That's when. The why? Not so simple to answer. Economics, philosophy and a new kind of education in Cambridge entered into it. The Crimson was rebuilding after the war, and the staff was heavy with veterans, Harvard juniors and seniors who were years older and more mature than their pre-war counterparts.

Canny Crimson businessmen looked across Harvard Square and saw a new market, both for circulation and advertising, at Radcliffe. To Crimson editors, an old joke had staled. The portrayal of a Radcliffe girl as a female with brains but no beauty was a pallid sketch after they had seen women at work in the war.

And most of all, the girls were there in Harvard Yard. In 1943, Harvard and Radcliffe had agreed on a system of joint education, which brought Radcliffe girlsinto Harvard classes for the first time in thecolleges' history. It was now time to coverRadcliffe, not just joke about it.

I had worked with Crimson editors that summeron The Globe.

So I was in, by the back door perhaps, butworking for the Crimson nonetheless.

And with the men of the Crimson. Scot Levitt,who rose high in the hierarchy of Life. Tony Lewisof the Times, Church Bailey, newspaperman, author,newly named to the board of the Neiman Fellows.Burt Glinn, the sprightly soul who became a Lifeand Magnum photographer. Dozens of other who wenton to every field of publishing and some who brokecompletely to enter law and medicine and politics.And every one a nice guy.

Of those days on the Crimson, two impressionslinger. One is that Crimson editors worked hardand turned out a good product.

The other impression is of a faint haze ofzaniness that hung over the Crimson building at 14Plympton St. I remember an eight-day bicycle racestaged when Crimson editors lugged bikes into thebig news room and made a raceway by pushing allthe desks together in a tight rectangle. Writersworked imperviously, tossing copy to the desk inthe intervals between riders.

When I arrived, the president's privatewashroom was turned into a ladies' room (no breakwith precedent; it had always been so used duringCrimson dances,) I remember that for days someobject stolen from the Lampoon was stashed awaythere in the simple belief that no gentleman wouldeven enter a ladies' room, even in search ofstolen goods.

Vignettes pop up. The sound of music throughoutwarm June weeks as one editor tape-recorded (verynew then) stacks of borrowed records so he couldtake home an instant music library afterCommencement. The editor who was rarely seenwithout a yo-yo; the senior who spent, or so hesaid, a whole term in the stacks of WidenerLibrary, working out a system to beat the horses.Endless poker games.

While waiting for proofs in the basement of theadjoining Crimson Printing Company, we used to siton, and read, great stacks of uncut pages of aparticularly macabre journal-a trade magazine forundertakers.

Even after 25 years, the memories are warm andso is the feeling that we of the Crimson'sRadcliffe Bureau were a feisty, doughty bunch ofpioneers. So I was put out at being left out ofthe party. And don't think I was soothed byCrimson president Robert Decherd's explanation,either. Crimson records are so bad, he syas, that"hundreds of people" never knew about the party,either.

But he gives me an idea. How about it, all ofus Crimson leftovers? How about a party just forus? Anyone feel like starting one? If so, put meon the list and mark me "first Radcliffecorrespondent."

It's still a pretty good title to have held