6 page newsletter with updates and events on campus including a memorial service for Mark Drier. The newsletter begins with mention of BMC's contributions to the war effort. Ends with announcments of art exhibitions and visitors to campus.
Black Mountain College Newsletter
Number 16 November 1941
The college’s part in national defense
In the past few months Black Mountain College has contributed actively to the national defense program, and also has felt its effects. A number of students have been drafted, one of the members of Faculty has been called to a defense research project, building materials have been harder to obtain, and the number of applications for admission to the student body has slightly declined. The whole community feels the seriousness and urgency of the world situation and is eager to make such contribution as it can.
Charles Lindsley, professor of chemistry, was called, in the middle of October, to take a research post in national defense work at the University of Virginia. Before he left, Mr Lindsley spoke to the college about the place of science in the world of today. “The greatest threat to civilization is the present,” he said, “lies not in the fact that institutions long cherished and of great value to us are being challenged, altered, uprooted, or destroyed. It lies rather in the fact that this freedom to search for the truth, without fear or favor let or hinderance, is being challenged and openly denied, as a cardinal principle of policy, by a ruthless and relentless power intent upon extending its domination over the minds as well as the bodies of all men.”
He drew a parallel between the state of science in modern times and the persecution of Galileo in the seventeenth century. Galileo, inventor of the telescope and the father of modern astronomical knowledge, was forced by the Catholic Church to abjure and deny his discoveries because they contradicted the edicts of the church. “It is easy for us to condemn the judges and justify the condemned man,” said Mr Lindsley. “It is, on the other hand, much more difficult for us to try to understand the true significance of the spiritual and intellectual crisis of that time, a crisis of which Galileo’s trial is but a dramatic symbol.” It was a crisis, Mr Lindsley said, in which a new interpretation of the world was being questioned. For Galileo denied the existence of purpose in the realm of natural science. He, and scientists after him, replaced the question “to what end?” by the question “in what manner?” Since that time, scientists have been searching for the relations between things, not for the ultimate nature of the things themselves.
“Galileo, and before him Socrates and Jesus, were tried not on any particular belief or disbelief,” said Mr Lindsley. “They were tried and condemned because the truth they discovered and taught was a truth dangerous to a ruling class, dangerous to a status-quo. And is not the same issue on trial today- an indeed it has always been? In a large part of the world it is asserted that the good of the nation or the race- good as defined by a small group of rulers- is superior to the truth. Indeed it is asserted that there is no such things as objective truth about this world. There is Aryan science and non-Aryan science, just as there is Aryan art and non-Aryan art. What is true for the superior race cannot be true for the inferior. Truth is no longer to be regarded as the limit approached more and more nearly by the free and unprejudiced observer. Truth is what is expedient for the conquerors. Truth is what conforms to political dogma. Science is what strengthens the hand of the conqueror by freeing him from dependence upon those not under his control.
“We face a crisis,” Mr Lindsley concluded, “like that of Galileo. Can we for a moment countenance such a travesty of truth, such an interpretation of the nature and of the role of science? Freedom to search for the truth is today in the greatest danger since the middle ages. Above all else it is the spirit of free inquiry that was on trial in Galileo’s time. Above all else it is this same spirit that is on trial today. That is the challenge which we must meet today, even as did the men of three centuries ago, with all our strength, all our faith, and all our courage.”
A few weeks after his talk, Mr Lindsley left for the defense work he has undertaken. He is on leave of absence from the college for the rest of the year, and plans to be at Black Mountain again next fall. In his absence, chemistry classes are being conducted by Margot Bergmann, wife of Peter Bergmann, professor of physics.
Students drafted
Students of this year and last year who have been drafted for military service include: Eric Barnitz, Derek Bovingdon, Charles Forberg, Isaac Nakata, George Randall, and Morris Simon. Eric Barnitz was graduated last June; the other drafted students have been given leaves of absence for the duration of their military service. Paul Wiggin enlisted in the Canadian air corps last summer.
Jalowetz speaks
At one of its October meetings, Heinrich Jalowetz, professor of music, spoke to the college faculty. A digest of his talk is printed in this Newsletter because it was felt that his speech was significant in restating some of the aims of the college.
“We must differentiate between ideologies and ideas,” he said. “Ideologies are always strictly excluding, asserting themselves by discrediting any different opinion and putting anathemas on others. Our community must have a common idea; it must be based on ideas rather than on ideologies.
“Our college must give equal evaluation to all fields and take all of them extremely seriously, for only in this way can we reach a new kind of universality, an educational background which is opposed to the narrow-minded specialized training that is a characteristic of average education today. This genuine universality can only be reached if everybody sees the whole world in his own field.
“Because such genuine universality is a basic principle of the school, I have been able to see and to teach music not as distracting, light entertainment for the tired times after the serious hours of business, but as something that is a very strict discipline, that asks for our utmost concentration, and that offers an interpretation of the world and of life equal to any other. Words are not only means of approaching the absolute; other means of expression can and do build up a full world of their own at least as closely related to this absolute.
“We must avoid making a cult of words. Reliance on word magic makes it impossible to develop the genuine universality that we can reach only if we do not indulge too much in general pronouncements. We must substitute actions for talking; we must make sure that what we say really means something.
“And, each of us in his own field, we must try to give universal meaning to everything we do. We must see the general in the specific.”
Annual business meeting
At the annual business meeting of the Corporation of Black Mountain College, the faculty re-elected Robert Wunsch rector for the coming year and Josef Albers and Frederick Mangold members of the Board of Fellows.
Because a need was felt for more fluidity in the membership of the Board, legal action was started to amend the charter of the college to provide for two one year Board members. Those elected to these positions would not be eligible for re-election for another one year term. But they would be eligible for election to the regular three year positions on the Board.
New architecture professor
A new addition to the college faculty is Howard Dearstyne, architect, of New York, who comes to the college as assistant to A Lawrence Kocher. Mr Dearstyne is a graduate in architecture of the Bauhaus school of design in Dessau, Germany, and of the Columbia University School of Architecture. At the Bauhaus he studied under Mies van der Rohe, who recommended him to the Board of Fellows.
Mr Dearstyne was a member of the firm of Harrison and Foulhoux in New York and worked with them on plans for Rockefeller Center and for the Rockefeller Center apartments. This fall he has been working on defense housing with Antonin Raymond.
He will help in the development of a site-plan for the college, in cooperation with the Planning Committee. He will also teach a course in architectural structure and design detail work on new college buildings.
Mr Dearstyne’s appointment is the first step in the expansion of the architectural department of the college to provide better training for those planning to specialize in architecture.
Work progress
At a general meeting Monday night, October 27, the community voted to discontinue classes for the last three days of that week in order to get as far ahead on the work program as possible. The object was to finish laboratories, faculty studies, and classrooms so that academic work might be better and more easily carried on. Physics and chemistry laboratories in the old bathhouse building were finished except for the installation of heating and some scientific equipment not yet available. Enough rooms in the studies building were made usable to remove the necessity of having classes in the library or in the various lodges.
First dramatic productions
First dramatic productions for this year will be two of Moliere’s comedies, The Highbrow Ladies (Les Precieuses Ridicules), and The Physician in Spite of Himself (Le Medecin Malgre Lui).
The plays are to be produced both at the college and on tour. College production will be in December, and the tour is scheduled to begin shortly after the Christmas vacation. They are short enough to be given together in an evening’s program, but it is expected that one or the other will be given alone when the dramatics group goes on tour.
Settings and costumes have been designed by Frances Kuntz. As part of the work program, an old barn on the property has been transformed into a costume and scene shop, and construction for the plays is under way. Production at the college will be in the dining hall where a stage will soon be built.
Community discussions
There has been a growing feeling on the part of the Student Officers and some members of the community that a better understanding of the fundamental ideas and ideals of the college is necessary. Small discussion groups have been organized to cover, in rotation, the entire community. They will discuss certain problems in order to stimulate the community as a whole to a more responsible interest, and more intelligent participation, in the affairs of the community.
Senior division
Seven students were admitted to the Senior Division following examinations given on Monday and Tuesday, October 13 and 14. The students and their fields of concentration are as follows: Leonard Billing, architectural design; Thomas Brooks, sociology; Cynthia Carr, English literature; Will Hamlin, non-fiction writing; Mendez Marks, dramatics and playwriting; Barbara Steinau, psychology; and Eeva Zhitlowsky, textile design.
Mark Dreier
Mark Dreier, nine year old son of Theodore and Barbara Dreier, was killed on Wednesday afternoon, October 8, in an automobile accident near the Lake Eden dam.
A short memorial service was held at the Dreier cottage for the friends of mark on the following Sunday afternoon.
College concerts
Ruthabeth Krueger, Trudi Straus, and Heinrich Jalowetz gave the first concert of the season the evening of September 28. They played violin music by Pugnani, Schubert, and Bach.
On October 3, Miss Verena Peschl, contralto, sang music by Italian, French, German, and American composers. Miss Peschl was assisted by Mrs Straus and Dr Jalowetz.
Ruthabeth Krueger played again on October 10. Her program included music by Mozart, Bach, and Brahms.
Maude Dabbs, Mrs Straus, and Dr Jalowetz gave a concert of Beethoven music on October 17.
Miss Radiana Pasmore, contralto, of Converse College, Spartanburg, South Carolina, sang at Black Mountain College on October 24. Moussorgsky, Debussy, Brahms, and several contemporary American composers were represented in her program. Miss Pasmore was accompanied by Constance Fox, also of Converse.
Radio programs
Black Mountain College has renewed its series of radio programs over station WWNC, Asheville, on Sunday nights from 9:00 to 9:30. The first program was by Ruthabeth Krueger, violinist. This was followed on November 9 by Maude Dabbs, who gave a piano recital, and Paul Radin, who gave a short talk.
On November 16, 23, ad 30, the teachers and students in the course in American Life and Letters will inaugurate a series of programs on “The American Dream”. During the half hour broadcasts dramatizations of important moments in the lives of Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, and Davy Crockett, will precede discussion of their ideas. The programs will be punctuated with American folk-songs from each period, and will attempt to analyze and clarify the importance of these men to the pattern of American culture as it developed during their lives and as it exists now.
The Black Mountain College Players will perform Moliere’s The Highbrow Ladies on the December 7 broadcast. The program will be accompanied by music of the seventeenth century played by the college string quartet.
As its last program before the Christmas vacation, the college will present on Sunday, December 14, a Christmas program combining drama and music, written by Mendez Marks.
Atlanta trip
Robert Wunsch and four students, Leslie Paul, Jane Robinson, Thomas Brooks, and Fred Stone, made a four day trip to Atlanta and Greensboro, Georgia, late in October. While the students visited Dr Arthur Raper, southern sociologist, co-author of Sharecroppers All, and author of The Tragedy of the Negro Lynching, Mr Wunsch attended the fall meeting of the Secondary School Study of the Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools of Negroes, of which he is a member.
New York conference
John RP French Jr, Leslie Paul, and Will Hamlin represented the college at a conference of Progressive College Community Councils in New York City, Monday and Tuesday, October 27 and 28. The conference was called by the Goddard college community council and included representatives from Goddard, Bennington, Bard, Black Mountain, Antoich, and Sarah Lawrence.
The purpose of the meeting was a discussion and clarification of the aims and functions of a college government which includes a whole community rather than being limited to students alone or faculty alone. Problems discussed included the relation of a community government to the community it governs, the problem of college standards and their enforcement, the voice of the community in matters of administration, and the place of such a government in coordinating community activities.
The Black Mountain delegates reported on the conference at a discussion meeting Sunday night, November 2.
North Carolina colleges
Kenneth Kurtz and Robert Babcock of the college faculty represented Black Mountain at the twenty-first North Carolina College Conference in Greensboro, North Carolina, November 5 and 6.
Art exhibitions
During the month of November, necklaces by Anni Albers and Alex Reed are being shown at the Katherine Kuh Gallery in Chicago and at Outlines, a gallery in Pittsburgh, where they will be in a joint show with jewelry by Alexander Calder. In December, the necklaces will be at the Addison Gallery of American Art at Phillips Academy, Andover, Massachusetts.
During October, paintings by Josef Albers were included in an exhibition of the work of European Artists Teaching in America at the Addison galley. Notes of the exhibition and reproductions of some of Mr Albers’ painting were printed in several art magazines.
Visitors
Mr Paul Kelpe, well-known abstract artist of Chicago, recently spent several days at the College as the guest of Frederick Mangold. Mr Kelpe was educated in Europe where he received his degree in architecture and the history of art. Sometime later he began painting, and since 1930 his work has been well known. His paintings have been exhibited in the Museum of Modern Art and at the Whitney Museum in New York City, in the Art Institute of Chicago, and at the Delgado Museum in New Orleans.
Dr Juan Lliteras, a lawyer of Havana, Cuba, spoke before the members of the Current Affairs group on November 6. He discussed the possible bases on which Pan-American policy might be founded. Dr Lliteras, a graduate of the University of Havana, is visiting the United States with his wife and daughter.
Mr and Mrs David Kaplan, friends of Dr William Zeuch, formerly of the Black Mountain faculty, spent their recent vacation at the College. Mr Kaplan is chief economist for the International Brotherhood of Teamsters. He has always been interested in labor movement, and has worked in factories, packing houses, iron mines, in railroad construction, and on the sea. After studying at Commonwealth College, Mr Kaplan took his master’s degree in economics at the University of Wisconsin. In his work with the Teamsters’ Union he prepares and presents arbitration cases and advises the Union on economic matters.
