6p, one sided pages, mimeograph on matte off white paper. Includes letters from Hollister Noble and Mac Wood's report on community work. Mrs H B Adams (mother of Henry), Mr and Mrs W H de Graaff (parents of Frances), Dr and Mrs C H Gray (Dr Gray is Cynthia Carr's examiner), Mrs O B Voigt (Barney's mother). Staple in top left corner. one horizontal fold.
BLACK MOUNTAIN COLLEGE COMMUNITY BULLETIN
College Year 10 Bulletin 30
Monday, May 17, 1943
CALENDAR
There will be a short meeting of the Faculty (without the Student Officers) in the Kocher Room afternoon at 5:30 o’clock.
There will be a meeting of the Faculty, the Student Officers, and several invited students in Study 10 tomorrow evening at 7:00 o’clock to discuss the Encyclopedia article on Black Mountain College.
“The Elves and the Shoemaker” will be presented on Wednesday afternoon at 2:30 o’clock at the Stephens-Lee High School for a thousand Negro children.
The Board of Fellows will meet in front of the Dining Hall from 1:14 to 2:00 o’clock on Thursday afternoon.
“The Elves and the Shoemaker” will be presented in the Dining Hall on Thursday evening, May 20 for the children of the College Community, the Moore General Hospital, and the Mountain Orphanage. The students and teachers may attend the performance which will begin promptly at 8:00 o’clock.
The Black Mountain College broadcast on Friday afternoon (2:00-2:30) will be a piano concert by Frederic Cohen; he will play Mozart’s Rondo in A Minor and Beethoven’s Bagatelle, Opus 126.
Frederic Cohen and Trudi Straus will give a Mozart-Beethoven program on Saturday evening at 8:00 o’clock in the DIning Hall. Frederic Cohen will play Mozart’s Rondo in A Minor for Piano and Beethoven’s 6 Bagatelle’s, Opus 126 for Piano. Trudi Straus and Frederic Cohen will conclude the program with Beethoven’s Sonata for Piano and Violin in C Minor, Opus 30, Number 2. Before the two Beethoven Compositions Kenneth Kurtz will read Beethoven’s will, “The Heiligenstaedter Testament”.
THE INTERLUDE
The Interlude that began this morning at 8:15 will continue until Friday evening at 7:00 o’clock.
During this time there will be no classes (except the Mozart Class this evening and the A Capella classes throughout the week), Each teacher will give assignments for the week.
The Community Work Program will give assignments for the week.
The Oral Examinations of the candidates for Upper Division will be given as early in the week as possible.
ANNOUNCEMENTS
From her first month’s salary in her new position as Agricultural Research Worker, in California, Ilse Hoffman has sent Edward Lowinsky a donation to the College for books and music to be used in his Music History course.
In the poll conducted on Saturday, May 8, the concert audience voted as follows:
Thirty-three would like to hear more of Bach; thirty-one more of Debussy; twenty-two more of Chopin; twenty more of Shostakovitch; fifteen more of Kauder.
Twenty-two expressed a preference for written introductions to the concerts; nine preferred oral introductions; four wanted either written or oral; five wanted neither.
Forty-five wrote comments on their programs. The following are representative comments:
“I like the idea of tracing a form’s development through several composers’ interpretations.”
“Weekly concerts preferred.”
“Short intermissions to be continued during long concerts.”
BMC COMMUNITY BULLETIN, May 17, 1943- page 2
ANNOUNCEMENTS (continued)
“Would like to hear Beethoven’s Piano Sonata and more piano solos.”
“Let’s hear some Beethoven!”
“Reason I prefer introductions: they take less time from the actual concert; give an audience a change to re-read information about composers which they may not be able to digest on hearing it hearing it once; give an audience something constructive to do before a concert.”
“Would like to hear more of Bach on the organ.”
“More earlier and later Bach music.”
“Some recordings of Shostakovitch symphonies.”
The Nineteenth Century Class will read Anton Chakhov’s “The Cherry Orchard” on Sunday, May 22, beginning at 7:30 o’clock in the Bentley apartment.
WITH THE TEACHERS AWAY FROM HOME
Ted Dreier will return to the College “on or around” May 22.
Molly Gregory write from Wenham, Massachusetts on May 14: “I am staying over a little longer than originally planned in order to follow up on some of the students I have seen and also to go up to Putney School this next wee. I plan to get to Black Mountain Sunday morning the 23… I don’t know at the moment whether I have done any good or not. Students I have seen for either next year or the summer are enthusiastic and I feel frightfully encouraged- I find schools friendly- more so than before, I think.”
Larry Kocher has been working for the past few weeks with Howard Dearstye, at the Deatsyne home in Middleburgh, New York, completing drawings and the preparation of other material on a Post-War project to be published in July in The New Pencil Point. This project is an Architectural Center, utilizing the services or architects, engineers, research men, contractors, and others in cooperation with industry for Post-War building.
WITH FORMER TEACHERS
Jack French writes from Iowa City, Iowa: “Our research on leadership training here is both fascinating and satisfying- it’s good to feel that you’re getting to work on some of the more important problems in psychology. Incidentally you would be interested to know that most of the aspects of leadership and training which concern us are things that I learned most about from my experience at BMC. You see we are trying to discover the best ways to teach democratic leadership techniques. If the war doesn’t interfere too much, I think we’ll make some progress.”
WITH FORMER STUDENTS
Addresses:
A/C WC Berry, ASN 14175101
Squadron B-10
AATFFS (Pilot)
Maxwell Field, Alabama
Private Drances A Foster
ASN 14100243, 1 Rec Co
4th Bc TCRTC
New Orleans Staging Area
New Orleans, Louisiana
A/S Robert H Marden, 14101733
US Army Air Forces, 63rd CTD (Aircrew)
Squadron 1, Section 27
University of Tennessee
Knoxville, Tennessee
BMC COMMUNITY BULLETIN, May 17, 1943- page 3
WITH FORMER STUDENTS (continued)
Dick Brown is now Private Richard D Brown, ASN 14101337. 70th Trg Grp Sqd 22, AAFTTC, Atlantic City, New Jersey.
Danny Deaver (A/C John V Deaver, ASSSB, Sq 103, HPA, Santa Ana, California) writes, in part: “As it stands now I’m an A/C and will remain so unless I wash out my mental (aptitude) of physical. If I’m classified I will stay here if classified pilot, New Mexico if for bombardier, and God known where if for navigator. If I flunk out on my physical I will have a chance to go to officers school or train for gunner or ground officer. I’m not worried, though, I’m pretty sure I won’t make ‘pilot’ because of my eyes.”
Will Hamlin writes from New York, in part: “Tuesday morning the Army looked at every part that was visible and then took x-rays to look at the rest, talked to me about girls, being afraid of the dark… whispered among themselves for ten minutes, and then stamped my various papers ‘Rejected by the Armed Forces’. So I walk the streets of New York (alternately egg-fryingly hot and swimmingly wet) a free man in search of work a little more interesting and a little less nervously straining than copyholding legal briefs.”
Lisa Jalowetz made the liberetti drawings for Mozart’s “The Magic Flute” now being studied in the Mozart class.
Rutabeth Krueger Conrad (93 Homer Street, Bowton Centre Massachusetts) gave a concert in New Haven with ShirleyTurner the last Sunday in April and played in an orchestra concert in Boston yesterday. Ruthabeth’s husband is a submarine lieutenant.
Mrs L E Mascott (Wudice Shifris) writes: “I am living temporarily in Little Rock, Ark… My husband is stationed at Camp Robinson, but will soon be sent back to college for advanced training in Military Government… I gave up my job as editor of that weekly paper three months ago when I came down here, and I’ve been writing detective work as social editor of the Arkansas Gazette… I’ve been writing detective stories, several of which are in the hands of a publisher… Permanent address: 7656 Greenview Avenue, Chicago, Illinois
According to special cable story to the New York Times on May 1st from London, Staff Sargaent Evelyn Tubbs was among the first excited by the mere fact of their arrival in strange surroundings to embark on the social phase of their new life, although they did accept a luncheon en masse arranged by a soldiers’ group at the Red Cross Rainbow Corner. The girls
will do clerical and stenographic work at the local headquarters… pending the expected arrival of a large contingent of sister WAACs.”
THE SOLDIERS’ SAVING PLAN Bill Hanchett writes from Cookesville, Tennessee: “At present I am not in a position to say how much I could expect to ‘bank’. If the plan has no provision for the immediate turning over of money to the government, I would probably want to split my contributions between War Bonds and Black Mountain. But my contributions, you can be sure, will be all of my pay but what I need for personal expenses and it will be grand to feel that I am ‘working my way through college’,,, my…. Congratulations on a plan that has such great possibilities. The college is again showing that it is ‘alive’ with ideas.”
LETTER
United States of America
OFFICE OF WAR INFORMATION
224 West 57 Street
New York City
Office of the President May 10, 1943
Black Mountain College, North Carolina
There exists in many parts of the world today a great curiosity
BMC COMMUNITY BULLETIN, May 17, 1943- page 4
A LETTER (continued)
And hunger for information concerning all aspects of the American educational system. The Office of War Information receives many requests from foreign nations for articles dealing with this subject.
To satisfy this demand we hope to obtain an article running from 2500 to 3500 words describing some of the outstanding characteristics of your institution.
Such an article should stress whatever is unique about your college. What we should like to have its the human story of your college rather than the usual historical sketch. Something about the founders and their ideas and purposes in creating your college. You might mention some of the leading spirits of the student body, alumni, and faculty in their recent and present-day activities on behalf of your college.
A series of these articles interpreting famous American colleges for foreign readers will be distributed world-wide by this office.
At the same time, in each article we hope to have included certain common denominators of the American educational system- something about coeducation, the racial backgrounds represented in your student body, how American youngsters can work their way through college by methods novel and unknown to many foreign nations, how young people from all walks of life can obtain scholarships- and how your students and faculty function today in a democracy at war.
Perhaps such an article concerning your institution already exists. If so, we should like very much to obtain a copy of it. If not, is it possible to secure an article of this kind signed either by your President or by some prominent writer or close friend of the college when you care to suggest?
Very sincerely yours,
(signed) Hollister Noble
Overseas Features and News Bureau
ALSO IN THE MAIL
Augusta Roberts, National Student Secretary of the Young Womens Christian Associations, writes, in part, to Bob Wunsch: “Mr Catchings has already expressed to you our appreciation for interest and concern shown by you and the students and the faculty of the college as you worked with us on plans for our Inclusive Student Christian Conference (Inter-racial). It is good to be able to face with persons like you the next steps we must take as we move toward a consistently democratic and Christian society. We look forward to the possibility of accepting the hospitality of Black Mountain College at a future date…. We extend a cordial invitation to Black Mountain College to have a student and faculty representative in the Seminar (Borea College, June 10-15).
A letter to Dr Miller from Hickory, North Carolina: “We recently organized a Committee for the United Nations, and we are wondering if it would be possible to get you to come to Hickory for a talk on the treatment which should be meted out to the aggressor nations.
“We understand from Asheville that your discussion there was considered the best they have heard in opening new avenues for thought.”
Mrs JB Jamieson writes, after her recent visit to the College: “Despite your tremendous daily readjustments, or perhaps because of them, you all present to us, outsiders, superb flexibility and faith in the basic ideals of the college, and the future working out of them.
BMC COMMUNITY BULLETIN, May 17, 1943- page 5
ALSO IN THE MAIL
Dr WD Weatherford writes to Bob Orr: “Thanks to the good efforts of you and your group of Black Mountain College faculty and students, the forest fire in and around Lee Hall, Blue Ridge is finally out. It evidently was a stubborn situation, and without your most generous help it might have done even more damage.
“While we were seriously damaged, we are thankful it was no worse than it is. Please accept my genuine thanks and appreciation for your fine services.”
From New Brighton, Pennsylvania: “I read a descriptive article in one of the leading magazines about your College. I must say, that bringing practical experience in a school room along with your book learning, plus the teaching of self-reliance and originality can’t be beat in no theater of knowledge.
“If every American student had access to such teaching, America as a Democratic Nation would be able to defy the world in any field of events and make it stick.”
COMMENTS ON THE COMMUNITY BULLETIN
Sophia French writes: “We have enjoyed getting it very, very, very much and hope that you will be able to continue sending it. Respectfully, like the Babcocks, we like notes about ‘shorts and bare feet’ and also alumni notes. This week we enjoyed very much reading the work program notes. Both of us like to picture Lake Eden and the improvements, and it is so hard to do this when you are changing it so fast that we jumped on the description of the Music Building (Where is it?) and the storage bins and hog pens. Then too we like to know what every one is doing so it is nice to know that Ken Kurtz is broadcasting next week… I’ve been especially
interested too in Herbert Miller’s activities as I once took a course under him at Bryn Mawr and can very easily imagine him there at BMC. Anyway each Bulletin makes us very nostalgic, especially when it says that the news summary will be held on the lawn in front of the Kocher House… and we are grateful for the feeling of keeping in touch with you.”
Mrs Ruthabeth Krueger Conrad writes: “I especially like the excerpts from letters you are now putting in.”
THIS WEEK’S VISITORS
Mrs HB Adams, mother of Henry; from Lenoir, North Carolina.
Mr and Mrs WH de Graaff, the parents of Frances; from Portland, Oregon.
Dr and Mrs CH Gray from Bard College. Dr Gray, Dean of Bard, is Cynthia Carr’s examiner.
Mrs OB Voigt, Barney’s mother; from Olney, Illinois.
EXCERPTS FROM THE ASHEVILLE CITIZEN-TIMES of SUNDAY, MAY 16.
“The Elves and the Shoemaker” was presented yesterday by the Black Mountain College dramatic group before a capacity audience of enthusiastic children at the Plaza Theater, concluding the Asheville Children’s Theater season.
The three-act comedy, a clever version of the well-known fairy tale, written by Charlotte Chorpenning, had the children rising from their seats in the excitement of the climax scene….
The action is well motivated and the menace of the play, Heckla, was done so realistically by Betty Kelley that several cries of “old witch” were heard from the younger members of the audience who were angered by her bad treatment of the kind shoemaker’s wife and his daughter.
Colorful costumes and fairy-tale sets added to the effect of the play which the children watched wide-eyed, completely lost in the fantasy. The costumes of the elves were especially well done and several small voices asked the question “Are they real elves?”....
BMC COMMUNITY BULLETIN, May 17, 1943- page 6
EXCERPTS (continued)
Highlights in the dancing sequences were the dances by the shoemaker’s daughter, by the elves, especially Widget, with his pipe, played by Aurora Cassetta, and the dance of Hookla in the last scene when wearing magic shoes she is dancing against her will, turning cartwheels as she goes out the door.
MAC WOOD’S REPORT ON COMMUNITY WORK (for two-weeks period, ending May 18.
Students did secretarial work in the office and helped to get the Newsletter into the mail. They continued cataloguing music in the Round House. They worked in the library, cooled the milk, gave assistance in the cleaning up of the Dining Hall and setting tables. They continued spring cleaning and lawn mowing in the lodges area.
Barbara Holler prepared and gave weekly news summaries and commentaries.
Barney Voigt and his crew practically completed the new earthen steps from the Jalowetz terrace.
The new road, which has been graded in here opposite the upper entrance to Black Dwarf, was put into useable condition.
The road from the Gate House to the farm was scraped and recontoured. Additional surface-water run-off dishes were provided.
The week of May 3 there was a serious five-day forest fire extending from Black Mountain along the upper half of the ridge nearby to Lee Hall and several miles over toward Fairview. It was spectacular at night. The dry and windy weather caused it to break out time and again. Three groups from the College, led by Bas Allen answered the call of Mr Sanders for help. The work of the girls was especially praised. The fire was stopped on a line two miles from Lee Hall and up just west of the Fire Tower.
The week of May 10 was busy with rehearsals, with costume making and with scenery construction for the play for the Asheville Children’s Theatre play. Some other work was done, however;
An electric fence was put up around the old pasture lor west of the barn.
The enlarging of the barnyard with the Hough Leader continued.
Now trash barrels were painted. A dozen lawn benches were repaired and painted.
Weeding, hoeing, and second planting went on in the garden.
One group worked daily at cutting and placing two hundred and fifty locust fence posts for the new two-acre hog lot. This lot is located in the wooded area from the top of the ridge at the rear and east of the barn down to the swampy land near Jackson’s line.
