Kup's Chicago - Irv Kupcinet [112]
And many were surprised at the quick wit of my old friend Ed Murrow, whose serious side is the one to which they have been exposed most frequently; at the lack of pretense in the great biographer-poet Carl Sandburg, who unabashedly excused himself during one show to go to the toilet; and at the virtuosity of David Susskind, who has been derided as a moderator by some reviewers, but who is unquestionably an excellent guest.
The late Dr. Tom Dooley deserves special mention. I doubt that anyone on the show has ever moved, inspired, and galvanized our viewers into action as did this slight young man. I’m told that as a result of his appearances on At Random, a number of young people decided to devote themselves to similar overseas work – and enough money was sent to his MEDICO organization to support the operation of two jungle hospitals for an entire year.
When you consider that every At Random program has perhaps half a dozen outstanding guests, you can see that it is all but impossible to pick an “all-star” panel of those who have appeared without omitting dozens of deserving names. Not long ago, however, I was caught off guard and asked to choose a group who would make up a so-called “ideal” At Random panel. I named five former guests: Dr. Morris Fishbein, philosophy professor Paul Schilpp of Northwestern University, Jimmy Hoffa, Adlai Stevenson, British biologist Sir Julian Huxley, and Carl Sandburg.
In selecting the all-time classic At Random program, much the same dilemma is involved as in singling out “all-star” guests. For this special designation among all our programs, however, I would have to choose what we refer to as our “Darwin show.” As anyone knows who saw it, either live or on videotape, it came as close to having everything as any At Random show to date.
The occasion was the hundredth anniversary of Charles Darwin’s publication of the theory of evolution. The guests were drawn primarily from the distinguished participants in the Darwin Centennial Celebration at the University of Chicago: Sir Charles Darwin, grandson of the naturalist; biologist Sir Julian Huxley; the Honorable Adlai E. Stevenson; former Harvard astronomer Harlow Shapley; and University of Chicago anthropologist Sol Tax.
As Chicago Sun-Times reporter Jerry Cohen wrote in his coverage the next morning:
The program was like a sampling from an anthology to which each of these wise and witty men might have contributed one of his own wisest and wittiest dissertations. It may have been erudite, but it was never dull.
The major issues facing mankind today, the participants agreed, are three: The population explosion; the dilemma of prosperity, by which the rich get richer while the poor get poorer; and the hydrogen bomb.
A typical Huxley comment on the population problem: “When the babies born today are old enough to vote, there’ll be a billion more votes. It’s appalling! Absolutely appalling!”
Darwin made an eloquent plea for birth control, saying, “The way to tackle the problem is to get the reproduction rate down.”
“We need a new international and global policy,” agreed Huxley.
So the discussion went, punctuated by such exchanges as one in which it was suggested that Huxley is an agnostic.
“I am an atheist,” he answered. “I am not an agnostic!”
And there was outright humor, as when Huxley asked Darwin if he believed that machines had become so far advanced that they one day would write poetry.
“Yes,” said Darwin. “A machine will be able to write poetry – but it will be the type of poetry only another machine could enjoy.”
Or when someone commented that we have come to expect our schools to be responsible for teaching everything but a course in picking pockets.
“Oh, but they do teach that,” said Adlai Stevenson. “They call it banking and finance!”
I find At Random a welcome change of pace from my regular routine, but it gives me