Die Luft 



der 



Freiheit 



'The Days of a Man 1892 



Murray and Fairclough and to the fortunate fitness 

 of Miss Eunice Cooksey as the tragic heroine of 

 Sophocles. 



Many good modern plays also have been well 

 produced at Stanford, too many indeed to permit 

 individual notice. Moreover, my mind persistently 

 turns back to the old, idyllic days, never before 

 experienced by any university group, and never to 

 return. The atmosphere of that time was so de- 

 lightfully expressed by Ellen Coit Elliott, wife of 

 the registrar, that I cannot refrain from quoting 

 her here. In an article relating the experiences of 

 the "Cornell Colony" at Stanford, she wrote: 



Perhaps it is the spirit of the West, perhaps it is the vital 

 breath of the Pacific, coming in to us over the mountains, but 

 whatever it may be, some enchantment has blinded us to the 

 crudities, the drawbacks, the limitations of our state. The 

 giants looming in the path of the pioneer appear but frivolous 

 windmills in our eyes. Come not out to us, O doubting Cor- 

 nellians, thinking to return untouched by the unreasonable 

 enthusiasm. Christmas shall bring you, and the months of 

 spring shall bring you, critical, skeptical, curious, speering 

 after our library, questioning about our funds, and you shall 

 return if you return at all chanting as fervently and ir- 

 relevantly as we, "Die Luft der Freiheit wekt" 



Among the students generally the presence of the 

 women was from the first taken as a matter of 

 course, only a small set (commonly reputed to be 

 "fast") regarding them as in any sense intruders. 

 However, as time went on, certain elements began 

 to voice their opposition to coeducation at Stan- 

 ford. One critical group consisted partly of business 



C 420 3 



