After the Kent State Shootings: Bowling Green State University's Reaction

70_05_10_Vajda

Kent State Shootings at Bowling Green State University
Bowling Green State University 70_05_10_Vajda

TEI Letters

2017 Mathew Sweet Created the initial version of the article
2017 Mathew Sweet Converted to TEI
George Vajda Ohio May 10, 1970 William T. Jerome
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George Vajda
10809 Penfield Avenue
Garfield Hts., Ohio 44125

May 10, 1970

Messrs:
Governor James Rhodes
President Wm. Jerome

I just returned from a visit with my daughter who is a student at Bowling Green
State University
. I am just furious with the way the trouble makers who are
trying to run the University.

How in the world did the administration let the dissident students get so out
of hand and get so much control over the state college, that people like myself,
who is a tax payer, has to support?

I heard some of the remarks that were made at a rally that was held in the
afternoon of my visit and it infuriated me to see that some of the faculty had
the gall to go along with these bums. Some of the professors go along with
the dissenters and don't show up for their classes that they are so highly
paid to teach. If they do not want to teach, they should leave and be replaced
by more willing, more capable teachers who want and need the job.

Some of these characters are grad students and some are even from out of the state.
They put their remarks that if the professors don't give the students a passing
grade that the student thinks he should get, even though they cut classes, that
this dissident body would put pressure on the professors and get a passing grade.

I never had an opportunity to go to college because my family couldn't afford it.
I have four children that I would like to put through college so that they can
have the education that I couldn't have. My daughter wants to go to college
to get that education.

When my daughter started at BGSUBowling Green State University
in September 1967, the students looked neat and
seemed well behaved, but the '68 and '69 students are demanding too much freedom
and the college officials are giving in to them.

Every student attending the college is given a book of rules of the college and
if they don't like it they should be told that the doors are "open" and that
they are free to find a college that they would like. Instead the administrators
bend over backwards to meet some of their ridiculous demands and disregard the
rules or rights of the students who are there for an education.

I was 18 years old when I was drafted during the 2nd world war. I graduated from
high school on June 4th and was inducted on June 28th. I served my time and was
discharged when the war was over. I loved my country and still do. If the long
haired bums don't like it here they ought to leave this country.

I believe that the parents, as tax payers, should have a voice as to what the
students do on our tax payers property. The students should not be allowed to
dictate and destroy the colleges or hamper the rights of the students who are
going to college for an education.

Very truly yours,

George Vajda - A concerned Parent
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June 16, 1970

Mr. George Vajda
10809 Penfield Avenue
Garfield Heights, Ohio 44125


Dear Mr. Vajda:

This is by way of belated acknowledgment of your letter of May 10
addressed to the Governor and to me. I regret this delay in replying but
the events of May generated more correspondence than I could personally
handle.

It would be interesting to know whether the views expressed in your
letter have been modified at all by subsequent events. You ask a pretty
fundamental question when you write "how in the world did the administration
let the dissident students get so out of hand." You also gave the appropriate
answer in your following comments when you said that "some of the professors
go along with the dissenters." Not only do some of the professors express
sympathy for those who are labeled dissenters but so do many of the students.

It is not possible for me to explain in this letter why there is this
general sympathy because some of the reasons have great validity and other
reasons would seem as ill-founded to me as to you. Howbeit, the University
is a place for dissent, the trading of ideas, the testing of values. Thus as
long as there is no violence or interference with the rights of others, and at
Bowling GreenBowling Green State University there was no such violence, most of the faculty and student
body are even willing to let the longhairs express themselves.

In making these brief observations, I know I am not satisfying you.
I believe that some administrators have been too ready with concessions.
I have endeavored to keep a balance between legitimate needs and frivolous
demands. Perhaps only time will judge my success. In any event, I wish
to thank you for your letter and hope that your daughter enjoys her studies
at Bowling GreenBowling Green State University. I can assure you, however, that the days ahead are not
going to be easy ones for any president or for that matter any parent.

Cordially,

Wm. Travers Jerome III
President

WTJ:da