00:00:01.379 - 00:00:22.389

Mr Poly Moor. Today is June 11th, 1969. Uh We're at the home of uh Doctor Du Levin at, for 986 Dumfries in Houston time is uh 1005. This is interview number um 31. Uh Doctor Levin. Could you just uh give me your address, uh something to

00:00:22.399 - 00:00:40.049

test this microphone setting. Let's see how it registers. 4986 Dumfries Drive. Ok. I think that'll be all right. We were just getting acquainted here, Doctor Levin. I was giving you an idea of what it is we're looking for in these uh in these interviews. Uh where

00:00:40.060 - 00:00:54.040

the, these are the very unstructured interviews we're understood in your, your total recall, uh everything that uh occurred to you. Uh uh how you analyze the situation, how it appeared to you, uh how you perceived it, uh what actions you took. If you were uh involved

00:00:54.049 - 00:01:11.440

in any of the uh uh activities as a participant, I would like to uh uh know your reactions to those, your, your reasons for doing what you did. And um if you were not, then we're interested in your uh your uh eyewitness report. Well, maybe we

00:01:11.449 - 00:01:34.809

should go back uh to 1963 when I first arrived at Rice for interviews. One of the people who interviewed me was uh Professor Masterson himself, who at that time was Dean of Humanities. And at that time, our relationship was quite good. Uh The dean was quite

00:01:34.819 - 00:01:58.540

interested in building up the humanities in general and he expressed a great interest in building up classics in particular. And this is one of the reasons why I was attracted to Rice. And uh I think good relationships continued uh while he was Dean. However, I became

00:01:58.550 - 00:02:21.449

aware later that uh there were others on campus who were not at all happy with uh Professor Masterson's performance. But even after he had ceased to be dean, there were rumbles and grumblings coming out of the history department, particularly from younger men. And uh at the

00:02:21.460 - 00:02:43.929

time, I suppose I didn't pay too much attention. Although I do know of one excellent younger historian who left Rice because Masterson was still in the department and making his life miserable. I also know of two other younger men who didn't leave Rice, mainly because Masterson

00:02:43.940 - 00:03:04.830

left first and the prospect of his return uh was really most discouraging to these two men who were both on leave and were both thinking of going elsewhere. So I'd like you to see both sides of it. Now, of course, uh being not a member of

00:03:04.839 - 00:03:32.360

the history department, but only hearing it from members themselves who had various gripes later on. I heard about gripes in the English Department. Uh, I, I really didn't pay too much attention, however, yeah, I suppose the next step will, will drop several years with the nature

00:03:32.369 - 00:03:47.169

of the complaints against Masterson. Did they sound to you at the time as though they were really genuine, legitimate? I think so. Or were they? That's just against any administration? No, I think, don't forget this was even after he had ceased to be dean, these younger

00:03:47.179 - 00:04:06.259

men felt that uh the younger people in the department were being uh sort of, oh, what's the right way to express it are being treated as if they should be seen and not heard. In other words, uh If you were a junior man, you don't count.

00:04:07.630 - 00:04:29.959

Now, I should point out that during this period for five years. Professor Rath was chairman of the history department. He himself fought very hard uh in behalf of these younger men, getting them promotions and pushing some of them into tenure positions. And uh I guess that

00:04:29.970 - 00:04:52.709

he and Professor Masterson frequently found themselves in conflict uh on that particular score. But I do know that uh probably were it not for Professor Raths championing of the younger men? Uh We would have had mass defections instead, he, he brought more uh able young scholars

00:04:52.720 - 00:05:13.019

to rice, really worked hard at it at building up that department. And now they have really some excellent people there uh whom I hope we can hang on to. Well, you've been on several uh campuses. Um It is the, is this complaint widespread in your opinion?

00:05:13.029 - 00:05:35.339

Uh The complaint against about younger or by younger members of faculty against the, the old line uh top echelon? Well, uh I suppose it's not at all uncommon, uh especially if you uh get an arrangement whereby there's sort of generation gap between the old timers who

00:05:35.350 - 00:05:55.399

came in under a different setup when uh different uh things were demanded of professors. Um Some of them came in at a time when uh there wasn't much of, of a demand that they be productive scholars, whereas most of these younger people, at least who came

00:05:55.410 - 00:06:14.899

in in the history department. Uh in fact, uh this was an important element in their selection that they be not only uh able in the classroom but that they advance uh the field. And I think that this younger crew uh really are that sort of people.

00:06:15.029 - 00:06:35.019

That's why I'm very eager for them to stay. Well, when I speak about other campuses though, what I'm well aware of is how uh the typical English Department at other campuses where I've been is one that is full of factions and feuds. Now, the remarkable thing

00:06:35.029 - 00:06:55.209

during the uh Masterson crisis was that the English Department at Rice, if it had been subjected to any cleavages, somehow got together and there was a remarkable unanimity. I don't know how long it will last, but it was there and there was a feeling of companionship

00:06:55.220 - 00:07:18.089

in that department. Now, the history department is a little different. Don't forget Masterson was himself an historian and, uh, he had both his champions and his, uh, determined enemies in the same department. And, uh, for a while, I guess, uh, things were sort of edgy during

00:07:18.100 - 00:07:42.989

and after the crisis. I, I suspect that, uh, the situation has calmed down since. But, um, it is rather interesting that, uh, you had on the one hand, uh, the chairman of the department, Professor Rath was one of the original signers of that manifesto issued on

00:07:43.000 - 00:08:05.589

the 21st of February along with, uh, Professor Hyman, who had just re, uh, just arrived from the U of Illinois. On the other hand, of some of, uh, Masterson's most ardent champions included, uh, Professor Vandever, who at the moment was chairman of the Department, of course,

00:08:05.600 - 00:08:30.500

later became acting president. And, uh, I guess for a while, things were pretty touchy though. Uh, the thing that I've noted about most of these historians is they are big men and, uh, they are able, I think to surmount these temporary squabbles and perhaps are able

00:08:30.510 - 00:08:52.348

to respect one another's viewpoints. So the same was true in our own department and not C I PR s of Professor Castaneda was a strong pro Masterson man. He and I disagreed publicly on several occasions and even on the day of the uh student faculty poll

00:08:52.359 - 00:09:12.270

with our whole department gathered in his office. He and I debated the merits of the, uh, propositions on the ballot, the Monday, the 24th of February. And uh, I guess as a kind of demonstration to the rest of the department, but we were still friends. We

00:09:12.280 - 00:09:31.369

shook hands afterwards. Let me ask you one thing, you use an expression C IPCC I pr S classics, Italian, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish. You can see why initials are helpful. I see. I uh I had uh as a classicist. Are you in with this group or

00:09:31.380 - 00:09:56.409

you're not in English or no? Are you? Well, we, we uh we cooperated with other departments but I'm part of this uh C I PR S classics and other languages, Italian, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish. Well, I did want to uh get back to the next stage.

00:09:57.059 - 00:10:16.969

I mentioned 63. My relationships with Masterson were good. He always treated me personally well. And as far as I could see, treated our department well, I suppose it may have helped that uh Jim Castaneda was on very friendly terms with him, but at that time, it

00:10:16.989 - 00:10:42.739

uh was hardly something that I, I would have noticed. Uh well, in 66 when he left or was it 65 as I said, some of the younger historians decided to stay well. Uh no more of that until uh the summer of 68 many of us had

00:10:42.750 - 00:11:03.020

been, let's say, great admirers of President Pitzer. I think that, uh there was a remarkable amount of respect and admiration for him on this campus. Something rare for presidents as a matter of fact. Oh, he had his, uh, his enemies and his detractors to be sure.

00:11:03.030 - 00:11:18.609

But I think that uh a very vast majority of people on campus, I looked upon him with favor and the thing that we feared the most was that sooner or later, one of the schools in the big leagues was going to snare him away from us.

00:11:19.080 - 00:11:40.960

So, uh when we heard that uh Stanford was after him, we figured that this is it. Well, it was uh with some trepidation and uncertainty that we got the news in August that he was definitely going and uh still uh there was a great deal of

00:11:40.969 - 00:12:07.780

optimism in October and November of that year, uh when we had uh our faculty meetings and we're establishing the uh uh procedures for uh helping get a president selected. Now, we had already received a word from the trustees that they were going to operate as in

00:12:07.789 - 00:12:28.650

the past soliciting faculty recommendations and consultation and the rest I even have their memo somewhere in this document file and that we were in a very optimistic mood. I'd say when we had that first faculty meeting in the fall. Did you understand at that time that

00:12:28.659 - 00:12:50.020

by consultation. They, it really would be sort of like allowing the faculty a veto on the selection. It wasn't just a matter of accepting. Well, I don't think the word veto was ever used. What we did have was a couple of persons who had been around

00:12:50.030 - 00:13:10.690

when Pitzer was selected, uh, describe the procedures that have been followed back in 61 and this seemed to be something of a model for, uh, what was going to happen in 68 and 69. So uh it looked as if there had been frequent uh consultation back

00:13:10.700 - 00:13:37.690

and forth between a faculty committee and the committee of the trustees. Now, the new element that came in in the fall was the uh rather universally accepted suggestion that the faculty committee uh be joined by several student consultants. Well, various terms were batted around, but it

00:13:37.700 - 00:13:53.559

was generally agreed that we did want to have students involved with us. And I think one of the reasons why there was so much stress on this was that we wanted to avoid the kind of difficulties that had sprung up elsewhere, including even Stanford, where some

00:13:53.570 - 00:14:12.450

of the students complained that they hadn't been adequately consulted when Pitzer was brought in. So, uh we spent a good deal of that uh first faculty meeting haggling over what kind of arrangements should be set up. Of course, you're familiar with the fact that ultimately a

00:14:12.460 - 00:14:37.000

student faculty presidential selection committee or whatever you wanna call, it was formed with six faculty members and three student uh members. Now, one thing that uh was not clear, I guess it wasn't clear even to the trustees when this whole uh Masterson uh affair erupted was

00:14:37.010 - 00:14:57.950

that the student consultants didn't have a vote. They were simply there to give advice. Uh There has been speculation in some quarters that that's one of the reasons why the trustees were so adamant about not subjecting the matter to reconsideration. They figured they wouldn't have enough

00:14:57.960 - 00:15:14.440

votes and the reason was they thought that the students had a vote, but they didn't. At least this is what one informant told me that it's possibly an explanation. But had they known that only the six faculty members had a vote, they would have thought that

00:15:14.450 - 00:15:36.659

they could have safely uh submitted it for reconsideration and had uh Masterson okayed in normal course. But of course, uh there, there are some other aspects of the thing that uh come up uh during the fall. Of course, this committee was working very hard. Uh I

00:15:36.669 - 00:15:59.349

have two memos from uh Professor Rason who's the chairman of the committee. The first one asks uh faculty members to uh submit names of people they think might be suitable and also recommendations as to the kind of people we should be looking for. Now. A second

00:15:59.359 - 00:16:19.950

memo came out February 3rd and uh oh, it, it was a long time before I got hold of another copy of it. I somehow mislaid the first copy, but I think the date is significant February 3rd. I probably didn't reach, uh, didn't actually get it till

00:16:19.960 - 00:16:38.429

a day or two later. And what that did was leave me with the impression and I guess it left a lot of other people with the impression that we were still a long way from finding President if they're asking for more names. Uh, obviously, uh we

00:16:38.440 - 00:16:58.619

still have a long way to go. And that is one of the reasons why on the afternoon of uh Friday, uh February 21st, when I got this phone call from Mrs Cooper who said, uh guess what? They've picked the president. And when she said, Bill Masterson,

00:16:58.630 - 00:17:20.139

I was just flabbergasted. I had heard a couple of other names being battered around. Well, Frank Van was one, as a matter of fact, Dean Gordon was another. Uh but I hadn't heard Masterson's name mentioned. In fact, there's one colleague of mine who said a long

00:17:20.149 - 00:17:37.500

time ago, if you should happen to hear any rumor that Masterson is going to be made president, notify me at once, we have to put a stop to it. And uh there were others uh back in the fall who just uh thought it was uh completely

00:17:37.510 - 00:17:55.969

uh beyond the realm of possibility that anyone would even consider Masterson who had already been eased out of the deanship. Are there any other names in the rumor mail from, uh, uh, outside the university. Well, uh, they had mentioned, uh, someone who was supposed to come

00:17:55.979 - 00:18:14.599

down and give a talk in the spring and I can't remember his name. Um, this isn't, is this the Yale Provost or? Oh, well, the Yale Provost was down here way back in 64. Um, I forget his name. He was a chalet expert as I recall.

00:18:15.060 - 00:18:31.380

And, uh, he, he was, uh, really very favorably looked upon here and we would have, uh, been very glad to get him. But what happened was Yale got wind of the fact that Rice was interested and they shoved him into this job of provost and that

00:18:31.390 - 00:18:53.800

was it. Now, whether he was being wooed again, I just don't know. Uh, but, uh, there's a man we could have used, uh, as dean, certainly. Well, um, coming back to this matter of, uh, being caught off base. Well, this phone call from Mrs Cooper went

00:18:53.810 - 00:19:12.050

this way. Uh, Masterson has been selected by the board. There's going to be a protest meeting this afternoon and be sure to come. Well, of course, it turned out that there were different interpretations of what that meeting was supposed to be. That was the meeting four

00:19:12.060 - 00:19:29.510

o'clock Friday. You see, I got a notice that was sent around to everybody in our department saying a meeting has been called to announce the naming of a new president. And technically that was true. Uh, later on, I got some more information on what happened the

00:19:29.520 - 00:19:55.739

day before on Thursday the 20th. That was the day that the board and the committee got together. And instead of consultation, as we thought it was going to be, the board simply announced, uh, Masterson, is it now it was, uh, decided, uh that the, uh, in

00:19:55.750 - 00:20:11.439

as much as the members of the committee expressed uh dismay at what had happened. And then we're told by the board that's it. It's, it's, it's finished and done that I can, I don't know if they use that language. Uh It was decided there should be

00:20:11.449 - 00:20:32.050

a meeting uh that weekend of the faculty at which the announcement would be made. And if any questions were to be raised, the board would uh have some spokesman there to answer. Well, I'm told that originally the board had angled for Saturday and that uh Professor

00:20:32.060 - 00:20:51.540

Broad and perhaps realizing that uh there'd be a bigger crowd on Friday somehow managed to call it for Friday. Um And of course, we did have that Friday meeting in the CM lecture hall, which was just the scene of that earlier meeting back in October where

00:20:51.550 - 00:21:12.369

we decided how we were going to set up our committee. Uh Well, it was just mobbed Friday as I arrived on the scene uh that famous petition uh which later became the basis of Professor Ward's resolution uh offered in the motion and voted on was uh

00:21:12.380 - 00:21:29.270

being circulated around, it had been circulated earlier in the afternoon to various offices. But, uh, just to make sure of catching the stragglers, there were some people waiting at the door with a copy of the petition to uh collect further signatures. I looked it over and

00:21:29.280 - 00:21:48.150

decided I was very strongly in sympathy with it and signed it. Well, I don't have to go through a whole uh description of that faculty meeting, which I guess is despite the fact that a ban on tape recordings was enforced, everybody seems to have to know

00:21:48.160 - 00:22:05.339

what happened. There, there were news men present scribbling down notes. I was taking down notes like mad. In fact, that's how this whole thing started with my diary. Um I felt that it was uh desirable to keep a record of what was being said at that

00:22:05.349 - 00:22:24.400

meeting. And as a matter of fact, my diary account, which I thought was, was pretty dull, turned out to be far more informative than the official minutes of the meeting. Uh This was something that puzzled me a bit because professor uh Thomas who has been the

00:22:24.410 - 00:22:45.859

secretary for quite some time usually produces the most witty mi minutes imaginable, uh full of sort of 18th century ish uh turns of phrase and the like but somehow or other, uh he was very subdued in his minutes of that uh February 21st meeting. I rightly

00:22:45.869 - 00:23:05.709

surmised it may be because he was a known anti Masterson man. He may have felt that it was incumbent upon him to give as impartial an account. That's possible. But I do think that that meeting was very climactic and uh very important. It set the tone

00:23:05.719 - 00:23:25.510

for much of what happened afterwards. And my own feeling is that had it gone the other way, had we simply accepted the protestations of the trustees that they had just made an honest mistake. And uh let's keep the man anyway, we would have been in for

00:23:25.520 - 00:23:40.459

an awful lot of trouble. The students had had a meeting of their own and uh that had already broken up before our meeting did. And those students filtered over to the front of uh cm lecture hall and they were waiting to see what was going to

00:23:40.469 - 00:24:04.390

happen. And uh as a matter of fact, one of the student representatives on the uh Presidential selection committee, Mrs Kaplan was present at the faculty meeting and when we took that uh final vote on the second uh half of the ward resolution and that passed just

00:24:04.400 - 00:24:20.410

as did the first half, uh she somehow got out there to inform the students and a tremendous cheer rose up. Did you detect any effect of this on the members of the faculty inside the meeting? They could all hear it. Yes, they all heard it. I

00:24:20.420 - 00:24:39.969

think that that reinforced the resolve of those who had voted in favor. Now, just imagine had it gone the other way. There were some of those kids had strike signs out there. I think that uh the self control was so marvelously displayed all through the crisis,

00:24:39.979 - 00:24:58.660

might not have uh been maintained that they felt that we were uh thinking out on it. So, uh we emerged as heroes, tremendous cheers went up. Everybody wanted to see the uh Professor Bodson who had was sort of the hero of the day in everybody's eyes.

00:24:58.670 - 00:25:16.229

But, uh, he had left as soon as the meeting ended. Uh, but, uh I talked with a few students and then they were, there was sort of tentative mood. Well, what can we do next? But already, Mrs Kaplan had announced that there was going to be

00:25:16.239 - 00:25:35.280

a meeting the next morning. And that was of course the famous teaching of Saturday the 22nd which I attended along with, uh, I came along with professors Hyman and Wiener from the history department and Professor Hyman. As a matter of fact, is one of the people

00:25:35.290 - 00:25:52.030

who encouraged me to keep up that diary record. Uh, he was convinced it might prove valuable someday we leave the faculty meeting not to live in. Now, are you close enough to Mr Allen? Mr Teague to notice the effect of these transactions on, on them. How

00:25:52.040 - 00:26:13.459

did they receive them? Some some weeks back, I went to a meeting at which some slides were shown of that faculty meeting. I didn't even know that anybody, aside from news men had been taking pictures, but, um, one of the faculty members, I think it was

00:26:13.469 - 00:26:30.869

Mr Dessler had taken some slides and, uh, he didn't have a complete set, but, uh, he had showed a picture of Mr Allen before he went up to make his speech and he seemed to be very, in very good spirits. And there was another picture of

00:26:30.880 - 00:26:51.959

Mr Allen a little bit later showing him looking very crestfallen. I suspect that uh Mr Allen was uh completely unprepared for what had happened. You'd think that he might have sensed something as a result of this uh dismay that was expressed the day before by the

00:26:51.969 - 00:27:11.369

committee members. But uh he may have felt that uh these were just a few people that the faculty at large would go along. But what he discovered was that it was not like that at all. Uh There is a famous anecdote going around. I don't know

00:27:11.380 - 00:27:29.420

if you've heard this one that I recorded that in my diary too, uh that uh the trustees got hold of Masterson on the phone and said, uh we'd like you to be president. And the way the story goes, Masterson will ask, well, is it all right

00:27:29.430 - 00:27:50.469

with everybody out there and Masterson met the whole university community, but the trustees at the other end of the line, uh thinking he just met the seven men in the room said, oh, yes, yes. Everybody's in favor. And, uh, it may be a uh somewhat apocryphal

00:27:50.479 - 00:28:11.979

story but, uh I'm not convinced that it couldn't be true. I, I think it does show their thinking but, uh this is what counts the seven of us and uh the realization that they had to take into account what other people were thinking uh may have

00:28:11.989 - 00:28:29.400

done slowly on them. Now, of course, they claim that they did talk with some faculty members, but I suspect the ones they talked with were people who were partial to Masterson already. There are very few people, by the way, one thing that ought to be taken

00:28:29.410 - 00:28:49.150

into account is that um actually a lot of people on the faculty had no strong feelings one way or the other before this whole thing started, they didn't even know too much about Masterson, especially those in science engineering who had not been in direct contact with

00:28:49.160 - 00:29:11.869

him when he was Dean. Um And this was true even more so, the students, uh most of whom uh had never had any experience of masters and a few were, there were a few seniors around who um no, they wouldn't even be seniors that have to

00:29:11.880 - 00:29:35.229

be grad students. I remembered when he was uh master of hansom college and uh they were sort of conflicting estimates of that. Some saying, oh, he was an excellent master at Hudson College. Others saying it was a dictatorial regime. So, well, the term authoritarian kept emerging.

00:29:35.989 - 00:29:52.040

In fact, I heard a story that Masterson himself said at one point. Well, I have a reputation of being somewhat authoritarian. Was he supposed to have said this at the meeting with the, I don't know, uh, possibly it was then I'm not sure just when he

00:29:52.050 - 00:30:14.680

was supposed to have made that remark, it may have been then, um, I'm, I'm just not sure I could see whether I have a note of on it. But anyway, the most of the students were quite neutral with regard to Masterson himself. What had them angered

00:30:14.920 - 00:30:36.119

was this uh break in the procedure because this consultation had been invited by the trustees themselves. And then these uh ground rules had been agreed upon, there was going to be consultation and they felt that they had been uh double crossed, so to speak. So that

00:30:36.130 - 00:30:56.630

was the thing and this emerged also at the teaching. Uh student leaders got up and said we have no objection to Masterson personally. But we do think that uh this matter of the uh bad faith as they saw it in procedure is so serious that uh

00:30:56.640 - 00:31:21.060

we're master to come, uh the success of his presidency would be seriously jeopardized. Well, as I said, the students were neutral toward Masterson until that celebrated confrontation at the Sally Port. Now, maybe he could have been better briefed by the people around him. I think he

00:31:21.069 - 00:31:40.319

was completely unprepared for this. Some people did call him up Friday night before he left Chattanooga and warned him about the faculty vote and how the students had been complaining. But apparently he didn't think that that posed a really serious problem. Just thought it was a

00:31:40.329 - 00:32:01.829

few dissidents or at least this is the way I interpret it. And, uh, he was still taking this line Saturday noon when, uh, people said that, don't, aren't you aware of the storm of opposition? He said, I'm not aware of any, uh, substantial opposition and he

00:32:01.839 - 00:32:15.739

talked about what he was going to do when he took over June 1st. Well, you see, that turned those students off completely and there were a lot of faculty members. What was that? How do you account for that statement by him at that time? Well, I

00:32:15.750 - 00:32:36.469

suspect that the, well, two things, one, he had already cut his ties with Chattanooga. And you see, I think he had been acting in good faith, an offer had been made to him. He thought that it was a bona fide offer that, uh, people had been

00:32:36.479 - 00:33:00.119

consulted properly and thought that it was going to be, uh, to go through without too much trouble. He realized he did have some enemies on campus. But, uh, I just didn't realize that there had been this procedural blunder. So he was sort of caught of in

00:33:00.130 - 00:33:20.420

a very exposed position. People at that confrontation of the Sally Port said, why don't you personally agree? To accept the notion that the matter be reconsidered. Well, this is where he really lost them. He said, uh the board has made its decision. I concur, I'm abiding

00:33:20.430 - 00:33:43.640

by it. And that's that as if the case is closed. Well, he made a lot of enemies right then and there and, uh, he didn't help it anymore when he got into that uh confab with student leaders in the afternoon and evening, uh apparently between the

00:33:43.650 - 00:34:01.479

afternoon meeting and the evening meeting, he may have been in contact with the trustees who probably were saying to him stand firm because he was a lot more intransigent in the evening than he had been in the afternoon. Well, justice. Meanwhile, the students have become more

00:34:01.489 - 00:34:27.649

and more disillusioned and they finally came out of that meeting convinced that he was unacceptable as president and they published the manifesto to that effect. And uh well, of course, uh Sunday, it was rather interesting day. Whereas um Saturday, there had been all of these official

00:34:27.659 - 00:34:45.909

things going on. Um What happened Sunday was that at least our experience was a lot of people were talking to one another on the telephone trying to figure out what to do next. And uh some of us were coming up with wild schemes. I was thinking,

00:34:46.070 - 00:35:08.840

let's get a big full page ad in the newspaper with 2000 signatures on it. That's a pretty expensive proposition. Of course. Well, later on, I found out from, um, it was Professor, um, Dowen of the English Department had been to that meeting with Dean Gordon and

00:35:08.850 - 00:35:26.649

informed me later that they had come up with this marvelous plan as a student faculty poll. Well, what was good about it was that, uh, this way, everybody got a chance to express himself in the most democratic manner possible and they no longer could if it

00:35:26.659 - 00:35:49.300

should turn out that the voting as everybody expected was going to be heavily anti Masters and they couldn't say it's just a few dissidents and of course, that's what happened. Um, nobody, well, just a few people, no, the exact totals which would have been awfully embarrassing

00:35:49.689 - 00:36:12.479

that they released publicly. Uh, all that you got in the official statements was that, uh, it seemed to indicate no strong sentiment in Masterson's favor on cap, you know, this sort of, uh, a nice way of getting around the really embarrassing situation. How do you speculate

00:36:12.489 - 00:36:33.600

that the vote went with your to the ground as it is? Well, uh, I can just quote to you what I got from various sources. Now, each department was supposed to convey its figures, uh, to Dean Gordon. And, uh, I guess, well, the student vote was

00:36:33.610 - 00:36:55.489

taken both at the colleges and at various places scattered around campus. R MC was one. Um, but supposedly the de the departmental chairman weren't to divulge pub, uh, what, how the vote had gone in their departments but that, uh, stricture was not observed. So, uh, Tuesday,

00:36:57.629 - 00:37:16.989

um, was it Monday or was it Tuesday? Well, no matter, somewhere during that period between the ba the balloting itself and, uh, Masterson's announcement that he was resigning, I had been hearing from various quarters how the vote had gone in this department or that. Well, in

00:37:17.000 - 00:37:40.260

several departments, it was unanimously against. And even in the history department where, uh, Masterson had his strong champions. Um The, I think there were just four people who voted in his favor uh in our own department, which was thought to be a stronghold of pro masters

00:37:40.270 - 00:38:01.290

and we didn't get a majority either. Um Do you attribute this vote to the wording on the ballot? Uh Well, I think partly it was a good spade work the night before, you know, Sunday night, when they had these all college meetings, it was explained that

00:38:01.300 - 00:38:21.050

a vote. Uh No, on proposition two did not necessarily constitute a personal damnation of Masterson. And I thought that was good because I frankly thought we should have some sort of proposal that even his friends could vote on the same way. And of course, some of

00:38:21.060 - 00:38:40.639

his friends did get on the phone calling him long distance saying we'd love to have you, but please not cop. And I think that was a very significant factor. Now, of course, there were some of his friends stuck with him to the end feeling that uh,

00:38:41.060 - 00:39:02.209

to, uh, say no in any way, shape, manner or form would be a betrayal while others felt that, uh, friend or not, they ought to get the word to him that he was stepping into a really, uh, explosive and potentially disastrous situation. Well, I, I respected

00:39:02.219 - 00:39:27.469

the opinions of, uh, people, uh, whichever stand they took. I, I really felt that, um, they were being honest and sincere, whether they were pro anti in the middle, I will admit though that I was sort of annoyed with some, uh, friends of mine who took

00:39:27.479 - 00:39:51.060

a very strong stand on the first item of business. They were aghast at this breach of procedure and yet they were urging that we accept it nonetheless because it would be embarrassing, uh, if, uh, we tried to stop this appointment. Well, this argument was put forth

00:39:51.070 - 00:40:10.250

by all sorts of people including Mr Allen, of course, who said, well, uh, you know, it's, it's been publicly announced that Masterson is coming, just think of the terrible effect in the community. Well, that is somewhere along and others among the faculty making similar pronouncements. That's

00:40:10.260 - 00:40:27.399

when I got up and made a speech saying we have to think about the future of rice, what it's going to be like, uh, some years hence. And so we, I think that's more important than worrying about temporary embarrassments. Well, uh, Professor Grove made a rather

00:40:27.409 - 00:40:50.340

similar state and saying, let's think about 15 or 20 years from now. So, uh, what this was, was really a call to, uh, we realize we might suffer some embarrassment now. But that in a way, it's sort of like, uh, this notion that the, the, uh,

00:40:50.560 - 00:41:08.669

bride has discovered she doesn't want to marry the groom and the family is saying what the wishes we've made. You have to go through with this. Well, if the girl, uh, and her parents have any sense, they won't go through with it because a marriage that

00:41:08.679 - 00:41:29.330

starts off that way is uh very likely doomed to failure. Well, I have the same feeling about uh this presidency. I felt that Masterson could have retrieved the situation. Had he started on Saturday by saying, by taking a gamble, I talked about this with several other

00:41:29.340 - 00:41:47.449

people and we seem to pretty much agree on this on this because we felt that had he been willing to take that gamble on Saturday and say, all right, I'll be willing to submit my name for reconsideration. What he would have gained was a tremendous amount

00:41:47.459 - 00:42:12.409

of sympathy from those students who naturally favored the underdog, whoever he may be. And uh very likely uh had it been reconsidered the thing that the trustees apparently weren't aware of, he might well have got a majority vote still uh on the, this uh presidential selection

00:42:12.419 - 00:42:25.830

committee. Do you know the six people on the committee? Well enough to speculate on how the vote might have gone. I, I know that some of the people fairly well, but I can't really speculate on how the vote would have gone. For example, one of them

00:42:25.840 - 00:42:42.699

was Professor Salzburg, who on the one hand was a, seems to have been a good friend of Masterson, but on the other hand was one of the people who called him on the phone and told him not to come now. Uh, so it's sort of hard

00:42:42.709 - 00:43:04.659

to speculate how he might have voted. And uh I suppose, well, I was aware of some people who probably would have been against him. One thing we have to remember. And this came out at the faculty meeting of the 21st uh when uh Professor Bo Boson

00:43:04.669 - 00:43:21.030

was asked to explain how the committee had operated. He pointed out that they had, they had assembled a list of 60 names that had been sent in and they checked through them uh weeding some out because people were either unavailable or uh they thought might not

00:43:21.040 - 00:43:44.530

be uh suitable for one reason or another. Well, when they had finished weeding the names down to the five that they submit, sent out to the board. Professor Masterson's name had been left to one side. Now, this was not necessarily a rejection. Uh And this point

00:43:44.540 - 00:44:01.659

was brought out even at the t the next day, but still, it did seem like an awful breach of faith for the trustees to take one a name that was not one of the five that was submitted and then say this is the man without ever

00:44:01.669 - 00:44:25.520

having discussed him with the committee. That's what I find really to be uh horrendous breach of what they had promised to do. Now, I had heard about the deliberations that had preceded the uh selection, both of Pitzer and of even of uh Houston back in 46.

00:44:26.199 - 00:44:45.459

And in those days, in both cases, there was frequent contact between the board and the committee and what would happen the way I got the story about 1946 deliberations was from, uh, Professor Dowen, who had got it from Professor mckillop, who, uh, had been on the

00:44:45.469 - 00:45:06.169

scene in those days, he said they, uh, met frequently and if the board proposed somebody that the committee thought unsuitable, but it would be some discussion, they'd point out why, uh, the retiring president of standard oil of Illinois of Indiana or whatever it was wouldn't be

00:45:06.179 - 00:45:21.919

the best bet and they'd move on to other names and discuss and discuss. And eventually out of this came Houston and I guess something rather similar happened when Pitzer was selected. Well, you see one of the things that was wrong this time was that there was

00:45:21.929 - 00:45:43.320

not enough contact between the board and the committee. Partly this was due to, uh, unfortunate occurrences. Mr Lovett was hospitalized and, uh, then somebody else took sick and so on and so forth. And So there was a lot of delay. The, the committee kept asking the

00:45:43.330 - 00:46:01.860

board for meetings, meetings were, uh, set up and then were canceled. Well, eventually we got this meeting on February 20th and, uh, as you can see what happened was quite unsatisfactory. Well, I was going back to, uh, how Masterson could have retrieved the situation on February

00:46:01.870 - 00:46:23.159

22nd. I think he would have had a lot of sympathy from those students who were not prejudiced against him if they would have said, well, look, he's man enough to uh agree that this procedure was wrong, uh to submit to having it, uh, reconsidered. Uh If

00:46:23.169 - 00:46:44.860

they do decide on him, we really should back him up. Now, you see, you have to, there are these two propositions that got separated on the ballot, one procedure to the man, uh or let's say the choice under the circumstances, notice how that was rephrased. But

00:46:44.870 - 00:47:04.489

I think we have to go back to, why was his name sidetracked? And uh when the committee was going through now, the story we got was, uh, it didn't necessarily imply rejection. You see, so somebody got up during that Sally Port confrontation and said, after you

00:47:04.500 - 00:47:28.129

have been rejected by the committee. Well, I asked Barry Kaplan herself about that. She said, well, as a matter of fact, we did put his name aside for good reason. But you see the thing that I found also sort of appalling were the reasons put forth

00:47:28.139 - 00:47:53.860

by Mr Allen on the 21st why Masterson had been selected in the first place he mentioned uh ability as a scholar and administrator. Well, he has uh produced some scholarly writings but uh those in the know claim that uh this is nothing too earth shaking or

00:47:53.870 - 00:48:15.090

important. Uh Let's say that uh I suppose he'd have a safely mediocre niche in that department as an administrator. We well know what happened. Uh as Dean, he was more or less eased out of the job. There are enough complaints and uh we've heard uh conflict

00:48:15.100 - 00:48:36.929

these conflicting reports about how he operated at uh Hanson College. Uh Apparently those who thought he was autocratic uh somewhat in the majority. In fact, I heard from another college master, uh how uh master intended to operate the student leaders of the college would put through

00:48:36.939 - 00:48:59.060

some legislation which they had really conscientiously backed. Then Masterson would call him in and say, all right boys, you have two choices. Either you can rescind that legislation or I'll rescind it for you. And what they had to do was go back to the membership of

00:48:59.070 - 00:49:18.360

the college and plead for them to vote down the legislation that they'd already voted up. And I guess this happened more than once. Well, that, that was just the case in point. So there are two strikes down already the eminent scholarship and uh or the administrator.

00:49:19.010 - 00:49:34.489

Now, of course, I don't know how he operated at, uh, Chattanooga. This is something we never got, uh, the word on though. They did seem to be eager to have him back, you know, I mean, something, uh, but then Mr Allen turned to other criteria which

00:49:34.500 - 00:49:58.239

I thought were completely, uh, irrelevant one. He's a Houston native with strong family ties. Uh, and that's supposed to be a great help when it comes to fundraising. Well, that seemed like the, the uh like utter baloney, we just finished that 33 million fund drive where

00:49:58.250 - 00:50:17.179

we raised 43 million under the aegis of Pitzer, the California. So that, that sort of fell flat. And the other thing, the fact that he was a rice alumnus that neither it militates for him nor against him. But it did seem to me again to show

00:50:17.189 - 00:50:39.840

parochialism on the part of the board. So, uh the story about uh the telephone conversation, uh maybe apocryphal, but this was right out of Mr Allen's mouth. Well, it seemed to us that to many of us that uh when you embark on a presidential search, you

00:50:39.850 - 00:50:59.229

don't just uh look around Houston, you look through the whole country and that's how it should have been done and that's how it was done when they selected Houston and Viner. Now, I realized there was also a sort of sentimental side to Mr Allen's pitch. He

00:50:59.239 - 00:51:20.120

said I've conducted a 45 year love affair with the university. He said, I feel that uh the university has come of age that uh we can uh safely select one of our own alumni as president. Well, I'm sure that this is true, but that's not how

00:51:20.129 - 00:51:39.419

you start. You don't exclude everybody else and then start with this alumnus. Now, what, uh now Mr Allen, in the course of questioning admitted and I guess some others admitted too, that it was possible that Masterson by virtue of having spent so much time on this

00:51:39.429 - 00:52:01.540

campus may have raised a few hackles or let's say, I think there might have been some back and forth. One of his uh proponents may have been Mr Allen himself. Well, that's pretty much very mildly. Um You see, I think Masterson could have come, had he

00:52:01.550 - 00:52:17.370

been willing to let the procedure operate correctly? Then there would have been no feeling among the students that a dictator had been imposed upon them against their will. And there wouldn't have been that feeling among the faculty though there would have been some defections. Obviously, some

00:52:17.379 - 00:52:36.389

people feeling that it no matter how he came in, uh Masterson presidency would be intolerable and they would have to leave. I imagine there would have been defections from the history department. Those two fellows on leave wouldn't have come back for one thing and some of

00:52:36.399 - 00:52:58.830

the senior people would have left, there might have been defections from various other departments. And as one, as a couple of professors who were chairman pointed out there's the problem of attrition and of missed opportunities for recruitment. Uh, once the word is known throughout the country,

00:52:58.840 - 00:53:18.310

what happened? Uh, now, do you, that's if, uh Masterson came in in a legitimate way. Now, just imagine if he came in in this illegitimate way that they were trying, it would have been so much the worse and we would have had, I think there would

00:53:18.320 - 00:53:38.649

have been trouble with the students who, uh, you know, this generation of students believes in honesty and sincerity. I think that's what a lot of the, uh, clamor is about. And, uh, if they felt that they had been treated in this, uh, what they regarded as

00:53:38.659 - 00:54:00.820

an essentially dishonest way and that a president was there who had no, uh, I suppose you could say technically it would still be legitimate. The board had no, uh, was under no obligation to consult at all, but they themselves were following previous precedent and, uh, admitting

00:54:00.830 - 00:54:20.629

this and they had issued the invitations. So, in a way it, it was a kind of, uh, well, what's the right word to describe it? I usually use the word breach of faith, um, which I think would be a good way of putting it since it's

00:54:20.639 - 00:54:34.280

not so much a legal as a moral issue that was involved. One thing I'd be interested in getting your comments on and if you've, uh, if you've dealt with this in your diaries. Well, you can just, it's very here uh to it, but if you haven't

00:54:34.290 - 00:54:53.260

dealt with it, I'd be interested in your, you're going into this uh somewhat. Um how, how do you perceive the different uh ideas by the different contingents um in their attitude toward the, uh the office of the presidency? I'm thinking perhaps of, of mits experience and

00:54:53.270 - 00:55:18.479

trying to separate the uh administrative fundraising function from the inside. Uh uh Well, you'll notice what's happened since then. We uh we've had a kind of um almost biological uh splitting up of cells when this new uh setup came in with uh Professor Vander's acting president

00:55:19.030 - 00:55:37.780

along with him came four vice presidents something we had, we had never even had one vice president before. Now, there was some complaint in some quarters that uh this was another thing that had been foisted upon us. There had never been any discussion about vice presidents

00:55:37.790 - 00:56:01.429

suddenly they were announced and whereas the president is acting, the vice presidents are, are simply it, they also have other titles as uh some of them are Danes or other things. But uh I think probably it was a necessary step to uh what should we say,

00:56:01.439 - 00:56:23.580

subdivide some of the functions of the president who was being called upon to do too many things. And I had an interesting little chat with uh Dean Gordon the uh the very night. A a uh Masterson's resignation. We went to that basketball game with Texas Tech

00:56:23.669 - 00:56:46.979

which rice lost by a narrow score. During the intermission. I went up to talk to Dean Gordon. We and uh we talked about what the future might hold and we discussed the need for communication between the, the rest of the university and the trustees. He said,

00:56:46.989 - 00:57:07.540

and one thing he thought was very important was to uh bring about some kind of communication with regard to what the university should be. He said, obviously, they have a very different notion than we have. But he also said that uh the power arrangements have to

00:57:07.550 - 00:57:25.199

be rethought. He said we no longer can operate the way we did in the past where everything went up through one office, the president, it was a kind of uh autocrat. Um in theory, even if not in practice, we were just lucky that we had three

00:57:25.209 - 00:57:42.800

excellent men in the presidency before. But I'd be interpreting this quickly to say that uh Dean Gordon was suggesting that uh operating the office of the presidency could not be done in the way that pictures was. Well, I suppose that any of the previous ones had

00:57:42.810 - 00:58:05.840

done it. He wasn't speaking of any specific president, just the way the thing had been set up, that the president was almost like an absolute monarch and uh that, that was no longer suitable um that, that was uh one part of it and we s uh

00:58:05.850 - 00:58:27.850

more or less around the same time, we had been already engaged in discussions in the Rice, a, a chapter of a proposal to institute a faculty senate and several other rearrangements that had been recommended by the A AUP National. Now, we've been discussing this for several

00:58:27.860 - 00:58:50.020

weeks before the Masterson crisis erupted, but now it seemed terribly apropos and uh we got some fast action on those proposals in the uh a AUP meeting and we were able to transmit them to the full faculty at the next faculty meeting. And uh these proposals

00:58:50.030 - 00:59:10.629

were then sent on to the Welfare Committee where some very conscientious work has been done. And uh I think it's a hopeful sign that uh uh Vandever himself seems to be very much in favor of these proposals. We're getting to the end of the tape here

00:59:11.510 - 00:59:40.989

might as well go ahead and flip it over before we go. I hadn't the sound of the word now set the dial to 054321. Now this is tape 13, continuation of the interview with Doctor D Levin June 11th, 1969 tape 13 side one, lack of that

00:59:41.000 - 00:59:59.209

interruption uh to switch the tape. Um We were talking during that time uh uh of the different ways that uh the various groups perceive the office and function of, of the presidency. Uh If you have any special insights on that, I'd like very much to get

00:59:59.219 - 01:00:22.570

them on record. Well, uh there has been this discussion came up. Of course, again, when uh Professor Vandever stepped in, uh there seems to be a notion on the part of some of the trustees that the president should be quote our man unquote. And uh there's

01:00:22.580 - 01:00:46.959

similarly a feeling on the part of the faculty that the president should not be the trustee's man, in fact, should really be a kind of a mediator between the faculty and the trustees whose views on many things may not coincide. Now, I suppose this makes the

01:00:46.969 - 01:01:10.209

president's role somewhat difficult. And I guess this was part of the problem that uh ma that um Pitzer faced when he was president uh trying to establish a kind of bridge between these two groups that don't always see eye to eye. And I don't know that

01:01:10.219 - 01:01:30.949

the president necessarily should be anybody's man but his own man. However, I think it's rather interesting that at the most recent faculty meeting, uh President Van Diver himself got up and uh gave what I thought was very good speech. I have it recorded here or at

01:01:30.959 - 01:01:54.560

least uh summarized in which he uh said there's been this rumor going around that uh I'm going to be the trustees man. Nothing can be further from the truth. And uh I suppose one thing in the rice tradition, which I think is good is that there

01:01:54.570 - 01:02:15.179

has never been this clear cut separation of faculty and administration that you have at some schools in effect. Uh The major administrators at Rice are also faculty people. Usually they teach a course or so and keep their hand. And this was true of all the presidents

01:02:15.790 - 01:02:38.159

Pitzer was still operating as a scholar in his field. And the same was true of Houston whose office I am told that operated also as a lab. Um And this is true also of the Danes or Vice President. I think this is very good. Uh One

01:02:38.169 - 01:02:58.330

thing that uh I was not so wild about when I was at Washington University, that was my first job was the fact that the place was just top heavy with administration. There were vice chancellors and Danes galore and uh I think they were sort of stepping

01:02:58.340 - 01:03:17.510

over one another. There were too, just too many. Uh It was a lot simpler, of course at Mount Holyoke where I had my second job, but that was a much smaller school trouble. There was that uh weather uh by historical precedent or not, they had an

01:03:17.520 - 01:03:39.540

autocratic president that this was when Gell was president, I imagine the same was true back in that 37 year reign of Mary E Woolley, who was nevertheless renowned for having built the place up until a school of great eminence. But the there was this tradition of

01:03:39.550 - 01:04:02.820

the autocratic president at Mount Holy or too, in fact, uh at many a place. And it was rather interesting in his lecture on academic freedom. On, uh, Tuesday, the 25th of February. Professor Hyman talked about what it was like on a university campus back in the

01:04:02.830 - 01:04:25.489

19th century when, uh, the president was, uh, like God and nobody had any rights and we've come a long way from that. Thank heaven. But you see, uh, I think the trouble with rice is that our administrative setup so far as the president's office and so

01:04:25.500 - 01:04:44.300

on goes, uh, is sort of a heritage from that earlier age and has become anachronistic. And I think a lot of people are realizing that now and would like to see some changes and the the way things are set up, this is why I think that

01:04:44.310 - 01:05:09.790

uh this movement for the faculty senate and other related proposals are very much needed and uh very desirable. And i it looks as if we're going to get uh those changes, at least now, I think that uh something that really is rather new, at least on

01:05:09.800 - 01:05:29.750

most campuses is the idea of getting the students more meaningfully involved. Now, we already have it to some degree, the students, even before they got on to this faculty student presidential selection committee, there were also student consultants on other committees. Uh several of them, as a

01:05:29.760 - 01:05:51.229

matter of fact, in fact, there was even uh most remarkable committee of all I suppose is q the uh committee on the undergraduate experience which even has a trustee and some alumni. And uh God knows what else involved in it. Probably a very good idea. And,

01:05:51.239 - 01:06:11.149

uh, it has even been suggested that, uh the arrangement of the board ought to be changed. Uh Instead of its being a kind of self perpetuating group of Houston business leaders, it ought to be drawn from the country at large, which is true of the Harvard

01:06:11.159 - 01:06:36.879

overseas, for example, uh, we just had some balloting for them and, uh, similarly, uh the uh trustees at Cornell are much more widely spaced geographically and professionally. There's also been a, a suggestion that there should be faculty and even student repre representation on the board. And

01:06:36.889 - 01:06:57.659

I think it's a good idea. I think, well, anytime soon, I don't know how soon the problem is we have to uh somehow get it through the present board, which uh doesn't seem to be too responsive to uh what originates anywhere except in their own heads.

01:06:57.699 - 01:07:19.239

But that's the trouble they are so isolated from really from what's being thought and done on campus. And I think if we had a different uh structure with student and faculty involvement, there would be a lot more liaison. Uh We would know what the trustees were

01:07:19.250 - 01:07:36.040

thinking and the trustees would know what we were thinking. I, I think it would be a much healthier setup. Another question that we wanted to explore uh before we uh uh complete this today and I realize it's getting close to your lunchtime. So Oh, well, that's

01:07:36.090 - 01:07:54.939

all right. And that's the question we were talking about during the, uh, uh, tape intermission, uh, um, your, uh, your impressions of Masterson, uh, what, what would they lead you to expect about, uh, his growth potential, uh, bearing in mind that, uh, he's been in a

01:07:54.949 - 01:08:14.340

new position, uh, in the last three years and this new position has also coincided with a tremendous escalation in the student movement deal. Well, of course, I don't know, I don't know what sort of place, uh, uh, Chattanooga campuses. It was the University of Chattanooga now

01:08:14.350 - 01:08:38.438

it has become part of the Tennessee State system. And, uh, I think this means there's going to be even a change in Masterson's own role of presiding over one campus of a large state aggregation as opposed to a, simply at what was, I guess, a city

01:08:38.449 - 01:08:57.609

college before that. Uh, so I don't know just what sort of role he's played out there of what is more from them? Yes. The guy from the air conditioning called, he said, is he coming? He said if somebody's gonna be home this afternoon, I'll be here

01:08:57.620 - 01:09:21.688

and somebody would be here. Yes, you sound lovely. Maybe you can edit it out. Well, anyway, uh, so that part of it, what was going on at Chattanooga is unfamiliar to me. I also missed his commencement address at Rice last, uh, last a year ago, June,

01:09:22.219 - 01:09:39.688

uh, which I hear was quite good. What happened was, uh, my, our son was being, uh, confirmed that very night. So we went to that instead. But, uh, Masterson's speech is available in files of the thresher, I think, and people who, who have either heard it

01:09:39.699 - 01:10:02.238

or read it. So it's very good. He is capable of expressing himself well, uh, either, uh, in voice or on paper so far as I know. And, uh, well, this is something that I believe I did get down in my diary. Uh My own feeling was

01:10:02.249 - 01:10:21.990

that uh we had almost the elements of a Greek tragedy here with Masterson playing the role of the Greek tragic hero. Here's a man who up till now has uh by and large been quite successful. Of course, we did have his removal from the deanship, but

01:10:22.000 - 01:10:46.910

that was not a publicly brooded around ousting. What happened was that he went off on a vacation to Portugal and several other countries at the end of the fall semester, 6364 uh Fulton came in as acting dean and the following year, uh Wadsworth came in. It's

01:10:46.919 - 01:11:07.350

both dean and chairman of the French Department and Masterson from that time on was simply one of the senior men in history where apparently you still creating some trouble. But uh I suppose it was one of his fondest ambitions. This is the way we keep hearing

01:11:07.359 - 01:11:28.529

it to come back to Houston and to preside over Rice University of which he was an alumnus where he'd spent a lot of time as teacher and administrator and, uh, you know, it's a sort of honorable homecoming and it must have been really a terrible blow

01:11:28.540 - 01:11:47.040

to him to find that he wasn't wanted at his alma mater and in his home town and then he has to go back to Chattanooga where they were only too glad or at least publicly expressed great enthusiasm to have him back. Now. I suppose he, uh,

01:11:47.049 - 01:12:07.549

prudently found out whether he could come back before it decided to drop out from rice. But, uh, if you look at it on that level, I, I see him as this, uh, tragic figure who has to make a noble self sacrifice. He misses his opportunity the

01:12:07.560 - 01:12:28.129

first time around. And the irony of it is that perhaps if he had taken that opportunity, he wouldn't have had to sacrifice so much, he might have got to be president anyway. But Saturday, the, uh, when he confronted students both as a mass and later student

01:12:28.140 - 01:12:51.120

leaders, um, he had a chance then, um, but you see, it would have involved a big gamble which I guess he was afraid to take. But later on when, uh, it was clear to him that, uh, he was going to have to make the sacrifice or

01:12:51.129 - 01:13:17.470

bring out a catastrophe, then, uh, very admirably, I think, uh, decided that, uh, the only thing he could do was bow out and uh So at, at that point, he still emerged something of a hero and gained the plots of many. Uh it, it is, I

01:13:17.479 - 01:13:43.970

suppose a rather, as I say again, ironic paradoxical that had he come, he would have been a villain, but by not coming and by making this great sacrifice, he emerges as a hero and uh gains a measure of respect from people at rice. Um Now we're

01:13:43.979 - 01:14:02.450

still left with some loose ends. So, yeah, I remember there was one student who wrote into the thresher and said, well, this is just an isolated incident. Oh, I don't agree with that at all. But as we found out in several succeeding incidents, that was part

01:14:02.459 - 01:14:30.020

of a pattern that uh there is a kind of unresponsiveness and uh particularly on the board that we somehow have to uh remedy. I don't know that we found the answer yet, but there is a good deal of concern on this campus lest they try to

01:14:30.029 - 01:14:51.339

pull the same thing again and uh fo another unwanted president upon us. Well, I suppose we're a little more alert this time and we do have once again their assurances which were issued at the time of the appointment of Professor Vandever as president, that the search

01:14:51.350 - 01:15:14.669

would go on, the proper consultation would be uh taken and so forth. But uh meanwhile, there, there were even some gaffes in the administration itself, uh the month of April at a crisis a week that you're probably familiar with. April. Well, it, each, uh, week an

01:15:14.680 - 01:15:37.339

issue of the thresher dealt with the, with the newest Mishap April 3rd. It was that Dan Pfeiffer had resigned as the students. April 10th. It was the Charlie Freeman hassle and April 17th, it was the SDS, uh, wrangle and in the, uh, in the Freeman and

01:15:37.350 - 01:15:58.910

SDS matters, of course, uh, President Van Dever, uh, was the one that everybody was zeroing it up. Maybe you can credit it to an experience. But I'm afraid he, uh, in my opinion, he bungled both of those situations, but I suspect that he did retrieve himself

01:15:58.919 - 01:16:27.169

afterwards. Now, uh what was happening? April 24th sort of, yes. Well, that uh that has had some uh effects on morale. Uh it, and it also some uh something of a strain of a credibility gap of how is it that it was possible to raise $43

01:16:27.180 - 01:16:53.020

million. But now suddenly we have to go in for retrenchments because money isn't available. Well, I realized that a lot of that 43 million was for uh things rather tangible nature, buildings and equipment and so on and so forth. But uh still, it was something of

01:16:53.029 - 01:17:15.689

a blow to find that faculty salaries, for example, did not advance as they should have from this present academic year to next. However, at that uh faculty meeting in May the day before commencement, uh there was some good news, uh President Vander said that, uh the

01:17:15.700 - 01:17:40.520

trustees are still committed to the 10 year plan, but uh that will go forward perhaps not so quickly, but it, it's still, there hasn't, uh hasn't been cut out of existence. Well, um as for Masterson himself, look at the other side of this tragic hero story,

01:17:40.529 - 01:18:02.169

there's also a positive note, the very fact that he does emerge with a degree of credit. Uh Well, of course, being a classicist, I think immediately of elis with his notion of uh learning through suffering. And it's my feeling that perhaps Masterson himself has learned something

01:18:02.180 - 01:18:26.580

through this experience and uh perhaps will become a more effective a figure as an educator. I certainly hope so. Um I think we, of course, the rice community have learned something from this experience. One of the more heartening developments which I hope will not be frittered

01:18:26.589 - 01:18:51.750

away was this newfound rapport between uh faculty students and administrators, uh which really was very meaningful during the crisis. And I think for quite some time afterwards, and I hope it does continue that we won't feel as if we're isolated from one another now. That has

01:18:51.759 - 01:19:10.330

been the trouble at so many campuses that students felt that the faculty were paying no attention to them. And I think that they probably had had that feeling at rice in the past, but certainly not during the February days. Uh We were doing everything together and

01:19:11.169 - 01:19:30.350

there was for example, the day of the teach in, we also had a silent march down to the grassy area in front of Lovett. And there was a huge banner being carried aloft which said the students and faculty united. And that was the whole idea. So

01:19:30.359 - 01:19:55.609

there are some positive elements. Uh of course, there are any kind of struggle like that is going to perhaps lead to little brush fire skirmishes here and there in some departments. Um, there were some exacerbations. Um I suppose this was most notable in the German department,

01:19:55.620 - 01:20:10.750

but I don't want to go into that whole story. That's a whole history in itself. But, and there have been, I suppose some people who used to be on friendly terms who are still a bit cool toward one another. On the other hand, there are people

01:20:10.759 - 01:20:36.979

who have barely nodded to one another in the past who uh are now in frequent communication now, one more recent development which maybe you ought to know about, um started up in May. Uh I've been already to two meetings and there's a third one scheduled of

01:20:36.990 - 01:21:01.709

a group of professors which uh still is not very formally formally structured but represents an effort to keep the vital center alive. You see, we're sort of looking toward the future, realizing what has gone wrong at other campuses that uh campuses became polarized into a right

01:21:01.720 - 01:21:21.160

and left wing with a sort of mushy vacuum in the middle uh oh, that's a contradiction in terms, let's say something not very strong in the middle. And we're trying to remedy that and we've had a couple of meetings already at which we first discussed what

01:21:21.169 - 01:21:47.529

the needs are. And uh we're anticipating the possibility of uh future crises or potential crises, hoping that maybe we can head them off before they, before anything really serious happens. So, um that is another of the developments and of course, um though Dean Pfeiffer is no

01:21:47.540 - 01:22:10.990

longer Dean, he is still very much involved in communication with students. He's become an, a faculty consultant to I think, to the student senate and uh a a role which I think he will feel very admirably because he has really been able to keep in touch

01:22:12.220 - 01:22:24.330

and that's why he was so good as being a student as, as a matter of fact. But I think he'll be good in this new role. Well, he stressed the need for us to keep in communication with students themselves who are trying to do much the

01:22:24.339 - 01:22:43.310

same thing. And I think we ought to keep in mind that during the February crisis, it was essentially a revolt of the moderates, something you don't even hear about and they stayed moderate. In fact, they were even able uh by hook or by crook to get

01:22:43.319 - 01:23:02.910

the sds to cooperates instead of going out hack half, talked on their own. Uh Well, it seems to me that these groups out on the extreme uh flourish mainly when uh the center has been betrayed. And they can say, well, you see, you can't work with

01:23:02.919 - 01:23:24.529

these people. But what happened in February was that students found that they got a lot farther by being uh rational and well behaved uh than they would have got by uh creating a rumpus. Now, of course, this may not be true at some other campuses. There

01:23:24.540 - 01:23:46.120

may be some places where the only way you're going to uh cope with the situation is by uh being terribly dramatic. But, uh in this particular case, uh it seems to have paid off and there was even very conscious effort, students were told to come to

01:23:46.129 - 01:24:09.919

uh the tin and jacket and tie if possible and many of them dead. And, uh, well, once again, I'd like to stress the fact that, uh there has not been any violence about the most that has happened and it wasn't, it was an occasional epithet hurled

01:24:10.250 - 01:24:30.200

which got edited out of the tapes when it was put on television. Um, uh Masterson made some remark that hired somebody in the back of the room or the back of out in the grassy area. Friend of love it. And somebody shouted very loudly an epithet

01:24:30.209 - 01:24:48.660

which I can't repeat here. And, uh I think somebody else booed. Yes, I was a faculty member as a matter of fact. And so that was something of a surprise at that faculty meeting on Friday the 21st, I'd never heard of anybody booing or hissing at

01:24:48.669 - 01:25:15.930

a faculty meeting. But it actually happened. Uh, let's see, Dean Rector from the grad school had made the mistake of saying, uh, he thought that the overwhelming sentiment of the university was in favor of uh Masterson's appointment. But Mr Allen's remarks were being uh endorsed by

01:25:15.939 - 01:25:36.629

everybody. I think the way he put it was, I believe that this appointment has the overwhelming endorsement of the faculty. And therefore, since we have no further business, let's adjourn that's when the Blues started coming through. Was that spontaneous? Right? I, I was really flabbergasted. Well,

01:25:36.640 - 01:25:55.649

uh but uh Chancellor Kron was presiding over the meeting in the absence of Dean Gordon, sort of got the hint that it might be wise to keep the meeting going, which he did. And it wasn't until after that, that the uh ward resolution came to the

01:25:55.660 - 01:26:25.000

floor. Well, uh I speak about uh that there is a tradition of uh rice students demonstrating in an orderly manner manner. Uh And it's interesting that they sometimes do get results. There was this incident uh a few years back when the previous Dean of students, uh

01:26:25.009 - 01:26:46.790

Pfeiffer's predecessor had uh thrown out the editor of the thresher, the Kappas newspaper, I forget on what issue or on what grounds. But uh students who had uh really sort of hated that editor, he was very much disliked on campus nevertheless rallied to his defense because

01:26:46.799 - 01:27:06.229

they thought that the freedom of the press was being tampered with. And they staged a demonstration out on a quadrangle, uh marching around, very orderly, very polite. This was the rice tradition and it was led upon with uh sort of jaded amusement by the news media.

01:27:06.240 - 01:27:22.709

The television cameras were out there and they said, oh, pranks are right. But as a matter of fact, uh it proved an effective tactic. Well, I don't recall that the editor got his post back, but he did graduate without a hitch and we got ourselves a

01:27:22.720 - 01:27:44.850

new dean. I think you got the picture. So, so there is this tra tradition of orderly protest and I discovered some more along the same line. Uh I picked up a copy of, I think it was the newspaper from Weiss College. One of the students there

01:27:44.859 - 01:28:08.009

had been scouring through the uh old issues of the thresher from 50 years ago and discovered that back in 1917 and 1918, when rice had become sort of a military cap, everybody was in uniform. Even the girls, uh students started to stage complaints about various things.

01:28:08.020 - 01:28:39.490

There were two food riots and there were various complaints about discipline and about other things. And uh finally, uh mass meetings were held and the administration did agree that some changes should be made. No, uh just imagine 1918. Uh and uh this tradition of uh what

01:28:39.500 - 01:28:58.689

should we say of complaining when complaint is due and also getting some results? That's been uh I suppose the happier side of things at Rice. Now, of course, when I came here, Rice was a very quiet place and remained quiet for six years. I mean, even

01:28:58.700 - 01:29:23.089

that demonstration on behalf of the student editor was only a mild ripple that would uh there were uh there was always some issue, exercising people, what the issue of, uh, who could speak on campus was a big thing back in 1964 and 65. And, uh, that

01:29:23.100 - 01:29:46.430

whole SDS matter was kind of, um, analogous in a way. But since it involved an organization rather than a speaker, uh, we're still as the a AUP found in a kind of gray area. So it's something that's being explored. But, um, I suppose most of these

01:29:46.439 - 01:30:11.250

things happened rather quietly. You'd, you'd find that there was agitation and pressures and, uh, maybe people were scouting around in the colleges, um, raising complaints and so on, but nothing really of, uh, such tremendous moment until the Masterson affair which, uh, where the whole university, uh,

01:30:11.259 - 01:30:29.520

was, uh, galvanized into action. I think we're very lucky that we had the college system, you see, for a long time. It was, people wondered, well, what do we need to have both the student association and these various colleges, that sort of duplicating constituencies? But what

01:30:29.529 - 01:30:52.629

turned out was that the student association people and the college officials worked very closely together and the colleges were a great rallying point. Uh I think, well, I've been thinking about this lately. We are very lucky. I think in this respect that we don't have anything

01:30:52.640 - 01:31:16.899

divisive such as fraternities. Uh That was one of the problems at Cornell that uh who was fighting over possession of the student union. There were black activists and fraternity boys uh who seem to be uh completely at odds with one another. Well, fortunately, we don't have

01:31:16.910 - 01:31:40.020

anything quite like that here. Well, I can remember even when I was an undergraduate at Cornell, uh there was a lot of pressure you might almost say to get into a fraternity. Uh I pledged one for five days and found it wasn't to my taste and

01:31:40.029 - 01:31:58.160

remained independent the rest of the time. But there was this kind of cleavage between fraternities and independence of the school and there were two different, there was a, an inter fraternity council and an independent council which uh were supposed to cooper with one another. I'm not

01:31:58.169 - 01:32:18.229

sure that they always did. But the difference is that there is nothing, I guess the only thing even comparable to fraternities or sororities are the old lit societies at women's colleges and they're pretty much dying out uh at rice. And what you have is a set

01:32:18.240 - 01:32:34.660

up where everybody is a member of something. Uh everybody's in a college uh in a way that's sort of like what you have at Harvard and Yale where everybody is affiliated and there are no fraternities or sororities in those places either, which I think is a

01:32:34.669 - 01:32:56.950

fairly good. Uh, now, of course, Rice was also lucky in being small. Um, but I think the set up with the college was a great help. Um, here's a place where you were able to get people together and there is some sort of meaningful leadership and

01:32:56.959 - 01:33:19.140

that, that's another thing, the very fact that there was good student leadership um both in the colleges and in the s a made a tremendous difference if you didn't have effective student leadership, which could sort of rally the middle. It's very easy for the extremist factions

01:33:19.149 - 01:33:43.089

to take over and become spearhead. Well, uh fortunately, um we have uh manage to do things from kind of power base if you wanna call that, call it that in the middle. And this is something which I think we have to hang on to and develop

01:33:43.290 - 01:34:04.080

still more this committee of a young faculty that you referred to. Well, it's not, not necessarily young, it's, it's uh and it's not an exclusive thing. Yeah. Just the, oh, I forget how many, maybe 20 or so faculty members got together. And uh so far just

01:34:04.089 - 01:34:29.709

the study group, which is a nice safe thing, but we have uh selected two committees. One is supposed to work up manifestos and the other is supposed to, uh, address itself to, uh, organization how the, whether we should have a tightly structured group, whether we should

01:34:29.720 - 01:34:53.689

be affiliated with anything. There are similar efforts afoot on other campuses. Uh, just how well developed they are. I just don't know. Have you gotten involved with curriculum studies, uh, evaluation? Well, uh, that has been going on through, uh, you know, there's a committee which deals

01:34:53.700 - 01:35:18.049

with undergraduate curriculum and a, these things are always under review and faculty meetings. But uh obviously there, there should be some changes there. We have what I think is a much too rigid curriculum, especially the first two years. Uh students have very few options, especially if

01:35:18.060 - 01:35:37.060

they're in science and engineering. And I think much of that ought to be changed toward a uh really a more fluid system. So I think a lot of these things are sort of heritage from the past and somebody was pointing out at a meeting recently that

01:35:37.069 - 01:36:04.939

uh rice probably has more requirements than any others of, of every description. Well, I, I do think it is much too cut and dried and that more effort should be put into changing it. But I don't really have any specifics at my fingertips right now. But

01:36:04.950 - 01:36:31.100

as I say, commit, there are committees that are addressing themselves to these problems. Maybe they need to be prodded once in a while. There are also um other new developments where for the first time we've been actively recruiting minority admissions. Um, and I just saw Alan

01:36:31.109 - 01:36:47.290

Grove who was the chairman of this committee dealing with that matter the other day and asked him how we're doing and he said we're going to get quite a few kids coming in this coming year. Um Now, of course, there are going to be some uh

01:36:47.299 - 01:37:04.870

problems connected with that. Some of these kids are going to need special help of one kind or another. But what's been suggested in the faculty meeting is that we have some kind of set up and I guess it is being worked out, which would go across

01:37:04.879 - 01:37:24.970

the board would not be directed only to minority students, but uh to students in general, many of whom have difficulties when they arrive at rice for, for one reason or another, even kids who did extremely well in high school. So uh we are moving in various

01:37:24.979 - 01:37:53.180

directions and it's hard to uh be in touch with the whole picture all at once. But I, I think that um there is a conscientious effort to uh bring rice into the mountain stream. And of course, we've always been talking uh I guess the big expression

01:37:53.189 - 01:38:11.910

that was always on everybody's lips. My first few years around here was the rice myth which meant that uh rice had pretensions of greatness which were not yet being fulfilled. You know, we've talked about ourselves as the Harvard Swarthmore or whatever of the Southwest. And uh

01:38:12.149 - 01:38:38.299

this was not necessarily so though, we certainly were pre eminent in the Southwest and will I trust be so? Um, but an expression that came up right during the Masterson crisis, one of the professors who was very much concerned about this procedural business and uh it

01:38:38.310 - 01:39:03.330

looked like a backward step to him, said, must rice remem remained forever poised on the brink of greatness. Very apt apt expression. Well, um I suppose what this whole crisis has done has caused a lot of people to do some rethinking of old and comfortable assumptions.

01:39:05.450 - 01:39:32.950

And a I think professors are coming to realize that uh they have to pay more attention to the students. Administrators are beginning to realize they have to pay more attention to students and faculty both. But uh I'm not sure just to what degree the trustees uh

01:39:34.089 - 01:39:54.560

are uh coming around to the realization that students are not Children and faculty are not hired hands. Uh It may take a while before that message gets across to them that what we have here is a community of scholars or what we should have and are

01:39:54.569 - 01:40:24.709

doing great uh working in some sort of cooper endeavor. And uh what's especially important is a sense of self respect and mutual respect. Uh We can't afford to have anybody looking down upon anybody else. It seems to me and uh we all have to treat one

01:40:24.720 - 01:40:48.419

another as adults likewise. And this includes treating the students as adults, I think that you, if you treat them as adults, they are more likely to behave like adults. Well, I don't know. Do you have any other things we'd like to? Well, as a matter of

01:40:48.430 - 01:41:03.209

fact, I think we've, we've covered the things very thoroughly and if, uh, if, after, if, uh, going over this, uh, questions occur to me, well, perhaps I can get back together with you later on in the uh Yes. Ok. Well, or even after school begins. Yeah.

01:41:03.439 - 01:41:20.209

Well, uh I'll be away most of July, but uh we'll be around all of June and all of August. And uh even when I have the sabbatical in the spring, I still expect to be in Houston most of the time. Well, the project is funded thus

01:41:20.220 - 01:41:36.839

far through, uh uh to the first of October. So, uh we'll, we'll have a chance to re evaluate what we have and see if there are any, uh, any open ended, uh, matters that uh we could become more enlightened on, uh, later on. I'm really very

01:41:36.850 - 01:41:52.270

grateful for the time you've given us. Uh Well, that's quite all right. It's, it's really made a splendid contribution in uh these uh these written materials like your diary. And uh yeah, so I still have to convince my wife that I should add my diary to

01:41:52.279 - 01:42:08.549

this file. Let's see. Was there anything you wanted to add before? I uh, well, I can't think of anything right now. Um, I'll probably think of a great deal later on. Well, we'll have an opportunity to talk again. Any time you have anything you want to

01:42:08.560 - 01:42:11.560

add or anything, anything occurs to me. Well, I'll be in touch with you.