Tisdale to Hear Final Arguments In 'Avatar' Trial

Judge Samuel T. Tisdale '35 will hear final arguments from the defense and prosecution this afternoon in the Avatar trial. He will render his decision early next week in the cases of 32 Avatar salesmen, charged with selling obscene literature.

"I'd make an educated guess that the judge will dismiss those cases which do not involve the sale of obscenity to minors," Avatar's lawyer, Harvey A. Silverglate said yesterday after a brief session in Middlesex Superior Court. Throughout the ten-day trial, the judge has expressed primary concern with the circumstances surrounding sales to minors and testimonies about the effect of obscenity on minors.

Silverglate also said that Tisdale would probably throw out on technicalities the sales-to-minors charges against Gordon R. Foote Jr. '69 and Paul Thompson, a wholesale distributor of underground newspapers. If the nine other sellers to minors are convicted, Jared Rossman '71 will be the only Harvard student involved in the appeal to the Massachusetts Supreme Court.

In the final day of defense testimony, City Councilor Alfred E. Vellucci yesterday denied that he had ever initiated any action against Avatar other than declaring in the October 2 City Council meeting that such "filth" should not be sold at the Out of Town News Agency, which rents its kiosk in the Square from the City.

Vellucci denied that Avatar and the hippies had been part of his campaign for re-election last fall.

"I only read a few sentences in Avatar, but that was enough to convince me that it was filth," Vellucci said. "Maybe it's the intelligent way to say things now, but that wasn't the way I was brought up."

Wayne Hansen, editor of Avatar, spent two hours on the stand yesterday explaining the philosophy of Avatar. "We're a 'family' of 50 or 60 young people who live together at Fort Hill in Roxbury. We're centered around the personality and ideas of Mel Lyman, who embodies the highest philosophical ideals," he said. Kennedy's concern for the educational situation in the District of Columbia. He created the Chase Commission, which recommended the establishment of a federally-sponsored college in the District. Congress, which controls the financial affairs of the District, allocated funds for a university and appointed a board of trustees.

The trustees appointed Frank Farmer, dean of the Graduate School at the University of Oregon, as President of F.C.C. and David Dickson, professor of English at the University of Michigan, as its provost.

Plans call for F.C.C. to be a large school, similar to the University of Michigan, Lynn said. It will probably be located in downtown Washington--a site has not been chosen yet--and will have several branch campuses.

F.C.C. will place great emphasis on urban affairs and on adult extension courses. The university hopes to initiate a number of programs in the coming years--first an active exchange program and eventually a Ph.D. program.

Lynn, who has been on sabbatical this year while writing a critical biography of William Dean Howells, has spent most of the last twenty-five years at Harvard. He is not the only member of the English department leaving at the end of this year--Rustin C. McIntosh '55 and Neil L. Rudenstine, assistant professors of English, are also resigning.