The Student Voice

Film and Radio
Within a month, though, Washington and the station manager Henry Roy Ruby (Ex 1945) received University and Federal Communications Commission approval to begin a radio station, which would broadcast community activities, student news, discussions, and social events. WCHI, or "Radio Midway" as Ruby termed it, was set up on the second floor of Judson Lounge, and by October 1945 began circulating its programs to the rest of the campus via the steampipes of the University's heating system. Radio Midway was soon joined by W9YWQ, an amateur student radio station established on the third floor of Reynolds Club.

WCHI later changed its name to WUCB and in 1967, with the help of funds raised by the Owl and Serpent club and the Senior Men's Honor Society, emerged as an FM radio station, WHPK, which broadcast its programs on the air and specialized in jazz and folk music. Beginning with only ten watts of power, WHPK now broadcasts at 100 watts to the South Side of Chicago.

War, Peace, and Politics
Political activity is part of an enduring tradition of student involvement which has marked the history of the University of Chicago. In a very real sense, President Harper's commitment to individuality and the unhindered flow of ideas placed the University from the beginning on the side of diversity and freedom of expression.

In the University's first month students gathered for a mock presidential election, which revealed the popularity of the Prohibitionist candidate who won by a landslide. Over the first quarter-century, students also expressed their desire for a fraternity system and voiced their opposition to the segregated class experiment of 1902.