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In Manhattan, New York University students shrilled cadenzas outside Professor Shaw's office door. Letters denouncing his statement piled on his desk. Professor Shaw stifled a fit of chuckles and issued another statement: "Whistling from the throat is indicative of the intelligent person, while whistling with the lips is significant of the moron."
More interviews, more press comments, more denunciations.
By this time Professor Shaw could no longer choke down his laughter. Slapping his middle he burst out: "What a comic world!" Then related just how it all had happened:
Last year he had sharing his office two raucous instructors. They whistled incessantly, "and always the same tunes, and always off the key. Remember that — always off the key. It is important." To order them to be silent was impossible for kindly Professor Shaw. Besides, their reaction might be more strident whistling. He thought of a ruse. For the university daily he wrote an article shaming whistlers in general. But the paper did not print it. Last week some New York University students who work as "campus" correspondents for the local dailies were be wailing the scantiness of university news. Professor Shaw dug up and gave them his diatribe against whistling. "I never dreamed such a thing would cause such a stir," roared he last week. "But it's a good thing. It keeps the world from becoming too much upset over such things as the gold standard and the world series."
* Funk & Wagnalls ($2).