8 page newsletter with details of the successful move from Blue Ridge to Lake Eden. Student and faculty updates included and fundraising needs for building campaign. Includes discussion of new scientific discoveries.
Black Mountain College Newsletter
Number 14 August 1941
College moves to permanent home
On Sunday morning, June 1, those members of the College community who had not gone home for the summer, ate breakfast on the porch of the dining room at Lake Eden and looked across at the new building with a feeling of pleasure. The move to Lake Eden was an event full of excitement, confusion, hard work, fun, and a great deal of satisfaction. Classes were suspended during the final week of the semester in order to enable the College not only to get settled at Lake Eden, but also to leave the buildings at Blue Ridge in good shape. Actual moving began two weeks before the end of the term when the committee in charge of operations made up a moving schedule, so organized that the building program would be interrupted as little as possible. The tractor and trailer, two trucks, and a third truck loaned by the local Chevrolet Company, began making several trips daily between Blue Ridge and Lake Eden. The stage in the Blue Ridge dining room was dismantled and moved first. This was followed by the furnaces, radiators, looms, pianos, part of the library, the personal possessions of faculty and students, and finally the kitchen and dining room equipment. Faculty belongings were immediately put into use in the summer quarters at Lake Eden, the student furniture being stored in the basement of the new building, and in the attic of South Lodge. The laboratory equipment, the remainder of the library, and some faculty furniture were left in storage rooms at Blue Ridge until space can be provided for them at Lake Eden.
Work camp
The Work Program was continued during the month of June by members of the Faculty and about six students who stayed to participate in the Work Camp. Cottages and grounds were put in order for summer occupancy. The building proceeded slowly but steadily, as the students worked nine hours a day along with Godfrey and his men.
The first session of the Work Camp opened on June 30 with an enrollment of twenty-five, augmented later by two more who came for a fortnight. Several of the students stayed for part or all of the second session which began on July 28, and for which some new students enrolled. In all thirty-four students (including one alumnus) attended the Camp, there being an average enrollment at each session of about twenty-six. Eighteen of these have been from outside the College and have included: three students from the Graduate School of Design at Harvard, one from the Cambridge Graduate School of Smith College, one from the College of Architecture at the University of Florida, and one from the Georgia Institute of Technology. There were also students from Bennington, Princeton, Sarah Lawrence, and Western Reserve. Theodore Dreier and Frederick Mangold are directing the Camp and Lawrence Kocher has supervised the building and remodelling. Evenings and free afternoon hours are given over to classes, special lectures, chorus and orchestra rehearsals.
Guest lecturers for the Work Camp are: Dr Warner F Brook, of the New School of Social Research in New York City, Dr Jacob Klein of St. John’s College, Annapolis, Maryland, and Dr Arthur Raper, noted southern economist. Dr Brook, who received his doctorate at Leipzig, was formerly professor of political economy at the Westphalian University of Munster, and director of the School of Public Administration there. Later he was for several years visiting professor at University College, University of Cardiff, Wales. He is conducting a course in The World Today. Dr Klein, mathematician-philosopher, is conducting a series of lectures on the Sources of Modern Civilization (sequel to the talks given at the College during his visit here last spring), with special emphasis on Descartes, Galileo, and Hobbes. Dr Raper, at present Social Science Analyst in the Bureau of Agricultural Economics in Washington, will lead a series of four discussions during the final week of the Work Camp on questions dealing with economic problems in the South.
Dr J Richard Carpenter, professor of Biology, and Dr Heinrich Jalowetz, professor of Music, both of the Black Mountain College Faculty, are also conducting courses this summer.
The Work Program has involved construction of the new, and remodeling of the old buildings, and the carrying on and development of the farm. The exterior of the stair tower of the new student-studies building has now been completed, and the stone work gives a finished appearance now that the scaffolding has been removed. The boiler room with its twelve foot stone walls, concrete floor and ceiling, was almost the most impressive room of all, until it was almost filled by the installation of the boiler. The hearing and the wiring are now nearly completed. The interior finishing of half a dozen rooms will soon be done. The plumbing fixtures have all been ordered and will shortly be installed. Another large remaining task is the installing of 700 feet of sewer line to serve the new building.
The new service building has been proceeding steadily under the direction of Bob Bliss and it is hoped that it will be practically finished except for installation of heating, equipment by the middle of August, Chuck Forberg and Claude Stoller have taken charge of the new faculty cottage being built by Dr Jalowetz. Its foundation is now complete, the framing has been started, and the first subflooring should be laid before this goes to press.
As for the old buildings, the additional wiring which was necessary has been completed and the installation of heating equipment has been begun. The installation in the North Lodge should be completed shortly. Alterations and heating of the other buildings is now being scheduled. A major job turned out to be the replacing of rotten sills under the concrete floor of the bathhouse which is being converted into science laboratories, a dark room, and a couple of studies. Fred Coolidge, a Camper from the Harvard Graduate School of Design has had charge of this difficult task.
The farm had its first harvest of wheat, which would have been very successful except for the protracted rain which caused about a quarter of the crop to be lost, or rather to be fed to the chickens now instead of later. Over 100 small chickens have been added this summer. Other farm work has included the cultivation of crops, remodeling of the pigpens, excavating space to build a machinery shed and a dairy barn.
It is expected that a number of the Black Mountain College students will return soon after the middle of August to help the buildings ready for the opening of the first semester. There will be an announcement of progress made either at the end of this month or the beginning of September.
Financial campaign
The money raising campaign for the new buildings, begun by the students last Christmas, has continued through the spring and summer. About $21,000 has come in during that time, $7,000 having been contributed since June 1. Of this latter amount, $5,000 is the gift of an anonymous donor, and $1,000 is from the Adele Rosenwald Levy Fund. John Evarts recently returned from a seven weeks trip to California. Most of his time was spent in Los Angeles. Besides getting gifts he gained a great deal of excellent publicity and won many new friends for the College. Ten thousand dollars are urgently needed before the opening of College in order to insure minimum adequate housing for the College community.
Faculty appointments
The Board of Fellows takes pleasure in announcing the appointments to the Faculty of Mr Roland Boyden, an Instructor in History, and Dr Frances De Graaf, as Instructor in French. Mr Boyden has been studying for his doctorate in History at Harvard University. He is a graduate of Harvard College, and Harvard Law School. He is a member of the bar and practiced corporation law before undertaking advanced study in History. His home is in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His sister, Mr Helen Boyden Lamb, and his mother, Mrs Walter Boyden, are former members of the College staff.
For the past year Dr De Graaf has been Visiting Instructor of Languages at Reed College in Oregon. She received her early education in Leiden, Holland, where she was born, and from the University of Leiden she received her doctorate in Languages and Literature in 1933. Since establishing permanent residence in the United States she has studied at Teachers’ College and Columbia University. This summer she is attending the Spanish School at Middlebury College.
The appointment to the Faculty of Dr Paul Radin, anthropologist, was announced in the Newsletter of last May.
Mono-molecular films
Two distinguished scientists, Dr Harry Sobotka and Dr Peter Bergman, were guests of the College in May, and lectured to the members of the community. Dr Sobotka, who with his wife, Yella Pessl, spent several days at the College, is Director of the Department of Chemistry at Mt Sinai Hospital in New York City. His lecture “The Study of Mono-Molecular Layers of Matter” was a description of the experiments that were carried out over a number of years in the laboratories of the General Electric Company to determine the dimensions and nature of films spread on the surface of water and through this study to get at the structures and behavior of molecules. Dr Sobotka explained that one of the results of the film experiments was to develop a new technique for getting at the vitally important reactions of sera and antitoxins in living organisms. He prefaced his exposition of the technical procedures used in two-dimensional chemistry with a critical discussion of trends in physical and chemical developments. The progress of science is often attributed to, and even identified with, technical improvements and the introduction of new techniques, methods and apparatus. On the other hand, there are those who emphasize the importance of new concepts in the light of which known facts gain new aspects. According to the viewpoint taken, a different appraisal will be put on the value of teamwork vs. individual intuition; going even further, one could project these trends on the old contrast between deduction and induction, between those sciences centering around experimentation vs. the purely observational disciplines, and finally, on the contrast between planned vs. individualist research. In this connection the lecturer digressed briefly on the time lag between fundamental and applied science, and the possible effects of the suppression or elimination of the former upon technological development in general.
Those actively engaged in scientific work will rarely be conscious of such dilemmas, and the creative work of scientific personalities will in most instances owe its share of ingenuity to the blending of the two trends, the development of new methods and their application in some unexpected way under equally novel aspects.
During the last few decades the remarkable progress of biochemistry, that is the application of chemical methods to biological problems, has vastly increased the knowledge of physiologically active substances such as enzymes, hormones and vitamins, which are effective in minute quantities. This development was made possible by the introduction of new methods such as micro-analysis and the handling of large quantities of starting materials on a semi-industrial scale, and also by the growth of new concepts taken over from other fields of chemistry, e.g., concerning the quantitative follow-up of biological preparations.
The highly active physiological catalysts mentioned owe their power over growth, metabolism, locomotion, sensual perception, etc. to their strategic position, as it were, at the interfaces of the animal or plant cell, where they are able to marshall many million times their own number of the molecules which form the bulk of living matter. Hence, the study of these substances has stimulated the investigation of reactions occurring on interfaces and surfaces. Interfaces can be classified according to the physical state of the phases of which they form the boundary, i.e., solid/solid, solid/liquid, solid/gas, liquid/liquid, /liquid/gas. The thickness of the boundary varies depending on innumerable factors, some films forming boundaries are not thicker than one molecule. Even before the enunciation of the molecular theory, Benjamin Franklin experimented and speculated on the thickness of oil layers spread on an unconfined body of water.
In recent years English workers, as well as Langmuir and his school in this country, have made a special study of the physical properties of mono-molecular films. The building up of such films on solid surfaces by dipping and withdrawing a plate vertically through a mono-molecular film, for instance of stearic acid on water, has led to the establishment of numerous facts which comprise “two dimensional chemistry”. The speaker gave an outline of this new branch of chemistry and presented some fundamental experiments which he had carried out in collaboration with Dr Langmuir and which demonstrate reactions between films superimposed on each other, and also between films and molecules in solutions brought in contact with such films. These methods permit the allocation of definite positions to various reactive groups in the molecules constituting a film. This “molecular anatomy” corroborates and extends the knowledge of molecular structure gained by less graphic, indirect means and imparts concreteness to the molecular and atomic theory.
Theory of relativity
Dr and Mrs Bergman of Princeton, New Jersey, visited the College at the invitation of Dr Nathan Rosen. Dr Bergman, formerly a colleague of Dr Rosen’s, is associated with Dr Albert Einstein in the Institute of Advanced Study at Princeton. His several lectures to the community were prefaced by a general talk on “The Theory of Relativity”, the purpose of which was to make the theory of relativity more intelligible to the lay person. He summarized his lecture as follows: “When we ride on a train which is moving along a straight track, at a rate of speed of, let us say, 60 miles per hour, we know that all the ordinary laws of physics hold in that train just as much as they do in any other place. For instance, if we drop a heavy object it will fall down to the floor along a parabola. In other words, the laws of mechanics are the same, whether we refer the motions of bodies to a moving train of to the walls of a stationary room.
The laws of mechanics refer always to the change of velocity (the acceleration) of a body, not to the velocity itself. That is why the velocity of the “reference body” (e.g. the train) does not enter into the laws, as long as the reference body itself does not change its own velocity. (When the train comes to a stop we are thrown forward- contrary to our experience in a stationary room.)
In optics, there is a law which refers directly to a velocity: the law of the propagation of life. In empty space, light propagates uniformly in all directions with a speed of about 186,000 miles per second. At first sight, it appears impossible that this law should hold both when the speed of light is reckoned with reference to the earth and with reference to the train. Physicists assumed, therefore, that there was one body or medium with respect to which the light propagated at the same rate of speed in all directions- the ether. Michelson and Morley attempted to determine experimentally the speed at which the earth traveled through the ether. Michelson and Morley attempted to determine experimentally the speed at which the earth traveled through the ether, by measuring the speed of light with respect to the earth in various directions.
Space does not permit explaining their arrangement; at any rate, their experiment showed conclusively that there is no such thing as an “ether wind” on the surface of the earth.
The theory of relativity explains how it is possible that the same light ray can have the same velocity with respect to two bodies (earth and train) which are themselves in different states of motion. The speed of light is found by the determination of the time it takes the light to travel a measured distance. The measurements of an observer aboard the moving train and an observer on the ground are comparable only if both can check their respective scales and clocks against each other. Such a check is possible only if they can determine the simultaneity of two distant events, for instance the agreement of two distant clocks; for a clock on the train and a clock on the ground are moving away from each other as they are being compared.
Each observer considers two events as simultaneous if he sees them simultaneously at a point midway between the events. But since the train is traveling while the two light signals are speeding toward the center, the train observer will see earlier that event toward which he is traveling, even though the ground observer see them simultaneously. It follows that two events which are simultaneous for one observer may not be for the other. Similarly, each observer will find that “his” clock goes at a faster rate than that of the other observer, and each will find that the other observer’s standard scale is too short. Because the two observers cannot adjust their scales and clocks to each other, either observer will find, with his instruments, that the speed of light is independent of the direction of propagation if that speed is referred to the observer’s reference body.
It turns out that the form of the laws of optics is independent of whether they are formulated with reference to the train or with reference to the train or with reference to the ground, just as in the case of the laws of mechanics.
Most laws of physics have to be modified to be consistent with the theory of relativity. However, these “relativistic effects” (the deviations of the relativistic from the classical laws) become appreciable only when large velocities are involved, of the order of the speed of light. Wherever it has been possible to test the relativistic laws by experiments, such as in the field of cosmic rays, the new laws have been found to be correct.”
Visitors
Other visitors to the College included: Mr and Mrs Julian Gardiner, formerly of London, England, and now at Elon College, North Carolina, where Mr Gardiner is head of the Music Department. Mr Gardiner was formerly a concert tenor and accompanied by his wife, gave a program of vocal music before the College community.
Mr FS Lincoln, a professional photographer, with offices in New York City. Mr Lincoln exhibited some of his photographs and lectured to interested students and faculty members on the techniques of photography. He took several pictures of the College and the Work Program.
Mr Martin Magner, dramatic director at the Chicago Opera Company and organizer and managing director of the Guild Theatre in Evanston, Illinois. For a number of years he participated in the theatrical life of Breslau, Nuremburg, Hamburg, Hanover, Vienna, and Prague. In all he directed about thirty operas and two hundred plays, among which were all of Shakespeare, all of Bernard Shaw and almost all of the Strindberg, Ibsen, Hauptmann, and Wedekind. He directed the first German performance of “Outward Bound”, “Death Takes a Holiday”, and “Sacred Flame”. Last fall Mr Magner was associated with the musical department of the University of Chicago.
Mr Alfred Najer, of the Najer Veneer Corporation in New York City made a brief visit at the College. He talked with the students in the art and architecture classes about the various uses of veneer, plywood, and similar synthetic materials.
College news
Students admitted to the Senior Division after comprehensive examinations last spring were: Derek Bovingdon, Wollaston, Massachusetts; Edward B Jamieson, Newton Centre, Massachusetts; Lucian Marquis, Beverly Hills, California; Suzanne Noble, Elmire, New York; and George Randall, Oakland, California. The Senior Division plans are, respectively, in the fields of Farm and Labor Economics, Music, Philosophy, Social Psychology, Dramatics.
Three students were graduated by the Faculty on May 28. They were Eric Barnitz of Hanover, Pennsylvania; Don Page of Denver, Colorado; and Hyalie Yamins of Fall River, Massachusetts. Mr Barnitz and Miss Yamins were graduated in the field of English literature, and were examined by Professor William Blackburn of the English Department of Duke University. Mr Page was examined by Mrs Marli Ehrman, head of the Weaving Department in the School of Design in Chicago, and Professor Christopher Tunnard, lecturer in the School of Design of Harvard University, and was graduated in the field of art with special emphasis on textile design.
Nathan Rosen, professor of Physics, spent several weeks of the summer vacation at the Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, continuing in collaboration with Charles Lindsley, professor of Chemistry, the research problem on which they have been working here at the College. Mr Rosen is at present teaching in the summer school at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Mr Lindsley is remaining at MIT for a few weeks.
Josef Albers, professor of Art, is teaching in the summer session of the Graduate School of Design in Harvard University.
Application has been made for the privilege of maintaining a post office at the College. Such an office would serve the people living in the North Fork valley, as well as the College.
Several Black Mountain College students have come here from Antoich College. An interesting comparison of Antioch and Black Mountain, published in the Antiochian for April 11, was written by Will Hamlin who attended Black Mountain last year after three years at Antioch.
In the California Arts and Architecture of July, John Evarts, in an article called “Democracy an Action”, gives a good summary of the history, aims, and present program of the College.
Thomas Whitney Surette, one of the first members of the Advisory Council of the College, died at Concord, Massachusetts, last May, after an illness of over two years. Mr Surette joined the faculty of Black Mountain College in the fall of 1937 and continued to teach music here until he suffered the stroke that incapacitated him. He was a writer, lecturer on both music and poetry, conductor, adviser to scores of schools and colleges, and founder of the Concord Summer School of Music which he ran for a quarter of a century.
