LETTERS
"We're not St. John's"

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James Chandler ("The Battle of THE Books," February/01) is under the misimpression that the College of the late 1940s and early '50s had a "Great Books" curriculum. Not so. The "Great Books" school was St. John's. The College curriculum was designed to culminate in a course titled "Organization, Methods, and Principles of the Sciences." Of the things that give me pride in my old age-Fulbright professor in the Netherlands, a book listed in several editions of Books for College Libraries, riding the winner of the Genesee Valley Hunt Cup, training the winner of the Middleburg Hunt Cup-my degree from the College stands at the top of the list.

If Dr.Chandler is interested in the curriculum of that college, he could read the book of essays put together by the College faculty and edited by Champ Ward that the University Press brought out in the early 1950s. To paraphrase Hutchins, it was not a great education, it was simply the best available.

William Raymond Smith, AB'53, AM'59, PhD'61
Warrenton, Virginia

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