"I think there's a tendency at Radcliffe to blame Harvard for this awful ratio, and they are to blame," she continued. "But all these years we didn't do anything either-we didn't pressure them.

"What we have put emphasis on is preparing more women to take the positions they should have," Bunting said. She added that half of the women at the Radcliffe Institute are now administrators-a post which she understandably sees as a key one.

Although she has always emphasized women's careers, Bunting has also paid attention to the role of women as mothers and educators of future generations. She herself did not work from 1940 to 1946 while she spent time raising her four children on a farm outside of New Haven, where her husband, who died in 1954, then worked. Had she lived in a city during that time, she said, she would have held a part-time job, but instead she worked in the community. She added that working on a local school board provided her with much useful administrative experience.

SHE HAS maintained a very personal involvement in her work at Radcliffe. Although she modestly says of her work days only, "You have to stick to your job pretty much," those around her say she is an indefatigable worker. She rises at 6 a. m. to write letters-many a big businessman has been happily startled by her handwritten notes of thanks for large gifts to the College.

Because Radcliffe is a considerably smaller institution than Harvard, Bunting has been able to maintain close contacts with students and staff. She is aware of births and deaths in staff members' families, writing personal letters on such occasions. And many a groggy Radcliffe student has been startled to look up from a lukewarm bowl of oatmeal to find Bunting on one of her frequent visits to the dining halls. The Grand Design for the Quad was hers, and she kept up with it even down to choosing the curtain material for Mabel Daniels.

Bunting often projects the feeling of a warm, motherly woman, easy to talk to and understanding. She is almost always accessible to students. Before the completion of Hilles, when the Radcliffe library was in the Radcliffe Yard, across Brattle Street from her house, she would leave her porch light on at nights if she was in. The light was an open invitation to any studying students to drop in on her for coffee, donuts and talk.

She has also broken the taciturn image of so many administrators by taking political stands on national issues. In recent years, her name has appeared occasionally in papers as the signer of letters protesting the war in Indochina. "It's a rare request I say yes to, but when I feel I know the group that is writing and that it can do some good, I will sign a statement," she said.

She attributes her ease of communication to Radcliffe's composition: "I'm really like a dean here-I don't even have a faculty between me and the students," she said. But communication has not always been good. The hunger strike of May 1967 was un-loubtedly the bitterest period of her time at Radcliffe. Twenty-three students starved themselves for five days in protest of the policy that year to let only 36 seniors live off campus in their own apartments. Off-campus houses were in the process of being torn down of sold to make room for Currier, and seniors who normally spent their last year in a quiet frame house with 10 or 15 other students were being forced into living in largedormitories again. Bunting stated that no more students could live off-off because it cost the College $1000 every time a student moved off. This was during the fund-raising campaign for Currier, which many of the students resented. They felt they had not been asked whether they would prefer a fourth house or apartments. They asserted that the College should absorb the $1000/ person deficit rather than build Currier.

The CRIMSON of that spring referred to Bunting's "growing reputation as an autocrat," and ran editorials strongly denouncing her. One of them said, "There is evidence, in fact, to suggest that Mrs. Bunting has consistently disregarded widespread student opposition to her pet project... Mrs. Bunting's repeated refrain at Radcliffe Government Association meetings, that Radcliffe is run both by its students and administrators, has always been a deception. And always will be."

Much of the students' bitterness came from the rapidity with which many decisions about housing had been made that spring, with little or no consultation with students. Bunting felt at the time that the hunger strike was organized by juniors who had not received permission to live in apartments, for their own selfish motives. On the second day of the five-day protest (which ended with a negotiating committee being formed), she said, "They're perfectly free to express their opinion, but we can't do anything."

And even now, almost four years later, her first description of the hunger strike is a slightly bitter, "the time when they tried to keep us from building Currier House." She looks at that period as one of national upheaval, which carried over to anti-authoritarian feelings on campus. "That year there was such a strong feeling against President Johnson, that any president was part of the establishment and suspect. I found it difficult to talk to anyone."

There is undoubtedly some truth in her description, but it seems to have worked both ways: presidents were also considerably tenser. Although Bunting is a wonderful woman in many respects, she has very little feel for politics-perhaps because she is so used to dealing on a personal level. I ler policies and the decisions of her administration unnecessarily alienated many students at that time.

The confrontation with black students a year and a half later was also due to a poor sense of politics. She has a tendency to try to please as many people as possible in any given situation. which ends up in offending all. Black Radcliffe students had asked for a definite commitment on the part of the administration to recruiting more black students. The Class of 1972 had only 13 blacks out of 350 students. Again, a lack of finances was a reason behind the administration's delayed response. Students had asked for a reply to their demand that Radcliffe commit itself financially and in terms of recruiting time to black applicants. They also asked for a black admissions officer.

Instead of replying directly to their demands by the date the students asked, the administration issued a news release several days later stating that Radcliffe's goal for the Class of '73 was 30 black students and that they were committed to finding a black admissions officer. "Her statement ignored our demands completely and was only a restatement of goals which the black students and the Admissions Department had agreed upon way back in May," Diorita C. Fletcher '71, one of the black students negotiating with Radcliffe said. "It was brought to our attention in such a way as to be insulting."

Two days later, on Dec. 10, 1968, while Bunting was at a conference in North Carolina, 25 black Radcliffe students, supported by Harvard students outside, sat-in in Fay House all day to dramatize their demands. Bunting flew back in the afternoon, and in a voice that sounded close to tears read a statement giving $5000 to recruitment of black students that year and pledging to hold the admissions deadline open until at, least 30 blacks were admitted.