Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-06-10
CUPID IN A. CONVENT.
Queer Franks Played in an Old
MOravian Church Seminary.
MAIDENS LOSE THEIR DIPLOMAS
Charge Staid Professors With Having Been
Much Too Tender.
CHARMING NAIL CARRIERS in TROUBLE

ESPECIAL TELEGRAM TO THE pIsPArcH.l
PHILADELPHIA, June Cupid has
been playing rare pranks in the 142-year-
old Moravian Church Seminary for young
ladies at Bethlehem, Pa, If the allegations
of several fair students who are now rest
ing under little cloud can be relied upon.
The faculty has itself to blame for spring
ing the first sensation upon the public,
though. This situation, in itself startling,
was disclosed by the staid faculty refusing
to permit seven young ladies of this years
graduating class to enter upon the honors
which the diplomas they had earned at
study would have conferred, or even to re-
ceive diplomas at ALL
The seven young charmers (for they are
all pretty girls) were in effect dismissed
from the graduating class. They are Misses
Lizzie Weaver, Fannie Roth, Helen Shields
and Ernestine Bredb all of Bethlehem;
Mary Smith, of Butler. Pa. Laura E. Lane,
of San Antonio, Tex, and Laura Humphrey,
of Chicago.
The principal of the seminary, Rev. J.
Blickensderfer, was asked to-day about the
relations these young ladies or some of
them had maintained in private and proper
but forbidden correspondence with the
young men of Lehigh University, almost
adjoining the ladies' seminary.
They Carried Notes to the Boys
He simply replied: 'The ladies desig-
mated must not fail OF graduation solely on
the ground that their department is not up
to the high average required and main
tanned in their studies" This failure in
department is alleged to be the carrying of
letters by the Bethlehem girls named above
for their three nonresident classmates to
the boys at the University. But the more
sensational part of the story begins right
here.
The young ladies, only two of whom,
Lizzie Wea, er and Ernestino Bredt, the
latter quite wealthy, have been withdrawn
from the school, allege that the staid and
sober faculty of the seminary have been in
some instances too fond of their pupils
only in endearing terms but in embraces.
Miss Lizzie Weaver said to-day: "T
have seen Prof - at the seminary
kiss and COO over more than one of the
students. He never embraced me, though;
I'd have slapped his face if ne had"
Miss Fannie Roth told her brother Of
what she, too, had seen, if not experienced,
at the seminary, and now her big brother is
on the warpath after faculty scalps.
Miss Mary Currie, of Florida, wrote home
to her San Antonio parents about the marks
of affection awarded her at the seminary,
and her mother wrote back: "Never per-
init yourself May, to be alone in Pro.
presence again.
Fair Pupils Kissed by Staid Professors.
Miss Nellie Clark, of New Brunswick, N.
j., is said to have related a somewhat sim
liar experience, having been kissed by
Prof - last Sunday night.
So taken altogether there is indeed great
sensation afoot at Bethlehem. This has not
been modified in the least by the announce
ment that when Miss Laura Lanes sister
from the Boston Conservatory of Music
came over to Bethlehem, the other day, she
was not permitted by the strict rules of the
seminary to stay there with Laura
'sYou can both 60 to a hotel, said the
principal. They went, but on the way they
were accosted and narrowly escaped assault
from rufian who saw them them out with
out escort
Miss Hattie CranwelI, another pretty stu
dent, as also is Nellie Spence, have told of
at the seminary such as they
had never expected.
Lehigh University boys deny that there
has been an unwarranted correspondence
between them and the girls at the semi
nary. So if there is such an investigation
as now seems probable the faculty are
likely to be defendants. The principal,
Rev. j. Blickensderter, denies that the
faculty have been in any sense familiar or
toward their fair students,
whom they have practically held down to
the rigidity OF convent rules.