19TH HOLE: THE READERS TAKE OVER

SPORTSMAN
Sirs:
Here in Oregon we are extremely proud of our homegrown athletes, especially one Terry Baker. I would like to express thanks for your extreme foresight in naming him "The Best Athlete in College" in an issue last year (October 16, 1961). Prior to your article, Oregon athletes were just "also rans" regardless of the large number presently in professional basketball and football.

Now, finally, the Heisman Trophy award has broken the geographical barrier and concurred with your article of a year ago. In these times of high-pressure athletics it is hard to find an athlete and scholar such as Terry Baker.
K. H. WHITMAN
Portland, Ore.

•We agree. See cover and page 16.—ED.

WONKS AND PREPPIES
Sirs:
Nine long rahs for Robert Boyle and The Harvards and the Yales (Dec. 17).

Come to think of it, when I was in college we had clubbies, jocks, preppies and wonks, too, but we didn't call them that, and their names were pronounceable.

In my day football was borghese. How could it help but be? You could count the number of games we lost or tied in the span of four years on the fingers of one hand. The varsity was almost entirely composed of preppies, many of whom were also clubbies. Stan Pennock, the best guard we ever had, was also a wonk. The poor guy was killed performing a chemistry experiment. We had five men on the 1914 All-America team. Eddie Mahan was the best running back in the country. For Tack Hardwick, bless his soul, football was borghese all year round. He once said that he would jump off the Washington Monument if Percy Haughton told him to.

I think that football at Harvard is in pretty healthy condition right now, thanks largely to Coach Yovicsin. Maybe Rick Beizer will be telling his children about that 50-yard runback he made at Franklin Field a year ago and omit any discussion of Elvis Presley and Plato. I bet that was borghese to him.
ROBERT W. WOOD JR.
Harvard '16
Princeton, N.J.

Sirs:
Having been non-U my entire life, I humbly suggest your reporters concern themselves less with the self-conscious mewings of the Harvards, their tiddlywinks, light touch-tacklers and shy but acne-faced football team and more with such solid sports as model train construction (HO), water ballet and cut the pie.
LLOYD H. SELBY
Orinda, Calif.

Sirs:
We have institutions for preppies, wonks, clubbies, etc. out here, too, but we call them state hospitals.
A. C. WILBER
Port Clinton, Ohio

Sirs:
Congratulations on an outstanding effort to misrepresent life at Harvard.
MICHAEL F. HOLLAND
Cambridge, Mass.

Sirs:
It is true that the Harvard-Yale game is no longer a meeting of powerhouses. However, the game is no less important to the players and the spectators. If Robert Boyle had been on the athletic fields that day, instead of mooching drinks from the clubs, he would have seen over a thousand Harvard and Yale men playing against one another on various levels of football, soccer and tiddlywinks. Where else does a student body get a chance to participate so fully in a meeting of two universities?
EDWARD J. SMITH JR.
Cambridge, Mass.

Sirs:
I want to tell you how much I enjoyed reading your recent article The Harvards and the Yales. My 13-year-old son, an avid Minnesota football fan, simply could not believe my descriptions of eastern football, and you served so well in my clinching of the argument.
CLYDE REEDY
St. Paul

Sirs:
Boyle has excellently portrayed the spirit prevailing among Harvard students. That's why we're at Yale.
EDWARD P. O'NEILL JR.
EUGENE STRASSBURGER III
New Haven, Conn.

CHILD'S PLAY
Sirs:
I would like to make a comment on the so-called "football predictions" you made each week during the football season.

I am a mere, uninformed child of 13 who is interested in football teams. Each week I predicted the same games you did, picking the teams I thought would win by using common sense and a look at their earlier games. I finished exactly 13% higher than you did in the final count. Some of your predictions over the year were ridiculous. Every week I would look at your guesses, guffaw, then make my own and steadily beat you. Shame!
ROB CORRUCCINI
Boulder, Colo.

•We committed ours to print, however.—ED.

PAWNS AND TIDDLIES
Sirs:
In reference to the letter of Mr. Lemuel Roberts II (19TH HOLE, Dec. 10), I would like to suggest that perhaps Mr. Roberts ought to discontinue his subscription.

What would he like to see in SPORTS ILLUSTRATED: "action" shots of chess? Or tiddlywinks'? To say that football and boxing represent everything "unclean, unfair and dishonest" in sports is absolutely ludicrous. I would even go so far as to suggest that Mr. Roberts might consult the nearest psychiatrist. Our youth is getting soft only because certain people like Mr. Roberts are attempting to take all exertion out of sports.
R. McCUTCHEON
London, Ont.

WRONG GATE
Sirs:
As a longtime admirer of Bill Hartack I was pleased to see the starting gate picture of him in your December 24 issue (The Challenge and Risk in Being a Champion). But Hartack does not ride at Del Mar.
KNOX MILLIGAN
New York City

•Right. The picture was taken at Chicago's Hawthorne Race Course.—ED.