The women of Stephens College in 1934 understood their place
in history—while the 1933 Stephensophia celebrated the first century of
Stephens, this year, the yearbook celebrates the next century.
The book opens by declaring: “Because we of Stephens College
are this year beginning a new century, because we wish to make it a century of
classic loveliness—the dignity and beauty of these pages reflect a dream for
the future.”
The 1934 Stephensophia is dedicated to “our generation” and to “modern
youth,” a theme that’s reflected in drawings throughout the book.
And President James Madison Wood in his message says the
next century “depends upon the continuation of that type of courage, loyalty
and foresight which characterized the pioneer citizens of the New West a
century ago.”
(It seems like years from now, but we’ll have completed that
next century in just 19 years when the College turns 200 in 2033.)
This year’s Four Fold Girl is Adeline Clarke (pictured) who is the
first in Stephens’ history to be both Junior Class president and president of
the Civic Association. We’re told she “represents to the fullest the balanced
perfection of the ideal Stephens girl. Her high scholastic standing, her
literary achievements, her democratic friendliness and her real campus service
are tangible proof that she is genuinely a Four Fold Girl.”
This is the first time we read about an advisory system at
Stephens that allows faculty to become personal advisers. They're charged with helping students not
only navigate coursework but also with “keeping in touch with her
personal relationships” and social activities.
Sciences at Stephens this year mostly center “around the
nature of the universe and of living things.” Each course, we’re told, “has
possibilities of making the world meaningful and interesting.” Star-gazing
groups as a hobby “may seem startling, but many Stephens girls have found
emulation of Dr. Van Buskirk’s scientific observation of the constellations
most fascinating.”
Louise Drake is assisting with a hygiene class. If that name
sounds familiar, it’s because she was the student who founded Stephens Life in
the 1920s.
In Humanities, Miss Eleanor Dunlap is teaching a special
class in news writing for juniors “with journalistic ambitions.” Remember, it’s
1934 and there aren’t many women in journalism right now.
The Cosmopolitan Committee, sponsored by Nellie Lee Holt, is
new this year and aims to “further interest in foreign countries through
learning of their customs and modes of living.”
The group sponsors guest
speakers who are authorities on foreign countries and this year hosted Maurice
Hindus, a famous Russian American writer, Curtis Bok, grandson of Edward Bok,
the Dutch born American editor and Pulitzer Prize-winning author who was editor
of the Ladies' Home Journal, and Ataloa, a Native American dancer and singer.
The Skills and Techniques division “is concerned with the
development of special abilities needful in the performance of tasks in school
or out.”
We’re told it’s the aim of a Dr. Claude Kantner, instructor of speech,
“to make Stephens girls talk only in pleasing, soft, well modulated tones by
correcting speech defects in his voice clinic.”
While the senior class touts that it’s the first to graduate
from Stephens during her second century of existence, this year’s junior class
has the distinction of being the largest entering class in the history of
Stephens.
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