The Daily Files: 25 years ago, May 1982

[HTML_REMOVED]A look backward in time through the yellowing pages of newsprint archives shows what The Daily and the UW looked like 25 years ago this month. [HTML_REMOVED]

Picture the mezzanine of Suzzallo Library. Hundreds of bookcases reach almost to the ceiling, blotting out most of the dim sunlight. On one shelf, sandwiched between dusty annual reports on the University's land holdings, is a slim custom-bound volume.

The report it contains is the only detailed description of a black time in the University's history. It has never been checked out.

The passage of 31 years has dulled memories, and it seems that only those who were directly involved recall the incident. Yet the case of Leonard Saari still has significance today.

Len Saari slept late on March 6, 1951.

He was awakened by the ringing of his telephone. Groggy, he threw off his sheets and stumbled out of bed. Saari, a senior majoring in journalism, was editor of the University of Washington Daily.

The voice on the other end of the line belonged to the Daily's adviser, Professor George Astel. Astel has called a meeting of the ASUW Publications Committee for noon that day. "We're going to dismiss you," he said.

It was 11:15 a.m. Within six hours Saari would be fired, and his journalism career thrown into jeopardy. The Seattle Post-Intelligencer would devote part of its front page to the case, and in weeks to comethe state Legislature would launch an investigation.

Why was Saari fired? The official explanation [HTML_REMOVED] from the School of Journalism Director H.P. "Dick" Everest [HTML_REMOVED] was that "he neglected his duties to the campus at large in favor of promoting the interests of a special segment of campus."

But many believe the real reason was far less innocent. All parties involved agreed that Saari probably lost his job because of a series of articles he published detailing the anti-subversive bills then being debated by the state Legislature. Saari attacked the bills himself on the Daily's editorial page, and many feel the pressure to dismiss Saari came from the highest levels of the government.