Disarmament was of course actively discussed in pacifist circles, such as the American Friends Service Committee. Stewart Meacham, the Peace Education Secretary for the national AFSC, wanted to involve leading academics not previously identified with pacifism. He kept in touch with Professor David Riesman at Harvard, author of the much-admired 1949 book on American social character, "A Lonely Crowd", and was stimulated by a paper Riesman sent written by one of his graduate student assistants named Roger Hagan, entitled “Memo To A Third Party.” To discuss the possibility that it might be necessary to start a new political party to avert nuclear war, Meacham invited Hagan, Riesman, and about forty persons he considered influential or useful to a conference in the West Texas hills at a Friends country retreat.