Long Trail A-winding

Back in the spring of 1945 the Student Council took a poll which opened the gate on the long road to building a memorial to the Harvard dead of World War II The poll, at the time nothing but an abstract expression of student opinion, showed undergraduates almost unanimously in favor of the construction of a Student Activities Center. Last spring the Council moved the results of its poll out of theory into practice and placed itself solidly behind the building of a Center as a war memorial. Shortly after the Crimson and the Alumni Bulletin joined the Council, and the long road was entered upon in earnest.

Not until the meeting of the Associated Harvard Clubs in June was substantial progress possible. At that time the backers of the various proposals for was memorials presented their cases Representing the Council, Thomas L. P. O'Donnell had little trouble demonstrating the value of an Activities Center. In a University which boasted seventy-four extracurricular groups in 1941, only three of which had their own buildings and most of which were badly in need of additional space and equipment, the need of an Activities Center was obvious. In addition, the lack of a decent post-antiquity theatre for plays, concerts, forums, etc. had been grumbled over for years, and the Alumni were quick to see that a building filling these gaps in the network of extracurricular activities would also fill the requirements of a war memorial. With general sentiment in favor of the Activities Center, it was decided that the Associated Harvard Clubs and the Alumni Association would appoint a committee to consider in detail the war memorial question and to report to the president and Fellows, who have the final word.

The first step had been taken down the long road, but it was a stride that stopped in its tracks and only new begins to move along again. Some time in the next mouth the committee finally will be appointed. It will reconsider the merits of the Active ties Center as against those of Dr. Arlie V. Bock's Medical Center, Dean Joseph Hudnut's Music and Arts Center, and whatever other plans may move to combine the two projects. As for the Medical Center, there can be no question as to the need for enlarged, modernized, and more conveniently located medical service and equipment. This is a need for enlargement of existing, if strained facilities, however, rather than for the creation of totally new ones. It can and should be taken care of, but by more ordinary financial measures than a fund for a war memorial.

Next to the choice of the war memorial, the speed of its construction the most important question. The road through the alumni committee, the President and Fellows, the drive for finances, and the actual construction may be long and winding, but it need not be traveled at a snail's pace. It was 1927 before the Memorial Chapel was built, and it may well be 1950 before the new war memorial materializes unless further six-month lapses of activity are averted.