News

Cambridge Residents Slam Council Proposal to Delay Bike Lane Construction

News

‘Gender-Affirming Slay Fest’: Harvard College QSA Hosts Annual Queer Prom

News

‘Not Being Nerds’: Harvard Students Dance to Tinashe at Yardfest

News

Wrongful Death Trial Against CAMHS Employee Over 2015 Student Suicide To Begin Tuesday

News

Cornel West, Harvard Affiliates Call for University to Divest from ‘Israeli Apartheid’ at Rally

Suddenly, The Streets Were Empty...

By Robert Decherd

Probably the most noticeable thing about the past four months in Cambridge was that the streets, for the first time since 1968, were empty. Disillusioned perhaps by the dirt and heat, or by the hassles and riots in the Square, or maybe by the army of hangers-on that absorbed the city, that indefinable and elusive group of people that made Cambridge The Place to Be for three summers suddenly vanished.

Gone too were the Summerthing Concerts in Harvard Stadium that drew even more people into Cambridge and which last summer went hand-in-hand with disturbances in the Square. Like so many others, the organizers of Summerthing somehow arrived at the conclusion that Cambridge was fast becoming a massive bummer. They moved the twice-weekly concert series to the Boston Common.

About the only thing that remained the same in Cambridge this year was the police, who "kept 'em moving" in the Square on weekend nights, who made sure they maintained high visibility at all times, and who one weekday early in the summer arrested 30 freaks on charges of drunkenness in a late-night sweep through the Square.

After that episode, which was passed off as "routine" by police officials, those few street people who remained in the area decided that it was time to pack the old backpacks and find a new city in which to spend the summer. "I want to enjoy what little freedom I've got left," said Reggie Young, one of the "drunks" arrested by the police. "I can't take this kind of bullshit." He left town.

By mid-July, Forbes Plaza--the gathering place for kids on warm summer nights, the homebase for peddlers and pushers--had become merely a way-station on the way to the Mass Pike. Sanctuary, despite a planned move to the old Iroquois Club on Mt. Auburn Street, set up shop in the Old Cambridge Baptist Church in North Cambridge. The Cambridge Common was vacant and dusty on most days. Yes, it was a quiet summer in Cambridge--even Hare Krishna and Process split town.

There were some who remained, however. There was a gentleman named Daniel Ellsberg, and two of his lawyers. There were more Harvard alumni than usual. There was the Cambridge School Committee and the Election Commission. And students trying to register to vote. And, of course, there was Harvard with its normal share of problems, appointments and summer school students. They all played a part:

THE PENTAGON'S CAMBRIDGE CORRESPONDENT...

It didn't take the feds long to trace the "source" who leaked the Pentagon's massive study of U.S. involvement in Vietnam to Cambridge. After a "coming out" press conference at the Boston Federal Building (actually it was the occasion of his surrender to the U.S. Marshal), Daniel Ellsberg '52 enlisted two Harvard law professors to defend him on charges of theft and unauthorized possession of classified government documents.

Thus began long months of court arguments on Ellsberg's behalf for Charles R. Nesson '60, professor of Law, and Leonard B. Boudin, the prominent civil liberties lawyer who was visiting professor of Law during 1970-71. Ellsberg is now on trial in Los Angeles, where he faces a possible 20-year prison term and a $20,000 fine.

Court proceedings dragged on in Boston most of the summer before U.S. Magistrate Peter Princi and Federal District Court Judge W. Arthur Garrity ruled that Ellsberg must stand trial in Los Angeles when grand jury there returned indictments against him. Boudin and Nesson had sought to have the trial moved to Boston, and they had argued at various times that the government may have used illegal wiretaps to obtain evidence used in the Los Angeles indictment.

Ellsberg, the former Rand Corporation consultant, still has a year to go on his contract as a research associate at MIT's Center for International Studies.

MORE MERGER...

The non-merger merger between Harvard and Radcliffe gained final approval on June 29 when the Radcliffe College Council accepted the so-called 1971 Agreement already ratified by the Corporation and the Radcliffe Board of Trustees.

The new contract supercedes the concordat of 1943, under which Harvard assumed responsibility for Radcliffe instruction in return for 85 percent of Radcliffe's tuition income.

Specifically, the new four-year arrangement provides that:

* Radcliffe will retain ownership of its property and endowments;

* Harvard will assume the operation of Hilles Library as well as the day-to-day operation of college buildings and dining services;

* Radcliffe will pay to Harvard 100 percent of its income from endowment, tuition fees and rents, and Harvard will assume the total expense of Radcliffe's operation, including joint fund-raising;

* Radcliffe Houses will become part of a unified House System under the Faculty of Arts and Sciences; and,

Radcliffe will retain control fo the Schlesinger Library, the Radcliffe Institute, the Alumnae Office and financial aids and admissions.

Mary I. Bunting thus becomes the last president of Radcliffe College. She and her successors will hold the title of dean of Radcliffe.

WOMEN FACULTY...

Six women joined Harvard faculties as full professors on July 1, bringing to 12 the number of women holding tenured positions in the University. One professor--Isabel G. MacCaffrey--is the first Kenan Professor of History and Literature, a chair established this year for a faculty member with a special interest in undergraduate education.

The other women appointees are: Charlotte C. Campbell, professor of Medical Mycology; Dorritt Cohn, professor of German; Betty G. Uzman, professor of Pathology: Luise Vosgerchian, professor of Music; and, Margorie A.C. Young, professor of Health Education.

The additions constitute half of the current breakdown of women professors holding tenured positions in three of Harvard's eight faculties: Education (1), Medicine (5) and Arts and Sciences (6).

DAY-CARE...

The Harvard Yard Child Care Center opened in July in the basement of Memorial Church. It is now the part-time home for about 14 children from the ages of two to five years.

A professionally-staffed day-care center governed by parents and open to the children of Harvard employees, students and faculty, the Center is the first parent-initiated day-care center in the University. Space for the Center, as well as heat and partial janatorial services, are being provided free by the University.

Tuition for the Center is $30 per week for full-time care, and $20 for part-time care. The tuition, together with some private donations, constitute the only source of funds for the Center.

ALUMNI COLLEGE...

About 150 Harvard alumni and their wives--representing classes from 1910 to 1965--returned to Eliot House during two weeks in mid-July for the first annual Alumni College.

Two courses were offered (and required) for the two heavily over-subscribed, week-long sessions. William Alfred, professor of English, gave an abbreviated version of Humanities 7, "The Modern Theatre," and Ralph Mitchell, McKay Professor of Applied Biology, lectured on "Man and His Environment."

Neither professor spared the rod--they assigned a total of ten, plays, four books and untold pounds of articles, and they managed to squeeze ten hours of lectures each into the five-day semesters. The alumni were duly diligent: classes began at 8:45 a.m., continued until 1 p.m., and then resumed in the form of hour-long section meetings after lunch.

The euphoric return to the academic grind went for a cool $180 per person.

MOON ROCKS...

Harvard researcher Dr. John A. Wood, director of the Mineralogy and Petrology Study Group at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory, was one of 24 American Scientists to recieve lunar surface material retrieved by the Russian Luna 16 mission.

An associate of the Harvard Observatory, Wood got a whopping 50 milligrams of moon rock for study and testing in a Russian-American exchange on July 13. Soviet scientists were given material collected by Apollo 11 and 12 astronauts in return for their lunar samples.

PRIESTLEY MEDAL...

George B. Kistiakowsky, Lawrence Professor of Chemistry Emeritus, is the 1971 winner of the American Chemistry Society's Joseph Priestley Medal, the highest honor in American chemistry.

The gold medal--given each year to recognize distinguished service to chemistry--will be presented to Kistiakowsky at the society's national meeting in Boston next April. Kistiakowsky, 70, became professor emeritus on July 1 after 40 years at Harvard.

HEW INVESTIGATION...

Investigators from the Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW) showed up at the Graduate School of Design (GSD) in late July to follow up a complaint filed against the School by a Boston architectural designer.

Franziska P. Hosken--the third woman graduate of the GSD--had earlier submitted a complaint against the School charging discrimination against women and minorities in faculty appointments there. She also requested, through the HEW and three Massachusetts congressmen, the release of the affirmative action plan for minority hiring practices at Harvard submitted to HEW last winter.

The lightly-attended rally conveniently ended just as the 12,000 people attending the Summerthing Concert were pouring onto downtown streets.

Interviews with at least three professors at the GSD--Maurice D. Kilbridge, dean of the School, Jerzy W. Soltan, chairman of the Architecture Department, and Reginald R. Isaacs, Norton Professor of City and Regional Planning--were conducted by HEW investigators. No findings by the HEW have been released as yet.

Hosken's complaint--outlined in an 11-point, three-page letter to the HEW--focuses on applications she made in 1970 and 1971 for appointment to the Design School Faculty as a member of the Architecture Department.

HIROSHIMA DAY...

About 225 antiwar protestors were arrested at a non-violent sit-in at Hanscom Field, an Air Force research and development center in Bedford, on the 26th anniversary of Hiroshima Day, August 6. The action, organized by the People's Coalition for Peace and Justice, was one of two antiwar demonstrations scheduled. The Greater Boston Peace Action coalition staged a candlelight parade following a rally on the Boston Common that night. The lightly-attended rally was conveniently over just as the 12,000 people attending the Rod Stewart Summerthing Concert were pouring onto downtown streets. Still, the candlelight parade had barely 1000 participants at its height.

HOSPITAL CONTROVERSY...

Peter Bent Brigham Hospital, the Med School's "teaching hospital" in Roxbury, agreed in early August to take legal responsibility for the state's only out-of-hospital renal dialysis unit.

The 20-bed unit--the Babcock Artificial Kidney Center, in Brookline--was founded and is still directed by two Brigham staff members, Dr. Constantine L. Hampers and Dr. Edward B. Hager. The Massachusetts Department of Public Health had insisted that it would license out-of-hospital dialysis units only through non-profit-making hospitals. Accordingly, it did not approve the application for licensing which the Babcock Center made last October independently of Brigham. The department did allow the center to stay in operation, however.

Attorneys for Brigham and Babcock drafted a plan whereby the hospital would assume responsibility for the center. The draft, with minor changes, was accepted by the Health Department on August 5.

VIETNAM LAWYERS...

Charles R. Nesson '60, professor of Law, petitioned President Nixon on August 13 to release three Air Force enlisted men imprisoned in Vietnam for refusing to carry weapons. Acting as president of the Lawyers Military Defense Committee--a group formed last year to give free legal representation to servicemen in Vietnam--Nesson asked the President to defer the three men's sentences during appeal of their convictions.

The LMDC charged that the three men are being subjected to "unwarranted harshness" and contended that they will have served out their six-month sentences before appeal proceedings are completed. The men were found guilty of refusing to bear arms when they claimed conscientious objection status last February.

A motion filed later by the LMDC in Federal District Court--seeking an injunction against censorship of literature being brought to the men at the Longbinh stockade--was denied out-of-hand by Judge W. Arthur Garrity.

MORE GRAND JURIES...

Samuel L. Popkin, assistant professor of Government, was subpoenaed by a Boston Grand Jury in late August as part of a further investigation of the Pentagon papers leak. Popkin testified on August 19, but refused to answer any questions2

Want to keep up with breaking news? Subscribe to our email newsletter.

Tags