The “Letters to the Editor” feature has been a staple of The BG News for much of its history. The section has long been a place for students to sound off, professors to provide expert commentary and, on occasion, the university president to respond to the campus controversy of the day.
It is particularly fascinating to read letters from decades ago. In the early years of The BG News, students and campus officials wrote glowing thank you notes to others at BGSU (this was, of course, a time before email existed). In the 1960s, students debated military strategy, civil rights and other cultural issues. Toward the end of the 20th Century, the opinion page sometimes served as a place for students — this again being in the pre-social media age —to share raunchy opinions and observations.
Each letter is unique and a miniature time capsule of their era. We recommend you peruse The BG News index to read letters from various years. If nothing else, it’s a fun way to spend a rainy afternoon indoors.
Here are a sample of letters sent to The BG News:
Prisoner wants a pen pal — Jan. 15, 1992
A man named Bryan serving time at the Arizona State Prison had one request to the BGSU student body: would anyone like to be his pen pal? Bryan wrote he was 10 years into his sentence (for what, he didn’t say).
“I just want to pass some time as I don’t get much mail anymore,” he wrote.
Angry at snowball attacks — Dec. 11, 1962
A student named Howard wrote to the newspaper after having “witnessed one of the most disgusting of undergraduate immaturity I have ever seen on this campus.”
Howard told of watching male students throw snowballs at unsuspecting couples entering and leaving the front entrance.
“Actually,” Howard noted, “(they were) iceballs because of the extremely wet condition of the snow.”
Howard was especially incensed that the men were targeting female students. He claimed several people suffered bruises from being hit in the head.
“This appeared to increase the boys’ spirits and they gleefully continued throwing at the women.”
Selfish library visitors draw one reader’s ire — Jan. 16, 1968
A student named Lois wrote in to complain about magazines in the library having articles torn out from them. Lois claimed she checked out periodicals for research purposes but the articles she needed were missing.
“I guess some students are only interested in themselves and don’t care about other students who may need that same article,” she said.
She suggested the library install an alarm system to alert workers when people steal material.
A long wait at the Strawberry Patch — Jan. 19, 1978
Roommates Allison and Bette had such a bad experience at a campus restaurant they wrote a lengthy letter describing the incident. It seems they had to wait a very long time to receive their order of sausage turnovers, blueberry pancakes and Polynesian Delight.
“When is it necessary to bring overnight accommodations to a restaurant? When that restaurant is Bowling Green’s own Strawberry Patch,” the two wrote.
The two urged the business hire more efficient cooks or instead close down entirely.
“It was ridiculous for us and others to have to wait over an hour for pancakes,” the letter read.
A Shakespearean controversy — March 2, 1949
Elden Smith felt he had to set the record straight, and there was no better place than the pages of The BG News.
Smith, the chairman of the university’s Department of Speech, wrote to clear up what he said were misconceptions about an upcoming performance of Hamlet.
This campus play was to be guest directed by Whitford Kane, a Broadway actor who had starred in various professional productions of the famous Shakespeare play.
The controversy involved a senior theatre student named Bill Prentice. He had apparently met with Kane privately in New York City prior to the tryouts to discuss the play. This led some at BGSU to believe Pentice was given the role of Hamlet before other students had a chance to compete for it.
“It is true that a director must have certain people in mind as being capable of playing certain parts before he definitely decides to do the play,” Smith wrote. “Just as (BGSU men’s basketball coach Harold) Anderson could not book basketball games with teams like Kentucky or Loyola and Toledo University without knowing that he has the potential material to compete satisfactorily with those teams — so a director would be foolish to announce that he will produce a certain play without knowing that he has actors capable of it.”
Smith claimed there was no such conspiracy and that he had urged Prentice to visit with Kane for learning purposes. Smith wrote that Prentice “may and he may not” win the role of Hamlet.
“I can think of two or three other students who may very well beat him out in competition for the role,” Smith said.
It does not appear The BG News invested any journalistic effort to determine if such a fix was in. But it should be noted that the campus newspaper printed this headline two weeks later: “William Prentice Will Portray Lead Role In Hamlet.”
- By Tyler Buchanan, BG News class of 2013