Yalie Damage to Widener Tops $1000

The cost of totally removing "BEAT HARVARD" from Widener's columns will exceed the $1000 deposit of the six Yalies responsible for painting the library, Cecil A. Roberts, director of buildings and grounds, said yesterday.

As water-blasting of the columns to remove the paint began, Richard C. Carroll, associate dean of Yale College, announced that the six, all juniors, had been placed on probation "for the rest of their time at Yale."

The students, who Carroll said had "immaculate past records," were arrested here by University Police early in the morning of Friday, Nov. 22, for defacing Widener with the three-foot-high letters of blue paint.

The cost of the water-blasting is about $200 a day, and the work will probably have to continue well into next week, according to Roberts. The charge for blasting, coupled with that for the "normal means" of removal which had failed, "is likely to be well over $1000," he said.

D.C. Moulton, assistant superintendent of buildings and grounds, who is directing the work at Widener, said yesterday that water-blasting was chosen to remove the paint because it is less likely than sand-blasting to seriously erode the columns. The water-blasting process uses water under very high pressure with a controlled amount of sand mixed into it as it is applied, whereas the stronger sand-blasting uses merely compressed air and sand.

Water-Blasting Successful

Moulton said that the water-blasting has been successful so far, and that other processes will probably not be needed to clean the columns.

The only action Harvard took after seizing the students was to turn them over to Yale with a full report of the incident. Yale declared shortly after the arrest that the six would be responsible for the total cost of removing the paint.

The students, whose names have been withheld, are also expected to come to Cambridge and apologize to Dean Watson for their action.