Four hundred South Vietnamese soldier and four American advisors were killed in an attack by Viet Cong and local guerillas at Ap Bac, Vietnam.
1963
At the second convocation of the school-year, President Blanding expressed disappointment with the students who cut class excessively and didn’t take their academic duties seriously, calling them “a menace to other students.”
Helen and Karl Ulrich Schnabel gave a four-hand one-piano recital in Skinner Hall. An anonymous review in The Miscellany News, began with an admission. “It is very difficult to write a review in praise of perfection; one runs out of superlatives….” The recital, the reviewer said “came closer to perfection than any recital we have heard this year. The duo created a rare balance of teture and mood which remained unbroken throughout the program. They achieved a sheer transparency of sound, at once the most important and the most difficult requisite of four-hand piano music. It is incredibly difficult for two people to play a piece on one piano and be exactly together in timing, phrasing and expression, yet the Schnabels were beautifully together and made of every note a work of art.”
The Schnabels’ recital—“longer than the printed program”—began with Mozart’s Andante and Five Variations for Piano duet, K.501, and Three Legends, in which “Dvorak’s characteristic use of American folk melodies was evident. American themes on a quite different level were used in a Little Suite (1960)” by Swedish composer Laci Boldemann. “This piece was a surprise in that it had a real jazz beat and swinging syncopations.” The program concluded with Mendelssohn’s Allegro Brilliante, op 92, “a work of scintillating viruosity, and one which makes fantastic demands on the performers. Mr. and Mrs. Schnabel met these demands in a stunning and vital performance. But the audience would not let the performers go until they played two encores, by Brahms and Weber.”
Karl Ulrich conducted a master class the following day for students of duet piano technique, at which he observed, “In four-hand playing…listening is at least as important as playing the notes.” Although they each had distinguished careers as soloists, Karl Ulrich Schnabel, son of legendary pianist Artur Schnabel, often joined his wife, Helen, in one- and two-piano, four-hand concerts.
In response to a proposal by the American Association of University Professors, the trustees voted to make children of full-time faculty member who were admitted to accredited two or four year colleges eligible for college tuition subsidies.
Pianist Robert Guralnick performed in the second concert of the Philharmonic Chamber Music Series.
Baritone Albert Van Ackere, associate professor of music and director of the Glee Club, gave a recital of works by Bach, Fauré, Ravel and Schumann.
Freshmen in the drama department presented two one act plays, Thornton Wilder’s The Happy Journey to Trenton and Camden, and J.M. Barrie’s Shall we Join the Ladies?
Students, members of the music faculty and members of the administration presented a representative selection of Mozart’s work honoring his 207th birthday in a salon-like gathering in Main Parlor.
George Armitage Miller, co-founder of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Harvard University, lectured on “A Psychologist Looks at Language.”
Carl N. Degler, professor of history, spoke on “Political Parties and the Rise of the City, 1877-1934” as a part of the Vassar Scholars’ Lecture series.
Scottish-born theologian Dr. John Macquarrie, Professor of Systematic Theology at the Union Theological Seminary, spoke on “Heidegger’s Concept of Death” under the auspices of the Chaplain and the Department of Philosophy.
English-born educational radio pioneer Professor Charles Siepmann, chairman of the department of communications at New York University, lectured on “Public Opinion and Propaganda.”
Dr. Kai Nielsen, associate professor of philosophy at New York University, spoke at Alumnae House on “Religious Perplexity and Faith.”
Josh White, internationally known folk and blues singer, gave a concert.
William Golding, English author of Lord of the Flies, spoke at Vassar under the auspices of the Vassar Student Lecture Series.
Dr. Emily Brown, emeritus professor of economics, gave a talk on “The Position of the Worker in the Economy of the USSR,” in which she spoke about working conditions in the USSR and the rapidly developing economy.
Dr. Arnold Lazarow, professor and chairman of the department of anatomy at the University of Minnesota Medical School in Minneapolis, spoke to Biology courses on “The Fourth Dimension of Anatomy” under the auspices of the physiology department.
The Paul Kuentz Paris Chamber Orchestra performed Vivaldi, Hayden, Boccherini, and Rossini at Skinner Recital Hall under the auspices of the Department of Music.
Faculty members of area elementary schools were guests of honor at the President’s House. Approximately 100 attended the tea, given in recognition of teachers who supervised in the student teaching program at Vassar.
The Vassar G-Stringers appeared at Carnegie Hall in New York City as part of a program called “The Collegiate Sound.”
President Blanding gave a second tea for 56 secondary school teachers from the area to honor their continued support of the Vassar teaching program.
The student and faculty curriculum committees held their annual joint meeting.
In cooperation with the field work office, 28 students from ten departments and six faculty members from the art, history, and Italian departments traveled in Italy during a two week “Renaissance Vacation.”
Dr. A. L. Rowse, fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, lectured on “The Personality of Elizabeth I.”
Dr. Hermann von Baravalle, mathematician, educator and author, lectured on “Dynamic Beauty of Geometric Forms.”
Professor Leonard Machlis, chairman of the department of botany at the University of California at Berkeley, gave a the Helen Putnam Gates Lecture on “Fertilization Insurance in Plants.”
Dr. Matthijs Jolles, professor of German literature at Cornell University, lectured on “Gott Natur und Mensch in Goethe’s Faust.”
Dr. Edward V. Sayre of the Brookhaven National Laboratory presented the first in a series of four lectures entitled “Clio in the Laboratory.”
Alvin H. Hansen, emeritus professor of economics at Harvard University, gave the Martin H. Crego Lecture, “The Changing Structure of the American Economy,” in Blodgett Auditorium.
E-Tu-Zen-sun ’44, Katherine Strelsky, of Vassar’s Russian Department and Ruth Stone, assistant professor of English from 1953-1959, were among 17 appointed members of the Radcliffe Institute for Independent Study for 1963-63.
Martin Luther King, Jr., was arrested and jailed during anti-segregation protests in Birmingham, AL.
Morris B. Abram, New York attorney, and first legal counsel to President Kennedy’s Peace Corps, spoke at Vassar on “Reapportionment: The New Civil Right.”
Dr. Ralph J. Bunche, under-secretary for special political affairs in the United Nations, spoke on “Inside Views of the United Nations,” under the auspices of the Vassar College Student Lecture Series.
Professor Charles Griffin, chairman of the history department, attended a symposium at the University of Bordeaux, France, on “The History of Twentieth Century Latin America.”
Hugo Buchthal, professor of Byzantine art at the University of London’s Warburg Institute, lectured on “The Miniatures of the Vatican Virgil Manuscripts.”
An all-senior cast presented the Senior Class Play, “My Hero!” in Skinner Hall as a benefit performance for the construction of a recreational center in Guinea, a project inspired by Operations Crossroads Africa. In the audience for the performance were Mme. Telli Diallo, wife of the Guinean ambassador to the United States, Mme. and M. Achar Maroff, members of the Guinean delegation of the Untied Nations and the Rev. James H. Robinson, founder, chairman and director of Operation Crossroads Africa, and former speaker at Vassar. The play was “a takeoff on nineteenth century melodrama.”
The seniors presented the play again, in aid of Crossroads Africa, in Skinner Hall on May 31.
The Miscellany News
The Vassar College Choir and the Princeton University Chapel Choir, under the direction of Donald Pearson, gave a concert of sacred choral music.
Leon Edel, professor of English at New York University, lectured on “Some Aspects of Henry James.”
The Vassar College Orchestra, conducted by Boris Koutzen, assisted by Claude Monteux, gave a concert in honor of Vassar’s retiring faculty.
The Vassar Experimental Theater performed Thornton Wilder’s The Skin of Our Teeth.
The Vassar College Glee Club, directed by Albert Van Ackere, and the William’s Glee Club, directed by Robert Barrow, gave a concert at Vassar College.
John Wilkie, chairman of the board of trustees, announced that gifts to the college for the year totaled over $2 million.
The New York Times
The college announced that British-born historian Alan Simpson would succeed Sarah Gibson Blanding on July 1, 1964, when she retired from the presidency of Vassar. John Wilkie, chairman of the board of trustees, said the board endorsed Mr. Simpson‘s nomination by a committee of five trustees and five faculty members “enthusiastically and unanimously” at its meeting on June 19. Simpson, Mr. Wilkie said, was elected “with complete confidence in his profound concern with and dedication to the further enhancement of Vassar’s distinction in the world of education.” President Blanding greeted her successor’s selection, noting that he “has proved himself to be one of the outstanding educators in the country and ideally qualified to head a great college.”
Educated at Oxford, Simpson studied at Harvard as a Commonwealth Fellow from 1935 to 1937. After eight years as senior lecturer in modern British history at the University of Saint Andrews in Scotland, he joined the history faculty of the University of Chicago in 1946. Mr. Simpson served as the dean of the Undergraduate College of the University of Chicago from 1946 until 1964.
In a statement, Alan Simpson said, “It is a great honor to be invited to be president of Vassar College. I have the warmest admiration for its trustees, faculty, students and alumnae. By combining a firm grasp of established standards of excellence with a vigorous readiness for constructive change, its future will be as distinguished as its past.”
The New York Times
The University Russian Club, a group formed by Yale, Harvard, Columbia and Vassar students to further understanding of Soviet life, organized a trip to the Soviet Union.
The annual chemistry program for fifteen advanced high school students, sponsored by the National Science Foundation, was given at Vassar.
An intensive six-week Russian program sponsored by the State Education Department began on this date.
The International Summer School of the Nursery School Association of Great Britain and Northern Ireland was held at Vassar, the first meeting in the United States in the school’s 8-year history.
Former Republican Senator from Massachusetts, United States Ambassador to the United Nations and—in 1960—unsuccessful vice presidential candidate Henry Cabot Lodge, Jr., took up his new post as United States Ambassador to South Vietnam.
The Group, Mary McCarthy’s novel about the lives of eight members of the Class of 1933, appeared from Harcourt, Brace & World.
President Blanding joined presidents and deans from 34 major colleges and universities in 21 states in urging the Senate to ratify a nuclear test ban treaty.
A bombing of a Baptist church in Birmingham, AL, killed four young African American girls attending Sunday school.
Dr. Mary Calderone ’25, director of Planned Parenthood Federation of America lectured on “Introduction to Sex Patterns.”
A symposium conducted by the symposium committee of the 175th anniversary of New York State’s ratification of the Federal Constitution in Poughkeepsie was held at Vassar.
The Student Madrigal Choir of Muenster, West Germany, under the direction of Frau Herma Kramm, performed in the Vassar College Chapel.
Daniel S. Lehrman, professor of psychology at Rutgers University, lectured on “Psychosomatic Influences in the Reproduction Cycles of Animals.”
Vassar students began what The New York Times called their “own version of the Peace Corps,” an after-school tutoring program called “Horizons Unlimited.” Coordinated by Patricia Blumenthal ’64 and Joan Leven ’66, the program sent 150 student volunteers four days a week to classrooms in four participating elementary schools for hour-long help sessions intended to provide “educational and cultural enrichment” to students identified by their teachers as having “potential for greater achievement.”
“It does reduce,” Blumenthal admitted, “the amount of time available for keeping up with our own studies. But, in a world where so much needs to be done, an experiment like ’Horizons Unlimited’ also gives us a purpose and an opportunity for fulfillment.”
The New York Times
Countess Alexandra Lvovna Tolstoy, youngest daughter of Leo Tolstoy, lectured on “The Life and Philosophy of Tolstoy.”
A day after a successful coup d’état, South Vietnamese President Ngo Dinh Diem and his brother Nhu Dinh Diem were murdered.
Several student members of the Vassar Committee for Civil Rights went to the polls on election day and collected contributions that were sent to the Student Non-violent Coordinating Committee to aid voter registration in the South.
The college and the New York State Council on the Arts sponsored a concert of Elizabethan music by the New York Pro Musica in honor of William Shakespeare’s 400th birthday.
The first chief of the Hispanic Division of the Library of Congress, Lewis Hanke, professor of history at Columbia University, lectured at Vassar on “The Life and Works of Bartolomé de Las Casas.”
Dr. Kenneth B. Clark, professor of psychology at the College of the City of New York, gave the Helen Gates Putnam Lecture on “Personality and Prejudice.”
President John F. Kennedy was assassinated in Dallas, Texas.
Vassar canceled classes. President Lyndon B. Johnson declared this day a National Day of Mourning for President John F. Kennedy and his family.
Evolutionary biologist Theodosius Dobzhansky, professor of genetics at the Rockefeller Institute in New York City spoke at Vassar on “Genetics and Equality.”
Vassar College, along with Dutchess Community College, Marist College and the State University College at New Paltz, sponsored a New Civil Rights Symposium on “A Psychologist Looks at Language.”
Christine Mitchell Havelock, associate professor of art, gave a Vassar Scholar’s Lecture on “The Goddess Athena as Emblem of Athens.”
The Vassar College Glee Club, directed by Albert van Ackere, performed in a joint concert with the Union College Glee Club, directed by Hugh Allen Wilson.
A bongo group led by Nigerian-born G. Godwin Oywole from the State University of New Paltz, gave a concert.
Members of the German Club presented a German Medieval nativity play, “Ein Deutsches Weihnachtsspiel,” in the Vassar College Chapel.
16,300 American military advisors were present in South Vietnam, and the year’s cost for their support was $500 million.