Cornell Alumni News - eCommons@Cornell - Cornell University
Cornell Alumni News - eCommons@Cornell - Cornell University
Cornell Alumni News - eCommons@Cornell - Cornell University
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apparent factor in the handling of antiwar<br />
sympathizers. He was due to speak<br />
in Bailey Hall on Good Friday, at the<br />
end of the week of maximum card-burning<br />
confrontation and the day before<br />
the start of the spring recess. A number<br />
of persons involved in the faculty and<br />
administration deliberations did not<br />
want a head-on clash that might have<br />
the effect of intensifying protests against<br />
Rusk.<br />
Rusk faced a capacity audience of<br />
2,200 in Bailey, with at least another<br />
thousand turned away at the door. A<br />
handful of people walked out when he<br />
got up to speak, another sixty-five or so<br />
donned white skull masks and wore<br />
them throughout the speech, and at least<br />
six women wore black shrouds, all in<br />
protest against US policy in Vietnam<br />
and his part in that policy. Some others<br />
wore arm bands bearing the word SHAME.<br />
He received standing ovations when<br />
he arrived and at the end. His talk on<br />
"Organizing World Peace" and forty<br />
minutes of responding to sharp questions<br />
were interrupted only once, when he<br />
failed to answer a question. President<br />
Perkins, who had introduced him, quieted<br />
those calling for him to answer,<br />
and he answered.<br />
Drug Arrests in Ithaca<br />
In mid-March, eleven persons in Ithaca<br />
were arrested on charges of possession<br />
or sale of marijuana, LSD, or other<br />
drugs. Eleven were also arrested in New<br />
York City at the same time, although<br />
the connection between the arrests has<br />
yet to be established, and one Ithacan<br />
was arrested in Montreal. Indictments<br />
on the Ithaca arrests were returned by<br />
Tompkins County grand jury April 3.<br />
One of the eleven indicted in Ithaca<br />
was a <strong>Cornell</strong> graduate student, Steven<br />
L. Surrey of the Bronx, on charges of<br />
selling $10 worth of LSD to a detective<br />
and of possession of marijuana. The<br />
other ten were not connected with <strong>Cornell</strong>,<br />
although several lived in the Collegetown<br />
area. An apartment at 410<br />
Eddy Street featured in seven of the indictments.<br />
As of April 6, no arraignment dates<br />
had been set and none of the evidence<br />
for the arrests had been released.<br />
District Attorney Richard Thaler '53<br />
said he believes the arrests represent almost<br />
a clean sweep of the distributors<br />
in the area. "You can't say I only got<br />
the little chickens this time," he said.<br />
One indictment mentions sale to a detective<br />
of $1,700 worth of LSD.<br />
The district attorney has also stated<br />
that he believes the <strong>Cornell</strong> campus,<br />
particularly Willard Straight, to be the<br />
gathering place for local distributors.<br />
The Straight is open to the public, and<br />
the university estimated that about 10,-<br />
000 people pass through each day—it is<br />
a popular gathering place for many purposes.<br />
The arrests led to considerable speculation<br />
in the press about the amount of<br />
drug use by young people in and around<br />
Ithaca.<br />
Those at all familiar with the picture<br />
estimate that approximately 1 per cent<br />
(about 150 to 200) of the <strong>Cornell</strong> student<br />
body use drugs at all regularly, and<br />
that many more have tried marijuana<br />
once or twice—although not necessarily<br />
at <strong>Cornell</strong> [NEWS, January 1967, page<br />
13]. There are no reliable estimates on<br />
LSD or amphetamine use.<br />
The quantity of drugs seized in the<br />
raid would support the general understanding<br />
that drugs are also available to<br />
and used by students of the nearby Corning<br />
Community College, Ithaca College,<br />
and other young people in the Ithaca<br />
area.<br />
Chair Honors Schurnian<br />
The Jacob Gould Schurman professorship<br />
in German literature has been established<br />
in the College of Arts & Sciences,<br />
to honor the university's third President.<br />
Eric A. Blackall, previously the Avalon<br />
Foundation professor in the humanities,<br />
has been named to the new Schurman<br />
chair.<br />
Professor Blackall, who joined the<br />
faculty in 1958 after twenty years at<br />
Cambridge <strong>University</strong>, was chairman of<br />
the department of German literature at<br />
<strong>Cornell</strong> from 1958 until 1964. A leading<br />
scholar, he has several books in print<br />
and is working on two more, Goethe and<br />
the Novel and The Romantic Novel.<br />
Schurman had life-long ties with Germany,<br />
extending from his student days<br />
at the <strong>University</strong> of Heidelberg to the<br />
early 1930s. He was US ambassador to<br />
Germany, 1925-30, and is honored by a<br />
building at Heidelberg for which he<br />
helped raise $500,000 from American<br />
donors. A Schurman fellowship at Heidelberg<br />
provides funds for a student<br />
from <strong>Cornell</strong> to study there and <strong>Cornell</strong><br />
has a similar scholarship for a student<br />
from Heidelberg.<br />
Honors for Seniors<br />
So far, <strong>Cornell</strong> seniors have pulled<br />
down a total of sixty-two national fellowships<br />
for graduate work, and seven<br />
state fellowships.<br />
Twenty-seven seniors have been<br />
Bruce Dancis '69 speaks to crowd in Willard Straight lobby on March 17 during draft-card-burning signups. —Ralph Baker