Citation: Albert L. Marting, ed., “Heroic Service,” Baldwin-Wallace Alumnus 21, no. 4 (1943): p. 5.
Another graduate of Baldwin-Wallace has recently been honored according to word received from his mother. Lieutenant R. C. L'Amoreaux, bombardier on a flying fortress flying in Africa has been awarded the Air Medal and his Fourth Bronze Oak Leaf Cluster. Detailed information is being withheld at present.
Citation: “Class Notes,” Baldwin-Wallace Alumnus 27, no. 1 (1949): p. 24.
The Atlanta Journal of October 21 carries a picture and story concerning Dr. Robert Lagemann, professor of physics at Emory university who was conducting over WSB's television station a Wednesday evening weekly program called "Science is Fun." Dr. Lagemann makes his own diagrams for the show and furnishes his own paraphernalia which includes a great variety of objects ranging from balloons, light bulbs and vacuum cleaners to live ducks. Dr. Lagemann is noted at Emory for his lectures which bring physics home to the laymen.
(College News Letter, BWC, page 2)
Dr. Robert T. Lagemann, of the B-W. class of 1934, is one of four professors of Emory University who played a leading part in the development of the atomic bomb, working around the clock for months at Columbia University with a group of men from eastern and southern college.
We quote from Bob's story as printed in the Atlanta Journal of September 30:
"For 20 months I lived the life of an atom smasher. Romantic as that may sound, and intriguing as was the work, it was certainly not the sinecure one might pick for the rest of one's life. Long hours, work under tension, constant pressure for results, fear of failure, fear of success, and doubt as to the outcome, all contributed to a realization that war was taking place on a scientific front as well as on actual fighting fronts.
"Such difficulties, unpleasant though they seemed, were perhaps insignificant in comparison with some larger ones. For one thing, when you split an atom, you don't use an axe. And in the second place, the particular atom we hoped to split was extremely elusive to say the least. Finding the proverbial needle in the haystack is child's play by comparison.
"Reduced to the simplest statement, the main problems confronting the gigantic scientific jigsaw puzzle crew to which I belonged were to secure the desired uranium atoms in quantity and then to devise a means for releasing the enormous energy stored there.
"The results are now well known. The exact methods involved are still secret.
"However, early in 1942, when I received a letter from a former professor suggesting that I join him at Columbia University in New York City for important war research, I had no idea of the extreme urgency of the task, and certain, no conception of the miracle that would be wrought.
“As is now known, Columbia University was assigned only a portion of the immense project; but those in charge led us to believe that we were the key to the entire undertaking. This was in line with the security policies of cloistering divisions and groups within divisions.
"Those of us who knew the significance of what we were doing, realized we were in a grim race with tremendous stakes. Often on the night shift where conversation flourished, we would wonder whether the German knew of the location of our experiments. And. if they did, would they catapult a plane from a submarine which could surface only 20 miles away, and drop a bomb on the building?
"I had the opportunity to take part in conferences with two British scientists who came by bomber for an exchange of information. We were amazed to learn that each had with him only the one suit worn on the trip across. They said it was the only one they possessed suitable for the trip and that to get it cleaned they had to send it to the cleaners a month in advance of the flight. Imagine an American going abroad with only one suit and one handbag. Before going back, these two men bought as many pair of hose for their wives and razor blades, as they were permitted to take back into England. At every meal they certainly took advantage of the opportunity to regain lost weight. So secret was their mission that only a few hours before the plane left were they told their departure time.
"Before August 6 when the first atomic bomb was dropped on Japan, we may have thought of a physicist as one of the few who understood Einstein' theory of relativity, or even perhaps as a soda jerker in a drugstore. But when people will have come to say that a physicist is one of those who developed atomic power for peacetime use, then all the members of that profession will feel that their labors, long unheralded and sometimes misunderstood, were indeed worthwhile."
Citation: "Deaths; Mr. J. F. Laning," Alumnus, vol. XIX, no. 4 (November 1941): pg. 20.
Death came to the Hon. Jay Ford Laning, of Norwalk, Ohio, on September 1, 1941, at the age of 88 years. Following his attendance at Baldwin-Wallace College in 1872-1873 he studied law and was admitted to the bar at the age of 21 and first practiced in New London, O. In 1882 he moved to Norwalk, O. and founded the Laning Printing Co. and the Fair Publishing House which once employed 600. He served two terms in the Ohio State Senate and one term in the U. S. Congress, and was also active in civic affairs, helping to promote many of the progressive improvements in his city. Two large reservoirs of the water-works system bear his name, Laning Lakes. His widow and six children survive.
Citation: “Former B-W Student Jailed In Nashville,” The Exponent, April 7, 1960, p. 1.
Reverend James Lawson, 32 year old divinity school student at Vanderbilt University, and a Baldwin-Wallace alumni was described in a February 29th edition of a Nashville paper as " leading organizer" of southern sit-down demonstrations.
Because of his experience, Lawson had been asked earlier in the week, by a group of Negro students for help in preparing them for a non-violent lunch-counter protests.
On March 2nd, Dean J. Robert Nelson of the Vanderbilt Divinity School asked Lawson to sign a statement saying that he would not violate a "disorderly assemblage' clause in the Vanderbilt handbook When Lawson refused to sign, the trustees of Vanderbilt requested his withdrawal from school.
Upon hundred Lawson's expulsion one eleven faculty members signed a joint statement that they saw "an adequate justification" for the action. Students of the Divinity School picketed the university Chancellor's office on his behalf.
Lawson was arrested on a state warrant charging him with conspiring to violate a state trade and commerce law, on March 4th at the First Baptist Church in Nashville. Seventy-nine others were arrested on the same "conspiring to commit acts injurious to public trade or commerce" charge.
Faculty Posts Bail
At 9 p.m. that same evening a committee of Divinity School professors, headed by Dean Nelson, posted bail for Lawson. Since his release on hail, Lawson has appeared at several rallies in both the North and South.
Students and faculty of several universities and colleges throughout the country have written to Vanderbilt protesting Lawson's dismissal. Boston University has offered him a tuition-free scholarship. The students at the Vanderbilt Divinity School have unanimously petitioned the university administration for Lawson's re-admission.
N. Y. Times Interview
In a recent interview with Harrison Salsbury of the New York Times, he spoke with "bitterness in accusing city officials and merchants of failing to appreciate the question of conscience in sitdown demonstrations".
Lawson is currently serving as an active member of the Fellowship of Reconciliation and a field director for the Congress on Racial Equality.
While at Baldwin-Wallace, he was active in the beginnings of Beta Sigma Tau and a participant in many major campus activities.
Citation: “B-W Council Protests Lawson's Expulsion,” The Exponent, April 7, 1960, p. 1.
The Student Council voted unanimously Monday night to send a protest, in the form of a petition asking for re-consideration of Jim Lawson's expulsion, to the administration of Vanderbilt University.
Council has decided to make it possible for the entire student body and staff to sign the petition. Copies are available from members of Student Council and the Human Relations Council.
Petition
The petition reads: "We, the undersigned students and staff of Baldwin-Wallace College, protest the action of Vanderbilt University’s Board of Trustees in dismissing Mr. James Lawson. Upon our academic communities rest the responsibility for constructive action in the crisis situation facing our society. We as members of the academic community, protest this action, not because of the individual concerned, hut because we believe that the University's action seemed to reflect social pressure more than educational integrity. We urge deliberate reconsideration of the Trustees' action."
Citation: “Decision Required,” The Exponent, May 12, 1960, p. 2.
This Tuesday marks the sixth anniversary of the Supreme Court decision on the segregation issue. The decision itself has resulted in a variety of actions in many areas.
Most notable of these are, of course, those which have resulted in the attempted integration of secondary and higher level educational institutions, and more recently the southern sit-in demonstrations,
Students on various college and university campuses have moved in a variety of different ways to support the cause of the Negro in the South. The southern states are not, however, unique in demonstrations of prejudice.
While it would seem commendable that northern students should desire to do all that they can in an effort to support any action which intends to end or lessen prejudice in any form, it seems inconceivable that anyone should become aroused to the point of action concerning a demonstration against certain chain stores many miles away, and yet remain passive toward instances of prejudice and discrimination within his own academic or civic community.
Our Student Council has seen fit to make petitions available in order that Baldwin-Wallace students may take n stand on two issues—the Lawson case, and the Woolworth sit-ins. The cause of the Negro student on campus and the Negro resident of Berea have, however, never been made the subject of such a Student Council petition.
This Tuesday has been declared a day of nation-wide protest in commemoration of the Supreme Court decision. Several B-W students intend to participate in a University Circle march in support of the southern sit-in demonstrations.
Citation: Kieth A. Peppers, 2020.
James Lawson was a student at Baldwin-Wallace starting in 1947 and graduating in 1953. While at Baldwin-Wallace he was involved in a number of activities and organizations. Some examples are the debate team, the Exponent, Beta Sigma Tau, student government, theater and many more. He was also arrested during his time here due to avoiding the draft. After his time at Baldwin-Wallace, he worked closely with Martin Luther King Jr. in the Civil Rights Movement. He focused on teaching non-violence workshops and encouraged its use by those involved with the movement. He continued to fight for equality and civil rights throughout his life, later using his role as a pastor to spread his message. He was a Methodist pastor first in Memphis, then later in Los Angeles until he retired in 1999.
Citation: Marion Cole, ed., “Spotlighting Alumni,” Baldwin-Wallace Alumnus 27, no. 4 (1949): p. 16.
Paul V. Lemkau, '31, associate professor of public health administration and director of the mental hygiene study, School of Hygiene:) and Public Health at Johns Hopkins University, is the author of a 396- page book on "Mental Hygiene in Public Health."
A psychiatrist interested chiefly in preventive psychiatry, Dr. Lemkau has been associated with Johns Hopkins almost continuously since receiving his M. D. there in 1935. His volume, being published by McGraw-Hill, is the first of its kind among books in preventive psychiatry to treat the problem in terms of action possible at the present time.
During World War II Dr. Lemkau was in the psychiatric service of the Army Medical Corps for 4½ years. Late in September he returned from his second trip this year to Italy, where he made a survey of mental hospitals for the U. S. Government. This was preparatory to a decision on granting of Marshall Plan aid.
Citation: Frances F. Mills, ed., “Walt Lemke, Associate Professor, Elect, University of Arkansas,” Baldwin-Wallace Alumnus 7, no. 4 (1928): p. 19.
W. J. Lemke, '11, who has spent the year at Northwestern University studying for his M. S. degree in Journalism, has been making a study of Methodist church publications as a basis for his thesis. Recent word apprises us of his election to the position of Associate Professor of Journalism and head of the University News Bureau in the University of Arkansas. Congratulations to the former Alumni Secretary and editor of the Alumnus!
Citation: Albert L. Marting, ed., “With the Classes,” Baldwin-Wallace Alumnus 23, no. 2 (1945): p. 10.
FIGHTS FOR LIFE IN NORTH SEA
Victoria Alice Vrana, daughter of Lt. and Mrs. Ralph Vrana, Berea, will be told some day about the heroism of her father and the members of his crew of "The Challenger," the B-17 which returned from a bombing raid on Berlin so badly damaged by flak that it fell into the North Sea. Victoria Alice pays very little attention to the story now, for she is a tiny babe born on Thursday, March 8, 1945.
The story of the fight for life of the crew of the bomber came from an Eighth Air Force Bomber Station somewhere in England.
"Scrambling out of the sinking craft which had been battered by flak over Berlin, the crew released two rubber dinghies only to see a large wave wash them away. The pilot, 2nd Lt. Robert C. Long, swam 50 yards through icy waters to catch one raft for his crew, all but one of whom meanwhile had grabbed the other raft. The radio operator, sank below the waves before he could reach the dinghy.
"Lt. Long's strenuous swim in the frigid water had apparently knocked him out," said Lt. Vrana, who had served as co-pilot on the flight. "We decided we'd better investigate."
Forty-five minutes of furious paddling and bailing with St. Jack C. Cook, the ball turret gunner, serving as a human propeller by kicking his feet in the water and pushing brought the dinghy alongside the stricken pilot, who was pretty far gone.
Two and a half hours later an air-sea rescue launch picked up the airmen. Lt. Long failed to revive.
