Thorndike Recalls '34 Editor Revolt

(One of the leaders of the 1934 Crimson revolt which set up the rival Journal, an incident described herein; now Managing Editor of Life Magazine.)

The controversy in the CRIMSON began during my junior year. Some of the members of the board of editors, including myself, felt that the CRIMSON had been losing a little ground during the difficult years of depression. We were anxious to make it a better paper and to attract the ablest editors from each class.

We had a number of ideas how to accomplish this end. We proposed to increase the normal issue from four pages to six; to run more pictures and photographic supplements; to run a column of outside news from the United Press; to expand our critical departments; and so forth. I shall not attempt to say whether our program would in fact have made the CRIMSON of that time a better paper. But we were wholly sincere in our efforts and we did, I believe, command the support of most of those editors on the news, editorial and photographic boards who took an active part in the daily production of the paper.

Our program was only partially realized, partly due to our own failures and partly because we presently found ourselves in a political battle. The business board regarded the whole project as an extravagance at a time when the paper had difficulty meeting expenses. Some of the more conservative active members of the other boards were also in dissent. There was a running fight during most of my senior year and the issue came to a showdown in the election of my successor as president. After much study of the constitution, a meeting was called of all the editors who were then in college. There was a surprisingly large number of them and, as you know, the vote went against us by a substantial margin.

After we lost the election some of my colleagues determined to try the experiment of a rival newspaper. I gave my support to this venture but took no active part in it, so the story of the Harvard Journal must come from someone else. I never felt that there was room for two papers at Harvard and, so far as I personally was concerned, I hoped that, if the Journal had succeeded, the two papers would soon have been merged under the name of the CRIMSON. This was not to be, as the Journal barely lived through the spring.

Looking back upon these events, I am appalled at the mistakes, both editorial and political, which we made in conducting our side of the argument. But I suppose that this is a natural part of any college activity. I for one count my experience on the CRIMSON, including the great battle and our defeat, as invaluable training in both journalism and politics.