College News, 1932-04-27, Vol. 18, No. 19

              The College News
VOL. XVIII, No.  19
WAYNE AND BRYN MAWR, PA, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 27, 1932
Price, 10 Cent*
Pageantry of May Day
Only Nine Days Away
Newspaper  Photographers   and
Movie    Representatives
Spread Publicity
MANY FACULTY IN "CAST
Only nine more days till Queen
Elizabeth ugain returns to Bryn
Mawr and the "playes and revels"
begin. Everywhere are signs of the
approaching festivities. Tall knights
in clanking armor parade across the
campus, a corps of photographers ar-
rives daily, and the northern side of
Taylor has long been shadowed by a
huge grandstand. The regular aca-
demic routine continues uninterrupt-
ed, but along with it there is a bustle
of preparation for the 6th and 7th
of May.
The pile of clippings which has ac-
cumulated in the Publication Office
would seem to indicate that the" whole
world knows this is Big May Day
year at Bryn Mawr. Mrs. Collins
reports that the publicity has never
been more successful. Five big movie
companies are sending representatives
to make sound recordings of Jhc Fri-
day performance. Camouflaged vans
will be parked at the Deanery to hold
the apparatus. A leading Stanley-
Warner official has promised that the
May Day newsreels will lie run in all
Stanley houses the following week.
Four of the most important officials
in the movie industry expect to ct-
tend the actual celebration, which
they consider the most interesting
event of its kind in the country. There
will also be spectators in the audience
from the English Folk Dancing Soci-
ety.
Although not many seats have been
sold for Friday, three-fourths of the
grandstand is already reserved for
Saturday. Undergraduates are urg-
ed to make their reservations now, as
additional grandstand seats will bo
erected only in case the space now
available is all reserved at the end
of the week.
A great deal of interest has been
aroused among students in prepara-
tory schools. The highest single sale,
seven hundreds dollars, was made to
a preparatory school. At another, in
Philadelphia, Mrs. Collins obtained
permission to discuss May Day for
live minutes, if she would first lecture
on candidates for the presidential
election, in place of a speaker who
could not keep his engagement. The
bargain was accepted, and her speech
aroused a notable enthusiasm.
On the flower-covered float, which
Mrs. Collins promised earlier in the
year, will be ensconced Jean Francois
Canu, Frieda Wagner, Elsa Wells and
A and B, twin children of Mrs. Emily
Kimbraugh Wrench, drawn by Mar-
ion Turner. The Eleanor Morris
children will ride on ponies.
(Continued   on   Tago   Five)
Personals
The first news of Mr. Horace Al-
wynne, who is traveling abroad, to
reach Bryn Mawr came through the
London Daily Mail.
"Taormina.�In H. Bowdoin's Vil-
la Rocca Bela, a concert was given
on St. Patrick's day in aid of the
funds of the Anglo-American Church.
It was arranged by Mr. Gilbert
Brown and the program was a select
one.
"Mr. Horace Alwynne, director of
music at Bryn Mawr College, who was
warmly welcomed by nearly 200 peo-
ple, showed the technique of a master
�>f the piano. Mr. Alwynne was as-
sisted by Mme. Brevee Copyn and
Mme. Gerda Borgesen, Who delighted
the audience with songs by Handei,
Gounod, Liszt, Kreisel, Doret. Some
violin pieces were played by Mr. Mar-
iano Tribuni, soloist of the Hotel San
Oomenico, who was greatly applaud-
ed and obliged to give encores."
-�International News Photo*, ln<
MAY QUEEN AND ROBIN HOOD
Cornel i.i Drake, '33 j Margaret Righter, ''M
1935 Freshman Show Music
Given Victrola Recording
(Specially Contributed By Barbara
Lewis.)
The music of the Freshman Show
of 1935 has at last been recorded;
it has found its place in the sun. On
Friday evening at nine o'clock we pre-
sented ourselves at 501 Madison ave-
nut, entertaining an idle hope that
we might be peacefully admitted to
the Great Home of the Royal Broad-
casting Company. The ringing of
the night bell over a period of a
quarter of an hour at length bore
fruit in the appearance of an aged
night watchman, who, uttering a few
small curses, decided to admit us to
the sacred precincts � this, after a
good five minutes of scrutiny. Such
small measures as the college" may
take to insure themselves of our
whereabouts after dark (signing out
book, special permission, etc.) were
as nothing compared to the elaborate
precautions taken by the night watch-
man. It was with the greatest relief
that we noticed, as We sinned in, the
names of the staunch members of the
Princeton Triangle Club Orchestra,
on the sheet above.
When we arrived the orchestra was
well under way rehearsing the Ani-
mal Song; the sons of old X'assau
were in shirt sleeves and tuning up
their tubas in careless abandon.
Frances Messimer and Marjorie
Wood, the pride and hope of Bryn
Mawr in this enterprise, were caught
sight of through the smoky air, and
escorted to the microphone with such
gallantry as will doubtless never be
duplicated. They then embarked on
a highly commendable rendering of
the piece, now entitled Wrong Again.
The lyrics had been re-written, and
the line once sung as "Phoenix! Phoe-
nix! Phoenix! Phoenix!" was sung
sotto voice, "You've got my heart-
please give it back."    (This is only
(Continued  on   rape  Six)
Trends Converge to
International Style
Structural Necessities and Engi-
neering Plans Are
Important
AMERICA    IS    SCORNFUL
�>.     Ruth Crossett, once of the Class of
'&.-� 1932, is to be married in Chicago on
:� April 30, to Mr. T. French, of Cleve-
. Jand, Ohio.
-

Lantern Board Contest
The Lantern Board wishes to
announce that the contest for
the new Freshman and Sopho-
more members will close on May
first. Each candidate is asked
to submit two pieces of creat-
ive and two of critical writing.
. The names of the new mem-
bers, together with Christo-
pher Morley's decision on the
writing, which has appeared in
the Lantern during the year,
will be announced in the May
issue.
"The keynote of the Intel-national
Style," said Philip Johnson in his
third lecture before the Modern Art
class Tuesday, April I'.i, "is summar-
ized in J. J. Roud's remark that 'Ev-
erything answers the why.' In expla-
nation of this school it is therefore
necessary to emphasize the importance
of logicalness and functionalism." The
movement might be said to have start-
ed with the re-integration of archi-
tecture by a few isolated individuals,
such as Schinkel and Richardson, af-
ter the decline of Baroque, but the
various constituent trends did not
converge to a single focus until 1931.
The International Style is clear and
pronounced, has a discipline of its
own and is largely dependent upon
engineering.
Impressionism and Neo-Plasticism
might be mentioned as elements in
the composition of the new style (in
addition to the Viennese School, the
Paris Exposition Styh
the New Tradition, all 20th Century
movements discussed in the last lec-
ture). Impressionism, 1919, was
short-lived, and represented a release
from all conventions, especially from
the restraints of the New Tradition.
The main principle of Neo-Plasticism
is that of abstract intersecting planes
�of planes floating in space. It com-
pletely discounts the laws of gravity
in its extreme lightness and apparent
disregard for supports. From this
point of view it is the true herald
of the International Style.
Of the four important European
men of this school, Le Corbusier.
Walter Gropius, J. J. Roud and Mies
van der Rohe, the first, a Swiss, has
been the best known modern archi-
tect since 1922. He considers a home
a machine in which to live and de-
signs no ornament which is not vital-
ly necessary for human needs. He
achieves his effects by the beauty of
one large plain surface of ordinary
re-inforced concrete against another.
Many of his houses are built on poles,
placed at regular intervals. These,
then, become the basis for his design,
and their underlying rhythm is car-
ried out in the house. J. J. Roud,
formerly a Neo-Plasticist. uses stucco
as a  building material to avoid the
(Continued  on Pare  Six)
Cornelia Otis Skinner playing "Wives of
Henry VJflr Interviews Member of News
Famous Alumna Was More Successful in Dramatics Than in
Athletics, But Active in Everything; Enjoyed Whole of May
Day, Including Paper Flowers and Trying on Costume
ANNE   BOLEYN'lS  HIGH   SPOT   OF   PERFORMANCE
The matinee performance of Miss
Skinner's Wives of Henry VIII was
played to a very enthusiastic, ^capac-
ity house. She opened the afternoon
with five of her original character
sketches. The first, a Southern girl
in the Sistine Chapel, was an amus-
ing representation of a very unin-
telligent but beguiling young woman,
who is touring Roma and points in the
vicinity, with chaperone and party. It
was thrown into the shade, however,
by the next selection, which was call-
ed "On the Beach at Barbados." A
fascinating young island girl, from a
rich but "very simple" family, is talk-
ing on the beach with a visitor from
New York, who is infatuated with her
and cannot understand her strange
unwillingness to talk about herself.
As his conversation becomes more per-
sonal, despite her re-iterated requests
to "swim out to the reefs where the
surf breaks," it becomes clear that
she is a half-breed,'"tar-brush." as
the black streak is galled, shows in
her  hands  and  in  her  immunity  to
(Continued   on   VatiO   Five)
Bryn Mawr Defeats Beaver
in Season's First Match
In the first tennis match of the sea-
son, Bryn Mawr came out on top of a
4-1 score over Beaver College on Sat-
urday morning. A strong breeze and
plenty of dust gave the players great
difficulty. In addition to this, Haskell
took the oral so that the number one
players had to play last. This was
hard on both Haskell and her oppon-
ent, Parry, as they had to play again
almost immediately in the doubles.
In the 2's match, Hardenbergh, the
captain of the 1982 Bryn Mawr Var-
sity team, played a steady game from
and to the base line. Her forehand
drives were strong and accurate. As
usual, she,never seemed to strain her-
self, but was almost always on the
spot. Although she play* casually,
her game is hard and accurate. Ster-
ner, her opponent, seemed inclined to
overwork a bit. Her bounding about
was spectacular, but in many cases
unnecessary. She made many nice
pick-ups, but lost to Hardenbergh by
n score of 6-3, 4-6, 6-4.
Although Bowditch has a long, flat
and powerful service and drive, her
came on the whole was wild. In the
third match, she lost the first set be-
cause Staples was steadier than she,
but she picked up to lead pretty con-
.f. 1!�25, and silently through the last two sets.
There was a lot of good backhand
driving on both sides. The score was
in llowditch's favor�li-6, 6-2, G-".
The fourth match was brief and
speedy, Faeth beating her opponent,
Hall, 6-4, 6-fi. Although Faeth plac-
ed her shots nicely, far too many
landed in the net. She was inclined
to hit olf center and her wrist seem-
ed weak. Hall had a great tendency
to cut her balls, often unnecessarily.
Haskell, in the number one match,
"snowed beautiful form and amazing
power. Her shots were well placed
and her service hard in the right
hand corner of the receiving court.
Parry seemed nervous and shaken by
Haskell's offensive,�but in the second
set she played some determined and,
at times, brilliant tennis.    Her game
(Continued  on   Pace  Two)
As all careful readers of this peri-
odical know already, Cornelia Otis
Skinner is to appear on May Day as
Queen Elizabeth, and|even Queen Eliz-
abeth has to submit to costume fit-
tings; accordingly, one fine day last
week Miss Skinner was motored out
from Philadelphia, where she was ap-
pearing in her Mires of Henry the
Eighth, and she, like the humblest
rustic of us all, submitted to the usual
stand-still-while-I-pin-you ordeal. We
would like to say that we had been
granted our interview at that crucial
point, but such is not the case. We
caught her as she was escaping, unin-
terviewed and radiant, and attached
ourselves firmly to the car, while, as-
sisted by two friends, alumnae of the
same class, she wracked her brain
for anecdotes and what-not for us.
What Miss Skinner could not remem-
ber about college as she left it. and
May Day, as it left her, the two oblig-
ing alumnae could.
Miss Skinner, it seems was not (like
us) athletic, but (unlike us) she tried
to he. She was a member of the sev-
enth class hockey team�there were
only seven�but got little practice as
the team was too small to play and
hence met very seldom. Her one stel-
lar appearance was on the occasion
when by a mistake she arrived nt
Varsity hockey practice and found
herself playing wing. She wa� so hi-
larious a success that even after the
mistake was discovered, the authori-
ties declined to replace her; she fin-
ished the game, although it was some-
thing of a strain. The only time she
cab remember hitting the ball it went
on to the next field, where another
team made a goal with it in the con-
fusion. Her one other athletic ap-
pearance was as a tennis player. At
this point she decided that her cos-
tume was too sober, and accordingly
brightened the regulation gym suit
with a bright bandana, and equally
bright floating scarf, and a pair of
long tortoise-shell earrings. She was
a success.
Her other memories of college activ-
ities include her difficulties in the
choir, where she sang double bass.
It seems that a hatpin was neces-
sary, and as Miss Skinner had no
hat-pin and never got one, she had
continual trouble with her mortar-
board, which on one occasion even
flew off her head and out a window
when she raised her head suddenly.
The most delightful story of all,
Was one about May Day. Being a
daughter of one of the directors of
the pageant, she and her friends were
constantly called upon to do little but
vital errands. One such was to bor
row the car of a friend who lived
near the campus, and load all the
spears and pikes which were to be re-
turned, onto it, and set out toward
Philadelphia with them. All went
extremely well until the car got firm-
ly embedded in the traffic under the
viaduct at Market Street. Here they
were stopped for a time, and when they
did start up it was with a terriffic
jerk, which sent all the hardware on
the running-boards clattering to the
(Continued  on   Fage   Four)
The News will issue a special
May Day number, with a four-
page pictorial, "Who's Who" of
the casts, and histories of all
the plays. Alumnae and anyone
else interested In receiving
copies through the mail may
obtain them by writing to the
business manager, j The price
will be 15 cents per copy.
Hall President Elections
Merion: Josephine Williams,
who successfully managed
1932's Freshman Show.
Denbigh: Eleanor Yeakel.
an Editor of the Lantern and
Subscription Manager of the
News.
Pem East: Virginia Balough.
Pern West: Elizabeth Ed-
wards, now secretary of her
class.
Rockefeller: Cecelia Candee,
a member of Varsity Basket-
ball squad.
�