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1852: The y fan and the ETC remembers The Great Biscuit Rebellion which was AM A A# 4HAA MM MMU *4M J!AM4 protests In the'good old days' of USC. MARK PIRAS Staff Writer A great blow was dealt to the enrollment at the University of South Carolina in 1852, when 108 of the 199 students enrolled in the college abruptly left the university. About 29 years of uprisings preceded the Biscuit Rebellion, dating back to 1823, when students who were fed up with spoiled meat and finding worms in their vegetables decided to break into the home of J. H. Randolph, the university steward (the man responsible for serving the meals to the students). The students destroyed his furniture, and threw his silver plates into a nearby well. Four years later, in 1827,75 students signed a petition to boycott the commons (the eating area where students were required to attend meals and eat at a "common table"). They were suspended by university officials for forming an "illegal combination", defined by officials as any group of students who decide to band together to deliberately ignore university regulations. Forty-one of those students refused to rescind their pledge and were expelled from the university permanently. The president of the university at the time, Thomas Cooper, wrote a letter to the board of trustees that read, "The college is in yearly jeopardy of being "? i Till A 1 X A ? destroyed Dy tne disputes aDout eating. He favored the abolition of compulsory commons (requiring students to attend meals at a certain time, and charging absent students for the meals they missed). In an incident that was not welldocumented, sometime between 1827 and 1852, students became so upset with the quality of the meat they were being served they stole a bull the steward had intended to serve them, led it to water, and drowned it. Part of the problems with the meal quality was due to the fact that the steward was paid one lump sum. He then took the lump sum of money, w 925 1/2 Huger St. 4] 10 Muscle Dynamics Indoor Rock C Treadmills, Bil Consultation V o : 10:0< ; Ru; s F \ UNIVERSITIl WILL BE A^ PLANS < p: HARMEYE] at GSA ear the bisci students hit purchased food for _ _ the students, and I I M kept whatever money was [OTW leftover as his 1 p f] rnll )/ \? salary. Vj' U U If "U \J ill V" Both students ; i : j and faculty ate at the commons (which was located in Steward's Hall) and complaints about < the quality of food were logged continually i from both groups. i In 1842, the university abolished the ] position of steward, and created instead i the position of bursar. The bursar was 1 paid a salaiy of fifteen hundred dollars; and his salary in no way depended on 1 the amount of money spent on the food. Unfortunately, the university's hopes that the quality of food would increase was not realized. Hie students' dislike for the commons continued unabated, and Professor Thornwell made a report in 1850 that reads, "Die dissatisfaction of the students, as it appears to me, arises from the unpleasant association connected with the place, as a place of compulsory boarding. The disgust extends to everything about the establishment, and by a natural illusion they transfer to their food the prejudices against the system that provides it." In other words, Thomwell was saying that students hated the facilities and regulations of the commons so badly it a J j iL.iL.i r. :?i.. x _ _ tney extenaea mai naie umairiy 10 me food they were served. Two years later, just months before what would become known as the Biscuit Rebellion, Thornwell noted in a report that everything in the commons had been going smoothly. The students decided soon after to petition the Board of Trustees for a change in the compulsory system. Most felt it was unfair to expect them to make it to a standard meal time, and that they would have to pay for food whether they attended the meals or not. The petition was denied. 108 students decided to enter into a secret pledge, promising to withdraw from the university if their next petition for a change in the compulsory system was denied. The students then petitioned for the change. Before the board could decide on the nrrrr t h I e t i Columbia SC 29205 Months $1 i Weeks $6 Weight Machines Free We ilimbing CLose to Downtow kes, Stair Climbers Person; Body Shaping and Cross Trs ictober 9.199 ) a.m. to 2:0Q sseli House Pi tee Admtssio 3S FROM ACROSS MAILABLE TO DISC FOR GRADUATE I LEASE CONTACT SON! R-TURNER AT 777-247' @SS1.CSD.SC.EDU wn QUESTIONS jits hit the : the road ^ petition, the secret pledge became ^ nnhlir lcnowlftdpe. ofew and the university ; U- - p /V\ again called on its i'Mlri lD vy rules against "illegal combinations." The students were told by university Dffirials to rescind the pledge, and their request to abolish compulsory commons would be honored. A great sentiment bad been building up, and even the faculty and administrators had become opposed to the idea of compulsory commons. The students refused to break up their coalition until after their petition was either accepted of rejected. In an attempt to diffuse the volatile situation, 30 students who had not entered into the pledge decided to petition the Board of Trustees to have the compulsory systeni abolished. The university agreed within two days to abolish the compulsory system, seemingly ending the student uprising. However, the 108 students felt honorbound to their pledge, which stated that they would withdraw from school if the university did not accept their petition. Since the other petition was the one the university had accepted, and the original one was effectively dead, all 108 students left the university and went back to their homes, thus ending the uprising that would be known forever after as the "Great Biscuit Rebellion". A letter dated Dec. 15,1852, from then-president Thornwell, asks the students to come back to school and implies that the students perhaps felt the scrutiny of their peers as being the real reason they did not want to return, and had even left in the first place. He also hinted that the students were more worried about what their friends thought of them than getting an education to further their futures. The university's enrollment was at a scant 81 students after the rebellion, and most of the 108 students who left Mn enwinva urora lie v ci tame uaca* ii v ovuwio ? vi ^ involved in the secret pledge, and no seniors left the university after the rebellion had ended. However, the large junior class was so decimated that in 1853-1854, only 11 students graduated from the university. c C I u b (803) 256-9001 10 5 lights Aerobics in & Campus al Training and lining Classes (6 ; F P?f((% p atio ; n : THE NATION \ ^USS YOUR STUDY! fA < 7 OR E-MAIL 'H YOUR 7 w? w., A 9wm 9 ^ ^ ^ ? 9 | ? 1 Webmaster can't swa I once advised the technically-inclined to get , ~ a life. In a grand sensje-ef turnabout-is-fair-play, MMfl I have fallen victim to an addiction which is forcing me to abandon my own advice. As a public service, I would like to warn USC students of a nefarious product that I fear will B!P^^f| i j r-n T 1, Tf Kav^Hil ue iii^y uuwumu. 1 speciiv, ui tuuiac, ui v^uaivc. xi HS? you didn't just laugh or cringe when I uttered that heinous word, you need a little deep re/HUMf background. ICtinnUv Quake is the second iteration of Doom, the .||Kc or* ultraviolent 3-d first-person shoot-em-up that was responsible for more low GPAs than all the beer in Columbia. Doom was a revolutionary and highly addictive game, and it made extensive rounds on local area networks worldwide as players perfected the art of pasting their office and classmates all over the walls with highpowered weapons. Quake, with minor technical adjustments, is basically Doom, but on a much larger scale, id Software (www.idsoftware.com), the guys who created Doom and modified it into Quake, have added in the ability for players to connect to servers anywhere on the internet. What does this mean? It means you c^n hook up to a Quake game in Moscow and be playing people from Italy, Australia, and China all in the same arena. Meet fascinating, interesting people and kill them. Of course, this sounds really cool, but the nature of the internet dictates that reality is a bit different. The game that I described above would be about as much fun as playing soccer in a pool full of Jell-O. Just think about it: a server in Moscow has to coordinate the actions of people coming in from thousands and thousands of miles away and try to make it so that all the people on the server see the same thing. Sounds easy, right? Well, not when you realize that Quake is the sort of game that sencfs out commands over the net hundreds of times a second, and it needs every one of those commands replied to by the server. Snv vnn'rA in a crama and von start, mnninp down a virtual hallway in the game. In an ideal situation, the server would take all of those run commands and move you around in the game. But if you're in Columbia, and you're playing on a server in Moscow, you're probably not going to have the greatest net connection of all time (Hint this is gross understatement). What results is a molasses-like lack of action commonly referred to as lag. Long story short, if you want to play Quake over the net, it behooves you to find a server a little nearer to you, or else you're going to be stuck in one place while faster players ? We do every ?Student Media THANK YOU UNIVEfl JpHHHBSSSuSl Ifs?^ iB 1111^, flMf' Bruce Darner, manager of the University Bookstoi Cox for the Bookstore's generous sponsorship of L and Addam's Bookstore provided t-$hirts and incei was held in August and was attended by over 200 Get More Tha Get Back national e screen: gBimjjg FREE of Charge LOCAL DEF Written Self-Test for Depression Screening Interview with Mental Sponsored 1 Health Professional Educational Presentation o ^ .TIJ Where: Tin Symptoms of Depression Include loss of pleasure Ti lft.ft( j* i r 1 I I 1 llllv* JL" feelings of sadness, hopelessness, worthlessness _ __ changes in eating and sleeping F or More 1 patterns or Call 1 irritability, anxiousness, restlessness inability Jo concentrate De fatigue or loss of energy unexplained aches and pains thoughts of death or suicide SuA" \ llow own medicine run around and kill you at their leisure. 8 A cool way to ensure that you'll have a good connection is to get a hold of Quake Spy, a shareware program which will scan the currently running servers and then list them in terms of 1 their speed relative to you. You can find Quake n i "I ' it TVl .i.' ? spy at www.stompea.com in tne r lies section (multiplayer utilities). rJIMf e Why is speed important? Simple: it feels lABBLc a hen of a lot better to be fast and rack up kills Mintftii (frags) than it does to be slow and get wasted all the time. Frags are good for the ego. When you get good at playing other people in Quake (this is called a Deathmatch), you'll get to the point where you're on a server with maybe 10 other players, and you have more than 400 frags, and the next guy down has 50. It's a real ego boost to have six or seven players band together to come hunt you down. This brings us to the next topic, and the one that will possibly put Quake on the map netwide. Quake allows players to get on a server with a bunch of other players and band up into teams to play organized games. This opens up all sorts of possibilities, and it has resulted in an interesting phenomenon: Quake Clans. There are now several hundred Quake Clans, containing from 5 to 30 members, and there are literal Clan wars going on as we speak. Certain clan members gain reputations quickly, be they good or bad, and that tends to reflect on the whole clan. Factor in the age of most of the players (voices oh so squeaky), and it can degenerate into an all-out insult war sometimes, with some clans taking things way too seriously. Despite all that, Clans are an interesting concept, especially if effective use is made of the capabilities of the game. If proper consideration is given, clan members can act together during a game to maximize their tactical resources. Standard infantry squad tactics can be used, such as covering fire, ambushes, flankiner. or whatever the situation warrants. Or, you can run around and paste anything that moves. To each his own. id Software has been amazed at the seemingly spontaneous formation of all these dans, but in an amazingly smart move for a corporation, id has officially recognized these dans and is now working on a total overhaul of Quake, called QuakeWorld, which will be geared specifically towards internet Deathmatching and clans. The mere fact that I was able to spout most of that stuff off the top of my head should be scary enough. Quake will take you and make you crazy.If 11 make you a junkie. YouH do anything to get Quake. You'll be jonesin' for it big time. Ypu have been warned. 'T-'--""1 GBQ dfiy, coming soon! BBrSn ; the Campus! ISITY BOOKSTORE! lb^ v. ' l ml TSai a fc gP"n';j' * 4 I I./*!. * fllH e, is thanked by USC student leader Harvey leadership Carolina. The University Bookstore itives for all participants. Leadership Carolina USC student leaders. n a Test Score Your Life DEPRESSION ING DAY nRVKWiffJM 'RESSION SCREENING INFORMATION by: Counseling & Human Development Center 9mson Student Health Center, 3rd Floor n m n m JPt IiAA r* m fn A HA n m j a.m. in iaiw ^ w p*ni? iu t?w p*iiit nformation Call: 777-5223 oil Free 1-888-805-1000 for a site near you. pression is an illness and effective treatments are available. Outreach Event During Mental Awareness Week >rted in part by an educational grant from Eli Lily and Company