Mail

To the Editor of the Crimson:

On Monday, February 14, there came from my grandson, Thomas Hinckley, Jr., a Valentine, addressed as follows:

ProF. Charles River Lanman

9 farrar st. cambridge Mass.

And I made him the following answer:

Charles Rockwell Lanman never dreamed--

In years which passed so slow, it seemed--

That he should ever come to be

Charles River Lanman, as you see.

But names wear out, just like a shoe,

Till grandson Tom gives one that's new.

Maybe the boy had overheard his father (and namesake) chaffing me for boasting that I had rowed over twelve thousand miles on the Charles River since the Dam was built. I used to row from that beautiful northeast room of the Newell Boathouse. I'm not as deaf as a post. But I was born in the first half of the 19th century, and we are near the end of the first half of the 20th.

The young women of the last two decades have taken to bringing so many stalwart sons into the world, sons of six foot and more, that there are more candidates for crews of Eight than the Newell can take care of. So they degraded me to the Weld, that is they graduated me backwards. But I kept up my pulls from the Cambridge Boatclub House for about six weeks after Newell and Weld had closed for the season. Yours truly C. R. Lanman.

(Ed.--Charles Rockwell Lanman was born in 1850 and graduated from Yale in 1871. Appointed professor of Sanskrit here in 1880, he is now emeritus. Three years ago he was one of the eight non-Japanese scholars awarded the Japanese Medal at the celebration of the 2500th anniversary of Buddha's birth. The fabulous number of miles he has rowed since coming here has won him the title "Charles River" Lanman.)