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Page Six
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
Sunday.January15.1956
SundayJanuary.15,1956
THE MICHIGAN DAILY
JF
r
Activities Men
"BIG
RED"
The
Rise of Richard.Ni
Dirty Shirts & Beer Busts
THE REPRESENTATIVE: Usually really good only when
hands with someone . . . undeniably a grand guy and
great one for parties.
shaking
often a
(Continued from Page 5)
0-_ -.
doesn't do him much good to take
a stand on anything, because few
pay him any serious attention.
6. THE HUSTLER is forever
bringing up new things and stir-
ring up new controversies. Ordin-
arily on or near the top of his
organization, he is sure of himself
and sincerely interested in con-
structive accompisnments for the
welfare of students, which re-
mains, nevertheless, a subjective
matter.
He usually keeps an open mind
on the issues that arise, but takes
a strong stand once he decides his
side.. Usually dissatisfied with the
way things are, he works hard to
improve them, even in his own
organization. These are among
the qualities that made him a suc-
cess in his organization.
He thrives on controversy and
is, in some ways, like The Agita-
tor. He certainly enjoys the pub-
licity he gets and takes at least
some satisfaction in a sense of
accomplishment and in the feeling'
of power that accompanies it.
Although he may have a very
pleasant personality, he is some-
times unpopular with other "cam-
pus leaders," both because he up-
sets their complacency and be-
By FRED STEINGOLD
T~HE MEN of Gomberg House,
South Quad, are proud of their
house and their spirit for the
house is expressed in everything
they do.
If their praise of Gomberg !
seems boastful at times, it's only
because the men have developed
a high degree of self-confidence
based on their outstanding
achievements in practically every
phase of student activity.
Dean of Men Walter B. Rea
says that Gomberg is a unique
house and represents the type of
house the University is seeking to
develop. He calls attention to the
house "spirit and loyalty."
The spirit has paid off in many
ways. Evidence of it is seen in
the Gomberg trophy case which is
filled with 18 awards ranging from
a three-year intra-mural sports
championship trophy to a plaque
for having the third highest
grade-point average for men's
houses last year.
SUCCESS IS part of the Gomberg
tradition which was begun in
1951 by Gil McMahon, Gomberg's
first resident advisor. He was re-
sponsible for interesting Gomberg
men in extra-curricular activities.
and they've been interested ever
since.
The tendency to help one an-
other shows up in scholastics as
well as in athletic endeavors. Two
years ago a 'group of freshmen in
the house were studying, with
difficulty, for a chemistry blue-
book.
Bernie Berman, then a pre-med
student, brought a large black-
board into the lounge and for
three nights he lectured to the
freshmen on chemistry. Their
performance on the exam raised
the grading curve considerably.
TEAM WORK played an import-
ant part in Gomberg's victory
in a tug-of-war last October. The
participants in the contest bor-
rowed a rope from the Detroit
Police department. They practiced
for several nights and when the
tug-of-war came they pulled the
heavier opposing team into the
Huron River.
The whole house usually turns
out when Gomberg is participating
in a competitive event. Shouts of
"Go Big Red" fill the air as Gom-
berg men cheer the team on to
what they hope will be another
victory for the house.
"Big Red" is the shortened form
of the "Big Red Machine," Gom-
berg's official nickname. The house
colors of red and white appear in
Gomberg jackets, derbies, and beer
mugs.
Even when they are not made
conspicuous by their red jackets,
Gomberg men can be singled out
of a group. Their house usually
has the largest block of seats at
such events as Gulantics and
Union Opera.,
LESS FORMAL socializing is
practiced by the 34 members
of the GOE-Gomberg Older Ele-
ment. The only qualification for
membership in that organization
is that the member be 21 years
old. The chief functions of the
organization are "spontaneous"
meetings at local taverns.
Another event which makes live-
ly conversation for Gomberg men
is the famed Gomberg Dirty Shirt
contest which began in September
of 1952.
Participants had to wear the
oversized Gomberg shirt for a full
day whenever their name was
drawn by lot. The incentive was
a pot into which each contestant
put 50 cents. As time went on, the
shirt got dirtier' and dirtier and
the wearer often found that he
was a social outcast.
Men dropped out of the contest
when they had to wear the shirt
on a date. Finally, in April of 1953
one brave man won himself the
25 dollar pot.
The runner-up received the
shirt.
A MORE serious expression of
Gomberg spirit is demonstrated
by the Kelsey Memorial Award
which the house has set up in
memory of Jack Kelsey.
Kelsey was a Gomberger who
made a valuable contribution to
the house and the school through
his work in many student organi-
zations. He died last April just
two months after graduation.
The Award provides an annual
stipend for the Gomberg man who
is most outstanding in "citizen-
ship, scholarship, and versitility
of aptitude."
"This award," says Dean Rea,
"is representative of Gomberg's
group solidarity and affection --
that bond which means so much
to a living group."
THE HUSTLER: Sure of him-
self, thrives on controversy, in-
terested in constructive accomp-
lishments.
cause he has been more success-
ful than they. However, they do
not let this show, because of prag-
matic considerations attendant to
a fear of antagonizing him.
By PHIL BREEN
RICHARD M. NIXON, the Vice
President of the United States,
is a remarkable man. Nine short
years ago he was a political non-
entity, quiet, shy, and embarras-
singly sincere. Today, he is a
superb hand-shaker, a magnifi-
cent back-slapper, .and odds-on
favorite to win the 1956 Republi-
can presidential nomination, if
Ike doesn't run.
Mr. Nixon is equipped with all
the personal qualities and abilities
important to a winning politician.
He is personable. He is energetic.
He is ruthless. He-can shed a tear
at the click of a flash-gun and he
can smile in the best toothpaste
ad style. He is bright-eyed, fat-
checked, and cheerful-looking-
the picture of "Republican peace
and prosperity., His friends, are
many and influential, and he has
organized a legion of supporters
behind him.
As the Nixon-for-President
bandwagon rolls up steam and the
1956 campaign draws near there
,will be much said and witten,
shouted and whispered about Vice
President Nixon. The public will
want to know more about this ris-
ing young man from California,
and it ,.ill have a hard time sift-
ing the fact from the fable, separ-
ating the truth from the half-
truth and the half-truth from the
outright lie.
RICHARD Milhous Nixon was
born on January 9, 1913 at
Yorba Linda, California. He is de-
scended from Quaker stock and
he spent his formative years in
Whittier, California, a town which
was founded by pioneering Quak-
ers in the 1880's and in which the
influence of Quaker virtue was
still very heavy during the time
Nixon was growing up.
Nixon's family operated a small
grocery, Nixon's Market, u hich his
brother Donald now runs. The
family business was a modest one,
but enough to provide the Nixons
with a small measure of prosperity
and to enable Hannah and Frank
Nikon to educate three sons in the
ways of Quaker tolerance and
generosity.
In 1934 the newly-founded Duke
University Law, School offered
him a scholarship and he accept-
ed. He graduated from Duke in
1937 with honors and went back
home to Whittier to practice law.
When World War II erupted
Nixon moved to Washington to
work for a government agency;
which badly needed lawyers. By
law his Quaker religion exempted.
him from military service. He felt,
however, that this was a war
which "had to be fought." He ob-
tained a Navy commission in 1943
and saw combat in the South,
Pacific. Near the end of the war,
he was transferred to an office in
'Baltimore to work on Navy con-
tracts.
"Amateur Candidate"
ONE SUMMER day, in 1945,
while he was observed in the
routine of his desk job, he received
a telephone call from a long time
friend of the family, banker Her-
man Perry. Perry told Nixon that
a 100 man committee of theRe-
publican leaders of California's
Twelfth District were looking for
a man to run for Congress. In
1946 the committee, In desperate
need of a candidate, had bought
space in the state newspapers ad-1
vertising themselves, to use thef
Saturday Evening Post's words,
as "amateur politicians searchingI
for an amateur candidate," and
"Are you available?" Perry
asked Nixon.
"I am," NixoiA quickly replied.
"Are you a Republican?"
"I guess so," Nixon answered. "I
voted for Dewey in '44."
Nixon took a plane out to the
Coast and appeared before the
committee. They unanimously en-
dorsed him. He was on his way.
At the age of 33, Richard Nixon,
the man of Quaker ideals, had
taken the first step on the way to
becoming Richard Nixon, the poli-
tician.
A grass-roots candidate, he
knew little about campaigning.
He learned fast. He canvassed the
whole area, talking to business
and community leaders in every
town in the sprawling Twelfth
District. Finally, he inveigled his
Democratic opponent, Jerry Voor-
his, into meeting him in a public
debate.
At the debate Nixon accused
Voorhis, who had served in the
House of Representatives for ten
years, of being a "New Deal Soc-
ialist." He produced documentary
evidence showing that Voorhis
was endorsed by an organization
some of whose members belonged
to 'the CIO Political Action Com-
mittee, a group which was then
controlled by Communists. Ham-
mering away at Voorhis' alleged
radicalism, Nixon went on to win
the election by a big majority,
At the outset of his political
career he had used a winning
campaign strategy which he has
employed ever since: attack. Blast
away at every one of your oppon-
ent's weak spots, and say little,
if anything at all, about your own
policies and plans. Sell your per-
sonality to the public, not your
ideas. Be quick, forceful, and dar-
ing. "The greater the risk, the
greater the opportunity," as he
has said.
"Lost & Frustrated"
A S A freshman Congressman he
"felt lost - frustrated." A
Washington newspaper even feat-
ured an article about him entitled,
"Greenest Congressman in Town."
But again he learned fast. He was
assigned to the "Labor and Educa-
tion Committee of the House and
was instrumental in the passage of
the -Taft-Hartley Labor Relations
Act and other important meas-
ures.
1948 saw him easily re-elected
and he returned to Congress to
take a post on the House Un-
American Activities Committee. It
is reported that he had serious
misgivings about joining the Com-
mittee, that he was afraid the
work of the Committee might
damage the basic American -free-
doms.
"We are deeply concerned," he
said, "that in our efforts to com-
bat and break up subversive
movements ... we do not impair
or destroy any of the rights and
liberties which we hold so funda-
mental in America."
Subsequently he publicly de-
clared for the rights of accused
individuals to refrain from giving
self-incriminating evidence, and
he urged some coded procedure
governing the actions of all chair-
men of Congressional investigat-1
ing committees.;
It was, however, because of his
work on the Un-American Activi-i
ties Committee that Nixon first
gained national fame. He became]
an expert Red-hunter, springing
suddenly into the national spot-
light when the Committee explod-
ed the Alger Hiss-Whittaker
came the prime mover in the af- 1 nary speeches in the annals of
RICHARD M. NIXON . . .. "The greatest error you can make
in politics is to get mad."
"I started with ideas of black or white. -But I found that it's hard to find anywh(
where it's all black or all white . .. I found compromise is often what is righ
Nixon's 1Transformation From "The Greenest Congressmar
To "One of the Great Leaders of Men"
'i
fair, making headlines every day.
He became wonderfully adept at
appearing before cameras and
microphones, giving speeches and
holding press conferences.
Nixon the Quaker ,was fast be-
coming Nixon the actor, Nixon the
orator, and above all, Nixon the
politician.
BY 1950 the transformation was
complete. He had become, as
political history.
Pouring out the details of his
family's penury, he claimed that
the fund was necessary to defray
the many expenses of Senatorial
life that a Senator's salary ordi-
narily couldn't afford, and that
the contributors of the fund did
not expect and did not receive any
special favors.
Choked with emotion, he
made references to his wife and
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-Daily-Chuck Kelsey
HOUSE LOYALTY sometimes turns out like this. The famed
Gomberg Dirty Shirt Contest, which ran through seven months
of contestants, resulted in a 25 dollar bill for the winner-the
odoriferous shirt for the loser.
The British Philosopher Took His Tea
There
By RICHARD LAING
THE South Cafeteria of the
Michigan Union will never be
the same.
The carved-top tables will still
be there and so will the "captain's
chairs," t hose "beefed-up" bow-
back Windsors painted in solid
blues and reds and yellows.
It will still be a cafeteria; the
alums in fall top-coats will still
(during mealtimes) be able to
find the really famous carvings.
The record of the Rose Bowl games
of 1902 and of 1948 and 1951 and
names like "Germany" Schultz
and Willie Heston will still be
there.
I suppose even those scores that
have been altered by disgruntled
anti-Michigan fans will still be
there, the 6 points their team
made cleverly converted to 36 or
to 61.
All this will still be there and
people will still eat there. What
then is lost or missing? Well, the
between-meals loungers will no
longer be there. The old south
side is to become part of a nice
neat meal-time-only cafeteria. And
it was never the mealtime-only
people that made the place what
ANY mid-afternoon a few years
ago, one might, in looking for
some especially famous table top,
find near the scores of the '48
games another carving for that
year. It would be down at the
far end, opposite from where the
professor is examining photostats
of Alexandrian papyri.
At that far end, near the foot-
ball records we find that "G.O.
'84" has somehow anachronisti-
cally managed to carve "War is
Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignor-
ance is Truth."
Evidently 1948 was some sort of
strange topsy-turvy world in which
more than that Rose. Bowl game
occurred.
Someone must have been a bit
annoyed about something then,
but the Professor of Classical
Studies seems unperturbed. He
is somewhat more the scholar than
the rebel. Perhaps his scholar-
ship is a rebellion. For the princi-
pal "loungers" of the South Cafe-
teria were rebels or scholars. Most
were a bit of both.
Tea & Vitriol
THE clergyman who had proved
that the world was flat used,
to sit there. The man with the
the Armenian fight for independ-
ence did his writing there.
The young man who pulled the
wires out of the public address
"squawk-box" was there along with
a friend who did the same thing
a few weeks later. Dozens of dis-
sertations were begun and finished
there and scores of graduate stu-
dents studied there for prelimin-
ary exams for the PhD.
Several Hopwood Award win-
ning manuscripts were written
there. Every evening a depart-
ment chairman had a dish of but-
ternut ice cream and read the next
morning's Free Press.
A visiting British philosopher
found the place on his second day
in town and after that always
had tea and cookies there at 3:30
p.m.
Cab-drivers, would-be lawyers,
candidates for the Neuro-Psychia-
tric Institute, mathematicians, and
the student who carved the Or-
well slogans all sat at the same
round-table.
OFTEN it was difficult to separ-
ate the scholars from the reb-
els. This was made more difficult
because some were hybrids. At
the same table with the . rebels
there was a young man who used
to sit cross-ways in one of those
"captain's chairs," legs hanging
over the arm.
His companions kept talking
and he kept reading. One day he
announced to them that he was
leaving to take a teaching appoint-
ment in an eastern university.
While they had quarreled over
the state of the nation, the nature
of reality, and women of Belleville,
-4e had quietly secured his PhD.
Reality & Ridicule
Scores of men date their in-
tellectual growth from the occa-
sion of some particularly intense
discussion there. There were those
that backed off from life abd those
that dove head first into it without
prior examination of the depth of
the water.
Now and then things were quite
grim. There were those who had
tried to get rid of themselves.
There were missing places for
those who had succeeded. Some-
one was always writing a-play, ex-
plaining it.
NEW cafeteria will be neat-
er, cleaner, and better lighted.
It will be open only during meal-
time. There will be an all-hours
tap-room but it will include TV,
radio; and juke-box.
the students. Most of the South
Cafeteria hangers-on have gone
off somewhere else, and the new
tap room will not suit them.
But the tall, and the short and
the medium sized classical scholars
are still in town. The professor
of history, and the department
head who had his ice cream there
every evening are still around.
So are the two professors of ro-
mance languages, and the student
who studied for prelims with his
gloves on, and the teachers of
English who had their conferences
with students there.
THERE are still some of the
graduate students about who
found that their writing was bet-
ter in this place where though
there were other humans nearby
-those humans did not shout to
assert their presence.
One of the young men who tore
the wires out of the P.A. system
is still around and so is the Union
house-man who every night flicked
the lights at 11:10 p.m. and began
putting the red and blue and yel-
low chairs up on the carved tables.
Maybe the student I once saw
there, who carefully salted his
newspaper, page by page as he
read it is still around. There must
Robert Coughlan has put it, "a
completely political man," mach-
ine-like in his "ability to digest
political factors and come up with
the predictions." As candidate for
the Senate from the State of Cal-
ifornia, he was a natural.
He based his campaign on the
"failure of the Administration's
'Par Eastern policy which had
made the Korean War inevitable,
made the Korean War inevitable,"
and he linked disloyalty in the
Government, as evidenced by the
Hiss case, with this policy.
Nixon accused his Democratic
adversary, Helen Gahagan Doug-
las of being subversively inclined
and pointed out that in the House
of Representatives she had voted
354 times for the same bills Com-
munist..-Congressman Vifo Mar-
cantonio had voted for.
His decisive victory added to the
Republican landslide of 1950. Nix-
on had now won three in a row,
and he was ready for the next
one. The prospect of California's
32 electoral votes and Eisenhow-
er's personal liking for the man
boomed him (into the. Republican
vice-presidential nomination in
1952.
"Nickels for Nixon"
HE WAS vigorously campaign-
ing for the GOP cause when
the story of a secret fund (which
Democrats facetiously l a b e l e d
"Nickels for Nixon") which had
been raised for him while he was
a Senator was brought before the
public. Party leaders were shocked,
feared the outcome of the election
was in serious jeopardy, and asked
Nixon to resign-from the race.
Nixon demanded a chance to
vindicate himself, and on October,
1952, before a radio and television
children, and even to the family
dog Checkers which an admirer
from Texas had sent him. ("You
know, the kids love that dog,
and I want to tell you right now,'
that regardless of what they say
about it, we're going to keep
it.")
As a result of the speech Nixon
received some two millio4 favor-
able letters and telegrams and the
unanimous re-endorsement of the
GOP.
Afterwards, speaking about his
performance, he gushed: "I told
my wife I didn't think I could do
it. But it was like before starting
in a football game. You're all
keyed up, you're praying, your
knees are full of water. But then
they blow the whistle and you get
in there and hit that line. I
probably had been preparing to do
it all my life."
NIXON had been spared the
political axe, but his influence
and prestige among fellow Re-
publicans was seriously damaged.
His performance as vice-president
has been a real political comeback.
No one stands higher in the
eyes of President Eisenhower than
Nixon. Ike has described the Vice-
President as "one of the great
leaders of men" and as "the most
valuable member of my team."
In the Eisenhower Administra-
tion Nixon has achieved the repu-
tation of "Mr. Fix-it"-the man
who is most responsible for any
semblance of harmony in the Re-
publican Party. He has become
the liason man between the White
House and stubborn Congressional
leaders, the mediator between the
left and right wing of the GOP.
RESIDENT Eisenhower has al-
lowed Vice-President Nixon to
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