THE PRESS

The place that the Harvard Lampoon has held among American undergraduate publications comes again to public attention through the death of John T. Wheelwright, Harvard '76, one of its founders. Mr. Wheelwright was not only one of the Lampoon's original editors; throughout his life he was a member of a group that continually worked for its success and, strange as it will seem to Yale undergraduate ears, returned ex-officio to its staff as "literary editor" when forty-two years out of college, his help carrying the magazine through the difficult publishing days following the war. Here in coed was an example of graduate loyalty to an undergraduate institution that is worth recording. Perhaps it was because much the same spirit kept alive the interest in the Lampoon of many other Harvard men, that it had long since become the American institution that it is. For certainly, to an outsider, the Lampoon is more than an undergraduate humorous paper: It has an individuality. If it is a solemn undertaking to became a Harvard undergraduate, the Lampoon cases the yoke; if the Harvard undergraduate gets too serious, the Lampoon holds up the mirror to him. Satire and good-tempered wit are the most potent of controversial weapons, and in the hands of undergraduate editors who know how to handle them are likely to make more impression that the sonorous periods of the average "editorial." The college humorous paper that is content to remain merely a "comic," loses a golden opportunity. Yale Alumni Weekly