Some Illinois college friends of 1938 () have a country reunion at Christmas of the present time. As students, most of them had what were known as progressive political ideas in 1938. One of them, a brilliant mathematician, placed his faith in Soviet Russia then. The Stalin-Hitler pact shook all that faith out of him in 1939. By the present time he is one of the dispossessed. Because of his college political associations, no one will employ him, no one will rent him an apartment, no one will associate with him, no one will clear him, no one will adjudicate his case.〔Atkinson, Brooks. Quoted by (Dramatist Play Service ).〕