SUPPLEMENT
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SUPPLEMENT
VOL. LXI, No. 42 ANN ARBOR, MICHIGAN, SUNDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1950
PAGE NINE
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Tomorrow:
s
*Ir
Phoenix History'
Reflects Growth
Of Student Ideal
War Memorial Dedicated to Guest
For Peaceful Use of Atomic Energy
The beginning of the student Phoenix Project fund drive to-
na',-rrow will mark the end of Ka four year cycle.
The drive, which will be the final one in a series of drives
throughout the nation, will end with students what started with
students.
When the final campus collections are made Dec. 15, student
Phoenix workers hope to have the material means to begin turning
into reality the idea for a living war memorial that first took shape
in 1946.
IT WAS DEC. 18, 1946 that the Student Legislature approved
the idea of establishing a functional war memorial here, and laid
;tentative plans for a fund-raising
Harnessed for Humanity
1,200 Workers
Will Participate
Every Student Asked To Pledge $30
In Four-Week Campus Campaign
By VERNON EMERSON
The student fund-raising drive for the Michigan Memorial Phoenix
Project will begin tomorrow as more than 1,200 volunteer student
workers begin the mammoth job of contacting every student in Ann
Arbor for oontributions.
The drive will last until Dec. 8, and the pledges collected will go
toward fulfilling the $6,500,000 goal of the Phoenix campaign.
DRIVE CHAIMAN Mary Lubeck, '51, said he hopes that his crew
of canvassers will personally meet with every student attending the
University whether they live in an organized house group or not.
"The purposes of the campaign are twofold," according to
Lubeck. "First we want to educate students in the history and
objectives of the Project. Second, we want to raise money to take
care of the student share of the %
U' Serves
As Atomic
StudyCenter
Panels on Atom
Began Here in'23
By BOB SOLT
Since a group of scientists met
27 years ago to hold the first atom-
Ic panel discussion on the cam-
pus, the University has been a lead-
er in the study of how the atom
can be made to serve man in peace.
However, it's probable that the
scientists at the panel discussion
in 1923 had no idea that their con-
ference was to be the first step
toward "Phoenix Project-1950."
4 * *
THE FIRST conference was so
successful that scientists attend-
ing the panel decided that much
about the atom could be learned
more quickly if the panels were
made a yearly affair.
As a result, Prof. Harrison M.
Randall, chairman of the Phy-
sics department, asked the Board
of Regents in 1928 to invite sci-
entists from all over the world
to visit the campus each summer
to institute a permanent and
combined effort to study the
atom.
The Board of Regents agreed,
and from 1929 to the outbreak of
war in 1941, and after the war
ended, the campus has served as
a summertin~ headquarters for
hundreds of ding experts in the
field of nuclear fission.
HAD THE conferences not been
organized, its possible that many
scientists who came from all parts
of the world to attend the ses-
sions would not otherwise have
come to this country and made it
possible for the United States to be
a leader in the field of atomic de-
velopment.
Among the many outstanding
physicists attending the panels
have been Pauli of Switzerland,
Dirac of England, Bohr of Den-
mark, Fermi of Italy, and Law-
rene, Oppenheimer, Condon,
Saunders, and Compton of this
country.
No less important was the role
played-in the development of in-,
formation at the sessions by many,
University scientists.-
AMONG THEM are Professors,
George E. Uhlenbeck and Samuel1
A. Goudsmit, first expounders of;
the electron spin theory; Prof.;
Kasimer Fajans, one of the first
to define problems of radioactive
isotopes; and Prof. David M. Den-
nison, who has been hailed by the
government for his important top
secret war contributions.
The funneling of knowledge
about the atom to the campus
made it possible for the Univer-
tiv t tae an earlv Ia in A-
campaign.
The Board of Regents ac-
cepted the idea the following
September and named a facul-
ty-Student war memorial com-
mittee.
Under the chairmanship of Dean
Erich A. Walter, the committee
was made up of Prof. Robert An-
gell; Regent Roscoe O. Bonisteel,
Arthur R. Derderian, Prof. Wil-
liam Haber, Christian Matthews,
Vice-President Marvin L. Niehuss,
Arthur M. Rude, Virginia Smith
and Jacqueline Adams.
At the request of the Alumni
Association the group worked to-
ward the idea of making the me-
morial something more than a
"mere mound of stone the purpose
of which would soon be forgotten."
* * *
BUT THE IDEA of an atomic
research center came from outside
the committee. The suggestion
that the memorial be used to tame
the wild power of the atom came
from a New York publisher and
one time University student, Fred
J. Smith.
Smith called the idea a con-
structive solution to the patho-
logical fog created in the minds
of the people of the world by the
advent of atomic warfare.
The memorial committee receiv-
ed the plan enthusiastically in
October, 1947. Prior to their de-
cision~on Smith's scheme, they had
scanned and turned down scores
of other proposals from the coun-
try over.
* * *
THE IDEA OF establishing a
center to harness the atom for
peace came to Smith, then an
Associate Editor of the United
Nations World, after hearing a
French official criticize America
for devoting all its energy toward
creating the atom bomb to win the
war, while doing nothing to aid
humanity through the tremendous
discovery.'
The former University student
decided he would prove the
Frenchman wrong, but after in-
vestigation found that there
really had been little effort to
use the new energy for peaceful
purposes.
When he learned of the Univer-
sity's search for a memorial idea,
Smith suggested that a research
project the scope of the Man-
hattan project be set up here.
Smith even suggested that the
phoenix bird be used as symbol
for the project.
FROM THERE the memorial
committee took over. Legal sour-
ces at the University were con-
tacted to see just how far the
Project could go into the secrets
of the atom. The experts reported
that the Atomic Energy, Commis-
sion should be contacted before
any definite action was taken.
So in February, 1948 Dean
Walter, Dean Ralph Sawyer, of
the School of Graduate Studies,
and Dr. Fred Hodges, University
radiologist, went to Washington
tp confer with AEC officials.
After hearing the plans for the
Project, the AEC gave its solid
backing to the proposed peace-
tip -+fnmie. .re.sar chce,.ntr
cost of the Memorial"
Lubeck explained that the cam-
paign will be a once-in-a-life-
time affair. "The four-week per-
iod of the drive is the only time
students will be asked to contrib-
ute either as students or alum-
ni." *
NO OVERALL goal has been
set for the drive. Phoenix commit-
tee members are asking each stu-
dent to set an individual goal of
$30 for himself. Pledges will be
paid over a. three-year period be-
ginning in 1951.
The campaign chairman point-
ed to results of last spring's
senior fund-drive as a good ex-
ample of student giving. The
brief campaign netted $26,000 in
cash and pledges. For nearly
600 gifts the average donation
was $50.
"The low number of gifts was
due to limits of time and working
personnel," Lubeck noted."We on-
ly contacted one-sixth of the grad-
uating class."
* * *
BUT LUBECK and his execu-
tive committee are confident more
than that fraction of the student
body will be contacted in the com-
ing drive.
For the past four weeks the
standing Phoenix student com-
mittee has been getting ready
for tomorrow's kickoff.
First, voluntary workers had to
be rounded up. Most of these had
listed their names as prospective
workers at registration earlier this
fall.
Then extensive training of the
enlarged Phoenix crew was car-'
ried out. Now the new workers are
ready to travel the campus area
telling students of Phoenix.
* * *
IN FACT some house group con-
tacts have already been made.
But the major portion of the work
remains to be done.
"We hope to have most of the
work done in the next two
weeks," Lubeck said. "That
would leave us a couple of weeks
to clean up in."
Project speakers or a special'
Phoenix sound film strip will be
available for any house group that
requests them. This may be done
through the individual. house
Phoenix chairman. Lubeckhex-
plained. In this way each house
will be contacted.
THE JOB OF reaching students
living in private homes and
rooming houses will be a little
tougher. Biggest job in organiz-
ing the campaign so far has been
filing names of these people into
separate areas.
Each of these areas will be turn-
ed over to a Phoenix worker who
will contact the students in it.
Workers will be given areas in
which they live so that they will
be contacting- people they know
for the most part.
T bihar krn in dnA c nt tha t
Global Drive
Nets Million
For Phoenix
Closing Date Set
For End of Month
As the student Phoenix drive
begins tomorrow, other fund-
raising campaigns will be rushing
to a close throughout the nation.
The drive here will be only part
of a larger, world-wide campaign
to raise $6,500,000 for the Me-
morial.
* * *
THREE SEPARATE large-scale
drives and many smaller ones are
now in progress. The biggest
drives are the international alum-
ni, special gifts and faculty cam-
paigns.
The special gifts drive, under
the direction of George Mason,
'13, began last spring. Mason
and his crew of volunteer work-
ers have since been busy con-
tacting alumni, foundations and
industrial leaders who might
make large contributions to the
Project. To date the special
gifts committee has not an-
nounced any donations over
$20,000 but there are hopes
that gifts of around the million
dollar mark may be forthcoming
from some industrialists.
Atom Day, the first of last
month, was the kickoff for the
overall campaign. Following the
gigantic network of Atom Day
rallies from coast to coast, Ches-
ter H. Lang, '15, and a crew of
10,000 alumni volunteers began
the month-long talk of contacting
every person on record as gradua-
ting from the University.
* * *
IN FACT the job of telling 120,-
000 people the story of the Phoe-
nix Project turned out to be so
great that Lang had to extend the
closing date of the drive until the
end of this month.
Up to now the drive has net-
ted nearly $1,000,000, and Lang
has announced that 150 to 200
pledges a day are being received,
Atom Day served as opening day
for numerous other drives also.
Special drives are in progress cov-
ering students' parents, University
employes and - Ann Arbor busi-
nesses.
And alumnae are conducting a
drive of their own to set up a
cancer research foundation within
the Project in memory of Dean
Alice Lloyd, long-time Dean of
Women who died last March.
One of the busiest sections of
the alumni campaign is its over-
seas branch,WilliamsA. David-
son, '12, has the job of seeing
that nearly 4,000 alumni in 32 for-
eign countries are told about the
memorial.
ATOMIC ENERGY UNLEASHED-Pictured above is the awesome smoke which towered more than 20,000 feet high above Nagasaki
Aug. 10, 1945. This same tremendous energy will be harnessed by the Phoenix Project to aid, rather than destroy, man.
'BRIGHT POINT OF FUTURE':
Phoenix Project Hailed by Leaders
Throughout the country the
Phoenix Project has been hailed
by the nation's leaders as one of
the brightest points in the future
of atomic research.
From the time that the Project
was announced in 1948, compli-
ments have been flowing in.
OFFICIAL government blessing
was given the Memorial at the out-
set. The Atomic Energy Commis-
sion and the Office of Naval Re-
search sent their congratulations
to the student body for hitting up-
on the idea of a living memorial
dedicated to furthering research in
the peaceful uses of atomic energy
even before the Project was offi-
cially announced.
Since t h e n an unending
stream of praise has been heap-
ed on the Project.
In Congress Michigan's Sen.
Ferguson has told the story of the
research project in glowing terms.
by the government over atomic in-
formation.
Lilienthal's successor as boss
of AEC, Gordon Dean, has con-
tinued to give AEC sanction to
Phoenix.
"We wholeheartedly welcome
Michigan's lead toward more pri-
vately financed atomic energy re-
search in unclassified fields," Dean
has said. "This is basic to speedy
progress."
COMMENTING on the proposed
studies of the social implications
of atomic energy, Dean said, "We
are gratified by Michigan's strong,
support for objective studies of the
social, economic and ethical prob-
lems-thethuman problems-sur-
rounding the development and use
of this force for defense against
aggression, and for bettering our
material standards of living."
Dean hailed the Project as a
contribution to progress over and
beyond the primary service of
the biggest job in the lives of the
people of America-the battle for
freedom.
"You are engaging in a world-
wide contest that is seemingly
endless in duration. "We must
count and husband all of our
resources, whether they be the
product of our hands or our
hearts," he said, in addressing
University alumni and students
at the start of the national
Phoenix campaign last month.
ergy research is national security,"
he said.
He explained that Congress
members are waiting for the ad-
vice of such projects as the
Phoenix Memorial on many of
the problems facing them.
"My mail shows that the peo-
ple are afraid of the atom; do not
see its potential benefits," Sen.
Ferguson said. "Phoenix can aid
in answering the age-old question
of how to get good for all."
He noted that an expanded * * *
atomic research is a tremendously AROUND THE WORLD the
important evploitation of our nat- Voice of America has sent the mes-
ural resources. soge of Phe i a n thesp es-
"Few causes are more urgent to- sage of Phoenix. And the spokes-
day and more worthy of your sup- man for the United States in the
port. I commend you for your in- meeting place of the world, War-
terest in it, because I believe that, ren Austin of the United Nations,
in war or peace, the atomic re- has said that the Phoenix Project
search being done at the Univer-
sity of Michigan, and at many is the most exciting enterprise in
other centers of learning, will university research that he has
strengthen America through better ever encountered.
utilization of its natural resources. "This idea is a grand testimonial
i-juoec remn. Iu e su ens i- - a-
the 'idea for the Memorial origi- And the faculty is being fully
nated with them. "This makes the covered by Prof. William Haber,
i