<p>Don't know how long it will remain up, but there's a vintage New Yorker cartoon featuring Wesleyan at:</p>
<p>Properly cropped it could make a nice gift.</p>
<p>JW: That is priceless, thanks! Will print out for my D.</p>
<p>you realize of course, that the cartoon is basically saying that wesleyan is for rich whiny kids. right?</p>
<p>Every private school was "for rich kids" in the 60s. It was only then that the zeitgeist started to change and the student bodies of the schools started pushing for more equity, minority representation, and so on. The cartoon is about that, and it certainly has little bearing on the state school today.</p>
<p>Well, yeah, it wouldn't be a New Yorker cartoon if didn't involve a member of the upper class. And I think that like all New Yorker cartoons, there's a marvelous ambiguity and tension between what we see (a meal being interrupted during the soup course) and what we know is actually going on. What we see is the matron's hand covering the phone's receiver as if what she has just heard ("Oliver" wanting to have a voice in something) is scandalous and perhaps even dangerous. What we know about the period (the mid to late 1960s) is that upper class homes all over the country were being rocked by differences over the war in Vietnam, civil rights (the movie, "Guess Who's Coming to Dinner", about a similarly situated family, opened in 1967--the year of our cartoon), drugs, music and sex. Almost exactly a year later in April of 1968, Columbia students would occupy the office of their president, Grayson Kirk--himself, the very epitome of a New Yorker cartoon. The Eastern Seaboard Establishment was self-destructing pretty much in the full glare of the national public. Which makes the cartoon that much more poignant; because in all probability--and like that phone call home from Oliver--they hadn't the foggiest idea what their kids were talking about.</p>
<p>haha, well that's a very comprehensive analysis of the cartoon</p>
<p>Rich sure, but i'm not seeing the whiny.</p>
<p>I think JW's characterization is dead on.</p>
<p>heh, JW, im sure you've mentioned this before or something but...are you a current student?</p>
<p>Nope. I'm definitely an Old Card (alumnus.)</p>
<p>And speaking of Old Wesleyan (how's that for a segue) it was announced in today's Argus (the last issue of the year) that Psi U will remain all male. Psi U is Wesleyan's oldest continuous Greek organization and generally recognized as the wealthiest. Starting next year, as a consequence of disqualifying themselves from "program housing" status, brothers who choose to reside at the house without special permission will have to pay a double fee, one to the university as part of its regular housing fee and another to the house. The brothers say, they're willing to pay the price:</p>
<p>Actually, the Psi U alumni donate enough money directly to the house that they don't need to charge room fees of the residents...</p>