News
Underground Railroad Station Marked
by Marya Sluck
Over 3,000 refugees slaves
escaped to the North on the
Underground Railroad that passed
through Guilford College in the
years before the Civil War.
Because it was an illegal
organization, however, the
Underground Railroad has been
documented mostly by word-of
mouth tradition at New Garden
Friends' Meeting.
Levi Coffin, a member of the
Meeting in the 1820's, was
president of the Underground
Railroad. Janice McGuire, a
descendent of Coffin's, said
Coffin's house was on the grounds
Is Guilford's Tree Dying?
by Rich James
Is the Guilford tree dying? Could
the mammoth Black Oak, whose
fullness and majesty are
embodied in the official school
logo, be destined to become the
Guilford College stump?
Contrary to rumor, Bill Scott,
the director of groundskeeping,
says the tree is not about to
meet its fate, and is "likely to
outlive us all." He says the tree's
thin crown and tattered
appearance are the products of
natural and "man-made" stress.
"Like a person," says Scott, a
tree cannot heal itself properly
in a stressful environment. The
thinning crown is due to
"vascular damage" (damage to the
nutient transporting vessels in
the branches) induced by natural
stress Natural stress is caused by
sharp contrasts in environmental
conditions. In recent history,
this region has suffered extreme
swings in climate; hot summers
followed by very cold winters
and moist seasons followed by
droughts. This has slowed the
healing of the tree.
Exacerbating this is the added
man-made stress of walking and
playing under the tree. The red
clay soil compacts quickly and
easily, closing air pockets,
preventing the root system from
absorbing nutrients and water
needed for healing. "This is why
we can't stress enough the use of
sidewalks," says Scott. "The
mindless making of dirt paths
will kill plants faster than we
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GUILFORD COLLEGE
PHONE: 299-2233
WELCOME GUILFORD COLLEGE COMMUNITY
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George Edmonds is proud to announce that Edmonds Drug
Store now has a copying machine for use by the public.
Copies are 8 cents each. He welcomes the Guilford College
community to come over and visit the store.
of the present day Jefferson-Pilot
Country Club, about two miles
north of Guilford College. Legend
suggests that refugees hid in the
woods between Guilford College
and Coffin's home en route to the
next "station."
The first station on the Railroad
was in southwestern Guilford
County near Randolph County
line. Refugees would travel from
station to station by following
road markers, such as a nail in the
tree, from North Carolina through
Virginia to northern states and
Canada. The Railroad's frequent
destination was Newport, Indiana
where many Carolina Quakers.
can save them."
To restore full health to the
tree, the college is employing
three methods of treatment. One
is, simply, "judicious pruning."
More complicated is a
process called "deep root
feeding." Three times a year, the
college feeds the tree a mixture
of fertilizer and 300 gallons of
water directly into the soil
through a high pressure pump.
Scott says, "We are doubling
the amount of water in order to
help "break up the compaction
of the soil." Fertilizer is added
to help the roots grow and
control disease.
The third procedure, which
caught the attention of the
college, was removing the grass
from under the tree and replacing
it with pine straw. This was
done to eliminate the
competition for nutrients
"Champion Tall Tree," 1984 -
largest black oak in N.C. photo by Michael Hall
including Coffin, migrated to
protest slavery in the South.
A former administrator and
professor at Guilford College, the
late Algie Newlin, wrote that
refugees would hide in hollow
trees or caves dug in the hill
"around the second bend in the
creek" by the present day exercise
trail near the lake on Nathan Hunt
Road. The refugees hid until they
received an all-clear signal from
Coffin or another "conductor."
There are two sunken areas in the
hill that hint the possibility of
the legendary caves.
Others suggest that a wagon
(cont'd, on pg. 6)
between the grass and the
shallow roots of the tree. The
straw blanket serves as a layer of
insulation, maintaining constant
temperature and moisture
balance.
"I think we've rounded the
bend," said Scott confidently.
"We haven't seen the consistent
loss of vigor that we've seen in
the past." He expects the tree to
return to full shape in ten years
and he feels safe in saying the
tree will "hang on another fifty
years."
A tremendous amount of
time, effort and energy has gone
into nursing the tree over the
last eight years which Scott
asserts is "well worth it!" The
towering oak has both scientific
mythic significance.
In 1984, the tree was given
the honor of "Champion Tall
(cont'd, on pg. 6)
I £l3 )]
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History Lecture
by Jacob Stohler
On Tuesday, October 25,
Guilford College sponsored a
lecture in the Founders Hall
Gallery entitled "Hitler and the
Munich Crisis," with quest
speaker Dr. Sally Marks.
The lecture was presented at
7:30 p.m. with over 60 people
attending including Acting
President Sam Schuman.
Dr. Marks, a history profesor
at Rhode Island College in
Providence, has published such
books as The Illusion of Peace:
International Relations in
Europe, 1918-1933 and
Innocent Abroad: Belgium at the
Paris Peace Conference of 1919 .
She has a master's degree in
modern European history from
UNC-CH and a doctorate in
international history from the
University of London.
This lecture was part of the
1988 Newlin History Lecture
Scries, named for the late Algie
Newlin, a Guilford College
History and Political Science
professor from 1924-1966. Dr.
Marks was asked to submit
several possible topics for her
lecture, and from them "Hitler
and the Munich Crisis" was
chosen.
Dr. Marks began her lecture by
stating that this year marks the
50th anniversary of the Munich
Crisis, the event preceding
World War II which, according to
Dr. Marks, "made appeasement a
dirty word." It was in Munich
during 1938 that the Allied
Forces agreed to Hitler's demands
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and temporarily avoided war.
There was much resentment
among both the people of
Czechoslovakia and the U. S.
State Department over this
agreement because it was seen as
a "caving in" to Hitler and his
demands.
In point of fact, said Dr.
Marks, there is a growing view
now among historians that
Munich was a necessary
agreement. Not only did the
delay buy a year of peace for
Great Britain and France, but it
also allowed Hitler needed
momentum for his plan to
conquer Europe.
Dr. Marks also explained in
her lecture some of the rationale
behind Hitler's plans, his
intended methods, and his
successes and failures. The
Munich Crisis, she said, has
continued to play a role in world
politics even after World War 11.
For instance, she speculates, one
of the reasons the United Slates
remained so long in Vietnam was
because supporters of the war
compared a concession there
with the situation in Munich.
Dr. Marks spoke for
approximately 45 minutes with a
brief question-and-answer session
following.
One student who attended the
lecture, freshman Paula Mullins,
said she came because she has
"always had an interest in the
history of the World War II era,"
and was glad because it "proved
to be very interesting."
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