Image provided by: University of Oregon Libraries; Eugene, OR
About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (March 23, 1944)
Jlette/iA to- the CdUoA. To the Editor: I have just returned from fur lough in Portland and could not help but feel how much more pleas ant it would have been if all the Friars and other kids from Ore gon could have been there together with me. I wish deeply they would have. Ten days out of 365 at home Isn’t ultimate happiness, but it helps tremendously. While I was home I got to see Friars Roy Vernstrom and Dave Silver. . . . Had one embarrassing experience while in Portland, when aboard one of the electric trolleys. Two young kids of about five boarded the car and sat next to me. For a few moments they gazed at the good conduct ribbon and sharpsooter’s badge on my chest (sure sign of the proud non-combat soldier home on furlough) and then one bravely interrogated in a voice loud enough to be beard anywhere on Kincaid street: “Soldier, how many Japs have you killed all by yourself?” Before I could blushingiy explain that the only thing of importance I had killed thus far was U. S. army time, by a fortunate coinci dence I arrived at my destination and so was saved from further em barassing queries. In San Francisco while walking dow'n Market street I was sud denly halted by two formidable looking Waves, one of whom turned out to be Mary Wolf, a classmate in the journalism school. She’s do ing some kind of public relations work as a yeoman and is a good representative of how a university gal can help in the armed forces. Am now back at my old desk, where I'm doing signal corps cryptography work keeping track of and servicing our telephone equipment at this field, and acting as a drill sergeant and assistant to the first sergeant of our detach ment. Right now, lor amusement, in addition to writing a column and features for the post newspaper, I am taking part in the musical comedy “Of Thee I Sing,” which incidentally is the same show put on at the University in place of a canoe fete in ’42 . . . which is why 1 got in it. I'm Throttlebottom, the vice-president, same as Jerry Lukefish was for Oregon's show. (Lust; I heard of him he was a special service sergeant at Camp White, by the way). Don't meet many Oregonians in these parts, but Saturday night last did bump into Bill Gray, for mer Oregonian writer and later Time correspondent. (He's now working out of L. A.) He came through with a newspaper entour age getting material for stories in Time, Life, and other magazines and papers on gunnery training for air force men, and we bumped into each other at a local hotel night club. Sincerely, BUCK BUCHWACH Headquarters Air Corps Gunnery School, Las Vegas, Nevada. Three girls were enjoying a se lection by the orchestra. "Isn't it divine! Wonder what they’re playing?” said Madge. "It's the sextette from Lucia," announced Tillie positively. "No, it’s ‘Tales from Hoffman,’ " persisted Annabelle. "I think that you are both wrong, but there is a card up there I’ll go and see for myself," announced Madge, suiting the ac tion to her words. She came back triumphant. “You’re ’way iff, girls! It's the ‘Refrain from Spitting.’ ” iiiiiiiiuumiiiiumuimiiiHUiiiiHinmiimmiiiiiimmuiiiiiituiiiHiiimiiiiiiiiiiiuiiiiiiniiiHiiH.F MARJORIE M. GOODWIN EDITOR ELIZABETH EDMUNDS BUSINESS MANAGER MARJORIE YOUNG Managing Editor GLORIA MALLOY Advertising Manager ANNE CRAVEN News Editor Norris Yates, Joanne Nichols Associate Editors Betty Ann Stevens EDITORIAL BOARD Edith Newton Mary Jo Geiser Shirley Stearns, Executive Secretary Warren Miller, Army Editor Bob Stiles. Sports Editor Mary Jo Geiser, Staff Photographer Carol Greening, Betty Ann Stevens Co-Women’s Editors Betty French Robertson, Chief Night Editor Elizabeth Haugen, Assistant Managing Editor Published daily during the college year except Sundays, Mondays, and holidays and final examination periods by the Associated Students, University of Oregon. Entered as second-class matter at the postoffice, Eugene, Oregon. R@dl G*iq4A> 2noia # • • Oregon totaled over a quarter of a million dollars in the fourth war bond campaign, and incidentally showed the other schools of the nation what they could do when they really started the ball rolling. That same ball should be taken out of the emergency chest and put into action on the Red Cross drive for membership. In this case the campus has to raise only $1000 to meet the quota set by the authorities. But quotas don’t mean much. They’re cold black figures on white paper. The Red Cross means much more than that and it means much more than merely meeting an arbitrary quota. It means backing with whatever comforts are available the fighting our men and women in service are doing. Oregon can help in this humanitarian effort. One thousand dollars would help; two thousand could help twice as much. Oregon didn’t hold itself down to the quota on the bond drive, with the result that as far as statistics are available, it topped the nation’s schools in the campaign. Our school has established a leadership in raising funds to back the attack and should follow its own example in more than making a quota. There are approximately 1400 students attending the Lni versity. One dollar entitles each person to membership in the Red Cross. If each student enrolled in the Red Cross the quota would be more titan met. If even a part of these students would contribute more for the aid and comfort of Oregon men and women and others in the armed services, the quota could be doubled or even tripled. We’ve shown them that we could do it. Let’s show them that we can keep on doing it by getting behind the Red Cross mem bership drive and backing them for all they re worth, which is a lot.—M.Y. No *Ja’ Elections... We have never been altogether sure of the attitude of most students toward politics, so it is gratifying' to pull a letter out of the heap on the editor’s desk which exhorts all students who are of voting age to exercise their privilege. "The privilege of voting in a free election is one of the pri mary tenets of the democratic way of life. . . . We urge all stu dents to register and apply for absentee ballots in ample time before tire May 19 primary election. \\ e all may differ on men and policies, but we would rather die than have "ja ’ elections in America.” The little group of students who were inspired to send this letter have not stopped there. They are at present covering the campus endeavoring to cause a greater number of adult stu dents to register for voting than would otherwise do so. They do not belong to any one political party; the)' are not doing this from an)' ulterior motive. They are simply displaying a sense of civic consciousness that every single American of thinking age owes to his country and his community. If all this means nothing' to you, then by all means don t at the county clerk's office and the job is done. Surely the time and effort expended is a small price to pay. Some may com plain that the single puny vote which each possesses wields so little influence, as to be not worth, casting. To these we an swer: your little vote wields more influence and power than any vote of anyone in any other country in the world. \\ ith \ our slip of yellow paper in the ballot box lies, quite literally, the destine of the globe. You may not think much of it—but kings and princes and diplomats and general wait tensely to see for which candidate your N ote was cast. * * * * If all this means nothing to you, they by all means don't go to vote. If registration, and later voting are too much trou ble, perhaps it won't lie too much trouble years from now to report to the police every time you leave town, to go to the polls at the point of a bayonet, or to march unwillingly in street parades sponsored bv someone whom you hate, but whose word is law in the land. Don't ever think it can’t happen here. —N.Y. Briton After Blitz Described in Novel Bv CAROL GREENING Everybody remembers the days of the Battle of Britain those anx ious days, when breaths were held lest the great citadel should fall, lest Hitler’s boast of “London by August 15th” should be made good. The world bowed in admiration of the courageous spirit shown by the British in that time of terror. Many brilliant descriptions have been written of the holocaust, many tales told of the heroism displayed there. But what happened after it was all over ? How were the British feeling when the Eighth army was grappling with Rommel's forces down in Tunisia, when Stalingrad seemed well-nigh lost, when the visiojn of the war’s end was cloudy and bedraggled ? And what is more important, how were the British working? At the pace of victory, or of defeat ? Priestley answers these questions. Here is what one of his characters, a girl worker in an aircraft fac tory, was thinking as she worked— “Why, for instance, did we keep on pretending that we were really winning, when Germany and Japan had got all those places and we didn't seem able to push them out? . . . It had been different in 1940, when the JNazis naa saia tney would bomb London and the people didn’t want to give in. She under stood all about that, had been in it herself, and still felt a bit of a thrill if anybody mentioned those days. They had been rather aw ful—and of course Madame (her former employer) being bombed out had just ruined everything— but they had been exciting and not at all miserable and boring. “The trouble was, of course, that she had had to start her life all over again, you might say, and somehow she had not got it proper ly started even yet. Sometimes she felt it would never get started. Just as if she was really now not much better than a ghost.” Of course, not every person in Priestley’s huge aircraft factory felt exactly like this, but the lag was there to some degree in almost everyone. And this lag is the prob lem of the book, the center of con flict, though there are minor con flicts, too. In “Daylight on Saturday” Priestley takes about 40 characters (too many), tell what they’re thinking about, what they do, and their effect upon on eanother. He starts at the top of the organiza tion of the factory, and works down to the lowest paid member of the organization, and the most cheerful one, a cripple who pushes the tea-canteen around at appoint ed hours. Through his movie-like technique there are brief, clear views into the personality of each one of them. There’s Elrick, works superin tendent. His wife, whose mind was reduced to that of a six-year-old by an illness, cuts paper dolls, and is his personal tragedy. He drinks, in an effort to forget it, is admired by those under him for his ability and friendliness. Pretty faces haunt him ... he is an unhappy man. He hates the man he has to work with—Blandford. This man comes from an old English family (Elrick rose from the ranks), is able, cold, and somewhat blood less in his outlook. His philosophy ? “ ‘When 1 decided to take up engineering, I gave my family which up to then had only dealt in country-house idlers, diplomats, soldiers, politicians and a few civil servants, a very severe shock. But I notice that they’re not shocked now. They’re almost relieved. Very soon they probably will be relieved. Why? Because they’re just begin ning to realize that the effective control of industry is a new and undisputed source of power. Now my class . . . may be stupid about some things—their taste in litera ture, for example, is appalling— but they are wonderfully quick at allying themselves with any new power. Instead of fighting it, as so many ot their kind abroad have I tried to do, they get to know it, they dine and wine it, they marry it, and finally control it. “ ‘This (new) industry already had its own aristocracy. But of course it’s not quite the real thing. But once it’s linked with the old er and more obvious forms, in cluding of course all the victors with glittering medals, a ruling-1 class that will look more like a ruling class than any we’ve seen since Waterloo, then the mob will be only too glad to recognize the real thing, and there’ll be no more silly chatter about democracy.’ ” And then there’s the Communist, Mr. Ogmore, who dreams about Soviet Britain; Nelly, who worries about her face that’s off kilter; Frieda, the society girl whose very old family hasn’t a penny; Arthur Bolton, whose family was wiped out by a bomb; Mr. Stonier, who is stark, staring, raving mad, and dozens of others, all working to gether under the colored netting and painted walls of the camou flaged air factory. There are, of course, too many characters to keep track of, and this defect seems to keep the cli max of the book from having any real conviction, especially as this climax seems to affect so few of them directly. Then, the lovers, Frieda and Angleby, are the only two characters who seem wooden in the whole book, and their ro mance, featured largely, especially at the end which helps to make a sort of fading out of the book, rather than a strong ending. But on the whole, “Daylight on Saturday” is important because it portrays so many different stra tar ot' thought in England today, and a good book because Priestley knows his subjects, and knows how to write about them. READER ADS Ten words minimum accepted. First insertion 2c per word. Subsequent insertions lc per word. DISPLAY ADS Flat rate 37c column inch Frequency rate (entire term) : 35c per column inch one time a week, 34c per column inch twice or more a week. Ads will be taken over the telephone on a charge basis if the advertiser is a subscriber to the phone. Mailed advertisements must have suffi cient remittance enclosed to cover definite number of insertions. Ads must be in Emerald business office no later than 6 p. m. prior to the day of insertion. • For Sale 1930 Chev. Sedan ,good condition— recently overhauled—good rub ber. $125. Call 3200. $17.50 Spaulding racket — very good condition—sell for $5.00, plus ad. Phone 349. “CORVETTE K-225” with RANDOLPH SCOTT I : 1 ^ "Sahara" with Humphrey Bogart — plus — "Find the Blackmailer" with Jerome Cowan, Fay Emerson, Gene Lockhart
