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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (Feb. 10, 1942)
From Out the Darkness Shines a Light “jDHYOND the city the East End begins. The first thing I noticed there was t hat people looked better than the last time I had been in Lon ion. 1 had never remembered seeing before the people of the East End with color in their cheeks.” This passage, taken from an article in this month’s Harpers by .John Dos I’assos, is full of an element which has sprouted up in almost every story which has reached us from the war-wearv, bomb-iidden little island of England. It brings a chuckle with the story of the old Scotch lady who “says a wee bit o’ prayer, takes a wee drap o’ whiskey,^jumps into bed, and says ‘To hell with Hitler’ ” when the .Jerries come roaring out of the holocaust of heaven to spit death at the heathered breast of Scotland. # # * # JT brings a justifiable tightening of the throat muscles with the reports from London of tiny man-children who refuse to leave their fathers’ sides for the safety of the air-raid shelters, their pride a pitiful mixture of childish ignorance and heartbreaking precocious courage in the ugly face of danger. Such things stir the hearts of men. Such things mirror the spirit of the times. It glows on the pink cheeks of East Enders and pokes its shining head through rows of ruined tenement houses which once were teeming har bingers of filth and disease but now, leveled by enemy bombs, allow East Enders their first view of the river. # # # # JT is in direct contrast to the scheming littleness of the Eugene housewife who figures, lies, and plays all the angles in order to get a 75-pound supply of sugar. It is beginning to manifest itself in the self denial of University students who are meeting the problems of food, social life, and straightened fam ily circumstances, with an ever-increasing ability to “take it.” ‘‘It,” whatever it is, is too big to be named. It's amoebic capacity to take any form precludes lab oratory investigation. It spills over man-made boun daries, transcends nationalism. In its evanescent light all flags, all jingoism, all trick phrases, dis appear. As surely as it is present in England today, so it is bound to appear in Germany, America, China, Japan, any war-torn population which feels that is is fighting for its life. if # * # ■^^"IIAT an unnatural paradoxical child is this spirit of nobility, given birth by the horror of war. But does that make it any the less worth sav ing? Can this nobility be preserved after the death of its hideous mother, or must it die along with the death rattle of the screaming Stukas? With the proper care perhaps it may be possible to sal vage this one priceless treasure which entered this war as a surprise but which may yet turn out to be the one thing worth saving.—J.S. Are You Accelerating?... rT''IIE American college campus, proverbial beginner of catchy' sayings, last week posted another record for itself in the world of witticism, and thereby proved that college students can take a hard sock on the chin and come up with a grin. For at Princeton the popular campus greeting between class bound undergraduates was coming to be, “Are you accel erating?’’ * While 89 per cent of the colleges in the United States fol lowed on each others’ tails to announce speeded up curricula, year around classes, and short cuts to law and medical school, the college student himself huffed and puffed his way along in the wake of a sudden surge of streamlining within the ivy covered walls of learning. And it was all a pretty harrowing experience. JT seems to us that Princeton's new saying is a reassuring sign. Educators must have waited with interest the reaction of students everywhere to tin* new concentrated education, de signed 1o take most of the frivolity out of college. They must have wondered a little warily about the ability of youth to “take it.” For there is nothing more coveted by the college student than a vacation ... it’s a two-week dose of heaven wrapped up in cellophane. With holidays gone, there might well be a reaction among collegians. Washington is getting itself in quite a srew this month over tin* question of national morale. The office of facts and .figures is about to add a propaganda duty to its present load of information-giving, Columnist Paul Mall on told his readers yesterday. Big-wigs in Washington's war developments arc worried about Mr. Average Citizen's passive attitude toward the war. And they’re puzzled too by the preponderance of grumbling among United States citizens in the matter of war time inconveniences . . . such as rationing, shortages, and pleasure-lessening. # # # # JT is a reassuring sign, although nobody pretends to be very happy about it, that American college students have taken the move which takes the fun out of college with grace. And they manage to assume their double load of work, their reduc tion of play, and their lack of spare time with a smile. They even tl ought up a new saying to describe it. And so we say to Webfoots, “Are you accelerating?” Another King is Crowned... JjMHv as long as can be remembered it lias been a question in tin' minds of males as to just wlmt it is that they have (other than ears and plenty of filthy lucre) that attracts the fair sex to them. More than one bull session has been devoted entirely to the consideration of that question, and the con clusion that is usually reached is that even the women don't know. (liven a certain amount of good looks, and even that isn't always necessary, a gift of gab, and plenty of time almost any fellow can get a girl to show an interest in him. Of course the Big Men On The t’ampus make the competition pretty stiff for the ordinary, run-of-the-mill male. For what dewy eyed little freshman girl doesn't spend her first two weeks getting all the BMOF pointed out to her. and then carry their pictures close to her heart until she sees the light? # # # * ^TJOMKS today the Heart Hop. and comes also the selection of a King of Hearts, It’s a better than even bet that whoever is chosen by the girls on this campus as their ideal man will not be at the present time a BMOC. But it's an even Ijet (in fact the odds are probably for itl that this hero-to-be, flam jpn BneaklcuU By TED HALLOCK No time for fluff, nothin’ but stuff. And its mellow Sid. Cats who thought the Will Bradley crew was solid murder won't any more ’cause it isn’t. Which does n’t mean it isn’t still solid mur der, but just that it isn’t Will Bradley’s mine own enny more. Seems that Ray McKinley of tub position, and Wilbur of tram, leader, same, didst disagree bout sweet and hots, so now it ain’t except on wax. Brad is taking Ray’s share of the hats and go ing on a head, and Ray is taking the fresh business and creating one of today’s most frequent oddi ties, a new band. Also, just as we said it would many suns ago, Shaw’s band has broken up. Seems Art gave them this two week furlough, as of course you two steady readers of J.F.B. will remember (I’m seri ous too). So after this involun tary off for union bizz, comes the strep in the throat and Arthur is finding Death Takes a Vacash is merely a play, so he is giving the boys the one-two again. So now everybody is laid off in the beeg town east of Pendleton, with no job. So that is the extremely sad pitch. Too Sad Auld, Tough, and a couple of others are forming a combo for the Famous Door, and Les Rob inson et others are snatching at name side men angles. So good bye for the third time to the • • • 9*ieland ue/U*U. £*Ufla*ui Is the Irish Policy Wise? By DON TREADGOIiD I wonder what the reaction in America would be if, in the midst of war, Mexico should loudly demand to be reunited with Arizona and California, announce she was going to raise a large army to “fight any invader,” and say bluntly there was no choice between Hitler and the United States. This roughly corresponds to what the men of Eire are saying to the British. We are lucky that Mexico, though we certainly did grab a big greatest experiment in modern jazz. Jimmy Dorsey pulled the usual oh-so-snazz thing in adding Charlie Teagarden, Jack’s close relative by the same mother, to a growing brass section. Tom Dorsey lost 88’er Bushkin to the air corps. Bushkin flying to N.Y., where he was called', from Los where the Palladium sprong was going. More Noise Wanted And another thing. The ap plause lately at campus jigs has stunk. Nothing but effervescent silence which ain’t really golden at all. Them cats on the stand ain’t subtle, they’re provincial as hell. So make with the hands, and the hop will jump groovily and all will be well. Kenton finally got east. Only two Sioux raids, too. Opened N.Y.’s Roseland, dime-a-dance jernt last Friday eve. Expects NBC airtime any year now. Also, to prove that music is laden with the tall moo, Tom D. just re signed with Victor at what friends say to be one thousand, two hundred fifty stones a side. Which is giving the poor kid some twenty-five hunnert stangs for one plastic. Which isn’t neces sarily grass when you think about it. Ellington plays like Ellington on “Chelsea Bridge’’ which is enough. Except that, oh yea, it’s beautiful. And on Victor, too. in the background today, will tomorrow be a BMOC in liis own right. Even the most stout-hearted fall. So, girls, practice your prettiest smiles, and boys, call another bull session, for a new star lias risen. And if you still can't figure out the answers, there’s always the Love and Marriage series.—F.T. Oregon The Oregon Daily Emerald, published daily during the college year except Sundays, Mondays, holidays, and final examination periods bv the Associated'Students, University of Oregon. Subscription rates: $1.25 per term and $3.00 per year. Entered as second class matter at the postoffice, Eugene, Oregon. HELEN ANGELL, Editor Associate Editors: Hal FRED O. MAY, Business Manager Olney, Fritz Timmen Ray Schrick, Managing Editor Betty Jane Biggs, Advertising Manager llou r lazier, News Editor Elizabeth Edmunds, National Advertising1 Manager UPPER BUSINESS STAFF ‘IVHII l\u; M, ua>uui 1H>UUI^U Helen Flynn, Office Manager Lois Clause, Circulation Manager UPPER NEWS STAFF • 'Mutuum i\,u..u..uuu, lice i Co-Sports Editors Corrine Nelson, Mildred Wilson, Co-Women’s Editors neru fenny, assistant .Managing Editor Joanne Nichols, Assistant Xews Editor Mary Woli, Exchange Editor Represented for national advertising by NATIONAL ADVERTISING SERVICE INC., college publishers’ representative. 420 Madison Ave., New York—Chicago—Boston - Los Angeles—San Francisco—Portland and Seattle. slice of her territory on a flimsy enough pretext, is firmly aligned on our side. In fact, her pure blood Indian foreign minister, Ezequiel Padilla, took the lead at Rio de Janeiro in demanding unity of the Americas against foreign aggression. Britain’s Problem But Eire is a different story. In a sense it is Britain’s problem, not ours. However, when Prime Minister de Valera indignantly protested the landing of an AEF in northern Ireland, it became part of America’s problem, too. If through Irish weakness or "neutrality” a German invasion of the British Isles succeeded, it would be a very direct threat to us. Why do the Irish hate the Eng lish? The roots of this question are to be found far back in the reign of Henry II in the 12th cen tury, when he sent his Norman feudal lords across the sea to conquer Ireland. They succeeded mainly in arousing bitter hostil ity to the invader. For centuries one English king after another tackled this problem, and bun gled it. The English tried to force the Irish into the Angelican church, and as a result the Irish became uncompromising Roman Catholics. Conciliation Tried During the last century the English began trying to concil iate the Irish, but found that one concession only aroused a clamor for more. The “solution” was t^_ set up Eire in 1938 as an inde pendent republic, while Northern Ireland remained part of the United Kingdom. But deep-seated hatreds, fanned by centuries of warfare and mis ery, are not lightly forgotten. Nevertheless, even if the Irish don’t like the English, their pres ent policy seems pure insanity. Irish “neutrality” is only a standing invitation to Germany to help her commit national suicide at any time; for any sane person knows England will never again threaten Irish independence. Many Irishmen in America see the folly of de Valera’s policy and are trying to bring pressure to bear on his government to adopt a more sensible attitude. Perhaps traditional American friendship, arising from our fur nishing Irish immigrants a haven after the 1846 potato famine and our consistent support of Irish freedom, will swing the balance.