Category Archives: Documentaries and interviews

“Princeton: A Search for Answers,” 1973

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Dur­ing a morn­ing ses­sion of the President’s Con­fer­ence in the early 1970s, a mem­ber of the stu­dent panel told the assem­bled alumni that she had come to Prince­ton “not to find a way of mak­ing a liv­ing, but instead to find a way of mak­ing a life.” Film­mak­ers Julian Krainin and DeWitt Sage used this state­ment in their pro­posal in 1972 for a new recruit­ment film for Prince­ton Uni­ver­sity. “It seems that it should be the respon­si­bil­ity of a great uni­ver­sity not so much to answer the ques­tion of how to “make a life,” but to present the stu­dent with at least the tools and courage with which he or she might dis­cover the answer.”

The result­ing film Prince­ton: A Search for Answers won an Oscar  in 1974 for Doc­u­men­tary Short Sub­ject. Film pro­ducer and direc­tor Joshua Logan ’31, who had started his stage writ­ing and direct­ing career in Princeton’s Tri­an­gle Club, was one of the first to see it. “I not only believe that it is a mov­ing, funny, and stim­u­lat­ing account of a Uni­ver­sity I once knew but had almost for­got­ten,”  he wrote to his fel­low mem­bers of the Acad­emy. “It tells about the gleam that flits across the human mind and gives us all some­thing to hope for, to live for. It makes the human race quite a bit more respectable then (sic) we have recently thought it to be.” The film which has recently been remas­tered (2013) is fea­tured here.

In order to write the film treat­ment and script, Dewitt Sage spent sev­eral months on cam­pus, attend­ing classes and sem­i­nars, and talk­ing with stu­dents, fac­ulty and staff. Once the film treat­ment was approved, Julian Krainin took over to super­vise the actual cam­era work. Dur­ing 1972 and early 1973 four­teen and a half hours of 16mm color footage was shot for the thirty minute film. The out­takes are kept in the Uni­ver­sity Archives. To accom­pany the film, the Office of Com­mu­ni­ca­tions pro­duced a hand­some brochure with quotes and infor­ma­tion about the fac­ulty fea­tured (see SearchForAnswers.pdf).

As already sug­gested by the title, the film’s main empha­sis is on edu­ca­tion, schol­ar­ship, and student-instructor rela­tions. The film includes footage of tuto­ri­als and lec­tures by physics pro­fes­sor and Dean of the Fac­ulty Aaron Lemon­ick (1:50, 9:11), and pro­fes­sors Edward Cone (Music, 3:01, 29:48), John Wheeler (Physics 7:05), Daniel Seltzer (Eng­lish, 12:39), and Ann Dou­glas Wood (Eng­lish, 25:02). Wheeler is filmed dur­ing a lec­ture about the impli­ca­tions of black holes (he is cred­ited with coin­ing the phrase in 1967), while Dan Seltzer teaches a Shake­speare act­ing class and lec­tures about Henry IV (Part 2). Addi­tional footage fea­tures Prince­ton pres­i­dent William Bowen dur­ing a ques­tion and answer ses­sion with alumni and under­grad­u­ates (9:55, 26:11, 27:49) and the work of two grad­u­ate stu­dents: Niall O’Murchadha (Physics, 5:10, 26:51) and Maury Wolfe (Archi­tec­ture, 16:11).

Pro­duced only a few years after the intro­duc­tion of co-education in 1969, at a time when diver­si­fi­ca­tion of the stu­dent body was a pri­or­ity for Prince­ton, women and African Amer­i­can stu­dents fea­ture promi­nently in cam­pus scenes (9:40, 20:56, 24:36) and in the class rooms. There is lit­tle empha­sis in the film on extracur­ric­u­lar activ­i­ties. In addi­tion to footage of the Glee Club singing Bach in Alexan­der Hall (directed by Pro­fes­sor of Music Wal­ter Noll­ner, 17:47), sport scenes are lim­ited to marathon run­ning and row­ing (23:25). Addi­tional footage includes stu­dents shar­ing their views of Prince­ton in a pub (19:45, the legal drink­ing age was still eigh­teen!) Some his­tor­i­cal pho­tographs and footage is shown at 22:27, includ­ing a frag­ment of a chem­istry lec­ture by the famous Hubert Alyea (pre­vi­ously fea­tured) and the Tri­an­gle Club.

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Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, An Overview

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Since 1951, the Prince­ton Plasma Physics Lab­o­ra­tory (PPPL) has con­ducted research aimed at devel­op­ing con­trolled nuclear fusion as an energy alter­na­tive to fos­sil fuels. Founded by Lyman Spitzer *38, the PPPL is a joint project of Prince­ton Uni­ver­sity and the US Depart­ment of Energy, located on Princeton’s James For­re­stal Cam­pus. This 1989 pub­lic­ity film high­lights the PPPL’s his­tory, projects, and progress toward its mis­sion of devel­op­ing sus­tain­able nuclear fusion.

The film’s focus is the PPPL’s main exper­i­ment in the 1980s and 1990s, the Toka­mak Fusion Test Reac­tor (TFTR). This device used mag­netic fields to con­tain a plasma made of hydro­gen iso­topes which were heated to a tem­per­a­ture so high that their nuclei fuse together into a new mol­e­cule, gen­er­at­ing energy as a byprod­uct. TFTR’s goal was to develop a process of gen­er­at­ing more energy through the fusion than the amount of elec­tric­ity required to power the reac­tor con­tain­ing the plasma. By 1989, TFTR’s suc­cesses included achiev­ing a then record-temperature of  200 mil­lion degrees Cel­sius and con­firm­ing exis­tence of a so-called “boot­strap cur­rent” within plasmas.

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Student, Scholar, and President: Four Hours with Robert Goheen

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It did not take long after com­ing to Prince­ton in 1994 for me to appre­ci­ate the impor­tance of Robert Goheen and his place in Uni­ver­sity history. During his time in the president’s office, the Uni­ver­sity was trans­formed phys­i­cally, socially, and aca­d­e­m­i­cally and became the mod­ern Uni­ver­sity it is today. But as I stud­ied the records in the Uni­ver­sity Archives and came up to speed with his administration’s accom­plish­ments, I had no sense of the man who over­saw this water­shed era until one day Goheen vis­ited Mudd Library to con­duct research himself.

Expect­ing an over­size char­ac­ter on the order of Yale’s King­man Brewster—Goheen’s con­tem­po­rary who was a car­i­ca­ture in Doones­bury—I found just the opposite. He was a quiet, unas­sum­ing man who, if not for know­ing his name from the daily log, I would have assumed to be just another of the many senior schol­ars who vis­ited the library and duti­fully went about their work. He did not ask for nor expect any spe­cial treat­ment, nor did his demeanor call atten­tion to him­self in any way. I would learn that was the essence of Bob Goheen.

In the com­ing years, there were a num­ber of occa­sions where I crossed paths with Goheen, includ­ing one spring day when I went to his house to pick up his non-Princeton papers.  Later, Sec­re­tary of the Uni­ver­sity Robert Dur­kee asked me to con­duct a video oral his­tory inter­view with Goheen with the Alumni Council’s Kathy Tay­lor serv­ing as producer. The four, hour-long videos here are the result of our efforts, and they doc­u­ment the man’s remark­able 72-year asso­ci­a­tion with Prince­ton as a stu­dent, fac­ulty mem­ber, and president.

All four inter­views are described in a find­ing aid that con­tains links to the tran­scripts of the inter­views.  (The tran­scripts also have time stamps which closely cor­re­spond with the video time stamp.)

The first inter­view, con­ducted on Octo­ber 21, 2004, cov­ers Goheen’s early life, his under­grad­u­ate, grad­u­ate, and fac­ulty careers at Prince­ton, and his selec­tion as Uni­ver­sity Pres­i­dent at age 37. He also reflects on his men­tor, Pro­fes­sor Whit­ney Oates, long-serving trustee Dean Mathey, his pre­de­ces­sor Harold Dodds, and Fred­die Fox. (In each inter­view, I asked Goheen to dis­cuss var­i­ous peo­ple with whom he crossed paths. He freely admited that recall­ing spe­cific anec­dotes is not one of his strengths, and so these tend to be impres­sion­is­tic.)   (Read the tran­script.)

In the sec­ond inter­view (con­ducted on Octo­ber 26, 2004), Goheen dis­cussed the state of the Uni­ver­sity upon becom­ing pres­i­dent, the $53 Mil­lion Cam­paign, the growth and allo­ca­tion of the Uni­ver­sity bud­get, coed­u­ca­tion, the eat­ing clubs, and his con­tem­po­rary Ivy League presidents. Of spe­cial note is his dis­cus­sion of the 1963 Spring riots (15:35) as they related to the civil rights demon­stra­tions in the South.  (Read the tran­script.)

In the third inter­view (Novem­ber 4, 2004), Goheen dis­cusses coed­u­ca­tion in more detail, cam­pus archi­tec­ture, the estab­lish­ment of the Provost’s Office, William Bowen, the growth of the grad­u­ate school, and changes in Uni­ver­sity gov­er­nance and the Kel­ley Com­mit­tee. (Read the tran­script.)

The final inter­view (Jan­u­ary 6, 2005) cov­ers the cre­ation of the Coun­cil on the Prince­ton Uni­ver­sity Com­mu­nity (CPUC), the Viet­nam War and cam­pus unrest includ­ing the cam­pus strike of 1970, the Board of Trustees, his deci­sion to resign as pres­i­dent, and his life after­wards, includ­ing his foun­da­tion work and his time as Ambas­sador to India. (Read the tran­script.)

Gen­er­ally speak­ing, as an archivist, I am con­cerned with pre­serv­ing records, not gen­er­at­ing them. But in inter­view­ing Goheen, it was a chance to not only cre­ate what I hope will be a use­ful doc­u­men­ta­tion of his long asso­ci­a­tion with Prince­ton, it was also an honor and a pleasure.
Dan Linke
Uni­ver­sity Archivist

“Princeton University: Conversations that matter,” 1991

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After the 1960 and 1961 “Prince­ton news­reels” fea­tured last week, which marked a new stage in Princeton’s pub­lic rela­tions efforts, it is inter­est­ing to make a 30-year leap to view a film that was pro­duced for the Admis­sions Office by Andrew Greenspan: “Prince­ton Uni­ver­sity: Con­ver­sa­tions that Mat­ter” (1991). Focus­ing on the aca­d­e­mic cli­mate and intel­lec­tual exchanges, the film uses a markedly dif­fer­ent for­mat than the Orange Key Soci­ety film of 1962, which was also aimed at prospec­tive students.

This film uses footage of dis­cus­sion groups, lec­tures and sem­i­nars, and indi­vid­ual meet­ings between stu­dents and fac­ulty, touch­ing upon a wide range of sub­jects within the sci­ences and human­i­ties. Pro­fes­sors fea­tured include, among oth­ers, Cor­nel West (African Amer­i­can Stud­ies, 1.13 and fol­low­ing), Peter Brown (His­tory, 4:31), Robert Fagles (read­ing from his trans­la­tion of the Iliad 6:57), Toni Mor­ri­son (Eng­lish, 8:27 and fol­low­ing), John Flem­ing (Eng­lish and Com­par­a­tive Lit­er­a­ture, 9:05), John Con­way (Math­e­mat­ics, 12:36), Steve Mackey (Music, 18:24 and fol­low­ing), and Michael Littman (Mechan­i­cal and Aero­space Engi­neer­ing, 19:19). In addi­tion, the film addresses indi­vid­ual stu­dents’ research and cre­ative writ­ing projects. The footage includes an act­ing class by play­wright David Rabe (16:02) and train­ing ses­sions with bas­ket­ball coach Pete Car­ril (2:50 and following).

The film won a Gold Award from the Coun­cil for Advance­ment and Sup­port of Edu­ca­tion (CASE).

This VHS video is part of the Uni­ver­sity Archives’ His­tor­i­cal Audio­vi­sual Col­lec­tion (item no. 1293).

Black alumni looking back, 1996

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Har­vard offered its first degree to an African Amer­i­can stu­dent in 1870, with Yale fol­low­ing in 1874. At Prince­ton, how­ever, the first two black stu­dents grad­u­ated only in 1947 and 1948, after arriv­ing on cam­pus as mem­bers of the Navy’s wartime V-12 pro­gram. His­tor­i­cally the “Ivy League school for South­ern gen­tle­men,” Prince­ton was a lit­tle “tardy,” accord­ing to Cor­nel West (then direc­tor of the Cen­ter for African Amer­i­can Stud­ies) in the doc­u­men­tary fea­tured here (32:01). In the words of Franklin Moore, Asso­ciate Direc­tor of Admis­sions 1970–1980: “If you had a seg­re­ga­tion­ist atti­tude or would like to cher­ish that atti­tude a lit­tle longer before real life hit you after you grad­u­ated, this was the place to come to.” (31:35).

The first two black grad­u­ates, John Howard ’47 and James Ward ’48, are among the 35 alumni who were inter­viewed for the doc­u­men­tary Look­ing Back: Reflec­tions of Black Prince­ton Alumni, which was writ­ten and directed by Melvin McCray ’74 and pro­duced by McCray and Calvin Nor­man ’77 on the occa­sion of Princeton’s 250th anniver­sary in 1996. Most of the alumni inter­viewed are from the 1960s and 1970s, when the admin­is­tra­tion started to make diver­si­fi­ca­tion of the stu­dent body a pri­or­ity. In the doc­u­men­tary Robert F. Goheen, pres­i­dent between 1957 and 1972, explains how the racial riots of 1963 in the South made him real­ize that Prince­ton, which counted only seven African Amer­i­can under­grad­u­ates in 1962, should pro­vide more edu­ca­tional oppor­tu­ni­ties to qual­i­fied blacks (20:52). Goheen’s suc­ces­sors William G. Bowen (Pres­i­dent 1972–1988) and Harold T. Shapiro (Pres­i­dent 1988–2001) are also inter­viewed, as well as Carl Fields (Assis­tant Direc­tor of Stu­dent Aid 1964–68 and Assis­tant Dean of the Col­lege 1968–1972), and the afore­men­tioned Franklin Moore.

The 75 minute doc­u­men­tary, in which alumni describe con­trast­ing expe­ri­ences and feel­ings, is divided into sev­eral chap­ters: “The early his­tory” (2:59), “Inclu­sion” (20:46), “Diverse back­grounds” (25:59), “First impres­sions” (28:44), “A mat­ter of race” (31:57), “Aca­d­e­mics” (43:51), “Nas­sau Hall Protest” (detail­ing the protest of April 14, 1978 over Princeton’s invest­ments in South Africa, 56:40), “Grad­u­a­tion” (1:01:35), “One Word” (1:04:20), and “Part­ing thoughts” (1:05:20). In the first chap­ter Woodrow Wilson’s racism is dis­cussed (6:16). The intro­duc­tion of coed­u­ca­tion in 1969 is dis­cussed at 48:43.

In addi­tion to the inter­views, the pro­duc­ers use his­tor­i­cal footage and pho­tographs (includ­ing mate­ri­als from Mudd Man­u­script Library and pri­vate sources) and ren­der­ings of “Old Nas­sau and “Going Back” by the a capella group “The Persuasions.” The doc­u­men­tary was pro­duced under the aus­pices of the Steer­ing Com­mit­tee for Princeton’s 250th Anniver­sary, in con­junc­tion with the Asso­ci­a­tion of Black Prince­ton Alumni (ABPA) and the Alumni Coun­cil. It won a Bronze Medal from the Coun­cil for the Advance­ment and Sup­port of Edu­ca­tion (1998).

This VHS video is part of the Uni­ver­sity Archives’ His­tor­i­cal Audio­vi­sual Col­lec­tion (item no. 1361).

Freddie Fox ’39 about old and new: “A Walk in the Springtime,” 1974

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After last week’s film about liv­ing and learn­ing at Prince­ton in 1962, it is inter­est­ing to watch “A Walk in the Spring­time,” cre­ated only twelve years later. The film fea­tures the leg­endary Fred­eric C. Fox, ’39, whose love and knowl­edge of Princeton’s his­tory and lore made him the first and only Keeper of Prince­to­ni­ana in 1976. Helped by his class­mate Sandy Maxwell ’39 and Arthur (Buz) Schmidt ’74 (“He looks like a rad­i­cal but he is only just the son of a class­mate” 0:18) Fox reaches out to the many alumni who were uncom­fort­able with the rapidly chang­ing face of campus.

As with other col­leges, the civil rights move­ment and Amer­i­can involve­ment in Viet­nam had sparked polit­i­cal activism at Prince­ton, includ­ing stu­dent demand to be part of cam­pus gov­er­nance. In addi­tion, the tra­di­tion­ally all-male pri­mar­ily white, Protes­tant, private-school edu­cated stu­dent body had diver­si­fied.  Of par­tic­u­lar con­cern for con­ser­v­a­tive alumni was the intro­duc­tion of coed­u­ca­tion in 1969. In the film Fox, Maxwell, and Schmidt, take view­ers on a tour, with the aim to show that although some things have changed much is still the same.

The film opens with Fred­die Fox in front of Nas­sau Hall’s two bronze tigers, point­ing out that one is male and the other female (1:25). After a brief visit to Fire­stone Library, Fox, Maxwell, and Schmidt sing Prince­ton songs at the piano in Prospect (8:38). The last part of the film, shot from the top floor of Fine Hall (11:56), con­tains exten­sive shots of the old and new build­ings on campus.

Out­takes are shown below. Fred­eric C. Fox died in 1981 at age 63.

These Umatic UC-30 videos are part of the Uni­ver­sity Archives’ His­tor­i­cal Audio­vi­sual Col­lec­tion (items no. 0516 and 0528).

These Umatic UC-30 videos are part of the Uni­ver­sity Archives’ His­tor­i­cal Audio­vi­sual Col­lec­tion (items no. 0516 and 0528).