You Can't Win

Even if the students had tried to answer correctly, they seem up against a marking set-up that would make even the most abject apple-polisher protest with fire in his eye.

For example, the Times was greatly distressed because only 15 per cent placed Portland. Ore, on the Columbia River as the Times expected them to. The current Rand-McNally Atlas places it squarely on the contributory Willamette, with the city limits stopping noticeably short of the Columbia. "Close, but no cigar."

But that doesn't prove much more than that even the New York Times (All the News That's Fit to Print) can be wrong, since it is probable that even less than 15 per cent would have known the exact location of the city.

The Times marking system also falls down on several of the broader questions. Only 15 per cent of those taking the test knew that the Times thought that America's policy toward China was "Open Door," although Fine says that "friendliness" would have been acceptable. Anyone who went beyond the catchword was ridiculed.

On this basis, the Times first of all disagreed with Mme. Chiang, who has been stumping the country saying that it's all very well that America likes China, but China would appreciate a few more fighting, planes. One ignorant student was ridiculed for saying "Sympathize but do little else," while another was incorrect in saying. We have sent supplies to her but not in quantities."

Say It Isn't So

Of course, these can be quibbled against because they do not represent, official tradition, but instead show that the war has taken precedence over such tradition in the minds of American students. But what of those who tried to explain what the Open Door meant in practice? It was just too bad for those who used the word "exploitation" because everyone knows that American businessmen have had only humanitarian motives in bringing the symbols of modern civilization to the home of the oldest culture in the world.

The Times states indignantly that "For the most part the students thought that our policy had been to prevent immigration, to send them missionaries, and exploit her." It all depends on the point of view, and emphases differ. A number of Harvard Faculty men say they would give credit for those "errors."

In the lists of the major contributions of Lincoln, Jefferson, Jackson, and Theodore Roosevelt, the facetious student and the opinionated marker came into violent contact, and the results are both amusing and amazing.

Merk Flunks

Only 12 per cent could give two major contributions of Andrew Jackson, which is pretty bad. But Professor Merk would have been among the ignorant 88, since he emphasized Old Hickory's bringing the common man into politics through the party system. The Times didn't.

One the other hand, the several hundred who credited T. R. with his kid cousin's pet agencies like the NRA and the WPA weren't serious no matter what the Times may like to say, and his collection of animal heads, while famous, is on a par with the more prevalent Mr. Jones of railroad prominence.

A similar question, identifying various famous figures including John Burroughs, Nicholas Biddle, and Alexander H. Stephens, brought out the collegiate sense of humor in all its glory. One of the best lines, which hundreds thought of, was calling Walt Whitman a popular band leader.

Still another fault to be found (they keep cropping up), which led the Professor Holmes' statement that "These startling things aren't so startling" was the opening question, "Name the thirteen original states." Newspaper headlines may make the fact that only six per cent of the freshmen polled could do this but while very few people can name all 13, a fair question which called for 11 or even 12 might have produced a more favorable result to the students, although not to the Times' campaign to have American history made a compulsory study.