The Optimist (Abilene, Tex.), Vol. 46, No. 14, Ed. 1, Saturday, January 10, 1959 Page: 3 of 6
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JANUARY 10 1959
THE OPTIMIST
PAGE :
DESCANT
Fa) in Love with Aunt Mame
OUdave Dead
". . . wt mmI tn4 ytf J.
Jwunt
Art u4 Ufit ..." '
-W. Y..H
By WILKES BERRY
I defy you not to fall In love
with "Auntie Mame." If you fail
to I'm afraid Patrick Dennis her
author will mark you down as
having the I.Q. of a dead flash-
light battery and I'm afraid he
would be right. In the unlikely
event-that anyone-does not know
who AuntlC'Mame is? perhaps an
introduction is in order5.
Mame is the most dazzling fab-
ulous and utterly engaging flap-
per in American literature. She Is
Susan B. Anthony Tallulah
Bankhead Clara Bow and. the
Duchess of Windsor rolled Into
one dynamic and totally unpre-
dictable personality.
IN SHORT if you were looking
for a guardian for an orphaned
child she would be the last per-
son you would pick. I won't say
that; I'll say this: if you like the
sweet demure grandmotherly
type there's not much there for
you. You guessed it. This Bo-
hemian step-child of New York
society in the '20's assumes the
responsibility of rearing her little
nephew after his father's death.
The remaining two hours and
twenty minutes of the movie is
devoted to recounting the mad
life one lives in the eye of a hur-1
ricane named Mame Dennis. Sel-
dom does the screen reach such
high-points of sheer comedy as
when Auntie Mame engages a
telephone switchboard in mortal
combat sells roller skates at
Macy's during the Christmas
rush and goes South to capture
a husband all in order to tide
COMPARED TO ACC
French
By DOROTHY GOODWIN
All does not go well for stu-
dents of science in Paris this year.
It all started November 1 Regis-
tration Day when over 19000
students presented themselves in
the science classrooms at the Sor-
bonne. Actually.hardly half that num-
ber could present themselves In
the classrooms proper. The rest
jammed the lobby or milled
around outside the university
murmuring ominously. It was
painfully evident to all concerned
that the centuries-old classrooms
would no longer suffice.
The result was inevitable. All
FROM; PAGE 1
Building . . .
President Don H. Morris made
'this statement concerning the new
'construction "The first unit of
our' In'dustrlaf Arts building will
enable us to broaden the work in
this d&artment. ""
"THE INDUSTRIAL Arts De-
partment'has proved to be one of
the most popular in the College
and it makes it possible for us we
feel to serve the public schools
in the preparation of teachers and
to serve our own students in pre
paration for home maintenance
and do-it-yourself Jobs."
Plans are also being made to
match this building with another
for the wood working shop which
is now housed in a temporary
frame building.
Flashlight Q
i' r Si"---'
her little family over the depres
sion.
MANY A new day will dawn
before you forget Mame's visit at
Peckerwood (makes Tara look
like a cracker shanty) the plan-
tation home of Beauregard Jack-
son Pickett Burnslde III.
Constance Bennett and Sylvia
Sidney have tried the part but
they are sub-standard Impostors
in Rosslind Russell's role. She
should have a long-deserved
Oscar for her flawless perfor-
mance which no other actress
would have been remotely cap
able of bringing to the screen
There is something terribly
sobering and frightening as well
as amusing in the absolute medio-
crity of the American upper mid-
dle class as personified by the
nephew's prospective in-laws
Claude and Doris Upson. They are
a couple of intellectual vacuums
who have two children two cars
.two addresses and two aver-
sions: Roosevelt and Jews.
AUNTIE Mame speaks her
most eloquent line to her nephew
when she learns that he has been
hobnobbing with the Upsons:
" . . . I think you have become
one of the most beastly bourgeois
babbitty bigoted little snobs on
the Eastern seaboard."
Ros dominates the screen every
ifoment the camera is on her but
"he has her stiffest competition
from her mousy secretary who
will undoubtedly rank as the
'plain jane of the decade. Agnes
Gooch is a riot in orthopedic ox-
fords and rimless glasses.
Auntie Mame's motto is: "Life
is a banquet and most poor suck-
ers are starving to death." Amen
Auntie Mame.
Housing Seen Poor
science students and professors
went on strike last month vowing
to hold no classes whatever until
the government does something.
WHILE WE can sympathize
with the venerable General de
Gaulle who must now find an-
other trick in his resourceful
sleeve or face a dearth of scient-
ists we can't blame anyone con-
cerned for the strike itself. For
how many times have I content-
olated the same thing in the
GrillT
You can't expect someone
schooled in Paris not to toy with
the idea of a demonstration when
in after-chapel crowd sweeps her
completely away from a mailbox
and a letter she is sure contains
a check.
Nor can you expect a student
who has traveled all the way
from South Africa Vienna or
Hong-Kong to study physics at
the University of Paris to Rlmply
shrug his shoulders mutter "Cest
la vie" and go home to sulk in his
room.
He probably doesn't have one
to go to. The student housing
problem Is just as bad as the over
crowded classrooms. Rooms are
hard to find and rent sky-high
when they're found.
MORE THAN one girl student
has taken a position as part-time
maid in a Parisien family simply
because of the room that goes
with the low-paying job.
Those who find and can afford
hotel rooms in tho student quar-
ter can hardly be classed as more
fortunate. Take the case of
Karen's Kubicle. Karen was a
WAS MULE AUCTIONEER
Mabee Holl Donor
Students
"!-J---
By THE OPTIMIST STAFF
"There was a great celebration
when J. E. Mabee came to the Hill
for the Mabee dormitory ground-
breaking ceremony" said ACC
President Don Morris as he re-
flected '-upon that day April 8
1052.
Morris chuckled and explained
that there were two reasons for
the excitement. One was the thrill
of ACC men as they looked for-
ward to "literally moving back on
campus" after letting the girls
take over McDonald Hall during
the war years.
But the other reason for stu-
dent body enthusiasm was tho
personality of Mabee himself.
''Mr. Mabee certainly was an ex-
pressive fellow" said Morris his
hand rubbing his chin as ho
searched in the past.
THE GROUND-breaking cere
mony was the first time that Ma
This Week
(As scheduled on
SATURDAY. 10
MONDAY. 12
TUESDAY. 13
THURSDAY. 15
'et
lovely American ballerina study
ing at the Sorbonne.
Since we both faced the same
stiff (examination last spring wc
went "chez elle" to study to-
gether. The entrance to her hotel
was a grim little door sandwich-
ed between two student cafes. A
long hallway led to the staircase
the only access to Karen's eighth-
floor abode.
The abode Itself was 5' by 8
and I do not exaggerate.
For forty-five dollars a month
Karen had hot water from two
until five every afternoon and
continuous rhythm from the ex-
African chieftan across the hall
who'd brought his tribal drums
along to Paris.
THE KUBICLE'S redeeming
feature Karen told me with stars
in her1 eyes was that she could
hear the clock in the courtyard
of the Sorbonne itself.
What atmosphere! What inspir
ation!
Since the clock bonged out with
a voice of iron doom every hour
half-hour 'and quarter-hour I
wondered the price she paid in
sleep for her atmosphere.
The more I saw of Karen's
Kubicle the more I worried about
my room at ACC this year.
Having never laid eyes on the
campus and relying entirely up-
on the diagram on the back of
the catalogue I had naively writ-
ten the Bursar's office the follow-
ing implicit directions:
I wanted a private room on the
third floor of McKinzie Hall fac-
ing away from the cafeteria with
Brought Enthusiasm
bee met the ACC student body.
He was to speak in a chapel ser-
vice imediately before the cere-
mony "On tho way over to
Sewell Mr. Mabee said to me
'Now no speech making'" said
Morris.
But when President Morris in-
troduced the donor of Mabco
Hall the happy boys and willing
girls gave him a standing ovation.
When asked to say a few words
Mabee stepped to the speaker's
stand and talked for 15 minutes.
"And he entertained them as
well as anybody ever has" said
Morris.
The J. E. and L. E. Mabeo
Foundation Inc. of Tulsa Okla.
became interested in helping ACC
through a close friend of Morris
Paul Taliaferro Tulsa executive
vice president of the Sun Ray
Mid-Continent Oil Company. This
foundation is interested in promo
on the' Hill
the Dean's calendar)
Frater Sodalis Banquet
Sigma Tau Delta
Sooner Club
Kappa Epsilon Kappa
Oral Reading Hour
Credit Union
Dead Week All Week
Civ
mauve walls blonde furniture a
private bath and if possible a
picture window.
THE THOUGHT occurred to
me at this point that I might not
get everything I'd specified. In
fact I might not even get a room!
I was right. I arrived in Abi-
lene to find myself placed not in
a McKinzie penthouse but well
after number 100 on the waiting
list. I established myself off
campus waiting guiltily for one
hundred girls to have severe at-
tacks of appendicitis or home-
sickness. After three days it happened.
The little card in my mailbox
read "Miss Goodwin you have
been assigned to Room 334 in Mc-
Kinzie Dormitory."
Overjoyed I raced tp McKin-
zie third floor. A frantic search
revealed rooms 333 and 335 and
between them what could have
been at one time room 334 but
what was now unmistakably the
storage closet!
I LEARNED later that the new
IBM machines had put me in the
wrong slot and that I had actu-
ally been assigned to room 334 in
Nelson.
But by this time nothing could
have Induced me to budge from
a room that was irrevocably mine
as long as I paid the rent.
I was afraid that once giving
up a room I would wander home-
less through Abilene all year
looking as wistfully up at dormi-
tory windows as those thousands
of students must be looking at the
darkened windows of the Science
Faculty in Paris right now.
Impressed
ting good citizenship.
THEY promised to build ACC
a $700000 dormitory if other
friends would furnish it and it
steel could be procured for the
building.
Friends of ACC came througfc
with their- part and President
Morris and Board of Trustees
President B. Sherrod hustled ott
to Washington D. C exerting'
Christian determination to get a
steel allotment. The Korean War
had forced a government ration-
ing of steel.
A. L. Ward who has since dieeV
was the contracted On this $70O;-r
000 job there wasn't even a writ-
ten cbntract between him the
Mabees and ACC. Each monthi
Ward sent a bill to the Mabeesr
who sent a check to ACC for pay-
ment. In this way the eventual
cost of $644065.64 was paid.
The dormitory was ready for
the fall semester in 1953. Mabee
returned to the Hill for the open-
ing ceremonies this time with
his wife. Again he impressed ACC
students with a chapel speech an
interesting autobiographical talk.
BESIDES being a rancher and
oil man Mr. Mabee was in his
earlier years famous as a mule
auctioneer. He was so skillful that
he signed a contract with the
British government to auction oft
several thousand left-over World
War I mules for them in Fort-
Worth. Mabee said that he only attend-
ed school through the third grade.
After his speech an ACC student
introduced himself shook his
hand and asked. 'Where can J.
find a third-grade reader liko
that?"
In an official ccrmony the Ma-
bees signed their names as the
first guests of Mabee Dormitory.
Again Morris recalled "Mr. Ma-
bee led his wife to the guest book
and quipped 'Mary Jane just
take your glove off and sign right
here. "
SHE SIGNED the two portraits
of the Mabees that now hang In
the Mabee parlor were unveiled
and ACC men moved into the
dormitory 312 strong. There
never has been a moment since
the opening of Mabee that there-
has not been a waiting list for its:
shelter.
Now -Mabee Dormitory rests
an "L" of tannish brick molded;
into a window-tiered flat-tomjed!
shelter. Behind those windows arc
long corridors that echo with th
laughter of midnight "bull-ses
sions" and ring with the sincere-:
music from men joined in devo
tion.
Under .that flat roof ore rooms:
filled with the essence of collegi-
ate Christian life.
J. 'E. Mabee's purpose in giving;
Abilene Christian College Mabeei
Dormitory was to promote good
citizenship. Mabee Hall is serving"
well.
School Picks
Top Teachers
A secret ballot of the student
body at the Abilene Christian"
College Campus School resulted
in Bess Bell and Mrs. C. H. Stan-
ley having been picked as out-
standing teachers of this schools
year.
The selections were made ok.
the basis of 13 pre-arrangedr
points. Both Miss Bell and Mrs
Stanley have at least 30 years off
teaching experience and hol
master's degrees.
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The Optimist (Abilene, Tex.), Vol. 46, No. 14, Ed. 1, Saturday, January 10, 1959, newspaper, January 10, 1959; Abilene, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth95930/m1/3/: accessed April 27, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting Abilene Christian University Library.