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UB Choral Society To Drop Red Song \Meadowland\ From Programs ly ROBERT D. SCHAFFER At a regular rehearsal-meeting of the University of Buffalo Choral Ensemble, held last Monday, the question was placed before the Ensemble by their director, Wallace A. Van Lier, “Should we drop the Red Army song, ‘Meadowland’, from our repertoire?” The uprofir that followed would have gladdened the heart of any decent, red-blooded, liberal-minded American boy or girl (and I mean this seriously)! But . . . the song was dropped. Here is the background to the “uproar:” At the beginning of, this school year the whole Ensemble voted in a group to accept “Meadowland” (also known as the Russian Cavalry Song' into our repertoire for the coming year, along with half a dozen other numbers. Mr. Van Lier, always eager to please BADSllA C S — o f —t l l f l ifiem b ie, to TnAiin f fti-n— h igh artistic standards in the selection of music, was pleased to find the group eager and willing to sing this well-known, popular (heretofore), well-arranged choral number. At three (or four... the* exact number escapes me) high school concerts in this city, the subversive \1) piece of Rus sian music was sung... and well-received. There were no complaitfts, no letters from the KKK, Thomas Committee, et al. Then we went to sing for the Kiwanls Club and the political sparks started to fly. What was, we had thought, a purely musical organization suddenly became an instru ment for spreading a foreign ideology. Mr. Van Lier received a let ter from the wife of a faculty member of U. B. ^ho had heard the Ensemble at the Kiwanis concert and who was both surprised and worried at hav ing heard us sing “Meadow land”. Grave doubts began to assail some of the members of the Choral Ensemble as to the aid they might be giving the U. S. Communist Party by singing this now openly alleged Commie war-melody. After all, don't the words that we sing say that as loyal Russians we are protecting our Russian homeland from all a’ttackers? And isn’t it a perfectly hor rible thing for a nation to say that it will protect its home land? After all, none of our patriotic songs says anything like th a t... or do they? And .don’t-w e sing in a, pulsating tempo, double forte, “Soldiers are marching, soldiers are marching, soldiers are march in g ...” until you can prac tically see the Red Army walk into the concert hall? And na turally, no one wants to think about soldiers marching or army mobilization... that is, no one but the President of the United States of America ■^%o in absolutely irnequivocal terms called for UMT and Selective Service. But still, it’s shameful for us to sing of soldiers who are marching... or maybe it isn’t? So there you have it, tha't was the situation at the time of the “uproar.” Why am I proud of an “uproar.” Well, because this j iproar showed that there were a considerable (I’d say almost two-thirds of the' Ensemble) number of members of the Choral En semble who stood, up and claimed the right to sing any- (Continued on Page 3) PRIVILEGE CARDS SAVE STUDENTS DO RE Ml “Start saving today the NSA way,\ that’s the motto key noting the present drive of the UB chapter of the National Student Association’s privilege card system. The members in the various campus divisions are selling these cards for $1. They offer discounts of from 5 to 30% at local stores, thea ters, and service organizations. The cards can be, used until Jan. 1. 1949. A number of new business organizations have been a4ded to those already parti|j|^aUng in the plan which, through the concentration of student buy ing, will save considerable money for the students and faculty of the University.' As announced in last week's ARGUS, Posmantur’s three stores, the Sample Shop, the Record Rack, the Twentieth Century and Midtown theatres. Surplus Sales, Dick Fischer’s Sporting Goods, and Steward and Benson Leather Goods (Continued on Page 4) DEAN OF MED SCHOOL ANSWERS EDITORIAL Last week the ARGUS pub lished an editorial questioning the \value of a yearly physical examination.” The following article was written in answer to that editorial. What is the value of the year ly physical examination given at the University? In the October examination one girl was discovered by X-ray to have active pulmonary tuberculosis with living tubercle bacilli in her sputum. Her X-ray the previous spring had been normal. She was an early case. She did not know she was-UL DINNER SPONSORED BY HISTORY CLUB Monday, March 29, 1943, the History Club of the University is sponsoring a dinner in Nor ton Cafetetria to be followed by an address on “Conditions in Italy” by Prof. John Clark Ad ams in Norton Auditorium. The dinner will be given at 7 P. M. and the talk at 8 P. M. The price for the dinner will be $1.95, and is open to all interest ed persons.. Those wishing to attend the dinner should con tact Dr. Wilfred Kerr of the History Department as soon as possible to insure a reserva tion. Prof. Adams has just return ed from Italy where he served for three yars as Labor Attache to the American Embassy in Rome. This address, “Condi tioQS in Italy,” will be of great interest and importance in view of the forthcoming elec tions in Italy. The political sit uation there is of vital concern to all who wish to see the sur vival of democracy and world peace. Had the diagnosis not been made at this time, two things would have happened. Her dis ease would have progressed to a more advanced stage, much moiTe difficult to cure; and she w.ould have exposed fellow students to tuberculosis. She promptly entered a sanatorium for treatment. Another girl was discovered to have a very large cyst of the ovary weighing several pounds which has since been removed at operation. This also was un suspected by the girl. She thought she was getting fat. Had the tumor remained undis covered it might have changed to cancer. Tumors of the. breast were found in two girls. One girl and one boy were found to have toxic goiters. Other diseases . of the thyroid were found in five girls and ten boys. One boy was fouixi to have an early positive Wasserman which he had not suspected. He received immediate treatment. Heart murmurs were found in ten girls and 34 boys. One boy had a serious form of congenital heart disease of which he had not known. High blood pressure, persisting after re-examination, was found in several boys and girls. The commonest trouble was with the bone and joints — feet, back, etc. — 66 students were found to have abnormalities. Nineteen boys had hernias and three an undescended testicle. < A large number of defect^ in vision were noted. In the March examination, out of about 1000 students examined, 95 had de fects of vision suffiqient to re quire referal to an eye specialist. All students were notified of defects. All with defects were referred to their own physicians or to other physicians if they had no doctor of their own. Some were advised concerning participation in sports. Six stu dents were referred for psy chiatric aid. The more complete the exam ination the better — granted The present examination is suf ficient to discover promptly the majority of correctible defects in a group of young individuals. It is practically as complete and involves far less delay than did the former hospital examina tion, even though the student body was then far smaller. Pro cedures will be added to future examinati-'r's as they reveal (Continued on Page 3) ' ARGUS AnEMPTS TO CLARIFY ‘ NORTON LOBBY DEBATE ON UMT. In an attempt to present a factual account of the activities in Norton lobby and auditorium last Thursday, the ARGUS has obtained statements from the leading personalities engaged in this activity. According to- Gerard-J. Lankes, his part began when he asked the people at the YPCA table in Norton lobby why this organization opposed Universal Military Training, and then in quired why it was necessary to have a rally to argue the pros and cons of UMT. “ 'W^y a rally? Why not debate it right here?” • Lankes sa d he asked. His opponent, whom the AR GUS has identified as Morton Rubinow, and Mr. Lankes then negan to assay the whole ques- tion of UMT. Witnesses to the Tests Show Poor Lighting In Haves Aud., Classrooms Comparative light readings were obtained last week by an ARGUS reporter in an effort to impldment'our editorial of two weeks ago citing the poor light ing conditions, notably in Hayes. Readings were taken with a very reliable make of light meter under the best conditions possible for the comparison. Under a heavy overcast last Friday, classrooms necessarily were lighted artificially, hence the effects of outside sources were minimized. The following readings were obtained. They do not represent any particular light measure, but were calculated from an arbitrary standard and recorded in relative numbers: | Hayes Auditorium........ 251 Music Room ................. 100 Hayes 243 ..................... 100 Reference Reading Rm. l50 Library Main Read. Rm. 150 Crosby 201 ................... 150 Game R o o m ........... '... 130 Norton Lobby ............. 200 Magazine Reading Room 3-400 ARGUS Office ............. 300 Hayes 230 ..................... 300 Engineering 208 ........... 600 Drafting Room ........ 600 (The Ijist two have excellent flourescent lighting.) J The ARGUS cannot reason ably set up a standard for good reading light from these figures, but 150 seems to be a reasonable figure. Obviously the wide divergence shows that some of the above figures represent sub standard conditions. HARVARD, RADCLIFFE PLAN FRENCH CAMP NSA corpmittees working at Harvard and Radcliffe have initiated a plan for a summer camp for 50 of France's under nourished children between the ages of 8 and 12. These c\hildren whom Entre Aide, Francaise will choose, will come after Bastille Day (July 14) to a boarding-house in Vence, near Cannes on the Cote d’Azur; for six Or eight weeks of rest, food, and,healthful out door fun. ' Their supervision is to be undertaken by trained coun selors. Seven will be from Har^ vard arid Radcliffe, and seven from France. Each counselor must be able to' speak fluent French and have had more than merely preliminary camping and leadership experienqc. attair all agree that the diSCUS- sion was accompanied by an ever-growing crowd of spec tators. Lankes and Rubinow agree that Lankes asked whether Ru binow had sdrved in the Armed Forces during World War II and in which campaigns he had served. Rubinow declares that he refused to answer these questions inasmuch as he felt them to have no bearing on an UMT discussion, although Mr. Rubinow is a veteran of W. W. II. Spectators to the affair, including Rubinow, stated that at this point Lankes asked Rubi- now, . “Are you a Christian?” When interviewed by the AR GUS, Lankes denied having asked this question of Rubinow. At this point Gunnar Hanson, chairman of the UB chapter of YPCA, entered upon the scene and was invited to debate the question on the spot. Hanson agreed and he and Lankes mounted a table. During this time the crowd had grown to fill the lobby in Norton and had filtered up the stairway and the balcony. Lankes (claims that he now asked Hanson to explain where and from Whom YPCA received • their funds and literature and further states that Hanson de clined to answer these ques tions. Hanson states that he has no recollection of these ques tions having been asked of him. The asserribled students in the balcony now entered actively into the meeting and began to shower the speakers with bits of paper and debris. Rubinow states that he was hit on the bead by a coin hurled at him 'oy a spectator in. the balcony, but says that he was in no way injured. All parties agree that it was at this point that, while Lankes was attempting to show the con- equences of repeated aggres sive action on the part of ope nation towards another nation, one of the crowd in the balcony cried out, “I want a Wallace button.” Lankes then is said to have snatched e Wallace button from Hanson's jacket and to have thrown in into the air. Lankes says that after having thrown Hanson’s button away he immediately asked to have the button returned. In re- .sponse to Lankes’ request, the button was thrown back to the ..peaker’s table. During the affair the specta tors entered into the discussion by hurling questions and epi- (Continued on Page 4)