Hamilton Magazine - Summer 2019

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HAMILTON Magazine

Summer 2019

THE BIG QUESTION What was your senior project/ thesis, and what did you learn from the experience?

FOR NEXT ISSUE, CONSIDER:

Countless trips to the library, interviews with original sources, meetings with your advisor, endless revisions and presentation rehearsals. Yet many alumni say the ordeal that was their senior project was worth it. Send your memories about this Hamilton rite of passage to editor@ hamilton.edu by October 1. Kindly limit your submission to 150 words or fewer, and include your name and class year. Responses will be published in the next magazine or on the Hamilton Hub (hamilton.edu/hub).

THE BIG ANSWERS To find out what your fellow readers shared about fashion trends during their days on College Hill, see pp. 24-25.

A Kirkland Alumna’s Take on Life

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Still Standing Tall

THINGS YOU’LL LEARN A Secret Society’s Afoot SHHHHH! A covert group of women scientists has coalesced to save the world, and a Hamilton alumna is behind it. PAGE 11

Cr = Carissima Enjoy a salute to the 150th anniversary of Mendeleev’s Periodic Table of Elements ... with a Hamilton twist. PAGE 16

Stories Lead to Understanding Through a new oral history project, LGBTQ alumni share with student interviewers candid memories of their experiences on College Hill. PAGE 32

Some Memories Endure At age 100, WWII veteran Ralph Nichols ’40 recounts his D-Day experience with focused detail. PAGE 50

Everybody Has a Story Ernie Found ’74 found more than kicks on Rt. 66. PAGE 58

On the Cover

New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast K’75 shares how she found her independence on College Hill, where she gets her inspiration, and the pitfalls of rubber cement. PAGE 44 Photo of Roz Chast by Kelly Campbell Illustration “The Universe in a Grain of Sand” by Roz Chast

“This granite may crumble, this bronze may corrode, this College may be dissolved; but the monument of his work will remain.”

WITH THESE WORDS ELIHU ROOT, Class of 1864 and then chairman of the Board of Trustees, dedicated the Alexander Hamilton statue on Commencement Day, June 17, 1918. How fitting that the College’s namesake and founding father would be lauded by another esteemed statesman.

Root served as secretary of war and secretary of state, was a world leader in the development of international law, and received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1912.

PHOTO BY BOB HANDELMAN

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The classic American musical West Side Story received an update when the Sharks and Jets faced off in present-day Bronx, N.Y. Shown here are Maria (Nina Merz ’22) and Tony (­Christopher Victor ’21). Read more from the director of Hamilton’s ­production, ­Associate Professor of Theatre Mark Cryer, on page 22.

PHOTO BY NANCY L. FORD

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COMMENTS

HAMILTON MAGAZINE SUMMER 2019 VOLUME 84, NO. 2 EDITOR Stacey J. Himmelberger P’15,’22 (shimmelb@hamilton.edu) SENIOR WRITER Maureen A. Nolan (manolan@hamilton.edu) HAMILTON HUB MANAGER Kimberly A. Dam (kdam@hamilton.edu) NECROLOGY WRITER Jorge L. Hernández ’72 STUDENT CONTRIBUTORS Drew Anderson ’21 Grace Collins Libby Militello ’22 ART DIRECTOR Mark M. Mullin DESIGNER Vanessa L. Colangelo PRODUCTION MANAGER Mona M. Dunn PRODUCTION ASSOCIATE Phyllis L. Jackson CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHER Nancy L. Ford WEB COORDINATOR Esena J. Jackson STUDENT ILLUSTRATORS Jack Confrey ’19 Isaac Fung ’21 VICE PRESIDENT, ADVANCEMENT Lori Rava Dennison ’87, P’16 ASSOCIATE VICE PRESIDENT, COMMUNICATIONS Michael J. Debraggio P’07

CONTACT Email: editor@hamilton.edu Phone: 866-729-0313 © 2019, Trustees of Hamilton College

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More on our redesign

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LTHOUGH A FEW of the following letters touch on readers’ reactions to the newly redesigned Hamilton magazine, most feedback we received was through conversations or comments not intended by the authors for publication. Here’s a summary of what we heard: I’m happy to report that most feedback was positive. Specifically, readers liked the large photographs, the Show and Tell spread that featured bands who came to campus, the Because Hamiltonians profiles, and several of the feature articles. More than 130 readers wrote in with a response to our Big Question call for memories about unforgettable courses.

Negative feedback almost exclusively concerned class notes and necrology. Moving forward we will continue to publish alumni news highlights from the online Hamilton Hub in the magazine and will be stepping up efforts to engage class correspondents, class presidents, and other alumni active on social media to promote the Hub. The more people who contribute, the more successful this news/networking/event-sharing tool will be.

As for necrology, we just published the first edition of Because Hamilton Remembers, a collection of memorial biographies of alumni who died in the preceding year. Copies were available at Reunion Weekend

in June and mailed to alumni in the classes of 1979 and earlier.

If you have not received a copy and would like one, write to editor@hamilton.edu. You can also access the searchable database at hamilton.edu/necrology.

As I noted last issue, we consider the magazine, the monthly enewsletter Hamilton Headlines, and the content we share via the College’s social media channels to be works-in-progress. We are always interested in hearing your ideas for ways to best connect readers with College Hill and with each other.

Stacey J. Himmelberger P’15,’22, Editor WORRIES ABOUT NOT having all class notes in print should be set aside. The new look, format, and content more than make up for the missing pages of notes (which more and more are redundant given the Hub and the many class pages and connections alums have already via Facebook.) Congratulations again.

Carol Travis Friscia K’77 THANK YOU for your overview of the new Hamilton magazine and your welcoming of feedback.

I will say I’m quite disappointed with the new class notes. Reading through the pages of notes from the oldest living alumni to the newest has always been a real treat for me and my favorite part of the magazine. I also have always enjoyed the marriages/ unions and births/adoptions pages. I’m disappointed that

the new trend is toward “Instagram-ready” postings both online in the Hub and now in the magazine. There was not a single update in the magazine about anyone who was at Hamilton while I was, and I don’t need a full story to be happy knowing what’s going on with fellow alumni. I hope others feel the same and a more comprehensive view of class notes will reappear again soon.

Jen Kleindienst ’09 THE WINTER 2019 ISSUE of the Hamilton is the first that I’ve kept beyond first glance in decades. It’s fresh, engaging, informative and, I think I’d go as far as to say, inspiring.

Steve Potter ’69 I RECENTLY VISITED the Algonquin Hotel in New York City for cocktails and discovered that the hotel is celebrating the centennial of the 1919 founding of the Round Table, a luncheon group of post-World War I ­theatre and literary luminaries known for their sharp-tongued wit and including the likes of Dorothy Parker, Robert Benchley, George S. Kaufman, and, somewhat oddly, Harpo Marx.

Many of us will recall that fellow alumnus Alexander Woollcott, Class of 1909, the fearsome drama critic for The New York Times and a columnist for The New Yorker, was a founding member of the Round Table.

I doubt, however, that many of us (myself included, until

COMMENTS

recently) know that another alumnus also belonged to this illustrious group. He was John V.A. Weaver, Class of 1914, a widely read poet in the 1920s and ’30s who wrote innovative verse in “the American language.” After his death, Weaver’s widow, the actress Peggy Wood, established a poetry award at Hamilton in his memory. Although out of print for many years, Weaver’s work is worth searching out in used book stores. I suggest you do so and then drop by the Algonquin to toast our fellow alums with a martini or two.

Dudley Kimball ’69 I WAS QUITE SURPRISED to find that 49 years later, I was the poster boy for high fashion at Hamilton in the late 1960s!

(See photo above reprinted from the back cover, Winter 2019.) I admit there is a sharp contrast with the Ozzie and Harriet/June Cleaver group in the other picture. Thanks to being number 7 in the first draft lottery by birthdate (Dec. 1969), I won an allexpense-paid tour of Southeast Asia from Uncle Sam. After 101 combat missions in Vietnam and Cambodia as a C-130 navigator and 20 years of active duty, I was able to grow back most of that hair. The jacket didn’t fit.

Major Hamilton “Bud” Stewart USAF Ret. ’70 Stewart later followed up: “The bike became a 1965 MGB when I started flight training in February 1971. The jacket fell apart

years ago. The girl was my wife at the time. Susan introduced the British mini skirt to Hamilton when she came from England to be my date for spring houseparties in 1968.” The couple later divorced.

Today, in his retirement, Stewart enjoys painting, his 1,000-plus collection of jazz albums, and spending time with his wife, Yu Hua, and seven grandchildren.

IN CONSIDERATION of the Because Hamilton campaign and what might be missing, but now possible, at Hamilton, the addition of an architectural studies department should be strongly considered. Among potential departments to add, this one might be the most promising in that it (1) aligns well with Hamilton’s existing academic structure, (2) would enter a relative vacuum of programs at liberal arts colleges, and, consequently, (3) could evolve into a nationally prominent set of offerings.

In terms of practical issues associated with growth of this magnitude, Hamilton could ­initially develop the program through its studio art and art history departments, which would naturally overlap with an architectural studies department.

As a general model, Hamilton

need not look further than Hobart and William Smith, which, justifiably, claims that its program is “[l]arger and more established than any other liberal arts architecture program in the nation.” With Hamilton’s resources, it seems conceivable that in the future the College could establish a distinctive imprint of its own in an important and interesting field that has been underserved at liberal arts colleges.

Michael Seplesky ’81 I WROTE the following op-ed piece for the [Jan. 4, 2019] Duluth News Tribune, and thought it pertinent to your Serve America Movement story in the recent Hamilton magazine (pp. 44-45, Winter 2019): Political gridlock, chaos, stalemate — how many words are there to define the morass in which we presently find ourselves? Self-doubt toward Democracy is rampant. Complaining is easy; what might work as an alternative, a way out, a path to actual progress?

Several years ago, I wrote a tongue-in-cheek column suggesting a “We the People” party

based on a growing national discontent with both political parties — Democrats and Republicans.

In theory there always seems to be room for an independent candidate, particularly as registered independent voters outnumber both Republicans and Democrats. In reality, independents virtually always falter, sucking votes predominantly from one party or the other, but never enough to win ... insufficient momentum and savvy to overcome the entrenched party loyalties. Moreover, a “We the People” party, while a catchy and appealing moniker in some respects, would nevertheless suffer from an overall namerecognition deficit.

What if a “Republicrat” party should emerge, comprised of the “silent majority” in the middle, attracting voters from both sides, who are tired of the debates dominated by the extremes? Are there not enough disillusioned Democrats, remorseful Repub­ licans, and surely some independents, tired of the aforementioned gridlock, chaos, and stalemate?

What if they perhaps united, creating a middle ground where reason, debate, and ­compromise might once again

Send your letters, story ideas, and feedback to editor@hamilton.edu or Hamilton magazine, 198 College Hill Road, Clinton, NY 13323.

We welcome comments on topics discussed in the magazine or on any subject of possible interest to the College community. Please include your name and class year, and whether you intend for your letter to be published. We reserve the right to judge whether a letter is appropriate for publication and to edit for accuracy and length.

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actually work — something to restore hope for the “American Dream,” the land of opportunity?

Nor would a “Republicrat” party suffer from a name recognition deficit; it would attract voters from both parties because of its familiar-sounding, inclusive, resonating title.

To bolster such a suggestion would not some younger candidates with leadership skills be an attractive alternative to the septuagenarians (and older) who presently reign so inefficiently? Don’t most folks retire by that age? We need fresh faces with new ideas, with energy and enthusiasm, willing to openly reason, debate, and compromise — unrealistic?

Might you consider voting for an appealing Republicrat candidate who ran on such a platform? I would!

Tom Wheeler ’68 Republished with permission.

LIKE MANY READERS, I was intrigued to review the range of artists who have ­performed at our alma mater (pp. 18-19, Winter 2019). I need to call out a couple omissions, undoubtedly due to editorial space. Little Feat (Led Zeppelin’s favorite American band) appeared in fall 1975. A year later Patti Smith performed in the Chapel, well before she leapt to fame with her cover of Springsteen’s “Because the Night.” In 1979, we bet the entire Student Activities Committee budget on The Kinks (one of the original four bands comprising the British Invasion) and ended up with a surplus budget, which we happily passed along to the next year’s class.

And since you understandably showed Hamilton’s homegrown Steak Nite, I’d also like to point to Rogue. The band was (and occasionally still is) comprised of Bob Kinkel ’79 on keyboards, Tom Porter ’80 on bass, Brian Middleton ’79 on guitar,

TASHA PANARITES COCONIS ’79

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Ray Davies of The Kinks (left) and Brad Auerbach ’79 before the ­former performed in the Alumni Gym, Feb. 28, 1979.

Dave Scofield ’80 on drums, and Rene Don Boni ’80 and Kevin Barry ’79 on vocals.

After graduation, Bob went on to cofound Trans-Siberian Orchestra, consistently one of the most successful touring groups of the last decade. TSO’s songs generally rise to the top of holiday charts each winter.

Brad Auerbach ’79 For more on Bob Kinkel’s career path, see p. 27.

Georgiana Silk K’72 and Kathy Collett P’03, Hamilton’s archivist, identified some of the photographers whose images accompanied “The Meaning of Kirkland” (pp.

46-51, Winter 2019). The photo at the top of page 50 is by Allen Green. On page 51, the photo in the bottom middle is by Mark Tarmy ’80, who worked for the Kirkland College Office of Publications. The image at the bottom right of that page (seen here at left) is by Jack Manning, who took it for a New York Times’ story about the opening of Kirkland College, published on Sept. 18, 1968.

Because many of the photos used in our story were not identified with credits — and because Silk was editor and creator of Les Ballons, a book that chronicled the first year of Kirkland — she was likely behind the camera for some of those we included.

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I JUST RECEIVED the ­Winter 2019 Hamilton magazine. The graphics supporting “The ­Meaning of Kirkland” article (pp. 46-51) caught my attention.

I am a member of the last allmale Hamilton graduating class and was there during the preparations for the new college. I have a bit of history to tell about Kirkland that I am sure has not entered either College’s lore. How it would be interpreted today, I am not sure. Attitudes have changed (rightfully so) much over the last 50+ years. I am sure it is harmless. It was of its time.

In spring 1968, there was a special unveiling of the logo graphics that cost many dollars to design. The event was for executives of the various Hamilton student organizations. No one had seen the logo yet and had no hint about what it might be. I was a senior and president of the Newman Club and so invited.

We all met at the Alumni House.

The presidents of Hamilton and Kirkland, several deans, the graphic designers, and we students gathered round. The logo sat on an easel in the front of the room

COMMENTS THE TRUSTEES Stephen I. Sadove ’73, Chair Susan E. Skerritt K’77, Vice Chair

covered with a tarp. After the requisite speeches, the designer whipped the tarp off … ta-da … and there sat the tree logo.

I took one look at it and burst out laughing. The weight of literature studies, history, and biblical studies hit me at once.

Of course, I was asked what I found so silly. I simply said, “Don’t you all see it? There is an apple on that tree.” The “powers” looked at the logo and said “What?” I answered, “Let me explain: Hamilton has been all male for almost 200 years, and now the logo you offer for Kirkland has the Fruit of Knowledge on it ... Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve stuff.” The “powers” took a closer look and one could hear the silence in the room.

The next day I received the swankiest envelope in the mail from the Office of the President.

The contents: A letter thanking me for my contribution in the development effort; however, my participation, though appreciated, was no longer needed. Ah well, a life lesson. Do not criticize what the establishment has spent many dollars to design.

As “texters” say today: LOL. Paul F. X. Schneider ’68 I TEACH undergraduate and graduate seminars on American foreign policy — following the lead of Channing Richardson in my Hamilton day — in the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University. I am always mindful that I am preparing young people for a world of opportunity, but also one

where terrorists attack churches and mosques, where climate change and nuclear weapons pose growing threats, and where too many of America’s political leaders are ethically challenged and/ or woefully unqualified ­­for the high offices they hold. Unsurprisingly many of my students worry about their futures and question the rewards of public service.

I [ended the] semester by saying, “You are the Class of 2019. Many of you are apprehensive about the challenges you will confront after Georgetown.

Let me offer these thoughts. I was in the Class of ’68 at Hamilton College. My last semester began in January with the Tet offensive in Vietnam. (I lost a classmate, Whit Ferguson, in 1969 in Vietnam.) On March 31, President Lyndon Johnson announced he would not run for re-election — driven from office by the war.

A few days later Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated, and riots broke out across the U.S. I graduated from Hamilton on June 2; three days later Bobby Kennedy was assassinated.

“I tell you this not to minimize the challenges you will face, but to let you know that there are opportunities for each and every one of you to make a ­positive difference. The Vietnam War is behind us, and now Americans are welcomed in Vietnam. When I was at Ham­ ilton I spent a summer in Louisiana working for the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) registering would-be voters — now millions of African Americans vote across the South. Accept

the challenges and pursue the opportunities.”

Casimir Yost ’68 Cas Yost was prompted to share this reflection when the magazine put out a call for fashion trends (see pp. 24-25). “I do not know if this is what you are looking for, but it captures what is on my mind,” he wrote. We thought it was worth sharing.

CHARTER TRUSTEES Aron J. Ain ’79 Richard Bernstein ’80 Harold W. Bogle ’75 Brian T. Bristol Julia K. Cowles ’84 Robert V. Delaney, Jr. ’79 Carol T. Friscia K’77 Amy Owens Goodfriend ’82 Philip L. Hawkins ’78 David P. Hess ’77 Gregory T. Hoogkamp ’82 Linda E. Johnson ’80 Lea Haber Kuck ’87 Robert S. Morris ’76 Daniel T.H. Nye ’88 Montgomery G. Pooley ’84 Ronald R. Pressman ’80 Imad I. Qasim ’79 R. Christopher Regan ’77 Nancy Roob ’87 Alexander C. Sacerdote ’94 Jack R. Selby ’96 David M. Solomon ’84 David Wippman ALUMNI TRUSTEES Johannes P. Burlin ’87 Mark T. Fedorcik ’95 Daniel C. Fielding ’07 Matthew T. Fremont-Smith ’84 Ann E. Goizueta ’90 James E. Hacker ’81 John Hadity ’83 Alison M. Hill ’87 Elizabeth A. Marran K’77 Greg M. Schwartz ’94 Kathleen O’Connor Stewart ’84 Sharon S. Walker ’90

JOHN SUPLEE ’69 ASKED that I share this photo (above) of ­Professor Cratty from his archive of images. I have heard from many of our classmates who were saddened by his passing and who praised his mentorship.

John’s image captures the memory of a kind and dedicated scholar and teacher.

Steve Kenny ’69 For a memorial biography of Professor of Chemistry Emeritus Leland “Bud” Cratty, Jr., who died on May 27, please see hamilton.edu/necrology.

LIFE TRUSTEES Henry W. Bedford II ’76 David W. Blood ’81 Christina E. Carroll Drew S. Days III ’63 Gerald V. Dirvin ’59 Sean K. Fitzpatrick ’63 Lee C. Garcia ’67 Eugenie A. Havemeyer Robert G. Howard ’46 Joel W. Johnson ’65 Kevin W. Kennedy ’70 † A.G. Lafley ’69 † George F. Little II ’71 David E. Mason ’61 Arthur J. Massolo ’64 Elizabeth J. McCormack Donald R. Osborn Mary Burke Partridge John G. Rice ’78 Howard J. Schneider ’60 Thomas J. Schwarz ’66 A. Barrett Seaman ’67 Nancy Ferguson Seeley Chester A. Siuda ’70 Charles O. Svenson ’61 Thomas J. Tull ’92 Susan Valentine K’73 Jack Withiam, Jr. ’71 Jaime E. Yordán ’71 † Chairmen Emeriti PRESIDENT OF THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION Paddy J. McGuire ’81

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BECAUSE HAMILTONIANS [...]

Go ahead. Fill in the blank. There’s no shortage of possibilities Because Hamiltonians make an impact in their professions and communities throughout the world.

LEND A HAND

Tanya Namad Lerch ’05 The simple technology can have a profound benefit for children who need a prosthetic hand but who don’t have one, usually because their insurance doesn’t cover it, Lerch says. She’s careful to inform parents that the hands are not highgrade medical prosthetics but to think of them as a toy that can accomplish basic tasks.

Lerch loves it when parents later tell her how their kids proudly show off their new hands to curious classmates.

“It opens up a great conversation about differences when they are younger, and they are able to take charge of those conversations in a positive way,” she says. “For me, I think it’s great if the hand helps you ride your bike, but I think it’s greater if that hand is just giving you confidence to be yourself.” n Learn more at www.sageprosthetics.org.

BRANDON FLINT

THEY CAN BE PINK and purple, or Superman red and blue, or have a Mickey Mouse motif. With them a kid can high five a friend, ride a bike, or play the ukulele in music class.

Teacher Tanya Namad Lerch ’05 and her high school student volunteers have made prosthetic hands that do all those things using a 3D printer. They create the free, customdesigned hands primarily for children and last school year delivered nine of them.

Lerch teaches math at Sage Hill School in Orange County, Calif., where she founded and advises Sage Prosthetics. It’s a chapter of e-NABLE, a nonprofit that promotes using 3D printers and open-source designs to cheaply and easily make prosthetic hands and arms. Lerch made hands even before the Sage chapter, roughly 40 all told.

UNTUCK

Aaron Sanandres ’96

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SOME DO, SOME DON’T. But according to Aaron Sanandres ’96, “There are very few topics in men’s fashion that are universally [pausing to capture the right word] emotional. And this is one of them.” He’s talking about the range of emotions sparked when discussing whether to tuck or not to tuck your shirt.

Still, Sanandres’ research showed that not only did a big segment of those surveyed favor untucked, it also showed that the market lacked a well-fitted, untuckable shirt. In 2011, his friend Chris Riccobono pitched him an idea — create an online company to sell shirts designed to look good hanging out. Sanandres grabbed the opportunity, the company became UNTUCKit, and Sanandres is its CEO.

The venture did so well that in 2016 he left the job he loved at PricewaterhouseCoopers to go totally untucked. The burgeoning UNTUCKit, moving quickly into brick-andmortar, now has 56 stores and counting.

It is positioning to expand into the United Kingdom, says Sanandres, who relishes the dynamic nature of the work.

“The thing I loved about consulting was that you had projects. Everything changed every day, and there’s no sense of monotony,” he says. “Building a business is the antithesis of boring. There’s this whole Brownian motion. Things are always moving.

Always moving. Big decisions have to be made every day.” n

BECAUSE HAMILTONIANS [...]

TRAILBLAZE

ONE OF THE FIRST African American students to earn a philosophy degree at Hamilton, Alfred Prettyman ’56 became a guiding figure in African American philosophy. First, however, he had a groundbreaking career in publishing, becoming an editor at Harper & Row, then leaving to launch, in 1969, a publishing company to create a platform for black intellectuals. In the 1970s, his Emerson Hall Publishers was one of the country’s top black publishers.

But to Todd Franklin, Hamilton’s Christian A. Johnson Excellence in Teaching Professor of Philosophy and Africana Studies, Prettyman’s enduring legacy is founding the Society for the Study of Africana Philosophy.

Prettyman first hosted the society salon in 1976 at his New York City apartment, where it still meets. “He’s always been trailblazing in terms of, as I like to describe it, giving a voice to or creating mediums for the sharing and expression of voice of African American intellectuals,” Franklin says.

The salon has become a mecca for African American philosophers, a space where scholars at all stages of their careers can present work and engage in great conversation, says Franklin, who has done just that.

He describes the society as “a longstanding community of scholars dedicated to clarifying and addressing social issues regarding race.”

In its founder’s assessment, the society’s most significant impact has been to provide a forum for “cordial, but uncompromising” critical discussion across disciplines. “In this we have engaged the works of women and men graduate students, untenured and tenured faculty, as well as unaffiliated intellectuals and members of the community — all of a variety of cultural identities,” explains Prettyman, who is still an active scholar.

The announcements for the society’s meetings give a glimpse of what happens

NANCY L. FORD

Alfred Prettyman ’56

Alfred Prettyman ’56 visited Hamilton in November for the 24th Philosophy Born of Struggle Conference.

on those Sunday afternoons: “What’s Your Tribe?: an open discussion on the recent report Hidden Tribes: A Study of America’s Polarized Landscape; Please read as much of the [160-page] report in advance of the meeting.” Or “At our September meeting, our perennial host Alfred Prettyman will give a presentation and facilitate a discussion on the Sage Philosophy of Frederick Ochieng-Odhiambo. In preparation, please read the ‘African Sage Philosophy’ entry of the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Students are welcome.”

Throughout the years of discussions and meetings, Prettyman has maintained a rich archive of the society, and he recently

donated all of it to Hamilton. He wants it to be used as a resource for active study and research and considered Hamilton, with Franklin as curator, to be the best place to house it. Franklin is working to establish the archive with Director and Curator of Special Collections and Archives Christian Goodwillie and with help from students. One of the goals is to digitize the materials, which include audiotapes of the salons.

“The idea is to really ramp that up in terms of digital humanities and have it as an opportunity for students to create different types of projects and draw upon it as a resource,” Franklin says. “I want it to be something that inspires thought.” n

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SUPPORT CULTURE

Among your accomplishments, what are you most excited about?

What excites me the most about my career so far is that I have witnessed unbelievable milestones in the development of the arts and culture arena in my country. I am proud to have played a significant role in this and know that I have built, with my team, a sustainable institution from the ground up.

I recently launched a dream project of mine called Museums Express, which was in the making for two years. It’s an arts education initiative that brings a mobile coach bus fitted with an exhibition to schools in rural areas of the Emirate of Sharjah. I wanted to find a solution for children unable to experience museums because of their geographical distance to the city. The program provides free visits to schools alongside art workshops we deliver onsite. We are impacting thousands of students by the end of this year, and I hope to take it nationwide. n

Manal Ataya ’01

AS DIRECTOR-GENERAL of Sharjah Museums Authority, Manal Ataya ’01 manages a diverse range of museums in her native United Arab Emirates. France recently awarded Ataya its Chevaliers de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, one of the country’s highest awards for cultural contributions. In the last few years the two countries have engaged in joint cultural initiatives. We asked Ataya to tell us about her work.

Why is the Sharjah Museums Authority important?

Culture is central to social cohesion and lays the foundation for intercultural understanding and dialogue. [The authority] was established in 2006 to strengthen and nurture the cultural scene in the UAE and the Emirate of Sharjah in particular. For the last 10 years I have been responsible for the overall management of 17 museums ranging from art to archaeology, the strategic planning of future cultural projects, and building partnerships with global museum institutions. My role also includes work in the area of cultural diplomacy and cultural heritage preservation.

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How did you get from Hamilton to where you are now?

I owe being in Hamilton’s environment to giving me a strong belief in myself and what I could accomplish. Particular faculty members encouraged me to pursue postgraduate study, so after I graduated I applied to the few U.S. programs in museum studies. I knew I would not be a practicing artist; however, I wanted to combine my love for art and education. Museums were the obvious career move for me. After graduating with a master’s from Harvard, I came back to the UAE in 2004 and was the only person in the country with a degree in this field. Fortunately I was recommended for a position as the founding deputy director of a new authority. Two years on I was promoted to my current position.

Jack Confrey ’19

BECAUSE HAMILTONIANS [...]

GO WEST

Brian Callahan ’66 HISTORY LOVER BRIAN CALLAHAN ’66 went from Hamilton to earn a master’s degree in medieval history. Then he began his chosen career of teaching until the meager income forced him into a sharp turn.

Callahan went into commercial banking, which he enjoyed until retirement out West pointed him back in his original direction.

He is the volunteer president and a founder of the Lifelong Learning Club in Sun City, Ariz. It’s a lot of work to plan and schedule courses and instructors; the payoff is that he gets to teach. Callahan has led courses on American and Irish folk music, the Civil War, and famous Western films 1939 through 1962, to name a few.

“My favorite course, the one that I’ve done the most, three or four times, is called Gunfighters of the Old West,” Callahan says. He covers famous range wars and feuds, the outlaw as popular hero, and the flip side, lawmen. Turns out a lot of them were at one point criminals. “It’s an intriguing dichotomy how many of these guys are actually bad men themselves that turn out heroes,” the teacher observes.

This fall he’ll teach courses on British comedies and siege warfare in the Civil War. Over the last 11 years, Callahan has taught 25 different courses, maybe more, and the ideas are still flowing. Near the top of his bucket list of courses he would like to teach — something related to the U.S. Revolutionary War. n

COMPETE

Joe Gilbert ’87 JOE GILBERT ’87, Hamilton’s first football player to earn first-team All-America honors, is the new offensive line coach for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. He started the job in January, the latest move in a coaching career that has taken him back and forth between colleges and the NFL. The best thing about his job with the Bucs is working with head coach Bruce Arians and “the type of players who are the best in the world,” as Gilbert puts it. It’s what he’s always aimed for. “I think that’s the one thing that’s always driven me — if you’re going to do something, do it at the highest level. And I’m having the opportunity to do that,” he says.

COOK

Rich Vellante ’86 RICH VELLANTE ’86 was studying in Rome during his junior year at Hamilton when he befriended an Italian chef and discovered his passion for cooking. However, he hesitated to follow this newfound dream, thinking, “The idea of being a chef is not what a college graduate would ever pursue.”

After a year working in marketing for a Fortune 500 company, however, he traded his business attire for chef ’s whites and

His first coaching job out of Hamilton was a graduate assistantship at the University at Albany. Before Tampa, he coached six seasons with the Indianapolis Colts and last year at the University of Arizona, where his unit helped the Wildcats lead the Pac-12 in rushing. n

enrolled in the French Culinary Institute.

From there he worked in kitchens across the globe and owned an Italian restaurant in Massachusetts before beginning his journey with Legal Sea Foods, where he is now executive vice president and executive chef.

While he has received countless accolades for his work, including the Massachusetts Restaurant Association’s 2018 Chef of the Year award, Vellante considers his biggest accomplishment to be his more than 20 years of commitment to Legal, where he is leading the company’s transformation into a “lean thinking model.” He is spearheading the application of these efficient management and production principles to the Legal Sea Foods kitchens.

As for his favorite item on the menu?

It changes with the seasons, but his staples include the lobster roll, Dover sole with ­capers and lemon butter sauce, and cioppino, a mix of seafood in a tomato-basil broth. n — Grace Collins

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9

BOB HANDELMAN

BECAUSE HAMILTONIANS [...]

Walker Lourie ’15 out on the water in New York’s Peconic Bay

SHUCK

Walker Lourie ’15 JUST WHEN THE HAMPTONS get fun for the summer, the work day of Walker Lourie ’15 grows longer as he tends to his million-plus charges. “You can be out there for 14 hours on a tough day, or you could do a 12-hour day on the water then have to go and shuck oysters at a private event,” says the co-founder of West Robins Oyster Co. “But the work has never been a problem for me.

[There’s] that moment when you actually get to eat something you’ve spent all this time creating — and when other people eat it and

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give you positive feedback, like, ‘This is the best oyster I’ve ever had.’”

Maybe they’re just being nice, Lourie ­concedes, but he thinks there’s a pearl of truth in the words. He is convinced his operation is nearing its goal of producing the best oyster in New York state. The business, located on 225 acres in Peconic Bay, put its first baby oysters in the water in 2016. It sells primarily to private events and local restaurants, but this summer will wholesale in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

Walker champions the sustainability of the oyster as crop. It needs no food or fertilizer beyond what it extracts by filtering water, a process that also cleans the water, explains Lourie, who majored in environmental studies. “Part of my life’s mission is to leave the planet better than I found it. A lot of people say that, but I think I can actually attain that by farming oysters. Because if you’re doing it on the scale of millions, and each filters 30 to 50 gallons of water a day, that’s a huge footprint,” he says. n

BECAUSE HAMILTONIANS [...]

ENSEÑAR (TEACH) Paula Eberhart K’78

AFTER GRADUATING from Kirkland College, Paula Eberhart K’78 received a Rotary International Graduate Fellowship to study at the Universidad de Belgrano in Buenos Aires.

She has called Argentina home ever since.

Eberhart spent four years in the country’s capital while she completed her graduate thesis, danced in nationally renowned companies, and met her husband. They then settled in the city of Monte Caseros, where Paula was approached by students interested in learning English. She became a teacher through the Asociación Argentina de Cultura Inglesa, the country’s largest nonprofit English teaching institute, before opening a school of her own.

That school, known as the Cultural Inglesa de Monte Caseros, has been thriving.

Educating more than 150 students a year, these extracurricular English immersion courses are offered at all levels to all ages.

Her students are well-equipped for

“Music and dance form the heartbeat of my life’s work.” success and have gone on to become doctors, engineers, translators, and English professors. Two of her former students have even returned to Monte Caseros after careers teaching English in the United States and are currently teachers at the school.

Eberhart has also founded community choirs in Monte Caseros and incorporates movement exercises in both her choirs and her classes. “Music and dance form the heartbeat of my life’s work,” she says. n — Grace Collins

THE DETAILS, FOR NOW, are available only on a need-to-know basis. But this much is public knowledge: A secret, international organization of women scientists has coalesced to save the world.

“The fun part is it’s a secret,” says Heather Einhorn ’07, “so a lot of the details you’ll discover in the graphic novel and in the TV show. We’re keeping it under wraps.”

The hush-hush organization is known as The Curie Society.

As co-founder and CEO of Einhorn’s Epic Productions, Einhorn and her team came up with the idea, and it’s taking off.

Working with MIT Press, a Curie Society young adult graphic novel is scheduled for release next year. In addition, MIT Press and Einhorn’s Epic are working with Massive, a science media company, to create a companion online Curie Society made up of real-world women science superheros

and young fans. A television show is also in the works.

This is just the latest project from Einhorn’s Epic Productions. Last year her company teamed with iHeartRadio to create a scripted podcast, Lethal Lit: A Tig Torres Mystery, that starred a female teen detective. The New York Times included it in a story about five great podcasts of 2018.

The Curie Society reflects Einhorn’s focus on creating what she describes as “the next generation of heroic franchise properties,” which is diverse and female forward. “For the Curie Society, our goal is to create an exciting, action-adventure entertainment property, but to show a group of diverse women as the heroes — women who are excited about using their intelligence and their scientific skills in action-adventure scenarios,” she explains.

She hopes also to inspire young women to pursue STEM careers. n

HAVE HEROES

Heather Einhorn ’07

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11

RECENT NEWS HIGHLIGHTS From across the Hamilverse

1 MINOR FIELD Hamilton conducted a large-scale emergency drill in partnership with the New York State Police and the New York Air National Guard on March 18. To comply with the federal Clery Act, the College is required to test its response systems annually. Drill activities took place across campus, and just after noon the National Guard landed a Chinook helicopter on Minor Field.

1

2

2 KIRNER-JOHNSON BUILDING Jim Messina and Reince Priebus held an off-the-record Q&A session with government students in the Red Pit prior to their Common Ground discussion on April 11. Messina, former deputy chief of staff to President Obama, and Priebus, President Trump’s former chief of staff, shared an exclusive look into their experiences at the White House. “We got to see a little bit more of how the sausage gets made,” said Alex Nemeth ’22.

3 TOLLES PAVILION Students, faculty, and staff packed the Annex for a Student Assembly-sponsored Town Hall on April 29. Topics, chosen by vote of the student body in advance, included sexual misconduct and social life on campus. Those gathered not only identified issues but worked together to discuss potential solutions.

3

4 SPENCER HOUSE Viet Thanh Nguyen, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of the novel The Sympathizer, visited campus on April 9 as part of the Winton Tolles Lecture Series. Students and faculty joined him for dinner prior to his public presentation titled “Refugee Stories and American Greatness.”

Nguyen emphasized the importance of understanding the complexity of identity and increasing representation in the field of literature.

WANT MORE HAMILTON NEWS? Visit hamilton.edu/news.

And if you’re not receiving our monthly Hamilton Headlines in your inbox, send a note to editor@hamilton.edu, and we’ll add you to the list.

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H A M I LTO N

4

5 WELLIN MUSEUM “Theaters of Fiction,” an exhibit of works that address both the theatre and opera’s historic associations with power, privilege, and wealth and those that represent sites of more democratic and popular entertainment, included more than 20 works by seven international contemporary artists. As part of the interactive WellinWorks series, an experimental, pop-up theatre space accompanied the spring exhibit.

5 6 PRINT SHOP

7 6

No such thing as “Stop the presses!” When a replacement part for a broken 25-year-old printing press was unable to be found, Rhudi Darko ’20 stepped in. Utilizing skills gained as a Library and Information Technology Services tutor, Darko replicated the part on a 3D printer using digital modeling software. “This is just one example of what Digital Hamilton looks like,” said Scott Paul, Help Desk and LITS student manager. “We’re able to utilize technologies on campus to help students learn, research, and become involved in projects like this.”

7 CHRISTIAN A. JOHNSON HALL

8

Bob Moses ’56 met with students in government and mathematics classes on Feb. 20 to share his experiences as an activist, both in civil rights and in education. Moses played a central role in the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee during the Civil Rights Movement, was instrumental in forming the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, and subsequently founded The Algebra Project, a national mathematics literacy effort for high school students.

8 BRISTOL CENTER In April, Hamilton participated in StoryCorps’ new “One Small Step” initiative. This program encourages and facilitates discussions between individuals on opposing sides of political issues in an effort to find common ground among the participants. Students, faculty, staff, and members of the greater Mohawk Valley community opted to share stories from their lives that shaped their beliefs.

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13

Students2Mentors NANCY L. FORD

T

Anecia Lawrence passes the Girlz2Women “talk ball” to Tori Stapleton ’19 (right) after getting it from Anna Macdonald ’20 (left).

NANCY L. FORD

Hamilton students get kids amped up for some basketball at a Boyz2Men event.

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ori Stapleton ’19 is convinced that the role models we encounter in elementary and middle school help determine who we become later in life. As founder of Girlz2Women and Boyz2Men, known collectively as EmPower Moves, she has mobilized Hamilton students to engage with local children through games, activities, and conversation designed to build confidence and confront gender norms.

A sociology major, Stapleton created Girlz2Women as an offshoot of Hamilton’s Strong Girls chapter, started by Katherine Kreider ’18 and Eleni Neyland ’18. Where Strong Girls focused on encouraging elementary school-aged girls to participate in athletics, Girlz2Women combines sports and other activities to inspire confidence in middle school-aged girls in all areas of life. Meetings of Girlz2Women, held at the Thea Bowman House in Utica, have centered around such themes as building a positive self-image, defining beauty, and discussing what it means to be an empowered woman.

This year Stapleton introduced a new group, Boyz2Men, to connect young boys with role models of their own. Her inspiration? Growing up with two brothers who “sometimes had trouble expressing their emotions in a healthy way because it’s so stigmatized in our culture in general,” she says. “It’s hard to have important conversations if half of our population is stunted and silenced emotionally.” Boyz2Men meetings are held at nearby Sauquoit Central School, focusing on elementary school-aged boys.

Both Girlz2Women and Boyz2Men have given Hamilton students from different backgrounds opportunities to connect with the surrounding area. Members of athletics teams, a cappella groups, and past orientation leaders have all volunteered with EmPower Moves. “I wanted this group to be a safe space for everyone to confront emotional issues,” Stapleton says. “Most of all, I wanted these kids to know that it isn’t a girly thing, talking about your emotions — it’s a human thing.”

— Libby Militello ’22

NANCY L. FORD

For Next Class, Please Read …

We asked four literature and creative writing professors about their favorite book to assign.

(How many have you read?)

Tina Hall, professor of literature and creative writing Bargain hunters score some great deals at a past Cram & Scram in Sage Rink.

PRE Cram & Scram THERE’S EVERYTHING FROM SMALL APPLIANCES and school supplies to room furniture and decor. And although most items left behind in May (after students “cram” their cars and “scram” from campus) are held for the fall’s Cram & Scram event, those deemed unsuitable for resale are donated to charitable organizations. Here’s a partial list of things that found a home off campus over the summer.

187 POUNDS

164 POUNDS

of non-perishable food items and cleaning supplies to

of winter clothing to

2,285 POUNDS

136 POUNDS

of clothing, linens, pillows, and 3 boxes of toiletries to

of sheets and towels to the

STEVENS SWAN HUMANE SOCIETY

of linens and pillows to

THEA BOWMAN HOUSE

>1,400 POUNDS of furniture to

CNY VETERANS OUTREACH CENTER

RESCUE MISSION OF UTICA

2

BAGS

435 POUNDS

Onno Oerlemans, professor of literature and associate dean of faculty

ON POINT FOR COLLEGE

CLARK MILLS COUNTRY PANTRY

of hangers to

THRIFTY SHOPPER

My favorite book to assign is Frankenstein due to: grave robbing, galvanism, ghost-storycompetition-betweenfamous-poets origin story, lots of male fainting, high level of improbable coincidence, Arctic expanses, Alpine jaunts, bodies washing up on shore, pleas for creature comforts and companionship, tracery of a bright mind (Mary Shelley’s, to be clear) grappling with issues of scientific progress and parenthood and destiny of humankind, the eternal debate between natural and unnatural, a monster who has upstaged the title character for 200 years and counting.

TOTALING NEARLY

5,000 POUNDS

of materials not only diverted from local landfills, but donated to

LOCAL CAUSES

Although I rarely get a chance to assign it, Moby Dick is my favorite novel to teach. It requires slow and careful reading, and most students approach it with a sense of trepidation. They know it’s long, and they’ve probably heard that it’s dull and not really a novel. When I teach it over the course of three or four weeks, we get a chance to see why it’s so wonderful: rich and complex characters, beautiful sentences, sly humor, genre-busting formal Continued on page 18 …

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15

SHOW AND TELL

The Periodic Table

H Alexander Hamilton

Li

Do you think about Hamilton periodically? As a salute to Russian chemist Dmitri Mendeleev, who published the first periodic table of elements 150 years ago in 1869, we thought it might be fun to create our own ... but with a Hamilton twist.

(Don’t worry — unlike your high school chemistry class, there will be no pop quiz tomorrow!)

Ds

Lightside

Nb

Darkside

Pb

Need-Blind Admission

K

Phi Beta Kappa

Ga

Know Thyself

Oc

1

Go Away!

In

Curly Friday

4

Writing Intensive

Te

Bh

Teacher-Scholars

Because Hamilton []

La

Ji

Senior Canes

Cf

Open Curriculum

Sc

6

Lu

Lake Effect

Long Underwear

The Jitney

As Alternative Spring Break

Be

V-Day Buffergrams

Bell Ringer Award

Cd

Hc

Class & Charter Day

Ci

Hs Housing Lottery

Th

Cider Mill Donuts

Db

Senior Thesis

Characteristics

V

Diner B

Aj

Fallcoming

Hg Hogwarts at Hamilton

Dh

Ax Alex

Rn

Cg

Alumni Network

Derek Jeter

#GetScrolled

Digital Humanities Initiative

An Dj

Gs

Xe TEDx Hamilton

Amy James

Honor Code

Fl

2

10

Zr

Common Ground

Zipcar Rental

Ph

Ht Hamtrek

Rites & Traditions

Reunion

Phyllis Breland ’80

Community

KEY

1. About two-thirds of Hamilton students study off campus.

2. Feeling “COOP”ed up? See Amy James, director of the Community Outreach and Opportunity Program, who helps students find service roles in the area.

3. Symbol of Kirkland College and a student publication dedicated to “innovative cultural criticism and feminist art and writing.”

4. Students must complete three writing-intensive courses offered throughout the curriculum.

5. Pink was Hamilton’s official color until President Stryker suggested buff & blue.

6. Hamilton’s $400 million campaign supports digital leadership, career exploration, financial aid, living & learning, the humanities, and the Hamilton Fund.

Ke Kennedy

Ar

Ce Center

Tl

Wr Writing Center

Ba

Br Bronze Map

C

Cl Clinton, N.Y.

Or

Si

7

Siuda House

Pu

7. Likely the first stop for future Hamiltonians — the Office of Admission and Financial Aid. 8. Also known as a “dink,” a “slimer” is a green beanie first-year students were once required to wear by upperclassmen.

9. Hamilton’s campus was designated as an arboretum in 2004 for its setting, collections, and educational goals.

The Yankee great is just one of the speakers to visit campus as part of the Sacerdote Great Names series.

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Jazz Archive

Taylor Science Center

Fillius Events Barn

Chapel

Oral Communication Center

The Little Pub

SHOW AND TELL

of Hamilton College B Words by Stacey Himmelberger, Lynn Kim ’21, and Maureen Nolan

Ca

Black and Latinx Student Union

Al

Images by Jack Confrey ’19 and Isaac Fung ’21

Me

First President Azel Backus

Cb

Am

Citrus Bowl

Campo

Pd

Mb

Parade

Pe Saunders’ Peonies

Np

Mango Brie Panini

Pr

Au

President Wippman

“Golden” Voices of the College Choir

Fm

Hb

F.I.L.M.

Hamilton Hub

Ap 5

Pink?!

3

Green Apple

Houseparties

Steak Nite

8

Slimers

Cs

Ch

College Seal

Ge Sn

Er Sm

Meditation Club

Geological Society

Elihu Root Class of 1864

Ho

Campus Activities Board

The Charlatans

Cr Carissima

Kr Samuel Kirkland

History

Hu

Gd

Bristol Center Hub

At Arboretum

9

Pe

G-Road Apartments Peters Observatory

Cm Commons

Bk Beinecke Village

N

O

Nordic Ski Team

Outing Club

Sa

Photography Club

Student Assembly

Mc

Y

Sr The Spectator

Bi Bike Co-op

Md

Health & Wellness

F

P

Mock Trial

He Ne

Field Hockey

U Fr

Ta Tumbling After

Po Power Yoga

Ra

Model UN

WHCL

Root Glen

Cu Couper Hall

Co

Re

Café Opus

Es Eells House

Red Pit

S Rock Swing

Athletics Director Jon Hind ’80

Rb

French Club

I

Rugby

Sf

Investment Club

Mt

Steuben Field

Cn

Mathletics

Ps

Continentals

Go Go Blue!

Poetry Slam

Clubs & Organizations

Rg

Ad

Untitled @ Large

Yodapez

NESCAC

Athletics

W Wellin Museum

Mn Martin’s Way

Kc Kirkland Cottage

No North Residence Hall

Lv Levitt Center

Lr Burke Library

Special thanks to the magazine staff at The College of New Jersey, from whom we borrowed this concept!

Places & Features

S U M M E R 2 0 1 9

17

A League of their Own JOSHUA D. MCKEE

… Continued from page 15

elements, historically rich realism, extraordinary symbolism, to name a few. Plus, it does explore whales and our relationship to them and animals more generally, which is a particular passion of mine. It is still one of the greatest novels in English.

Margaret Thickstun, the Jane Watson Irwin Professor of Literature I would have to say Milton’s Paradise Lost, because it is such a clearly rich and opinionated text that it sort of teaches itself: students feel a great sense of accomplishment working their way through the poem, and they find it impossible not to fight with him (which makes for great class discussions). But I also love to teach Sharon Creech’s Love That Dog, which seems focused at middle grades but raises all sorts of great questions about what makes something a poem (the little boy whose weekly journal the book reproduces finds it all perplexing: “If that’s a poem, then all you have to do is make short lines!” “Why doesn’t he just keep going if he has miles to go before he sleeps?”). It fits in classes about poetry and in classes about how narratives work.

Endlessly flexible, funny, and very short!

Steven Yao, the Edmund A. LeFevre Professor of English My favorite book to assign is Ulysses by James Joyce for two reasons: 1) It remains the greatest novel written in English (so far). And 2) Reading it is therefore nearly always a life-changing experience.

Nothing ever looks quite the same after you’ve made it through the 700+ pages, divided into 18 chapters, each chapter done in its own distinct style.

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T

he World Cup champion U.S. women’s soccer team wasn’t the only group of ladies who made history this year. Hamilton’s softball squad cracked the record books when it logged its 27th victory, breaking the College record for most wins by any team in a season previously held by the 1990-91 men’s basketball team. Smashing their program best of 15 wins, the Continentals (28-10 overall) advanced to the NESCAC tournament, a first for the team. Here are reflections from three players about their memorable season.

ON WINNING Liz Brautigam ’19: We knew that we were going to beat the Hamilton softball record for most wins; however, I don’t think anyone was aware of the College record. Hamilton has a strong athletics program, so it was an honor.

Caitlin Berreitter ’20: I remember my dad joking about winning 28 games this year during our games down in Florida over spring break ... We wanted to celebrate by winning more games.

TEAM TRADITIONS Brautigam: My favorite team ritual is our dance parties in the locker room before our home games.

Helen Lin ’19: Every year before the team goes to Florida we go to a hibachi dinner. I

think this has always been a great way to foster camaraderie with our team and help returning players get to know the freshman class better.

SEASON HIGHLIGHTS Lin: The greatest play of this season was when Emily [Fraser ’20] hit a walk-off home run against SUNY Plattsburgh. I remembered us being down by one run, but just knowing we were going to win the game. I think it was this moment that solidified the idea to me that we were going to do great things this season.

BEST ADVICE Berreitter: Our head coach, Coach [Stephanie] Hartquist, would often talk about team mentality and how it was one of the most important things to have going into the season.

She consistently emphasized that this was

Caitlin Berreitter ’20, Liz Brautigam ’19 (captain), and Helen Lin ’19 (captain). not an individual sport about individual stats or records. Rather, this season was going to be about enjoying softball and supporting our teammates both on and off the field.

Lin: Before one game, Coach Hartquist told us to put our hand on the shoulder of the person next to us. She then said for us to look at who we had our hand on and whose hand was on our shoulder. This was to show that we all have each other’s backs. That if I felt down, the person whose hand was on my shoulder would pick me up, and if the person I had my hand on was down, it was my responsibility to pick her up. I think this was a great moment and brought us closer as a team and took away a lot of individual pressure.

HAMILTON runs ON BUNDY For residents of Bundy, Wally-J, Wertimer, Skenandoa, and other points down College Hill, walking to and from classes develops more than firm calf muscles — it also helps muster an appetite. Introducing the Bundy Café and Lounge (formerly Bundy Dining Hall), which provides a space for students to eat, gather, socialize, and study without leaving the comforts of “home.” The café offers light breakfast fare on weekdays and brunch on Saturday and Sunday. Evening goodies are available too, which come in handy for late-night study sessions or when catching friends perform.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO ACHIEVE THIS RECOGNITION? Berreitter: It’s incredible to be a part of a team that is in the Hamilton history books. We had an amazing group of hardworking and brilliant girls this season, and I am so happy to share such an honor with them. It makes me feel like all the work I put in before and at Hamilton is being celebrated by the entire community.

Brautigam: What it means to me is that all the hard work from current and former players has paid off. It was the best way to end my senior year — to see everything come together and make it all worth it.

— Grace Collins

[PAYS IT FORWARD] The books are officially closed on the 2018-19 Hamilton Annual Fund. Here are a few facts about the year’s effort, which supports such College priorities as student financial aid, digital learning and the academic program, career exploration, athletics, and extracurricular activities.

GOOOOOAL! $7.156 million was raised, once again topping the goal, which was $7.15 million.

Early bird: Mary Mahon-Foley ’80 made the first online gift of the fiscal year at 12:08 a.m. on July 1, 2018.

Taking the lead: Celebrating its 35th reunion, the Class of 1984 contributed $521,360 to the Hamilton Fund, the most of any class.

The power of many: 7,608 alumni made a gift to the 2018-19 fund. The 42% alumni participation rate, while envied by the vast majority of colleges and universities, slipped from 45% in 2017-18.

GOLDen effort: The 10 most recently graduated classes (a.k.a. Graduates Of the Last Decade) collectively raised $140,822. The Class of 2012 led the way with $31,712.

For whom the bell tolls: George Sherwin ’63, P’90, who started his monthly contributions in 2011, is the longest continuous donor to the Chapel Bell Society, which recognizes individuals who establish recurring gifts. And making the most of Chapel Bell Society membership is Bob Guth ’82, whose contributions each month support five separate initiatives.

Thanks Mom and Dad: The Parent’s Fund topped its goal by raising $810,911 for the Hamilton Fund from 1,273 current and past parents.

Last but not least: Jean McGavin K’76 made the last online gift of the fiscal year at 11:47 p.m. on June 30, 2019.

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19

THE BIG PICTURE

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H A M I LTO N

Field of Green HAMILTON DEDICATED ITS PGAquality golf practice facility in June, one year after the death of its beloved namesake, Professor of Philosophy Bob Simon.

Located on the site of the former golf course, the Simon Golf Center features a large putting green, short game area, and a full driving range.

Golf Coach Lauren Cupp ’07 says the facility will give her players the opportunity to perfect their game on a championship facility. Plus the venue provides excellent instructional space for students choosing golf to fulfill a physical education requirement. Both objectives would receive endorsement from Simon, who came to Hamilton in 1968 where he taught philosophy and for many years served as golf coach.

Mark Fedorcik ’95 provided leadership funding for the center to honor a man who taught him “humility, sportsmanship, and making whatever you do fun.”

Simon’s former student adds, “Golf and Hamilton had been such an important part of coach’s life and that of his entire family. There’s no better way to honor him than with this new facility.”

PHOTO BY NANCY L. FORD

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21

VOICES

VIEW FROM COLLEGE HILL

Why do West Side Story?

BY M A R K C RY E R Associate Professor of Theatre

The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions that have been hidden by the answers.

— JA MES BA LDWIN, n oveli st & pl aywr i ght

W

EST SIDE STORY WAS THE FIRST play I had ever seen. I was in the sixth grade, and I cried like a baby! A colleague asked me, “Why do West Side Story?” This simple, yet powerful, question has stayed with me.

Based on Shakespeare’s Romeo & Juliet, West Side Story is at its core a love story. When first produced in 1957, it was a groundbreaking production not only for its original score, but for the diversity in its casting. With a focus on the Shark gang being primarily recent Puerto Rican immigrants, the sight of a Broadway cast that included over 20 actors of color was a unique event in 1957.

Although both Jerome Robbins and Leonard Bernstein had by this point established a solid track record in representing progressive racial issues on stage, West Side Story isn’t without issues when viewed through a contemporary prism. While the Sharks are meant to be primarily Puerto Rican, there is no mention of Puerto Rican culture anywhere in the script.

So why attempt to present a play with such a problematic history in 2019 when our sensitivities and norms are much different? Theatre, since its inception, has been used to highlight social issues, to address difficult topics such as racism and sexism, to articulate the hopes and dreams of

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H A M I LTO N

its citizens, and to tell stories. At the forefront of this have been actors who are tasked with telling other people’s stories, sometimes representing other cultures, ethnicities, and genders. Within the Theatre Department at Hamilton, we routinely break boundaries with our casting choices as a way of broadening our theatrical offerings, of being more inclusive, of telling a more relevant story to the community at large. When we do so, we do so with a heavy emphasis on research, allowing the actors to portray and represent a three-dimensional character, not a stereotype.

Why do West Side Story? At a learning institution that prides itself on teaching critical thinking, the semester-long conversations this production has generated should make us all proud as we seek a deeper understanding of societal issues faced by many “othered” groups today and as we raise questions around who gets to tell these stories. We can be proud of how theatre in its truest form doesn’t shy away from these issues; it instead chooses to problematize them, expose them, to make a difference through our art. With this in mind, half of the box office receipts from this production went to Hurricane Maria relief. Finally, this production allows us to highlight a salient fact — love is not a color, nor is it reserved for a specific ethnicity, gender, or sexual orientation. It belongs to us all and is the tie that binds us.

Why do West Side Story? Because “The purpose of art is to lay bare the questions that have been hidden by the answers.” n

COMMON GROUND

Good for What Ails You? WE ASKED TWO PHYSICIANS, Allan Guiney ’08

and Matthew Crowson ’09, to stake out a position on the benefits vs. drawbacks to consumers of drug advertising by pharmaceutical companies.

Crowson is an otolaryngologist/head and neck surgeon at the University of Toronto.

Guiney works as an attending physician and medical school course director in emergency medicine at Bassett Hospital in Cooperstown, N.Y.

MATTHEW CROWSON ’09

B

y the end of 2020, medical school educators estimate that the entire body of medical knowledge will double every 73 days, according to research published by the American Clinical and Climatological Association. To keep up with this incessant torrent of new medical knowledge, physicians read journals or blogs, listen to podcasts, or attend conferences to learn about the latest therapies and medications for their patients. However, juggling the day-to-day grind of a busy clinical practice in combination with administrative and family obligations can make it difficult for physicians to remain up to speed. As a result, physicians may not always be aware of the latest and greatest interventions for their patients.

Pharmaceutical companies can help patients become active participants in their care by informing them of new therapies via direct-to-consumer advertising. I have been witness to several occasions where a patient brought a therapy advertisement for a new drug that the physician was unaware of. While a care plan needs to be individualized for each patient’s circumstances, keeping an open dialogue where a patient can be an active participant in treatment decisions is a win-win for both the patient and physician.

Direct-to-consumer advertising can be an effective instrument to provide patients with information so that they may be better self-advocates. n

ALLAN GUINEY ’08

P

harmaceutical advertising is about making money for pharmaceutical shareholders. That’d be fine in a free and open market, but health care isn’t a free market at all.

Imagine watching an ad for a pickup truck with an off-road suspension. You may not be an “expert,” but as a consumer you know how cars work in general and how you’d use one in your daily life. Do you drive off-road often? Do you even need a new car right now? You know how the product works, can decide if you need it, and decide if you want to spend money on it. In turn, carmakers will build more of what consumers want and need.

In contrast, most patients know little about their health and disease. They almost never get to choose when they need medicine,

and if a patient is fortunate enough to have insurance, he won’t know the price. Further, the money he spends will not really be his own (it comes from society as a whole, through payments to insurers and the taxes that fund Medicare and Medicaid).

Despite all this, the ads do work, and they sell a lot of medications that are new, patented, and expensive. Those meds make profits for shareholders, but they’re often not the ones that would keep our country healthy without bankrupting it. The U.S. is one of only two large countries that allows direct advertising, and it’s no secret that most other countries spend less money for better healthcare outcomes. If we want cheap medications that keep our patients healthy, then that’s what we should pay for. n

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THE BIG QUESTION

WE ASKED OUR READERS

In the past few years, I’ve noticed that the Hamilton community has turned away from general trends for highly concentrated personal styles instead. I’ve seen a person who wears exclusively bright colors on top and bottom, a girl who wears platform boots every day, a dark-sider who wears a different pair of patterned pants and posts them on Instagram, and everything in between. I could identify my friends from their closets alone with ease.

— ALI ZILDJIAN ’19 (editor of the campus magazine Signature Style) For responses to a previous issue’s Big Question, see hamilton.edu/bigquestion.

Illustrations by Alex Eben Meyer

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7 for All of Mankind jeans were huge when we were in college … and by senior year I had procured a pair. My roommate [Ruthie Leoniuk Godfrey ’05] and I would switch off days wearing them. They were so cute and so flattering; I loved those jeans!

— KATE CALDWELL ELWELL ’05

Upon arriving on the Hill in thefall of ’56, identical twin brother [Jim Allen ’60] bought a red fur-lined Army waterproof down surplus hooded parka in Utica, and I purchased a gray one.

Wore them all four years. Many students wore tweed sports coats, or blue blazers, with repp [striped] ties, particularly at fraternity house dinners.

— JOHN ALLEN ’60 Earth shoes — PENNY WATRAS DANA K’78

Bodysuits, cutoff jean shorts, oversized flannels, Birkenstocks, and “pegged” pants. I also remember the hideous fashion of overalls for both guys and girls. Yuck!

— TINA MCSORLEY SOMMER ’96 Oxford button-downs and Shetland or Fair Isle sweaters. Duck shoes. Leg warmers and painter’s pants/overalls. Clogs. Polo shirts (collar up) and Levi’s bootleg blue jeans. Shoulder pads in almost everything for women!

— LIZ FINEGAN MENGES ’84 (and sundry members of her class) Bring back: Hair Forget: Platform shoes — RICH BERNSTEIN ’80

What fashion trend from your college days would you sooner bring back — or forget?

Members of the Class of 1969 were in an especially reflective mood — could it be a result of celebrating their 50th reunion this year? Several weighed in on fashion trends, including …

Not a craze, but something we did: Colgate athletic jackets, two-buck suits from St. Vincent de Paul, H letter sweaters worn backwards, pho-ties with women in bathing suits pictured inside, raccoon coats, capes from Army surplus stores, bowling shirts, “lizard” outfits (every piece in green), ratty tweeds, biker boots.

I’m sure I’ve forgotten something. Sorry, no photos allowed.

— HARRY “HANK” HUTSON ’69

Sideburns.

— TOM DUCIBELLA ’69 The Woodstock look was all the rage. Kirkland had it, and so did women’s colleges nearby. Nothing beat the music, the bell-bottomed, peasant-bloused girls, free from mom and dad, hot for adventure with the quiet confidence that they would soon be fierce young women ready to change and lead the world. Yale’s Sam Babbitt had no doubts about his Kirkland charges nor did Hamilton’s John Chandler, the gentleman president and scholar who gave polish to that college on a hill.

— ROBERT “SYD” HAVELY ’69

Since I was from West Virginia, how about bib overalls and red bandannas! I also liked wearing really skinny ties and bow ties. Seersucker would be nice, too, because that would mean it’s warm and we could have an “endless summer” — not a bad thing after those brutal Hamilton winters, which I now know as cruel and unusual punishment — something that stunted my growth!

— LEWIS “BUBBA” LAWSON ’69 Remember the Bass Weejuns we made last for four years by taping the soles to the uppers with white tape we took from the training supplies in the gym locker room?

— STEVE POTTER ’69

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QUOTABLES

You are our life’s work.

Olivia Valcarce ’15, assistant editor at Scholastic Books, sharing advice with students during a “How to Get Published” Career Center panel in March that also featured Zoë Bodzas ’16, assistant literary agent at McIntosh & Otis, Andrew Gibeley ’16, assistant publicist at Harper Collins, and Kyandreia Jones ’19, a published author through Chooseco.

At the end of the day, this institution is the people who comprise it — and that includes each and every one of us.

Illustrations by Jack Confrey ’19

Dan Chambliss, the Eugene M. Tobin Distinguished Professor of Sociology, addressing students at the annual Class & Charter Day celebration in May.

In my heart, the only thing I wanted to say was, ‘This happened to me, too.’

Social activist and #MeToo movement founder Tarana Burke, who visited campus in May as part of the C. Christine Johnson Voices of Color Lecture Series.

James Soper Merrill Prize winner Jonathan Stickel ’19 reminding his classmates at Commencement in May that graduation is but one moment in their lifelong connection to Hamilton and each other. Stickel, an economics and mathematics double major and captain of the hockey team, also graduated as valedictorian, becoming the first person since 1994 to achieve both honors.

Read a lot!

David Solomon ’84, chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs, on what he foresees as the impact of artificial intelligence on society and the labor force. Solomon and Thomas Tull ’92, founder of Legendary Entertainment and CEO of the investment-holding company Tulco, visited campus in March for a discussion on technology as it relates to business and finance.

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… We create new platforms, new opportunities, and we create new jobs that come out of that.

KNOW THYSELF

VOICES

START HERE

Bob Kinkel ’79 Bob Kinkel ’79, a founding member of Trans-Siberian Orchestra, is a producer, composer, arranger, music director, studio owner, and recording engineer. A music major with a love of physics, he spent a year after graduation working in the Physics Department and playing church organ on weekends. From there he entered a graduate fellowship in solid-state physics at Columbia University, but music won out and he left grad school to make it his career. Kinkel toured for 11 years with TSO, which has sold eight million records. These days he’s stepped back from the band to pursue other projects, often with his creative and life partner, musician and producer Dina Fanai. Kinkel and ex-wife Eliza Green K’80 have two children.

’96 RECORDING

“TSO released its first album, Christmas Eve and Other Stories. The single ‘Christmas Eve – Sarajevo 12/24’ became a hit, and we followed up in 1998 with The Christmas Attic, which had the hit ‘Christmas Canon.’”

“

’81

RECORD PLANT STUDIOS, NEW YORK CITY

“That’s where I got to learn everything about recording and producing from the best in the business. My first day of work, Cyndi Lauper was recording her debut record in Studio B, The J Geils Band was upstairs mixing Freeze-Frame. Everybody who was anybody came through the Record Plant — The Who, Aerosmith, Rolling Stones, Genesis.”

’85

One of my main projects is our company The Power of Music.

The thread that holds it together is using music to make a difference in the world, in whatever way that may be. It covers all genres of music and all different types of performers.

We’ve been doing events in New York City, and we’re expanding

INDEPENDENT SESSION KEYBOARD PLAYER AND JINGLE WRITER

“I had my first nationwide ‘hit’ — the Hefty-Wimpy campaign — that financed my music and recording equipment addiction. This is where I met Paul O’Neill and Jon Oliva on the Savatage record Hall of the Mountain King. We began writing together; our collaboration led to the Trans-Siberian Orchestra.”

to other cities around the country and to a record label and a publishing company.”

’10

’99 A DECADE OF TOURING WITH TSO

“It just kept growing. The first tour was a week long, with seven shows.

By the mid 2000s, we split the band into two tours and were playing arenas all over the country. We became one of the country’s top 10 touring acts, playing for over a million people a year. Between tours we recorded in the studio finishing three more albums.”

’19

COMPOSING, PLAYING, ARRANGING, PRODUCING WITH HIS COMPANY, STELLAR PRODUCTIONS

“Post touring with TSO, I took some time to explore other passions and projects including [working with] Jackie Evancho, Five for Fighting, and the Power of Music Concert Series with Dina Fanai, and Daniel’s Music Foundation.”

S U M M E R 2 0 1 9 NANCY L. FORD 27

WHAT’S YOUR PLEASURE?

Connecting students with common interests blurs the lines between learning and living

BY MAUREEN A. NOLAN

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T

HERE ARE THOSE AWKWARD GETTING-TO-KNOW-YOU gambits like “Share two truths and a lie about yourself” and “Describe your mood in one word” … or there’s video games.

From the perspective of Nathan Ward ’22, video games are universal these days, making them an organic way for people to bond.

After all, “everyone has played Tetris at some point,” he observes.

When the Residential Life Office put out a call seeking themes for this fall’s special-interest housing for upperclass students, Ward suggested video gaming. “[Speaking for] myself and a few other people I know, we’ve met some of our best friends through games, and I wanted to see if I could bring that to Hamilton,” the intended physics major says.

Scenes from last year’s pilot special-interest housing community Wilderness and Outdoor Leadership (or WOLF). The program gave first-year students the opportunity to hike, canoe, and snowshoe while forming lasting friendships.

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“IT’S A WONDERFULLY INTENTIONAL WAY FOR STUDENTS TO CONNECT AND LEARN FROM EACH OTHER.” TERRY MARTINEZ, DEAN OF STUDENTS

Emma Parkhurst ’21, who is coordinating a specialinterest housing community focused on Spanish language and culture.

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Special-interest housing is a section of a residence hall dedicated for students with a common interest. “At its best, it means students are actively engaging with others in growing together, supporting each other, and discovering themselves,” says Dean of Students Terry Martinez. “It’s a wonderfully intentional way for students to connect and learn from each other.”

Hamilton launched its first special-interest community last year in Dunham Hall — the pilot Wilderness and Outdoor Leadership Floor for first-year students. WOLF drew 22 students for the fall semester, plus a few more January admits just in time for snowshoeing.

The community was such a hit that Residential Life decided to offer it again to incoming students next year and add two more first-year communities: community service and mindfulness and meditation.

To create communities for upperclass students, Residential Life turned to the experts, students, for ideas. “Picking the topics for upperclassmen probably wouldn’t go over very well if [it came from our staff], so students were asked to propose their own ideas. We selected two that we’re going to pilot,” says Ashley Place, director of residential life.

One is Ward’s video-gaming community; the other is Spanish language and culture, a proposal that came from Emma Parkhurst ’21. She’s a neuroscience major who wants to learn Spanish but has never managed to work a course into her schedule.

Both communities will live in Saunders House on Griffin Road. Ten students, including Parkhurst, signed up for the Spanish group, and six students, plus Ward, for the video game crew. Ward and Parkhurst will shape group activities, supported by a shared resident advisor and the Residential Life staff.

“We’re going to help direct them — assist with the logistics of how to plan a program and the resources needed for funding. But the ideas and actual execution are going to come from the students,” Place says.

Ward is pondering a group trip to one of the major East Coast video gaming conferences and, of course, lots of group sessions. His personal taste runs to more experimental games, for instance Pathologic, a roleplaying game. “It’s made by a small group of Russian developers and is a sort of meta-contextual experience.

It explores all types of philosophy, especially relating to death, and talks about how telling stories affects us,” Ward says.

Among Parkhurst’s ideas: a book club, creating and sampling native cuisine, and volunteering in the SpanNANCY L. FORD ish-speaking community in nearby Utica.

Although the topics may be different, both Ward and Parkhurst share a common goal for their groups — that they gel into a close-knit group of friends. “I just hope that everyone individually is able to say that they progressed in terms of language learning and really grew in any way they can as people, finding new people on campus to be friends with,” Parkhurst says.

WOLF set a high standard for Hamilton’s new communities. If the College offered a WOLF for upperclass students, Natalie Rodriguez ’22 would join the pack for a second year.

Growing up in Miami, she jumped at the chance to be part of the pilot. “I just never had those outdoor opportunities of going canoeing or hiking,” she says. “Imagine me having all

of these amazing outdoor experiences — even having a campfire [or] making s’mores. As long as it’s healthy and nonthreatening, I’m always down for new experiences.”

With WOLF, Rodriguez climbed her first mountain and became friends with students she doubts she’d have met otherwise.

One secret to WOLF’s success was the tireless RA Gianni Hill ’21, outdoor adventurer and double major in public policy and Hispanic studies. When Hill applied for an RA job, he was offered the considerable challenge of developing and overseeing WOLF, with substantial help in particular from Sarah Jillings, assistant director of outdoor leadership.

Hill liked the idea of designing a program himself, even though he knew it would be hard, especially figuring out the ideal number of events to offer, working out logistics for trips, and balancing activities with his schedule and those of the other students. But he thought it would be worth it. He remembers wondering as a first-year student where he belonged on campus and what his niche would be. He happened to live on a floor whose residents became close, in his words, “by chance.”

“I liked the relationships we built on that floor, and I wanted to model that here: show people that you can live together in the same space, build lasting relationships, and also do fun stuff,” he says.

He put together dinners and other events designed to help students get to know one another, plus bigger excursions, working with Jillings. The group journeyed twice to Blue Mountain Lake in the Adirondacks to camp, hike, climb a mountain, canoe, and in the winter, snowshoe. With an eye toward future WOLF RAs, Hill kept a detailed log of what the group did and how things went.

Attendance for the events and activities was voluntary, yet students turned out. When he organized an overnight retreat at the Glen House, almost every student showed up for the duration, and two more stopped by who couldn’t stay the night. He had no problem filling the vans for any of the trips. If too many people signed up, he gave priority to students who hadn’t gone on one yet.

Participation is one measure of the program’s success, but as the pilot year wound down, Place and the Residential Life staff were developing other ways to evaluate WOLF. “We are working on assessing how students feel connected to the community compared to students who are not in this program. I’m looking at behavioral data and even academic success,” Place adds.

Here’s an informal endorsement: Life in the pilot community was so agreeable to Jade Xu ’22 that she’s signed up to live in another one this fall. Xu is one of Ward’s video gaming housemates, eager to learn more games than the one she plays — Pubge, the mobile version of Fortnite. To make the most of the limited free time she has as an intended physics and math double major, she likes the idea of ready proximity to other gamers.

Xu, who is from China, says she came to an American college for more than academics.

She wants to get to know people who grew up in different cultures and to hear their views about politics and other issues. “So in terms of housing, I want to know more, different people,” she says. “I’ve met a lot of outdoorsy kids. Now I want to know American nerds.” n

“I JUST NEVER HAD THOSE OUTDOOR OPPORTUNITIES OF GOING CANOEING OR HIKING ...

I’M ALWAYS DOWN FOR NEW EXPERIENCES.” NATALIE RODRIGUEZ ’22

NANCY L. FORD

Nathan Ward ’22, whose video gaming specialinterest housing community will take up residence in Saunders House.

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By MAUREEN A. NOLAN

Photo from the 1979 Hamilton yearbook taken by David Balog ’79 at a gathering in Utica held to protest a visit by gay rights opponent Anita Bryant.

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N

EAR THE BACK OF THE 1979 HAMILTON yearbook, 14 pages titled “Campus Life” feature a collection of black-andwhite photos without captions, leaving it to readers to posit the who, what, why: three laughing women in silly hats, a guy at a pottery wheel, a student bent over a book at a library table, etc. The story behind a photo on page 143 belongs to David Balog ’79. He alluded to it when he was interviewed for a new and developing oral history archive of LGBTQ Hamilton alumni.

It’s a shot of protesters on a city street beside a marquee that heralds a visit by Anita Bryant. At the front of the protest line, two young people display a “March for Human Rights” banner. Bryant, a controversial 1970s singer, celebrity, and anti-gay crusader, led Save Our Children, an organization that fought against gay-rights laws. At the time, Balog was a young gay man struggling with his sexual identity and not yet out. Hardly anyone was out at Hamilton then; Balog knew of only one student.

When he read about the impending protest in nearby Utica, he knew he needed to be a part of it. He went by himself; if any other Hamilton students were there, Balog didn’t see them. He shot the photo and, as yearbook editor-in-chief, made sure it got published. “I wish I could have done more, but at least I did that,” he said recently. “I went to the rally and took the picture and put it in the yearbook. It seems a small thing to do, but it was a tough, tough, conservative environment when I look back.”

With three decades of LGBTQ activism behind him now, Balog is among more than 35 alumni who have volunteered so far to be interviewed for the oral history archive. Their stories, like Balog’s, offer glimpses of layered history: personal, Hamilton’s, and the broader culture.

“We’re not only trying to establish an LGBTQ history of Hamilton College, but we want to put this history, and these people who lived it, within a larger context of LGBTQ history in the United States,” says the project’s originator, Joyce Barry, visiting assistant professor of women’s and gender studies and American Studies chair. References to issues of the day — Anita Bryant, AIDS, same-sex marriage, rights for transgender people — are revealed through the personal accounts.

Barry’s goal is to collect at least 100 individual histories for the project, which is being digitized in partnership with Hamilton’s Digital Humanities Initiative and DHi class fellow Duncan Davies ’21. The plan is to build an interactive archive that eventually will be open to anyone who wishes to read it.

The idea for the project began to percolate several years ago when Barry team-taught the course Queer Literature and Film and discovered how difficult it has been historically to gather and establish queer histories of any kind. She found herself wondering why, and that interest dovetailed with conversations she’d had with LGBTQ students over the years. “They shared their experiences with me, their life experiences of being identified as LGBTQ. Some of them are still working out that identity and affiliation at Hamilton. For some of them it’s easy; for others, it’s not,” Barry says.

She knew of other colleges and universities that had created LGBTQ histories and figured Hamilton should, too, especially if it meant an opportunity for students in her Feminist Research and Methods course to have hands-on experience in creating oral histories.

Students helped devise the questions, and, over two academic years and two different sections of the course, they asked alumni about their lives at Hamilton and beyond. Barry and Davies are spending this summer working with the information, collecting metadata, and bringing big-picture plans into focus. They are considering creating a digital timeline of the College and LGBTQ rights in the United States, on which the participants would be placed. Davies, a history major with an enthusiasm for digital tools, has suggested that the project include a blog where students and staff can contribute.

T

HE PROJECT IS LONG TERM. CREATING THIS TYPE OF searchable digital archive that will be useful to scholars takes time, and the work this summer is just the beginning. “We want this to continue.

It’s an event right now, it’s happening now, but I know Professor Barry’s goals are to keep building this, and hopefully now and in the future people will continue contributing and benefiting from hearing each other’s stories. That alone is really, really powerful,” says DHi Director Janet Oppedisano.

Barry plans to unveil the project to the campus this fall with a panel that includes students, some who are now alumni, who helped

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build the archive. She wants to get more students involved in the project to keep it moving apace.

Eliza Glaser-Kshensky ’20, former co-chair of the Queer Student Union, likes the oral history concept. In her work with the union, she says she saw how easily history disappears in an environment where students come and go so quickly. “Having something like that as a resource, maybe for students who are trying to find their way or who might want to know more about queer culture at Hamilton or queer history at Hamilton, would be really worthwhile,” she says.

To recruit alumni to tell their stories, Barry posted a query on Facebook to Spectrum, Hamilton’s LGBTQ alumni group. The responses came in faster than she’d expected, and she quickly reached her goal of 15 to 20 responses each of the two times she asked for participants.

Spectrum Chair Ann Horwitz Dubin ’06 answered the call.

“Being a sociologist and somebody who got a Ph.D. and specialized in qualitative research,” Dubin says, “I think interviewing and gathering oral histories are wonderful. Some folks in academia might look down on it and say it’s not ‘real science’ or whatever, but the truth is that stories matter, and I love the idea that Hamilton students are collecting the recollections of older alumni because it’s such an intimate and deep way of learning the story of gay life at Hamilton over time.”

D

URING HIS TIME ON COLLEGE HILL, David Pratt ’80 remembers an organization called SAPPHO for gay students. He knew Kirkland women who were out as lesbians, and men he thought were gay, but nothing was certain because nothing was ever said. Like Balog, Pratt was gay but not out while at Hamilton, and both of them found Hamilton then to be a difficult place for gay students. One of the questions posed to survey participants is: What was the climate like for LGBTQ students at Hamilton? “There virtually was no climate,” Pratt told his interviewer. “I think you could say that, in a way, the problem was not hostility; the problem was that one didn’t exist. But, of course, it would be especially true of transgender, which did not exist as a word or as a category then.”

Students who worked on the project found some of what they heard mind-blowing, Barry says. As a queer student, Mo McDermott ’18 (who uses they/them pronouns) was struck by how different it was to be an LGBTQ student in a time of invisibility. In their Hamilton experience, LGBTQ students were visible, and students in general had a level of knowledge about them. Yet McDermott also discerned a common thread running between the decades — a feeling of isolation for LGBTQ

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students. For McDermott, a great value of the oral history project is that it allows students and alumni to understand their own experiences in relation to others across time, backgrounds, and perspectives. “I just think there’s so much power in LGBTQ people being able to connect with one another and learn from one another, when there has been such a lack of records of LGBTQ history,” they say.

It’s important for Hamilton to know its history and doubly important for a marginalized group like LGBTQ students to know theirs, says Ryn Winner ’19, one of the facilitators of T-Time, a discussion group for transgender students. Winner (who uses they/them pronouns) sees in the archive a potential benefit that Barry hadn’t anticipated but likes — a networking opportunity of sorts. Winner believes students need to hear from alumni about how things have improved, or not, on campus, and to understand how alumni progressed after College. For a lot of queer students, especially trans students, says Winner, envisioning a future can be a challenge, and this database can be helpful for that. “It’s really hard to see yourself in the future being respected as who you want to be,” they say.

O

N THE FAR SIDE OF THE STUDENT EXPERIENCE, Pratt and Balog also recognize a need for connection, which emerged as they explained why they wanted to be part of the archive. Balog did it in part to re-establish a relationship with the College. And he wanted to share what he’s learned since he was a student on the Hill. Isolation has been a problem for older generations of LGBTQ people, Balog says, just like it’s a problem now for LGBTQ youth. He would like to help them have an easier time than his generation did. “I think I have something to offer,” he says.

A science writer whose books include Healing the Brain: Stress, Trauma and LGBTQ Youths, Balog co-founded and runs a nonprofit organization that supports LGBTQ youth in the foster-care system. He’s studied stress and its effects on learning and sees the impact it had on his own studies when he was closeted at Hamilton, where he remembers enduring homophobic comments and attitudes.

Pratt, a fiction writer whose books include a young adult novel, told his story because it felt like he was doing something for future generations of LGBTQ students. He’s hoping that straight people use the archive, too. “I hope by reading our stories, they can at least get a sense of what it is to be different in such a core way. Presumably Hamilton students, who have been taught to read, write, and think, will be able to see themselves in our stories, whatever their positionalities,” he says. n

ALYSSA KEYS

The following pages feature highlights from the oral history interviews conducted by students. Conversations have been excerpted, with permission.

JACK BLACK ’81 Retired Medical Librarian San Jose, Calif.

Black: Okay. You may want to get into this later, but I helped start a basically gay students group — Student Interviewer: Oh, cool.

Black: So, obviously, my junior and senior years, that was my focus.

Student Interviewer: That’s awesome.

Black: Yeah, there were about four of us who did that.

Student Interviewer: What did that entail? Would you just meet together, the group of you?

Black: Yeah, we put a notice in The Spectator ... Back then, everybody was closeted, obviously. It was very much underground. We would meet at the Alumni House — I don’t know if it’s still called that — on Sunday evenings, and we’d usually have somebody in there.

I don’t know if this is getting ahead of things, but we actually applied to the student government for money to bring in speakers. That was a stressful thing because to be out at that time was very scary, and we went before the student board. I thought we had a snowball’s chance in Hell of getting anything. They ended up giving us 75 percent of their budget. I guess they felt like we were really a neglected group, so they gave us a big chunk of change, and we were able to bring, I want to say it was Richard Burns, and I may be wrong, but we brought him to campus to [speak]. He was involved with the LGBT center down in New York City at that time.

Student Interviewer: While you were a student here, what was the climate like for LGBTQ students?

Black: It was bad. I don’t know how else you’d describe it. Maybe our fears were overblown. One of my friends, good friend — I tend to present as straight, so I don’t think people assume I’m gay — but one of my friends was pretty effeminate. He’s about as out as you can be.

There’s this guy who would spit at him every time he saw him and stuff like that. There was that prejudice. And of course the usual terms back then, people were less hesitant to use terms like faggot and queer in a derogatory sense.

Student Interviewer: Do you feel like the merger with Kirkland was helpful, maybe not diminishing the fear, but do you feel like it was helpful for students who did identify as LGBT? Black: I think the existence with Kirkland absolutely was. Again, it was this very progressive women’s college and a lot of lesbians. That’s why I hung out at the Women’s Center, because that’s where a bunch of women were, and therefore, the gay men.

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PAUL MAROTTA

JULIE SHELDON ’93 High School Math Teacher Wellesley, Mass.

Sheldon: It was hard [at Hamilton]. Not very many people were out. The people who were out were ... I don’t know, I felt like they were ostracized.

I don’t know what it’s like [now]. I’m much older than all of you guys, but I know at my school, because we have a [Gay Student Association], we have kids who are out. I don’t know how to say it — it’s not a big deal, for the most part. It’s a big deal for some kids because of their background.

Maybe they’re international students or maybe their parents are particularly conservative, but for the most part, people are pretty accepting. I felt like we’ve almost flipped the percentages, so maybe now it’s like 30% are not accepting, and I think then, it was about 30% who were.

Student Interviewer: Sure.

Sheldon: You really were careful about who you told for fear of what would happen, worried about the repercussions from losing friendships and what my coaches would say or my professors would say and how they would judge you. [For example] I was with my advisor doing my courses and we had this Knowledge of Others category you had to fill in order to graduate. He says to me, “Well, you haven’t completed your Knowledge of Others category. Why don’t you take this course in the Sociology Department called Psycho-Sexual Diversity where you learn about gay people and transgender people?” I was like, “Yeah, sure.

I’ll take that course.” I wasn’t going to tell him I was gay, but he just assumed that would be “other.” It was so bizarre to me. I don’t know.

Student Interviewer: Was the course not good?

Sheldon: No, I thought it was very good. There weren’t very many people in it. I think people were afraid to take it because I think they were afraid of the stigma of why you would sign up for a course like that.

Student Interviewer: Okay, sure.

Sheldon: It was like every couple of weeks, we’d have a panel of people that were transgender who would come in and answer our questions.

[The professor] had so many connections with people who would come in and talk to us about what it was like to be born with either full sets of organs or neither set of organs for one particular gender and what was that like growing up. ... I grew up on a farm in the middle of nowhere. I was like, “Oh, my God. That can happen?” That‘s incredibly difficult. Yeah, gender is such a construct. It really made you think about some things you hadn’t thought about. It normalized to me what it was to be gay. Like I said, I grew up in a very conservative family, and it really made me feel better about what I was dealing with.

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PAUL MAROTTA

HARRISON NEKOROSKI ’15 Program Coordinator for Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging at Harvard Kennedy School Cambridge, Mass.

Student Interviewer: Will you talk a little bit more about the climate on campus? It seems like you saw some shifting while you were on campus.

Nekoroski: Oh, absolutely. Yeah, I think when I started [at] Hamilton in 2011, I knew maybe two queer people on campus. When I’d go to Rainbow [Alliance] meetings, I think we averaged probably eight people at a meeting, maybe something like that. And when I joined the rugby team my sophomore year — I was dating a girl on the rugby team, but we were the only two people who were out on the team. And then by senior year on rugby, my entire class, save two people, were identifying as queer. And I remember going to a Rainbow meeting my senior year, and you couldn’t even fit everyone in the room, there were so many people. It was insane. So, it changed very drastically over my four years there. I mean, I think during those four years, that was at the time when a lot of huge changes were happening, both in politics and culturally.

Lady Gaga was popular and all that stuff, and all the political things were happening with DOMA and marriage equality and everything. So I think you definitely started to see a lot [more] queerer kids on campus.

And I think it was a combination of people coming out on campus, and also a lot of kids coming from more accepting high school experiences, already being out and coming to Hamilton already out.

Student Interviewer: Yeah. I have seen a big shift, too, in my four years.

Nekoroski: It’s very cool.

Student Interviewer: All right, could you expand a little bit more on the personal hardships that you faced because of your identity?

Nekoroski: Yeah. I mean, in terms of Hamilton’s campus specifically, I think the biggest thing that I would experience was people not using the correct pronouns, even though I would tell them many times what my pronouns were. That was always [a] difficult sell for people. And just generally not respecting my identity and those sort of things. I was involved when we started the whole gender-neutral bathrooms initiative.

So that was a thing, but I wouldn’t consider that to be a particularly hard process. Some of the most difficult experiences I’ve had being trans actually stemmed from when I was abroad. In Morocco, I got kicked out of a bathroom once because they didn’t think I should be in there. And

yeah, I had some verbal attacks, I suppose. But Hamilton’s campus has always been never explicitly unaccepting. I think I’ve found that any times I ever felt like something was difficult, it was usually more below the surface uncomfortable, people being uncomfortable with it, or not knowing what it meant.

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TYRONE EVANS ’09 KYLE LARSON

Property Manager Seattle Student Interviewer: What was the most difficult part of being LGBTQ at Hamilton College?

Evans: It’s difficult saying. The community is small so you’re known. ... I was in a relationship throughout college from freshman year through senior, so I didn’t really get tied up into that.

Student Interviewer: Was your partner from Hamilton?

Evans: No. I feel that would be a little too weird. That would also have narrowed it down to seven people. Like, ”No, thank you.”

Student Interviewer: You mentioned not having any personal hardships at Hamilton. Could you elaborate a little bit on [any other] hardships that you’ve had?

Evans: When I was 17, so my senior year of high school, I was gaybashed. It was just me and my then boyfriend who got jumped by seven guys, something like that. I had my face dragged across the concrete. It took off layers of skin on the right side of my face, and there was a chunk out of my knee. My hands were [expletive] up; I had a black eye, busted lip. That was a hardship that was caused by being gay. It’s funny because ever since that, now I’m like, ”Oh no, [expletive] no, I take no bullshit regarding my sexuality.“ Student Interviewer: Right. I was going to ask how that experience at 17 shaped you, which you answered, but how you presented yourself in college, what effect did that have?

Evans: If something [like] that were to happen again, I was totally prepared to beat the shit out of somebody. So for me, it made me a little bit more confident, but I also feel this was different because I was in a long-term relationship. I wasn’t trying to, I don’t know, I was already comfortable, so I just completely carried on. I didn’t feel I had to prove anything to anyone about anything.

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NANCY L. FORD

ANN HORWITZ DUBIN ’06 Political Consultant Livermore, Calif.

Student Interviewer: What would you say are some of the biggest challenges facing the queer community today?

Dubin: Well, through all the progress that’s been made, you know, it’s not news to you I’m sure, there’s still a lot that’s wrong.

Student Interviewer: Right.

Dubin: The way that gays and lesbians and trans people and queer people and bisexuals and gender queer folk and all of that are treated.

It’s great that we have marriage rights, but I think over half the states in this country still have legal discrimination against people who identify as minorities in terms of their sexual identity or sexual orientation.

In a lot of places it’s still perfectly legal for somebody to fire you because you’re gay or they think you’re gay or for a landlord to evict you because you’re gay or they think you’re gay. That’s wrong. That’s unconstitutional. It violates people’s equal protection under the law.

So, that’s a big challenge.

Another big challenge is that, you know, my experience as a white woman who comes from an affluent background and from a social milieu that is generally quite progressive, is that my coming out experience was relatively easy. It was still difficult and emotional and all of that, but, you know, imagine the kids whose parents disown them or cast them out of the house or whose friends or whose religious communities shun them and they end up homeless, they end up addicted to drugs, or having to turn to sex work in order to survive. Trans people face all kinds of discrimination that cisgendered people, cisgendered gay folks, don’t necessarily have to [face]. So, I think that the gay community faces the challenge in understanding that the issues of affluent, white, gay people are not only issues in the LGBT community, and we — cisgendered, white, gay people — need to shut up and understand that this movement is not just our movement. It doesn’t belong to us, and we need to be much more comprehensive in our [thinking]. I think it’s unconscionable that there’s so many places in this country where people can be fired or evicted just because of who they are. n

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create as if no one is watching

BY LIBBY MILITELLO ’22

The artwork and poetry that accompany this article appear in The Blue Velvet Dress Says I Told You So by Heidi Wong ’20 and are used with permission. Above photo of the artist by Claire Chang ’20.

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E

QUALITY, LOSS, NEGLECT, LEGACY. These are just some of the unabashedly vulnerable topics Heidi Wong ’20 addresses in her latest collection of poetry and paintings, The Blue Velvet Dress Says I Told You So, published by 777. The book is the second for Wong, a creative writing and art major whose first poetry anthology, Sixteen, was self-published while she was still in high school.

This time, although her creative process was similar, the publishing process was vastly different. “There was a lot of conflict between my vision and the publisher’s vision,” Wong says. The friction centered around the publisher’s ideas for marketing the book and generating sales. Wong’s first priority was to maintain integrity and openness with her audience, something she has valued since she first began sharing her work on Instagram at age 15; today her followers on the social media platform top 300,000.

“When I write, I write with the intention that no one will see it but me,” she says. “I create art that is intimate, that speaks my truth for me.” Wong believes that inspiring others and “being relatable” is the byproduct of her work as an artist, not the goal. In an interview last year with Authority Magazine, she said, “Poetry isn’t a lesson, but sometimes it can end up as one. The only goal I have when writing is to put my raw, uncensored truth into the world and have my readers interpret it through their own experiences. No one will ever have the same experience as you did, but they can feel the emotions you put on a page or canvas — that’s the key.”

Even at the beginning of her Instagram journey, Wong’s art was not about garnering fame but about expressing herself. When she created her account (@heidiwongofficial), she published her poetry under her initials without her full name attached. Being anonymous, she says, allowed her to draw on some of her most personal experiences without fear of judgment. It’s this authenticity, she believes, that engages viewers and defines her as an artist.

“For me, it was that I would keep my style and create whenever the inspiration came to me instead of when my [Instagram] feed ‘required’ it,” she told Authority. “For other [artists], it might simply be not letting the social media world take over their love of what they do. We’re all grateful for our following and all that social media has given us, but it’s important to create the same way we would if no one was watching.”

Among the inspirations for Wong’s art are her Hamilton experiences. “There are little details about Hamilton buried in my poetry,” she says, citing Martin’s Way and her room in Milbank Residence Hall. Hamilton’s rural setting has also played a role in her creative process. “I needed a place to be quiet and still, and be with my own mind,” she says.

She also explained how Hamilton’s rural setting has sometimes made her feel disconnected from the world, a feeling she believes has had some positive and some negative effects.

For Wong, isolation allows her to get in touch with her creative process at her own pace, and whenever she feels cut off from the rest of the world, social media can keep her in contact with the controlled chaos she is used to as a native city-dweller.

Wong earned her international baccalaureate diploma at the Western Academy of Beijing. She can’t remember a time when she wasn’t creating through images or words. By sharing her experiences and emotional struggles through her art, she has become an ambassador for issues she is passionate about. Wong has lost several family members to cancer, including her aunt, whose memory was the inspiration for “how i became an atheist,” which won the Button Poetry Short Form Contest in 2018. In 2015, the sale of her paintings netted $43,000 for leukemia treatment and research in rural China through Phoenix Media’s annual charity art auction. And a portion of the proceeds from her new book will benefit Planned Parenthood, an organization whose mission she believes has similar themes to those found in The Blue Velvet Dress Says I Told You So. Her art has appeared in numerous magazines such as Galore, Art Reveal, and ArtAscent Art & Literature Journal, as well as at Artexpo New York. Last year, her following on social media earned her a nomination for Influencer Awards Monaco. She also recognizes the value of being a prominent poet of Asian descent, especially one on social media. “Representation is so important,” Wong says. “I’m glad I get to provide that for people, especially aspiring young artists.”

Although Wong expects she will one day return to China and continue her family’s investments business, she first plans to pursue a graduate program to continue working on her art and poetry. “I don’t know where this book will take me,” she says, “but I know I’ll always continue creating.” n

recount of last night’s dream and suddenly i’m thirty living with a partner in the city i love still dreaming of you as the age we were when they found you a tall fragile sparrow neck cracked purple wings dangling like electric cords and suddenly i’m thirty and you are both the boy in bryant park with ice cream drips on his dinosaur hoodie and the white haired man in a leather wheelchair suddenly i’m thirty and it’s been ­september for eleven years i’m standing outside our home watching the light in your room flicker on and off and on and off and on until it goes out for the rest of its life even when dreaming i say nothing even when dreaming i do not save you so every morning since the earth did to your bones what waves do to seashells washed ashore i’ve carried my silence like a cross let it bite down on my shoulders dig into my spine because with poetry i can raise you from the dead but cannot give you back your laugh lines your grandchildren’s voices cannot make the ground give you back to us

Libby Militello ’22 is a writer for the Hamilton Communications Office, a Career Center intern, a member of the a cappella group Tumbling After, and on the board of the College Democrats. She plans to major in government and Chinese.

because all the words i never said still cannot amount to the weight of too late

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did he make you feel like wallpaper? oil on canvas

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spring in clinton oil on canvas

opus oil on canvas

home country and the white man she is running from i politely asked my first home not to kill me

which is to say

so she handed over a roof of iron nails

you cannot teach my body to stop fighting

a bed of needles

for

threading in and out of my abdomen

and against itself

years later i am still trying to see how that too

my third home is dirty and

helped me grow

promiscuous strutting down spiral staircases in fake

split my blood

designer shoes

between the seawater of victoria harbor

socks mismatched

and the streets of saint petersburg

she’s raw rude and unafraid

let beijing separate my bones from muscle

hair in knots

cartilage from tissue

i want her trash filled neighborhoods

with each stanza

give one eye to pennsylvania

rusty walls like chipped nail polish

i smile this pseudonym out of

the other to clinton

the way her silhouette hugs the

my wrists

leave my heart for fifth avenue

sweltering sky

pseudonym

untangle her

but one day i must shed her like milk teeth

from silk tied tourniquets

my second home and i remain on nodding

and remember

terms

every time i make art in the language

her beauty unquestionable

that pushes my mother tongue deeper into

no artist works

her smile

my skull

to be a master of their craft

unquestionably soulless

every time i sleep soundly in a city

only a victim to it

that cannot pronounce my birth name if you go back far enough

the earth beats me black and blue

i am both

until these bruises

the native girl leaving her burning village

start to paint the flag

behind

of a country that does not yet exist

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BILL HAYES

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H A M I LTO N

Drawing

Fidgety Brilliance on

i

F YOU KNOW ROZ CHAST’S cartoons, you know Roz Chast.

You know she’s funny. And perceptive. And prone to outbursts of delicious quirk. You also know she’s every inch the Big Apple native, her New Yorker bona fides evident in her New Yorker cartoons — the streets, the subways, the apartments crammed with odd ducks and overstuffed couches. You know she doesn’t shy from the weirdness or kerfuffle of everyday life.

What you might not know from her cartoons: Chast’s two years at Kirkland College in the early 1970s were a formative blur that she considers an important transition toward her life as an artist. It was there, she says, that she started to figure herself out.

“I was young chronologically and also in every other way. I was 16 and pretty ignorant about everything,” says Chast, who arrived on College Hill in 1971 and left in 1973. Coming from an academically rigid Brooklyn high school (“like, the torture of taking trigonometry!”) and overprotective parents, she found in Kirkland’s independent vibe the freedom to make her own choices.

“You know, some of those choices may have been completely ridiculous — but at least, for the first time, I was making my own choices for everything. For friends. For what I did in my spare time — which was nothing to brag about,” she recalls. “I’m glad there was no social media in those days. I was kept on such a short leash when I lived at home, and Kirkland was just, like, there was no leash.”

by Amy Biancolli ’85

In retrospect, “It was kind of maybe what I needed: just a little time to run around and be a nut, you know. Which is pretty much what I did.”

Chast is on the phone from her home in Ridgefield, Conn., where she lives with two birds — an African grey and a caique — and one husband, humor writer Bill Franzen. It’s early May, just a few weeks before she’s due to receive an honorary degree at Hamilton’s commencement, and she gamely fields a wide range of questions.

Some she can’t answer. (Has she ever grown up? “Ahhhh, I don’t know. I don’t know. That’s an interesting question. I don’t know.

I’m definitely an old crone and getting older by the minute. And I don’t know, I don’t know.”) Some she won’t. (Who’s funnier, Chast or Franzen? “Sidestepping,” she replies.) But beyond those, she’s forthcoming and chatty, discussing her short stint in Clinton, her long career in cartooning, her familiarity with New York interiors, and her considered opinion on rubber cement (more on that later).

a

S A TEENAGER, Chast wanted to go to art school. Her parents wanted her to get a bachelor’s degree. Kirkland was the compromise. Living in Major Residence Hall her first year and Carnegie

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her second, she threw herself into art, making photo silkscreens, etchings, lithographs, drawings. Among her many art classes was printmaking with Professor of Art Bruce Muirhead, then a freshly arrived faculty member from Middlebury College and a graduate of the Rhode Island School of Design.

“I remember that Roz had a strong drawing sense,” Muirhead says, “and good sense of line and an expressive use of line.” All of which he sees now in her cartoons — “the way she uses line to express posture movement, express a glance, a look. And also patterning and design.”

was “Garden Trolls,” a portrait of three nasty little men in pointy hats. “Your garden is crap,” says one. “Zinnias are stupid,” says the second. “The world is falling apart, and YOU’RE GARDENING?!?,” asks the third, his words squiggling loudly with sarcasm.

The bulk of Chast’s work displays that same, fidgety brilliance.

Eyes goggle. Hair spazzes. People squirm with mundane frets and frustrations. In “The Fountain of Puberty,” we see a freak show of stinky adolescents. In “Pigeon Little,” the titular bird portends doom until it waddles across a bagel on the sidewalk. (“The sky is falling, the sky is – oh, look!”). In “Listenin’ In,” a woman overhears a phone conversation about a “floating kidney” — portrayed as a whistling, smiling, fedora-wearing blob.

Yes, she actually overheard the kidney chit-chat. “I heard part of it. I heard somebody talking about a dislodged kidney, and I was just like, Whaaaaat? I was on Metro North, which is the train I take into the city, and I often hear just insane conversations.” When that happens, “I jot it down. I don’t draw it out, but I jot it down.”

o

Chast “was part of a group of young women who were adventuresome,” he says, many of them from New York City. “But they didn’t want to do the Barnard thing, you know. They wanted to do something new, and Kirkland had that appeal to them. They were a very independent group, and I remember Roz was, too. Very determined about what they wanted to do. And talented.”

Observing both her gifts and her drive, he mentioned RISD to her — and off she went for four years, graduating in 1977 with a degree in painting. A year later, she made her debut in The New Yorker with “Little Things,” a whimsical collection of made-up doohickeys that remains a favorite of her own cartoons — “always the first one I did, and the last one I did.” At the time of the interview, the last one

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VER THE YEARS, Chast’s work has followed her course through city and suburb, through raising children and caring for elders. In 2014, she published Can’t We Talk About Something More Pleasant?, her deeply moving book about the decline and deaths of her parents. She followed that with 2017’s Going into Town, a mash note to New York City that she wrote after one of her kids — both now grown, one in the city, the other in Portland, Maine — asked her the meaning of the word “block.” (He did? “I swear! I swear on my children’s lives that he did ask me.”)

“It’s so corny, but I really do love New York very, very much.”

As an artist, she says, “You have your image bank, sort of — your internal image bank.” Hers is filled with the terrain and tchotchkes of New York City. “If I drew an interior, I’d have a thousand lamps,” she says. “I’d have a thousand couches and end tables and knickknacks — and, you know, the ash tray that your weird aunt brought back from Spain in 1962 and the weird framed pictures of you in a horrible swimsuit when you went to Miami Beach.”

(Nature, on the other hand, “I don’t understand.” Back in her Kirkland days, “I remember seeing a barn. I was on a bike ride, and I was just like, ‘Oh my God! It’s just like a picture of a barn!’”)

Some might say Chast portrays humanity at its most endearingly neurotic, but not Chast. If the characters peopling her world are wobbly with anxiety over life and death, well, shouldn’t we all be?

“I don’t see it as neurotic,” she says, “and it’s sort of puzzling to me when somebody describes this as neurotic. Because, I think, ‘Oh, so you’re completely fine that you don’t even know why you’re here!

That suddenly you’re here and by the time you’re 4 or 5 years old, you know that you’re gonna die! And it could happen at any time!

And you’re completely fine with that! That, to me, that’s absolute — that’s INSANITY.” The caps are loud and clear. “So I don’t feel like these things are neurotic. I think they’re a reasonable response to a completely unreasonable situation.”

She was never the class clown; she didn’t get picked for teams; she wasn’t the popular kid. “I wasn’t the prettiest girl. I was socially — forget it!”

So she drew. In class, she doodled. “Art was all I ever liked to do.

You know, I got good grades in school, but only because if I didn’t, there was hell to pay. … I can remember, in fact, sitting in class and feeling, this is just torment. If I didn’t draw while I was listening, it was just like being in solitary confinement.”

These days, whenever someone asks for advice, “I say, ‘If you can do ANYTHING else, you should do that thing.’ There’s just too much rejection. Most people I know who are cartoonists, they can’t do anything else, you know? This is what they do — and that’s sort of how I feel. This is what I do. I’m not really equipped to do other things, especially at this point.

“I’ve done this for four decades now,” Chast says. “So I’m stuck.” n

a

SKED WHAT SHE'S LEARNED from her years as a cartoonist, Chast hmmms and ummms for a few moments before answering. Then it hits her: Lesson Number One. “Don’t say ‘yes’ right away to things. Somebody offers you something that sounds really great, say that you’ll think about it for a minute.” She hmmmmms again, then hits on Lesson Number Two. “Oh! ... Rubber cement is a false friend.”

Wait. What? “It’s true. It’s like, when you discover rubber cement, you just can’t believe nobody told you how great it was, and then about two years later, all your drawings have all these brown stains on them!”

Chast speaks from experience. She’s been drawing since age 2 or 3, after all, and while all kids start then, most kids stop later on.

“I just kinda kept going with it, I guess.”

Amy Biancolli ’85 (Columbia Journalism ’87) is an arts writer and columnist for the Albany Times Union. A former film critic for the Houston Chronicle, she is the author of three books Figuring Shit Out: Love, Laughter, Suicide, and Survival; House of Holy Fools: A Family Portrait in Six Cracked Parts; and Fritz Kreisler: Love’s Sorrow, Love’s Joy. Cartoons courtesy of Roz Chast.

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SCALING

seven

SUMMITS DIABETES

BY DREW ANDERSON ’21

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H A M I LTO N

for

F

or Taylor Adams ’11, it really is about the journey and not the destination. “It” for Adams came on May 23 when he conquered Mount Everest and joined an elite club of climbers with type 1 diabetes who have summited Earth’s tallest mountain.

But achieving that goal was not nearly the most exciting part of Adams’ Everest adventure.

“There were probably a hundred other times during the trip that I remember much more thinking how gorgeous this is and how special it is to be here,” he says.

With Everest under his belt, Adams has just one more peak to reach before he’s mastered the Seven Summits — the highest peaks of all seven continents. He plans to check Mount Kosciuszko in Australia off his list this winter. According to his GoFundMe page, where Adams raises money for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, he aims to become only the third person with type 1 diabetes to climb all seven summits and the second to do so while using an insulin pump.

Adams has come a long way since he began climbing with the Outing Club while a student at Hamilton. “It was my junior year,” he recalls. “We went to Ecuador over winter vacation and climbed two of the big volcanoes there, Cotopaxi and Cayambe, and I sort of fell in love with the sport.”

But climbing the world’s highest peaks is not the nonstop adventure it’s sometimes made out to be. Compared to the drama of feature films depicting climbing disasters and newsreels of queues of climbers huddling together below the summit, Adams described a more mundane experience: “One of the biggest things people don’t understand is that climbing a mountain like Everest … 90 percent of the time it’s a lot of sitting around.”

In fact, of the two months he spent in Nepal acclimatizing for his ascent, the actual climb to the summit took only eight days. But all the initial sitting around actually serves a vital purpose — preparing the body for the physical demands of high altitude. “You’re playing hours of cards a day and acclimatizing and making red blood cells so you can at least marginally breathe,” he says.

The air pressure at the top of Everest is roughly a third of that at sea level, so each breath brings in substantially less oxygen. Adams recalls experiencing a hypoxic state induced by climbing near 30,000 feet. “You have so little oxygen that even wearing an oxygen mask, you’re not in your right mind when you’re up there,” he says. “It’s

sort of like being drunk, sort of like being asleep, sort of like not having slept for 48 hours, maybe all of those combined.”

Adams lives in Salt Lake City, where he works as a nurse in the pediatric and pediatric cardiac ICUs at Primary Children’s Hospital. His schedule of working three 12 plus-hour shifts a week allows him four days a week for training. Adams’ medical background also serves him well in preparation for climbs. Before he left for Everest, he took classes on the respiratory system and worked on a project focused on altitude sickness. Yet despite his research, and frequent exercises at altitude, he still remembers feeling ill as he acclimatized at 17,600 feet upon reaching the base camp. “You are constantly coughing, the air is so dry up there, it just does a number on your lungs. You lose all the muscle in your body. I went there so strong … and it just destroys your body,” he says.

A

dams’ preparation was made even trickier given his diabetes. He brought an extra insulin pump, pens, and a handful of syringes in case some froze or broke. He packed extra glucometers and about three times the insulin he would need, leaving some in Kathmandu, some in base camp, some with his guides, and carrying some. “On summit day I was actually wearing two insulin pumps,” he says. “One of them was on ‘suspend’ so that if the one actually delivering insulin to me malfunctioned, I would be able to start the other one with the push of a button, hopefully in a short enough time that my fingers wouldn’t get frostbite or the insulin freeze in the -30 degree temperatures.”

Nearing the completion of his Seven Summits challenge, Adams says he needs to find some new goals. He plans “to do a lot of climbing in the Wasatch Mountains” of Utah where he hopes to “complete climbing all of the 30 peaks over 11,000 feet.” But Adams is still aiming higher. “I would love to return to Nepal and climb Ama Dablam,” he says.

Climbing mountains is already a consequential endeavor, but doing so with diabetes is another challenge altogether — one that for Adams extends beyond personal accomplishment. “It’s been an amazing opportunity to be put in a position where I can be a role model to other people with health challenges,” he says. “[In my job] I encounter such children on a daily basis. It’s a great message to be able to demonstrate that if you really want something and are willing to put in the time and effort, in most cases whatever disability you do have does not preclude your ability to attain that dream.” n Drew Anderson ’21 is a writer for Hamilton’s Communications Office and, as an assistant director for orientation activities, helped organize 31 Adirondack Adventure trips this August. A government major and Spanish minor, he will spend the fall semester in Hamilton’s Washington, D.C., program and the spring semester in Spain.

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Ralph Nichols ’40 from his time serving with the U.S. Navy in World War II. Opposite page photos: Nichlols, 100, taken at his home in Connecticut; inset photo from the 1940 Hamiltonian yearbook.

R

ALPH NICHOLS ’40 recounts his D-Day experience with focused detail and the conviction that it’s important for people to hear about World War II. The 100-year-old believes his country isn’t immune to a potential dictatorship. “They say, ‘Oh, it can’t happen here,’” Nichols says, “but I saw it happen in Europe in the 1930s, so things do happen. You just have to be very aware of it, just be sure to protect what you have, what is right.”

He grew up in Clinton, N.Y., just down the Hill from Hamilton, and had finished two years at Yale Law when he entered the U.S. Navy and became engulfed in the war.

On June 6, 1944, Nichols was serving as a lieutenant and communications officer on the U.S.S. Corry, which is said to have been the lead destroyer in the invasion of Utah Beach in Germany-occupied Normandy, France. He recalls with undiminished wonder the massive number of ships and planes that converged for the invasion. “On the radar, it looked like one solid light stream going up from different ports in England,” he recalls.

Minesweepers had cleared the channel to the beach, and on June 6, the Corry advanced down the swept channel, anchoring off the beach to fire at the Germans and clear the way for the invasion forces.

Although the Germans had been severely bombed, Nichols says, they were able to target the destroyers, cruisers, and battleships. An aircraft that was supposed to lay down a smoke screen to conceal the Corry was shot down, leaving the ship exposed,

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according to a June 2004 story in Naval History Magazine. The headline — “The Gallant Destroyers of D-Day.” From the bridge, Nichols could see the shells getting closer and closer. Then he headed down to the radio shack to check on its operations. “As I was standing in the doorway to the radio shack there was a sudden, huge explosion, and we were thrown up against the overhead, and all the lights went out,” Nichols says. He heard tubes shatter in the radios and felt the ship breaking up beneath his feet.

He remembers running below to dig out the secret communications devices and code books, and with help from another officer, tossed them overboard. They were weighted to sink so the Germans would not discover them.

With the deck underwater, Nichols made his way to the stern, which seemed to be the focus of the shelling. There he helped an engineering officer who could not swim find a flotation device. At one point, a shell hit the ship’s smokescreen generator, creating choking smoke they couldn’t see through until the winds picked up.

The Corry was going under, and Nichols says he stepped into the frigid water, where, for at least an hour, he and his shipments swam and clung to anything they could.

Nichols had a flotation device, but it was ineffective, so he was in trouble.

“What happened was one of the crew saw me struggling with it, and he had, what the crew had done, was to take powder cans that were used in connection with firing the 5" gun. If they screwed the tops back on

them, they became watertight. He had two of them, and he gave me one so I could put that under my chin,” Nichols recalls. “That kept my head up, so I was able to paddle around all right. It was a little scary because they continued to shell us while we were in the water.”

After boats rescued Nichols and the other survivors, he received a one-month survivor’s leave, then was assigned to amphibious duty in the Pacific, including a year in Guam. All told, he gave four years to the Navy.

Traveling back to the U.S. on the Queen Elizabeth, Nichols encountered Navy Lt. Halsey Barrett ’35, whose ship also went down during the Normandy invasion.

N

ICHOLS WENT ON to finish law school, make a career, raise a family. Now he lives in Connecticut in a senior residential community, where he was asked to say a few words in honor of the 75th anniversary of D-Day back in June. Two of his children attended. A week or so before the anniversary, Nichols hadn’t yet given a lot of thought to the occasion, but wished he could tell the nation more about the millions of young men and women who served in World War II. If you asked them why they fought, they’d probably tell you they fought for freedom, says Nichols, with unique authority.

And doing that changed their lives. “I think that [for] the people who participated in World War II, it was a defining incident for them. In other words, your life was sort of what happened before the war and what happened after the war,” he says. n

BOB HANDELMAN

HAMILTON’S

D-DAY

HERO

BY MAUREEN A. NOLAN

Editor’s Note: We first shared this story on June 6, 2019, to mark the 75th anniversary of D-Day. Not only did it receive many likes, shares, and comments on social media, but the story was picked up by several media outlets. In case you missed it, here again is Ralph Nichols ’40 and his story of bravery that day. To hear a segment of an audio recording of Nichols, see hamilton.edu/dday.

S U M M E R 2 0 1 9

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HIGHLIGHTS FROM

Syd [began] this new position in May and continues to teach at Penn in its Organizational Dynamics program for master’s students, as well as do crisis management consulting.”

CLASS CORRESPONDENTS David Simonson ’47 simonsona6@aol.com Sheldon Horowitch ’48 morrismgt@aol.com Bob Bloomer ’50 rsbloomer@aol.com Jack Banks ’52 jbanks711@hotmail.com Roger D’Aprix ’55 rdaprix@roico.com Greg Bathon ’56 egab33@gmail.com Bill Poole ’59 eloop3@aol.com John Allen ’60 johnallen347@gmail.com 1961 TBD * Sam Crowl ’62 crowl@ohio.edu Doug Wheeler ’63 dpwheeler@hhlaw.com

FOUR CLASS OF ’60 guys got together in Long Boat Key, Fla., on March 12 — (left to right) Pete Rasmussen, Marty Hirsch, Don DiGiulian, and Bob Kliphon. “Lunch so nicely prepared by Corrine Hirsch. All glad to see each other. Hope to do it again soon.”

PETER KINGSLEY ’68 took his production of

The Proposal by Anton P. Chekhov to Chekhov’s estate in Melikhovo, Russia. He and his company of actors from The Lambs Club of New York performed in the 20th Annual International Theatre Festival by invitation of the government of the Russian Federation on May 18.

Correspondent BILL MULLER ’69 posts: “Syd Havely ’69 has accepted a position as adjunct professor at Thomas Jefferson University in Philadelphia in the Doctor of Strategic Management Program overseeing student dissertations.

Jon Vick ’64 jonvick2@aol.com Forrest Jones ’65 forrestljones@earthlink.net Curt Brand ’66 r_curtis_brand@sbcglobal.net Barry Seaman ’67 seamanbarrett@gmail.com Mike Berkowitz ’68 m.berkowitz@sbcglobal.net

*WE HAVE A VACANCY! If you’re interested in learning more about serving as correspondent for this class, contact editor@hamilton.edu.

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Happy Birthday Sam! Kirkland President Sam Babbitt turned 90, and on hand to wish him well were Betty Hagerty Marmon K’72 (left) and Elaine Weiss K’73 (right).

They attended Weiss’ presentation about her book, The Woman’s Hour, at the New York Historical Society.

PERCY LUNEY ’70 writes: “Bev and I have enjoyed traveling to Argentina and Brazil during carnival in 2019. Rio and carnival were amazing. Experiencing the reality of the movement of Africans and Europeans into South America was fascinating. I even spent a day playing at polo outside Buenos Aires.”

BARBARA STEIN K’72: “When I woke up

ORHAN TANER ’81 shared: “Here’s a recent Southbay magazine article about my ambitions regarding transforming Manhattan Beach into a global arts hub. I am a cultural arts commissioner in this picturesque beach community, just south of LAX, and am working toward organizing an international contemporary beach art biennial.”

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

Tuesday morning I found a text on my phone from Christie Vilsack K’72 that she was in town and wanted to know if we could get together that day. Then on Friday [I] woke up and found almost the exact same text from Jane Weintraub K’72. So, I got to spend two unusually beautiful DC afternoons this week with dear friends from Kirkland.

Seems like over time the Kirkland connections only become stronger.”

THE HAMILTON HUB

TOMMY THOMPSON ’73: “Spring in New Mexico can be much like spring in Clinton. Saturday night it was snowing; yesterday it was 75 degrees and sunny. Fortunately, the high country had plenty of snow this season. The pic was taken at Taos Ski Valley in late February on one of 24 ski days for the season. I’ve started carrying a skiing data tracker app on my phone. It reports a total of over 338,000 vertical feet and 377 miles of travel over the snow for the season, with a top speed of 62.5 mph (that was on a steep cruiser at Taos). Now that spring has sprung and the ski hills have closed, I can get back on my bike (pedal, not motor). I try to ride three days a week, working to stave off the

advance of decrepitude. Since all roads around me go UP from my house, I get plenty of exercise.”

COSMO CASTELLANO ’74: Many thanks to my suitemate, John J. Donohue III ’74, for coming back to do another standing-roomonly Alumni College [at Reunion Weekend in June.]” John’s scholarship was featured by Bloomberg in a June 11 opinion piece titled “‘More Guns, Less Crime’ Is Wishful Thinking.”

course. Now I’ve kept my promise; just finished auditing Tsars, Tsarinas and Terrorists at Middlebury College. Fantastic Russian history course. So lucky to live here — the College really welcomes the commun­ity in to courses, lectures, performances, seminars, sports events, etc. All (most) free. I let Haltzel know I was ‘keeping my promise,’ and he was thrilled.”

WALT STUGIS ’76: “January winter study 1975 went to Soviet Union with Prof. Michael Haltzel and about 15 students. I hadn’t taken any of the prerequisites, but Haltzel let me go with the promise I’d take his course upon our return. I got hurt and had to leave school after a couple weeks — never finished the

Correspondent JOSEPH FLYNN ’83 shares: “Matt Cartwright ’83 sent this photo of his son Jack Cartwright ’15 (left), Craig Lasher ’81 (center), and himself attending an event sponsored by Sen. Patrick Leahy, where Jack just finished a law clerkship. He graduates Penn Law next weekend. Craig is the director of U.S. Government Relations at PAI, a respected advocacy group in Washington. He is also on the board of directors at the U.S. Global Leadership Campaign and is on the political advisory board of the League of Conservation Voters.

The 40th League of Loons banquet was held this spring in Nyack, N.Y., at the home of RICH KAVESH ’73 with 26 Hamilton and Kirkland alumni in attendance. Front row (from left): Matt Schaefer ’74, Bill Whitham ’74, Kathy Hughes (crouching), Don Hughes ’74, Kenny Marten ’74, Herbie Ogden ’75, Glenn “Doc” Reisman ’72, Kathy and Jim March ’74, Gennaro Nunziato ’74, Paul Montalbano ’74, and Rob Keren ’74. Middle

row: Nathan Stack ’74, James Carr ’74, John Navarre ’75, Manny Sargent ’74, Kevin Lynch, Chris Baker ’74, Andy Mosner ’74, Ashton Applewhite ’74, Steve “Tuna” Flores ’74, Victoria and Ken Bochat ’74, Deborah Forte ’75, and Peter Stone ’74.

Top row: Bobby Pelz ’75, Rich Kavesh ’73, Henry Hecht ’74, Kevin Abruzzese, Joe Kavesh, Emily Feiner ’81, and John Heyl ’75.

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

WANT MORE HAMILTON ALUMNI NEWS? Hop onto the Hamilton Hub—

hamilton.edu/hub

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CLASS CORRESPONDENTS Bill Muller ’69 william.muller@usdoj.gov Bill Royer ’70 waroyer@aol.com Rory Radding ’71 roryradding@gmail.com Glenn “Doc” Reisman ’72 glenn.reisman@ge.com Rick Eckman ’73 eckmanr@pepperlaw.com Ed Watkins ’74 az1730@nycap.rr.com

Arla Altman ’76 TwinkieBGood@yahoo.com Carol Travis Friscia ’77 carolfriscia@me.com Marc Komisarow ’78 marc.komisarow@ hamiltonbridgeadvisors.com Brad Auerbach ’79 brad@bradauerbach.com Peggy Daniel ’80 peggydaniel@earthlink.net Elly Cyr ’81 ellycyr@comcast.net Scott Allocco ’82 scott@sjahealthcare.com

A TRADITION PRESERVED When Harden Furniture closed in 2018, longtime employee DOUG CLEVELAND ’85 thought about the impact that would have on a Hamilton tradition. The company, located about 30 miles from College Hill, made the canes bestowed each year on Hamilton graduates, and Cleveland knew of no other source readily available.

He also thought about his boss at the company, Hamilton Trustee Dave Harden ’48,

NANCY L. FORD

Bob Hylas ’75 bobhylas@gmail.com

Joseph Flynn ’83 jtflynnmd@earthlink.net Liz Finegan Menges ’84 efmenges131@gmail.com Debbie Grassi Baker ’85 debgbaker@aol.com Melissa Joyce-Rosen ’86 MelissaJR@frontier.com

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A COMMENCEMENT TRADITION: THE HAMILTON CANE

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

who died in September. “He was the owner and driver of Harden Furniture for his whole career, and I thought it would be a fitting tribute to be able to continue the canes in his honor,” Cleveland says.

So Cleveland got to work looking for a manufacturer who could create the specialty item. The top part of the cane — the face and hat — are finished by hand carving, he explains. He turned to the Fancher Chair Co. in Salamanca, N.Y., which had made parts for Harden and had the capacity to fabricate the canes. The upshot — Fancher produced 500 canes for the College to present this spring, and Cleveland will donate the bulk of his commission to Hamilton in Dave Harden’s name.

The cane means much to Cleveland, and, he suspects, to other alumni. “It’s more than just a stick. To me it’s the symbol of what the College means and our history and the great education that’s had there,” he says.

Endnote: The cane in Cleveland’s home is, truth be told, his second. He lost his original somewhere along the way. “But my friends in purchasing at Harden got me another one,” confesses Cleveland, who is now the New York State representative for Sherrill, a high-end furniture manufacturer based in North Carolina. n

4 THINGS NOT TO MISS IN

TORONTO T

By Brent Davey ’00

oronto is the fourth largest city in North America after Mexico City, New York City, and Los Angeles. It’s the economic hub of Canada and one of the most multiculturally diverse cities in the world. While the winters here can test the mettle even of people who survived four years on College Hill, don’t let that keep you from visiting. There’s plenty to see and do in this wonderful city and a number of Hamilton alumni who call this place home.

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LAKEVIEW RESTAURANT Fantastic old diner where lots of movies were filmed including Cocktail (with Tom Cruise) and The Boondock Saints. Looks like it did the day it opened back in 1932. It’s good to also note that they are ALWAYS OPEN. It’s continuous breakfast, lunch, and dinner all day!

GRAFFITI ALLEY The key to decoding the best of Toronto’s street art and a hidden gem in the city. It starts at Spadina Avenue and goes west for a few blocks.

Made more famous by the Rick Mercer Report (a famous Canadian TV show) during his rants.

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2

BRENT DAVEY ’00

has been a real estate agent in Toronto for the past 16 years and currently works with the Johnson Team at Re/Max Professionals. He lives in the west end of the city with his wife, Karen, and 9-year-old son, Charlie. When not working, Davey stays busy coaching his son’s lacrosse and hockey teams while finding time to religiously follow his beloved Toronto Maple Leafs.

TILT ARCADE BAR Retro video game and pinball machines that will bring you back to childhood. Cheap drinks with a great selection of locally brewed beers — because if one thing is true, it’s that here in Toronto we are all over the craft beer culture. Cheers!

HOCKEY HALL OF FAME I played hockey at Hamilton so this one is special to me. It holds exhibits about players, teams, National Hockey League records, memorabilia, and NHL trophies, including the Stanley Cup — the Maple Leafs will be printed on the cup again soon, I promise. A worthwhile trip for the whole family.

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PHOTO CREDITS 1. Permission of Lakeview Restaurant 2. Mark Watmough via Flickr 3. Permission of blogTO, by Jesse Milns Photography

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CLASS CORRESPONDENTS Monique Lui Holloway ’87 moniqueholloway@comcast.net Maria DiGiulian ’88 mdigiulian@verizon.net 1989 TBD * Tamara Helmich Conway ’90 tamaraconway@gmail.com Ray Lauenstein ’91 rlauenstein@gmail.com Richard Skinner ’92 richardms70@aol.com Brendan McCormick ’93 brendanmccormick@verizon.net 1994 TBD * William Ferguson ’95 hamilton.college@outlook.com Tina McSorley Sommer ’96 mcsommy@gmail.com 1997 TBD * Sam Packer Finkelstein ’98 packer.samantha@gmail.com Sarah House Murphy ’99 sarahehouse@hotmail.com

JEFF MATLOW ’89 posted this question on the Facebook page Hamilton College – Alumni, Students + Staff: “Why did you choose Hamilton over the other schools you could’ve attended?” Here are a few of the responses: Greg Wilson ’89: My dad had three cousins graduate from Hamilton, all became doctors.

I set foot on campus and fell in love. I knew it would be challenging. I was right. I applied early, got in before Christmas. No regrets 30 years later.

Kimberly Farish Kandra ’93: I went to Hamilton to visit a friend, but she had a major project due, so I spent most of the weekend sitting in the library. (Although another friend did rescue me and took me to Chi Psi to play a little foosball) BUT ... I had an awesome “practice interview” to get ready for my interview at Duke — my dream school. The admissions rep at Duke sneered at me when I told her my favorite book was Catcher in the Rye. She told me to choose a different major because I would never get anywhere with a dance degree. I called my mom immediately and said, “Send the Hamilton app in early decision.” Hamilton was the only school I applied to. I am happy to report that my dance major paid off. I danced, taught, and choreographed professionally for over 18 years, with

my final performance being just shy of my 40th bday. Oh, and Catcher in the Rye is still my favorite book.

John Refermat ’91: January early decision.

True confessions: I applied early to Amherst (the “best” school on paper on my list) & was deferred. By that point, I’d looked at many colleges that seemed very similar & I just wanted to be done with the process. Hamilton happened to have the January early decision (I don’t know that any other school did); it was a done deal. Now, over 30 years later, I honestly can’t imagine having gone anywhere else.

Jeff Matlow ’89: Three words: cute tour guide.

Steven Brown ’93: My father took me to his 25th Hamilton reunion in 1988 when I was a junior in high school (he was Class of 1963) and that was all she wrote!

And finally, this exchange between a happy Hamilton couple …

Kirk T. Berlenbach ’91: Two words: open curriculum Rebekah Sassi ’91 [to] Kirk T. Berlenbach: not “to meet the love of my life?”

Kirk T. Berlenbach [to] Rebekah Sassi: I went so you could meet the love of your life.

Carol Bennett Lang ’00 carol.b.lang@gmail.com Justin Stein ’01 steinjustin@gmail.com Dan Fillius ’02 danfillius@yahoo.com Amanda Gengler Horrigan ’03 amandagengler@yahoo.com

*WE HAVE A VACANCY! If you’re interested in learning more about serving as correspondent for this class, contact editor@hamilton.edu.

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HENRY SNEATH ’80 was elected to the

executive committee at the Pittsburgh law firm Houston Harbaugh. A trial attorney focusing on complex business litigation, products liability, intellectual property matters, and insurance coverage and bad faith, he chairs the firm’s intellectual property practice and co-chairs its litigation practice.

Sneath also serves as an adjunct professor at Duquesne University School of Law where he teaches Trade Secret Law and Law of Trademarks and Unfair Competition.

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

Correspondent

ELLY PHILLIPS CYR ’81 reports:

From Matthew Sheridan ’81 — “Tour de Bintan Stage 1 Individual Time Trial...age group champ! @ Lagoi, Riau, Indonesia”

Bookshelf

MIKE BARLOW ’75 and Cornelia Lévy-Bencheton.

Smart Cities, Smart Future: Showcasing Tomorrow (Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley & Sons, 2018).

COLIN CARMAN ’00. The Radical Ecology of the

Shelleys: Eros and Environment (New York: Routledge, 2019).

Douglas Ambrose, professor of history Your Obedient Servant: The Letters of Alexander Hamilton & Aaron Burr (Cooperstown, N.Y.: Fenimore Art Museum, 2019)

T

his beautifully illustrated book

by Doug Ambrose, the Carolyn C. and David M. Ellis ’38 Distinguished Teaching Professor of History, examines the letters between Alexander Hamilton, Aaron Burr, and their seconds leading up to the fatal duel on July 11, 1804. Ten of the most significant letters are presented in pictorial form for the first time, alongside their transcriptions. We asked the author a few questions about his new work.

What do you hope readers gain from the book?

I hope readers do what they should always do when thinking about the past: Recognize that the past is “another country” and that we need to step out of our moral and intellectual worlds if we are ever to understand why peoples in different times and places, with different values, fears, motives, and beliefs, acted as they did. We too easily see Hamilton as “one of us” — a modern who embraced a dynamic global economy, urbanization, and realpolitik.

We thus miss why he saw Burr as such a menace or why both he and Burr rationally decided to face each other at 10 paces with loaded pistols. Answering both of those questions requires us to enter the quite alien world of the early national United States.

Did working on this book add to or change your understanding about Hamilton?

I loved working on this project. Hamilton is an endlessly fascinating figure — as is Burr.

Re-reading Hamilton’s writings deepened my conviction that his skepticism about the American experiment in republican government centered in his fear of a demagogue who “by flattering the prejudices of the people, and exciting their jealousies and apprehensions,” would “throw things into confusion” so “that he may ‘ride the storm and direct the whirlwind.’”

As a historian, is the huge popular interest in Alexander Hamilton a good thing?

I think the popular interest in Hamilton and the founding era is wonderful. Yes, historians and other scholars rightly see how works aimed at popular audiences, such as Lin-Manuel Miranda’s musical Hamilton!, distort, simplify, perhaps even misrepresent the past and the people they present, but they also arouse, stimulate, and encourage interest in that past.

I can’t help but think that, on balance, that this is a good thing. We as a culture need to think more about the past, more about how it has shaped our world, and more about what we do with our knowledge and understanding of the forces that led men like Hamilton to act as he did. n

ANDREW S. CURRAN ’86. Diderot and the Art of Thinking Freely (New York: Other Press, 2019).

GEORGE R. DIXON ’63. Adventures in Physics (self-published, 2019).

RABBI STEPHEN LEWIS FUCHS ’68. ... And Often the First Jew: Kristallnacht Survivor’s Son Teaches Holocaust History in Germany (Jerusalem, Israel: Mazo Publishers, 2019).

KYANDREIA JONES ’19. Choose Your Own Adventure — Spies: James Armistead Lafayette (Waitsfield, Vt.: Chooseco, 2019).

MARTINE KALAW ’03. Illegal Among Us: A Stateless Woman’s Quest for Citizenship (Mechanicsburg, Pa.: Sunbury Press, 2018).

JAMES G. MEADE ’66 and Hari Sharma. Dynamic

DNA: Activating Your Inner Energy for Better Health (New York: SelectBooks, Inc., 2018).

QUINCY D. NEWELL, associate professor of religious

studies. Your Sister in the Gospel: The Life of Jane Manning James, a Nineteenth-Century Black Mormon (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019).

ALEXANDRA PLAKIAS ’02, assistant professor of philosophy. Thinking Through Food: A Philosophical Introduction (Peterborough, Canada: Broadview Press, 2019).

PETER WELTNER ’64. Antiquary: Poems and

Stories (Seattle: Marrowstone Press, 2019); Old-Growth (Marrowstone, 2019); and Vespers on Point Reyes: Selected Poems 1989-2019 (Baltimore: BrickHouse Books, 2019).

HEIDI WONG ’20. The Blue Velvet Dress Says I Told You So: Poems + Paintings (Los Angeles: 777, 2019).

For descriptions of the books listed above, and links to where you might purchase them, visit hamilton.edu/alumni/books.

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

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LD ENTERTAINMENT/MIRROR/CAMERON, KATE

Ernie Found ’74 with members of the cast of the 2018 movie The Miracle Season.

‘TRAVEL MY WAY’ For ERNIE FOUND ’74, 2018 was a year of milestones. Two of his children got married, and a feature film in honor of his third child, Caroline, was released — The Miracle Season.

Caroline, a star player for the Iowa City West High School volleyball team, died in a moped accident at age 17. Twelve days later, her mother and Found’s wife, Ellyn, died of pancreatic cancer. That was in 2011. The movie that came out in April 2018 is an account of how Found, his family, volleyball coach Kathy Bresnahan, and her team stood up to grief by supporting an improbable quest for the state championship in memory of Caroline, whose nickname, “Line,” inspired the team’s rally cry — Live Like Line.

The movie release and the two weddings made for three big events in a single year,

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Found observes in his unassuming way. “And so at the end of all that,” he says, “I got to thinking, ‘Damn — it’s time for me to do something for me, you know?’”

Cue Nate King Cole singing “(Get Your Kicks On) Route 66.”

This spring Found traveled a stretch of the iconic highway, a dream he’d long harbored.

The timing felt right in multiple ways. He had turned 66 years old. One of the few hip tunes his classical music-loving parents ever played was Cole’s “Route 66.” And he was retired from a career as an orthopedic surgeon. All signs pointed west. He made up his mind to take to the road in April. But by what conveyance?

Motorcycles are popular with Route 66 pilgrims, and Found considered one. But at 6'5" (he played basketball at Hamilton), he thought

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more than two days on a bike would be painful.

A convertible was enticing, but again, he would be too tall for comfort unless the top was down.

Found, a native of Western New York, remembered being enthralled on his first trip to New York City by the big Checker cabs that were once ubiquitous on the busy streets.

Almost all of the vehicles made by the Checker Motors Corp. of Kalamazoo, Mich., were cabs, but the company also produced a relative few cars for individual use, and Found knew it. He scouted one out and bought it. Setting out from his Iowa City home, he picked up Route 66 in St. Louis and followed it to its terminus at a pier at Santa Monica, Calif. He motored 2,400 miles at 10 to 12 miles per gallon.

At differing points along the way, he was joined by his sister and his newlywed children

THE HAMILTON HUB

and their spouses. He picked up a hitchhiker or two. The entire experience was better than he’d hoped it would be.

People ask him about his favorite part of the trip, and with reflection, he’s come up with two things. One was the Grand Canyon, which no photo or painting can adequately capture.

It overwhelmed him. The other was the pride and patriotism he felt for his great country in all its beauty and variety. That included the variety of people. He’d pull into a local eatery, say, the RoadKill Cafe, or some other little village spot, and there he’d find people who would want to talk.

During his three weeks or so on the road, he concluded that everybody has a story and that “it’s our human requirement” to find out what those stories are. “Sometimes it takes a little digging, and many of them are heartbreaking. Many of them are heartwarming,” says Found, who did more listening to stories than telling them along the way.

He has been careful with the story of Caroline and the Iowa City West volleyball team. He and his family, Coach Bresnahan, team members, and their families, he says, were averse to a Hollywood treatment of Caroline’s life, death, and the victory, initially spurning offers that flowed in from movie people. Eventually, after discussing their apprehensions with representatives from LD Entertainment, and with David Aaron Cohen, who wrote the screenplay for Friday Night Lights, on board, they grew more comfortable with the idea of a movie.

The deciding factor, says Found, was the lack of inspirational movies about women’s sports teams. William Hurt played him in the movie, and Helen Hunt portrayed Bresnahan.

Right up until Found saw the movie, he was apprehensive about how the story would be told. To his profound relief, it turned out pretty well.

“It had its shortcomings. It didn’t tell the whole story. You know, they had to leave things out, some things that we wish that maybe had been there. But overall, yes, they did a nice job with it. It got the message across, anyway,” Found says.

With the movie wrapped up and Route 66 behind him, Found hung onto the Checker car.

It’s in his garage when he isn’t driving it around town. Maybe he’ll use it to take some of Caroline’s former teammates for a spin around Iowa City when they gather there for another milestone. “One of them is going to get married out at our house next summer, which is fantastic,” Found says.

— Maureen A. Nolan

The Miracle Season is available on various streaming services; a trailer can be found by searching on YouTube.

Ernie Found behind the wheel of the sweet set of wheels that took him along Route 66 from St. Louis to Santa Monica, Calif.

To catch Ernie Found in a segment from Real Sports w/Bryant Gumbel presented by the late sports commentator Frank Deford, see hamilton.edu/ carolinefound.

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

Correspondent JOSEPH FLYNN ’83 writes: Received a nice update from Julie Parker ’83 this week — “In July, I started a new position as associate professor of biblical studies at The General Theological Seminary in NYC. My husband and I moved to Manhattan and just love it. Recently I was in Florida and had a lovely visit with Laurie Gutstein (visiting Hamilton student). One evening we had dinner with her brother David Gutstein ’83 and his wife, Jodi. Dave has a thriving medical practice and is the proud father of three daughters, Alison, Jillian, and Lila, two of whom have gone into medicine like their parents.”

Correspondent MELISSA JOYCE-ROSEN ’86: “I’d like to share a ‘small world’ story. Last year, I met Tyler, a student at Hobart College who was heading to medical school and was interested in rural medicine. I remember our classmates, Steve Lyndaker ’86 and Shereen Palmer ’86, left the Boston area to practice medicine in Lowville, N.Y., a small town an hour north of Utica and in the heart of rural Upstate New York. I introduced Tyler to Steve virtually and they connected for a phone call.

Fast forward to this year. Tyler completed his first year of medical school at Syracuse. As part

Because Hamiltonians support each other!

Gathered for the launch of Equileap, a company founded by DIANA VAN ­MAASDIJK ’93, were Amy Owens ­Goodfriend ’82, Jacqueline Vargas Donovan ’93, Sarah Edelston Hiner ’82, Katie Winn Boyer ’93, and Charlie ­Boyer ’93.

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of his rural medicine program, he found himself in Lowville for a week volunteering and learning more about the day-to-day practice of rural medicine. He shadowed Steve to get first-hand experience and spent time with Shereen understanding her role as a pediatrician in a small community. Steve and Shereen graciously hosted Tyler and four of his classmates at their home for dinner. Their daughter, Catherine, graduated from Hamilton in 2018 and is currently in medical school at the University of Rochester, Steve and Shereen’s other alma mater! Their daughter Anna is a member of the Class of 2021 at Hamilton.”

SHERRY KLEIN ’86 has written and produced

her first feature film, an indie thriller titled Paradise Cove and starring Mena Suvari, Todd Grinnell, and Kristin Bauer van Straten. “It’s about a contractor and his wife who come to Malibu to flip his mom’s beach house and are terrorized by a homeless woman living under the house. We shot in and around Malibu and are in post production,” writes Klein, who is hoping for a release in 2020.

MATTHEW KANE ’99 has been promoted to

general counsel and chief compliance officer at Z Capital Group, a leading alternative asset manager of opportunistic, value-oriented private equity, and credit funds. Matt has also been appointed to Z Capital’s Management Committee.

YOUR CLASSMATES ARE HUNGRY FOR NEWS! Feed the Hamilton Hub—

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CLASS CORRESPONDENTS Céline Geiger ’04 celinegeiger@gmail.com Sara Peach Messier ’05 sara.messier11@gmail.com Colby Bishop ’06 colby.bishop@gmail.com Alexander Hamilton birthday celebrations happen around the globe. Gathering in Tokyo were REN STERN ’13, RANGA KOTANI ’10, GENTARO ASAI ’95, MARI IZUMURA ’94, and AKIHIRO NAKANO ’92.

NIAMEY PENDER WILSON ’99 is the new director of breast surgery, quality and research and a breast surgery division leader with the Hartford HealthCare Medical Group in Connecticut.

CHRIS BAUDO ’00 was named the

Sara Carhart ’07 carhart.sara@gmail.com Melissa Joy Kong ’08 melissajoykong@gmail.com Fiona MacQuarrie Helmuth ’09 fionahelmuth@gmail.com Kory Diserens ’10 kdiserens@gmail.com Nick Stagliano ’11 stagliano.nick@gmail.com

United Collegiate Hockey Conference’s women’s hockey coach of the year. Not only was it his first season as head coach at Nazareth College in Rochester, N.Y., but the inaugural year of the program. The Golden Flyers wrapped up the regular season 19-4-2 on their way to a second-place finish in the conference. Baudo committed to bringing in top flight talent to make his program a success, and a team guided almost entirely by freshmen certainly delivered. He is a first-time collegiate head coach, having recently served as the head coach of the Selects Academy in Rochester.

Baudo spent over a decade at The Gunnery School in Connecticut.

Allison Eck ’12 allison.c.eck@gmail.com

CAITLIN HULT ’12 (right) and JEAN LEVERICH ’87 performed in the University Musical Society Choral Union’s performance of Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem in February at Hill Auditorium in Ann Arbor, Mich., in honor of the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day. It

2019 TBD *

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

Alex Orlov ’13 alexandra.m.orlov@gmail.com Tara Huggins ‘14 tarahuggins4@gmail.com Ben Fields ’15 hamilton2015notes@gmail.com Kaitlin McCabe ’16 kamccabe1@gmail.com 2017 TBD * 2018 TBD *

*WE HAVE A VACANCY! If you’re interested in learning more about serving as correspondent for this class, contact editor@hamilton.edu.

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was a reunion of sorts as the two sang next to one another at the alumni celebration of Professor Rob Kolb a few years ago. When Hult came to the University of Michigan to pursue a postdoc, she joined the UMS Choral Union; Leverich has sung with that group since 1997.

The Hamilton connection to the War Requiem runs deep — Leverich first read Wilfred Owen’s WWI poetry, which provides the text of the Requiem, in Austin Briggs’ modern literature class, and she first heard fragments of Britten’s haunting piece while visiting Coventry Cathedral while touring England with the Hamilton College Choir in 1987.

SHARE, ENGAGE, CONNECT! It’s all happening on the Hamilton Hub— Correspondent TARA HUGGINS ’14 shares: “Chicago celebrated a wonderful Alexander Hamilton Birthday at Eataly [back in January].”

BECAUSE HAMILTON [EXPANDS MINDS] PROBLEM Not all kids have access to science that motivates them to reach their potential.

SOLUTION AMRIKA SIEUNARINE ’16 Having first boarded BioBus as a high school student, the world politics major is now a manager for the nonprofit that sends a mobile lab staffed with scientists to visit underresourced schools throughout New York City.

“ I remember boarding this bus and being filled with so much excitement and

curiosity about using microscopes. … I want to translate that same experience to low-income students. I think it’s very important for youth to have access to an innovative space that allows them to think outside the box, think outside the theoretical framework they are getting in the classroom, and build their confidence.”

The world is full of problems.

Hamiltonians deliver solutions. hamilton.edu/becausehamilton

hamilton.edu/hub

Necrology

For full memorial biographies of the following alumni, as well as a searchable database for those published dating back to 2008, see hamilton.edu/necrology.

George R. Gillmore ’42, a surgeon of Palm Beach Gardens, Fla. Feb. 24, 2019.

William P. Hypes ’46, an investments analyst of Vero Beach, Fla. March 5, 2019.

Paul Greengard ’48, a Nobel Prize-winning neuroscientist of New York City whose work opened new pathways to studying psychological diseases. April 13, 2019.

Paul S. Langa ’48, a labor relations director of Brevard, N.C. March 28, 2019.

Edward “Pete” M. Bakwin ’50, a banker/ financial manager and collector of fine art of La Porte, Ind. Nov. 22, 2018.

Thomas E. Dolan ’51, a marketing research and sales manager of Baldwin, N.Y. Jan. 10, 2019.

Clarence “Buddy” A. Griffith, Jr. ’51, a grocery store retailer and property developer of Huntington, N.Y. Feb. 4, 2019.

James W. Ring ’51, a professor emeritus of physics at Hamilton. April 27, 2019.

Richard C. Cummings ’52, an attorney of Watertown and Chase Lake, N.Y. Dec. 4, 2018.

James D. Rose ’52, a physician of Auburn, N.Y. Jan. 10, 2019.

Richard H. Martindale ’53, a dentist of Granby, Conn. Jan. 17, 2019.

William R. Madden ’58, a stockbroker and investment banker of West Allenhurst, N.J. March 19, 2019.

Jeffrey D. Thatcher ’69, a mining industry worker and conservationist of Berkeley Springs, W.Va. Aug. 1, 2018.

John J. Murphy ’58, a teacher and administrator of East Greenbush, N.Y. March 7, 2019.

George H. Gray ’72, an attorney of Rochester, N.Y. Dec. 2, 2018.

Benjamin J. Werner ’58, a Catholic priest of Dewitt, Mich. Dec. 25, 2018.

Jeffrey W. Beaumont ’74, a financial officer for software companies of Manhattan Beach, Calif. Oct. 24, 2018.

Peter E. Wormuth ’58, an information technology and telecommunications manager of Seneca Falls, N.Y. April 7, 2019.

Peter A. Marks ’76, a real estate investor and consultant of Princeton, N.J. Jan. 13, 2019.

Sterling P. Davis ’59, a textbook salesman and educational software developer. Nov. 23, 2018.

David W. Hanson ’82, a financial consultant of Evanston, Ill. Jan. 25, 2019.

Donald A. Drake ’59, a high school principal of Roseboom, N.Y. Jan. 23, 2019.

Alexander M. Fraser ’85, an investment banker and analyst formerly of Dallas.

Feb. 13, 2019.

Paul T. Englund ’60, a professor emeritus of Baltimore’s Johns Hopkins University who studied African sleeping sickness.

Jan. 12, 2019.

Theodore A. Hand ’60, a business and research services consultant of Wayne, N.J. March 14, 2019.

Robert H. Wells ’60, a public relations specialist of Syracuse, N.Y. Feb. 5, 2019.

Robert “Mike” J. Ryan ’61, an attorney of Washington, D.C. Jan. 15, 2019.

Carmi Schooler ’54, a research psychologist of Washington, D.C. May 11, 2018.

Stuart L. Scott ’61, a commercial real estate service and investment management executive of Lake Bluff, Ill., who had chaired Hamilton’s Board of Trustees. Feb. 25, 2019.

Samuel W. Sade ’56, a computer software designer of Jordan, N.Y. Dec. 6, 2018.

Charles J. Olney ’64, a general and vascular surgeon of Dataw Island, S.C. Nov. 26, 2018.

Charles G. Rammelt ’57, an investment counselor of Glenview, Ill. Feb. 14, 2019.

George H. Willis ’64, a professor of education of Wakefield, R.I. Jan. 20, 2019.

David L. Eaker ’57, a scientist and educator of Uppsala, Sweden. June 22, 2017.

Paul F. Streitz ’66, an advertising executive and writer of Shelton, Conn. Dec. 25, 2018.

Robert Job III ’58, an IBM executive and information technology consultant of Christiansburg, Va. Dec. 29, 2018.

Brian W. Beach ’69, a family practice doctor of Oswego, N.Y. March 2, 2019.

Visit and post on the hub at HAMILTON.EDU/HUB

Ann E. Rasmussen ’89, a teacher and free­lance writer of Amagansett, N.Y. Nov. 11, 2018.

Jason P. Andris ’96, an investment fund executive of Far Hills, N.J. May 30, 2018.

Scott D. Chatham ’07, a psychologist/social worker and real estate agent of Rochester, N.Y. March 20, 2019.

FACULTY Leland “Bud” Cratty, Jr., professor of chemistry at Hamilton from 1958 to 1996.

May 27, 2019.

Edwin B. Erickson, an assistant professor of biology from 1969 to 1973 who went on to serve for 14 years in the Pennsylvania Senate.

Jan. 7, 2019.

Memorial biographies prepared during the previous year are published in a booklet available at the Alumni Service of Remembrance held during Reunion Weekend in June.

If you would like a copy, please write to editor@hamilton.edu.

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5

Still Standing Tall

THINGS YOU’LL LEARN A Secret Society’s Afoot SHHHHH! A covert group of women scientists has coalesced to save the world, and a Hamilton alumna is behind it. PAGE 11

Cr = Carissima Enjoy a salute to the 150th anniversary of Mendeleev’s Periodic Table of Elements ... with a Hamilton twist. PAGE 16

Stories Lead to Understanding Through a new oral history project, LGBTQ alumni share with student interviewers candid memories of their experiences on College Hill. PAGE 32

Some Memories Endure At age 100, WWII veteran Ralph Nichols ’40 recounts his D-Day experience with focused detail. PAGE 50

Everybody Has a Story Ernie Found ’74 found more than kicks on Rt. 66. PAGE 58

On the Cover

New Yorker cartoonist Roz Chast K’75 shares how she found her independence on College Hill, where she gets her inspiration, and the pitfalls of rubber cement. PAGE 44 Photo of Roz Chast by Kelly Campbell Illustration “The Universe in a Grain of Sand” by Roz Chast

“This granite may crumble, this bronze may corrode, this College may be dissolved; but the monument of his work will remain.”

WITH THESE WORDS ELIHU ROOT, Class of 1864 and then chairman of the Board of Trustees, dedicated the Alexander Hamilton statue on Commencement Day, June 17, 1918. How fitting that the College’s namesake and founding father would be lauded by another esteemed statesman.

Root served as secretary of war and secretary of state, was a world leader in the development of international law, and received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1912.

PHOTO BY BOB HANDELMAN

HAMILTON

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198 College Hill Road Clinton, NY 13323

Hamilton College

HAMILTON Magazine

Summer 2019

THE BIG QUESTION What was your senior project/ thesis, and what did you learn from the experience?

FOR NEXT ISSUE, CONSIDER:

Countless trips to the library, interviews with original sources, meetings with your advisor, endless revisions and presentation rehearsals. Yet many alumni say the ordeal that was their senior project was worth it. Send your memories about this Hamilton rite of passage to editor@ hamilton.edu by October 1. Kindly limit your submission to 150 words or fewer, and include your name and class year. Responses will be published in the next magazine or on the Hamilton Hub (hamilton.edu/hub).

THE BIG ANSWERS To find out what your fellow readers shared about fashion trends during their days on College Hill, see pp. 24-25.

A Kirkland Alumna’s Take on Life