Wednesday, February 21,
Records
help
instruction
'German is in groove'
say department heads
"German's in the Groove," was
the boast of the German depart
ment heads as the second week of
their streamlined language system
came to a close. The complete text
of the German 2 course, "In
Deutschland," has been recorded;
English to German and German
questions answered in German.
After a day's assignment stu
dents may hear the completed les
son, recorded in correct German
by Professors Alexis and Pfeiler.
Monday through Thursday these
recordings are played from 4:00
until 5:30.
Although this method of instruc
tion has been tried before, the de
partment claims, it has never been
so much of a success as now. As
a result classes are uniform in
assignments and are able to work
well together. Students taking ad
vantage of this extra feature of
the course are expected to pro
gress more easily.
NYA students . . .
Solve problems of university
herb conservatory in Bessey
Until government-paid NYA stu
dents exactly solved the problem,
lack of funds severely limited and
continues to hamper the work car
ried on by the university herbar
ium in Bessey. For those who are
uninitiated in the language of the
botanist, a herbarium means lit
erally a conservatory of herbs. Ac
tually, a herbarium has come to
be known as a collection of dried
plants, scientifically arranged for
study.
When the NYA students began
fheir work in the herbarium,
'plants to be mounted were piled
up from years back, pressed only
in newspaper folders. Many of
ut
the structures simply have to be
remounted, and some of these date
back to the days of Prof. Samuel
Aughey and Dr. C. E. Bessey and
are as old a3 the university it
self. To date, the university herb
arium has mounted, labeled and
filed away over 425,000 plant
specimens.
In preparing plants for the files,
the first job performed by the
NYA workers is poisoning the
plants. The poison, a mixture of
tlcohol, ether, and mercury is
painted on the dried leaves to kill
any insects that might be present
to destroy the exhibit. This poi
soning treatment also protects the
plants from any future insects that
might look upon the vegetation as
a food supply.
The next stop in the herbarium
work of the NYA pupils is to give
the plant a correct label. These
labels must contain the name of
the plants, when and where it was
collected, and who it was that col
lected and classified it.
In mounting the specimens, spe
cial quality rag paper is used as
well as adhesive strips and glue.
The job of mounting is most deli
cate, and unless students use great
care, results are apt to be unsatis
factory. Dr. Walter Kiener, assistant
curator of the herbarium in charge
of the technical work, declared
that some of the thirteen -students
employed by the NYA do exceed
ingly well in this type of work. He
disclosed the fact that girls arc
iVtter suited to the mounting of
Wie plants and the boys to the poi
soning of the plants.
There is no chance that the staff
of the herbarium will ever run out
of work, for government botanists
continue to send types of plants to
be labeled and mounted. The uni
versity's collection Is one of the
largest in the middlewest, and its
value has already proved itself
many fold. It is possible to iden
tify accurately for farmers any
unusual types of grain or weed;)
that appear on their farms.
Pilger to lead
Ph
oto discussion
Claude Pilger, a member of the
National Association of Photog
raphers, will be the discussion
leader of the photography forum
at 4 p. m. today in Parlor Y of
in
in
ia
Ph
the Union. Pilger has studied pho-
graphy for fourteen years and
Tias his pictures shown In many
photography salons over the
United States. His favorite cam
era is the Lelca and he is pri
marily interested in the compo
sition of pictures. The forum will
be open both to amateurs and ad
vanced fans of photography.
1940
Engineering unit
head advances to
army major rank
R. E. Cruse, director of the uni
versity ROTC engineering unit,
has been advanced to the rank of
major in the United States army.
An experienced engineer, Major
Cruse has supervised army con
struction, harbor and improvement
work in the United States for
many years. He entered West
Point Military Academy in 1915
and was graduated in 1918. He
is also a gruduate in engineering
from the Army Engineering
School at Fort Belvoir, Va.; and
the Rensselaer Polytechnic Insti
tute at Troy, N. Y. He has also
taken advanced work in engineer
ing at the Carnegie Institute of
Technology.
In civil works.
Most of his service has been on
construction and civil works proj
ects supervised by the army engi
neer corps, including river and
harbor work in the vicinities of
Jacksonville, Fla., and Chicago.
The general collection is repre
sentative of the flora of the entire
world including large collections
from the Philippines, Japan, China,
Hawaiian Islands, Palestine, In
dia, Australia, and wherever
plants have been collected.
The state collection of over
40,000 sheets represents the entire
flora of Nebraska. This collection
is the result of the work begun by
Professor Aughey and carried on
by Dr. Bessey, his co-workers, stu
dents, and others.
NYA workers get training
as jigsaw puzzle champs
Twenty-five boys, employed by tity alone in research work in this
the National Youth Administra- field.
tion, are doing everything from Time is not the criterion by
cleaning exhibits to fixing bones which this type of work is meas-
as part of the work being carried ured. A careful and neat job is
on in Morrill under the general di-. paramount even at the expense of
rection of C. Bcrtrand Schultz, as-
sistant director of the museum
According to Frank Bell, pre
parator at the museum, the boys
do those jobs for which they are
best suited. In direct charge of the
students' work is Henry P. Reider,
chief preparator, who assigns
those boys with training in an
atomy to the task of fitting parts
of bones together and to cleaning
specimens. Others, without this
skill, are put to work arranging
collections and putting exhibits in
systematic order in storage as well
as painting numbers on each bone
and checking labels.
When the bones arrive from the
bone quarries in western Nebras
ka, they are enclosed in plaster of
paris casts and are usually covered
with matrix, the dirt and soil in
which the fossil was found. All of
this extraneous material must be
cleaned away by using sharp
pointed tools.
The less experienced NYA boys
content themselves with extract
ing whole bones from their casts,
but the students with more train
ing are assigned to more difficult
Jobs, such as working up a skele
ton out of a block containing sev
eral bones and pieces of bones.
Often this fitting of pieces of bone
together is akin to working out a
jig-saw puzzle that has a few
pieces missing. A few NYA work
ers assist in mounting skeletons
for display but there are none of
them experienced enough to han
dle this type of work by them
selves. A good deal of patience on the
part of the boys is required in
handling the fossils because these
ngc-old structures are extremely
fragile. When the bones have been
made perfectly clean, . they are
painted with a hardening solution,
a mixture of white ahellac and al
cohol. This soaks into the bone
and makes it possible to handle
the specimens less gingerly.
The bulk of the NYA students'
work Is never put on display. In
fact, the most common fate of the
cleaned bones is a label and a
place on a storage shelf. For ex
ample, there are only five or six
rabbit skulls or jaw fragments in
display cases, yet actually there
are five or six thousand such spe
cimens in storage. The reason for
such large numbers of bones is
hat there is value in having quan-
THE DAILY NEBRASKAN
Poof says . . .
'Humans are posites
of insecure balances'
"Man himself is a composite
rhythm of precariously complex
balances, as indeed is the universe
as a whole" states Dr. R. J. Pool,
chairman of the department of
botany in a speech, "White Man
versus the Prairie," published in a
recent number of "Science."
There have been wise men of all
ages who knew quite well how so
ciety should plan in order to oper
ate successfully and continuously
within the mighty cycles that rule
the universe. Pool declared, adding
that their advice has gone un
heeded. The Romans paid no at
tention to Virgil; Americans have
paid no heed to Pcnn, Washington
or Jefferson. As a nation we have
blundered in the utilization of your
primitive wild-life resources just
as the ancients. We have boasted
too much of a growing mastery
that gave us every right to win in
the conquest against nature and
time. Pioneers, inspired with a ro
mantic and adventurous spirit,
pressed on to settle in the prairies
and in the foot hills of the rockies.
As a small boy on a Nebraska
farm we have worked childishly to
pay off our small mortages only
to inherit larger ones.
Then came the selfbinder, the
riding gang-plow, the tractor, and
with these the urge for more acres.
But the white man afiled to real
ize that is only God who sends the
raindrops. He failed to sense the
danger involved if he dared to
cross nature's tendencies with rad
ical schemes for utilizing the na
tive range and introducing crops
of the humid East. After periods
of drouth and misery the rains
again came and another boom was
on. Man had almost finished his
conquest of nature when the drouth
of 1933 came. Then when moisture
came, it came in torrents destroy-
a few hours. Therefore, it is im-
possible to estimate the amount of
time any project will take.
B.D.O.C.?
0 Course,
Ym Entering!
Rules
O Nomination blanks may be obtained at Harvey Brothers, 1230
O St., The Daily Nebraskan office, or from the Contest Man
agers: Burton Thicl and Whitie Reed.
0 Twenty signatures of male students signatures not appearing
on any other nomination blank are necessary to nominate a
candidate for the B. D. O. C. title.
Q Nomination blank must be mailed or delivered to Harvey Broth
ers or The Daily Nebraskan not later than midnight, March 12.
O A committee consisting of Betty Bachman, Marg Krause, Betty
Meyer, Jean Morgan, Betty Roach, and Peggy Sherburn will
select the B. D. O. C. man from the entries submitted.
QThe nominee selected for the B. D. O. C. title will be announced
In the Spring Fashion Edition of The Daily Nebraskan, March
20th.
O Harvey Brothers will present the B. D. O. C. title winner with
$50.00 in clothing.
Enter Early
ing all in its path. We boast of im
pressive dams and levees to pro
tect us against the flood waters.
But the white man failed to real
ize that it is only God who sends
Lincoln Journal uud Star.
DR. H. J. POOL.
influence in the steady maintain
ence of a cover of vegtation on the
land, but he can only aid ature.
The White man must cease from
the boast of having conquered na
ture and face the problem of pre
serving what is left of his heritage
in the soil, and to restore the
broken lands that have dogged his
footsteps thru the forest and
across the prairies for centuries,
Reporter - -
(Continued from rage 1.)
ernment job, you'd be sure of your
position. There is also room for ad
vancement. George Russell, business adminis
tration, junior.
When and if I do graduate I'd
like to get a government job to
give me some experience at their
expense. Then I'd like to work for
the U. S. Revenue Department. If
that falls thru, I'll go to work in
extension service, namely, WPA.
Jerry Wallace, teachers, senior.
No. However government jobs
are a good thing, and I don't know
what people would do without
them. If I hadn't slaved for four
long years in teachers college, I'd
consider what the government has
to offer me.
For The Contest
It's To Your
Bizad offers
scholarships
Applicants to file in
office before March 1
Applications for the Business
Reseach Scholarships and the
Graduate Fellowship in the busi
ness administration college should
be filed with Dean Le Rossignol
before March 1. The Business Re
search Scholarships, ranging from
$250 to $500 are given by promi
nent citizens and business firms to
outstanding graduate students, for
the purpose of encouraging busi
ness research.
For graduate work.
The John E. Miller Graduate Fel
lowship is given annually to a
member in the senior class who de
sires to do graduate work. Pre
sented by the Cooper Foundation,
it amounts to $500. The fellowship
may be used here, or at any other
college of business administration
approved by the faculty committee
making the award.
Earl M. Constable is the pres
ent holder of the Business Re
search Scholarship, which has to
be used at the University of Ne
braska. William B. Williams,
holder of the Graduate Fellowship,
is now at the University of Penn
sylvania. Sadie Hawkins
Day comes to ag
campus Friday
Ag campus girls will play Sadie
Hawkins when they take their
dates to the annual party spon
sored by Phi Upsilon Omicron,
home economics honorary, Friday.
Theme of the leap year party
will be a circus, with Bill Davis
and his orchestra playing under
"the big top." The dance is semi
formal and will be held in ag ac
tivities building from nine to
twelve. It will be open to any stu
dent in the university. Phi U mem
bers will entertain their dates at
a dinner before the dance.
Committee chairmen for the din
ner are Evelyn Young and Rachel
McDonald. Alice Lideen and Betty
Jo Smith have charge of decora
tions, Marian Smrha and Sylvia
Zocholl are publicity chairmen and
Lois Hammond has charge of the
orchestra.
T
Advantage
f
1 yy 4 - v i.
l A I
