Letter from the Editor: 100 Years of The Tower
Image courtesy of Noah Slayter
By Jacqueline Jedrych
With this edition, The Tower turns 100 years old.
My name is Jacqueline Jedrych and I am the 129th editor-in-chief of The Tower. Being elected to editor during the 100th year of The Tower’s existence was exciting but also stressful. Having the opportunity to work on such a monumental year of production is so special and a privilege. It also comes with the pressure: both to live up to the legacy of my predecessors and to create a strong future for the organization.
After one long Thursday night of uploading articles, our Managing Editor Margaret Adams and I were walking home. I was talking about my fear that The Tower may one day dwindle in membership, and how I would feel responsible for not setting it up for success.
“I would feel awful if that was to happen to an organization that has literally shaped my Catholic University experience,” I said.
“If there’s one thing that I have learned by working on The Tower, it’s that it really has a life of its own,” she replied.
This is so incredibly true. There is something special about this organization.
Why has The Tower lived for so long? As any staff member or alumnus can attest, it’s not because the work is easy, not because we get incredible funding, nor is it because everyone wants to work outside of class. I think that the reason that we have been around for the last 100 years is our dedication to our mission: to report on the truth and inform the student body of Catholic University.
In light of this, The Tower is pleased to announce our new motto: Veritas ex stylo. In English this means Truth from the pen.
Veritas ex stylo was chosen by our current staff members, and exemplifies that ideal that we hold to be true: spread the truth through writing.
“If we wish to get out a respectable paper, a paper that is worthy of our School we must work, we must be willing to make sacrifices of time and pleasure,” reads a Tower article titled ‘A C.U. Newspaper’ from October 1922. “This is going to be irksome at times, but it is only at the price of hard work and sacrifice that we can expect to publish a worthwhile paper… ‘The Tower’ is a fact. Let us first show the Faculty and the alumni that we can run it.”
This is a special organization, and I believe we have shown faculty and alumni that we can run it. I want to thank all the past and present staff for all their hard work on every week’s edition. I, along with every past editor-in-chief, am incredibly grateful and proud of the organization we have created. Thank you for your 100 years of loyalty to Catholic University’s independent student newspaper, The Tower. Here’s to 100 more years of serving the Catholic U community.
