PAGE TWO. nearly all to pay the notes we had negotiated in order to pay the old bills. In other words, instead of having $2200.00 to start with last fall we had less than $lOOO.OO and enough old bills appeared during the fall to materially reduce this sum What departments had run behind prior to that time I am unable to tell, suffice it to say that some of them did, and as the Association would not care to repudiate its debts there was nothing to do but pay them at the sacrifice of funds that should have been for use this year. It would have been possible to have paid the entire indebtedness this year, but as the system is new and it always requires time to adapt an old system to new meth ods it has been the sense of the Advisorv Committee that the changes be made gradually, so that there may be fewer misunderstand ings of the real motive of the new system. And let me say light here that from the short observation I have been able to make of the situation there is no reason why, under con ditions such as have existed since last September, your Association should not be able to maintain its athletics on a par with that of any other institution in the country and still clear a thousand or more dollars every year. The trouble appears to have been in the past that there was no one who knew exactly what bills had been contracted and, a conse quence, the Association was living beyond its income. There seems to have been a general disposition to go ahead without thought of how the bills were to be paid. I write this to you not in disparagement of anyone who has been in authority in the past, but merely to illustrate the ef fects of a lack of proper organiza tion in your business affairs. When brought face to face with this con dition of your finances in Septem ber, Mr. Postlethwaite, your football THE STATE COTXEGtAN. manager, very promptly signified his willingness to co operate with me in the effort to bring about cer tain economies that worked no hard ship, yet saved considerable money for your Association. It will scarce ly seem credible, yet his bills for supplies for the team were only a little more than half of what they had been the year previous and you must admit that the team was splendidly equipped last fall. This was all due to his care in enforcing a little system whereby petty eco- P. B. POSTLETHWAITE Football Manager, 1908 nomies were made. He gave the team the best and most expen sive training table that State had ever known, and the best and most expensive coaching, and brought it through the season with a record of which you will ever be proud, and I am only sorry that a few unforseen expenses have made it impossible for him to complete the season with the unequalled record of not having used a cent of the student assess ment allowance tor his Department. As it is if all the board bills due the association are paid he will have consumed onlj $316.51 of that al lowance. It is such managerial ability as Mr. Postlethwaite’s that is going to put your Association on a footing with other colleges that I might mention that have been able to build Athletic Club houses and other me morials that will be lasting. That is, if the student body grasps the situa tion as it should. You can help more than you imagine. And that is the principal reason that the Advis ory Committee wants you to know every detail of your business affairs. There is no reason why you should subscribe money to maintain a branch of athletics and then permit any of the men paiticipating in that branch to be careless, negligent or improvident of the supplies your money furnishes; there is no reason why you as a student body should nor ferret out the men or boys who have robbed your track house re peatedly and bring them into a court of justice. There is no reason why you should not inculcate such a spirit of enthusiasm for the letter and cheers of your body that any athlete you have should be inspired by that, rather than by the quality of the clothes he wears while con testing. I do not mean that he should not have the best, for the best is none too good, but only when you can afford it. The athlete who is in the games only for “what is in it” is not worthy the name and is not worthy to wear the blue and white. If it is only the sweater, the banquet or the trips that spurs him to his best endeavor he is far better away from the College. If the stu dent body takes this view of the situation and causes such a senti ment to permeate the entire institu tion athletics will always be pure and there will be no demands nor dissatisfaction because the Associa tion has not provided more than it can afford. This is not intended as a lecture. It is merely an expression of what your Advisory Committee hopes to accomplish with your assistance. That it will be accomplished is cer tain. The fact that so much has
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