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PAGE 1 FREAKS AND JAILBIRDS: TOWN GOWN RELATIONS BETW EEN NEW COLLEGE OF FLORI DA AND THE SARASOTA BRADENTON COMMUNITY FROM ITS FOUNDATION TO 1975 BY ALEXANDRA VARGAS FOU RNIER A Thesis Submitted to the Division of History New College of Florida in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Bachelor of Arts under the sponsorship of Dr. Brendan Goff Sarasota, Florida April 2012 PAGE 2 ii Dedication This thesis is dedicated to my favorite people in the world: my friends and family. Mom, Dad, Amelia, Grandma, Jackie, Cyd, Will, Cindy, Melissa, Mackenzie, Kate, Allison, and Adam (just to name a few of you), I don't know where I would be without all of your love and support! This thesis also dedicated to my sister Michelle, wh o I know has been reading it from a better place. You have been the biggest inspiration in my life and probably one of the strongest forces driving me to finish this project. I love you and miss you dearly! Finally, I must dedicate this thesis to New Coll ege of Florida and everyone involved with the college in any capacity. At times this thesis may be critical of the institution in its earlier years; however, that is not at all a reflection of my sentiment toward New College This school has had a tremendo us influence on my life and is a place that I will always hold dear to my heart. PAGE 3 iii Acknowledgements First I would like to thank Dr. Brendan Goff for making the idea behind this project possible. Had it not been for your visiting professorship at New College this year, my thesis probably would have never turned into what it is now. Your enthusiasm, encouragement, and wisdom at our weekly meetings provided endless reassurance and ins piration. I cannot emphasize enough how I do not know what I would have done without you! I would a lso like to thank a few of the professors I have had the honor of working with during my care e r at New College Dr. David Harvey, Dr. Thomas McCarthy and Dr. Carrie Bene! you have each played an integral part in my undergradua te education and I can never thank you enough for all that you have taught me. This thesis is the product of your instruction. Finally, I would like to thank everyone who stuck by my side in the process of writing this thesis. It has been a long, arduous year, and I know that many aspects of my life fell to the wayside to complete this piece. All of your understanding and support has made this one of the most worthwhile accomplishments of my life thus far. And it will not be t he last! PAGE 4 iv Table of Contents Title Page i Dedication ii Acknowledgements iii Table of Cont e nts iv Abstract v Introduction 1 Chapter 1 12 Chapter 2 41 Chapter 3 60 Epilogue 90 Bibliography 96 PAGE 5 v FREAKS AND JAILBIRDS : TOWN GOWN RELATION S BETWEEN NEW COLLEGE OF FLORI DA AND THE SARASOTA BRADENTON COMMUNITY FROM ITS FOUNDATION TO 1975 Alexandra Vargas Fournier New College of Florida, 2012 ABSTRACT This thesis serves as an interpretive framework surrounding the foundation of New College of Florida until 1975. The college is framed as developing within the Sarasota Bradenton Sunbelt community, noted for its conservative ideals and yet exhibiting a prestigious approach to modernization at the outset of the second half of the twentieth cent ury. Specific facets of the community's identity are noted for influencing the approach to development and modernization of the area. Key community boosters along with the Chamber of Commerce sparked the initiative for a college within the Sarasota Bradent on community. Aspects of New College 's development indicate that these figures attempted to found the college in order to create an innovative, prestigious, and culturally affluent image for Sarasota and Bradenton. This development ended up being significa ntly different from that imagined by the surrounding community. Parallel to this was the recruitment of a student body onto the campus that largely stood at odds with the community in terms of ideology and life styles. Town gown relations are a major focus of this thesis and are demonstrated through the presence of social movements on campus that were prominent throughout the country during the mid twentieth century. Ultimately, New College of Florida when it was founded as a private, independent PAGE 6 vi i nstitution in 1960 serves as an interesting case study that both f ollows and challenges the larger phenomena of expanding higher education and the ris e of the Sunbelt during the same time period. Dr. Brendan Goff Divi sion of Social Sciences PAGE 7 1 Introduct ion This thesis is a community study that attempts to situate the foundation of New College of Florida as a private, independent institution within the Sunbelt Sarasota Bradenton community between 1956 1975. The work frames the community as a divided one with a fiscally conservative, Republican population as well as an artistic and academic vanguard. Out of the Northern dominated Sunbelt community came forth a few key boosters both native and non native, that helped develop the Sarasota community as well as Ne w College in some very similar ways. Despite the views and efforts of these boosters on developing an institution like New College, the original vision portrayed to the community of the college did not entirely match up with the institut ion that materializ ed on their peripheries on the northernmost border of Sarasota and southernmost for Bradenton Tensions developed between the institution, within its student body as well as among the administration and faculty, and various members and groups found in the community. New College can on the one hand be viewed in light of the boom in higher education in the post World War II and Cold War era as an institution that filled the void felt by the lack of higher education in the area. On the other hand, New Colleg e became an entity separate from the surrounding city in politics, population, and opinions. As a community study, this thesis provides a framework upon which New College may be conceptualized as having developed in Sarasota and Bradenton. The thesis tri es to strike a balance between factors within the community that affected New College's development and factors that were unique to the institution itself. Furthermore, it attempts to analyze these factors and reaction s to them within the general community and in light PAGE 8 2 of national trends Therefore, t his thesis is not intended to be a history of the foundation of Ne w Colle g e or its over fifty year history. Nor is it an attempt to situate the involvement of New College's student body in the many socio politi cal movements of the 1960s 70s. The time parameters placed upon this t hesis are also very important. T his thesis runs from 1956 to 1975 because these were the years in which New College was considered a private, independent liberal arts institution. Ninete en seventy five was a crucial year for New College, as it marked the beginning of a few decade long relationship with the Florida public university system with the merger into the University of South Florida. Beyond 1975 the power dynamics and direction o f the institution change d seeing as how the university had to concede not only to the public university system and thus to the Florida State L egislature, but also to the University of South Florida itself. In contrast, a s a private institution, New Colleg e was approached almost as a private business venture in the late 1950s mirroring the boosterism evident within the Sarasota community in its own rank and file. Furthermore, the fact that New College started as a private institution resulted from its inno vative academic curriculum that ran counter to the upsurge in public education during the same years throughout the country. The most comprehensive piece of literature on the early years of New College is Furman C. Arthur's book New College: The First Th ree Decades. The book gives a very detailed account of the different challenge s that the New College founders, administrators and boosters faced during the ongoing developm ent of the institution from 1956 to 1993. As an a dministrative assistant to the Boa rd of T rustees beginning in late 1960 and the head of Public Relations Arthur would have been very well informed of the power dynamics and politics during New College's formative years and beyond. The PAGE 9 3 book begins by situating the 1960s as a period of dram atic increase in college enrollment. 1 Arthur also presents the idea of in loco parentis or the parental role taken by college administrators nationwide governing student behavior and especially limiting dormitory intervisitation that many colleges accepted throughout the country during these formative years and how New College consciously rejected it. 2 A very detailed picture of the power structure within the institution between 1960 75 is presented in this book as well. Arthur retells the different college boosters within the ranks of the Presidents, Board of Trustees, and those affiliated with the United Church of Christ (UCC). 3 The presidents include George F. Baughman, president from 1961 65 mainly for his fund raising abilities, John Elmendorf, president from 1965 72 and largely a student ally with a marked academic preoccupation, and Arland F. Christ Janer, president from 197 3 75, who negotiated New College 's merger with the University of South Florida. Notable Trustees involve Philip H. Hiss, president of Philip H. Hiss Associates and the Chairman of the Sarasota Board of Public Instruction; David Lindsay, the president and p ublisher of Lindsay Newspapers and the Sarasota Herald Tribune ; and Gordon Palmer, director of Palmer First national Bank & Trust Company in Sarasota. Moreover, important UCC members who were involved with the foundation of New College included Reverend Jo hn W. MacNeil, minister of Sarasota's First Congregational Church; Dr. Howard E. Spragg, the treasurer of the UCC's Board of Home Missions in New York City; and Dr. Wesley A. Hotchkiss, the general secretary of the Division of !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 1 Furman C. Arthur, New College: The First Three Decades (Sarasota, FL: New College Foundation, 1995), 1. Arthur notes how the G.I. Bill, or the Servicemen 's Readju stment Act of 1944, allowed many World War II veterans the opportunity to pursue higher education. The 1950s 60s saw the maturation of their children, the "baby boomers," and their entrance into public institutions of higher education in high volumes. 2 A rthur, New College 16. 3 Ibid., 4. The UCC formed in 1957 from the merger of the Congregational Christian Church with the Evangelical and Reformed Church and there was a delay in the name designation early on. PAGE 10 4 Higher Education within the B oard of Home Missions. Though Arthur does provide a well rounded view of the first three decades of New College's history from an administrative position, especially in terms of faculty, staff, and administration, he is not able to cover New College's stud ent history and the exact political outlooks of the entire student body 4 This book has been used throughout this thesis as the historical framework for New College. There are a few senior theses written by New College students that pertain to the topic of the present work; two of which are from the time period being discussed and two from the next couple decades. William S. Herman's thesis from 1972 entitled "Creating a Foundation: A Look at Education, Growth, and Innovation at an Innovative College" dis cusses the innovative academic curriculum at New College since the institution's foundation and focuses particularly on an experimental dormitory created on campus. 5 Under the sponsorship of President John Elmendorf and directly relating to a work he publi shed entitled Transmitting Information About Experiments in Higher Education: New College as a Case Study Herman's thesis offers insight into the mindset and activities of New College students as well as their significantly Northern student population. Th e thesis, however, does not extend beyond the scope of the students involved in the experimental dormitory. Another student thesis written in 1973 by Michael J. Winkleman gives particular insight onto the way a New College student understood the city of Sa rasota at the time. "Winkleman's New Collegiate Guide to !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 4 Arthur does a very good job of presenting the students at odds with the community at certain times, though he mostly blames student aloofness toward the community because of their differences. He does not note m any of the class divisions that made community members resentful of the Sunbelt characteristics evident within the institution. 5 Kingsley Hall was the self assigned name of a community of students who moved into a Pei dormitory and created an environment that would intertwine their social and academic lives. PAGE 11 5 Metropolitan Sarasota: A Glossary of Vital and Interesting Information Pertaining to and Dealing with Things to do, Places to Eat, People to See and Ways in Which to Get Things Done; a City Visibilit y Primer," precedes the thesis itself, offering information on all facets of Sarasota life pertinent to a New College student. The actual thesis, "Eclecticism in the Ad Hoc School: A Proposal For A Multifaceted System of Urban Education in Sarasota Bolster ed by a Compendium of Questions, Projects and Related Resources and Geared Particularly to the Junior High School Student," focused more on the Sarasota community by presenting ideas on ways to enhance local children's education in the community using its own resources. The student's actual thesis does not really pertain to the scope of this thesis, nor does the preceding city primer really offer any information on the Bradenton community an indication that New College identified much more closely to its Sa rasota rather than Bradenton neighbors. A senior thesis written by Aric Johnson in 1985 is one of the most similar pieces of literature to the content of this work The thesis, entitled "From Intention To Concrete: The Founding of New College and I.M. Pei' s Plan, 1960 67," focuses mainly on the architectural aspect of the foundation of New College. This piece adequately situates the development of New College's campus master plan as the institution was being founded and discusses the importance of New Colle ge's architectural program as a physical manifesta tion of the educational program. 6 Johnson notes the lack of support among community factions for the college as it was trying to find a campus, but is limited in that he focuses solely on the selection of I.M. Pei as the campus architec t and follows his seven year relationship with the college. The thesis does retell the instability w ithin the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 6 Aric Johnson, From Int ention To Concrete: The Founding of New College and I.M. Pei's Plan, 1960 67" (B.A. thesis, New College of Florida, 1985), i. PAGE 12 6 institution at the time, 7 but it definitely does not elaborate on the different ele m ents behind disagreements between New College and the Sarasota Bradenton community. A final senior thesis, "In Sylvan Sarasota: Social History, Educational Theory and New College by Elizabeth Rider, describes the history and theory behind the liberal arts curriculum in America, situating New College within the broader movement for liberal arts in the country and acknowledging the role of key individuals within the business community, or boosters, that aided the college's development. Rider's thesis, h owever, generally ignores the Sarasota Bradenton community and focuses more on the theory behind the institution's ac ademic curriculum rather than the groups that influenced the development of this curriculum. The source which most adequately frame s the Sarasota community within this time perio d is Jeff LaHurd's Sarasota: A History. As a local historian, LaHurd provides a good balance between many different perspectives that are particularly pertinent to this argument. He frames Sarasota as a community en tering the second half of the twentieth century that wanted to transition from a mainly tourist based population and economy to largely family based ones. There are a few individuals discussed throughout the piece that are comparable to what this thesis ca lls community boosters. 8 Among these boosters are the Ringling B rothers, who were instrumental to Sarasota's modern development in the first half of the twen t ieth century and Ken Thompson, Sarasota's City !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 7 T he instability referred to regards the disagreements between President George Bau ghman and Dean John Gustad amounting to a stru ggle between the role the president played in the college's academic affairs. Since Baughman only held honorary degrees of doctor of letters from the New England College of Pharmacy and New York University, his perceived under qualification in academic ter ms by the staff meant that many expected him to take a largely financial role in the foundation of the college rather than an academic one. 8 LaHurd describes certain individuals, such as Ken Thompson, in a way that makes them fit into the category of what will be considered in this thesis a community booster. These boosters focused their efforts within the community on development, modernization, and growth of Sunbelt towns PAGE 13 7 Manager from 1950 until 1988. LaHurd also does a good job of depicting race relations in Sarasota in the years prior to New College's foundation, describing the struggle of desegregation of local beaches and the public school boycott. 9 Despite the inclusion of these events, they were dealt with in a very superficial way and not discussed in depth, adding to the racial frame of the Sarasota community as a fairly exclusionist community in terms of race. Furthermore, there was little to no coverage of the foundation of New College beyond a couple paragraphs on the first few years of its development. Framing Sarasota as a Sunbelt community comes from the book Land of Sunshine, State of Dreams by Gary Mormino This book provides a social history of modern Florida within the second half of the twentieth century and characterizes the state as being part of the Sunbelt. For the purposes of the following thesis, the term Sunbelt has been appropriated as defined by Kevin Phillips in 1969 the South, West, and Southwestern regions of the United States that felt a demo graphic explosion into a super region defined by its moderate climate, reliance upon air conditioning, support of the military and defense programs, dynamic economy, favorable business climate, modern transportation advantages, and drift toward conservati vism and Republicanism." 10 Furthermore, Florida is presented as a markedly racially segregated society, hardly feeling the effects of the 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas case of desegregation of public schools even in the couple decades that followed. 11 Not unique to Florida, this was true of most of the South and the nation. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 9 LaHurd's publication was the only book encountered that discussed the Sarasota Public School Boycott in the late 1960s, a topic which got considerable local newspaper coverage. 10 Gary R. Mormino, Land of Sunshine, State of Dreams: A Social History of Mode rn Florida (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005) 12. 11 Mormino, Land of Sunshine, State of Dreams 7. Mormino notes that by 1960 only one school in Florida (Dade County) was desegregated, and how segregation was staunchly defended in many diffe rent ways in the state. PAGE 14 8 Mormino also mention s the influx of populations into the state through interstate highways U.S. 41 and U.S. 301, both of which cross through Sarasota itself. 12 The book specifically mention s Sarasota in terms of its cultural resources (as the winter quarters for the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus and the home of the Sara De Soto Pageant) 13 and its large retiree community. 14 Unfortunately this work does not focus solely on Sarasota, and thus only briefly mentions the city within its pages. The book also fails to incorporate the idea of community boosters within Sunbelt communi ties aiding their development. T herefore the definition from Elizabeth Tandy S hermer's essay "Sunbelt Boosterism: Industrial Recruitment, Economic Development, and Growth Politics in the Developing Sunbelt" will be used instead This essay defines community boosters as mainly Northern businessmen with political interests and large s ocial networks that were key to the growth of Southern Sunbelt communities. 15 America In Revolt During the 1960s and 1970s by Rodney P. Carlisle and Geoffrey Golson is a comprehensive work on the student movements of the time period in which the first clas ses were entering New College. Carlisle and Golson present the development of these student movements as a coalition of movements intertwined with one another and having very similar origins. The basis of the majority of these movements and their ide als ca me from the Civil Rights M ovement that aimed for the inclusion of African Americans and later many different minorities into American society. The Free Speech movement was born from the Civil Rights M ovement at the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 12 Ibid., 78. 13 Ibid., 79. 14 Ibid., 131. 15 Elizabeth Tandy Shermer, "Sunbelt Boosterism: Industrial Recruitment, Economic Development, and Growth Politics in the Developing Sunbelt," in Sunbelt Rising: The Politics of Place, Space, a nd Region, ed. Michelle Nickerson and Darren Dochuk (Philadelphia, IL: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011), 33. PAGE 15 9 University of California Berkeley (UC Ber keley) as a reaction to the bureaucratic management and impersonal administration of the campus. 16 The Cold War Vietnam conflict, where the United States supported the anti Communist South Vietnam against the communist North Vietnam and the Viet Cong (also known as the National Liberation Front or NLF), caused a major uprising of students and others throughout the country in the 1960s. Student uprisings against the military engagements in Vietnam began in earnest in 1965 and culminated in the draft resistanc e movements of the late sixties and early seventies. 17 The New Left student movement, led in part by a nationwide student organization called Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), was an outgrowth and culmination of the Free Speech, Civil Rights, and ant i Vietnam War and anti Draft movements as well as a rebirth from the Old Left that held strong Socialist views in the first half of the twentieth century. 18 Two other key movements grew out of all these social movements during the time period: second wave f eminism characterized by its involvement with issues like reproductive rights, women's health, the workplace and legal inequality and environmentalism, which f ocused on conservation and conservation of the overall state of the environment. Another phenomen on discussed is !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 16 Rodney P. Carlisle and J. Geoffrey Golson. America in revolt during the 1960s and 1970s (Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC CLIO, 2008), 192 3. The Free Speech movement was an outcry against the power structure and resulting administration of the campus mirroring Cold War ideologies, viewing education in an industrialized manner (the dissemination of education resembling a factory that educated the c ountry on programs that would be beneficial during wartime), favoring domestic racial discrimination and armed interventi on against Northern Vietnamese C ommunists. 17 The root of much of the student discontent with the Vietnamese conflict culminated in the feeling that the government was forcing young people to support and fight in conflicts that they did not agree with. In 1969 the first military draft since World War II occurred and drafted young men based on their date of birth, causing further discontent among young people who felt that they were being forced by older generations to engage in a conflict that they did not agree with. 18 Carlisle and Golson, America In Revolt During the 1960s and 1970s, 198. The New Left Movement spoke out against the implic it alienation of groups of people and ideologies from modern society, was threatened by the increasing threat of Cold War conflicts culminating in nuclear arms race and the Vietnam War, and emphasized the shift from a family oriented society in the 1950s t o a society based mostly on individual rights. PAGE 16 10 that of the town gown divide which separated the "ivory tower" a term delineatin g the academically oriented ethos of campus life in colleges and universities nationwide from its surrounding towns and communities. 19 Though this book does a fa ntastic job in condensing all of these different student movements and noting the intertwined nature of their origins and development, it misappropriates the development of the counter culture as being mainly a result of the Vietnam War conflict. This thes is instead employs a definition of the counter culture as elaborated by Theodore Roszak in The Making of a Counter Culture where the movement came as a reaction to the United States "technocracy" and had a very spiritual rather than materialistic basis a t its outset. 20 In aggregate, this literature provides the interpretive framework for this thesis The first chapter is dedicated to Sarasota as a Sunbelt co mmunity and its boosters, who sought to enhance the prestige within the development of Sarasota that already resonated in the architectural program and other aspects of New College's development. The second chapter focuses mainly on New College and how it developed apart from the community from which it emerged The third chapter approaches the vario us student a nd youth movements of the 1960s and 19 70s within the context in which the Sarasota Bradenton community and the New College community clashed. These chapters are organized to highlight the parallels and differences evident within each community and !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 19 Carlisle and Golson, America in revolt during the 1960s and 1970s 122. The basis of the town gown divide comes from the divide between the local communities and colleges and universities found within them. These conflicts usually culminated in perceived differences of objectives: student bodies perceived the surrounding communities to be "tapping into the strain of anti intellectualism in U.S. society," while the communities usually viewed students and insti tutions as elitist and aloof to community concerns. 20 Theodore Roszak, The Making of a Counter Culture: Reflections on the Technocratic Society and its Youthful Opposition (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1969), 5. Roszak's "technocracy" is basically the social entity formed at the peak of a society's development as a modern, organized being. Though Roszak does admit that eventually the Counter C ulture gets accepted as part of mainstream society as a very material ly driven movement, its origins were very spiritual and an outgrowth from the passivity and conformity of the older generation to rule of law. PAGE 17 11 how these differences affected the relationship between both communities. Overall, New College was in its early years an institution plagued by differences in ideologies and perspectives among every group involved. These differences eventually added to the financial demise of the institution as a private and independent entity in 1975. PAGE 18 12 Chapter 1: Sarasota Boosters Aim For Prestige Paralleled at New College As a Sunbelt community, boosters influenced Sarasota and attempted to uphold the most attractive aspects of the community to increase visitation and permanent settlement There was in fact a need for these boosters, seeing as how key features within the community considered as the basis of Sarasota's identity earlier in the century had disintegrate d by 1958. It is noteworthy, though, that many of these boosters were not native to the Sarasota Bradenton community, as most Sunbelt boosters were not native to the communities they were involved in These boosters opportunistically used prestigious insti tutions those that would draw attention to Sarasota either because they were well established or followed a well established trend in the country to increase Sarasota's national visibility and appeal. This need for boosterism can be seen emulated within th e foundation of New College since the institution sought to increase its visibility and appeal to students on a national and international scale These similarities can be attributed to the fact that the boosters were involved with both the city and New C ollege itself. Community boosters such as Ken Thompson, Philip Hiss, and George Baughman used New College as a mechanism through which Sarasota's image was reinvented, despite having fundamentally different agendas and expectations of the institution than the rest of the community. The influence of the Sarasota boosters paints a multifaceted portrait of the creation of New Colleg e as an entity within an ever developing Sunbelt community that sought constant validation fo r its newly established identity. Roo ts of Modern Sarasota's Prestigious Identity A central part of Sarasota's identity stemmed from key institutions that developed before the 1950s. One of the most renowned facets of this identity revolved around the PAGE 19 13 Ri ngling Bros and Barnum & Bailey Circus and its e ffect on the town. John and Charles Ringling were integral in boosting the Sarasota community from the 1920s until the Great Depression through their own investments in the town both for the circus and their own personal gain. Another facet of Sa raso ta's prestigious identity, partially due to the Ringling influence on the area, was the city's image as the spring training headquarters for a few major league baseball teams A third key aspect of the Sarasota community that was used to increase the c ity's prestige was the Sarasota School of Architecture and its modern ae sthetics, giving Sarasota international recognition. Following the influence of architects like Frank Lloyd Wright and Le Corbusier, the Sarasota School of Architecture presented an en tirely new, simplistic, and different design aesthetic to the community. These three elements within Sarasota prior to the 1950s h ave a lot in common including their decline between 1958 1960. The decline in these institutions did not motivate the city to renew all of them; rather, it motivated the boosters to find alternative ways to enhance the community to fit its new prestigious image. This is especially evident in the creation of New College John Ringling saw potential in the small fishing community that was Sarasota in 1909 when he first kept winter quarters in the area with his wife Mable. By 1912 John had brought his brother Charles and his wife Edith to Sarasota, who also decided to keep permanent residence there. During their lifetimes, both John and Charles invested in large amounts of property in Sarasota and L ongboat Key. These land investments turned into development projects that aimed to boost and stimulate the Sarasota community. Among these developments were the uncompleted Ritz Carlton Ho tel, the world renowned home of John and Mable known as the Ca'D'Zan, the Ringling Museum of Art, the Ringling PAGE 20 14 Shopping Plaza, and the School of Fine and Applied Art, now the Ringling College of Art and Design. In 1927 John decided to move the Ringling Bro s. and Barnum & Bailey Circus' winter quarters to Sarasota, specifically in the 200 acres of land that belonged to the Sarasota County Fair Association. Through their developments and investments in Sarasota, the Ringlings especially John attempted to tran sform the town from a small fishing community into a high end tourist destination. By 1958, Sarasota's relationship with the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus culminated in its decline. That year John Ringling North heir to the circus after John's death in 1936 announced that the circus would move its winter quarters south to Venice; the winter of 1959 was the last season the circus considered the city of Sarasota its home. The end of this over thirty year relationship with the city was mainly due t o the financial situation of the circus. After the death of Charles Ringling, when John Ringling North inherited the ci r cus, North decided to eliminate the use of the traditional big top circus tent, instead having the circus tour larger venues and facilit ies throughout the country. This eliminated the burden of setting up the tent in each city the circus visited and allowed for larger crowds to enjoy the show. The implementation for this system was difficult since it had no precedence, and North encountere d a lot of resistance and legal ramifications from within the circus itself. 21 The economic ramifications suffered by the circus extended into the relationship it had with its winter home. Besides the internal decline of the circus, its seasonal presence i n Sarasota did not serve the needs of the community as it once had. The circus was no longer one of the central economic forces drawing attention and people to Sarasota as it had once been in !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 21 "Ringling Circus Will Close Winter Quarters By April 1," Sarasota Herald Tribune February 25, 1958, accessed March 16, 2012. PAGE 21 15 the 1920s. 22 Moreover, the circus had almost become an economic b urden on the community. A property tax agreement was originally used to lure John Ringling and his circus to Sarasota. More recently, however, the circus had not lived up to its end of the contract. As long as the circus ran a quarter page advertisement fo r Sarasota in its programs while touring the country, it would not have to pay property taxes that season on the land provided by the Sarasota County Fair Grounds. A unanimous vote by the County Commissioners ended this agreement, since the Sarasota advert isement in the circus's 1958 program was considerably smaller than a quarter page. 23 Sarasota County made this opportunistic agreement with the Ringling Br os. and Barnum & Bailey circus to gain publicity during the circus' travels throughout the country in the 1920s, especially up north. Now that the circus did not serve its needs and proved to be an unproductive element in the community, the city of Sarasota did not fight to keep it around. Nor did the County lose out on the circus all together, seeing as h ow it only moved a little south to Venice. Another facet of Sarasota's notable identity revolved around its affiliation with major league baseball since it attracted so much attention and visitors to the community From 1923 until its demolition in 1990, Sarasota's Payne Park was the spring training headquarters to fo ur major league baseball teams, the first two being the New York Giants from 1924 27 thanks to the efforts of John Ringling 24 and the Boston Red Sox from 1 933 58, with a four year hiatus duri ng World War II The baseball teams attracted a considerable num ber of travelers to Sarasota, especially Bostonians following the Red !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 22 Ibid. 23 "Ad In Program Too Small: County Cancels Tax Benefit Pact With The Ringling Circus, Sarasota Herald Tribune October 21 1958. Accessed April 5, 2012. 24 "Sarasota Baseball: A Tradition Since 1924," Sarasota County Government Online, accessed March 13, 2012, http://www.scgov.net/ballpark/History.asp PAGE 22 16 Sox to their spring tra i ning site which housed them all. Payne Park, donated to the community in 1925 by Calvin and Martha Payne, also became the location of the Sarasota Mobile Home Park, housing these baseball fans as its first residents beginning in 1933. 25 Affiliation with major league baseball teams brought notoriety to the community by making it an attractive destination for northern visitors during the spring. Through the sport, Sarasota became a seasonal vacation destination to the teams' fans and even attracted some more permanent residents to the area. Furthermore, baseball served as a means of economic stimulus, than ks to the amount of visitors and publicity it drew to the community. Though Sarasota would keep this affiliation with one of America's most popular sports into more modern times, in 1958 the Red Sox abruptly decided to relocate, causing a scramble amongst community boosters and leaders to find another team to call Sarasota its spring training home. Again, the boosters had to confront a sudden loss to Sarasota's urban identity and tax base. The decision of the Red Sox to relocate to Scottsdale, Arizona in Ju ne of 1958 cam e as a major shock to Sarasota, especially since earlier that year the town had celebrated its twenty fifth anniversary with the team, declaring March 7 th as "Red Sox Day." 26 City Manager Ken Thomp son, along with the efforts of Chamber of Commerce Sports Committee C hairman Willie Robarts and Chamber of C ommerce M anager Tod d Swalm, wanted to maintain the tradition of major league baseball in the Sarasota community and thus went on a campaign to sell Sarasota to another team. These three men attended the 1959 all star baseball game in Baltimore and were able to convince the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 25 Patty Allen Jones, "Sarasota Set To Close Mobile Home Park," The Gainesville Sun September 15, 2001, accessed April 5, 2012. 26 "25 th Anniversary: Boston Red Sox Honored Today," Sarasota Herald Tribune March 7, 1958, accessed April 5, 2012. PAGE 23 17 Los Angeles Dodgers to play nine games at Payne Park during the spring, seeing as how no other teams were available for the spring 1959 training season. 27 After a two year a bsence of a major league baseball team from the community during the spring and thanks to the efforts of these community boosters and team owner Bill Veeck in 1960 the thirty seven year affiliation between the Chicago White Sox and Sarasota began The comm unity's relationship with major league baseball continued well into the twenty first century when Ed Smith Stadium, built in 1989, replaced Payne Park. Not many institutions used to enhance Sarasota's prestigious image were as continuous in modern times as the city's relationship with major league baseball, and the last institution that will be discussed was one of t he most influential and yet was very short lived. From the beginning of its existence in 1941, the Sarasota School of Architecture brought a ve ry modern aesthetic to the community's development that roused national and international attention. The unofficial association of architects were attracted to Sarasota due to a combination of factors: the historical legacies of the town, the proximity to Frank Lloyd Wright's "Child of the Sun" educational complex at Florida Southern College in Lakeland Florida the tropical environment expanding as a suburban community from a tourism based one, and the publicity attracted to Ralph Twitchell's architectura l firm by himself and his former partner Paul Rudolph. 28 The aesthetic of these architects and the following generations of architects to comprise the Sarasota School were greatly influenced by the unique Florida environment, as well as the modern designs o f Wright and Le Corbusier. The initial design philosophy of the Sarasota School of Architecture revolved around five main premises: "clarity of construction, maximum !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 27 LaHurd, Jeff. Hidden History of Sarasota ( Charlesto n, SC: The History Press, 2009), 155. 28 Michael Sorkin, introduction to The Sarasota Sc hool o f Architecture, 1941 1966, by John Howey (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1995), vi vii. PAGE 24 18 economy of means, simple overall volumes penetrating vertically and horizontally, clear ge ometry floating above the Florida landscape, [and] honesty in details and in structural connections." 29 Twitchell Rudolph, and other architects attracted to Sarasota through the two, were responsible for designing numerous residential, civic, religious, an d educational buildings during the School's prime. Sarasota's faith in its architects early on proved to be very strong. Numerous new developments commissioned by the city had architects from the Sarasota School. This amicable relationship did not last, h owever, and by 1960 the Sarasota School of Architecture was well on its way to declining for numerous reasons. The ambitious school building program in Sarasota led by the Chairman of the Board of Public Instruction Philip Hiss during the late 1950s which will be discussed in greater detail in the sections that follow was not as well received by the community as it was built up to be. John Howey attributed the decline in public opinion of the Sarasota School of Architecture to three factors : the quick deter ioration of certain structures, the dominance of Sarasota by commercial developers starting in the mid 1950s, and Paul Rudolph and Victor Lundy's absence from the community by 1960. By the completion of Paul Rudolph's addition to Sarasota Senior High Schoo l, Howey noted how the structure developed some cracks, leaks, and negligible differential sett lement (structural issues due to either uneven distribution on the foundation or soil variations), fueling criticism and distrust from the local community toward the Sarasota School of Architecture. 30 Furthermore, Sarasota sold public beaches and recreational areas to outside commercial developers in 1956 for purely economic reasons. According to Howey, these sales started !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 29 John Howey, The Sarasota School of Architecture ( Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1995), 2. 30 Ibid., 88. PAGE 25 19 a trend of land resource fragmentation in the city and "negated any logical planning for the area." 31 With the developing mistrust of the Sarasota School of Architecture by the community came the departure of the two founde rs of the School. With Sarasota's new domination by commercial developers, P aul Rudolph and Victor Lundy each started focusing their attentions elsewhere; by 1960 Rudolph was the chair of the Department of Architecture at Yale, Lundy started a second office in New York and closed his Sarasota office in 1963. 32 Though the "order, lo gic, and legacy of their architecture and ideas stayed in Sarasota," 33 the School lost the two individuals who drew the appeal of so many other architects that subsequently made up the School of Architecture. Insight can be gained on the Sarasota community based on certain factors that the Sarasota School of Architecture faced and could not overcome. As it modernized and grew in size, Sarasota no longer needed certain aspects of its identity that created prestige for economic reasons, mainly the Sarasota Sc hool of Architecture and the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus. Since c ommercial developers with their own financial resources could expand the city more quickly than the independent architects within the School of Architecture, the School was purg ed from the community. Similar reasoning can be found behind the purging of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, seeing as how it was no longer the main force driving economic stimulus in the community as it was in the 1920s. Sarasota used these institutions to gain national and international attention for itself but was not invested in maintaining their presence in the community if they did not adequately fit its needs over time. Baseball on the other hand was an element of Sarasota's identity that would have been very compatible with the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 31 Ibid., 90. 32 Ibid. 33 Ibid. PAGE 26 20 interests of the city's prospective residents Sarasota's association with major league baseball teams as their spring training homes was considered a positive element in the community that hardly had any negat ive economic ramifications. Sarasota Boosters Aiming to Maintain and Create Prestige There were a number of key individuals in the Sarasota community that were greatly responsible for the quick development and modernization of Sarasota. These individuals were looking to boost the community and turn it into an actual city with a permanent population rather than being mainly a tourist destination. Not only were these individuals essential in the dev elopment of Sarasota, they were also very influential within New College's rise to prominence. Kenneth Thompson, Sarasota's City Manager from 1950 1988, modernized Sarasota with his ambitious agenda of civic development and improvement. Philip Hiss, a member of the Sarasota Board of Public In struction from 1952 1960 and Chairman since 1956, was responsible for the construction of modernized and prestigious architectural program for Sarasota schools (both public institutions and for New College). George Baughman, New College's first president, also played an important role within the Sarasota community through his role as a booster for the college itself These boosters are notably all non natives of the Sarasota community, indicative of the Sunbelt phenomenon in place. The most influential boos ter in Sarasota during the time was Ken Thompson who was the acting City Manager of Miami Beach before being appointed as the second City Manager of Sarasota in 1950. A guiding principal of fiscal conservativism always motivated h is efforts within the com munity. Thompson was even said to have the motto, PAGE 27 21 "maximum municipal services for the least tax dollar." 34 His fiscal conservativism did not affect his plans to develop Sarasota early on, but probably guided him toward maintaining what he established within the first twenty years of holding office. Thompson notably promoted the Sarasota School of Architecture, though not referred to as such at the time since he had some of its architects design civic buildings in the first half of holding office. The Saraso ta School of Architecture can be credited for many of Thompson's civic buildings early on in his career. The Sarasota Chamber of Commerce building (designed by Victor Lundy, completed 1956), a new terminal at the Sarasota Bradenton Airport (designed by Pau l Rudolph, completed 1959), the Sarasota County beach facility on Siesta Key (designed by Tim Seibert, completed 1962), the Sarasota Juvenile Detention facility (designed Bert Brosmith and Frank Folosom Smith, completed 1963), and Sarasota City Hall (desig ned by Jack West, completed 196 6), were all designed by architects of the school under Thompson's leadership Thompson was also noted as being responsible for laying the groundwork to build the Van Wezel Theater, designed by William Wesley Peters of Frank Lloyd Wright's architectural firm Taliesin Associated Architects. 35 In employing architects from the Sarasota School of Architecture as well as those of the same aesthetic, Thompson was very aware of their wide appeal on a national and international scale. Thompson's choice, however, to commission Wesley Peters to design the Van Wezel rather than an architect from the Sarasota School indicates that break in the good relationship between the School and the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 34 "The Charmed Life of Ken Thompson," Florida Accent May 13, 1973. 35 "Kenneth Thompson: City Manager of Sarasota 1950 1988," accessed March 14, 2012, http://www.allaboutsarasota.com/biographies.htm#thompson. Frank Lloyd Wright's wife, Olgivanna, is known to have chosen the Van Wezel's purple color as well. PAGE 28 22 city. Furthermore he would have known that employing these architects would make Sarasota a destination point for many interested in the architect s works. Despite the work he did to improve and modernize the community, Thompson's position as City Manager did not go completely unopposed. In 1968, after Tho mpson had been City Manager for eighteen years, City Commissioner Gilbert Waters accused Thompson of "foot dragging on some of the commissions most important and progressive projects." 36 The commissioner, who did formally request Thompson's retirement, refe rred to how the City Manager wanted to increase the waste collection rates in the city without increasing the services provided to taxpayers. Furthermore, Waters thought Thompson's opposition to issuing a franchise for waste management was an outdated meth od Sarasota was turning into a modern, larger city whose infrastructure needed to expand in the face of a more demanding population. Regardless of his request for retirement Thompson continued to serve as City Manager for another twenty years. This compl aint against the City Manager indicated that there was opposition to his conservative approach in holding office. It also indicated how Thompson would have approached a financial scheme for New College with an emphasis on fiscal control. Such a scheme, as will be discussed in future chapters, went against the ideas of people such as Philip Hiss, who wanted the institution to be prestigious and innovative. The implementation of these educational ideas required a much larger budget to function than expected b y the Sarasota community. As City Manager Thompson would have undeniably had a large role in the foundati on and placement of New College and would have been a moderating force in New College 's aspirations as an institution. Had !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 36 "Commissioner Asks City Manager 's Retirement," Sarasota Journal, August 27, 1969, accessed April 2, 2012. PAGE 29 23 Thompson played a more dire ct role in New College 's development, it is possible that the institution may not have faced the financial woes it did so early on in its existence. A second individual who was a notable Sarasota booster was Philip Hiss. Not a native of Sarasota, Hiss sett led in Sarasota in 1949 after having visited on a sailing trip and remained until 1965 A man of wealthy background, Hiss traveled the world and pursued his passions, which included architecture. He applied his worldly experiences within the architecture h e commissioned as a developer in Sarasota. 37 Owning tracts of waterfront land on the northern end of Lido Key, Hiss enlisted Paul Rudolph to design a house for him on his waterfront property that was known as the Umbrella House (1954). 38 Hiss' passion for architecture reflected his career as a land developer since the majority of his developments were independently contracted to feature the works of renowned architects, especially those who were part of the School of Architecture. Many sch olars, including John Howey and Christopher Berger, compare Hiss' presence within the Sarasota community to such notable figures as John Ringling Bertha Honor Palmer a Sarasota land developer in the early twentieth century and mother of the owners of the Sarasota Bank and Trust Company. Serving on the Board of Public Inst ruction in Sarasota from 1952 to 1960, and as C hairman starting in 1956, Hiss was able to implement his own architectural program through the development of and addition to numerous public school facilities in Sarasota. Philip Hiss had a very strong interest in the effect of architecture on educational performance. Finding the Sar asota School S ystem to be in a nearly deplorable state, with !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 37 "Philip Hiss, Dreamer," Sarasota History Center, accessed March 16, 2012, http://scg.co.sarasota.fl.us/ Historical_Resources/Dr eamers/dreamer_hiss.asp 38 Christopher J. Berger, "Historic Preservation and the Sarasota School of Architecture: Three Case Studies," (masters dissertation, University of Florida, 2010), 29. PAGE 30 24 sub par designs for the city's climate and ill mai ntained facilities, Hiss was able to use his position on the Board of Public Instruction to develop and implement a modernized building program for school facilities in Sarasota County. 39 His initial success in suggesting the employment of Ralph and William Zimmerman for the Brookside Junior High School project, both noted for their involvement in the association of the Sarasota School of Architecture, got Hiss involved with the development and addition to nine different school structures in the county betwe en 1955 and 1960. 40 In 1957, Sarasota County started a $4.5 million building program to fund these schoo l developments and alterations. Such a large scale agenda for modernizing educational architecture in Sarasota undoubtedly represented the attempt to bui ld the prestige of Sarasota in a way that would attract permanent settlement of families. Having the Sarasota School of Architecture involved with renovations and the building of new school campuses would have been indicative of the community's investment in the education of its children and ref lected highly upon the curriculum of each school. The program, however, did not end as well a s it had begun Berger suggested that financial incentive was behind the initial interest in Hiss' ideas, since the Brooks ide Junior High School development ended up being $45,000 under budget. 41 By the time the development of the addition to Sarasota High School came around the biggest project undertaken within the public schools' building program spearheaded by Hiss and desi gned by Paul Rudolph the community expressed its discontent with the buildings because of "cost overruns, technical issues, and complaints about acoustics." 42 After !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 39 Ibid. 33. 40 Ibid. 41 Ibid 42 Ibid. 34. PAGE 31 25 Hiss' term with the Board of Public Instruction came to an end in 1960, he became one of the central figures in the development of New College, approaching the Ford Foundation for endowments that helped get the college up and running. He was also instrumental in the selection of an architect that would design the master plan of the campus before his departure from Sarasota in 1965. A third community booster of particular interest only engaged with the Sarasota community through his involvement with New College. George F. Baughman left his vice presidency at New York University to act as the foundi ng president of New College in 1961. Baughman a Tampa native who received a bachelor of science and law from the University of Florida, a masters from George Washington University, and honorary degrees as a doctor of letters from the New England College of Pharmacy and New York University 43 was the man who spearheaded the fund raising campaign for New College to get the school up and running by 1964. His administrative roles and previous involvement with the Congregational Church were what originally spurred the United Church of Christ (UCC) to suggest his appointment as New College 's first president. Baughman served as business manager and vice president for business affairs at the University of Florida and as Business Manager, Vice President for Business Af fairs and Treasurer at New York University. 44 He was also "Chairman of the Board of Trustees of a new showplace Congregational Church in the wealthy Short Hills, N.J. community," which gained the attention of Dr. Howard Spragg, treasurer of the Board of Hom eland Missions of the UCC and head of the Church's initiative to create a college in Sarasota. 45 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 43 Furman C. Arthur, New College: The First Three Decades (Sarasota: New College Foundation, 1995) 21. 44 Ibid. 22. 45 Ibid. 12 13. PAGE 32 26 Suggestions have been made that Baughman was chosen to be the first president of New College because of his capac ity as a fundraiser and booster. The fact that he only ever earned honorary doctorate degrees proved to be a point of contention later on within the ranks of the college. Many viewed Baughman as lacking the scholarly qualifications necessary to maintain an extended presidency over such an academically lucrative institution that New College intended to be. 46 During his four years as New College's president, there was a constant struggle caused by the loose definition of the role of the president. Within his appointment as president, many assumed that he would serve in a mainly a financial capacity; however, he attempted to assert his authority over the school's curriculum and academic development as well Baughman's lack of academic stature caused some trustees and faculty to resent the president's attempt to control the academic curriculum, since he only held an honorary doctorate. 47 Two figureheads in New College's development, Philip Hiss and John Gustad, each struggle d against Baughman's fervor and as a result gave up their involvement with the college. Event u ally Hiss voluntarily resigned in his capacity as chairman and a member of the board of trustees, 48 while Gustad was let go as academic dean due to insubordination when he signed a letter of no confidence in the presiden t in 1965. 49 Though the role of the president in serving the college was highly contested by those within the institution, Baughman's capacity as fundraiser was never once questioned or opposed due to his relative success in the short time span of his presi dency. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 46 Ibid. 23. 47 Ibid. 63. 48 Ibid. 50. 49 Ibid. 64. PAGE 33 27 Public acclaim of George Baughman as a Sarasota and New College booster was very prevalent. The Sarasota Journal wrote an article celebrating the president's enormous success within the community less than a year after he became a part of it. The ar ticle entitled "Four Area Men Are Named Among 77 Most Influential' In Florida," celebrated Baughman's success in raising $5 million within a six month period and how he had "generated enthusiasm and concerted bi county and national support for New College ." 50 Baughman also noted while speaking to the Gulf Coast Builders Exchange in 1963 that New College w ould enhance the local Manatee County industrial sector. With the large campus development program, Baughman claimed that many jobs would be created in the Manatee County community as well as enhance the concept of the area's development with "new research centers, professional state headquar t ers, cultural and educational centers." 51 Moreover, he believed the school would change the community's image "from on e of merely sunshine, citrus and retirement' to one of vitality, youth and a dream of the future.'" 52 His success in generating local support for the college was exactly what made him a local booster, especially serving as a mediator between Sarasota and Manatee Counties, both of which had New College on its fringes. Baughman's praise within a publication published by the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) further lends to his image a s an important figure within the Sarasota community and for New College. As an association, the NAM is an advocacy group that aims to reduce powerful government regulations over the manufacturing sector !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 50 "Four Area Men Are Named Among 77 Most Influential' In Florida," Sarasota Journal December 11, 1962. 51 "In Manatee: Builders Hear College Will Cure Many Ills," St. Petersburg Times January 17, 1963, accessed April 7, 2012, http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=QppPAAAAIBAJ&sjid=r1IDAAAAI BAJ&dq=new%20college%20manatee%20county&pg=7327% 2C3157559 52 Ibid. PAGE 34 28 to keep low production costs and diminish export barriers. 53 Its aim is free enterprise, and in an article within its Service for Company Publications President Baughman was commended for his equation of education with free and private enterprise. According to the NAM Baughman thought that New College should be established and remain as a private institution because pr ivate education was "necessary to the American way of life as free enterprise, and that each [private enterprise and private education] must be retained in large part if this nation is to be kept free, well educated, and with good living standards." 54 The a rticle suggested that there was a trend in those days for private colleges to "give up" and go public, to which Baughman answered that New College had no intention to do such. Baughman's laudatory remarks of private enterprise and the equation of private e ducation as such made him a true Sunbelt booster. In an era marked by the expansion of public higher education thanks to the G.I. Bill and federal expenditure New College stood in opposition to this growth as a private institution. The New College contradi cted this phenomenon in higher education at the time because of its location within the Sunbelt and the influence of community boosters on the institution. The efforts of President Baughman within New College 's development reflect those of John Ringling in his involvement with developing Sarasota through his own private enterprise. Through his own initiative, George Baughman made himself a prominent presence in the Sarasota community almost immediately after joining it and raised millions of dollars to esta blish the private New College as an image of free enterprise. Boosterism In Advertisements !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 53 "About the NAM Manufacturing in America," The National Association of Manufacturers accessed March 15, 2012, http://www.nam.org/About Us/About the NAM/US Manufacturers Association.aspx 54 Seth H. Mosley, 2 nd "A New College For True Kn owledge," Service for Company Publications 14, (December, 1962). PAGE 35 29 The Sarasota Chamber of Commerce and other groups used promotional materials to attract visitors and potential residents to the area, mainly in the form of travel bo oklets. The following images are advertisements present in these booklets previous to and around the time of New College's foundation. These advertisements evidently targeted certain types of visitors from northern states to come to Sarasota by emphasizing the ease in travel to the area, the accessibility to modern institutions, and the appeal of the prestigious and tropical landscapes. These advertisements are the products of community boosters, mainly realtors and bankers, to try and increase the growth and development of Sarasota. The following two maps appeared in the annual publication called the Sarasota Visitor's Guide from 1955 5 6. These booklets were published by groups of Sarasota realtors and the Chamber of Commerce since 1928 to attract people to Sarasota. The maps of the national highways US 41 and US 301 were provided in each edition of the booklet to demonstrate to Northern travelers the easiest and safest routes to Sarasota. These highways were created as a result of the Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 where the government provided the majority of funding to create these systems of interstate highways, expecting each state to pay the difference. These maps would have made Sarasota look very accessible to Northern and Midwestern visitors, seeing as how the routes are straightforward a nd directions are given for transitions between different interstate highways. PAGE 36 30 Maps of highways US 41 (left) and US 301 (right). From the Sarasota Visitors' Guide, 19 55 56 Courtesy of the Sarasota History Center. This next advertisement for the Palmer First National Bank and Trust Company of Sarasota is found in a guidebook for Sarasota called Sunspot published in 1958. The advertisement is aimed at three primary groups that were targeted as visitors to Sarasota: fishermen, artists, and vacationing tourists. The advertisement is sure to note that the Palmer Bank and Trust Company is a "complete modern bank" and would be able to fulfill any sort of banking need that might be required of the visitors. Presenting the b ank as a modern one indicates that Sarasota was trying to establish itself as an area of PAGE 37 31 commerce that was up to date and could handle the transactions of visiting business people as well as normal tourists. It is also very apparent that this advertisement is the product of a community booster since it promotes a bank and would want the economic development of Sarasot a Advertisement for Palmer First National Bank and Trust Company of Sarasota. From Sunspot, 1958 Courtesy of the Sarasota History Center. Finally, t he 1963 cover page of the Sarasota Visitors' Guide is an artistic rendering of the back por ch of New College's College Hall, which was Charles Ringling 's home. The picture is a culmination of the prestige Sarasota sought after in PAGE 38 32 these years because it demonstrated the use of this historic place for students' e very day educational needs The bac k porch of College Hall here is depicted as a setting where students interacted with the historical setting in everyday life, where students would do homework or read, socialize, and engage in leisurely activities. Furthermore, the juxtaposition of the his torical setting with the tropical waterfront setting combined the aim for prest ige with the need to attract N orthern visitors and students who would not have access to such a setting at home. Interestingly enough the image depicted students a year before t hey were on campus; thus, the students demonstrat ed very traditional appearances. This indicates the expectation that N ew College students were to be of the highest caliber, both in an academic and a social sense Cover of the 1963 Sarasota Visitors' G uide Courtesy of the Sarasota History Center. PAGE 39 33 New College Aims For Prestige As a part of the Sarasota communit New College as an institution needed to establish its own prestige to justify its presence within the Sarasota Bradenton community There were many other institutions in Florida that New College had to compete with early on in its existence These institutions had different elements that compared to those within New College mainly in terms of architecture and religious affiliation It was t his necessity to surpass these already established and developing Florida institutions that fueled New College 's need to uphold a prestigious identity. During its foundation and formative years, New College established and maintained this prestigious ident ity through its adamant efforts to secure an opportune location, selecting a world renowned architect to design its campus, and upholding the prestigious culture of the college as the "Harvard of the South." New College Competes With Other Highe r Education Institutions In Florida As its name indicates, New College was a brand new institution i n 1960 that had to compete with the already established institutions of Florida to make a nam e for itself. Just as Sarasota used its prestige to attract permanent resi dents and leave behind its image as a mainly tourist destination, New College similarly attempted to distinguish itself from private institutions in Florida with which it shared common features. According to Richard Dober, grand design schemes in higher ed ucational architecture were used by universities to gain attention and recognition. "Erected as icons of aesthetic supremacy, stylized elegance, the uplifting grand projects are usually intended to signify institutional advancement, solemnize special cause s three dimensionally, ennoble benefactors, and PAGE 40 34 provide publicity, if not prestige, to the sponsoring college and university." 55 There were many private institutions of higher education in Florida that used this to gain recognition, New College being one of them. New College found common ground with numerous private Florida institutions including the University of Tampa, Florida Southern, Eckerd, and Flagler Colleges in their similar architectural models (whether pre dating the institution or not) and/or rel igious affiliation. Not all of these institutions, however, were religiously affiliated, nor were they centered on architectural innovation on their own campus. Numerous private institutions of higher education in Florida have used historic as well as modern architecture as their calls to fame. The University of Tampa (established in 1933 from Tampa Junior College) used as its facilities the old Tampa Bay Hotel built by railroad and shipping magnate Henry B. Plant. The extremely ornate design of the hot el, with Victorian and Moorish elements, only added to the prestige of the site. In its history, the hotel referred to as "Florida's first Magic Kingdom" 56 attracted visitors from the likes of Teddy Roosevelt, the Prince of Wales, the Queen of England, and was even the place where Babe Ruth signed his first baseball contract. 57 Flagler College paralleled the phenomena of using a historic hotel as its campus. It was established as a women's private liberal arts college in 1968 by one of the American entreprene ur Henry Flagler's principal heirs, Lawrence Lewis, Jr., on the site of the historic Ponce De Len Hotel. 58 The historic hotel was built in 1888 as one of the first winter resorts of Henry !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 55 Richard P. Dober, Campus Architecture: Building in the Groves of Academe (New York: McGraw Hill, 1996 ), 177. 56 "Henry B. Plant Museum," The University of Tampa, accessed March 19, 2012, http://www.ut.edu/plantmuseum. 57 "History," The University of Tampa, accessed March 19, 2012, http://www.ut.edu/history. 58 "Who we are," Flagler College, accessed March 19, 2012, http://www.flagler.edu/flagler difference/who we are.html PAGE 41 35 Flagler's along the east coast of Florida, was designed by architect s John Carrre and Thomas Hastings, decorated by Louis Comfort Tiffany, and was one of the first buildings in the country to have electricity, installed by Thomas Edison himself. 59 Though Flagler College was established after New College it competed with New College in attracting students interested in pursuing an education in the liberal arts tradition within Florida. Both the University of Tampa and Flagler College have similar historic architecture that was originally commissioned by very successful ent repreneurs, but neither was religiously affiliated. Florida Southern University, on the other hand, competed with New College in terms of its modern architecture. Established in 1883 as the South Florida Institute in Orlando, relocated numerous times and r enamed Southern College in 1906, and finally in its permanent home in Lakeland by 1922 and gaining its permanent name in 1935, Florida Southern College sought prominence through its extremely ambitious architectural scheme. President Ludd Spivey commission ed Frank Lloyd Wright to design the master plan for the college because of Wright's recognition as one of the greatest architects of the time and the attention that his designs would attract to Florida Southern. 60 The designs of Frank Lloyd Wright parallel the style of the Sarasota School of Architecture, since many of those architects were attracted to Sarasota because of its proximity to Wright's "Child of the Sun" educational complex at Florida Southern. Furthermore the Florida Southern designs fall withi n the same stylistic aesthetic as I.M. Pei's eastern side of the New College campus. Though New College had to compete with private institutions in Florida that had prestigious historic or modern plans, none of them !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 59 "Ponce De Len Hotel," The National Parks Service, accessed March 19, 2012, http://www.cr.nps.gov/nr/travel/geo flor/26.htm 60 Brendan Gill, Many Masks: the Life of Frank Lloyd Wright (New York: Ballantine Books, 1987), 397. PAGE 42 36 had a combination of the two. The contra st between historic and modern architecture at New College enabled the institution to distinguish itself from the other Florida private institutions discussed. Religious affiliation is another aspect within New College that was also found in other Florida institutions of higher education. New College was founded in part by the support of the United Church of Christ (UCC) and sought support from other religious institutions such as the Presbyterian Church before its affiliation with the UCC. The national Pre sbyterian Church intended to found a four year liberal arts institution around the time that the Sarasota Chamber of Commerce wanted to start a college within the city. The Presbyterian Church was not as interested in the land offerings that Sarasota provi ded, however, and instead accepted a 1,000 acre waterfront site offered by St. Petersburg thus founding the Florida Presbyterian College in 1958, later known as Eckerd College. 61 Florida Southern College was another institution that was affiliated with a re ligion, specifically from the United Methodist Church, throughout its entire history. Religious affiliation would have been a very important facet of these institutions' identities and would have attracted the attention of prospective students, both inside and outside of Florida, by the nature of their religious ties. Though the UCC did not attempt to uphold religious control over the campus, as was the case at Florida Southern, New College 's affiliation with the church was a very important part of the coll ege's identity to the community early on, as will be discussed in the next chapter. How New College Upheld its Prestige As previously mentioned, Sarasota's boosters used a development model where they aimed to legitimize the city by establishing its presti gious image. This method was !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 61 Arthur, New College, 3. PAGE 43 37 also used by New College to establish and legitimize its own prestigious identity. The c ollege 's development made this evident in three distinct ways: through the selection of its location, the selection of its architectural pr ogram, and its academic culture. The Sarasota Chamber of Commerce was the original group that created the initiative for any sort of higher level educational institution in the area. In its pursuit of promoting the need for a college or university of some sort, the Chamber would play up the Sarasota community's rich cultural resources to legitimate the need for a high caliber college in the area. Along with the Sarasota community demonstrating such phenomena, the imagery New College itself was established p restigiously through ties made with Ivy League and international institutions of higher education as well as through the grandiose architectural program it sought after. The Sarasota Chamber of Commerce, in its pursuit of creating a college within its ow n community, presented itself as a "college town without a college, 62 meaning that the community had a locality and resources that would benefit from an institution of higher education. Newspaper articles and promotional materials for New College constantly mention these resources. The Ringling Museum and the historic Asolo Theater are the main attractions for such an institution; seen as a resource to humanities students and generally adding prestige to the aesthetics of the campus due to their pr oximity. 63 Local newspapers portrayed the decision for this location as a deliberate choice so that New College would create a "superb educational and cultural complex" that would unite these neighboring cultural resources. 64 Promotional material exhibited t he same tendency to glorify local resources to legitimize the school's establishment. On a more pragmatic !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 62 Ar thur, New College 2. 63 "New College To Open This Fall" The Tampa Tribune February 11, 1964. 64 "New College To Open Here In 1964," The Bradenton Herald March 24, 1963. PAGE 44 38 level, local Sarasota Bradenton residents were seen as potential resources for New College, since they had "records of achievement in business, educat ion, the arts, science, and many other fields." 65 The prestigious locality, with its rich cultural resources, was appealed to as a way to authenticate the newly established institution. Other more far reaching appeals to prestige were employed to qualify th e institution as well. New College 's choice of architectural program was one of the most obvious ways that the institution attempted to uphold its prestige and very closely paralleled the aims for architectural prestige within the Sarasota community. Phili p Hiss, as the figurehead of the Architectural Selection Committee, sought after an architect among the country's best in order to achieve an "architectural distinction to match intellectual class.'" 66 The committee ultimately chose architect I.M. Pei, and early promotional material for the college advertised the plans for his $15 million campus complex. A promotional booklet on the campus itself noted how Pei was undergoing many other important projects along with the New College campus, including the Gre en Center for the Earth Sciences at M.I.T., the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado, the East West Center at the University of Hawaii, the Everson Museum of Art in Syracuse, and large scale urban developments in downtown areas of Boston, Montreal, Cleveland, Los Angeles, Providence, and Columbus ." 67 Pei accepted designing the campus as a challenge, since he had to "create an academic climate" within one that was "usually associated with vacation and recreation." 68 The aesthetic of I. M. Pei greatly reflected that !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 65 Bulletin of New College 1964 1966 ," January 1965, 66. 66 Gerald Grant and David Riesman, The Perpetual Dream: Reform and Experiment in the American College (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978), 221. 67 "The Campus," promotional booklet, New College of Florida Archives, 8. 68 "New College To Open This Fall" The Tampa Tribune February 11, 1964. PAGE 45 39 of the architects who were part of the Sarasota School, creating a parallel in the architecture of Sarasota and the developing architecture of New College Comparisons were made between New College and Ivy League and internati onal institutions of higher education to legitimize the new institution. One comparison frequently made in newspaper articles on the foundation of New College compared the new school to the other New Colleges found within Oxford University in England 69 and the University of Edinburgh in Scotland. 70 Arthur suggested in his work on the school that the New College name, instead of paying homage to prestigious international academic institutions, may have been mere coincidence, since the school was informally referred to from the outset as "New College. 71 The appointment of Dr. Arnold J. Toynbee as the first professor of New College definitely indicated the aim for prestige of the institution from the beginning, giving the institution immediate regional, national, and inter national recognition. Florida n ewspapers extolled Toynbee's appointment even before the college broke ground to start constructing the campus. His appointment was referred to as the perfect combination for "making academic history," 72 and his presence on campus was concluded near the dea th of Sir Winston Churchill attracting national attention to New College with numerous television teams coming to campus to interview Toynbee after the tragedy. 73 Besides appeals to similarities between New College and prestigious international educational institutions, the institution was also compared t o Ivy League schools within the United States, especially Harvard. Language in newspaper !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 69 Charles Stafford, "In the Oxford Image: Dream College at Sarasota," The At lanta Journal and CONSTITUTION, July 14, 1963. 70 Joy Rosenz weig Kliewer, The Innovative Campus: Nurturing the Di stinctive Learning Environment ( Ph oenix, AZ: The Oryx Press, 1999), 57. 71 Arthur, New College, 14. 72 "Auspicious Start At Sarasota," The Miami Herald October 19, 1963. 73 Arthur, New College, 68. PAGE 46 40 articles an d promotional material referring to New College as the "Harvard of the South" relate New Coll e ge 's ground b reakin g ceremony. Some of the school's founders mixed together soil brought over from Harvard University at New College to symbolize the relationship between the oldest and finest of the nation's educational institutio ns and the newest one, which had drea ms of becoming Harvard like." 74 This act culminated in the aim f or prestige that was attempted by New College to make a widely recognized and prestigious nam e for itself. In conclusion, Sarasota and New College had similar development trends within their p eriods of expansion and modernization. New College was used by the Sarasota Chamber of Commerce as a vehicle for reinventing the city in the wake of the sudden departure of the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus, the Boston Red Sox, and the Sarasota School of Architecture. Both used the initiative of community boosters to establish themselves as prestigious to attract future residents and students. These similarities within the foundation of New College and the modernization of Sarasota were contrast ed with the different ideals of each, which will be discussed in the subsequent chapters. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 74 Ibid. 35. PAGE 47 41 Chapter 2: New College's Development Creates Tension Within the Sarasota Bradenton Community As a private, independent institution, New College stood at odds with the community in which it was created. In the years prior to the school's merger with the University of South Florida, New College and its faculty, staff, and students and the surrounding Sarasota and Bradenton communities were polarized There are many tensions evident throughout the establishment of the liberal arts college in such a conservative community. Such strain arose from certain elements in and around the institution that came from undercurrents within the community or out of t he need to establish the institution as a credible and reputable college. Academic innovation, one of the essential principles upon which New College was founded, went against the conservative and traditional elements within the community. Many of the stud ents that were being sought to enroll at New College more often than not rejected the neighboring community's political and social standards. The United Church of Christ's involvement with the foundation of the college actually served as a conduit for inde pendent development of the college, rather than being a conservative influence like the community expected. Finally, even th ough the institution's constant aim of distinction was compatible with the high self image of the Sarasota Bradenton community, this aim also undermined the community's involvement and relations hip with the institution. The tensions upon which New College was established had long term effects on the school and its relations with the Sarasota Bradenton community. The Sarasota Bradenton community was made up largely of what coul d have been considered average conservatives that subsc ribed to the Cold War Consensus. This PAGE 48 42 term describes how the government cooperated with other powers to solve national and international problems including Co mmunism, and yet was willing to intervene in the affairs of other powers to protect the country's anti Communist self interest. 75 Such a consensus gave the United States an altruistic image when it pursued military engagements on foreign soil. It was mainly the fraction of the population who bought into this rhetoric that stood at odds with the student population at New College and to a degree its administration, faculty, and staff. Issues that arose between these groups usually were based on misunderstandin gs and conflicts of interest and opinions. Another subset of the Sarasota Bradenton community was comprised of a population of artists, musicians, and retired scholars that were attracted to the town because of its climate and cultural resources. It was fr om this group within the community's population that a lot of support funneled into the college, especially in networking with prestigious organizations. Academic Innovation Within a Conservative Community The Sarasota Bradenton community's conservativis m stood against New College's ideal s that upheld innovation as an essential aspect of the educational model. The choice in trusteeship and fellowship for the college attests directly to this fact, since there were many t rustees appointed that did not fit t he conservative profile of the surrounding community Furthermor e, in advertising for the institution, Sarasota was portrayed in an international light indic a ting an openness to innovation and yet adding an aspect to Sarasota's image that had not been appe aled to previously. The notion of innovation on the New College campus in the first couple decades of its existence when !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 75 Eugene R. Wittkopf and James M. McCormick, "The Cold War Consensus: Did It Exist?" Polity 22, no. 4 (Summer, 1990): 628, accessed April 9, 2012, http://www.jstor.org/stable/3234822. PAGE 49 43 the institution itself was trying to formulate its own identity was a force that ran counter to the conservative and traditional cultur e in the surrounding Sarasota Bradenton area. By New College's foundation in 1960, the Board of Trustees was comprised of eighteen members six from the United Church of Christ, six from the Sarasota community, and six chosen from both of these groups and assumed the responsibility over the institution. The original Board of Trustees was a diverse group of individuals suggested by the United Church of Christ (UCC) who were all distinguished in their own respective fields and within the Sarasota Bradenton c ommunity. Among the most prestigious within their ranks were individuals like Alberto Gainza Paz, the publisher of La Prensa in Buenos Aires; Dr. Carroll V. Newsome, vice chairman of Prentice Hall, Inc.; and Donald W. Weber, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of Maine. 76 With the widely varying qualifications among the group appointed to serve on the Board of Trustees came many different political views which would have allowed for the kind of academi c pursuit New College intended for its students Many of the local Trustees were seen as holding more conservati ve views, notably t he editor of the Sarasota Herald Tribune David Lindsay, lending to a stereotype based on false premises where Northern truste es were Democrats and Southern trustees were Republicans 77 One of the Board of Tr ustees' most progressive actions involved their appointment of a specific individual as an Honorary Fellow. In November of 1966, the St. Petersburg Times reported the appointm ent of former Florida Gov e rnor LeRoy Collins as an Honorary Fellow of New College by the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 76 Charles Stafford, "In the Oxford Image: Dream College at Sarasota," The Atlanta Journal and CONSTITUTION, July 14, 1963. 77 Gerald Grant and David Riesman, The Perpetual Dream: Reform and Experiment in the American College (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978), 231 PAGE 50 44 Board of Trustees. T hough t his position did not hold any administrative or functional value for the college, 78 it was indicative of the progressivism within the trustee ship of the college. LeRoy Collins served as the g overnor of Florida between 1955 and 19 60 and was a member of a law firm in Tampa in 1966. O ne of his most notable roles was the one he played in the Selma, Alabama Crisis of 1965 while serving as the Direct or of Community R elations for the U.S. Departm ent of Commerce and later Under Secretary of Commerce. 79 At the outset of civil unrest in Selma, Alabama, Collins was summoned by President Johnson to head off the confrontation planned for March 9, 1966 by Civi l R ights leaders, including Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., reacting to an attack on peaceful protestors crossing the Edmund Pettus Bridge marching toward Montgomery. 80 Collins served as the liaison between the Ala bama State Troopers and the Civil R ights prote stors led by Dr. King ultimately moderating what became a symbolic victory for the protestors and remained a completely peaceful march. The details of his involvement in the Selma Crisis were not allowed to be publicized at the time du e to his position in government and according to Wagy 81 and Mormino, 82 cost him the election into the Florida Senate as a Republican. Collins' political moderation and sympathy towards racial issues were what attracted the New College trustees to appointing him as an Honorary F ellow, though the Republican dominated Sarasota County would not have been supportive of Collins' stance on racial issues. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 78 Furman C. Arthur, New College: The First Three Decades (Sarasota, FL: New College Foundation, 1995) 87. 79 "Two New Board Members are Elec ted for New College" St. Petersburg Times, November 11, 1966. 80 Wagy, Thomas R. "Governor Leroy Collins of Florida and the Selma Crisis of 1965," The Florida Historical Quarterly 57 (1979): 405. 81 Ibid., 418. 82 Mormino, Land of Sunshine, State of Dreams : A Social History of Modern Florida (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2005), 150. PAGE 51 45 With the aim for innovation came a new geographical conception of the New College campus, placing it under an international spotlight. Promotional material for the earlier years of the college indicate that the location for the n ew college was integral to its purpose as a center for higher education conveniently located between the no rthern United States and Central and South America. The "Bulletin of New College, 1964 66" was a promotional pamphlet created as a way to advertise the institution by describing it, its faculty, its direction, anticipated student life, and admission standa rds. This bulletin conceived of the college as both a "national and international institution" and described its Florida location as making it "easily accessible from many parts of the United States, from South America, and from other nations." 83 Another pr omotional booklet from roughly the same time period entitled "New Horizons With New College" was used primarily for fund raising and student recruitment. The booklet refers to New College's Sarasota location as a "new national frontierequidistant from the great population centers of both North and South America," strategically positioned "to strengthen the common bonds of democracy and freedom in the two Americas," and as part of the "forces of change" within the world, especially in terms of hemispheric r elations. 84 New College 's international outreach even extended to relationships with institutions of higher education in the Southern portion of the North American continent. A final promotional booklet from around 1964 cal led "The Campus" describe d the loc ation of the institution and suggested that there was direct contact between New College and institutions in Latin America. The booklet was part of a series of promotional booklets disseminated to high school counselors nationwide, among others, !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 83 "Bulletin of New College 1964 1966," Volume 1, Number 1, January, 1965, 67, New College of Florida Archives. 84 "New Horizons With New College," Promotional Booklet 1965, 5, New College of Florida Archives. PAGE 52 46 to attract students to become part of New College 's charter class in 1964. It described New College as having a sister college in the University of Santo Domingo, "establishing a firm bond between the newest and the oldest institutions of higher learning in the West ern H e m i s p h e r e 85 Furthermore, the booklet made the connection between the location of the college as being near numerous transportation hubs such as the Sarasota Bradenton Airport, two U.S. highways, two railway lines, and a major bus line, bringing the c ollege "literally within hours of almost any city in the w o r l d 86 Such rhetoric used in promotional material for the college at its inception indicates that the college was tryin g to establish itself in a position on the border of the different cultures in the Americas. This was a completely new orientation for Sarasota and Bradenton, seeing as how the community had never been appealed to in an international light before. This rhetoric was particularly interesting since it added an element of international attention to Sarasota, which had not been previously received, and gave Sarasota a sense of cosmopolitanism when in fact the city still struggled with issues such as racial tensions. The Ne w College Student The tendency within admissions at New College wa s to s eek the highest calib e r of students possible, evident in the qualifications among students that were admitted as well as the language used in promotional material for the college in its earlier years. Admissions in itself shaped the campus in a disti nct most likely unintentionally, seeking a certain niche of students to attend New College. This was one way the college was innovative; it attracted students that otherwise probably would not have gone to Sarasota, let alone for academic pursuit, and it called for those who would not have been attending !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 85 "The Campus" Promotional Booklet, 1964, 3, New College of Florida Archives. 86 Ibid. PAGE 53 47 on the G.I. Bill due to the institution's private nature. The amount of independence given to students within the New College curriculum and campus life in general meant that admissions wanted to fin d very independent, self motivated students; many times they admitted students that supported many of the current social movements at the time fit the profile of social activist, f or instance members of the Counter Culture or conscientious objectors to the Vietn am War The environment of innovation constantly fostered by the institution led to the rejection of the societal norms of the surrounding Sarasota Bradenton community by the students. Furthermore, due to student academic achievement, faculty and staff on campus validated student opinions rejecting local societal norms. The amount of independence built into the curriculum at New College meant that the Admissions office had to look for students with a high degree of self motivation and initiative. The amoun t of independence given to students was intended, in the words of Professor David Dykstra, to give students "a great deal of freedom to pursue their own interests in their own w a y 87 Dean of Admissions Robert J. Norwine referred to the types of students New College sought after as "doers" who were "bright, imaginative, independent students" with very high academic qualifications. 88 These types of students would have been expected to go on to pursue graduate study, being conditioned to further their own education and their intellect. Moreover, a bookl et entitled "The Charter Class," originally distributed to attract New College 's charter class, indicated that these students would set the precedence for following classes. The students of the charter class were !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 87 Joy Rosenzweig Kliewer, The Innovative Campus: Nurturing the Distinctive Learning Environment (Phoenix, AZ: The Oryx Press, 1999) 62. 88 "A Report by George F. Baughman, President, New College, Sa rasota, Florida, April, 1964," 6, New College of Florida Archives. PAGE 54 48 referred to in this booklet as "the natural leaders of succeeding classes," bearing the responsibility of "establishing the pattern of student activity and g o v e r n m e n t 89 Seeing as ho w the charter class was given such a great deal of responsibility in establishing what student life and government on campus would be like, New College attracted students that were willing to take a risk academically in attending an unaccredited, fledgling institution and that had the initiative to follow through with those responsibilities. Such patterns sought after in student enrollment almost fostered an environment where activism could develop and flourish among young minds, free to develop in their ow n ways and pursue subjects that were of interest to them. A letter written by President John Elmendorf in 1967 to the Sarasota Herald Tribune entitled "College Asks Understanding" indicates a clear divide between student opinion and societal norms in the Sarasota Bradenton community. In the letter, Elmendorf noted that he brought to the students' attention the local citizenry's disapproval of some of their political activities. Though New College would never "compromise its integrity as a self respecting institution of higher education" by policing student thoughts and actions, Elmendorf noted how the community saw student activism as a reflect ion of the institution's o p i n i o n 90 It is evident through this letter that the Sarasota Bradenton community thought New College students were being conditioned into holding certain political views by their professors and administrators The community was no t able to understand that the student body's opinion was their own and did not reflect the faculty, staff or administration's stances on those issues. This assumption divided the student body from the surrounding community even further. As !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 89 "The Charter Class Promotional Booklet, 1963 4, 5, New College of Florida Archives. 90 John Elmendorf, "College Asks Understanding," Sarasota Herald Tribune October 29, 1967 PAGE 55 49 the community co ntinued to demonstrate its invalidation of New College 's academic program, the student body further rejected larger societal norms. Another source of motivation to reject the Sarasota Bradenton community's values was a lack of common ground and each group 's inability to relate to the other Such a phenomenon was observed by three authors on New College history Gerald Grant and David Riesman in their chapter on New College in their book The Perpetual Dream: Reform and Experiment in the American College as well as Furman C. Arthur in his work New College: The First Three Decades Grant and Riesman noted that New College students were not interested in interacting with the larger community because of a sense that it was "both empty and forbidding," making ref erence to the community of retirees who "drove paste colored luxury cars with agonizing slowness." 91 Here Grant and Riesman insinuate d that the inability of New College students to relate to the larger Sarasota Bradenton community was from a generational ga p with dif ferent interests and lifestyles This gap gave rise to what they both see as one of the "ironies of New College where ther e was a distaste for Sarasota combined with "the frequent unwillingness on the part of students to leave the home away fro m home they have discovered." 92 As an Honorary Fellow of New College, announced in 1966 along with Governor LeRoy Collins and a few others, Harvard Sociologist David Riesman was a frequent visitor to the campus and made considerable contributions as a consu ltant to the college. Furman C. Arthur mentioned that Riesman suggested to President Elmendorf sometime during his presidency that he should consider in his writings the "problems of being a college president in an institution that needs both money and com munity support !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 91 Grant and Riesman, The Perpetual Dream, 230. 92 Ibid. PAGE 56 50 and invites students who do not believe in e i t h e r 93 Such a fundamental gap in student beliefs versus the institution's needs and the greater community's expectations can also be found when Arthur discusses the outset of the counterculture on campus. Furman C. Arthur indicated that the Counter Culture movement ca me about at New College unanticipated by President Ba ughman and Academic Dean John Gustad. The Sarasota Bradenton community, however, suspected that the students were at the forefr ont of the movement Though Arthur admits that students were not the initiators of the Counter Culture like the community thought he claimed that the students were not far behind. 94 Stephen Nohlgren a former New College student from the graduating class of 1970 and writer for the St. Peter s burg Times commented on his observation of the outset of the Counter Culture movement on campus. In the article "An Idea Struggles for Survival," Nohlgren admits that he learned of the "hippie" movement by reading an a rticle in a 1967 issue of Time maga zine and instantaneously equating characteristics of the San Francisco's Haight Ashbury District 's "hippies" to New College. In walking barefoot on campus and growing their hair to unrestricted lengths, Nohlgren admits th at the students were hardly a few months ahead of a movement that would soon sweep across the nation. Despite this fact, the people of Sarasota did not appreciate the change in student demeanor and dress and subsequently limited their support of the s c h o o l 95 The independent development of student opinion and lifestyles widened the rift between the New College students and the larger Sarasota Bradenton community where each rejected the other and their ideals. This r ift between the town and gown of Sarasota manifested !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 93 Arthur, New College 92. 94 Ibid. 88. 95 Stephen Nohlgren, "An Idea Struggles for Survival," St. Petersburg Times May 20, 1974. PAGE 57 51 itself financially in detrimental ways t o the college which will be discussed later in the chapter. Furman C. Arthur on multiple occasions in his work on New College attested that academic performance validated student opinion in the eyes of f aculty and administration. He almost paints a picture of campus community relations in which the Sarasota Bradenton community victimized students for differences in opinion and appearance. The community devalued the academic performance and achievement of students and instead focused sometimes very negatively on things like student behavior. An example of this was when students were accused of "despoiling" the campus architecture by hanging laundry to dry on their balconies facing U S 41. In reality studen ts did not intend for such behaviors to be interpreted as such, they simply had no laundry facilities in their proximity. President Elmendorf, who was highly admired by the student body, drew up some form of regulation to avoid this negative attention how ever was notably "not disposed to criticize them [students] for their dress and behavior as long as they performed well academically. 96 Furthermore, faculty and staff validated student opinions by supporting and helping organizing events and initiatives to raise awareness about issues for which the students felt passionately. When students had strong convictions for certain things, Arthu r noted that faculty and administrative compliance was usually commonplace. Events such as the celebration of the first Earth Day, a three day suspension of classes to protest the Kent State student killings, and even a vote by faculty to delay summer eval uations for anyone who wished to involve themselves in the anti Vietnam war political movement in 1970 are indicative !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 96 Arthur, New College 90. PAGE 58 52 of such c o m p l i a n c e 97 The institutional validation of student opinion in these ways drove a clear wedge between New College student s' and t he Sarasota community. The Sarasota Bradenton community seemed to disregard student opinion on numerous occasions for superficial reasons. This enabled students to more easily resign themselves to a campus where their superiors respected and validated thei r opinions. The Unexpected Role of the Congregationalists The United Church of Christ (UCC) was one of the most influential groups involved in New College's development Still referred to at that point as the Congregationalist Christian Church, the UCC was expected by t he majority of the Sarasota Bradenton community to be a conservative and tradi tional influence on the campus. The UCC's aims and hands off approach in its projects of institutional development however, allowed for New College to develop in i ts own direction. The Church's insiste nce that the college be non denominational and free from dogmatic religious control was a point that not many Sarasota Bradenton residents expected or eve n understood. The biggest rift between the Sarasota Bradenton co mmunity and the UCC was on the topic of race the UCC insisted that New College be accessible to all types of people regardless of any personal characteristics at a time where the community was still deeply segregated. The larger population would have thoug ht favorably of the involvement of a religious entity in the foundation of its first local college but did not expect the UCC to influence the college in such a liberal and independent way. The initiative for a college in Sarasota originally came from the local Chamber of Commerce who wanted a college in the area for its own development After futile attempts at establishing a Presbyterian institution and even a junior college, a Sarasota !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 97 Ibid. 93. PAGE 59 53 Congregationalist Minister and Chamber member, John Whitney MacNeil sug gested to the Chamber that the Board of Home Missions of the Congregational and Christian Chu r ches may support their initiative. MacNeil called upon the Reverend Howard E. Spragg, the treasurer of UCC's Board of Homeland Ministries, to inquire upon the ir interest in establishing a college in Sarasota and eventually to help found New College logistically and financially. After a period of discussion and inquiry upon other religious organiza tions, such as the Presbyterian Church, the UCC's Board of Homela nd Ministries finally decided to aid the Sarasotans and the Chamber in their aim. Arthur claimed that Sarasota "seemed to fit the church's profile for assistance: a southern community with a culturally active citizenry, considerable wealth, and a high perc entage of its high school graduates going to college," and that the location had a geographic advantage in that it would be able to "exploit its geographical relationship to Central and South A m e r i c a 98 The UCC only conditionally decided to aid Sara sota in its initiative, however; it necessitated that local sources would have to provide a great deal of the institution's funding, excellence would have to be the ideal of the college, no church denomination would be upheld "but instead a free living conversati on or dialogue," and that the institution would need to have "an open policy on race, religion, and c r e e d 99 The UCC enabled New College to develop in an organic and unrestricted way by its own principles, and such independence was the source of a good dea l of stratification between the community and the students. The UCC's hands off approach in campus development allowed for very independent development of New College. Reverend Spragg noted in an interview with !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 98 Arthur, New College 5. 99 Frederick H. Treesh, "Church Community Project Meets Need for Colleges," United Press International Newsfeatures May 26, 1963, New College of Florida Archives. PAGE 60 54 the Ocala Star Banner that one of the guiding principles of the UCC in founding institutions of education was reminiscent of the ideals of the Protestant Reformation; cutting ties with an institution once it was firmly established so it may develop independently He did not see the necessity for the Protestant Reformation if "you don't trust yourself to have a corner on the t r u t h 100 Reverend Spragg claimed the UCC did not believe in imposing dogmatic views upon others and even went so far as to suggest that an atheist hold a position on the board of N ew College "just to keep the religious boys on their toes." 101 The innovative nature of the institution fostered by the UCC's direction was also evident within the development of New College's academic curriculum. The fact that student impetus was what init ially brought about a religious studies program to the campus points to the lack of dogmatic control over the institution by the UCC. A noteworthy point to make about the religious studies program pursued in the second year of the school's existence has to do with the community's reaction to the professor appointed for the position. The first appointed religious studies professor was Dr. William Hamilton, Professor of Theology at Colgate Rochester Divinity School. He received negative reactions on the part of the larger Sarasota Bradenton community out of a misu nderstanding of the premise of a book he co wrote on the "Death of God" thesis. 102 Here the community took Hamilton's theological academic pursuit on the radical premise of the "Death of God" thesis as his own personal belief instead of as mere academic interaction and evaluation. Once again the Sarasota Bradenton community proved that they upheld opinions of students and scholarship of professors as a reflection !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 100 Harold Sheehan, "From Harva rd to Florida's New College: A C hurch Tries To Close College Gap," Ocala Star Banner New College of Florida Archives. 101 Ibid., New College of Florida Archives. 102 Arthur, New College 101. PAGE 61 55 of New College's teachings and beliefs. T his was another instance where the community revealed that it did not understand New College 's educational premises. The institution encouraged independent thought, while the community assumed that its faculty, staff, and administration indoctrinated stude nts with these views. The UCC also insisted that New College be completely inclusive to all people in pursuit of academic excellence. This could be considered the most divergent point of disagreement between the UCC and the Sarasota Bradenton community wh ich, though working toward integration, was still a heavily stratified society well into the late 1960s. The church's policy on total accessibility to the institution was firm, stating that the college "shall be open to all students qualified for its acade mic program. Race, creed, national origin, or cultural status shall never be considered as a basis for denial of a d m i s s i o n 103 The institution ardently upheld the policy of complete access to the institution based on merit, and it placed phrases like "Neith er race, creed, color, nor financial condition will be allowed to keep qualified students from attending New C o l l e g e 104 on all of its promotional materials. Beyond the institution being accessible to all students regardless of race, color, and creed, the UCC insisted that its authoritative positions especially the Board of Trustees be accessible to all as well, including w omen and minorities 105 The United Church of Christ served as the least expected and yet strongest liberal force upon New College as a developing institution. The larg er Sarasota Bradenton community's norms at the time opposed the UCC's intention to have New College be totally inclusive, independent, and aiming for excellence By 1960 Sarasota still struggled with the issue of race, as it was still governed by Jim Crow !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 103 Arthur, New College 7. 104 "The nation's press reports onNew College ," i, New College of Florida Archives. 105 Arthur New College 31. PAGE 62 56 influenced separate but equal policies. At this point Sarasota and Bradenton were hardly in the preliminary stages of desegregating, only having struggled with obtaining a beach or pool for African Americans a few years prior and hardly undergoing the process of public school desegregation. Financial Burden As The Consequence of Prestige New Col lege's constant aim for prestige served, in a sense, as a double edged sword for the institution's relationship with its surrounding community. On the one hand, the school's attempt to make itself look prestigious complemented the Sarasota Bradenton's elit e artistic and scholastic community. On the other hand, New College's attempt to establish itself with such high standards from the outset created a financial burden that could not be met by the private, independent institution or its hometowns. Financial problems would eventually cause the demise of the institution as a private, independent entity, necessitating the merger of the college with the University of South Florida in 1975. After the merger and the creation of New College of the University of Sout h Florida, the institution did not have nearly the degree of autonomy as it did on its own. It did, however, gain the financial stability it needed to continue its existence and serve its purpose as a center of one of the highest quality collegiate educati ons in Florida. U pholding institutional prestige did not serve New College 's purpose for fund raising initiatives in the early to mid 1970s as was expected Behind the failure in financial pursuits was the noted independent nature of the institution for d ifferent reasons that had the e ffect of tarnishing the institution's prestige. Such aims for autonomy fostered a rejection of the collegiate practice of in loco parentis and gave students a lot more freedom than was appreciated by the surrounding community By the mid 1970s PAGE 63 57 New College had well since peaked in its ability to fund raise from within the community since it already tapped into all of its local resources. Furthermore New College had its image tarnished by the community's nega tive portrayals of its students. The foundation of New College as an institution that valued both academic and general independence as one of its best qualities ended up having a negative effect on the overall prestige of the campus. The faculty's disdain for in loco parenti s devalued the role it played on campus administration. 106 This negatively affected New College 's image, since it made the institution look less serious and detracted from its reputation within the local community. On numerous occasions, the larger Sarasota Bradenton community withdrew support from the institution because certain instances of student behavior that arose from the lack of in loco parentis on the campus. One instance of philanthropists rescinding funds from New College involved the more consistent of the numerous s tudent publications on campus, The Catalyst. The Sarasota Bank and Trust Company decided in 1966 to remove its advertising from the pages of T he Catalyst due to its objection of certain editorial policies and "the appearance in print of a certain less acceptable w o r d 107 Furthermore, the students' image proved to be a financial burden for the institution. A year later Dean Norwine threatened a crack down on student dress code. Specifically, the presence of barefoot students walki ng around College Hall, previously the home of Charles Ringling, "lost the college some money." 108 Potential benefactors of the school thought it was very disrespectful to be walking around such a historic building with bare feet. Student appearance very muc h detracted from the image !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 106 Arthur, New College 61. 107 To Mr. James R. Shutts the Assistant Vice President of Publicity and Advertising of Sarasota Bank and Trust Company," January 12, 1966 New College of Florida Archives. 108 "New Regulation Bans Bear Feet," Catalyst January 6, 1967. PAGE 64 58 New College wanted to uphold and the administration tried to be proactive to put an end to it. New College's prestigious architecture and locality ended up causing a burden upon the institution and its relationship with the comm u nities that surrounded it. The Architectural Selection Committee, assembled to determine whom the institution would commission as an architect for the campus anticipated the development of a modest campus. Their disfavor, according to Arthur, of monument al architecture was not reflected within their selection process, however, seeing as how they chose "among a group of architects with national and international reputations," who would certainly impose thei r grandiose style into the campus' design 109 The UC C anticipated in its financial sponsorship that the institution would be of "modest proportions; Hiss' insistence on excellence of "the program, faculty, students, and facilities," and Baughman's embrace of those goals "created a wide gap between the orig inal financial needs and those now being overlaid by the new elitist d r e a m s 110 A completely different realm of fundraising than was originally intended would have to be pursued in order to make Hiss and Baughman's goals a reality, though such a level of fu nd raising may not have been at all realistic or obtainable anyway. Finally, the inter jurisdictional locality of the New College property ended up alienating Manatee County from the institution. Baughman was committed to having a main campus on the waterf ront Ringling property and proposed that student housing be built on the seventeen ac re leased airport tract of land. Upon requesting that Sarasota County annex the entire campus includ ing the airport lands so that civic services !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 109 Arthur New College, 41. 110 Ibid., 38. PAGE 65 59 could be provided by a sin gle jurisdiction, ther e was an uproa r in Manatee County of "hurt local pride." 111 New College's choice to establish its campus on the border of Sarasota and Manatee Counties was bound to have some sort of jurisdictional ramifications. The marginal location o f the college to both urban centers also meant that neither city came into constant close contact with the institution, so that each city was able to separate New College from their everyday concerns. Each county probably expected to have a relationship with the college similar to the one they had with the airport, in which each shared jurisdiction. The architectural plan sought after and the location of the campus itself added to the rift between the New College and its surrounding communities. Neither Sarasota nor Manatee Counties anticipated that New College w ould strive to be a grandiose project, nor did they anticipate that the institution would cho o se one to administe r civic services over the other. There were many tensions at work when New College was founded within the Sarasota community. Many of these arose from the forces that drove the foundation of the college within the c onservative, Sunbelt communities of Saras ota and Bradenton. As the institution tried to legit i mize itself, tensions between it and the surrounding communities were highlighted and made more distinct Innovation served as an essential premise to the academic curriculum of the institution. Furtherm ore entities outside and within the college, the United Church of Christ and the admissions office respectively, gravitated toward liberal views on what the education at New College should be like and what the ideal New College student would be like. Thes e strains created a rift between New College and the surrounding Sarasota Bradenton community that would not be alleviated for years to come. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 111 Ibid., 43 4 PAGE 66 60 Chapter Three: New College vs. Sarasota The town gown divide between the Sarasota Bradenton community and New Col lege was rooted in many assumptions made by each party during the institution's foundation. There was a fundamental misunderstanding on the part of the townspeople on exactly what the nature and character of the new institution would be in its initial phas es of development (seeing as how they expected a junior college instead of a liberal arts one). The notion of civility governed the ideals of the Sarasota Bradenton community, a notion upheld by Supreme Court rulings that protected decorum over disruptive, offensive behaviors and efforts to obtain civil rights. 112 Another assumption made by the community was that the institution's administrators would act in loco parentis or act as de facto parents while students lived on campus. 113 This caused tension between New College and the Sarasota Bradenton community because the school was expected to monitor the behavior of the students but in fact let them have a great deal of independence and autonomy in action and thought. These misunderstandings sparked hostility t owards New College by the community under the guise of many different motives. The town gown divide was sparked by the misunderstanding of the true nature of the college and the physical manifestation of the Counter Culture on the college 's campus. Other m otives reflected much larger issues present within the nation during the time pe riod that fit under the large umbrella of the New Left Movement in the United States. This New Left developed from the influence of the Civil Rights Movement and rejected the d ominant, conserva t ive, !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 112 Kenneth Cmiel, "Sixties Liberalism and the Revolution in Manners," Major Problems in American History, Volume II: Since 1865 ed. Elizabeth Cobbs Hoffman and Jon Gjerde (Boston, MA: Hougton Mifflin Company, 2002), 387. 113 David Farber, Beth Bailey et. al., The Columbia Guide to America in the 1960s (New York: Columbia University Press, 20 01), 211. PAGE 67 61 Cold War consensus driven power structure, while upholding the rights of subjugated group The New Left, the Civil Rights Movement, the Anti Vietnam War Movement, the Free Speech Movement, second wave feminism, and environmentalism a ll had a significant presence on the New College campus. These movements, except for environmentalism during this time, were also a point of contention between New College and the Sarasota Bradenton community. Furthermore, despite the level of tolerance and acceptance of these movements within the campus community, there were indications that some of the student body bought into the notion of civility as did the Sarasota Bradenton community. All of these larger social movements present within American society during the 1960s and 70s were intertwined with one another, mostly coming to prominence from the influence of the Civil Rights Movement. These movements all borrowed ideologies and methodologies from one an other and were fueled by a town gown as well as a class and social divide. The Town Gown Divide The impetus for the town gown divide between the Sarasota Bradenton community and New College's student body, faculty, and staff was a result of misunderstandi ngs by the community as to the nature of the institution and fundamental differences between both groups An article written in the student publication The Organ in 1971 sheds light on exactly why the Sarasota Bradenton community harbored such hostility to ward New College early on. Evidently, hostility resonated from the Sunbelt nature of the community by which the influx of Northern influence went against the locals' perceived needs for the area. In this case the Counter Culture and other 1960s social move ments did not explicitly cause the town gown divide. The article presented PAGE 68 62 the community as one deeply divided by class and socio economic status; therefore, there was divided opinion on what the new institution should be. "The upper classes wanted a new O xford on the shores of Sarasota Bay. Working people with dreams of better things for their kids wanted a community c o l l e g e 114 The local community gave what little financial support it could for the idea presented by the trustees, the p resident, and the com munity boosters for a community college. The point at which the institution alienated itself from the community was when it "ignored" the townspeople in favor of Northern, "Yankee" money and control. 115 The evident bias throughout the remainder of the articl e against Northern "Yankees" is presented as a result of their economic domination of the area and the ent irety of the South The article even goes so far as to compare the control of the South by the North as a colonial relationship and that "the South is oppressed by the N o r t h 116 New College was concluded "as a symbol of Northern domination, of lies, promises never kept, and, yes, cultural oppression ." 117 Furthermore, New College was noted as part of an extravagant development program aimed to economically boost the Sarasota Bradenton community but ignored local needs like public housing. Local resentment for New College's development as a private liberal arts school rather than a community college served as the basis for much hostility toward the college. Even though community resentment toward the institution was rooted in a misinformed idea of how the college was founded, this article sheds light on the lack of communication between Sarasota boosters and the local community. Had the community been inform ed about the scramble for a guiding organization to help found the college !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 114 Doug Murphy, "Surviving Sarasota: An Outsider Looks at NC," The Organ October 1, 1971, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 115 Ibid. 116 Ibid. ""# Ibid. PAGE 69 63 which was eventually found in the UCC they may have realized the complex tensions in which New College was being created and thus understood the circumstances that disabled New Coll ege from being a community college. Despite local resentment of features that made Sarasota a Sunbelt community resonating within New College, hostility between the college's students and the community came also about because of social movements that proli ferated during the 1960s. Very negative assumptions made about New College students were solely based on the appearance of a minority of the student body that stood at odds with the conservative Sarasota Bradenton community. A Brade nton community member wrote to The Bradenton Herald complaining about the appearance and conduct of New College students after attending a meeting on the formation of a local political party known as Dr. Douglas' Constitutional Party That person compared the New College students to those "neat, clean cut young men and women" at Manatee Junior College (MJC), claiming that the former were "misfitsimported from some far out beatnik joint in Greenwich Village," with "slovenly dressed, stringy haired, pipe puf fing girls," and their "seedy looking, bewhiskered and moth eaten" male c o u n t e r p a r t s 118 Beyond their appearance, the person criticized the students' demeanor and character. While reading a speech by Justice Millard Caldwell of the Florida Supreme court repr oduced at the meeting, the person claimed the New College students had "the unmitigated gall to laugh derisively while reading a great patriotic speech." 119 Furthermore, the person noted the "arrogance" of the students that "hitc h hiked" to the Selma, Alabam a Civil R ights March that same !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 118 "Citizen shocked by Birds, Beards; Suggests Sinking Scenic Sea Scow," The Catalyst, May 28, 1965, 3 (Reprinted from The Bradenton Herald, May 26, 1965), New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 119 Ibid. PAGE 70 64 year, claiming that they "bragged about how proud they were to be jailbirds,'" and cynically mentioning how they had not yet been expelled. 120 The negativity with which this Bradenton community member portrayed the New College students exemplified the kind of disapproval the larger Sarasota Bradenton community usually expressed of New College students. The students bragging about being imprisoned while at the Selma March indicated a lack of civility on their part in the eyes of the community because they were breaking the law and boasting about it. Furthermore, this points to the tensions felt between the mostly Northern students and mainly Southern Sarasota Bradenton population as well as class tensions. Beyond this, such outwa rd disapproval usually stood in the way of the ability to create more meaningful interactions between the comm unity and New College students since such student opinion isolated them from the larger community. As later noted in a letter written to the paper from the chaperone supervising the New College students at this meeting, the accusations made of the New College students were out of line and superficial assumptions of the students' characters. The staff member who accompanied the thirty four students that attended the meeting not only defended the students as having demonstrated no great difference in dress or conduct to their MJC counterparts (and for having laughed at a witty speech they paid an admission fee to read). They also criticized the Brade nton community member for using misinformed assumptions, "mud slinging and name calling," to put the students at fault for something they were innocent of while pursuing to broaden their horizons at a political rally concluding that the only thing the stu dents were at fault for was that "they !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 120 Ibid. PAGE 71 65 were younger than anyone else there." 121 The New College staff member accused the Bradenton local of over generalizing a subset of the student population to represent the entirety of the student body. The staff member i dentified a generation gap and ignoranc e as the culprits creating spurring such opinion s by the particular community member. The chaperone weighed the students' educational pursuit over the ill informed and hasty assumptions made by the Bradenton local who originally wrote the editorial in the Bradenton Herald The editorials in the Catalyst regarding this event not surprisingly demonstrated student opinion held superior over the Sarasota Bradenton community. The editorial directly following the reprint of the letter from The Bradenton Herald in The Catalyst compared the Bradenton community member's accusations to McCarthyism. This comparison was made in reference to the person's lack of investigation when claiming that certain individuals were not students as well as their use of "name calling" as a scapegoat tactic to avoid the issue at hand the differing political ideologies between the individual and the students. 122 An editorial appearing in the following week's edition of The Catalyst interpreted the event as an instance where the larger community wanted New College students to conform to mainstream appearance and thought. This editorial furthered its argument in stating that often times conformity would lead to unreasonable actions and exclusivist att itudes that could be interpreted by some as "bigotry." 123 A final editorial written months later toward the end of the school term deemed the event as !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 121 "Phillip Fletcher Answers Mr. Morgan," The Catalyst June 4, 1965 (Reprint from The Bradenton Herald May 30, 1965), New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 122 "Morgan Answered McCarthy Remembered," The Catalyst, May 28, 1965, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 123 "Editorially Speaking: A special conformity for New College?" The Catalyst, June 4, 1965, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 72 66 beneficial for the students as a whole because it allowed the students to "observe the dynamics of human re lations" and led them to examine their own values further, though the incident was detrimental to the environment of academic pursuit as a distraction. 124 This sort of e litist rhetoric was used to accuse the Bradenton community member of holding an incorrect stance in the situation. The rhetoric included accusing them of using subversive tactics to denounce New College students, not taking students' reason or personal justification into account when complaining about their nonconformity, and concluding that t he student body as a whole reflected on the event and saw it as a learning experience. The rhetoric of student superiority was able to deflect the blame from the student body onto the Sarasota Bradenton community, thus causing further alienation from the t own. The Counter Culture Interpretations on the motives of student participation in the Counter Culture movement of the 1960s and 70s whether or not through their appearance, use of substances, or their taste in music were interpreted in different ways by non student and student publications. The Bradenton Herald specifically associa ted students' participation in Counter C ultural behaviors as a means for them to search for faith and meaning in their lives. New College students and the student publications offered a different perspective, suggesting that the Counter Culture was a sub culture on the New College campus that was accepted as part of the norm within the student body, though it did not define the norm. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 124 "Editorially Speaking: Effects of conflicts still to be felt," The Catalyst August 4, 1965, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 73 67 Student participation in Counter Culture ac tivities was being explained by the larger Sarasota Bradenton communit y as a means by which students sought after faith and meaning in their lives. An article in The Bradenton Herald suggested that the students had a concern for religiosity manifesting in different ways and eventually encompass ing many elements within the Counter C ulture. The article noted the appropriation of certain fashions of clothing by students as well as growing beards, wearing sandals, or going barefoot as analogies to Biblical time s, specifically "mendicant priests of the Middle Ages, the early Christian martyrs, or the Old Testament p r o p h e t s 125 Furthermore, the article equated such things as going to rock festivals as rituals that mimicked religious experiences, their group experie nces (like communes, mass sit ins, and be ins) as having elements of worship, and the use of drugs to induce a state of religious e c s t a s y 126 T he community interpreted these Counter C ultural behaviors in a religious way because it was one of the only ways they were able to comprehend why students and the younger generations would partake in such activities with such devotion. These students made the appropriation of Counter Cultural fashions a part of their lifestyle just like going to Church was part of th e traditional community's lifestyle. Rather than coming to terms with the development of cultural trends along with the onslaught of new technology that gave national exposure to these behaviors which in itself may be an observation more easily made in hin dsight the suggestion that Counter Cultural behaviors were in tune with a non traditional version of religious pursuit was a fitting explanation by which the community observed these changes in t he youth. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 125 "They're Looking for a Faith" The Bradenton Herald November 6, 1969. 126 Ibid. PAGE 74 68 New College students and student publications ind icated that Counter C ultural behaviors were more than anything else a subculture that became part of their generation's social norm. Furthermore, New College students were almost compared to being on the same level as the creators of the movement at its ou tset and even go so far as to uphold a negative view of the followers of the movement once it became commercialized. A 1966 article in The Catalyst reported that, despite the lack of regular drug use on the campus itself, students that were interviewed estimated that at least half of the student body had experimented with some substance or another at least once. 127 A reporter for the St. Petersburg Tim es who attended New College from 1966 to 1970 noted that Counter C ultural behaviors seemed to always have been a part of New College culture itself. The writer claimed to have discovered the "hippie" movement from Time magazine article in 1967 while he was a New College student. The article focused on San Francisco's Haight Ashbury District, but the alumni noted a similarity between individuals in the "Hashbury" district and New College students at the same time, indicating that both "must have been distant c o u s i n s 128 The alumni reporter noted that he and his peers did things like walk barefoot on campus for their own self satisfaction instead of doing it to follow a trend, since both the New College students and hippies did these things at the same time wit hout knowledge of the o t h e r 129 Here the earlier wave of the Counter Culture movement is noted as being in tune with student behavior and ideals when it was supposedly being created at the same time on the other side of the nation. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 127 Tom Todd, "What's the Dope on Drugs at NC?" The Catalyst July 1, 1966, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 128 Stephen Nohlgren, "An Idea Struggles for Surviva l," St. Petersburg Times May 20, 1974. 129 Ibid. PAGE 75 69 Later on New College stud ents would uphold a sense of superiority to those who bought into the movement after 1970 once it became more mainstream and commercial. By the 1970s, Counter Cultural behaviors had lost their sense of spirituality and appeal, instead having merged into mainstream youth culture. The prevalence of drug use on campus indicated the sort of extension of the Counter Culture to a larger amount of young people. An article in the student publication Ghola confirmed that there was a certain level of socially accep table substance use within the student body, but by 1973 there was a population of students that surpassed this accepted level r e g u l a r l y 130 The frequency with which these activities happened was no indication that the Counter Culture permeated all facets of the student body, but it did indicate it was there. There was certainly a current of students on campus who did not buy into the Counter Culture after 1970 because of the way it assimilated into the norm and lost its original meaning. The "freak" movement as many students not so affectionately called the Counter Culture once it was commercialized was denounced because of its un genuine nature; evident in way a student festival attendee described the "freaks" at the Florida Folk Fest in 1 9 7 1 131 The lack of c ivility in the behavior of the "freaks" is noted in their description as "frustrated rock festival goers. Ludicrous southe rn freaks, 99% male, talking incessantly (strange of hip talk in southern dialect) of nothing." 132 The female group of students who atte nded this festival in 1971 could not identify with the "fre a ks who were actually part of their own generation, saying that the group "preferred the festival people !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 130 Casey Green, "Runnin' Scared," Ghola, March 8, 1973, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 131 Carol Levenson, "Florida Folk Fest," The Cauldron, May 20, 1971, New College of Florida Student Pu blication Archives. 132 Ibid. PAGE 76 70 to the exponents of our own generation." 133 Counter Cultural behaviors found acceptance with in New College due to the institution's lack of already established tradi t ion, its striving for innovation, and its pursuit of highly intellectual and independent students. At the same time there were students who exhibited the opinions of mainstream socie ty in regard to the Counter Culture and its lack of civility, but mostly due to the way the movement developed into a commercialized entity that lacked any genuine motives. Such Counter Cultural behaviors grew in prevalence over the years but always found some degree of acceptance within the student body on ca mpus. The lack of genuine motives in the Counter Culture and the commercialization of the mov e ment was not unique to New College ; these were basic tensions found within the entire Counter Culture at th e time. The New Left The New Left political movement that swept the country throughout the 1960s and 70s had a very prominent effect on the youth of the country. New College was no exception; the New Left's ideas and theories permeated the pages of studen t publications and theses. This term "New Left" was almost like an umbrella term that encompassed many of the social movements within the 1960s and 70s because of their interrelated origins and nature. An inventory of student theses relating to the New Lef t social movements in the first years of New College is found in the table that follows. The table starts in 1967 because that was the year the charter class completed the curricul um and wrote their senior theses. These theses were categorized into differe nt movements based on the focus of the majority of their subject matter. Theses with New Left politically oriented subject matter and arguments were included in the New Leftist Theory category. Those that discussed political conflicts during the Cold War E ra were counted as part of !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 133 Ibid. PAGE 77 71 the Cold War Era Political Conflicts category. Any theses dealing with the issue of racial inequality were included in the Civil Rights category. Those discussing spirituality and the philosophy of the Counter Culture were includ ed in that category. Finally, those theses addressing feminist oriented topics or topics related to the environment and conservation were placed in the Feminism or Environmentalism categories respectively. Subject/ Movements 1967 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 Total New Leftist Theory 1 1 2 0 3 3 6 3 3 23 Cold War Era Political Conflicts 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 3 5 Civil Rights 1 0 0 0 0 0 1 3 2 7 Counter Culture 1 0 0 0 1 1 2 6 11 Feminism 1 1 2 0 0 2 2 6 4 18 Environmentalis m 0 0 0 1 0 4 4 7 13 29 Total Per Year 6 2 4 1 4 9 16 23 36 93 Total Theses That Year 41 32 31 26 19 25 67 122 172 535 This chart says a lot about the form of the student body at the very beginning of New College's foundation. The amount of senior theses began relatively low but higher than the class with the least amount of theses written, 1971. Furthermore, even though t he amount of senior theses written on the social movements of the era is fairly scattered, there is at least one thesis written on a social movement every year. Predictably, the prevalence of these topics increases as the amount of theses written increases In the first fifteen years of the college's existence, almost one fifth of the theses written by students pertained to social movements of the era. Senior theses relating to New Left theory and Feminism were the most evenly distributed throughout the yea rs. Projects on Environmentalism increased in frequency as the mid seventies approached, when the PAGE 78 72 movement gained momentum. Similarly, works on Civil Rights lulled and increased more toward the mid seventies, most likely a reflection of the increasing prev alence of Civil Rights issues in the Sarasota Bradenton community at the time due to the process of school desegregation. Based on the history of scholarship at New College through the first 9 years of senior theses, it is evident that the social movements of the 1960s and 70s were of substantial concern to a portion of the students on campus. They were nowhere near encompassing a majority of the student population, but a prevalent subset nonetheless. The Civil Rights Movement The majority of the New Coll ege community was sympathetic to the pursuit of the Civil Rights Movement. This was evident with the involvement of both students and faculty in Newtown the name given to Sarasota's African American community specifically the Booker School tutoring program in 1965 67 a nd in their assistance with the Sarasota School Board Boycott in 1969. The School Board decided to undergo desegregation of schools by following the court ordered instructions that instituted a system of bus ing children out of Newtown instead of bringing white children into the already existing neighborhood schools. "Freedom schools" were established in twelve Newtown churches to serve as schools for African American children while they and their parents boycot ted the School Board's decision. N ew College students and faculty served as instructors and coordinators at these facilities. Despite being sympathetic to the pursuits of the Civil Rights Movement and aiding in the struggle within the community, the college's lack of in frastructure promoting the inclusion of minorities stood in the way PAGE 79 73 of the student body being able to whole heartedly support the movement beyond at an ideological level. Education was the main way New College student s involved themselves with the Civil Rights M ovement. A tutoring program in Newtown at Booker Elementary School was organized by students and supported by faculty, evident in student publications from 1965 67. This program's effectivene ss was questioned at the outset due to the seemingly sup erficial interactions between the college and elementary school students with the "sit e seeing" nature of the program, and the small scope of the program with the one to one ratio of tutors to students. 134 T he negativity of some stemmed from simply not see i ng the point in such seemingly ineffective and insubstantial ac tions like the tutoring program. A t the outset the program would have to measure its progress "in inches," though there were many perceived benefits to the program. 135 The sheer interaction and introduction of the New College tutors to the Booker Elementary stu dents was seen as broadening those younger students' horizons beyond the cons training environment of Newtown. This happened t hrough education and community building with individuals outside of Newtown as well as the small ratio of student interaction, making interactions between both groups more meaningful and i n t i m a t e 136 Involvement with the Civil Rights M ovement continued a few years later in 1969 when New College students aided the Sarasot a Public School Boycott in opposing their flawed integration system by instructing students at "freedom schools." !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 134 "Tutors help dispel doubt on negro white relations," The Catalyst November 12, 1965, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 135 Ibid. 136 Ibid. PAGE 80 74 The role of New College students within the structure of the "freedom schools" was integra l to the Sarasota School Board B oycott's success. Both New College students and faculty members donated their time to instruct Newtown students; the New College students led classes for younger students under the direction of adult s u p e r v i s o r s 137 while the faculty members led classes for high school senior s in the e v e n i n g s 138 Program supervisors were quite surprised at the effectiveness of the "freedom schools" despite minor log istical and material problems. New College students also gained insight onto the racial issues that plagued Newtown students for ins tance, the distrust older Newtown students had of whites as teachers because of previous mistreatment. 139 Despite the efforts and the momentary success of the "freedom schools," the larger boycott on the school board was ineffective in changing the Sarasota School Board's approach to desegregation. Four of the five school board members, all of whom were white, voted to continue with the original court ordered desegregation s ystem that would bus African American students out of Newtown into schools farther awa y from their homes. T he one dissenter argued that closing the Booker Amaryllis school was not economical, the facility would have better use than being turned into a county wide kindergarten, and that redistricting would improve the ratio of white to Afric an American students even more than the court ordered system w o u l d 140 He was, however, outvoted. The grim outcome of the boycott was out of the control of any Newtown community members or New College supporters. One New College student blamed the fact that the School Board was looking !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 137 "Boycott Arrests Threatened St. Petersburg Times May 8, 1969, 1 B. 138 "Sarasota Crisis Still On; Freedom Schools Formed," St. Petersburg Times South Suncoast Ed., May 7, 1969, 3 B. 139 Ibid. 140 "Efforts Fail To Change Board Stand: Newtown Quiet After Decision," St. Petersburg Times July 30, 1969. PAGE 81 75 after the interests of w hite land owners and perpetuating economically and socially determined disadvantage s that African Americans faced. 141 This was done by busing students out of their local neighborhoods into schools farther away, decreasing the ease in obtaining upward social mobility through education and perpetuating the division of the races in Sarasota. Nevertheless, New College students aided the Civil Rights M ovement to the best of their abilities by educating young Newtown students. There are a few internal reasons why the Civil Rights M ovement did not take complete hold on the New College campus. T he inability of students to relate to the Civil Rights M ovement, the institution al infrastructure not aimed toward minority inclusion and the students' apprehensiveness of the more radicalized movements are to blame On the campus itself, there was one major effort on the part of a group of students reported in the student publicatio n Captain Jack that aimed to make New College a more racially inclusive institution. According to the article "Blacks Propose Minority Admissions, Black Studies," a motion was brought forth to the Student Executive Committee (SEC) by a new group of studen ts, the Black Students Association (BSA), who wanted acknowledgement for their newly formed group as an official organization on campus. Moreover, the BSA wanted there to be a larger minority enrollment as well as more minority faculty. The motion to ackno wledg e the organization was accepted; however the second motion of minority enrollment raised concerns within the SEC and the student body. One board member claimed, "bringing any group of poorly educated people up to median levels of achievement may have social utility,' but little academic !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 141 Tom Yori, "Agai nst the Status Quo," Captain Jack, October 2, 1969, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 82 76 respectability." 142 Dr. Arthur Miller brought up the point that New College cou ld not afford to compete with "N ortheastern and Big Ten prestige type schools" that were more well equipped to handle and attract African Am erican students of the caliber that was required of New College s t u d e n t s 143 The author concluded in a manner resembling the remarks of Dr. Miller, claiming that New College did not have the resources needed to accommodate and attract such minority students. U ltimately the author suggested that the SEC be reasonable rather than idealistic in its decisions on the matter (even though decisions regarding admis sions quotas and faculty appointments were not within their jurisdiction). New College itself was a smal l, fledgling institution that sought aft er a certain caliber of student; a few viewed min o rity inclusion as something that would compromise this search. Furthermore, the student body did not want the institution to compromise the academic ideals simply to be inclusive to minority students for the sake of idealism. The Black Power movement was another point of contention that New College students had with the Civil Rights M ovement, despite identification with the reasoning behind the movement and an understa nding of the movement's aims and ideals. In an editorial found in The Catalyst in 1966 entitled "Worse Than Co tton," the overall Black Power M ovement and th e actions of the Black Panther P arty were condemned for their radical actions, specifically naming Stokely Carmichael and his organization, the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, as responsible for the majority of the Black Power !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 142 Charles Kinney, "Blacks propose minority admissions black studies," Captain Jack, October 30, 1969, New College of Florida Student Publication Archiv es. 143 Ibid. PAGE 83 77 agitation. 144 "If violenceis prompted by militancy on the part of a few Negro leaders, then Black Power will have don e more to hold the Negro in bondage than cotton ever d i d 145 Furthermore, a political cartoon with a panther at the bottom of a tree representing Black Power and a person climbing up the tree representing rights progress cri tiqued the Black Power movement, presenting radicalism and violence as the movement's demise. The students' point of c ontention with the Black Power M ovement, according to this article, was with the seemingly unnecessary and forceful nature of the movement itself. Another article provide d a similar outlook to the Black Power, however this one acknowledged the necessity for violence on the part of the African Americans who participated in the movement. This article in The Catalyst "Force or Needless Suffering: Which Will Liberals Choose?" discussed the predicament t hat the Democratic Political Party faced on the brink of taking a stand supporting or rej ecting the violent Black Power M ovement. The author took a more practical stand on the issue, wanting to "avoid racial warfare" in the coun try and claiming that he "would like to see a mainstream political system that operates peacefully." 146 While not claiming to be a pacifist, the author did not approve of racial inequality and said that he "cannot tell the Negro he should put down his guns. 147 Ultimately the author gave a somewhat negat ive outlook on the Black Power M ovement and claimed that if a gradual change in the socio economic system could occur that would fully emancipate African Americans, such a change would be !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 144 "Editorial: Worse Than Cotton," The Catalyst, July 8, 19 66, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 145 Ibid. 146 Kenji Oda, "Force or Needless Suffering: Which Will Liberals Choose?" The Catalyst, September 29, 1966, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 147 Ibid. PAGE 84 78 preferable, though see ing the radical movement as necessary to effect the change. Here one student 's opinion was evidently criti cal of the radical Black Power M ovement but understood the movement's aims and accepted that, if nothing else would change the system, such a movement might be justified. Moreover, it is noteworthy to mention that New College students were critical of movements with more radical means and aims, such as the Black Power Movement, and thus they also upheld the notion of civility in the fac e of more extreme social movements. The Vietnam War Dialogue between the Sarasota communit y and New College students on the Vietnam War was generally hostile. This hostility is best exemplified in the expression of anti war sentiment by the student body. There was a perceived sense of self superiority by the New College students in their own opinions which opposed the lesser educated opinions of the rest of the community. Furthermore, the community understood the presence of such opinions on the New College camp us as part of the institution's own opinions on the Vietnamese conflict. The community accepted student opinion as an extension of the in loco parentis phenomena whereby the administrative structure of the institution would have influenced students' belie fs based on their control over the student body. In reality the college allowed for student opinion to flourish independently of its influence in the name of academic pursuit and personal development. Student and local publications' coverage of two events will be used to demonstrate these two phenomena. The first involved the misprinting of the date and time an event on campus by the Sarasota Herald Tribune which confused a meeting by the Sarasota Committee to Stop PAGE 85 79 the War with one by The Society of Friend s on conscientious objection. The Manatee Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) were attracted to come on campus by a misprint in the newspaper and tried to debate Vietnamese foreign policy with the students during a conscientious objection meeting The second event involved the showing of a Vietnam War propaganda film entitled "A Day in Vietnam" on the New College campus. The student publications' coverage of events involving the opinion of the Sarasota community on the Vietnam War always demonstra ted a sort of self perceived superiority among student opinion over that of the community. An article written in T he Catalyst satirized the situation that arose when an article in the Sarasota Herald Tribune misinformed the public on a meeting happening on campus on conscientious objection. Apparently the meeting was advertised to the public as one that would discuss Vietnamese foreign policy and it attracted some members of the Manatee VFW who wanted to defend the country's actions in Vietnam. The article constantly referred to the event that unraveled as a "comedy," noting the ignorance of the VFW as to the true nature of the meeting that was being held. The VFW members entered the situation expecting to face hostility on the part of the students and event organizers but were apparently encouraged by some to speak to add to the "comedy" of the situation the students enjoying the irony behind the hostility of the veterans at a meeting discussing conscientious objection. 148 After being hostile to the fact that the speaker, Arlo Tatum the Executive S ecretary of the Central Committee for Conscientious Objection would not answer the Veterans' questions attacking the group's views on U.S. foreign policy in Vietnam. Eventually t he VFW stayed at the meeting for half an hour and left because !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 148 "Comedy On Campus: VFW Enlivens Tatum Talk," The Catalyst March 31, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 86 80 they were "apparently bored." 149 The satirization of such an event served to highlight the seeming ignorance of the Sarasota community seen by the students in this case represented by the VFW, when it came down to issues rega rding t he Vietnam War. Here a specific group within the Sarasota Bradenton community was portrayed as being hostile to the stude nts' views objecting to the war. Of course, these differences in opinion could be attributed to class differences and differences in id eology between the community and the students. The student newspaper, however, presented the Sarasota Bradenton community as not being able to recognize that any meeting held on campus even remotely involving the Vietnam conflict was not always some sort o f rally that denounced the war effort. Another instance where student opinion was handled by a student publication as being superior to that of the Sarasota community came about after the showing of a war propaganda film on campus entitled "A Day In Vietn am." The article illuminated the polarization of the opinions of the Sarasota community and the New College students on the Vietnam War. The author noted that the reaction of students present indicated that they were questioning their conviction in the war while community members "applauded vigorously," having lost any reservations they may have had about the war. 150 The propaganda film used three hidden points to drive its agenda : the ends justify the means, "war is hell," and that the war was a humane one. 151 These three points were used, according to the author, to get people to accept and support the war without actually get ting into the details of the war as if to get people to blindly approve of the war effort !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 149 Ibid. 150 Stephen Olson, 'Day in Vietnam' Film is Effective War Propaganda ," The Catalyst November 17, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 151 Ibid. PAGE 87 81 without taking into account the developments of the war itself. The author concluded by saying "I sympathize with those in the audience who left with a feeling that war is hell. I pity anyone who think it n o b l e 152 to endorse the student view of the war as the correct and superior one. This remark ind icates that student opinion viewed the war as one with flawed motives and little justification for its supposedly legitimate aims. The larger Sarasota community constantly misinterpreted the New College administration's acceptance of student opinions, es pecially of the Vietnam War, as the institution supporting and upholding its students' opinions as its own. A Sarasota community member wrote a letter to the Sarasota Herald Tribune that basically equated the college allowing for Arlo Tatum and The Socie ty of Friends to speak with New College en couraging cons cientious objection The community member upheld their support for the institution but considered "this conscientious objector action" as "a serious blot" on New College's record and said "It sounds m ore like Berkeley, California." 153 The community member evidently considered the fact that the college gave The Society of Friends a place to speak and that they supposedly advertised the event in the newspaper as ways New College attempted to recruit consci entious objectors. Furman C. Arthur, the Director of Public Relations, responded to the community member's letter by saying not only that the event was not intended to be open to the public, but also that New College "frequently makes space available to ou tside groups and imposes no more censorship than does a newspaper over the contents of its !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 152 Ibid. 153 Mrs. Harold O. Bruce, "Sarasotan Complains," The Catalyst, April 27, 1967, (Reprinted from The Sarasota Herald Tribune April 25, 1967), New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 88 82 news columns." 154 He saw it as the college's duty to provide a forum for many different ideas to be examined by the students as part of the educational process, and that "the college would be derelict if it did not allow faculty and students the opportunity to perceive new ideas." 155 New College in no way tried to affiliate itself with any organization that asked to present on its campus, it merely saw it as the in stitution's educational duty to allow for these ideas to be available to students for them to make their own informed decisions. Arthur stressed that attendance at any such meetings on campus was completely optional for students, further stressing the poin t that the college did not try to impose any sort of views on its students or advocate any opinions over others. Its pursuit of objectivity in this case was merely sought after by allowing for groups to present ideas and information to students so that the y might hold an informed opinion; New College never tried to uphold or enforce any political views onto its students. The Free Speech Movement The Free Speech Movement was one of the social movements that developed in the 1960s as a result of the influen ce of the Civil Rights Movement and the ideals upheld by society at the time. The movement's epicenter was located on the University of California campus at Berkeley (UC Berkeley); it was a reaction against the university's power structure and the ways it tried to administer the campus. UC Berkeley President Clark Kerr in his 1963 book The Uses of the University compared the University of California system and networks of facilities to what he called a "multiversity," comparing them to segments of industr y, and viewing universities as "factories of k n o w l e d g e 156 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 154 Furman C. Arthur, "Arthur Answers," Catalyst, April 27, 1967 (Reprinted from The Sarasota Herald Tribune April 25, 1967), New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 155 Ibid. 156 Rodney P. Carlisle and J. G eoffrey Golson, America in revolt during the 1960s and 1970s (Santa PAGE 89 83 The student body did not particularly agree with this outlook on the structure and function of universities, slowly becoming dissatisfied with the impersonality of the large bureaucratic structure t hat constituted the university. Furthermore, many students caught on to the fact that the same power structure within the university that upheld this "bureaucratic impersonality favored racial discrimination at home and armed intervention against the commu nists in North V i e t n a m 157 Similar sentiment criticizing the homogenization of New College was present within the student publications, one specific article criticizing the New College Trustees having "relegated to an expensive rubber stamp," in the face of financial strife that led to the compromising of the experimental academic c u r r i c u l u m 158 New College faced a point in the early 1970s where it struggled to maintain its identity as an experimental and innovative institution, leading to such mechanization a s Berkeley experienced in order to function. Unlike Berkeley, New College was not large enough to sustain itself, nor did it have public, government funding to support it, so in 1975 the merger with the Florida public u niversity system was inevitable if Ne w College were to remain in existence. The Free Speech Movement very much affected students on the New College campus in the late 1960s and early 1970s. There are two main events that will be used to encompass instances of the movement's proliferation wit hin the student body. One of the events took place in early 1967 and involved the Manatee Veterans of Foreign Wars (VFW) inquiring to President John Elmendorf to explain a student's editorial to the Sarasota Herald Tribune. The student complained that a po litical cartoon printed in the newspaper depicting Viet Cong soldiers killing peasants was incorrect and said that if !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Barbara, Calif: ABC CLIO, 2008), 192. 157 Ibid., 192 3. 158 "Trustees," The Cauldron May 5, 1971, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 90 84 anyone were to be blamed for the "butchering" of the Vietnamese it was the American military system. The VFW found the student's claim tha t defended the National Liberation Front as a revolutionary group to be unpatriotic. The second event involved two of three students being injured after suffering from a violent attack by an unidentified community member while participating in a peace vigi l and the subsequent denial of due process of the law by Sarasota officials. In both of these events and the surrounding debate the spurred, it was evident that the larger Sarasota community only condi tionally supported the use of Free S peech (as long as i t was civil and not anti war) while the New College administration defended students' rights to free speech objectively ( even while upholding different opinions). Free S peech in the larger Sarasota community was upheld under the condition that others' vie ws were in accord with their own. A. M. Ettinger, the Educational Director and Past Commander of the Manatee VFW Sunshine Post 3223, wrote the letter to President Elmendorf asking for an explanation as to the meaning of a student's editorial in the Sarasot a Herald Tribune Ettinger claimed that the student's letter to the newspaper was "an abuse of the right of free speech" because the letter was "pure unadulterated Viet Cong propaganda" and promoted disloyalty to the United States government. 159 Here the rep resentative of the VFW made it clear that his organization of Veterans supported free speech under the notion of civility as presented by Kenneth Cmiel. Since the student's editorial in the local newspaper opposed popular opinion and governmental actions, it was seen by the VFW as a disruption to the societal norm and mainstream opinion and thus was not civil in its objectives. A letter to the editor under the name of Pulitzer Prize !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 159 "Vets ask for 'explanation' of student 's letter," The Catalyst, February 10, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 91 85 winning author and Siesta Key local "MacKinlay Kantor" (though probably not actually the author) demonstrated a similar opinion on such a condition existing on free speech. "Kantor," who was an ex serviceman himself, did not approve of the Sarasota Herald Tribune printing the student's letter and that the paper might as well have hired an "Oriental Communist to write a daily column for y o u 160 This community member also demonstrated the notion of upholding his notion of civility; he thought it appropriate only to express opinions in public forums that did not disrupt the status quo essentially negati ng the basic principles behind Free S peech. The second event dem onstrated a similar opinion on Free S peech upheld by a Sarasota County judge, according to a student publication. The Catalyst reported that after an unidentified assailant beat two of the three New College students on a peace vigil with a guitar, they were denied the ability to file a formal complaint to the police. Furthermore, when the students attempted to file a complaint, the judge presiding over the inquiry did not ap prove of their position on the war regardless of the fact that they represented a peaceful movement and would not hear out their case because of those views. The judge apparently told them that they should do something to aid the war effort and if "they di dn't like their own country to get out of i t 161 An editorial appearing in the same edition of the newspaper spoke to the event and said that S arasota residents only thought Free S peech was acceptable when it "does not conflict with their own values and pre judices." 162 A final article within the same edition of the newspaper confirmed that !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 160 "Shaughnessy's Letter And Others," The Catalyst, February 10, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 161 "Could Not Place Complaint: Two Students Attacked While On Peace Vigil," The Catalyst December 8, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 162 Editorial, No Protection," The Catalyst, December 8, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publ ication Archives. PAGE 92 86 Sarasota commu nity members only approved of Free S peech when it reflected their own personal opinions by reporting a claim that the Sarasota Herald Tribune was going institu te a blackout and not report on New College students' peace activities. 163 Though such a blackout was not officially confirmed, the rumor of one upheld the notion of civility being maintained within the Sarasota Bradenton community. If such a blackout did ha ppen, it would have indicated that the Sarasota Herald Tribune upheld the aim of civility within their paper by not printing material that would have disrupted mainstream opinions and ideas (a paper which, it turns out, was run by a New College Trustee) T he students felt at odds with the Sarasota Bradenton community becau se they thought the pursuit of free speech was a c onstitutional right of any United States citizen, rather than upholding civility and decorum over their First Amendment rights. Despite t he rift between the students and the larger Sarasota community on the issues relating to these events, the New College administration regardless of their own personal views on the subjects defended the students' rights to free speech objectively. President John Elmendorf wrote a letter responding to the student's letter in the Sarasota Herald Tribune t hat did not necessarily agree with that student's opinion, claiming that it "shows more courage than reason, more hear t than head." 164 Emendorf did commend the Sarasota Herald Tribune for providing a forum for dis s ent, though, because he thought on e should always be available 165 In relation to the attack on students at a peace vigil, the Assistant Dean Arthur Miller attested that he did not think the students' inj uries were self imposed to call attention to their cause and that an atrocity had been committed in !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 163 "Blackout?" The Catalyst, December 8, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 164 "Shaughnessy's Letter And Others The Catalyst, February 10, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. 165 Ibid. PAGE 93 87 not allowing for the students to file a formal compla int. Miller claimed that Free S peech in the American tradition ensured protection under the law and "If the worst of the rumors is accurate, Sarasota has given every redneck a free permit to assault and injur e any young person whose ideas he finds disagreeable." 166 Nowhere did Miller express his opinion on th e Vietnam War or whether he approved of the student 's peace vigil; however, he did uphold tha t the students deserved legal protection in demonstrating their opinions regardless of what those opinions were. The acceptance of New College administrators when referring to student opinions was a key point where the Sarasota community severely lacked. This was due to the rejection of taking on an in loco parentis role in student life, the aim of upholding students' rights, and the devotion of New College as a place of freedom of academic pursuit. There was certai nly an undercurrent within the community that subscribed to the notion of civility and was not willing to have any visible opinions within the community that opposed the status quo of the time. This in turn alienated the students from the majority of the community. Outcome of the New Left Movement: Second Wave Feminism The onslaught of second wave Feminism on the New College campus was always a smaller undercurrent in campus politics and especially came into prominence in the early 1970s. One particular incident on campus that received attention within the community was a sit in organized by a group of women that became known as the "South Hall 21." They all organized under the guidance of Robin Morgan, a feminist poet and writer who was elected to the fa culty as the Student Chair, a position chosen and funded by students. These women rallied under the banner of Feminism, demanding in particular !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 166 "Could Not Place Complaint: Two Students Attacked While On Peace Vigil ," The Catalyst, December 8, 1967, New College of Florida Student Publication Archives. PAGE 94 88 a female gynecologist on campus, abortion referrals, and free contraceptives (which were illegal under Florida L aw at the time). 167 These women, however, took a n extreme channel to make their demands known ; hosting a five day long sit in in President Elmendorf's office instead of simply approaching him with their demands. The sit in gained a negative stigma because of the rather extreme measures taken by the students who were disillusioned with the normal administrative procedures to express their demands inciting a Student Court injunction that threatened to expel the women if they did not leave the president's office 168 The student body's reaction to this demonstration was very similar to student opinion on the Black Power Movement. For the most part, students agreed with the aims of each movement but did not necessarily agree with the extreme means to which these aims were being pursued. The frequency with which the student publications exhibit Feminist pieces is quite high, indicating that a substantial portion of the campus was sympathetic to the larger Feminist movement. This reaction to such a demonstration shows that the student body itself did buy into some level of civility and did not think that very extreme movements or tactics were an appropriate means for action and achieving recognition. Conclusion The prevalent social movements of the 1960s and 70s defini tely permeated the New College campus early on in its existence. These movements all contributed to the deeply rooted town gown divide between New College Sarasota, and Bradenton. Fundamental Sunbelt, Southern, and racist elements within the community cau sed the !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 167 Arthur, New College, 242. 168 Jackie O'Quin, "Coed Feminists End Sit In Under Threat of Expulsio n," Sarasota Herald Tribune November 1, 1971, accessed April 13, 2012, http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=KT0gAAAAIBAJ &sjid=fmYEAAAAIBAJ&pg=6897%2C316956. PAGE 95 89 alienation of the community from the institution from the very beginning. The divide was only furthered and sometimes merely masked by the presence of the other social movements found throughout the country. The underlying assumptions within the co mmunity of civility in behavior preferring decorum before upholding Civil Rights and of New College as maintaining an in loco parentis role to its student body contributed to the town gown divide as well and fueled the opposition to the social movements ex hibited by students. The notion of the ivory tower was exemplified in the way students held themselves and their opinions in high esteem over those of the surrounding community because of their education and academic pursuit. New College faculty and staf f fed into this notion of the ivory tower without necessarily meaning to, and the larger community misinterpreted the freedom of opinion fostered by the institution as a reflection of institutional opinion. It is very important to note, however, that not a ll students upheld these social movements, and furthermore even exhibited upholding things such as civility in the face of extremism. PAGE 96 90 Epilogue New College has settled into its own niche within the Sarasota Bradenton community over the fifty years that it has been around. Today, community attitudes tend to be fairly dismissive of most New College students. They are mainly held in high esteem for their academic merits, and yet are known to engage in behaviors typical of all college settings. The institution' s location on the Northwestern most point of Sarasota County and Southwestern most point of Manatee County certainly aids the existence of such dismissive attitudes. With New Town as a buffer between downtown and the campus, the spatial separation of New C ollege from the bulk of the city of Sarasota definitely isolates each community from the other. The deep divides of segregation on the community could have something to do with this particular separation; since even in 1997 Sarasota was considered the thir teenth most racially segregated town in the United States, only being surpassed in Florida by Ft. Myers as the t w e l f t h 169 The same can be said about the location of New College relative to Bradenton; the airport and the nearly ten mile distance between eac h certainly separate one from the other. Furthermore, New College having its own police jurisdiction over the campus and its surrounding neighborhoods further polarizes each group, practically making New College its own separate entity. These separations are mostly circumstantial due to the institution's physical location and do not reflect any poor relations between modern Sarasota Bradenton and New College nowadays. Sarasota and New College have developed sign ificantly since 1975. Over time each has established itself and created images that go beyond the original calls for !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 169 "City Ranks High For Segregation," Sarasota Herald Tribune January 29, 1997, Accessed April 10, 2012. PAGE 97 91 innovation and prestige. Sarasota expanded into the largest city directly south of Tampa, with a population of over 50,000. 170 Since its rela tionship with the circus ended, Sarasota looks upon its history as the winter headquarters with nostalgia, probably due in part to the circus' presence still being felt from its new home in Venice. Sarasota has also kept its ties with major league baseball in modern times, as the spring training headquarters for the Cincinnati Reds from 1998 2009 (who ironically enough also moved to Arizona like the Red Sox did in 1958) and for the Baltimore O r i o l e s 171 These institutions enhanced the notoriety and prestige o f the Sarasota community as it emerged as a Sunbelt city. With these institutions remaining within a close proximity to Sarasota, the status they brought to the city continued to function in the way the community boosters expected them to. Innovation serve s as a more subdued influence on the Sarasota community, since through modernization it achieved a degree of innovation, but through upholding traditional societal values innovation was downplayed. Other influential institutions used to enhance the communi ty's prestige were not upheld in such high esteem as baseball or the circus. The legacy of the Sarasota School of Architecture has not fared as well as the circus or major league baseball in more modern times. The buildings designed by the architects of t he School have not all stood the test of time. This is an example of the community's disregard for innovative institutions intended to enhance its own image. Riverview High School's addition by Paul Rudolph was a prime example: it was demolished in the sum mer of 2009 due to its outdated design making it impractical for !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 170 U.S. Census Bureau, "State and County QuickFacts: Sarasota (city), Florida," Accessed April 1, 2012, http://quickfacts.census.gov/qfd/states/12/1264175.html. 171 Sarasota Guide, "Spring Training Baseball in Sarasota: Grapefruit League Teams in Fl orida," Accessed April 1, 2012, http://www.4sarasota.com/baseball.html. PAGE 98 92 the functions of a modern day high school and the lack of proper upkeep over the y e a r s 172 What was once innovative is no longer seen as such, and Sarasota has felt no great need until more rec ently to uphold this once innovative and prestigious institution. Efforts are being made, though, to preserve other iconic pieces of architecture designed by members of the School, mainly through groups such as the Sarasota Architectural Foundation (SAF). Recently, the SAF has involved itself with the Sarasota County School Board in an attempt to preserve Rudolph's addition to the Sarasota High School campus. Over fifty years since its foundation, New College merged with the University of Florida and has s ince established itself as an independent, public institution and the only public, self sufficient honors college in Florida. The college's aim s of prestige and innovation have never faltered ; its programs have remained fairly in tact and it has kept true to many of its original academic aims and innovative methodologies. The contract system of evaluation adopted in 1969 has persisted over the years almost in tact with its original form, even Arthur noted that it kept a very similar framework for "at least the next 25 y e a r s 173 New College 's nearly twenty five year relationship with the University of South Florida was uneasy, seeing as how New College had to reorganize itself as an entity within an already established public institution. The New College Found ation took on a serious portion of fund raising for the school once it merged with USF through both public and private endowments. Without the financial support of the Foundation, it is possible that New College would not exist today, since the State Legis lature was !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 172 Halle Stockton, "Riverview High: From Rudolph to Rubble," Sarasota Herald Tribune, accessed April 2, 2012. 173 Furman C. Arthur, New College: The First Three Decades (Sarasota, FL: New College Foundation, 1995), 98. PAGE 99 93 apprehensive about having to take on the funding of an honors college during merger n e g o t i a t i o n s 174 Providing close to one third of the school's total operating funds, the Foundation has raised over $100 million in public and private funds since 1 9 8 0 175 The prestige New College attempted to achieve has been upheld through the methods it appealed to during its foundation. The historic Ringling architecture on the West side of the campus has been preserved and is constantly the recipient of efforts to maintain it. Recently, New College has undertaken projects to restore the original sea wall and dock built by Charles Ringling while his home was under construction, as well as the restoration of Robertson Hall, which was the old Ringling Carriage House The architecture designed by I.M. Pei originally intended as temporary dormitories while the master plan for the campus was being formulated and financed has not stood the test of time like the Ringling architecture has. The letter dormitories on the Wes t side of campus, which became the Palmer office buildings and B Dorm, are slowly in the process of being phased out of use, since differential settlement is causing them to sink into the ground. These buildings are probably not as essential as the origina l Ringling complex is, however, so only time will tell what will become of those structures. The "temporary" dormitories on the East side of campus are being preserved and maintained as permanent housing for incoming students; two years ago one of the Pei dormitories was renovated with all new air conditioning, bathrooms, and flooring. Maintaining the original Pei complex is an important facet on which New College bases its identity, therefore these buildings will probably endure the test of time for years to come. !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 174 Ibid. 136. 175 New College of Florida, "The Foundation of Florida's Honors College," Accessed April 19, 2012, http://www.ncf.edu/about PAGE 100 94 New College 's students remain innovative, at the forefront of academic pursuit and social awareness. The activities of the student body have remained fairly similar, each year presenting ongoing and new social causes. This year alone the student b ody has engaged in activities to raise awareness for a plethora of issues: a campus wide shutdown to address discrimination on campus, a day of silence to commemorate the death of individuals based on hate crimes, a candlelit vigil for the fortieth anniver sary of the death of New College student and activist Nan Freeman while picketing for the United Farm Workers in Belle Glade, campus wide greening initiatives and efforts to make a "Green Dorm" on campus, among many others. As New College students have been a stable presence in the Sarasota community for around fifty years, there is little conflict between the two groups as there had been when the school was first founded. A town gown divide can be seen in existence today among students an d locals regarding social issues this year alone New College students have counter picketed the populist Tea Party movement, counter picketed Planned Parenthood protests, and have taken part in the Occupy Sarasota protests downtown to end socioeconomic ine quality. Yet the town gown divide is not nearly as prevalent in local and student publications for the same reasons. It is difficult to put a conclusion on a piece about an institution that has stood the test of time for half a century. Both New College and the Sarasota Bradenton community have come a long way since the institution was first conceived of in the minds of community boosters in the mid to late 1950s. Having to develop themselves to fit their ideal identities around the same time, they both had the same people involved in the process and similar ways they tried to develop themselves. What stands out the most is PAGE 101 95 the direction in which New College developed and how unexpected that direction was by most of the community. The influence of the Sun belt's characteristics on Sarasota is what I have argued to be the reason why New College moved into the direction that it did between 1960 and 1975. Had the Sunbelt trend not reached Sarasota, who knows what would have become of the initiative to have a c ollege in the community? Would there have even been an initiative to create a college? Would it have been a community college instead? Where would the institution be located? Would the Charles Ringling Estate have been preserved or turned into condominiums ? However interesting these questions may be, New College of Florida seems like it will be a staple within the Sarasota Bradenton community for a long time to come. PAGE 102 96 Bibliography Secondary Sources Arthur, Furman C. New College: The First Three Decades S arasota, FL: New College Foundation, 1995. Berger, C hristopher J. "Historic Preservation and the Sarasota School of Architecture: Three Case Stud i es." Masters dissertation, University of Florida, 2010. Carlisle, Rodney P., and J. Geoffrey Golson. America i n revolt during the 1960s and 1970s Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC CLIO, 2008. Dober, Richard P. Ca mpus Architecture: Building in the Groves of Academe New York: McGraw Hill Compan ies, Inc., 1 996. Gill, Brendan. Many Masks: the Life of Frank Lloyd Wright. N ew York: Ballantine Books, 1987. Grant, Gerald and David Riesman. The Perpetual Dream: Reform an d Experiment in the American College Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1978. Howey, J ohn. The Sarasota School of Architecture, 1941 1966. Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 1995. John son, Aric. "From Intention To Concrete: The Founding of New College and I.M. Pei's Plan, 1960 67." B.A. thesis, New College of Florida, 1985. Kliewer, Joy Rosenzweig. The Innovative Campus: Nurturing the Distinctive Learning Envi ronment. Pheonix, AZ: The Oryx Press, 1999. LaHurd, Jeff. Hidden History of Sarasota Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2009. Mormino, Gary Ross. Land of Sunshine, State of Dreams: A Social History of Modern Florida. Gainesville: University Press of Flori da, 2005. Roszak, Theodore. The making of a counter culture: reflections on the technocratic society and its youthful opposition Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor Books, 1969. Shermer, Elizabeth Tandy. "Sunbelt Boosterism: Industrial Recruitment, Economic Develop ment, and Growth Politics in the Developing Sunbelt." In Sunbelt Rising: The Politics of Place, Space, and Region edited by Michelle Nickerson and Darren Dochuk. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2011. Wagy, Thomas R. "Governor Leroy Collins of Florida and the Selma Crisis of 1965." The Florida Historical Quarterly 57 (1979): 403 20. Wittkopf, Eugene R. and James M. McCormick. "The cold War Consensus: Did It Exist?" In Polity 22, no. 4 (Summer, 1990): 627 53. Newspapers Captain Jack Cataly st Florida Accent Ghola Ocala Star Banner Sarasota Herald Tribune PAGE 103 97 Sarasota Journal Service For Company Publications The Atlanta Journal and CONSTITUTION The Bradenton Herald The Gainesville Sun The Miami Herald The Tampa Tribune St. Petersburg Times United Press International Newsfeatures Websites Flagler College. "Who we are." Accessed March 19, 2012. http://www.flagler.edu/flagler difference/who we are.html. Historic Sarasota County Biographies. "Kenneth Thompson: City Manager of Saras ota 1950 1988." Ac cessed March 14, 2012. http://www.allaboutsarasota.com/biographies.htm#thom p son. Sarasota County Government Online. "Sarasota Baseball: A Tradition Since 1924." Accessed March 13, 2012. http://www.scgov.net/ballpark/History.asp. Sarasota History Center. "Philip Hiss, Dreamer." Acc essed March 16, 2012, http://scg.co.sarasota.fl.us/Historical_Resources/Dreamers/dreamer_hiss asp. The National Association of Manufacturers. "About the NAM Manufacturing in America." Accessed March 15, 2012. http://www.nam.org/A bout Us/About the NAM/US Manufacturers Association. a spx. The National Parks Service. "Ponce De Len Hotel," Accessed March 19, 2012. http://www.cr.nps.gov/nr/travel/geo flor/26.htm. The University of Tampa. "Henry B. Plant Museum." Accessed March 19, 2012. http://www.ut.edu/plantmu s eum. The University of Tampa. "History." Accessed March 19, 2012. http://www.ut.edu/history. Sources from the New College Archives Bulletin of New College, 1964 66 New Horizons With New College Sarasota Visitors' Guide 1955 56, 1963 Sunspot, 1958 The Campus The Charter Class The Nation's Press Reports OnNew College |