral action has led But never the twain shall meet? Ronald R. Burke, '66 to accusations of weakness and lack Never. Unless each of us is con Yale December 6, 1968 A Christmas Childhood 0 you, Eve, were the world that tempted me To eat the knowledge that grevj in clay And death the germ within it! Now and then 1 can remember something of the gay Garden that was childhood's . . . Patrick Kavanagh's poem, which opens this issue, celebrates his recollection of rus tic childhood Christmases. The joy of giv ing, of receiving gifts, the magic and the music of peaceful family life — these mem ories, these possessions from the past, are consolation in the face of later tribulations. It is a season for memories, for reverence too, and certainly also for uproar and fun. But we don't have the prettiest of images to bedeck our daydreaming recollections. After all, is a trip to Kresge's for a box of tinsel worth Kavanagh's trek to milk the cow with Mother? Yes. It has to be. 8 The Scholastic Kavanagh tells us of a homely penknife this issue and the Football Review were pre and a father's melodeon, but we content our pared simultaneously. selves with the thought of Lionel guided- missile flat cars and a translucent red 45 Special thanks to the Moran, Garreau, r.p.m. disc of "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Rein and Walbeck families for saving the pictures deer." For these are the images of our life, of their little sons which gi'ace our pages to our world. This is our poetry. day. Similarly to Denny Malloy who patient ly shot two rolls of film as some of the staff There is love in cellophane-wrapped pres disrupted LeMans Hall in an effort to pro ents and peace in a five-and-one-half room vide illustrations of more recent vintage. split-level. This is where we are at home. And to veteran art director David Heskin This issue of the Scholastic is a collection and copy editor Steve Ki-chma, deep grati of our childhood Christmases. It is a serious tude for making the issue possible. Dave, effort, a gift to you, our friends, and each the smiling face in the center of our cover other. The work was play — and the effort photo, sorted through piles of old toy catalogs to avoid a maudlin presentation was work. and toured South Bend's finest dime stores to come up with decor for these pages, then Thanks and Christmas greetings are due joined Steve (seen squatting on the floor to many friends — the writers, of course, with a present on his knee) in several all who bared their infant souls to give us some night sessions to put this melange together. smiles, and the engravers and printers who had to be even more patient than usual while Merry Christmas! December 6, 1968 passing gifts around to Lew Alcindor: elevator shoes to Ralph Nader: a tricycle to Amanda Crdbtree: a new name Too much I to Chuck Nau: 1,000 "Chuck Nau for Senator" buttons to the Rugby Club: a live alligator to the YAF: a copy of the book "WJmt To Do When The Twentieth Century Comes" to Jim Bogle: a candidate v/ho can win to George Wallace: a walking tour of Harlem to Dick Gregory: a black Christmas to Rick Rembusch: the world's big gest pumpkin and 24 cases of beer to Senator Eugene J. McCarthy: a copy of The Collected Works of W. B. Yeats and a mountain top to the Angers students: a return trip to France to Mayor John V. Lindsay: a magic wand to the maids: birth control pills to Fatlier Burtchaell: the maids to Chris Wolfe: a co^y ot Intellectual Currents of tlie Westei-n World Since The Reformation to Tom Pagna: a black backfield to David and Julie Eisenhower: an all-white picket fence to the ND Band: June Taylor to Gore Vidal: a date with Bill to Michael Patrick O'Connor: a foot Buckley ball autographed by the Notre to Tom Payne, Tom Henehan, Marty Dame^ football team and three McNamara, and David Heskin: cases of Drewry's magazines of their very own to BrotJier Conan: a good 19 cent to the Notre Dame Library: quick ball point pen . . . with ink sand or another earthquake to Johnny Ray: a defensive backfield to the Huddle: a new day-glo mural to President Johnson: a barbecued Christmas tree vdth chili sauce to Johnny Dee: a white forward to Father Thornton: a position at to Pat Nixon: a cloth coat the University of Portland to Johnny Dee: another white for to BrotJier Gorch: a clean tee-shirt ward to President Thieu: a leg to stand on to Cardinal O'Boyle: a muzzle to Terry O'Neil: a Terry Hanratty to Chuck Perrin: a cloud without a silver lining talking doll and a complete set of Chip Hilton books to Steve Krchma: a dictionary and a copy of Fowler's to the Innsbruck students: a free pass to any local bar to Richard Nixon: a long and happy life—for at least four years to Louie Rappelli: a bottle of "Mogan David" wine to Spiro T. Whatshisname: Three fat Japs, two Polacks, and a partridge to Ricliard Rossie: a copy of How To Win FHends and Influence in a pear tree to Theresie Ambrusko: some obvious People autographed by Tom Payne reasons to William F. Buckley, Jr.: a lisp to John Lennon: a velvet codpiece 10 The Scholastic to the average Saint Mary's fresh man: a free date with Tuli Kupfer- berg to the Notre Dame Knights of Columbus: the Administration Building, cheap to James Robinson: a Gant shirt to Indiana State Police Sergeant, Tim McCarthy: a new writer to Ara Parseghian: a win on nation al television to King Constantine of Greece: a copy of The Republic, translated into Danish by Victor Borge to Bill Beyer: a soap box to Father Theodore M. Hesburgh: a copy of Bartletfs Familiar Quota tions, autographed by John Wal- beck to General William, Westmoreland: a tunnel and a light to David Kahn: a Harpo Marx short to David HesMn: a design-oriented world to Fatlier Edward O'Connor: the Catholic Church in the 12th century to Joel Connelly: a throne to stand behind to John Mroz: taste to Vice-President Ky: the island of Elba and a bottle of hemlock to Lance Davis: a dull moment to the Irish Guard: imderwear awareness to Teiry Hanratty and Jim Sey mour: a season's ticket to the to Mike Mead: two twelve-ounce to Mayor Daley: Mrs. O'Leary's cow Burger King cans of silicone and a hypodermic to the Memorial Z/ib7-ar2/: the Martha to MardeU, Fathei^ McCarragher's Washington Monument — a 550 to Jacqueline Onassis: a copy of The secretary: a vice-presidency of foot deep hole in the middle of Life of Anne Boleyn her very own the reflecting pool to Arthur Pears: a Fanner 50 to Mark Hatfield: a "For Sale" sign to Bill LuMng: a year's supply of Nutriment and some hair to Pope Paul: a copy of the encycli cal De Constipatione forbidding the use of laxatives because it upsets the natural rhythm to Moose Krause: a new philosophy of sports to Father Theodore M. Hesburgh: a C— in Freshman Rhetoric and Composition II to Bernard Mehall: a controlling in terest in a glue factory to Leonid Breshnev and Alexei Kosygin: Christmas in Prague to the men in Vietnam: Christmas at home December 6, 1968 ri on other Christmases ... THE SCHOLASTIC YEAR always heralds a word that is a star December 14, 1951 December 21, 1867 bringing man to the foot of its ladders of light — love. HE best two weeks of the year, A TTENTiON and thought are now T coming up! Up at the crack x\ concentrated upon the holidays. of midday, no limit on how late Many of the young ladies are to December 24, 1943 you can stay out at night. Sitting pass the joyful season at home around the tree on Christmas Eve with their parents, while the large great exodus began early in the with an eggnog in one hand and that majority wiU remain to celebrate A week as students began leav new Bulova in the other. The grand their Christmas and New Years' at ing for home or for the homes of feast the next day, turkey and aU Saint Mary's. Boxes are expected, friends and distant relatives for the the trimmings. Then turkey hash, and the great event after midnight Christmas holidays. turkey sandwiches and turkey soup. Mass, the denuding of the Christmas The climax of this exodus is not The parties build up all week to tree, is exciting the anticipations expected until tomorrow afternoon the killer which says goodbye to the of the children and the industry of when the great bulk of servicemen old year. Finally a few resolutions, the ways and means committe ap stationed on campus begin to leave. a few more good meals, and it's pointed by his marvelous lordship, Although it is true that "there is back to finish the semester. the great Santa Claus. Merry Christ no place like home," it has proved mas and Happy New Year are more practical for the majority of plainly read on the faces of all civilians and trainees to plan December 13, 1963 we meet. modified trips to nearby Indianap olis, Cleveland, Chicago or other HE King of Heaven places in the vicinity rather than (For the Students of Notre TDame) NOTRE DAME SCHOLASTIC attempt the long ordeal home to spend perhaps one day with their In the windows you may see no December 14, 1928 folks. light. F this earth . . . Those men remaining in the At the doors there may be no An iced ball from the planet vicinity of South Bend are urged to crowding, Ostuffed basket drop around to the Service Center, In the voices heard no hint of him, Of a God with solar systems for as there will invariably be some No sounding of the Name. flame-set finger rings . . . thing doing. A most entertaining But He will come to the house Of this earth I sing . . . program has been outlined by the Through a thousand earth-fed fires. Three words wrench themselves senior hostesses to make Christmas Crashing a thousand chains. from human speech a merrier one for the hundreds of He will find His way to the city. And the streets will be bright with And fly at the stars like eagles men who wiU be away from their unleashed. homes and family on this joyous His face. Burning with the unbearable feast. And the lands loud with His Voice. splendor of their message, Then sleep will not break again or "Christ Is Born!" breath tear. December 17, 1948 Or the multitudes mourn from room to room. December 13, 1929 LUSHj the final class bells will say, and then like a covey of From tower to tower of flags aflame As we wish one another "Merry Fquail, several thousand ND men will or falling. ,/\ Christmas" will we have in take off for their homes and He will come, mind a stable that was the birth Christmas vacation. Using every And within the eyes of the lonely place of a new world, a birth that transportation convienence known to women was a blast of trumpets across the modem man, including the thumb, By shaken pillars and shattered lands and waters of that world? they will seek out their home towns walls in every corner of the country. In our concern with the means let Their souls will speak: us not forget the end; and when Trains, busses, planes, cars and morning of Christmas Day bursts her even boats wiU be overloaded with "How does our sorrow seem old bombs in the far horizon, let us the Notre Dame specimen. Farewell For He is here and the enemy near remember that the silent thunder of to the drudgery of books. So-long no longer."—^Frank O'MaUey the explosions once heralded such early classes and night checks. Clear a birth as man has never known, the tracks, we're heading home. —Steve Novak 12 The Scholastic . and another holiday This may he a Christmas issue, and, we are leaving closet in the foyer that "was not to be opened" drew for Christmas vacation in a week or so, but the fact children like a magnet; and we would stare at it for remains tliat there are people who many of us know ever (at least, it seemed that long). Then the packages that don't celebrate Christmas. Every year around mid- from relatives would begin coming in, each clearly December the usual trauma sets in in many houses. marked "Do Not Open Before ..."; each package deter It could be very embarrassing to send a "Merry Christ mining which aimt was the favorite and who loved mas" card to the Goldslicks or the Lichtensteins, which whom the best. My father would come home each night is why some cards only say "Season's Greetings" or and light a fire. As the flames crackled through the some similar vaguery. Notre Dame doesn't have an logs, the questions rained down; "I'll die if I don't enormous non-Catholic jjopulation, but tJiere are some get. . ."; "Do you think I'll get . ."; "gimmee" was nonbead rattlers in residence on this campus. This is the order of the day. how they spend their holidays. . . . Finally, the time arrived. Relatives gathered, and while children squirmed impatiently, memories were REMEMBER the smells of December most of all. My revived and prayers recited, recalling that long-ago mother would be baldng cookies and the rich but time in the far-away place. Candles were lit, songs I tery smell seemed to permeate the house with deli- were sung, and then we could be contained no longer. ciousness. Outside, the snows of a New England winter With war whoops equal to any Crazy Horse might have would be piling up, to be pushed and kneaded into made, wrappings were made short work of, ribbons de fortresses and anMnunition by the guys on the street. stroyed, cards glanced at and tossed down and packages And there were the sounds: doors slamming shut, boots opened. Clothing was groaned at and toys oohed, clumping down to shake off the snow. . . . Red cheeks, thanks were muttered on the run as we disappeared runny noses and a half-dozen mugs filled with hot to try the gifts, the best we had ever had and all we chocolate appearing from nowhere. ever wanted, imtil the next night As the time approached, the excitement grew. The Happy Chaniikah. —Richard Libowitz 10 w PA5T r ^my^si? uuoeve wm rm IT i\)0{)i\? Lehp, immw A ?9Dces5 cf CmeS3io^, TO A 6RAP0l\L AGcepTMJce-^ AMP OMC^ MOgg WT CARRldP OUT siMc^ VHoajes m nesm lo \idmsrmm, MV ^A^LV \)\MO6VB9 WITH; -m &5W6U5AH5WT pmi^p mou^ sem AS A 5AFerv vhiye hemsj THAT Tie A/l?[(C^ OFPlF^e^KCdS UO^ b]e TALmp w H0^5 r FaraRUTA/,- pW6^^$ ^m]6H, MVSfRf HOLmsoor iiep, BWmMLY HAVws w cmc6 dor Foe mmmwi cHWQe.Fmrn^ m- ,^ , TO TUB) IK)AgT^CULAT^ d6CHJee I WAS uwes lep o\]i^ lo Fume^ HIS- /V omum TO AOHiT MT me ^WLV- IVORP , ^ uwpeR5TA^)p(^)6s WHICH decme -me i/v r cooLo mm OF sm^ ^AS .• xiu." ^ nioAav r WAS FORCBP FDR -meiR SN Uvo. inililtUKivIt4]| N]niIioic a-' 0tKf am ^nfB^ December 6, 1968 :13 Remember way back when . . . the Decembers of the late 1940's and early 1950's . . . the glowing excitement of the night before, the lights and presents of the days after . . . the trains, the dolls, all kinds of toys, all the trappings of a Christmas childhood. 14 The Scholastic A Christmas Childhood by Patrick Kavanagh 1905- One side of the potato-pits was white with The light of her stable-lamp was a star frost— And the frost of Bethlehem made it twinkle. How wonderful that was, how wonderful! And when we put our ears to the paling-post A water-hen screeched in the bog, The music that came out was magical. Mass-going feet Crunched the wafer-ice on the pot-holes, The light between the ricks of hay and straw Somebody wistfully twisted the bellows Was a hole in Heaven's gable. An apple tree wheel. With its December-glinting fruit we saw— 0 you. Eve, were the world that tempted me My child poet picked out the letters On the grey stone. To eat the knowledge that grew in clay In silver the wonder of a Christmas town- And death the germ within it! Now and then land, 1 can remember something of the gay The winking glitter of a frosty dawn. Garden that was childhood's. Again Cassiopeia was over Cassidy's hanging hill, The tracks of cattle to a drinking-place, I looked and three whin bushes rode across A green stone lying sideways in a ditch The horizon—the Three Wise Kings. Or any common sight the transfigured face Of a beauty that the world did not touch. An old man passing said: 'Can't he make it talk'— II The melodeon. I hid in the doorway My father played the melodeon And tightened the belt of my box-pleated Outside at our gate; coat. There were stars in the morning east And they danced to his music. I nicked six nicks on the door-post With my penknife's big blade— Across the wild bogs his melodeon called There was a little one for cutting tobacco. To Lennons and Callans. And I was six Christmases of age. As I pulled on my trousers in a hurry I knew some strange thing had happened. My father played the melodeon. My mother milked the cows, Outside the cow-house my mother And I had a prayer like a white rose pinned Made tlie music of milking; On the Virgin Mary's blouse. December 6, 1968 15 There aren't too inany of us who remember our first Christmas^ but Jiminy does. ^immy and the c^ngei NE thing about Christmas back then. It didn't begin until after Thanksgiving. It was Thanks O giving, and I was enjoying my Gerber's Strained Turkey & Vegetables when I heard Mom mention that, after all, I stiU had a month and maybe I would cut some teeth and graduate to the Junior variety in time for Christmas dinner. Eating was really a joy for me in those days, and I resolved to cut some teeth even if some knuckles got nipped in the process. I was busy working on a teething ring one day when they brought in a tree and put some lights on the branches. The bulbs were smaller than the ones now, more pointed, and every time one burned out the whole tree got dark. I hadn't learned about red and green and blue yet, but it was cheap thrills and I dug it, especially an angel named Mitsy who stood on the treetop and smiled down at me. She was really a doll, and she never once lost her cool, even when the hghts went out. I was doing my teething thing one day when Mom came in, and, swaddling me in six sweaters and a zip- up coat, explained that we were going to go see Santa Claus. I wasn't really up for it, but it was no use try ing to tell her. We bussed it downtown to the depart ment store and got in a long line of other intense mothers and bawling babies. Some of them were really groovy, though, and I learned a few things even then from my fellow Baby Boom-ers. We finally got there, and I met and posed with the nuttiest-looking guy I have ever met before or since. I was really scared by then, so I lost control. The picture came out OK, and I wanted to stick around and groove with the other kids, but Mom was embarrassed when Santa left mut tering to change his pants, so we split. Well, Grandma and Granddad and Christmas finally came on the same day, and I got a horse, a Goose Book, some blocks and other educational toys, but the best part was wrestling with Granddad while he cussed at me and called me Gaelic nicknames. I liked the smeU of his R. G. Dim's and resolved to try them myself someday. I got high on Dextri-Maltose and we all laughed and sang Rudolph and had a great time. By and by, I got tired and fell blissfully asleep under Mitsy's protecting glow. —Javxes FuUin 16 The Scholastic How long did it take you to figure it out? Tommy claims to have found out all about Christmas when he was four. ^ommy Starts to ^hink aerodynamical properties of reindeer must naturally lead to an inner questioning of the Uncomprehending, lying between the metaphysical and the metatarsal, the whole pulsating with the thrilling rhythm of be coming intertwined with transfusescent process of waiting. But what then? Nothingness? The Void? Or the ultimate experience of beiruting reality in the ever- present When? If Professor P. E. Dant's conjectures on the relationship between The Birds and The Frogs is correct, then the sublime answer was given by Aris tophanes when he wrote apuKupaK. In view of these facts, the attention given to the Odorific Argument for the Nonexistence of Santa Claus is most gratifying. The argument is not an a priori one unfortunately relying as it does upon the child's ability to smell the liquor on Santa's breath. Tradition has it that the argument was first formulated by Fr. Urban and his fellow priests of the Congregation of the Sacred Shroud after a visit to the wine cellars of the seminary which the order maintains in Rome. Indeed, certain of the little band who pondered the beautiful mysteries together with Fr. Urban have devoted their lives to the disproof of the belief in Santa Claus through the use of drink. The final word on this sub ject remains to be heard. Finally, let us turn to the argument concerning the ability of material objects to be bilocal with other material objects, that is to say, can Santa Claus pass through walls or does he need chimneys? The realists, maintaining that Santa Claus has existence primarily as the Spirit of Christmas and holding that spirits can pass through walls, naturally maintain that the lack of chimneys in some houses and the presence of gifts on Christmas day are not incompatible. This view drew UCH ink has been spilt — and very often a storm of criticism, especially from high Vatican to little purpose — attempting to establish sources, and was discussed at length by Innocent VI M aviomorphically the nonexistence of Santa in his encyclical letter Quid Me, Anxiiim Esse? or Claus. That this unwholesome belief should continue Centum Annas Abhinc. His Holiness maintained that to hold so powerful a sway over the minds of the all things being required to pass through the.orifices young is less a result of the tendency of the young to which God has ordained for them, and Santa Claus, cling to outdated modes of thought or the persuasive whether spirit or not, being a creature of God and ness of the arguments in its favor as it is an indictment bound by his laws, would be required to go through the against those whose arguments to the contrary assume chimney. The position of many Catholics who own framuloritary categories within a schematic frame no chimneys and stiU believe in Santa Claus was made work without successfully dealing with the analogical ambiguous by this pronouncement. However, rumor implications with respect to modality which bind it to has it that certain unidentified saints have appeared to an epiphanology v/hoUy divorced from the subject at a group of villagers in Spain and instructed them to hand. The mindless canting of catch phrases such as found a religious order for the construction of chim "reindeer don't fly" is a totally inadequate approach. neys. It remains for Rome to officially recognize the The existential situation of a child inquiring ir.to the order. —TJwrnas Payne December 6, 1968 17 Even after a couple of years, we were still more interested in playing with new trains and stuff. Spotting the Ghoo-Ghoo ow I ever got to sleep on Christmas Eve is still adult, and their attraction is irresistible. And now, a wonder to me. I was always going to stay up to be the owner of such a machine! I was ecstatic. H and catch Santa Claus in the act, but either my fortitude failed or my parents' forbearance could tol HERE were other presents for me beneath the tree, erate no more, for I never really caught a glimpse of but I think I would have been content to let them that hoary old gentleman (although my dreams were Tlie there unopened for the rest of the day, as long as usually pestered b^' the imaginary sounds of jingling I could play with my train. However, my father, who bells and the impatient stamp of reindeers' hooves on knew, as I did not, all the care that Mom had put into our roof;. wrapping my gifts, finally fiipped the switch and ob However, my anxiety, once I was safely tucked in served that Santa had brought me more. Not one to bed, was not of the sort that contents itself with a argue when more booty was to be gained, I scrambled lengthy slumber. Generally a rather sound sleeper, I off and began the ripping, tearing ritual of discovery; could assume the precision of a clock on Christmas Day, I suppose that my glad expression and cries of sur and many were the times that stubbled, rumpled father prise were reward enough for a mom who had taken staggered out of bed, dragged out his camera to record so many pains to create an effect she well knew would the joy on my face, and was met with the sight of soon be demolished. dishevelled remnants of the tree that Santa Claus had Although my father took joy in her pleasure, the so painfully bedecked the night before. train was still his doing, and I cannot really blame On one such morning, when I was five or six, my him for wanting to try his hand at it. The happiness unique, built-in, one-day-a-year alarm sounded even that parents can share with their children seems to be earlier than usual. It couldn't have been later than what keeps them young, and if that is the case, my .5:30 a.m., and everybody else in the house was sleep father was about ready for diapers. Consequently, ing off the elTects of the night before (hardly sugar when I turned once again to my train, he willingly plums, I would imagine). I scrambled out of bed, offered the guiding hand I had never requested. Al dashed down the hall about as quietly as a fifty-piece most at once I noticed his hands: battered and cut, military band, and was all set to bathe myself in wrap with one thumbnail as black as axle grease, and ping paper when I spotted a huge green plywood board bandages everywhere. He blamed it on his gardening, sporting a shiny new American Flyer train. I yelled. and I accepted the explanation then. Indeed, how My parents probably thought I was being attacked could I have realized his spastic attempts to assemble by a wild animal, and they must have spent a long the train two days before? He was always "all while congratulating each other on such a windfall, thumbs," and I can now reconstruct in my own mind for they did not appear for many minutes, probably what he must have gone through to make my Christ to allow the beast time to finish his work. I later mas what it was: a fuU hammer swing which drove discovered that when they finally did enter the room, his thumb into the board, a screwdriver that slipped stiff-legged and glassy-eyed, my father was about and knifed his palm, a thousand minor electric shocks, ready to clobber me on the head with a fire poker and that final damning blasphemy against the sacred out of sheer disappointment v/ith my happier fate. name of Santa Claus. And for all that, he probably But good old Mom, it seems, gently restrained him, found ample compensation in showing me, like a wise motioning instead toward a piece of thick red ribbon old sage, the very tricks he had learned to perform and indicating my neck. Gleefully, almost demon only yesterday. ically, my father advanced toward me with the ribbon Fascination is hastily extinguished and old wounds grasped taut in his fists, and I believe he would gradually heal of themselves. By the time summer have used it had it not been for my cries of joy over vacation rolled around, the train had been utterly for the train. Even in his angered state, he could not gotten amid a host of other cares. My father's hands resist the infectious spirit of Christmas and it was had recovered sufiBciently for another escapade to be only half an hour later that he and I were arguing attempted, and Mom had relinquished her "Mrs. Claus" over the possession of the control switch. role for the daily routine of a Mrs. Somebody. Even I had always been enti'anced with trains and can now, the train lies stashed away in some cluttered still remember going to the county fair and spending corner of our garage. But I realize now that some endless hours around the model train exhibit, enrap thing of it yet lives on; a spirit that had been given tured with watching the tiny metal cars play follow- it by human hands; a spirit I could never see as a the-leader among the landscaped hills and lifelike child; a spirit that will survive long after the train miniature villages. For a boy of five or six such things has lain rotting on a forgotten trash heap somewhere possess a great deal of meaning; they are the gateway in Nowhereland. to the mysterious, adventurous never-never land of the —Jeff Davis 18 The Scholastic Several times during the month of November, you made it kind of clear that you watited that Lionel train set for Christmas. When the big day came, you ripped right into the biggest of your presents, going right for th-at special steam engine. Within a half hcnir you had the whole deal set up right up next to the tree; the transformer teas a little tricky at first, hut after you got over those sixteen or eighteen minor shocks and ci'ashes^ you just couldn't tear yourself away from- the tracks, even to eat a Turkey dinner. Three days latei; just before the New Year's party, the loJiole thing had been moved down into the cellar, but you were still there, re-arranging bams and buildings, ripping that neio engine around the huge figure eight. December 6, 1968 19 tE^ommf^ Jfamilp Alburn Here I am with Mom and Dad, posing with a phoney empty box for our family Christ mas card. "Season's Greetings from Tom, Kathy, and Little Tommy"—^to everyone in five states who we owe money to. Bah! Humbug! 20 The Scholastic I've really had it with this Santa Glaus busi ness. This year I'm gonna check it out for myself. I won't believe it till I see it with my very own eyes. Just as I suspected! Nothing up there but bricks and soot. And they thought they could put one over on me; just because they can sell the old "we wish you well" story to their dumb old friends, they think they can feed their own kid some old story about an old man who flies around rooftops. Come on.... December 6, 1968 21 Well, now! I just fell asleep for a minute or two and what to my wandering eyes should appear? Santa Glaus, I'm sorry I ever doubted you. Anyone who knows what to give to the only hairy-faced seven-year-old on the block HAS to be magic. 22 The Scholastic A Christmas Vision Downtown by Richard Moron Red and green lights flash upon the mud-soaked, foot-melted snow. Two old ladies, their arms withered with the weight of Christmas, totter on the curb. And the urgent crowds around them await the mechanical signal atop an orange pole. Walk. The opposing armies enmesh themselves into each other's camps. And knit a soon-disappearing pattern. Pressed against a cold windowpane on that same corner a small nose disregards the pulsating crowds. The cold wind whistles in one ear but whispers into the other. And the scraggly old Santa Glaus becomes a plump and jolly old man. His tobacco-stained beard proves pure and white and flowing. Magic. The honking horns and the harsh talk of business disappear. And only wonder remains. December 6, 1968 23 Announcing! The SCHOLASTIC'S First Christmas TJiese six stories were all writte^v by tJie seco-nd graders of O'Brien Elementary Sclwol in South Bend. TJiey were cJwsen as the best of a good group of stories wlwse topic waSj at least to begin with, "Christmas At X love +Q open Our House." C^risfMas \s b est of all btCQuse. nrtsenis Otrt gooof toQ \Me/re, ojomQ +0 G^eoraiq "Por Chris^fnoiS My .in^e./ne toys- \\ke TO opein Loiura k-e/ob Criake.+ Sv[rnyn^PS Jt)' Pri en Schoo) T ViKe dahh C] aas Opoidt 1 0 m/ X Grade 1, 24 The Scholastic Annual Second Grade Spirit Essay Contest Ohhst Day Christ ma^ Dw prov JZ Be Cr^OQ> 1 ^^55^/^2^^ t visit ban^Chusl id I nmfha/7fiful four J ^^ ^^. prese/ifs December 6, 1968 25 By the time we were seven, cowboys and Indians moved off the TV screen into our hack yards. ^ 6 ACKING the mental acuity or the intellectual curi Swanson's office talking to Rusty and Rin-Tin-Tin (or osity of some of my more gifted friends at age Rinny, as he was known to his friends). L'seven, I was still waiting for Santa Glaus and Rusty was complimenting me on my choice of would do so for at least another year. Surrounded "shootin' irons" and asked where I had gotten them. by nonbelievers, I nonetheless managed to remain When I told him that Santa Claus had given them to secinre in my ignorance and obUvious to the reality me, he just smiled and said, "Oh, yeah." I could tell surrounding me. I came out of this state of semi- he didn't believe me but Rusty was such a goody-goody unconsciousness only infrequently cind then only to he wasn't about to let on. He asked me if I'd Uke to quiet a few of my younger and more skeptical friends go out to the Apache Village with him and Tonto and with explanations as to why the existence of Santa Rin-Tin-Tin to steal some Ovaltine or rather to get it Claus was not just a possibility but a certainty. Any back from those "thievin' injuns" who had swapped way, who wanted to take any chances with a guy who some innocent settlers a year's supply for a thousand was reputed to have a bevy of flying reindeer at his acres of land that turned out to be arid desert with now disposal? and then a pool of some ooky black stuff called oil. At least half the fim of Christmas lies in the ex Even at seven, being a Texan, I knew that oil was pectation of things to come. Christmas Day often worth more than aU the Ovaltine in Arizona and I in seemed almost anticlimactic after the weeks of prepara formed Rusty of its worth but he, patient as always, tion and suspense. Wondering whether or not Santa reminded me that cars weren't invented yet, so oil was Claus would come through as he always had in the still worthless stuff. We met Tonto and Rinny outside past and bring you everything that had been asked for the gate of Fort Apache. I immediately questioned — well, almost everything. Hoping that good behavior Tonto as to the whereabouts of Kemo Sabe and was over the past two weeks was enough to prove my informed that his ego had been shattered one day in worthiness. This ever-pervading doubt filled me and Dodge City when he met in a showdown with some lent just enough uncertainty to my expectations so Kansas gunner. The dude accused the Lone Ranger of that the excitement and suspense could mount to an being a Class B TV star and said his claim was con almost imbearable point sometime around 8:30 p.m. firmed by the poor grade of silver that the Lone Ranger Christmas Eve, when I went up to bed. used in his bullets. Then the dude proceeded to load his Colt. 45 with platinum bullets. That was the crushing There I lay dead still, eyes tightly closed, for about blow, the Lone Ranger was humiliated; he jumped on ten minutes. Then I began to twist and turn. Finally Silver, bid his Western Sancho Panza farewell, and I jumped out of bed and ran to the Christmas tree to went back to Texas to rejoin the Rangers and spend see if Santa Claus had come yet and asked my his weekends looking for uranium. He had his heart parents what time it was and when he would be coming. set on being the first TV star to have atomic bullets. Then, back to bed again, this time with the resolve to stay awake vmtil Santa Claus came. But after about fifteen minutes of staring at the ceiling and thinking WAS still distrustful of Tonto. After all, hadn't John about the Texas Ranger gun and holster with the raw Wayne once warned that the only good injun was hide leg-ties and the big silver buckle — if it didn't 1a dead injun? But Rusty quieted me with the explana have a silver buckle and leg-ties then it just wasn't an tion that Tonto had an insatiable desire for Ovaltine official Texas Ranger holster and pistol — and the new and there was no more left at Fort Apache. Anyway, cowboy boots and hat that I hoped I'd get, I thought I'd Tonto wasn't really an Indian but one of those dark close my eyes for just a few minutes to let them rest Irishmen and his real name was Patrick Carey Aloysius and in a few seconds found myself sitting outside Major Lynch McGiUicutty — Tonto for short. Rusty explained 26 The Scholastic that if we were successful we could keep all of the day we scalp 'um freckle face and clown." labels and send them in to Ovaltine and Co. for two "Yeah, they were a pretty dumb bunch," I chimed Captain Midnight secret rings. I couldn't resist the in. temptation. And so it was that we found ourselves late His face darkened again. "Want'um Ovaltine now!" that night inside the village, creeping out of Chief he yelled. Thunderthud's tepee with nine cases of Ovaltine. Well, I'd been patient about as long as I could. "I But Rin-Tin-Tin was missing. I asked Rusty and haven't got yom? silly Ovaltine," I yelled back. Lt. he looked worried. An instant later, I heard Rinny Masters always said that you had to show them that howl. "He's done it again," cried Rusty. "What?" I you weren't afraid of them, but maybe I'd overdone it demanded. Rusty explained that Rinny was % St. just a bit. For Thunderthud boomed, "Kow-a-bunga," Bernard so he loved the kickapoo juice (i.e., firewater) grabbed the nearest bow and arrow, and took aim. that Thunderthud's medicine man Booze Hounds made. Unfortunately, Rinny didn't know how to hold his I swore that if Rusty and Rin-Tin-Tin didn't save liquor and every time he got dnmk he started singing me I'd never eat another bowl of Nabisco Shredded and/or howhng. Anyway, the jig was up. Thvmder- Wheat. I told Thunderthud that if he hurt me, he'd thud was awakened by Rinny and, noticing his Oval wished he died a thousand times 'cause Buffalo Bob was tine missing, sounded the alarm. Soon the whole village sure to find out. But the Chief was not to be stopped. was alive. I looked at Rusty and Tonto and said, "Well, He let the arrow fly. looks hke we've had it, hey, McGillicutty ?" Tonto "Owl" Right in the ear. shot back, "What you mean, we^ little white eyes?" "Hey, what did'ja do that for?" I shouted at my and then grabbed my three cases of Ovaltine and ducked brother who had just shot me with one of the rubber into the nearest tepee. Rusty had already disappeared bullets from his "swell" eight-shot Mattel Winchester (some good guy he turned out to be) and I started rim- rifle. ning but tripped over my leg-ties. Before I could clear "C'mon downstairs and open your presents," he 'leather with my Fanner 50, I was disarmed by two shouted. "Everyone's up and waitin' for you." braves and taken back to the center of the village. We both hurried down to the Christmas tree and So I stood tied to a stake, surrounded by a hundred everyone opened their presents. I got my Texas Ranger silent, staring Indians, the only long knife in the crowd. gun and holster with those clumsy leg-ties and a cow Thunderthud approached, his face expressionless as boy hat and boots and several other gifts I hadn't ex always, mumbling something about little palefaces pected. Everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves and said, "We want 'um Ovaltine." when my brother shot my sister with another one of I said that I'd give him my vitamin-enriched Bosco those rubber bullets. She in turn tried to squirt him instead but he replied, "No! Want 'um Ovaltine." with her Betsy Wetsy doU but succeeded only in getting ' "Hershey's chocolate syrup?" I apologetically sug me wet, for which I handcuffed her to the Christmas gested. tree with my Dick Tracy handcuffs. She started to cry. "Want 'um Ovaltine," he persisted. My father turned to my mother and said, "I knew we Now if there's one thing I hate it's uppity injuns, shouldn't have gotten them those.. .." but considering the cirumstances I swallowed my Another Christmas season was coming to an end. pride and sought to placate him with flattery. My brother looked up from a pile of wrapping paper "You know, I always used to sit up in the peanut and said, "Hey, Mom, you know what I want for next gallery and root for you against Clarabell in those Christmas. . . ." selzter fights on the Howdy Doody show." "Fast away the old year passes. Chief Thunderthud's eyes Ut up as he said, "One Tra-la-la-la-la, La-la-la-la." —Timothy Unger December 6, 1968 27 l^aiting for %fimm cM^bJ^m-^lyy'^lJt^L^ ^-9:^ V---^^ •-^-'Amz^^^'i^'l^^ ^m^. 28 The Scholastic 0m HoMsie anta to Come NN^ m: MiiidM^SSMSp^ii ^^mm-^^^^^^Ammm: December 6, 1968 29 At age eleven, Christmas was only the last big thing in a long, eventful year. Saturday ^Homings at HEN you are 11 or so, time isn't measui'ed by Christmas vacation was one of those awkward days, weeks or even months. Time passes in periods that one must pass through between "lumps." W huge lumps, each "lump" governed by one Everybody is hanging around the house because it's particular activity performed with religious devotion too cold outside and a new "lump" won't begin until that only a kid of 11 can maintain. The early spring you get your Christmas presents. Actually there ain't usually announces the beginning of a nature "lump." nothin' to do except swap comics, watch TV and wait. Every forest, swamp, stream and sewer is scoured for anything that i'esembles animal life. Social status is ATtJRDAy morning during vacation was as close as a determined by the ability to stalk, captui'e and bring kid can come to heaven. The idea was to get up back alive snakes, frogs, turtles and pollywogs. Near Sso esirly that you can eat your toast and cereal while ly everybody, even those kids who were afraid to get the station sign and tone are the only thing showing their P.F. flyers dirty (dirty sneaks were neat), man on the tube. The trick was to gulp our last soggy corn ages at least a tadpole or two. But to capture a snap- flake just as the cartoons start and then settle back pin' turtle, the most ferocious beast to lurk in the to four or five hours of uninterrupted eyestrain. But marsh behind the shopping centei', was tantamount to that's not to say that Madison Avenue controlled the the discoveiy of the Hope Diamond and invariably en mind of an 11-year-old during those hours. Kids dis shrined one as the Da\fy Crockett of the grammar- criminated. Even though Captain Midnight and Ichabod school set. Mudd (two d's) exhorted you to buy Ovaltine you As soon as summer started the sports season began. knew the stuff tasted terrible, magic decoding ring or Every imaginable athletic activity from kickball to no.* By age 11 it was common knowledge that a piece basebcdl with a Ping-Pong ball and a tennis racket is of Saran Wrap and a crayon served as functional sub intermittently cheated at and played. If one was real stitutes for the Winky-Dink kit in solving the puzzles ly cool, he made up his own game (the more arbitrary flashed on the screen. You couldn't fool kids for long. and conti'adictory the rules the better) and became Those hours spent glued to the screen invariably recognized as the world's authority on that pastime. gave rise to more than a few guilt feelings. Nearly When the World Series v/as over (the Dodgers everybody at some time or another hoped that the won), sports faded rapidly and collecting assumed Song Bird wiU someday crash and take Penny with paramount importance. Stamps, coins, bottle caps, it. Girls just don't belong in Westerns. But some girls leaves and trading cai'ds overflowed drawers and did have their place. Hearts throbbed whenever An closets. The collecting lump proved an especially diffi nette Funnicello's face flashed across the screen. cult time for parents. Important letters and large Everybody loved her passionately but to admit this amounts of pocket change disappeared with unnerv'- fact to anybody ranked worse than recognizing the ing regularity. A true collector knew the worth of existence of your little sister. Roy Rogers' sex life everything. Only a fool or a girl traded a "team" for posed another knotty problem that troubled the mind. less than three other players. Roger Maris, Mickey Mantle or Willie Mays commanded a price that stag * In order to avoid any legal complications we wish to gered the imagination of the preteen set. Even a make it perfectly clear to the manufacturers of Ovaltine, "dearie bouldei'" paled in comparison to the worth of re: Fez Peril, that we consider Ovaltine neither addictive ha\ang these players in a shoe box in the closet. nor hazardous to the health. 30 The Scholastic ing at the pictures and wait for the second reading to \ fill in the words. At that age Batman and Superman were the big favorites. Superman was at his best either when he retired to the Fortress of Solitude or when he battled one of his archrivals in the Phantom Zone. The discerning reader knew the varied physiological effects that red, green and white kryptonite had on the Man of Steel and eagerly awaited a kryptonite issue. Nearly everybody who was anybody in comics had some fatal flaw that invariably tested his wits. John Johnzz had to avoid fire, G.L. lost his power if his ring wasn't re charged, Aquaman couldn't stray too far from the ocean and, alas. Batman and Green Arrov\r had to labor under the handicap of mere mortality. But the things that really interested kids in regard to the super- heroes never seemed to make their way into the strips. How did Superboy and Robin get their homework done if they were busy every night sa\ing the world? Why didn't the Batmobile ever run out of gas? Could Superman really see through a girl's dress? Why didn't somebody else beside Sgt. Rock and Easv Company help to fight WW II? HRISTMAS meant everybody had nearly three un interrupted weeks to tour department stores and Ccatalogues for Christmas gifts. If a toy couldn't wound, maim or kiU one of your close friends, it certainlj' didn't rate a place on your list. The Bluntline Special or a real bovvie knife had class. A neat toy had to do something; everybody wanted a toy that shot some thing, moved aa'ound by itself, or made a noise. But simple things were not neglected. Those unfortunate few who as yet did not have the complete set of Wham- mo gimmicks, including (1) a yoyo, (2) a hoola-hoop, (3) a slinkee, (4) a booba-loop, made sure hieavy em phasis was placed on these essentials. No self-respect ing 11-year-old could enter the sixth grade before he could twirl a hoola-hoop from his neck to his feet without it falling, complete a successful around-the- world, walk a slinkee down the stairs and snare the booba-loop the "hard" way. Christmas morning usually proved something of a Was he really married to Dale Evans ? If so how could disappointment. Invariably you never got something you he still be a cowboy and why didn't she have the same really wanted because it was either too dangerous or last name? Or was Roy simply shacking up with Dale? too expensive. Every relative you had been depending When Rags the Tiger nearly got his stripes removed on for something really big instead gave you some for use in making India Ink everybody wondered if thing practical like clothes or a book. Nothing is more they were spilling the blood of some less fortunate tiger impractical than a practical gift for a kid. Money as they did their homework. ranked as a mixed blessing. It never came in a package TV invited group participation. Not to have sung and you never could spend it right away. But on the Happy Trails, Tales of TeoMs Rangers or Mickey Mouse bright side it promised a series of Coke and comic was almost as bad as missing the shov/ entirely. book sprees after the vacation. The worst trauma of If you got bored with TV during vacation you aU came v/nen you visited a friend's house only to dis could always turn to your comic-book collection for a cover he had received the very present you had asked little entertainment. Curled up in bed with the latest for but didn't receive. The average well-adjusted, issue of Action Comics, a Coke and a Devil Dog, you middle-class child generally responded to this situation could forget the trials of mere humans for a while and by breaking the toy as soon as the friend's back was imagine yourself as Robin foiling the villainy of The turned. Joker. To make the ecstasy last longer the trained Somehov/ this Christmas just won't be the same. mind could read through the magazine once, just look —Philip Kiikielski sa.- M./"Vl/ December 6, 1968 31 And then, of course, when you were a little older, there was the Christmas Eve party with all the grown-ups. %he Sons of tSi VEN if you're just a little one like me, a couple of We'U get even with him later. Hey, pass some pierogi times a yeair it's great to be a Polack (it's OK down here, would ya? E to use the term if you're one of us, but not if your After dinner most of the women go upstairs and name is Spiro). Like at Polish weddings where you gossip. That means it's safe for my imcle to put a little usually don't know who's getting manied. But better spike in Bill's ginger ale. Bill would really catch it if yet is Christmas Eve. That's when three generations my mother found out. He knows I won't teU. That's of the sons of Pulaski get together to observe the tradi because he knows that I know what he'll do to me if tional Christmas Eve "fast." It's really just an intimate I do teU. I may be little, but I'm smart enough to family thing — only 50 to 60 people — so anybody's know when I didn't see anything. Besides, I'm busy in house is big enough to serve as a substitute for Dom a hot game of tag. As usual, we're all conspiring to Polski HalL If you're the host, aU you need is a lot of make Johnny "it." Getting picked on all the time is food and a lot more whiskey. the price he has to pay for being allowed to play with All sorts of miracles are happening tonight. For us bigger kids. instance, my big brother Bill is wearing a coat and tie, and none of the old men are arguing politics yet. There HE most important rule in this game is to keep they go again —"Na zdrowie!" Na sdrowie are the first the big people from noticing us. Of course it Polish words I ever figured out. It means something like Twould be a miracle if any of the men noticed us. In "OK let's all clank our glasses together and drink the state of happiness they're in, most of them can't this shot of whiskey, so we can get back to our even recognize their wives. Maybe that's why they're beer." You see, it's a lot easier to just say so happy. Well, weU, here comes Santa Claus, tumbling Na zdrovoie. Hey, there're my cousins Joey and down the stairs instead of the chinmey. Some Santa Shirley. It's about time you guys got here. Our he is, his "ho, ho, ho" is as bad as my Uncle Louie's. mothers oxe watching us so we'd better not try to In fact, so is his breath. have too much fun yet Mothers make it their lives' Oh no, one of the men suggested singing Christmas work to keep their kids from having fun when some carols. In Polish, of course. Somehow my quiet, re one else's mother is around. served father manages always to be the loudest singer Anyway it's time to eat and this year us kids are once a year. These guys try hard, you know, but their putting up a united front—no barszcz is going to be songs still come out more like Beer Barrel Polka than forced down our impressionable throats. Always, it Silent Night. All this racket is the cue for the women seems, one of my aunts is coming by and saying, to start nagging about going home. Anyway, the night "What kind of Polack are you? Look, even your was great while it lasted. Poor Dad, he didn't even brother Johnny is eating barszczl" Ha, that just proves get halfway through his musical repertoire. Oh well, that he's a little kid who doesn't know any better. as long as you're a Polack, there's always next year. —Raymond Serafin 32 The Scholastic About fifteen or sixteen years after that first Christmas, you began to ask for more than just trains and guns. "vers etoe ou had volunteered to go down to the florist shop noises from the direction of the couch. near the church to pick up some laurel wreaths You get down from the stepladder, fold it away, Y for your mother. This was not particularly to be and then turn expectantly. helpful — more to get your hands on the car, having Well, your friend and the other girl had lost no time just got your license. waiting for you to finish putting the mistletoe up, and And then you saw the mistletoe. That's probably for that matter, they weren't really following the tradi where the trouble started. The real thing with its tion very closely at all, for they hadn't even bothered sparse leaves and motley grey berries was something to get under the mistletoe. But The Girl wasn't paying of a disappointment, after having seen the bright, any attention to them. She was sitting, knees together, plastic imitations. But it only cost fifteen cents for a in her best what-kind-of-a-girl-do-you-think-I-am pos sprig, and it was accompanied by big ideas. ture, glaring pure venom. Your best friend had been fixed up with a girlfriend A frontal attack obviously would lack not only of The Girl you had been taking out. That meant that esthetic appeal, but efiicacy under such conditions. you had taken her to the big Thanksgiving football Taking the Jingle BeU Rock off the turntable and re game, and she had sat all the way over to the middle placing it with Bobby Vinton, you suggested, with such of the car on the way back (leaving one discreet foot elan as you could at this point muster, dancing. Your or so between you and her, as opposed to five). And friend, making little attempt to cover his disappoint what's more, you, in degenerate ment at the turn of events, never daring, had not only held her hand theless manfully struggled into his through most of the last three version of the Crowded Floor Two- quarters, but had actually put your Step. arm around her when she started "I'm Mister Blue, shivering in the last five minutes Wha-ah-wah-oooh, of the November drizzle. When you say you, At any rate, since conquest had Love me, . . . followed conquest with a speed . . . me, too. . . ." that had made your head swim on that oh-so-delicious afternoon, it Then came the problem of ma made you cocky. And you were neuvering him out from under the fated to plan that intimate Christ mistletoe, but months of practice mas party for four. elbowing your friends out from Plans were made, times were set. under the playgrovmd basketball hoop while avoiding When your parents confiscated the pint of rum for the cracks in the blacktop simplified your dancing style. the punch — the pint that you had spent days getting What it didn't at all help was the fact that she had someone's older brother to buy for you — you should her face buried firmly on your shoulder and she had have recognized it as an omen. But, blind as you were, absolutely no intention of moving it so you could get you didn't. a decent try at making use of the mistletoe. The only The tree, when the four of you had finished decorat known defense for that is stepping on her toe and then ing it, didn't look bad at all, your mother noted, moving fast as she screams. But this was a quiet bringing in more cheese and crackers and discreetly Christmas party, not a sock hop. turning off the four 100-watt overhead lights, thus And on and on it went, getting less a matter of plunging you into the darkness of the three table lamps beautiful moments as you had planned, and more a and the five strings of lights on the tree. The tinsel matter of alternately eating the crackers and cheese didn't exactly fall the way it had in past years, but earnestly, and remarking again and again what a won then again, how was one to resdize that jump shots derful job you all had done decorating the tree. And from five feet out was not the technique one used for all the while he who formerly was your best friend maximum success. and the girl that you realized in your agony was the And so, the triumphant moment. Softly, the move very same girl you had fixed him up with less than to the refrigerator where the symbol of all carnal de four weeks before — could it only have been four light had been stored. Gently, the green tissue paper v/eeks since Thanksgiving? — stared dreamily and was unwrapped, revealing the red beribboned wonder. silently into each other's eyes. Slyly, back to the living room where the thing was hung with care, while you ignored the various shifting —Joel Garreau December 6, 1968 33 AT CHRISTMAS Let the Christbrand burst! Let the Christbrand blazon! "^Vi Dartle whitely under the hearth-fire, Unwind the wind, turn the thunderer, And never, never thjnning, Forfend fear. Flare up smartly, fix, flex, bless, inspire, Instar the time, sear the sorcerer. And never, never sparing, Save all year. Let the Christbrand burst! • - - Let the Christbrand blazon! Frank O'Malley y^i^M 1^%!^^^' S?^SS&*%ii:?i«AS^ Contact Lens Specialist » Dr. T. R. Piioi Optometrist • EYi:S EXAMnfED GLASSES FITTED OPTICAL REPAIHS 212 S. Michigan 234-487^ it's a LOOK BOOK "the damnedest prayerbook you ever saw." — Ed Fischer What do you do 1,029 Private Prayers for Worldly Christians ate Students Gerard A. Pottebaum and Joyce Winkel This unique book pre Career hunt with 90 of the finest companies sents snatciies of biblical having operations located in the New Jersey/New prayer, striking photo York metropolitan area. On December 26-27 at the graphs and advertising slogans on pages split Marriott Motor Hotel, intersection of Garden State three ways. You choose Parkway and Route 80, Saddle Brook, New Jersey. your own from 1,029 For more details, including a listing of spon combinations — each a soring companies, see your college placement drannatic visual experi director or write to the non-profit sponsor of the ence and meditation second annual "Career-In": Industrial Relations starter. An outstanding Association of Bergen County, P. O. Box 533. gift book, too. Slipcased and spiralbound, S5.95 Saddle Brook, New Jersey 07662. AT YOUR BOOKSTORE •-•*•- .X . I '\ ^' /ifer?- 3 V .'> d I \ •: .',•#/ •; ,-.'-•-•'''-"-•: / ^ ,•*•.* GANT ft SH'"TS V ^~ \ LO^^DON FOG ^u SrC~:i" SWEAR JOCKEY BRANi UNDERWEAR are your >\ay of Hlo <>n campus. Ciicke!eciT gives vpsifd inioi'csi lo y