University of South Carolina Libraries
?ljr dantmirk Member of South Carolina College Press Association Published on Tuesday of Every Week by the Literary Societies of the University of South Carolina. SUBSCRIPTION HATE?$1.50 A YEAR. Entered as second class nail matter at the Columbia, South Carolina PostofTIce on November 20, 1908. Uews articles may be contributed by any member of the student body, but must be in by Friday night before Tuesday's publication. Hand In copy typewritten and double-spaced. Names must be signed to copy. Articles will be published in the Open Forum as submitted, with the name of the author signed. STAFF ASHLEY IIALSEY Editor-in-Chief LEROY M. WANT Managing Editor ASSOCIATES J. A. CATHCART Associate Editor W. FRANK TAYLOR Associate Editor WILSON O. WELDON Associate Editor W. G. JEFFORDS Associate Editor N. W. BROOKER Associate Editor FOY STEVENSON Associate Editor DOROTHY l'ENLAND Associate Editor J. MITCHELL MORSE Assistant Managing Editor W. I. LATHAM . ... Assistant Managing Editor EDITORIAL STAFF LEWIS 11. WALLACE News Editor MELVIN KARESH Sports Editor WILLIAM OKDDINGS Alumni Editor JACK FOSTER Fraternity Editor JOHN WHITE Y. M. C. A. Editor MASON C. BRl'NSON Exchange Editor J. ROY PRINCE Joke Editor CO-ED DARICE JACKSON Editor CLELIA K. HIjACK News Editor LOIS FISCHER ......... Society Editor FRANCES BLACK Feature Editor ASSISTANTS W. B. King, Lester Hamilton, John A. Oiles, Ethel Galloway, Sarah Agnes Jackson, Vera Jones, Frost Walker and John McKnight BUSINESS C. L. SCOTT Business Manager J. J. MACK Assistant Manager W. C. HERBERT Assistant Manager CIRCULATION CARL BROWN Circulation Manager R. II. BISHOP Assistant Manager J. ROY PRINCE Assistant Manager TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 18, 1930 CROWING FOR? Football Stadium?30,000 Capacity. Press Bureau?Absolutely Needed. t Student Activity Building. Paved Sidewalks. U.8.O. A Dangerous Place Perhaps it is merely an oversight on the part of some of our executives or perhaps it is not but an oversight has been made that is each day placing hundreds of Carolina student's lives in danger. The oversight that is referred to is the lack of fire escapes in LeConte College. LeConte College is a four story building used by the different science departments of the University. It has only one central stair case leading up from the ground floor to the stories above. The first and second stories are used by the department of Chemistry. These rooms arc filled with highly explosive and inflammable chemicals that are very likely to explode and set the building on fire at any time If such a fire were to break out on the first two floors then the students and professors on the two top floors would be cut off from the stairway and would be forced to jump from these floors which would indeed be a very hazardous affair. Of course there are those who will argue that a fire has never occurred there but this is no cause for assurance that there will never be a fire there. Very probably the people that attended the commencement exercises of the Cleveland High School, that ended by seventy-seven persons being burned to death, did not think that fire escapes were necessary but their costly awakening certainly made them realize such needs. There arc not even fire extinguishers provided for LeConte as far as could be learned. The remedy for this condition is simple. All that has to be done is to build the proper fire escapes. U.8.O. Results of the Gamecock-Cadet boxing bouts in Charleston went a long way toward proving the childish belief that it's not safe to fight in the other man's backyard?for several reasons. U.8.C. What Price Learning? Like buzzards after a battle, the text book publishers are having fine pickings again this semester. Almost every class is beitlg requested to buy new books, unless the class is a continuation of one which purchased revised texts at the opening of the year. The average cost of the new text book is about $2.75. A student may need as many as three books for one course, however. Total costs of a seasons class library may run higher than tuition and other fees paid the University for schooling. In other words, the State of South Carolina in many instances has reduced the price of learning to less than the book dealers demand for the mere volumes necessary to study the courses. Hooks arc fast becoming the prohibitive item of the students' expenses, paradox though this may seem. Results are various and weird, in keeping with a situation which many overlook entirely, and but a few ap- j preciate. Some professors, moved by the realization of the students' plight, order or arrange to have ordered all the books accessary for a class at reduecd rates. To offset this economy, some other professors carefully deliver a synopsis of their favorite text for class use, and then tack one or two others to the list. That more students do not faint on such occasians is a tribute to their hearts rather than their pockctbooks. The University library affords an oasis of free text reading in the wilderness of high priced, required texts, through which so many students spend the collegiate equivalent of seven years in wandering. Even so, it cannot alleviate the students' anguish. Some students never buy books. They take five or six classes, and own only one or two books for the lot. Consequent evils arc numerous, especially at examination time, when they whoop and wail around the campus like demons. The student who does not own a book has two alternatives. He may keep a complete and exact notebook, which few do, or lie may trust to the kindness of fate and never consult a text book except to cram before quizzes and examinations. Neither case offers one-half the lasting knowledge that may be derived from possession and daily perusal of a book. Another class comprises the student who owns a half or third share in his class text, which in such cases may have cost as much as $10. He may have a third share, but he rarely gets his money's worth out of the book. Such arrangements fail because one student usually monopolizes the book to the deprivation of his partners. The only way for a student to learn is for him to have a book, not in the library, not in a friend's room, but where lie can study whenever he wishes. Notebooks and cramming help somewhat, but arc not sufficient. Of the three old methods of obtaining the necessary, by buying, borrowing, or stealing, only the first is satisfactory when text books are involved. Some students never study, being students only in j name. If they were donated text books and given lovely sirens to read their lessons to them, they still would not study. These people arc not involved in the text book problem, for they do not buy books even when financially able. It is on behalf of the other, conscicntious and often poor, that The Gamecock appeals. That text books must be changed frequently to keep pace with a civilization making rapid advances is conceded. Professors are quite right in discarding their old text for these that offer more up-to-date information and modern treatment of the subject. The trouble is that they do not recognize this as a day of literary mass production. More magazines, more novels, and certainly more text books upon the same courses arc being written now than ever before. Where once the identical algebra book served father and son, it is a strangely neglected year that does not producc a score or a hundred volumes 011 teaching trigonometry. There are millions of historians, hundreds of thousands of grammarians, mathematicians whose numbers can be arrived at only by the working of progressions. All are busy in the lucrative field of text book writing. Every Frenchman, Spaniard, Italian, and scholastic scion of the ancient Greeks to emigrate to America in the last half century is scribbling off a dictionary or text book of his native language. It is a simple matter to change texts often, and the professors who do so are induced by every forceful method known to the modern salesman. Even good, readable text books, the sort the student can understand, are beginning to flood the market. Some day two centuries hence, the archeologist will stand text book in hand while his assistants wield their shovels in tossing aside whole pyramids of ancient books. Finally they will exhume a modern university, perhaps the University of South Carolina. U.H.C. This week's definition of a kibitzer: a track man who runs after the fire engines to keep in training. ir.H.c. Hell Without Cinders Asked in what condition the University track now was, a member of the track squad replied, "It's hell without cinders." By which he meant that cinders so necessary to the running path of Carolina's speed boys | had not been dumped on the track since last year, nor any other repairs made. Washouts trip the hurrying runner. Bare, sandy spots threaten to make him lose pace, and fill his low shoes with sole-searing grit. The absence of cinders makes a poor foothold. True it is that a man compelled to train on such a track should show marked improvement 011 a real cinder path. A high jumper forced to practice with a ten pound shot hung around his neck will also leap higher without the weight. The only way to train a track team, or any other team, is under conditions approximating those they will face in competition. The cost of cinders cannot be very high, and the University furnace, which creates and distributes quite a number of them gratis, might furnish enough to bed the track anyhow. Of laborers the University has a number. At present the track is nothing more than a quarter mile rim for the field upon which spring football is practiced. Such a situation is decidedly hard upon Carolina's track men, not to mention track prospects for the season soon to open. IT. m. c. Times may be progressing, but there are still oldfashioned students who prefer a buggy and a moon-lit road to companionate marriage and a coupe. "HONESTLY, IT'S THE BEST POLICY" WINCHESTER GRAHAM, Gen. Agt. Atlantic Life Insurance Co. 702-703 Palmetto Bldg. College Clothes Need Careful and Constant Attention. Let Us Keep You Well Dressed LEAVE TIIEM AT CANTEEN OR GAMECOCK PRESSING CLUB Carolina Dry Cleaning Co. *- - ' We Welcome You At The State Barber Shop Ground Floor State Office Building COLUMBIA. S. C. L. H. BOLAND, Prop. SNOOKER, CAROM AND POCKET TABLES M. & M. Recreation Parlor 1216 MAIN STREET COLUMBIA. S. C. BURNETT'S DRUG STORE CAROLINA SEALS, JEWELRY, STATIONERY DRUGS, DRINKS, CIGARS Pi Kappa Phi, Sigma Nu, Sigma Alpha Epsilon, Kappa Alpha, Alpha Tail Omega, Phi Epsilon Pi?$1.00 per box?Envelopes and Paper One Block From Campus Phone 3191 Cor. Main and College One Day Service Billy Bull's Thro The Canteen A Meal A Minute Columbia 1211 Gervais Street Laundry I SANDWICHES & WAFFLES SHORT ORDERS 1323 Taylor St. Phone 4954 . Ham and Egg Sandwich?15c CENTRAL DRUG CO. I 1204 Main Street OPEN ALL NIGHT Established Over 45 Years P. H. Lachicotte & Co. Diamonds, Jewelry, Silverware, Expert Repairs 1424 Main Street Columbia, S. C. "LET ED DO IT" George Davis?Rep. Gillie Watson?Rep. Tenement 7?Room 1 SUITS CLEANED One Day Service in Cleaning ED. ROBINSON PHONE 8187-8188 1017 GERVAIS ST. \ 1248 Main Street 1427 Main Street GAYDEN BROTHERS Cigar Stores CIGARS, CIGARETTES, PIPES AND PERIODICALS J