Now, Mr. Lincoln?

NML Money Distributed as Seed Capital

The article, “Now, Mr. Lincoln? Money Distributed As Seed Capital”, is shown here in image form exactly how it was published in The Trail in 1969 [A&SC 26]. Commentary is also included below.

First published in the March 7, 1969 campus newspaper The Trail, this piece discusses how the money raised in the “Now, Mr. Lincoln?” campaign will be distributed to Tacoma business. It speaks positively of the campaign overall, claiming “Now, Mr. Lincoln?” to be unique in how specifically it considers its community's needs. [A&SC 26].

Interestingly, though this is one of the only articles in The Trail that is specifically and solely about “Now, Mr. Lincoln?” it does not report much other than informational and procedural data. Although it does state an opinion or two about the campaign, it does so from an organizational standpoint and does not include the perspective of those who the campaign could actually help [A&SC 26]. Whether or not this is due to not being able to access those people, it was outside the scope of the article, or was an oversight that shows the campus perspective is difficult to say, although as is seen in other articles from the same year such as “Al Roberts Raps about Racial Conditioning” [A&SC 30]The Trail did not shy away from reporting less positive perspectives about the campaign. Overall, The Trail seems to have made an attempt to work towards reporting these events as they happened, accurately, and leaned heavily on presenting facts to do so rather than editorializing. Such was the campus climate of the time.

It is interesting to note that this article begins on the very first page of the newspaper—serving as one of the headlines of the week—but continues on the very last page of the newspaper. Equally interesting is the fact that no The Trail articles about “Now, Mr. Lincoln?”, including this one, included a student perspective—a seemingly deliberate and bold choice in an entirely student edited and published newspaper. Although it is impossible to say whether or not these decisions were intentional ones or just topical oversight, the observation potentially leaves a lot to be analyzed: what did students on the University of Puget Sound campus have to say about “Now, Mr. Lincoln?” and did they feel they could say it?

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