Walker Weed wrote to say that he was not the one to originate the notion that Dartmouth students should be required to make a chair. That idea, he says, came from Peter Smith, director of their Hopkins Center. Mr. Weed also contributed the following quote from Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe (1749-1832)

"The time has now come when any man who cannot turn to some form of art or handicraft is extremely unfortunate. With the world moving at its present pace, mere knowledge avails us nothing; by the time a man has taken note of all there is to know, he has lost his essential self."

“Art is not the fruits of one's labor but the labor itself. Art is integral to life and work - not the shoemaker's shoe but the integrity with which he makes it. In this sense art is accessible to everyone, and when we fail to take advantage of it, we forfeit completeness - both as individuals and as a society.”