Brown and White Vol. 96 no. 41

              th e ßrown and white bethlehem pennsylvania lehigh university 245 861-4184 vol 96 — no 41 friday march 29 1985 crownin queenan b&w photo by mary ralstoni lehigh's male dream machines strutted their stuff before a crowd of screaming body-hungry fans wednesday night and basketball star daren queenan took the trophy and the title mr lehigh m aopi's annual contest as dave moran left and eric smith finished close behind chemistry lab blast makes mess of mudd by martine costello a small explosion rocked the seeley mudd building tuesday night when a lab experiment burst m an oven kocking the door off and shattering glass according to chemistry professor jack alhadeff damage was estimated at 300 to 400 for the oven with no damage to desk and counter tops alhadeff said a graduate student had been conducting a routine reaction with sialic acid its derivatives and diaminobenzoic acid m 400 to 500 glass tubes the experiment involved heating the tubes for 16 hours to record the reaction according to alhadeff the cause of the explosion is unknown but he speculated that for some reason perhaps the oven was too hot or there were more samples run fortunately the explosion occurred at night alhadeff continued because someone could have gotten hurt although it was not life-threatening he reported that no one had been m the sixth floor lab and that custodians responded to the noise chem lab safety policies reviewed by jennifer silverman the lab experiment that exploded m the seeley mudd building tuesday and the whitaker lab fire that occurred last saturday are inaccurate reflections of the otherwise efficient safety procedures practiced m the chemical engineering and chemistry labs several professors claimed the cause of the accident was based more upon haphazard con ditions not human error said chemical engineering chairman john chen in the whitaker fire the faculty member who was transferring the test fluids from one container to another spilled the chemicals onto the hotplate when one of the handles of the container broke and started the fire the accident did not occur because the faculty member did not know how to use the correct facilities m the laboratory in addition chen noted that the facilities are well equiped to handle such incidents there is a flooding system built into the laboratory containing carbon dioxide that is designed to ward off all con flagrations as soon as the fire started this system immediately turned on extinguishing the flames within seconds with a few exceptions the number of accidents that occur each year m the lehigh laboratories are relatively small one of those exceptions hap pened tuesday night m mudd when a visiting journalist loves lehigh , hates the hill by lynn anne miller visiting journalism professor nat hentoff is impressed by lehigh students very open inquiring and highly intelligent minds but their sometimes raucous behavior at fraternity parties is primitive hentoff commented m a recent brown and white interview an avid brown and white reader hentoff said he is disgusted by reports of fights at fraternity parties barbaric behavior ain't funny the village voice columnist alleged that the lehigh administration treats party-going ruffians too leniently hentoff said if he were a college ad ministrator he would prosecute students charged with assault lehigh's first joseph b macfadden distinguished professor linked the incidents of violence on the hill with excessive drinking shortly after his arrival at lehigh he told members of the local press that lehigh probably has the liveliest social life m american colleges recently hentoff commented if i owned a package liquor store m this town i could get rich hentoff condemned the fraternity system as a stupid childish exclusionary procedure for allegedly grown-up children all that the greek system breeds he charged is elitism and a false consciousness of being special fraternity revelers get their jollies by getting loaded because they don't have to think hentoff said in this case it extends itself into the voting booth hentoff attributed president reagan's popularity the fraternity system is a stupid childish exclusionary procedure for allegedly grown-up children with the 18 to 25 year-old voting block to a terrible deficiency m education lehigh students voted for reagan by more than a 6:1 margin according to a pre-election brown and white poll it makes me wonder what will happen when they get older if they're so ignorant now hentoff remarked if i was a full time professor i would try to find out why the students are so eager to incinerate themselves and to lead a war against the poor a few days after he made that comment hentoff devised a way to come a bit closer to understanding the political philosophies of lehigh students he asked the students m his journalism ethics class to interview other students m order to determine if the media's election coverage influenced their voting why did they vote for this man he queried as he discussed the assignment i am genuinely mystified how did they get this way reagan he said is the most dismal president since hoover and is a very cold man the coldest man we've ever had although some of hentoff s students may disagree with his opinions this just makes for more stimulating discussions hentoff explained in contrast to lehigh's conservative upper-middle class aura hentoff's alma mater northeastern university was a working class college when hentoff was a student m the 19405 most of the students were socialists he reminisced if not they were close to it hentoff describes himself as a libertarian with a small t and a socialist m some ways like dealing with poor people hentoff's primary concern is the protection of those liberties afforded americans by the bill of rights as editor of northeastern's student newspaper he was suspicious of authority i still am he said matter-of-factly one of the earliest manifestations of this distrust was a series of critical profiles on members of the northeastern university board of trustees when the university administration ordered the series b&w photo by rob sternliebi nat hentoff see hentoff page 7 see safety page 5