Spring 2017, "You are what you read"

LAKESIDE SPRING|SUMMER 2017

You are what you read

• New Upper School director • Social history of dances at Lakeside

MADE YOU LOOK

MIKE LENGEL

LINDSAY ORLOWSKI

PHONE-FREE DAY: A Ringing Success.

noticing how phones negatively affected

Nearly 95 percent of Upper School students

social interactions. Two of the amazing

willingly gave up their cellphones – a total

experiences students reported: “I learned

of 514! – one school day in January, leaving

that I can spend 5 minutes with my mind and

them parked on the desk of Head of School

I won’t die” and “Today, I actually looked up

Bernie Noe. Led by Coco Sack ’18, seven

and saw the sky.” Read Coco’s full account

students had proposed the idea after

at www.lakesideschool.org/magazine. ■

YOUR COMMENTS In “From the Archives, Film Studies at Lakeside” (Fall/Winter 2016), archivist Leslie Schuyler asked alums to help fill in gaps in the archives’ details on early film courses.

You may already have reference to a film course taught in the spring of 1980, but in case you do not, it was course number 184 taught by Rob Doggett. It appears from my comment card for 1979-1980 that the course lasted only one academic quarter and combined watching classic films (“Potemkin” is mentioned in the comments), writing about them, and making a film.

— Alan Aronson ’80 TALK TO US:

Lakeside magazine is

Lakeside magazine welcomes your letters

published twice yearly by

to the editor and suggestions. Please send them to magazine@lakesideschool.org or via social media.

Facebook: www.facebook.com/ lakesideschool Twitter: www.twitter.com/lakesideschool Instagram: @Lakeside.Lions LAKESIDE

Lakeside School. Find past

Fall/Winter 2015 Spring/Summer 2017

LAKESIDE MAGAZINE EDITOR: Carey Quan Gelernter

issues at www.lakesideschool.

ART DIRECTOR: Carol Nakagawa

org/magazine. All contents

WRITERS: Mary Ann Gwinn,

©2017 Lakeside School.

FIND US ON:

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the communications office of

LAKESIDE ARCHIVES

Alan Aronson ’80 shown with a video camera in the Class of 1980 slide show, “at the beginning (and end) of my career as a filmmaker.”

Carey Quan Gelernter, Sheila Feeney, Leslie Schuyler, Amanda Darling, Mike Lengel

ALUMNI RELATIONS NEWS:

Kelly Poort

CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS:

Tom Reese, Lindsay Orlowski, Clayton Christy, Paul Dudley, Mike Lengel COPY EDITOR: Valerie Campbell

TABLE OF CONTENTS COVER STORY Page Turners 9 ■ ■ ■ ■

What we’re reading 10 Guide to recent alums’ books 4 who write YA 18 Q&As with 5 alums 26

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Inside Lakeside LINDSAY ORLOWSKI

GOOD CLEAN MONKEY BUSINESS

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T THE ENTRANCE of the Middle School library sits a monkey whose furrowed brow tips us off that he’s deep into the book he’s reading. His sculpted head’s a shiny gold, its surface smoother than the rest of him.

Lakesiders here since 1980 are familiar with him as library sentry. But even they don’t necessarily know how he came to be here.

He was created by Richard Beyer, best known for his “Waiting for the Interurban” sculpture in Fremont that has become a symbol of that Seattle neighborhood’s historic quirkiness.

“Our” Beyer captures a bit of Lakeside’s personality. We call attention to him at this moment because he was commissioned in part to celebrate reading, and reading’s what this magazine issue celebrates as well.

We asked Lakeside math teacher and benefactor Tom Rona ’72 to share the origin story:

“My wife Barbara and I specifically commissioned the sculptor, Rich Beyer (a family friend), to sculpt something for the Middle School library when we moved from Capitol Hill to the old Haller Lake Elementary School in 1980. We wanted to celebrate the unifying move, which brought the Middle School to within a couple of blocks of the Upper School, and we wanted

something to celebrate reading.

“We also wanted something friendly and inviting, something kids would want to touch.

It is gratifying to note that the monkey’s head is still shiny from the multitude of kid hands that pat him on the head every day as they go by. J “Two Lakeside parents, Linda Helsell and Peggy Enderlein, joined us to help funding the project.

“At Rich’s request, there is no plaque indicating his name and no title for the sculpture.”

Beyer died in 2012. His hundreds of public art works remain popular in each of their locales; passersby continually bedeck “Waiting for the Interurban” with whimsical clothes and decorations. Our Lakeside reading monkey continues to symbolize our love of letters.

Head of school’s letter New Upper School director 5 Micro-school site 6 Campus news 6 Lakeside and the election 7 Faculty kudos 7 Sports 8

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Alumni news

T.J. Vassar ’68 diversity celebration Bay Area receptions 31 Seattle reception 32 Class Connections 36 Distinguished Alumni Award 43 From the Archives 44 In Memoriam 46 Calendar 51

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ON THE COVER

Illustration

by Tom Reese

The respect for reading that the sculpture represents surely has influenced our many alumni authors.

Monkey see, monkey do. ■ CAREY QUAN GELERNTER

Editor, Lakeside magazine carey.gelernter@lakesideschool.org 206-440-2706 14050 1st Avenue NE Seattle, WA 98125 Contents

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HEAD NOTE

by BERNIE NOE

Reading about what matters in life

W

TOM REESE

HILE AWAY ON SABBATICAL this past school year, I had a chance to read a number of thought-provoking books. When Killian and I left we wanted to spend time thinking about what really matters in life; what truth is, as best we understand it; and what the answers to those two questions mean for us. My reading, therefore, was focused almost entirely on those questions.

I began by reading Etty Hillesum’s “An Interrupted Life.” Hillesum was a Jewish intellectual who lived in Holland and was deported to Auschwitz, where she died when she was 29 years old. In her diaries she reflects upon the superficial nature of life in the face of the persecution of the Jews of Europe and concludes that, in the end, only love and how we treat other people really matter. The second book I read, the Tao Te Ching by Lao-tzu (translated

by Stephen Mitchell, 1988), was especially powerful (I read Mitchell’s “The Second Book of the Tao” later in our travels). I am the too-controlling type, even with things that aren’t controllable, and it was helpful to read in the Tao Te Ching during the first week of sabbatical “that he who is concerned about the destination is not a

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good traveler.” I followed this advice and it made all the difference. I am still trying to follow it. The third book was Boethius’s “The Consolation of Philosophy” (translated by W.V. Cooper, 1902) written in the sixth century by a former court official who found himself on the wrong side of palace politics and wrote his masterpiece from a prison cell. It is a book about the ephemeral nature of fame, wealth, and position and the lasting value of friendship, family, and living an ethical life. He concludes, “There is no such thing as external happiness. We have to find our peace in the present moment, just like we find truth.” One of the more powerful books I read was Rainer Maria Rilke’s “Letters to a Young Poet,” beautifully written and with the important message to be authentic in

life — to write poetry (or do anything) because you must, because that is who you are in the world.

I read other similar books, but I think you get the point. It was such a privilege to have the time to do this reading!

I also read a number of books that I just wanted to read, some of which I had wanted to read for years. “Flow: The Psychology of Optimal Experience,” by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, was one such book. Csikszentmihalyi writes about finding your passions in life by doing things that literally put you “in the flow,” where your talent and your joy intersect.

Quoting Viktor Frankl (“Man’s Search for Meaning”), Csikszentmihalyi advises, “Don’t aim for success – the more you aim and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue ...”

I will end with a best-seller that a number of you may have read, Paul Kalanithi’s “When Breath Becomes Air,” the story of a Lakesidesque achiever who is diagnosed with cancer and faces his mortality. It is a powerful story, and also beautifully told, of the decisions made by a young man that end up really mattering to him.

I know you all have books that have really mattered to you, and if it is not too much to ask, I would love to hear from you about what they were and maybe a line or two as to why. I will read a number of them, and when we meet we will have something talk about! Thanks, everyone!

Rilke believes that there is no better way to develop authenticity than to get out into nature, even when it is raining (he did not specifically say that, but I am sure he would agree). So, I wish you all a beautiful Seattle spring, rain and all. ■

BERNIE NOE

Head of School

INSIDE LAKESIDE

Baltimore educator Felicia Wilks named Upper School director

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ELICIA WILKS, who heads an all-girls high school in suburban Baltimore, has been named Lakeside’s new Upper School director, to begin in July.

In announcing her appointment, Head of School Bernie Noe said Wilks embodies key qualities that Lakeside values, including “integrity, authenticity, empathy, determination, and a joy in learning.”

As upper school head of Garrison Forest School, in Owings Mills, Md., Wilks oversees all operations of its 260 day and boarding students. She’s also a member of the leadership team for the entire pre-K through 12 school of 600 students.

She spent the previous eight years in teaching and leadership positions at the 860-student Friends School of Baltimore, including as chair of the upper school English department and the diversity director. Before that, she taught at Catonsville Educational Center and Baltimore City Community College in Maryland and Paul Robeson High School in Brooklyn, N.Y. Wilks is a graduate of The Bryn Mawr School, one of the oldest college-preparatory schools for girls in the country, and has a bachelor’s degree in African American Studies from Columbia University and a master’s degree in writing from Johns Hopkins University. She began her career as a journalist, until a stint teaching a class showed her that her heart and calling were in education.

After a national search, Noe said Wilks quickly emerged as the committee’s No. 1 choice, a view cemented after her campus visit, when she also favorably impressed faculty, staff, and students who

FIND THE LINK to watch a short video with Felicia Wilks at www.lakesideschool. org/magazine.

interviewed her. “The search committee found Felicia to be a wise, thoughtful, smart, and empathic educator,” Noe said. “Midway through our final interview with Felicia, we found her answers to be so thoughtful that we all started taking notes so we could remember the points she was making!”

He said Lakeside will benefit as an institution and as a community by her knowledge gained at schools with a wide variety of educational models and philosophies: secular independent, Quaker, public, day and boarding, coeducational and single-sex. She also brings valuable perspective as one for whom leaving public school and entering a challenging independent school in grade 8 was transformative. These experiences, Noe said, “have given her a unique and valuable understanding of how to support both students and fellow educators, and how to bring together and lead a wide and diverse community of individuals.”

Wilks was honored in 2013 as a University of Maryland Philip Merrill Presidential Scholar Teacher Mentor, for her work mentoring high-performing students. She speaks nationally on diversity in education and has served on many committees for the National Association of Independent Schools and the Association of Independent Maryland and D.C. Schools.

She will move to Seattle with her family to start at Lakeside in

COURTESY OF GARRISON FOREST SCHOOL

Felicia Wilks quickly emerged as a search committee’s top choice for Upper School director. She begins at Lakeside in July.

early July. Her two children have been admitted to Lakeside, with one in grade 7 and one in grade 11.

During her visit to campus, she met with faculty and staff and answered questions related to everything from academic to social concerns.

One question was what she thought all seniors should know by graduation. She highlighted communication skills: writing and speaking, in different settings; the ability to be critical consumers in all things; the ability to collaborate, “even if they don’t like the people they’re collaborating with.” And selfknowledge: “They need to have a sense of who they are, what they need; to have the ability to advocate for themselves and to have the strength to advocate for others who can’t advocate for themselves. They need to be aware of things outside their bubbles … and engage outside school gates.” And she spoke of morality: “Students need to define that for themselves and go out and live by their principles.”

They should, she said, leave Lakeside feeling confident, “not totally confident, that’s a lifelong

process for some people, but confident in who they are at the moment.”

Responding to a question about her own confidence and how her family background might have contributed to it, she credited her mother, an early-education teacher and single parent, who drilled into her the need to “run hard, twice as hard; you don’t let people discourage you.” She shared that the transition hadn’t necessarily been easy at first when she moved from a public school to private, but that mastering it helped her gain both confidence and the sensitivity to help students and teachers in similar situations.“I’ve been the person who’s not comfortable in the room.

If you survive that, that can give you confidence. I’ve gained confidence by helping others be confident.”

Asked what she both looked forward to and felt challenged by, she said it was important to her to know all the students at a school, which will be harder with the larger Lakeside student body, but she believes she can do it; and that “everybody I’ve met here is brilliant – that is exciting”; and she relished “being pushed to always be at the top of my game.” ■ Head Note, Inside Lakeside

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INSIDE LAKESIDE

Micro-school to be near Seattle Center

MIKE LENGEL

This building on Warren Avenue North near Seattle Center will house a Lakeside-affiliated micro-school opening in fall 2018.

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N APRIL, Lakeside signed an 11-year lease for 16,000 square feet of space near Denny Way, two blocks from Pacific Science Center, for a Lakeside-affiliated high school that will open in fall 2018.

The building on Warren Avenue North off John Street, built in 1927, originally was Sacred Heart School, and was most recently leased to Waldorf High School, which left for another location about three years ago. The building includes eight large classrooms and a large commons room.

The deal calls for $5 million over 11 years, with the lessor also

contributing toward buildingimprovement costs; Lakeside has the option to terminate in five years.

The architect is Jeff Boone from Public47.

In February, another milestone was met when, after a national search, Sue Belcher was appointed director for the micro-school.

Belcher has served since its inception as the micro-school’s director of research and development. Previously she was director of Lakeside Summer School Programs and earlier was Lakeside Upper School library department head.

The Seattle Center-area site

fulfills the Lakeside Board of Trustees’ desire for a central location easily accessed, particularly by public transportation. While an initial hope was to be within a mile of the I-90 and I-5 interchange, this proved to be financially unfeasible given the rising cost of commercial real-estate in that vicinity.

“We are excited to find a building that meets both our programmatic needs and is financially a great deal,” said Belcher.

The micro-school effort was begun to create a more affordable model of independent school and to serve a greater number of academically talented students than the Lakeside campus can accommodate. It will be separate from but affiliated with Lake-

Alixe Callen to head Rhode Island school

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LEXANDRA “ALIXE” CALLEN, who began as Lakeside’s Upper School director four years ago, is leaving at the end of this school year to become head of school of St. George’s School, an Episcopal coeducational day and boarding school for grades 9-12 in Middletown, R.I. With the move, Callen, a New England native, and her family return to their roots on the East Coast. Before her Lakeside tenure, Callen was principal of a suburban Massachusetts high school.

Callen has strong ties to St. George’s, founded in 1896; four of her relatives graduated from there.

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Callen cited the time being right for her family’s move, as one of her two sons graduates from Lakeside in June while the other will graduate from 8th grade.

“It’s been a privilege working with Lakeside’s stellar faculty, forward-thinking leadership, and amazing students and families,” Callen said.“I will always treasure the professional relationships and personal friendships that I have built here.”

Lakeside’s Head of School Bernie Noe said he was “excited to welcome her as a fellow school head” and that “St. George’s is so fortunate to be getting such a smart, warm, knowledgeable, and dynamic person.” ■

side, with a different educational model, admissions process, student-life program, and cost.

It will serve 160 students in grades 9-12. Tuition will be set at approximately $17,000 per year (Lakeside’s 2017-2018 tuition is $33,280).

“The micro-school will preserve the fundamental components of Lakeside: a high-quality academic education, meaningful studentfaculty relationships, and a diverse body of students and adults,” says Belcher. Differences, in addition to lower tuition and modest leased space, will include a more narrow focus on academics rather than providing a comprehensive slate of offerings such as athletics or arts and somewhat larger class sizes.

With the site now nailed down, the small team of Lakeside faculty, staff, administrators, and board members led by Belcher and Head of School Bernie Noe are turning to naming the school, refining curriculum development, finances, and staffing, and beginning outreach to potential students and families. ■ Find a previous longer story on the microschool and periodic updates at www. lakesideschool.org/magazine.

Lakeside takes AIM to assess inclusiveness This winter, Lakeside gathered feedback on its efforts to be a successfully diverse and inclusive community.

Over the course of several weeks, 1,500 students, current parents and guardians, faculty, staff, administrators, trustees, and alumni from the Classes of 2012 through 2016 completed the Assessment of Inclusivity and Multiculturalism (AIM) survey, a tool designed and administered by the National Association of Independent Schools.

Lakeside is in the fifth and final year of its Diversity and Inclusion Initiative.

Survey results will help guide Lakeside’s plans for diversity and inclusion actions over the next three to five years and will be reported on the website this spring and in the magazine’s fall issue. ■

FACULTY NEWS

by AMANDA DARLING

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IKE MANY SCHOOLS around the country, Lakeside is wrestling with how to deal with the current political climate. Teachers have faced the challenge of trying to remain nonpartisan while upholding the school’s values of inclusiveness, global engagement, and ethical behavior, even as some of those values were disparaged by various candidates.

In a blog post, Middle School history teachers Carl Engelhardt and Meera Patankar voiced an The Upper School library curated a collection of media literacy resources in one display approach taken by many teachcase and lessons on how to detect real news from fake in another and posted examples ers at the school. “[As] much as of real and fake news on library walls, asking students to identify which was which. possible, we wanted to let the students figure out their own views and give them a dispassionate and orders banning refugees and others Large wrote how Lakeside Middle optimistic view of how the system from entering the country are inimi- School’s digital life curriculum works.” cal to the mission of Lakeside School teaches students essential informaLakeside Lecture Series conto be ‘a school in which individuals tion and media-literacy skills. He tributed to the mix of voices on representing diverse cultures and quoted Middle School Library campus. Students were impressed experiences instruct one another in Department Head Janelle Hagan: that a joint visit from political the meaning and value of commu“You can look at the Google analytoperatives Howard Dean and Karl nity.’ … We view our diversity as our ics, and the search for ‘fake news’ Rove shortly before the election strength and will continue to honor was unprecedented. … It’s our job remained respectful despite their our values as an institution. We will as teachers to address what’s going clash of views, prompting Head of do everything within our power to on in the world.”

School Bernie Noe to remark: “… ensure that all of our students are How to tackle the complicated the students I spoke with almost safe, honored, and respected while in political environment was a focus intuitively understand that we all our care.” at the National Association of need to be open to views that might Faculty, staff, and coaches came Independent Schools conference differ from our own, even if in the up with ways to support students, in March, where Noe reported, “All end we strongly disagree with those families, and employees, including schools, regardless of their political views. … In this sadly uncivil time discussion groups and student and outlook, are wrestling with how I do find it encouraging and hopeadult affinity groups that provided to respond to the new political cliful that the current generation of time and space to learn and talk mate, the rise of fake news, and the students does want a more civil about current events from a variety political rancor at the national level.” society.” of viewpoints. In March, the school At the same time, he continued, After the election, Noe and launched a global issues lunch “there is a recommitment on the other administrators returned series for students and adults, led part of schools across the country repeatedly to the touchpoint of the by outside speakers; the first event, to nurture ethical human beings school’s mission and Statement of “Fake News vs. Inaccurate News,” who will serve their society and the Community Expectations. When featured journalist Ann Scott world. Everyone seems to get that President Donald Trump issued Tyson ’77. in unusual times, unusual commithis first executive order temporarily Lakeside briefly came to ment to raising good people is more banning refugees, Noe wrote to the national attention during conimportant than ever.” ■ school community: “I respect all versations about “fake news.” In a Amanda Darling is communications director of Lakeside School. Reach her at viewpoints and one’s right to express column in The Seattle Times that amanda.darling@lakesideschool.org. one’s viewpoints, but the executive was shared across the country, Jerry

• NSE EKPO, Upper School concert band director, was the guest conductor for the Pazardzhik Symphony Orchestra in Bulgaria in April.

Works included Beethoven’s Symphony No. 2 and George Walker’s “Lyric for Strings.”

BARRY WONG

Lakeside navigates the presidential election and its aftermath

Applause please …

Jacob Foran’s “Head of Boy with Rockets”

• JACOB FORAN, Upper School art teacher, had a solo show with Abmeyer + Wood gallery in downtown Seattle in February as well as a show at Zinc Contemporary in Pioneer Square in September.

• ERIK CHRISTENSEN, Upper School English teacher, and John Newsom, former Lakeside technology director, have had their science-fiction story accepted for publication in the literary journal Poplorish.

• CLAYTON CHRISTY, Upper School maintenance worker and sports photographer, won the Durango Fall Classic’s award for “best user upload,” aka best picture, at the fall invitational volleyball tournament that the Upper School volleyball team went to in Las Vegas.

• ROB BURGESS, Upper School theater director and maintenance foreman, performed in ACT Theatre’s “A Christmas Carol” over the 2016 holiday season and played “Raiford the Dalmation” in the world premiere of “Fire Station 7” at the Seattle Children’s Theatre this spring. ■ Inside Lakeside

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SPORTS ROUNDUP

by MIKE LENGEL

ONE DAY, TWO STATE CHAMPIONS

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N JUST ONE DAY, Lakeside added two more Washington Interscholastic Activities Association (WIAA) 3A state championship trophies to its collection. On Nov. 12, within just a few hours of each other, the girls swim and dive team won its third consecutive state championship and the volleyball team won its first in program history.

“It’s incredible,” remarked Director of Athletics Chris Hartley. “The accomplishments of these two teams throughout this season are strong indicators of their talent, dedication, and commitment to be at their best. This is a season that will be remembered for a long time!”

Along the way, both teams also were crowned Metro 3A and Sea-King District 2 champions. Volleyball Program Head Teron Uy was named Star Times Volleyball Coach of the Year, and senior Kallin Spiller was named to the Star Times All-Star Team. Girls Swim and Dive Head Coach Susan Mayfield was named the Metro Coach of the Year and the Washington Interscholastic Swim Coaches Association Coach of the Year.

Girls soccer put together one of the best seasons in its history, making it to the state quarterfinal round.

Boys golf won the Metro 3A team championship and Stephen Dai ’20 won the individual championship, while Abby Euyang ’17 won the girls golf individual Metro championship.

Girls basketball, under the direction of Sandy Schneider, finished with a strong playoff run. Schneider is back as head coach, a position she held from 1979-2009. Spiller made history again, becoming the only player in program history to reach 1,000 career points and 1,000 career rebounds.

Boys swimming and diving finished fourth in the state, and Bryent Takayama ’20 reached the WIAA state championship wrestling tournament.

For full highlights from the fall/winter 2016-17 season, visit www.lakesideschool. org/athletics.■ Mike Lengel is the digital media specialist at Lakeside School. Reach him at 206-440-2955 or mike.lengel@lakesideschool.org.

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CLAYTON CHRISTY

Senior hitter Kallin Spiller attempts a spike in a match against Garfield High School. Kallin was named a Star Times All Star and will attend and play volleyball and basketball for Seattle University this fall.

Isabel Chien ’19 swims the 100 backstroke in the Metro f inals. She would eventually take second place in the state in this event, and her time of 57.29 seconds broke a 29-year Lakeside school record.

CLAYTON CHRISTY

The books issue: It’s a page-turner This issue celebrates authors and the power of their written words. Our cover story package looks at books that are making an impact on Lakeside students today (Page 10) and at books written by our alumni (Page 16). A fascinating mix of alumni authors share some of the angst and the joy they take in telling stories. And we have a fun guide to recently published alumni works, from histories to sci-fi to literary fiction, for young people and adults.

What We're Reading

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What we're reading (and maybe you should be, too)

THERE ARE SO MANY GREAT BOOKS yet only so much time to read them. As brilliant new works are published, English teachers assigning books face the challenge of deciding what to change in their mix.

What follows is a graphic with a sampling of both traditional and newer choices, plus Lakeside teachers’ “top picks” list for alumni.

We also share results of a survey of Lakeside seniors, who cite the books most significant to them and suggest titles for adults who wish to gain insight into their world.

LAKESIDE ENGLISH TEACHERS TO ALUMNI: Be sure to read these books Look for the ê marking the 10 newer classics the Upper School English teachers recommend for alumni. If you were at Lakeside before they were on the scene and haven’t already read them, consider assigning yourself the “homework”!

All are notable because they offer high literary merit and provide insights into distinct cultures and historical events.

These are a few of our favorite reads

by CAREY QUAN GELERNTER

THE FOLLOWING pages include a sampling of the assigned books in Upper School English classes this year, reflecting a mix of older “classics” and newer works that have become standards in the past decade or so. In Lakeside’s early years emphasis was on British authors. Since 2000, the English department’s goal has been to reflect international, racial, ethnic, and cultural diversity and include works that allow students of varying backgrounds to see themselves reflected in what they read.

In required classes, all teachers assign some books from a selected list plus others of their own choice.

Discussion is spirited when they are picking the required texts. After all, says Department Chair Bob Lapsley, “Choosing books for the curriculum is one of the most important things we do.”

Find the full book lists for all the Upper School English classes at www.lakesideschoool.org/magazine.

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Why we still include classics, and what does “classic” mean, anyway?

Some teachers shy from the term “classic” because of its historically male and Western-centric focus. But the faculty still values many traditional choices, in part because they illuminate universal themes.

“Books like ‘Macbeth,’ ‘Frankenstein,’ ‘The Stranger,’ and ‘A Doll’s House’ dramatize a whole range of powerful ideas and feelings, such as (in order) our capacity for violence in the name of ambition, the limits of scientific responsibility, the deadening effect of social norms, and the invidious destructiveness of patriarchal attitudes,” says teacher Erik Christensen.

“Can’t get much more relevant than that.”

“They are portals to a past that we can revisit imaginatively, and insofar as they show us perennial human truths, they remain ‘relevant,’” says teacher Brian Culhane, “though I prefer saying the phrase ‘enduringly true.’”

GRADE 9

Emphasizes literature dealing with the broad themes of knowledge, responsibility, rebellion, and the power of individual choice.

Older standards include Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet,” J.D. Salinger’s “The Catcher in the Rye,” and Lorraine Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun.” Newer standards include ê Sherman Alexie’s “The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven” (1993) and ê Marjane Satrapi’s “Persepolis” (2000).

“Alexie’s collection expands and explodes our understanding of Native American life to an enormous degree through stories that are lively, candid, brutal, and brilliant.

— Christensen

“Satrapi’s graphic novel vividly draws us into violent political upheavals in Iran by depicting them through a child’s perspective, a situation with many tragic echoes each day, somewhere in the world.

— Christensen

GRADE 10

Emphasizes international literature Older standards include Shakespeare’s “Othello,” “Macbeth,” or “Twelfth Night” and Albert Camus’s “The Stranger.” Newer standards include ê Jhumpa Lahiri’s “Interpreter of Maladies” (1999) and ê Edwidge Danticat’s “The Dew Breaker” (2004). Others in some classes: “Pronoun” by Evan Placey,

Haruki Murakami’s “After the Quake,” ê Emma Donoghue’s

“Kissing the Witch,” and Laura Esquivel’s “Like Water

for Chocolate.”

Meg Ruppel ’16 and Lulu Klebanoff ’16, who worked on an independent project on LGBTQ literature with teacher Lindsay Aegerter, proposed that "Pronoun" be part of the curriculum.

Pulitzer Prize-winning collection about Indian immigrants to the U.S. “Lahiri's stories dramatize what it means to leave home, with all that phrase implies about confusion and longing and the struggle to adapt to a wholly foreign (American) culture.”

— Culhane

Award-winning bestselling novel set both in Haiti in the 1960s and New York in present day. The title comes from a Creole phrase referring to a torturer.

Irish-Canadian writer Emma Donoghue reimages fairy tales with a feminist spin.

GRADE GRADE 11 11

Emphasizes American literature, in American Cultural Studies and American Studies Older standards include F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby,” Zora Neale Hurston’s “Their Eyes Were Watching God,” selections of Ralph Waldo Emerson, and Henry David Thoreau’s “Walden.” Newer include ê Toni Morrison’s “Beloved” (1987), ê Julie Otsuka’s “When the Emperor Was Divine” (2002), Moisés Kaufman’s “The Laramie Project” (2000), “How Beautiful the Ordinary,” edited

by Michael Cart (2009), ê Tim O’Brien’s “The Things They Carried” (1990), and ê Gene Luen Yang’s “American Born Chinese” (2006).

Set in a wartime Utah internment camp for Japanese-Americans and Japanese, notable for “the spare writing style and almost neutral tone used to describe crushing consequences for an innocent family.”

— Lapsley

Finalist for both the Pulitzer and National Book Critics’ Circle awards. “One of the finest works about the Vietnam War written in an extremely engaging, lucid, and stylistically innovative style.”

— Christensen

Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by a Nobel laureate. “One of the greatest American novels ever written, about an absolutely crucial topic.”

— Christensen “Simply, it forced me to face a reality that I had never connected to or understood before.

— Student comment

National Book Award finalist.

"A brilliantly drawn graphic novel and brilliantly told story that blends themes ranging from the protagonist’s challenges of growing up and adjusting to a new culture, to his arriving at an understanding of the deep values of friendship, to his learning the significance of humility and spiritual growth.”

— Teacher Tom Doelger What We're Reading

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GRADE 12

Electives, which shift with faculty and student interest Electives often introduce newer works to the curriculum; in recent years they’ve brought in more science fiction, books with technology themes, and LGBTQ and multiethnic literature. Offered this year: Gender Studies, Post-Colonialist Literature, Modernism, Postmodernism, Quest for Queer Literature, The South, Utopias/Dystopias, Multiethnic Literature, Cinema, Diseases, Fiction Writing, and Chaos and Literature.

The newest elective is a team-taught Asian American Studies course, and the African-American and Black Literature elective has been entirely reconceived.

The teachers recently presented their curriculum for these classes at a national conference. Here’s a closer look:

Named a notable book by The Washington Post and by The New York Times, which called it, “One of the most acutely observed accounts of what it is like to be young, Black, and middle-class in contemporary America.”

Won the National Book Critics Circle Award; Jefferson’s a PulitzerPrize winning art critic.

Winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award and finalist for the National Book Award in poetry.

Student comment: “‘Citizen’ can help break down the racial tensions in society today.”

“‘Who’s Afraid of Post-Blackness’ and ‘Angry Black White Boy’ were the only two books I read in high school that I could relate to. Everything else was definitely engaging and interesting, but what I read in these two actually had an impact on the way I look at myself.”

— Student comment

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African-American & Black Literature: A New Take

U

PPER SCHOOL teacher Mal Goss revamped the class to emphasize newer texts rather than more traditional standards because “thinking about the world we’re sending our students into, I felt it was really important for them to have positive views of black people and also to give them some things to think about other than ‘what did it mean to be oppressed.’ I chose books of literary merit that I thought would elicit discussion.”

“Who’s Afraid of Post-Blackness” by Touré (2011). “Touré really speaks to (our students’) experience. He went to a private school and had the experience of being one of the few black kids at the school. … We’re in a time that we’ve had a black president and Shonda Rhimes is a huge presence on TV, but racism still exists and it’s no longer explicit in the ways it was before.

He’s exploring – how do we live in this time?”

“Negroland: A Memoir” by Margo Jefferson (2015). “Jefferson writes about being part of the upper class of African Americans and finding herself in what she calls the third race, because she wasn’t what many people expected of black people (poor, uneducated, remnants of slavery) but she wasn’t white. She and her family and all their friends lived in this weird gray area. Many of our students of color live in that gray area. We can talk about … how they can navigate being privileged in socioeconomic status but not privileged in race.” ê “Citizen” by Claudia Rankine (2014). “Her poetry is required reading to understand what black people are going through in this country. Even if you’re not black, you have to understand what it feels like every day. When people are rioting or protesting or doing all those things … it may not always feel like the right way to respond, but it is in part because of how difficult it is to articulate their feelings. There is a real deep hurt. She does a really good job of expressing that.”

“Angry Black White Boy” by Adam Mansbach (2005). This novel “gives us a way to talk about where the white voice fits into the conversation. It’s written by a white man about a white boy who desperately wants to be black. Because it’s fiction and satire and the characters are so exaggerated, it’s not as loaded when we talk about issues the book brings up, like ‘do white people owe a debt to black people?’ ‘Should white authors write about black characters?’”

“The Granta Book of the African Short Story,” edited by Helon Habila (2011). “What does it mean to have immigrated to this country and you see yourself as Ethiopian, or Trinidadian, or Ghanaian, but when you get here you’re lumped into being a black person?

A lot of our students are first-generation Americans who emigrated from Africa and the Caribbean. Their culture and sense of self are very different from those more traditionally African American.” ■

English teacher Emily Chu ’05, second from right, discusses Justin Torres’s “We the Animals” with students in her Multicultural Literature elective. Electives are a common path to adding newer works to the curriculum.

LINDSAY ORLOWSKI

Asian-American Studies: Finding meaning in different voices across time

A New York Times notable book and editor’s choice book, and on “best books of 2016” lists of NPR and Publishers Weekly, which called it “a brilliant, absorbing masterpiece.”

In 2014 University of Washington Press reissued Okada’s book, calling it “one of literature's most powerful testaments to the Asian-American experience.”

The reference of “no-no” refers to a compulsory government questionnaire asking those who’d been forced into internment camps whether they would serve in the armed forces and swear loyalty to the U.S. and forswear any obedience to the Japanese emperor. Those who answered “no” to both were called no-no boys.

E

MILY CHU ’05, an Upper School English teacher, is team-teaching this new course with Jamie Asaka ’96, Lakeside’s director of student and family support. The class poses the questions: What does it mean to be Asian-American – historically and today? What is Asian America? How have Asian-Americans shaped the literature, history, and culture of the United States, of Washington state, of Seattle?

Two books they’ve assigned: “ ‘The Fortunes’ by Peter Ho Davies (2016) contains four novellas that span ChineseAmerican history from the building of the railroads through today,” says Chu. “ ‘No-No Boy’ by John Okada (1957) is the first Japanese-American novel and looks at the aftermath of World War II and internment for Japanese-Americans in Seattle. The protagonist is a ‘no-no boy’ himself, which is a perspective/experience not always examined in the study of the Japanese internment.

“Jamie and I picked these texts because we liked the way ‘The Fortunes’ gave us four different voices across time, allowing readers to see both the differences and similarities across Chinese-American experiences, and because we thought ‘No-No Boy’ allowed for an alternative narrative about Japanese internment and its aftermath, as well as a setting that is right here in Seattle.

“We definitely recognize that these texts are both written by East Asian men and that these authors on their own are not wholly representative of the incredibly complex and diverse lived experiences of the Asian-American community. So, we’re making sure to complement these works with other materials, e.g., a contemporary Asian-American poetry anthology I put together myself, essays, short stories, documentaries, excerpts from history textbooks, etc., that highlight a wide variety of Asian-American experiences and voices. We are invested in underscoring how all the different pieces of people’s identities (such as race, class, gender, ability, and sexual orientation among many others!) intersect and interact. We want to resist and deconstruct the notion that Asian-Americans are a monolith.” ■

What We're Reading

13

Most significant books to seniors

Books to gain insight into teens

H

S

ERE ARE those most frequently cited in the survey, along with a student quote excerpt for each.

1 “The Things They Car-

ried” by Tim O’Brien. “… presented an entirely new way to view war that was completely novel and surprising.”

2 “Brave New World” by

Aldous Huxley. “… my first encounter with the concept of the impossibility of a perfect society. It made me question what it meant to be free, happy, and human.”

3 “The Catcher in the

Rye” by J.D. Salinger.

“Holden Caulfield’s voice is just so real.”

4 “Labyrinths” by Jorge

Luis Borges. “It caused me to question reality and the meaning of everything, a terrifying but captivating concept.”

5 “In the Time of the But-

terflies” by Julia Alvarez. “… gave insight into a life that’s so different from mine. Not only did it allow me to see into the struggles of women but also impoverished citizens under a dictatorship.”

Also mentioned multiple times: “The Great Gatsby,” “Free Fall,” “The Stranger,” “The Laramie Project,” “Citizen,” “When the Emperor Was Divine,” “Waiting for Godot,” “American Born Chinese,” “Cat’s Cradle,” “Beloved.” ■ 14

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Spring/Summer 2017

(according to Lakeside teens)

eniors suggested a wide range but by far the most cited were “The Catcher in the Rye” and the “Harry Potter” series (student comment: “Well, Mr. Doelger IS Albus Dumbledore”).

“The Catcher in the Rye”

by J.D. Salinger. “… it shows some of the impulsive decisions that we make.

Sometimes adults seem to lack an understanding of the difficulties that we have with poor decisions.”

“Harry Potter” series by J.K. Rowling. “… offers valuable insight into what kids want out of a story and out of life.”

“Diary of a Wimpy Kid” by Jeff Kinney. “… tells adults how hard it is to be a kid.”

“Looking for Alaska” and “Paper Towns” by John Green. “… Adults don’t seem to understand that children these days are EXTREMELY different than they were, because of how society has changed… These books dive into the teenage mind of the 21st century.”

“Going Bovine” by Libba Bray. “… it’s sort of a view into what teenage boys are like and how they see the world nowadays. Kids just want to go on adventures and really live, not just find some boring old desk job.”

A few more titles: “Prep,” “Fun Home,” “How Beautiful the Ordinary.” Find more at www.lakesideschool.org/ magazine. ■

TOM REESE

One Middle Schooler reads “One Thousand and One Arabian Nights,” assigned in grade 6 in part to teach respect for Islamic folklore and arts, while another looks at two books that reflect popular genres for tweens: fantasy where teens have extra powers (“Savvy”) and dystopian novels (“Legend”).

What they're reading at the Middle School Older standards include “The Odyssey” and “To Kill a Mockingbird.”

Since a major review two years ago, newer choices include graphic novels and more recent classics by authors of color, including Sandra Cisneros’

Critically acclaimed and New York Times best-selling 1984 novel about a young Latina growing up in Chicago.

“The House on Mango Street”

and

“The Absolutely True Diary

Alexie’s first young adult novel, based on his experiences growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation, won the 2007 National Book Award for Young People’s Literature.

of a Part-Time Indian”

by Sherman Alexie, and with LGBTQ themes, including Benjamin Alire Sáenz’s “Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe.”

To encourage the habit of reading for pleasure, 8th grade teachers have also reduced homework to allow time for independent reading.

“This Printz Honor Book is a tender, honest exploration of identity” (Publishers Weekly, 2012).

What’s most popular… …when Middle Schoolers choose their own books DYSTOPIAN NOVELS “are new on the fiction map for adolescents in this last decade” and often have female protagonists, says Middle School English teacher Susie Mortensen.

FANTASY, with the newer twist of teen superhero books. Kids love Rick

Riordan’s “Percy Jackson” and “Heroes of Olympus” series, in which otherwise-typical adolescents are demigods who discover their powers when they reach their teen years.

GRAPHIC NOVELS are the go-to choice when they have free moments in the library, says Middle School librarian Janelle Hagen.

3 most checked-out books at the MS library:

• “The Selection” by Kiera Cass. A global best-seller, first in a series.

“Described as ‘The Hunger Games’ without the bloodshed, it follows 35 underprivileged girls who are chosen to compete to live in a life of luxury” (deadline.com). DYSTOPIAN • “Divergent” by Veronica Roth. First of a trilogy, set in a post-apocalyptic Chicago, where society is divided into factions each dedicated to cultivation of a particular virtue. DYSTOPIAN • “Drama” by Raina Telgemeier. “The drama on the stage is no match for drama behind the curtain” (Scholastic). GRAPHIC NOVEL ■ Carey Quan Gelernter is editor of Lakeside magazine.

Reach her at carey.gelernter@lakesideschool.org.

What We're Reading

15

An abbreviated guide to some

RECENTLY PUBLISHED A

THIS SELECTION from works published in the past few years represents just a few among dozens and

dozens authored by alums over the years. Browse the Lakeside alumni Goodreads group for many more great reads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/list/45645755-lakeside-st-nicholas-alumni-authors.

If your book is missing from the Goodreads group, please email alumni@lakesideschool.org

so we can add it to the virtual bookshelf.

FICTION Like to go where no one’s gone before?

I’m not a big sci-fi fan.

Rather venture to the past?

I prefer to stay present.

OK

Maybe a snappy pageturner for the beach?

YES!

“Ghost Storm” by Sechin Tower ’92.

A dean “stumbles upon an ancient technology with the incredible power to recreate a living mind.”

“Where the West Ends” by Peter L. Bergquist ’65. The tale of a lone mountain man in 1841 California.

My heart beats faster for paranormal romance.

“Hearts of Chaos” by Kira Brady (Ciara Brady Stewart ’00). Fierce woman betrothed to Seattle’s most feared shifter clan leader must fight ancient evil.

My attention span’s actually limited.

Short stories suit?

YES!

I’m not very beachy.

Something more come-of-age-y?

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Especially one to share with girlfriends.

YES!

“Everybody Rise” by Stephanie Clifford ’96. A striver in the Manhattan world of 1-percenters.

(Clifford feature: Page 26.)

“See You in the Morning”

by Mairead Case ’02. Three 17-year-olds take care of one another one summer in a Midwestern town.

“In Twenty Years” by Allison Winn Scotch ’91.

One-time college housemates reunite ruefully in middle age. (Scotch feature: Page 27.)

Comics?

“Monstress” by Marjorie Liu ’96.

A girl in an alternate society in 1900s' Asia struggles to survive the trauma of war.

(Liu feature: Page 29.)

“War of the Encyclopaedists”

by Christopher Robinson and Gavin Kovite ’99. Meanderings of grad student and soldier/lawyer buddies.

(Kovite feature: Page 27.)

“How to Name a Generation”

by Emery Wager ’03.

Inspired by his experiences as an officer in Afghanistan.

Poetry’s my preferred short.

“Blues Divine” by Storme Webber ’77. “At heart, an ancestral mixtape and tribute,” says Webber.

SURE

I like short but with pictures.

SURE

Joyce Thompson ’66.

Thirteen stories on Amazon Audible (search: Joyce Thompson Audible): wistful protagonists, real lives, wasted possibilities, impossible choices.

DO YOU PREFER fiction or nonfiction?

“After I Stop Lying” by Deborah Bacharach ’84. Moments in a woman's life become “a smart, sensual, hypnotic journey.”

“The Featherhood: What Happened to the Most Valuable Bird in the World” by Jim Jenner ’67. Tacoma boys find billionaire’s missing champion racing pigeon.

I’m more about the action.

A thriller?

OK

“One Bullet,” by Ted Wight ’60. A president comes to power intent on transforming democracy into a dictatorship.

D ALUMNI BOOKS

WANT TO BE A WRITER? Check out “642 Things to Write About,” among the highestselling books in the past few years on the writing craft, created by Po Bronson ’82 (his bestsellers include “Top Dog: The Science of Winning and Losing,” “NurtureShock”) and crowd-written by writers at the group he co-founded, the San Francisco Writers’ Grotto.

NON-FICTION Contemporary or historical?

Contemporary

Historical

Aimed at the younger set

Interested in learning about combat?

Local or overseas?

“Firstborn” by Tor Seidler ’68.

New York Times notable book about a magpie who joins a family of wolves in Yellowstone.

YES!

Children

“The Adventures of Willem and Wontus” by Christie Cunningham (Lauran Cunningham Henderson ’00). Tales of a boy and his cuddly friend teach good behavior.

Young Adult (These four are profiled on Pages 18-25.)

“Thanks for the Trouble”

by Tommy Wallach ’01.

“We Were Liars” by E. Lockhart (Emily Jenkins ’85).

“The Game of Love and Death”

by Martha Brockenbrough ’88.

“Dirt Bikes, Drones, and Other Ways to Fly” by Conrad Wesselhoeft ’71.

I love sports.

“Beast: Blood, Struggle, and Dreams at the Heart of Mixed Martial Arts” by Doug Merlino ’90. Follows four highlevel fighters. (Merlino feature: Page 28.)

I want to know more about actual war.

“American Spartan: The Promise, the Mission, and the Betrayal of Special Forces Major Jim Gant” by Ann Scott Tyson ’77. War correspondent reported on, then fell for, the controversial Gant in Afghanistan.

LOCAL

“Roots of Tomorrow: Tales of Early Seattle Urbanism” by Knute Berger ’72. Traces origins of urban best practices from P-patches to condos.

OVERSEAS

“Eyes of the Tiger: China 1944-1945” by Arthur W. Clark ’39. His exploits as an Air Force intelligence officer.

THEY’LL BE COMING, AND THEY’LL BE BIG

By Joan Schenkar ’60, much-lauded biographer of Patricia Highsmith (“The Talented Miss Highsmith”): A novel inspired by Highsmith’s groundbreaking lesbian love story (movie version: “Carol”) and a commissioned theater piece about a famous female rocker (details still under wraps).

By Ken Bensinger ’93: “Houses of Deceit,” a book based on his BuzzFeed reporting on the FIFA scandal. A big-star movie deal is already in the works.

(And yes, that was his byline on BuzzFeed’s explosive Russia/Trump dossier story.)

What We're Reading

17

The Lakeside YA Four:

HOT GENRE, HOT AUTHORS WE’LL CALL THEM the Lakeside YA Four: Martha Brockenbrough ’88, E. Lockhart (pen name for Emily Jenkins ’85), Tommy Wallach ’01, and Conrad Wesselhoeft ’71.

These alumni authors are dominant voices in the world of young adult literature, garnering prestigious prizes, critical praise, and popularity with readers.

That includes many not-soyoung adults; Publishers Weekly reports that more than half the books traditionally aimed at those aged 12 to 17 now are bought by adults, particularly those aged 30 to 44.

A fun plus for Lakesiders: Some of our alum authors’ books include insider references to places and people inspired by their Lakeside years. Just keep in mind that inspirations don’t mean literal accounts! As Jenkins says in her dedication of “The Boyfriend List”: “For my dear old high school friends, who were (and still are) excellent and hilarious – and who never did anything like the bad stuff people do in this book.”

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Writing for those with open minds (young or otherwise)

by MARY ANN GWINN AUTHOR MARTHA BROCKENBROUGH ’88 was already a

publishing veteran when she came up with this idea for a novel: A 17-year-old boy and girl fall in love. The boy is white, the girl is black. They live in different worlds on different sides of a town split by class, race, and hate.

So far, so Romeo and Juliet. But Brockenbrough, who had binged on Greek mythology as a young reader and studied classics at Stanford, recalls that “when I was a kid, I loved the idea that the gods were walking among us.” She had an idea. What if the two lovers were pawns from birth in a terrible game, a match between Love and Death, two metaphysical beings jaded and wearied by their eternal struggle? What if their love, stoked at every opportunity by Love, was blocked at every turn by Death?

The magic of fiction is that you can make almost anything up and make it sing. Thirtyone drafts later, the story of star-crossed teenagers Henry and Flora had moved from its original time frame, contemporary Seattle, to a 1937 version of the author’s hometown. The lovers struggle against segregation, racial violence, homophobia, and other hard truths left out of conventional narratives of Depression-era Seattle. Their story plays out in a lively jazz-infused milieu the author recreated with the help of history books like Paul de Barros’ “Jackson Street After Hours” and Zora Neale Hurston’s novel “Their Eyes Were Watching God.” The result was “The Game of Love and Death” (Arthur A. Levine/Scholastic), a young adult novel in which mortals are shadowed by two extraordinary characters: Love, who has lost every game with Death he has ever played, and Death, cloaked in the guise of a brazenly attractive woman who can’t live without the souls of humans.

Brockenbrough’s risky idea paid off.

Her novel won a 2016 Washington State Book Award and was a 2015 finalist for the prestigious Kirkus Prize for young people’s literature.

Brockenbrough was editor-in-chief of the

Stanford student newspaper, worked briefly as a journalist and at Microsoft, and made up questions for Cranium and Trivial Pursuit. She’s written about parenting and pop culture. She’s taught at Lakeside twice, most recently journalism and yearbook classes from 2004-2006. Her next book, a biography of Alexander Hamilton for young adults, comes out in September.

A petite, dark-haired woman with catseye glasses and a fondness for red and black ensembles, Brockenbrough talked recently about the writing life, how Lakeside helped shape it, and how she came to write her book.

Q

Your book has a lot of grown-up themes. What made you decide to write it as a book for young adults?

A

Kids that age are just starting out in their lives. First love, first sexual experience, first betrayal, first heartbreak. That is really rich territory. A lot of people with no knowledge of YA pass it off as stupid stuff.

There are some wonderfully complex stories about people of a certain age. … I enjoy creating books for people whose hearts and minds are so open.

Q A

What did Lakeside do for you as an aspiring writer?

Jane Palais, the Middle School librarian, guided me to my first book set in Seattle, “Go to the Room of the Eyes” by Betty Erwin. You learn how a novel works by reading novels — if you don’t see your part of the country represented, you think, I can’t see my home in a novel. I’m grateful to Ms. Palais for getting me that book.

My instruction in English was outstanding. One of my little bones to pick with the Lakeside Upper School is that they don’t do much in the way of creative writing. That’s not particular to Lakeside, but you understand novels best when you write them yourself. I loved my teachers

Martha Brockenbrough ’88, author of “The Game of Love and Death,” takes a break from her writing schedule in her Madrona neighborhood.

there (Tom Doelger, Rob Doggett), and I’m still in contact with them. They come to my book launches.

Q A

Did you always think of Henry and Flora’s story as a book for young adults?

My first two books were nonfiction for adults but I was interested in writing kids’ books. … I initially thought I would write picture books, then I started going to conferences for children’s writers and I thought, wow, it’s a very wide-open field.

In part, it’s a marketing thing. “Harry Potter” started out as a middle grade book, but those books were enjoyed by adults. It helps to have categories, but anybody can enjoy any book.

Q

Do you approach the writing of a YA book differently than if you were writing for adults? Do you place any restrictions on word use?

A

No ... I think about it as, are these sentences beautiful, do they evoke what I want to evoke? Some adults don’t have any appetite for complexity, some teenagers do.

YA books are about $8 cheaper for a hardback. My guess is that young adult books sell

more and reach more people. … People said I should write “The Game of Love and Death” as an adult book, that it would be a more important work. My goal is not to be important — it’s to create an excellent book.

Q

What inspired you to create Love and Death?

Q

What inspired Flora, jazz singer and aviatrix?

Q

What was the biggest challenge in writing the book?

A

I had read “The Book Thief ” which is narrated by Death. I thought, well, what would love be? I thought that the real enemy of love is not its opposite, hate, but death.

A

She’s partially based on the black aviatrix Bessie Coleman (Flora is both a jazz singer and an aspiring pilot). I thought, why is she not as famous as Amelia Earhart? She came first. The answer is because she was black.

A

When you are telling a story from multiple points of view, weaving those points of view together must work toward the highest

TOM REESE

drama. I wrote 31 drafts, until I got it to where I really liked it. It sold after the 29th draft. You have to keep on slugging.

Q

I hated Death, but in many ways she is the most interesting character.

A

Both Love and Death are very flawed characters. There’s lots of ambiguity.

They both play dirty.

No one thinks they are the villain of their own story. Everyone thinks they are the hero. But Death is full of self-loathing — I can relate to that. I know what it feels like to hate myself; it’s embarrassing to admit, but I know how it feels, whether it’s immutable characteristics and/or choices I’ve made.

I think I have made her sympathetic, even though she’s the grand villain of all time. No one is all good and all evil, and to be able to convey that on the page is a wonderful and meaningful challenge. ■

Mary Ann Gwinn is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who writes about books and authors for The Seattle Times, Booklist, and other publications. She was a juror for this year’s Pulitzer Prize in fiction and is co-host of “Well Read,” a books and authors television show that airs nationally on PBS. You can reach her at mgwinn@seattletimes.com.

What We're Reading

19

TOM REESE

Conrad Wesselhoeft ’71 walks West Seattle’s Alki Beach. His book “Adios, Nirvana” is largely set in West Seattle. An early interview he wangled with Scott O’Dell, revered author of “Island of the Blue Dolphins,” changed his life.

Turning grief into fiction

by MARY ANN GWINN CONRAD WESSELHOEFT ’71 was a young journalist working at The New York Times when he met a man who changed the course of his life.

Wesselhoeft was a news assistant, mostly writing copy for the edition that covered the Times’ Westchester suburbs. On a trip to the library in 1984, he learned that the great young adult writer Scott O’Dell lived in Westchester County. Wesselhoeft had read and loved O’Dell’s Newbery Awardwinning “Island of the Blue Dolphins,” based on the true story of a young Native American woman who lived alone for 18 years on an island off the California coast, and he successfully pitched an interview to his editor.

As Wesselhoeft tells it, O’Dell, an

20

LAKESIDE

Spring/Summer 2017

85-year-old man with long white hair and blue eyes, met him at the train station.

After a seven-hour interview, the author “flipped the questions on me and said, what do you really want to do?” Wesselhoeft remembers. “I said, I want to be like you, to write novels. He said, there is no school for this. If you want to do it, this is Friday, start on Monday.”

Wesselhoeft said he couldn’t do it; he was working 15 hours a day. O’Dell said, “Start with a notebook. Write, ‘I want to write a book’ on the first page, and on the second, ‘I want the book to be about’ …. once you develop a rhythm, once you get the details down, at some point a spark ignites and the story flames to life.” He said, ‘Write every day, never miss a day, and persevere.’ ” Wesselhoeft did persevere, and he filled a lot of notebooks before he published his

first young adult novel, 2010’s “Adios, Nirvana.” Along the way he worked at a series of writing jobs, married, became a father to three kids, and endured an unimaginable tragedy. After leaving Wesselhoeft and Seattle, his wife Lyn died violently in New Mexico in 2006.

Wesselhoeft had to grapple with the shock of her death and his own grief, as well as that of his children. That experience infuses both “Adios, Nirvana” and his second book, 2014’s “Dirt Bikes, Drones and Other Ways to Fly,” both published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Both books have won accolades: The German translation of “Adios, Nirvana” was a finalist for the German Youth Literary Prize. “Dirt Bikes” won a Reading the West Award from the Mountains and Plains Independent Booksellers Associa-

tion in 2014 and made the Air & Space/ Smithsonian’s 2014 list of Best Aviation and Space-Themed Books for Young Readers. Booklist said of “Adios, Nirvana”: “Peopled with the elderly and infirm, crazy parents, caring educators, and poignant teens trying desperately to overcome death's pull, it mixes real and fictional musicians and historical events to create a moving picture of struggling adolescents and the adults who reach out with helping hands.”

Wesselhoeft lives in West Seattle with his partner, composer and musician Bronwyn Edwards, his standard poodle Django, and Charlee, Bronwyn’s basset hound.

In “Adios, Nirvana,” his neighborhood is a character in its own right, from the No. 22 local bus, to local hangout Easy Street Records, to a guest appearance by West Seattle’s own Eddie Vedder, vocalist and guitarist for Pearl Jam. He has two more books in the publishing pipeline. He answered questions about his writing and its intersection with life, including his years at Lakeside:

Q A

Tell us about your education after Lakeside.

I went to Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. I was only 17 and I wasn’t ready for college – by the end of the year I had to stop.

I joined the Merchant Marine and worked on a tugboat. I did that for a number of months before I went back to school, to Lewis & Clark College in Portland, where I graduated. Later I went to Ohio State and got a master’s in journalism.

Q

When you started writing books, why did you choose the young adult genre?

A

Scott O’Dell had this theory — I don’t entirely agree with it, but he said, when you write for adults, you’re really not changing their lives. But children and young adults are very hungry for direction. You can actually change lives with the work you do.

Q A

What is the hardest thing about writing for young adults?

I thought it would be easier, but it’s really harder. Young people have perfect pitch, they can detect lies. You really have to work at getting your language right,

your facts right. The characters have to be really credible.

Q

“Adios, Nirvana” is about a teenage boy who loses his twin brother. It’s a book about death, grief, and reconciliation. How did your own life story affect the narrative?

A

After my wife died in 2006, we were thrown into this tremendously dark place as a family. On the surface we were able to smile and speak to our friends, but each one of us at a molecular level was soaked in grief.

I just turned it into fiction … I did an interview with BookBrowse a few years ago. I said, if you don’t know how to deal with grief on your own, you can project it onto a character and maybe the character can do it for you. I was using fiction to help me through a dark time. On one level, I was just trying to entertain young adults, but at a deeper level, I was trying to get through it myself. Metaphor became medicine.

How did Lakeside shape you as a writer?

Q A

I had this wonderful teacher, Bob Spock. He was the younger brother of Dr. Benjamin Spock (the child care expert).

When we would mess up he would quote Shakespeare – “You blocks, you stones, you worthless things …. you cruel men of Rome.” He taught literature with real feeling. … Right away he was talking about rhythm, and music, and cadence. …

I only got into Lakeside because I agreed to take remedial reading. I was dyslexic.

I took reading from Fran Bassett. …

She had to break it all down, she had to teach me to read all over again. My handwriting was cuneiform in its mysteriousness. She had to re-teach me how to write. It was all done with respectful discretion in a way that would never embarrass the student.

That was all led by Bob Spock. … Later they renamed it Language Training. I

“

That’s what the book was about: the healing power of friends and family.”

would not have written any novels without it, I probably would have never gone to college.

Q

You have written that you modeled the friends of Jonathan, the teenage protagonist of “Adios, Nirvana,” on the posse of your son Kit, called “The Thicks” in the book. What did Kit make of that?

A

My kids tell me they liked the book. … I think Kit liked it; he is not going to come to me and say, I loved your book or hated the book, but he liked the attention …

All those kids (Kit’s friends)… I loved those guys. We were going through this terrible time, but we were all lifted by our friends. The boys that surrounded my son injected his life with so much friendship, so much fun, so much smack talk. ….

That’s what the book was about: the healing power of friends and family.

Q

Writing can be a solitary occupation.

How do you deal with that?

Q

What do you do for fun?

A

I’ve been in the same writing critique group for 20 years. We meet once a month at Third Place Books in Lake Forest Park. We send out pages by email a week in advance, and we mark them up in comment mode. Then we sit down in person and do an oral critique. No one slams anyone … Sometimes, if two people tell you something, you can lose your vision. You have to stay in charge, you can’t let others take control.

A

I play ukulele and guitar. I learned a bit of guitar from Paul Allen. Kenneth, Paul’s father, drove Paul and me over to Pullman to WSU for a campus visit.

Paul, using an air guitar, showed me how to play “Lay Lady Lay.” ■ More about Conrad: http://conrad wesselhoeft.com/ and Adiosnirvana.com

What We're Reading

21

From zero to100 Years of struggle, then the YA stratosphere

Tommy Wallach ’01 argues passionately for living life “in accordance with what would happen if everyone behaved as you do.”

by SHEILA ANNE FEENEY TOMMY WALLACH ’01 supported him-

self as a test-prep tutor, writing book after book that publishers rejected. Until he hit it big, really big, in 2015 with a young adult novel, “We All Looked Up,” about four Seattle teenagers facing the end of the world as an asteroid hurtles toward Earth.

Critics praised it for its suspense and pitch-perfect grasp of teen angst; Kirkus Reviews called it a "stunning debut ... with brilliant imagery and astounding depth.” The book’s immediate success prompted a reprinting within a week, and it stayed on The New York Times’ best-seller list for 26 weeks.

A movie may be next, and Wallach, also a musician, created a companion album he

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hopes may become its soundtrack.

A second well-reviewed YA novel, “Thanks for the Trouble,” followed, about a spontaneously mute teenage boy and a mysterious time-traveling girl. In what the trade press termed “a significant deal,” this fall Simon & Schuster will publish the first book of his apocalyptic “Anchor and Sophia” trilogy about two brothers on opposite sides of a holy war in a society that has eschewed all technology.

Wallach, who lives in a "stereotypical Bushwick loft” in Brooklyn, among other striving writers, artists, and musicians, spoke recently about his journey to full-time YA writer, his fierce stand in support of artists, the Lakeside teachers who nurtured his talent, and his cautionary tale of the dangers

TALLIE MAUGHAN

of being glib and telling your own truth on social media.

Q

You pitched each of your six stillunpublished novels to “80 or 90 different agents” whose names you found in “Writer's Market” – and still never got a book published. What kept you plugging away for more than a decade?

A

I could be the proof of that newfangled definition of insanity – “doing the same thing while expecting a different result” – but I had a fundamental belief in my ability that wasn’t dimmed by failure …

When I was still in high school, I had work published in a couple of magazines – McSweeney’s and Tin House – which made me believe I had some modicum of talent.

I credit a lot of my success to studying classical piano for about seven years, which was how I learned the value of excruciating long-term effort – not to mention really good support from my mom.

I also performed in professional theater as a teenager and more important, auditioned for professional theater: Nothing thickens the skin more than standing onstage in front of a panel of strangers and hearing them say those six terrible words: “Thanks so much for coming in.”

Q A

But there’s the practical matter of having to support yourself.

You do need a day job. I was able to teach the LSAT, GRE, and GMAT, and the pay for that is shockingly good, so I only had to teach for about 25 hours a week.

Q

You have said you ended friendships over people downloading content without paying. Is that because the arts can’t exist if people aren’t willing to pay for what they read, listen to, and watch?

A

There is a categorical imperative: You have to live your life in accordance with what would happen if everyone behaved as you do. I used to yell at people for fast-forwarding their TIVOs to go past the ads. I’m serious! Content on television costs many millions of dollars to produce. How do you think that is paid for? All the money that used to go to TV channels and affiliate stations has shifted away – and away from all the people who worked for them. That money does not go into nearly as many hands now that everything has moved to the internet, which primarily benefits just two or three companies – Google, Amazon, and Netflix. Everyone else is pretty much destroyed. Companies such as Google have a hysterically tiny number of employees relative to their market cap. This has macroeconomic effects that are incredibly pernicious: There is a cascading series of very terrifying ramifications that are a direct result of your individual choices that lead to the destruction of the middle class. It’s an ethical issue!

Q

Why do you think “young adult” is such a popular genre with adults as well as teens?

A

Many adults have lost the ability to read adult books about adult problems. And many older people want to escape back into their childhoods.

But it was “Harry Potter” that opened the floodgates. Before “Harry Potter,” most adults would have been embarrassed to be seen reading a kid’s book, but “Harry Potter” was so enjoyable, we all read it and everyone saw us reading it. In YA, you’re not allowed to tell a boring story. (Publishers) won’t buy it and they won’t publish it. If you’re reading the best in YA, you’re reading really, really good books.

Q

Let’s address the social media storm you’ve faced. (Wallach was earlier derided for tweeting, after a terrorist attack on Paris, that the world would be a better place if more people were atheists, as he is, and for a blog post about the most “emo” suicides in literature. But a social media tsunami ensued after a tweet accompanying a new book jacket for “Thanks for the Trouble,” where he commented about the uses of the Golden Gate Bridge.)

A

People are always asking me if (a character in TFTT, who may or may not be 250 years old) jumps off the bridge. “Did she jump? Did she jump?” So I shared a tweet with the book cover saying, “That’s a damn sexy bridge right there.

I could really get into jumping off it.” That was it in its entirety. I took down my post about emo literary suicides – I got that idea from a BuzzFeed article – but I absolutely stand by that piece. It’s comedy!

There are some writers out there whose brand is to get angry on Twitter. … I was absolutely willing to engage in a conversation, but you cannot engage in a conversation when everyone is calling you a murderer. Multiple, real people

have cited “The Catcher in the Rye” as the reason they committed suicide, but I don’t think J. D. Salinger is responsible.

Q A

Did your publisher pressure you to delete your Twitter account?

My agent did; he represented a few of the people who came after me … and dropped me during this. The woman who started this organized a bunch of authors … They were trying to destroy my livelihood. …

Q

Suicide can be a particularly inflammatory topic for young readers, though.

A

It might be that I should be more careful joking about suicide. I don’t believe that right now. But I am absolutely positively open to the possibility that I could be wrong.

“

If you’re reading the best in YA, you’re reading really, really good books.”

Q A

How did Lakeside inform your writing?

Lakeside was the most rigorous intellectual environment I’ve ever been in, and that includes NYU and Stanford. I had some beefs – like the curriculum didn’t encourage the arts as much as math and the sciences. But in 9th grade I had a teacher, Jack McHenry, who had a really interesting class and had us mimic the style of Cormac McCarthy, which I remember to this day. He is the Mr. McArthur character in “We All Looked Up.” And I studied “Ulysses” with Mr. Brian Culhane in independent study and he read my early writing. Lakeside served me well that way. In some ways, it’s a dishonest environment because it is so honest and welcoming. It was kind of like Sweden – a great utopia but a totally homogenous culture. ■ Sheila Anne Feeney is a writer in New York City who often wonders why she ever left civilized Seattle.

She can be found on Facebook.

What We're Reading

23

“Subversive and clever” novels with “fierce femme” heroines IF YOU’RE A FORMER TEENAGER,

it’s a pretty safe bet you’ll find E. Lockhart’s “Ruby Oliver” books both a hoot and reminder of how happy you are to have made it safely past adolescence.

Set in a Seattle high school that sounds a lot like Lakeside, the first of the “Ruby” quartet, “The Boyfriend List,” has a genesis particularly amusing for those who knew the author when.

As Emily Jenkins ’85 (Lockhart being a pen name) describes it: “I was sorting through a box of old high school yearbooks (I had a perm) and school papers (I wrote the humor column) and the senior class poll (I administered it – and was voted worst driver), and I thought, ‘Where’s that little notebook where I wrote down every boy I ever kissed?’ And boom – I had a book idea.”

That’s just one of the tidbits that Lockhart offers her avid fans on a website packed with links to interviews, videos, resource guides for students and teachers, bookrelated merchandise, and a bio page that includes “21 things you don’t know about me” from “I like wax museums” (No. 12) to “I used to cry after my fiction writing class in college because the criticism was so harsh” (15).

Jenkins has moved certainly past No. 15, given her numerous well-received books. Along with the quartet, the most 24

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HEATHER WESTON

Emily Jenkins ’85 knew at age 8 she wanted to be a writer but felt compelled to pursue a more “serious” academic career before turning to “what brings me joy and what I do well,” writing for “the kid or teen I used to be.”

notable are “The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks” (2008) and “We Were Liars” (2014). “Frankie” was a Printz Honor Book and a finalist for the National Book Award (“Subversive and clever, this young adult novel is a stunning story of gender, entitlement, and the making of an anti-heroine”). Her portrayal of Frankie clinched Jenkins’ reputation for writing strong female protagonists (or as a young blogging fan put it, “fierce femmes who aren’t afraid to assert their authority over men”).

“Liars” was on The New York Times best-seller list for 30 weeks, won the Goodreads Choice Award, and was Amazon's No. 1 YA novel of 2014.

Her next, “Genuine Fraud,” a psychological thriller about “a young woman whose diabolical smarts are her ticket into a charmed life,” is due out this fall from Delacorte Press, an imprint of Random House.

But as you’ll read in her essay at right, she took a circuitous path to finding her true north as a writer and a person.

Here are a few additional Lakesidespecific thoughts.

Q A

What of your Lakeside experience is reflected in the books?

I only went to Lakeside for two years – junior and senior. I escaped from a school where I was pretty unhappy, so Lakeside seemed like a haven to me. In the “Ruby Oliver” books, I used the architecture, the January Days program, the dance on the boat, and some of the slang. I wanted to replicate the feeling I had at Lakeside and some of the joy I had in the friends I made there. But everything that happens in the books, I invented. The characters are all imaginary. Even Ruby. I never lived on a houseboat, I never had panic attacks, I never worked at the Woodland Park Zoo, I never swam or played lacrosse, and Lord knows I was never such a boymagnet.

Q

Were you, like Ruby, a scholarship student? You often touch on differences in social class in a number of your books.

A

I was a scholarship student at both my private high schools and at Vassar as well. That’s why so many of my characters have one foot in a world of privilege — and the other foot out. I was acutely aware of the difference between my economic status and my friends’.

Q

I love this quote of yours: “High school (like grad school, actually) is a festering microcosm of anxious, slightlyout-of-control people — a wonderful setting for both comedy and social commentary.” How do you stay in tune with the emotions and obsessions of that age and world?

A

I just remember how it felt. I guess I write for the kid or teenager I used to be. ■ More at: emilylockhart.com and emilyjenkins.com.

— Carey Quan Gelernter

“

I decided to take seriously the person I actually am”

by E. LOCKHART (Emily Jenkins ’85)

I

WAS A CONVENTIONALLY NICELOOKING TEENAGER. I laughed easily and took dance classes. I baked bread and brownies. I loved makeup. I didn't know how my car engine worked.

It was a pretty fun life, but around age 17, I realized I wanted to be taken seriously.

The realization came as a bit of a shock. Perhaps it was my philosophy course. Perhaps it was the collegeapplications process or a boyfriend who didn't rate me as an intellectual equal. In any case, I began to crave stature and authority — and to realize I didn't have it. There were a million small indicators that people did not judge me as a force to be reckoned with, and I decided to change. I hated being underestimated.

If you present yourself in certain feminized ways — whatever your sex or gender — there are joys and annoying consequences. For me, the joys include playing with my appearance, feeling free to abandon codes of behavior that connote dignity in academia and business, and various sensual pleasures. The annoying consequences include being thought silly, weak, and incompetent.

They are pretty damn annoying.

I got myself into a fancy college and then a fancier grad school. I read Jacques Derrida and Edward Said and planned a career as a professor of Victorian literature. I bought suit jackets and spent my days in the rare-book room at Columbia.

As an academic, I did get other people to take me seriously, at least some of the time, and the respect felt good — but the life was one of constant competition with my colleagues for institutional approval. And frankly I was bored by literary theory, though never by the novels I was using it to analyze. I was bored by learning scholarly French and German, too, and by the work of many of my colleagues and by the effort

it took to maintain this façade of seriousness.

In breaks from my dissertation I wrote stories and plays. One was about a dog and a cat in family therapy.

Another was about a dragon who gardens. I wrote Spider-Man fan fiction, half-baked picture books, comic poetry.

I kept a photograph of Roald Dahl on my mirror and worked on a middlegrade portal fantasy about a girl and a lot of crazy talking birds.

But if you write for kids, you will not get respect from universities, and you will not get it at literary-type cocktail parties, either. For a long time, I wanted that kind of validation more than anything else, even after I began publishing my stories.

The turning point was when I was ready to go on the academic job market. I had published two books for children and a commercial collection of essays for adults, all from major publishers, and was advised by the professor overseeing my job applications to leave the books off my curriculum vitae — in other words, to pretend to be a more serious person than I was. To him, the children's books and even the essays were not accomplishments but shameful evidence of my lack of conformity to the university's academic ideals.

That was when I decided to take seriously the person I actually am rather than try to be a person whom others define as serious.

Leaving academia to write fiction for children and teenagers was a return to that person I had been — the one who laughed easily, who liked makeup and baking and dance. I stopped being afraid of being thought silly or weak and instead pushed myself to be more than competent at the things I loved best to do.

I am true now to what brings me joy and to what I do well — and most of the time, to hell with the rest. ■ This story originally appeared in the Los Angeles Times.

What We're Reading

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Q&A

5 alums tell of writing struggles, must-read books, and how you, too, can write well

WE ASKED FIVE recently published authors from the Lakeside Goodreads group to respond to a few questions. They kindly obliged with answers that are, not surprisingly, exceedingly well-written.

STEPHANIE CLIFFORD ’96 Brooklyn-based Stephanie Clifford sold her 2015 debut novel, “Everybody Rise” — “a morality tale of misguided ambition and financial obsession set in the bubble years leading up to the U.S. financial crisis of 2008 (NPR Books)” — to St. Martin’s Press in a major book deal and sold the movie rights to Fox 2000. The book quickly made The New York Times best-seller list and “summer best” lists of People, Time, and Entertainment Weekly.

What’s one book you think all Lakeside alumni should read this year?

James Baldwin’s essays — I’d suggest “The Fire Next Time” or “Notes of a Native Son.” Though Baldwin was writing more than 60 years ago, his thoughts on race and equality are startlingly relevant.

What did you find most challenging about writing your latest book?

The early mornings! I had the idea for “Everybody Rise” in my head for a few years before I started it but kept waiting for that perfect time to write it, as though somehow life would suspend itself while I absconded to an imaginary country house and waited for inspiration, just me and the muses. Eventually, I figured out that I had to fit novel writing into my everyday life if I wanted to get it done. … I wrote the book while I was a reporter at The New York Times and during years that I got married and had my first child — and saw that the early mornings, from 6 to 8, were the times when I was least likely to be interrupted.

What are you working on now?

I’m splitting my days between journalism and writing my second novel. I recently wrote my first New Yorker piece, “An Ex-Cop’s Remorse,” on an investigator handling wrongful convictions who realized he had helped cause a wrongful conviction years earlier. The second novel is set in the criminal-justice world, and one of the main characters is a mother in prison, so I’ve been spending a lot of time interviewing female defendants and finding out about their lives, which is fascinating, moving, and frustrating. It’s infuriating to see these women continue to be punished, with difficulty getting jobs, housing, and child custody, even once they’ve served their time.

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© 2015 ELENA SEIBERT

Was there a book you read during your Lakeside days that made a significant impact on you?

We were assigned “The Canterbury Tales” in, I think, 9th grade. …

It seemed impenetrable and dull, (but) when we read it in class, and the teachers put it into historical context and had us read the various tales aloud, it came to life. It was bawdy and sharp and memorable. …

(I put a couple of fragments from the prologue in “Everybody Rise,” where Evelyn, the protagonist, and her high-school pal Preston are bantering back and forth.)

Can you share one tip everyone can use to improve their writing?

Take off your headphones. One of the best ways to improve dialogue and get jumping-off points for stories or characters is by listening to everyday chatter, whether that’s on the bus, in line at the drugstore, or walking down the street. ■ More: stephanieclifford.net; instagram.com/cliffordwrites; facebook.com/cliffordwrites; twitter.com/stephcliff

ALLISON WINN SCOTCH ’91 Los Angeles-based Allison Winn Scotch’s best-sellers, which have been on must-read lists in publications such as Redbook, Glamour, and People magazines, are “The Department of Lost & Found” (2007),“Time of My Life” (2008),“The One That I Want” (2010),“The PHOTO BY ERIN POLLOCK

PHOTO BY KAT TOUHY

GAVIN KOVITE ’99

Song Remains the Same” (2012),“The Theory of Opposites” (2013), and “In Twenty Years” (2016), which made the Library Journal’s Best Fiction of the Year list in the “women’s fiction” category (described in

Gavin Kovite was sent to Baghdad while in his senior year at the Uni-

The Hollywood Reporter as “a female-centered update on ‘The Big

versity of Washington to serve as an infantry officer, later served as an

Chill’”). She began with a traditional publisher, tried self-publishing,

Army prosecutor, and now is going for a Master in Teaching at UW. He

and now is in a two-book deal with Lake Union Publishing, a full-

is published in “Fire and Forget: Short Stories from the Long War” (Da

service Amazon imprint. (She shares advice on this and how to draw

Capo, 2013) and is the co-author, with Chris Robinson, of “War of the

in an agent at www.allisonwinn.com).

Encyclopaedists” (Scribner, 2015), which The New York Times’ Michiko

All alumni should read: “Just Mercy” by Bryan Stevenson, because it’s important in these current times to understand life outside your bubble; “The Gene: An Intimate History” by Siddhartha Mukherjee because it was my most fascinating read of last year (really!); and “Hello, Sunshine,” because my critique partner, Laura Dave, wrote it, and she’s amazing and wise, and we all need some escapism and optimism right now.

Kakutani called “a captivating coming-of-age novel that is, by turns, funny and sad and elegiac,” about two best friends in Seattle as their post-grad lives diverge — one into liberal academia, the other into the American military occupation of Iraq. They followed with “Deliver Us,” which Kovite describes as a “biggish social novel set in the near future (under a Trump administration — it was intended as a joke at the time!) in Detroit.” Unfortunately, he says, “all the major houses passed on it.” They’re still hoping but have started on another work.

All alumni should read: “This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War,” by Harvard president Drew Faust. It’s a social and cultural history of our bloodiest conflict that’s beautifully written, fascinatingly argued, and, yes, desperately sad.

Writing challenge: Pacing is always an interesting challenge in storytelling. It gets more complicated when you have multiple threads or characters in different locations. We had concurrent plotlines in Boston academia and in 2004 Baghdad, and making those work together well took a lot of doing.

Now working on: We’re doing a revenge thriller, “Killing Byrne."

Thirty-something Seattle scientist (and wife and mother) gets sexually assaulted by a serial date-rapist. She and her husband take justice into their own hands.

Significant book read at Lakeside: Jorge Luis Borges’s “Labyrinths,” the 1962 translation.

Writing tip: Understand that first drafts can and should be bad. Trying to draft a piece that’s as good as someone else’s published work will lead to frustration and block. English teachers should provide terrible first drafts of the masterpieces they’re teaching from time to time, to reinforce the idea that writing is a process. ■

More: http://www.robinsonkovite.com/

Most challenging about her latest book: I set the book at Penn, where I actually attended college, and there were times when it was difficult for me to separate my own experience from that of my characters. I never, ever cull from real life or base characters on people I know, but my own memories kept getting in the way. I considered shifting it to a fictional school, but my critique partner (who also went to Penn) read it and said I was being a little crazy with my worry.

Now working on: I just filed the draft of my next book, “Between Me and You,” which is slated to publish in January 2018. It’s the story of a marriage over two decades, told from different perspectives and told in differing time frames, and it’s the most ambitious thing I’ve ever written (including my Credo my senior year at Lakeside!).

Significant book at Lakeside: For me, it wasn’t a specific book, rather the nurturing of specific teachers. Mr. Doelger was my advisor and English teacher, and he encouraged (and critiqued) my writing in ways that led me to believe I might be semi-decent. And Mr. Wichterman, in Philosophy, pushed me out of my comfort zones and taught me to be a critical thinker. I use all of these skills and still honor their advice today.

Writing tip: Take your ego out of the equation. Seriously.

Constructive criticism is crucial to becoming a better writer, and if you push back against helpful feedback and wise counsel and insist that you know better, you will never improve. Listen, I just filed my seventh novel, and I had to burn it down twice (!!) pretty much entirely — literally, I deleted 75 percent of my first two drafts — before it became halfway decent. ■ More: On Twitter at @aswinn; Facebook under Allison Winn Scotch; www.allisonwinn.com What We're Reading

27

COURTESY OF DOUG MERLINO

Doug Merlino ’90, center, with American fighter Jeff Monson and Japanese fighter Satoshi Ishii after their 2013 bout in St. Petersburg, Russia. Monson, from Olympia, is a superstar in Russia, where Vladimir Putin has attended his fights. He’s one of the fighters Merlino followed for “Beast.”

DOUG MERLINO ’90 DOUG MERLINO’s latest book is “Beast: Blood, Struggle, and Dreams at the Heart of Mixed Martial Arts”; The New York Times Book Review praised him as a “gifted writer,” and Kirkus Reviews said “Merlino consistently captures the grit, determination, and sheer willpower of these hungry warriors . . . Fascinating.” The New York-based journalist won the 2011 Washington State Book Award for biography/memoir for “The Hustle: One Team and Ten Lives in Black and White,” which crosscut.com called, “A captivating memoir that sees racial and class divides in intimate personal terms, but with no easy pieties or excuses, no righteous indignation or blame.” He also wrote “The Crossover: A Brief History of Basketball and Race, from James Naismith to LeBron James” (2011).

All alumni should read: James Baldwin’s “The Fire Next Time.” Not only one of the most trenchant examinations of the American racial divide you will ever read but a reckoning with how one lives an ethical life within the political and social realities of one’s time. Published in 1963, as relevant as ever.

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One thing about your latest book that you really felt good about: Professional cage fighters are generally highly suspicious of outsiders. I was happy that over time I was accepted into this world, so much so that I ended up being a corner man in several fights. I finally felt able to write an intimate story that I think reveals the humanity of what might seem to be a scary subculture.

Now working on: Taking up another passion that started at Lakeside, I’m composing electronic music and getting ready to put out an album later this year. On the writing side, I’m starting to experiment with fiction. Don’t know where it’s going but it’s fun to be trying new things.

Significant book read at Lakeside: I remember reading Richard Wright’s “Black Boy” in Middle School and how viscerally it drew me into a different reality. It was a really powerful experience of how writing (and art) can create empathy and shift your perspective.

Writing tip: I’ve always liked George Orwell’s advice to never use a long word when a short one will do. ■ More: www.dougmerlino.net; @dougmerlino

MARJORIE LIU ’96

ing control, not just over her internal life but over her larger life, fighting to maintain her autonomy in a world that wants to corral her because she’s too powerful. Which is what a lot of women have to deal with in our own reality.

This is a society that doesn’t always welcome powerful girls, powerful women.

Marjorie Liu is an attorney and New York Times best-selling author of more than 19 novels and short stories. Her comic book work includes issues in series featuring Han Solo, Black Widow, X-23, and Astonishing X-Men, which was nominated for a 2013 GLAAD Media Award. Her current project, “Monstress,” a dark steampunk fantasy that Entertainment Weekly named the "Best New Original Series of 2015," hit No. 2 on The New York Times graphic novels best-seller list and received rave reviews. Liu has

Now working on: “Monstress” comes out almost monthly, so that keeps me pretty busy. But I also just sold a graphic novel for children, about a little girl who has to save the souls of birds, and I’m making time to write another novel.

been interviewed on CNN, MTV, NPR’s All Things Considered, and the New Yorker Radio Hour. She teaches a course on comic book writing at MIT. All alumni should read: “James Baldwin: Collected Essays." I recently watched the documentary “I Am Not Your Negro,” which was a reminder of the power and truth and relevancy of Baldwin’s thoughts about race in America and the future of this country. … (Also) Rebecca Solnit’s “Men Explain Things to Me,” a scathing collection of essays about misogyny, and the silencing of women. Right now, especially now, these are vitally important texts.

Significant book read at Lakeside: I find solace and inspiration in poetry (poems are where my heart lives), and when I was at Lakeside there were two assigned readings — the poetry of Pablo Neruda and Jorge Luis Borges. There was such a reckoning inside myself after I read their work — I couldn’t look at words in the same way, and it forced me to go back to my own fledgling fiction and revaluate everything I thought about language and how it can be used.

Most challenging character to write? The main character of my comic book “Monstress,” Maika Halfwolf. … She’s a raw, open wound — a young woman who survived a terrible war and who feels like a monster and has an actual monster inside of her. Every moment of her life is about assert-

Sana Takeda illustrations in Marjorie Liu ’96’s comic book “Monstress.”

Writing tip: Maybe it sounds basic, but reading is the baseline of what it takes. You have to read and read and read ... Without reading you won’t understand language, structure, character, or the basic sound of a story. ■ More: http://marjoriemliu.com, https://twitter.com/marjoriemliu, https://www.instagram.com/ marjorie_liu/

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T.J. VASSAR ’68 ALUMNI DIVERSITY CELEBRATION 2017 by KELLY POORT

I

N JANUARY, the annual T.J. Vassar ’68 Alumni Diversity Celebration moved off campus to the Northwest African American Museum.

Nearly 100 alumni from the Classes of 1958 to 2016, Lakeside teachers, students and their families, and friends joined members of the Vassar family for a celebratory evening. Guests toured the museum exhibits, shared stories with friends, and video chatted with out-oftown classmates. A short program emceed by Natasha Smith Jones ’89, chair of the Board of Trustees, provided updates on the school’s Diversity and Inclusion Initiative, including the launch of affinity and alliance groups for Lakeside Middle School students and members of the Parents and Guardians Association. (To read more about these groups, go to www.lakesideschool.org/magazine.)

Find more event photos at www.lakesideschool.org/alumni. ■

1989 Facetime! From left, Board of Trustees chair Natasha Smith Jones, Asha Vassar Youmans, Alumni Board member Mo Drayton, and Lanae Miller made sure that classmate Calvin Anderson didn’t miss out on the event.

From left, Ron Koo ’96, Lisa Olmos de Koo, Head of School Bernie Noe, and Alumni Board member Alexa Helsell McIntyre ’98.

From left, former faculty member Liz Gallagher caught up with 2016 graduates Jared Youmans, Diana Van Hoosier, Wesley Yu, and Loren Wallace.

Classmates from 1994, from left, T.J. Vassar III, Sarah Leung, and Dominic Hainje.

Ellis Hazard ’10, center, caught up with Upper School Spanish teachers Lupe Fisch, left, and Paloma Borreguero.

From left, Charlotte Blessing, director of global education; Robel Mulugeta ’16; Loren Wallace ’16; Emma Blessing ’19; Lisa Devine, associate director of global programs; and Nacole Abram ’16.

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3 BAY AREA ALUMNI RECEPTIONS

A

LUMNI MET AT THREE different gatherings in the Bay Area in February. Over lunch in Palo Alto, a group from the Classes of 2006 to 2016 shared their reflections on Lakeside and discussed the future of artificial intelligence. That evening in San Francisco, alumni and friends gathered at the Pacific Heights home of Hallie Mitchell Hoffman ’93 and Auren Hoffman. Head of School Bernie Noe shared Lakeside updates and Sue Belcher, recently appointed director of the micro-school, talked about plans for the new endeavor (more on Page 6). The next day, another group of young alums met near Union Square for lunch, where conversation topics included the microschool, careers, and the average job tenure for millennials (it varied between two years and one year – or less!). ■ Photos from the annual New York Area Alumni Reception in April can be seen at www.lakesideschool.org/alumni and in the next issue of Lakeside magazine.

From left, David Changa-Moon ’06, Samra Mengistu ’09, Margot Malarkey ’07, and Sarah Adler ’09.

From left, David Cho ’96; Sue Belcher, director of the micro-school; and Piper Pettersen ’03.

From left, Kimberley Hughes Moazed ’81, Steve Moazed, and Anna Kranwinkle ’12.

From left, Margaret Campbell Miller ’93, Hallie Mitchell Hoffman ’93, and Ned Sander ’90.

Classmates from 2006, from left, Shane Easter, Sarah Koo, and Eric Monek Anderson.

Receptions

31

SEATTLE RECEPTION 2017

by KELLY POORT

PHOTOS BY PAUL DUDLEY

Surrounded by Seattle History

I

N MARCH, more than 325 alumni from the Lakeside and St. Nicholas Classes of 1951 to 2013, along with faculty and friends, gathered in the Faye G. Allen Grand Atrium at the Museum of History & Industry for the 2017 Seattle Area Alumni Reception. Surrounded by Seattle history, including the 1919 Boeing B-1 mail carrier, Lincoln Towing Co.’s pink “toe” truck, and the Rainier Brewing Company’s “R” sign, Alumni Board President Crystal Ondo ’99 introduced the 2017 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient, Kirk Johnson ’78, who shared how much he enjoyed talking with current students during his day on campus. Visit www.lakesideschool.org/alumni for more photos. ■

From left, Elise Drake ’09, Patrick Lestrange, Alumni Board member Sadie Mackay ’09, and Daniel Thompson ’09.

Alumni Board members Mo Drayton ’89, left, and Laurie Frink ’81, modeled Lakeside logowear.

Members of the Class of ’79, from left, Betsy Passarelli, Amanda Wood Kingsley, Craig Jacobrown, Leslie Flohr, John Hammarlund, and Bill Holt share a laugh.

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From left, Ross Baker ’75, Alumni Board member Tyler Moriguchi ’91, and Ellis Hazard ’10.

Classmates from 1986, from left, Ellen Tousley Reid, Alexa Albert, and Roxanne Brame.

From left, Erinn Leary ’05, Colin Johnson ’04, Mike Dubovick, and Charlie Mead ’05.

From left, Brie Reynaud ’96, Alumni Board member Bruce Bailey ’59, and Darin Reynaud-Knapp ’98.

From left, Alumni Board member Brooke Loughrin ’10, Andrew Koch, Rachel Taylor ’10, Navya Prakash ’10, and Remington Schneider ’10.

From left, Chuck Nordhoff ’77, Grace Nordhoff ’78, and 2017 Distinguished Alumni Award recipient Kirk Johnson ’78.

From left, Alumni Board member Ben Stephens ’77, Natalie Grim Stephens ’81, Nicole Mazen, Helen Erwin Schinske ’81, and Rob Outcalt ’81.

From left, Therin Fenner, Alex Fenner ’05, Vicki Weeks ’73, Reed Schuler ’03, and Ashley Jackson ’03.

Receptions

33

➢ RECEPTIONS 2017

Betty-Em Norgore Vhugen ’51, left, and Jan Vhugen.

From left, Patrick Chinn ’86, Sean O’Donnell ’90, and Alumni Board member Dan Shih ’90.

Members of the Class of 1993, from left, Alumni Board member Maki Arakawa, Hana Rubin, Ali Stewart-Ito, and Lisa Narodick Colton.

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Spring/Summer 2017

From left, Justin Marks, Margaret Trzyna Marks ’01, Whitney Moller Howe ’01, and Jared Howe.

From left, Brian Park ’88, Alumni Board President Elect Claudia Hung ’89, and Alumni Board member Gen Rubin ’88.

From left, John Kucher ’73, Matt Griff in ’69, and John Weeks ’69.

Classmates from 2011, Peter Augusciak, left, and Rahul Birmiwal.

Classmates from 1985, from left, Alumni Board member Elizabeth Richardson Vigdor, Megan Ayrault, Polly Hogan, and Julia Morse.

From left, Robyn Rader Horton ’98, Dean Irwin, Wesley Irwin ’98, and Shira Kost-Grant Brewer ’98.

Classmates from 2006, from left, Aaron Goodman, Alumni Board member Brandon Vaughan, and Nicholas Stevens.

Classmates from 1997 gearing up for their 20th reunion, from left, Taraji Belgacem, Jazmyn Scott, Carmen Mikacenic, Mark Stoner, David Lamson, Matthew McCardell, Thom Rose, and L’Erin Asantewaa.

From left, Collin Jergens ’01, Jessica Blat ’01, and Ben Resnick ’02.

Classmates from 1988, from left, Lisa McMahon-Myhran, Elizabeth Joneschild, and Lisa Christoffersen.

Eric Ayrault ’83, left, and Barry Erickson ’82.

Receptions

35

CLASS CONNECTIONS

Penny and Mick Deal ’68 with their four grandchildren over the holidays.

1960

Joan Schenkar was a keynote speaker at the Edinburgh Film Festival this summer, and she toured her national award-winning biography of Patricia Highsmith, “The Talented Miss Highsmith,” throughout England.

1964

A fossil species was recently named Maurotarion Isaacsoni for Peter Isaacson by some of his domestic and overseas colleagues. Peter is a professor of geological sciences at the University of Idaho.

1966

Lauren Colman writes, “You meet Lakesiders in the oddest places. My wife and I were exploring an out-of-the-way beaver pond in Grand Teton National Park in late September, bird watching and looking for other wildlife, when a young man walked up to me and asked me, “Did you go to Lakeside?” because I was wearing a Lakeside Lions baseball cap that I had picked up at our 50th reunion last spring. Andrew Haeger graduated from Lakeside in 2012 and attended Bowdoin College in Maine. He was spending the summer fly fishing across the West before starting work this winter in investment consulting in Boston. I thought it interesting that two out of about 8-10 people in a remote part of Grand Teton N.P. at the end of the season would be Lakeside graduates.”

1968

See 1999 notes for news from Mick Deal.

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Spring/Summer 2017

From left, Lisa Haug ’75, Peter Kung ’05, and Vicki Weeks ’73 met up at a gathering for the November Project Seattle at Gas Works Park.

Members of the Class of 1983 at the wedding celebration of Charlie Benditt and Faye Rasch Benditt included, from left, Howard Lichter, Nicole Sailer, Corinne Koban Hagen, Nick Rothenberg, Charlie, and Sterling Ramberg.

1969

and applications for Dutch citizenship in the offing. Finally, about descendants ... I suppose I’m likely the last member of the Class of ’76 to have my first child, born in December 2015, so Nyala Bremner just had her first birthday, and if you believe the attached photo, she is already interested in world affairs (though pretty disappointed with the recent election). Julie Hayes Ernest (and husband Scott) have visited us here in Leiden, and any other friends will be welcome!”

Paul Walsh recently passed the 20-year mark as a web author and consultant to numerous traumatic brain-injuryrelated organizations and recently received the president’s award from the National Association of State Head Injury Administrators for his dedication and years of service. Paul and his wife are living a community-involved and actively creative life on San Juan Island, “the Maui of the Salish Sea.”

1972

John Kennell has completed a circumnavigation aboard his 48-foot sloop, “Amulet.” He reports, “It’s a wild, wacky, world out there.” The voyage began in 2008 and covered 43 countries.

1977

1973

Vicki Weeks and Lisa Haug ’75 ran into Peter Kung ’05 at the anniversary of the November Project Seattle at Gas Works Park in August. The November Project is a fitness movement that started in Boston as a way to stay in shape during cold New England months. Vicki shared, “Peter, a member of November Project Boston, was here visiting his family and came out for the event, recognized me, and we had a great conversation. He is happily working as a software engineer there.”

Nyala Bremner is the daughter of Davin Bremner ’76 and his wife, Masha.

1975

While attending a UW women’s basketball game recently, Bruce Bailey ’59 connected with Robert Allen, who was the manager of the Lakeside boys basketball teams in 1974 and 1975. Bruce notes, “Robert has been the official scorekeeper at Husky men’s and women’s basketball games for a remarkable 39 years! Congrats, Robert, for your commitment!”

1976

Davin Bremner writes, “My wife, Masha, and I have been living in Leiden, in the Netherlands, since 2005. Not many Americans know that the Pilgrims didn’t leave England first for New England but lived in Leiden for 12 years before some decided to stay and most sailed for Plymouth Rock on the Mayflower. Twelve U.S. presidents including Obama (from the Blossom family) are all descended from Pilgrim fathers who

In September, poet, playwright, and interdisciplinary artist Storme Webber visited Lakeside to speak to Lindsay Aegerter’s senior English elective, “Studies in Literature: A Quest for Queer Culture.”

Storme read some of her poetry and talked with the students about her experience growing up as Two Spirit and Aleut/ Black/Choctaw and the history of Seattle’s queer community.

She also shared archival family photos for the first time and talked about her experience at Lakeside.

1980

Dr. Mary Leonard, professor of pediatrics and medicine, was appointed chair of the Department of Pediatrics at Storme Webber ’77 talks with Lakeside Upper School seniors in Stanford School of Medicine the English elective “Studies in Literature: A Quest for Queer in October. She is the first Culture.” woman to hold this position.

Mary graduated from the Stanford School lived a mile from where we live now. William of Medicine, then spent 25 years at the Bradford wrote of Leiden, ‘...Leyden, a fair Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia and the & bewtifull citie, and of a sweete situation, University of Pennsylvania before returning but made more famous by ye universitie to Stanford. wherwith it is adorned, in which of late had been so many learned man.’ More of late, I’ve taught a couple of Conflict Resolution courses at that same Leiden University.

We expect to be here awhile, with a house on a ‘bewtifull and sweete’ Dutch canal,

1982

Michael Chiu reported he had a blast talking with Lakeside 8th graders about leadership traits in their Life Skills class. He says, “I also found time to track down Mr. Johanson and ➢

Alumni news

37

CLASS CONNECTIONS of her success. “I learned to be more open to new experiences and more openminded. I know that when I do that, I will learn the most,” she says. “I also learned tolerance, patience, flexibility, adaptability, humility, and the priority of human interaction, which have contributed to my professional leadership role [as director] at the University of Washington’s Global Business Center, and my role as a parent and spouse.”

1990

Lakesiders at the January wedding of Andy Schocken ’92 and Jennifer Grausman included, from left, Brian Johnson ’92, Trea Schocken Diament ’95, Kara Schocken Aborn ’91, Celina Schocken ’91, Jennifer, Andy, Bora Kim Smith ’92, Mindy Kemman Dodobara ’92, Steve Dodobara ’92, and Na-il Tamimi ’92. thank him for his patience when he taught me music skills as a 6th grader. Actually, it was more an apology for being excessively wiggly in his classroom!”

See Former Faculty/Staff notes for news of Sallie Thieme Sanford.

1983

Nick Rothenberg writes, “A recent wedding celebration for Charlie Benditt and Faye Rasch Benditt reunited friends from the Class of 1983.” Lakesiders there included Howard Lichter, Nicole Sailer, Corinne Koban Hagen, Sterling Ramberg, Charlie, and Nick.

From left, Matt Alsdorf ’92, Rachel Sottile Logvin ’90, and Sean O’Donnell ’90 connected in October when they presented about pretrial justice reform.

Gretchen Kiefer Peri ’97, left, Quan Ralkowski ’95, center, and Casey Schuchart ’96, were each selected as one of the Puget Sound Business Journal’s 2017 “40 Under 40.”

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1986

An article in a recent issue of “Alaska Beyond Magazine” about the Fulbright Program featured Kirsten Jensen Aoyama and other Fulbright scholars. Kirsten majored in Asian studies at Tufts, where one of her professors inspired her to pursue a Fulbright in 1990. She received a Fulbright student grant to study at Tohoku University in Sendai, Japan, about 225 miles northeast of Tokyo. Her research focused on Date Masamune, a 17th-century feudal lord who lived in the Sendai region and was instrumental in funding a major expedition to establish relations with the pope in Rome and also encouraged foreigners to visit his land, according to Kirsten. She credits her Fulbright experience for much

King County Superior Court Judge Sean O’Donnell, Rachel Sottile Logvin, and Matt Alsdorf ’92 reunited in Seattle Oct. 7 to present to stakeholders from across Washington state on the subject of pretrial justice reform. The pretrial justice system, which affects those detained in an unconvicted status, is a focus of a national movement of states and localities working on criminal justice reform, particularly those committed to ending mass incarceration. Matt serves as the vice president of criminal justice for the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, a leader in national research and the application of an actuarial risk assessment tool to assist stakeholders in identifying opportunities for people to be safely released pending the outcome of their case. Rachel serves

SEND US YOUR UPDATES! Share your updates and photos with classmates and Lakeside/St. Nicholas friends! Events big and small, personal or professional, are always of interest. Send in your baby announcement and photo, and we’ll outfit your little one with a Lakeside bib. Photo guidelines: We ask that images be at least 300 dpi, approximately 6 inches wide, so they will display well. Email notes and photos to alumni@ lakesideschool.org. Deadline for the fall issue is July 15.

lasting and resounding difference.”

1992

See 1990 notes for news of Matt Alsdorf.

On Jan. 15, Andy Schocken married Jennifer Grausman in New York City.

Lakesiders in attendance included Andy’s sisters, Kara Schocken Aborn ’91, Celina Schocken ’91, and Trea Schocken Diament ’95, as well as classmates from 1992, Brian Johnson, Bora Kim Smith, Mindy Kemman Dodobara, Steve Dodobara, and Na-il Tamimi.

1993

Robyn Rader Horton ’98 and her husband, Joshua, are the proud parents of Matthew, left, and Carson.

Edwardo Jackson has a new venture to share. He writes, “CinemaDraft, based on daily fantasy sports-style gaming like DraftKings, allows you to pick your favorite Hollywood stars, getting points by predicting their movies’ box office performance. With hundreds of dollars given away to winning players each week while in beta, CinemaDraft is free to play.

Games run each Thursday at 10 p.m. PT.” Learn more at http://cinemadraft.co/.

1998

Bridget Morgan and Jim Bickerton welcomed Jack Morgan Bickerton on July 28 in Honolulu.

See Former Faculty/Staff notes for an update on Lisa Marshall Manheim.

Cousins born the same day! Emma Deal, left, is the daughter of Andrea and Brandon Deal ’02 and Taylor Yelish is the daughter of Lauren Deal Yelish ’99 and Shane Yelish. as the vice president of the Pretrial Justice Institute, a national nonprofit organization committed to safe, fair, and effective pretrial systems across our county, and Sean spearheaded the convening of key Washington leaders from every aspect of the criminal justice system, as the incoming president of the Superior Court Judges’ Association. To our fellow Lakesiders they say, “We look the same, just a little older. Our Lakeside connection served as the foundation for bold conversations and new actions, ultimately in service of our home and community.

All three of us couldn’t stop saying how very cool it was to be together again, connected by our commitment to make a

Robyn Rader Horton and her husband, Joshua, welcomed their son Carson Nicholas on Aug. 31. He joins 2-year-old brother Matthew.

1999

On Aug. 1, the Deal family had a big surprise: Cousins Taylor Marie Yelish and Emma Christine Deal were born three hours apart down the hall from each other at Overlake Hospital in Bellevue. Taylor is the second child for Lauren Deal Yelish and Shane Yelish, and Emma is the first child for Andrea and Brandon Deal ’02. The girls are the third and fourth grandchildren for Penny and Mick Deal ’68.

2001

Jack Morgan Bickerton, son of Bridget Morgan ’98 and Jim Bickerton, was born July 28.

Nicole Conrad married Vince Santo on Sept. 18 at Mount Hood Organic Farm, outside of Hood River, Ore. Classmate Liz Bolen was her maid of honor. Nicole attended Colby College, then medical ➢

Alumni news

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CLASS CONNECTIONS

Andrew Locke ’07 and Sojung Yi ’08 met up with Ian Holmes ’06 (not pictured) in Rwanda. school and residency at Oregon Health Sciences, where she met her husband. When they complete their training at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, they will return to Portland, where they will be practicing.

Nicole is a pediatric anesthesiologist and Vince is a vascular surgeon.

2002

See 1999 notes for an update on Brandon Deal.

Alpha Mengistu married Alpha Kiflu (yes, they share the same name) on May 21.

They got married in the wonderful and romantic city of Sorrento, Italy. Alpha’s younger sister Samra Mengistu ’09 was her maid of honor. Alpha and Alpha are now living in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. She is working as head of brand building (marketing) for Unilever in Ethiopia.

Alpha Kiflu married Alpha Mengistu ’02 in Sorrento, Italy, on May 21.

banking firm and Claire is at Amazon. She is originally from Nottingham, UK. The couple lives in Seattle.

2004

In August, Shannon Donegan Saam married Derek Saam on the shores of Lake Crescent in Olympic National Park.

Lakesiders in attendance included Gina Fridley ’05, Alex Robinson ’05, and Cameron Donegan ’06, as well as Shannon’s 2004 classmates Ilana Kegel Singh, Briana Abrahms, and Erin Pettersen Jarrett.

Briana Abrahms graduated from the University of California, Berkeley in August with a Ph.D. in ecology and is now working as a marine scientist for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

2005

Frank Paiva’s essay, “A Prince Charming

for the Prom (Not Ever After, Though),” was originally featured in the Modern Love column in Sunday’s New York Times in 2005. In 2007 it was selected to be included in the book “Modern Love: 50 True and Extraordinary Tales of Desire, Deceit and Devotion,” and in August it was featured on “Modern Love: The Podcast,” read by “Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt” actor Tituss Burgess. The podcast also includes an interview with Frank. Visit www.wbur.org/modernlove to find it.

See 1973 notes for news of Peter Kung.

2006

Ian Holmes shared that, while working as a resident physician at King Faisal Hospital and Centre Hospitalier Universitaire de Kigali in Rwanda last summer as part of the Johnson and Johnson Global Health Scholars program, he ran into fellow Lions

Leslie Burns and her husband, Quincy Maggit, welcomed their son Jaxon on April 15. Leslie writes, “I’m currently a stay-athome mom and I’m looking to get back into the workforce.”

2003

Reid Rader and Claire O’Donnell were married Aug. 27 at Suncadia Resort. Josh Weiner officiated and the wedding party included Reid’s sister Robyn Rader Horton ’98, as well as classmates Zachary Bench, Moses Namkung, Henry Schneider, and Jonathan Manheim. Other Lakesiders in attendance included Chrix Finne, Tom Doggett, Ben Flajole, Alex Krengel ’06, and Katie Prentke ’99. Reid works at Eastdil Secured, a real estate investment

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Katherine Warren ’08, left, and Donna Leet ’11 Northwest School basketball coaches, from left, John Schmale at their Harvard Medical School White Coat ’10, Sam Fein ’10, Spenser Spencer ’07, and Aaron Gottlieb Ceremony. Both started at HMS in August. ’07, returned to Lakeside in December to take on the Lions.

Lakesiders at the August wedding of Shannon Donegan Saam ’04 and Derek Saam included, from left, Gina Fridley ’05, Alex Robinson ’05, Derek, Shannon, Ilana Kegel Singh ’04, Briana Abrahms ’04, Erin Pettersen Jarrett ’04, and Cameron Donegan ’06.

Sojung Yi ’08 and Andrew Locke ’07.

Andrew works as a project leader at Open Capital Advisors in Kenya and Sojung, currently attending George Washington School of Medicine, was taking part in a research year via the Program in Global Surgery and Social Change at Harvard.

2007

See 2006 note for news of Andrew Locke.

2008

Lakeside lifer George Hageman graduated from Harvard College in 2012. He went on to receive a master’s in public policy from the University of Tokyo and will graduate from Harvard Law School in May 2017. He begins active duty with the United States Navy JAG Corps this fall.

Nicole Conrad ’01 married Vince Santo Sept. 18 in Oregon.

Lakesiders in the wedding party for the August marriage of Reid Rader ’03 and Claire O’Donnell included, from left, Josh Weiner ’03, Zachary Bench ’03, Robyn Rader Horton ’98, Reid, Moses Namkung ’03, Henry Schneider ’03, and Jonathan Manheim ’03.

See 2006 note for news of Sojung Yi.

2009

Mark Jahnke writes, “Greetings from beautiful, snowy Osh, Kyrgyzstan! I am in the Peace Corps here and, in November, Maya Gainer called me to tell me she would be here on business. We immediately made plans to explore my city and celebrate a proper American Thanksgiving with friends here, followed by a traditional dinner of Osh’s famous rice pilaf.”

2010

Bruce Bailey ’59 shares, “Lakesiders are coaching boys basketball at The Northwest School. Head coach Sam Fein, with assistants John Schmale, Spenser Spencer ’07, and Aaron Gottlieb ’07, brought

Mark Jahnke ’09 shows classmate Maya Gainer ’09 around Osh, Kyrgyzstan, where he is serving in the Peace Corps.

their team to Lakeside in December and defeated the Lions 53-48. They completed the most successful basketball season in The Northwest School history, winning the league championship and qualifying for the State 1A tournament.”

2011

Upper School assistant director and chemistry teacher Hans de Grys shared in December, “I heard a former student of mine on the radio this morning. Simoné Alicea is a reporter for KNKX on 88.5 FM.” Last summer, Graeme Aegerter directed a short documentary film on the Navajo Reservation about the Navajo Mountain Boarding School Project (learn more at: www.navajomountainschoolproject.com), ➢

Leslie Burns ’02 and her husband, Quincy Maggit, with their son Jaxon.

Alumni news

41

CLASS CONNECTIONS

2017 BEERS WITH BERNIE IN OCTOBER, young alumni from the Classes of 2002 to 2012 filled the Sky Retreat at Insignia to have a brew with Head of School Bernie Noe. After a brief school update from Bernie, the group enjoyed telling Lakeside stories and catching up over pizza and beverages.

Leah Aegerter ’13 at artist John Grade’s studio explaining to her family the process of constructing “Middle Fork.”

Graeme Aegerter ’11, right, and his partner, Ryan Hueston, upon their completion of the first summer’s work on the Navajo Mountain Boarding School Project. which was funded by and presented at the California College of the Arts. He will continue working on a feature-length version of the film this summer. In the fall, he produced a feature-length documentary in Kenya in partnership with a group of Maasai educators who rescue girls seeking refuge from female genital mutilation and early forced marriage and provide them with an opportunity to receive an education free from violence.

Graeme is currently spending three months in South Africa working on another feature documentary with a local film team and best friend and Lakeside classmate Susie Neilson about the resurgence of skin lightening in post-apartheid South Africa (learn more at: https://www.facebook.com/YellowboneDoc/).

2012

See 1966 notes for news of Andrew Haeger.

2013

Leah Aegerter will graduate from the Rhode

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Spring/Summer 2017

Island School of Design (RISD) in May, majoring in sculpture. She held her senior show in April. Last fall, she co-curated her first art show at RISD’s Gelman Student Exhibitions Gallery in which she also exhibited a collaborative installation.

Last summer, Leah interned with artist John Grade, working alongside about 16 other artists and a host of volunteers on his extraordinary, enormous sculpture “Middle Fork,” which was exhibited at the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery and is now at the Seattle Art Museum.

2014

Henry Fulghum has recently transferred to the University of Washington in their earth science and paleobiology programs. After spending his first year at Santa Clara University, Henry took a gap year to work and also spent four months in the Himalayas on a NOLS trip. Saturdays you can find him making lattes at Café Ladro’s First and Union location downtown.

FORMER FACULTY & STAFF In February, former Lakeside history teacher Gray Pedersen emailed the alumni office about a recent UW Law School/Town Hall Seattle presentation on “Presidential Power in 2017,” noting that

From left, Peter Nowadnick ’07, Tom Austin ’07, Elizabeth Guyman ’07, Christine Gilbert ’07, Denise Yavuz ’06, Alumni Board member Brandon Vaughan ’06, Alumni Board member Alexander Oki ’08, and Alumni Board member Bruce Bailey ’59.

Members of the Class of 2002, from left, Mark Middaugh, Katie Wood, and Robin Stewart, with Bernie Noe.

two Lakeside alums participated. Gray shared, “It was one of those great teacher moments: Two former students, now UWLS faculty, were on the panel and much appreciated by the audience. Lisa Marshall Manheim ’98 was the moderator throughout and did a great job of distilling federal-versus-state powers, and Sallie Thieme Sanford ’82 spoke on the repeal of the ACA (Affordable Care Act).

I was looking at the panel and suddenly realized, ‘It’s Lisa! It’s Sallie!’ I am very, very proud of those two!” ■

2017 DISTINGUISHED ALUMNI AWARD WINNER

Paleontologist Kirk Johnson ’78

K

IRK JOHNSON ’78, a world-renowned paleontologist who is director of the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural

History in Washington, D.C., is the 50th recipient of the Distinguished Alumni Award.

Johnson oversees the museum’s collection of more than 145 million objects and 500 scientists. Previously he spent two decades as curator and scientist at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science.

PAUL DUDLEY

Kirk Johnson ’78 shares tales of his love of fossils at an assembly recognizing him with the 2017 Distinguished Alumni Award.

His work established the drastic, worldwide change in flora after the Chicxulub asteroid hit the Yucatan Peninsula 66 million years ago — confirming the massive impact as the cause of widespread extinctions and the end of the dinosaurs. He has led expeditions in 11 countries and 19 states that resulted in the discovery of more than 1,400 fossil sites.

Johnson got a standing ovation at the March 8 assembly at the Upper School, where he gave a slide-show presentation and answered questions. He also visited Upper School organic chemistry and molecular and cellular biology classes and that evening was honored by those gathered at the Seattle Area Alumni Reception held at the Museum of History & Industry.

As the Smithsonian natural history museum’s director since 2012, his biggest role is as administrator and fundraiser but he said he insists on reserving two weeks each summer for doing what he loves best: digging for fossils.

He’s never lost the excitement he first felt as a youngster about discovery, and because the fields of geology and paleontology are relatively new, he told the Lakeside audience, much remains to be discovered. “There are incredible things out there and no one is looking at them. … Our planet buries its dead and tells its story in fossils. Layers of rocks are remains of ancient landscapes.

You see the coal mine and I see the swamp that was that coal mine before it became the rocks. That is what my friend (and artist/book collaborator) Ray Troll calls ‘time travel with a shovel’ – the ability to go back in time and find fossils and reconstruct ancient worlds.”

He shared a host of amazing things about the museum and his career, including: • Smithsonian scientists’ research projects take them all over the world, doing everything from monitoring the world’s 1,554 live volcanos to maintaining genomic collections with an aim of eventually collecting the entire tree of life.

• While working on the 2016 NOVA series “Making North America,” which Johnson hosted, the team discovered a fossil palm frond on the beach in Alaska. “If these two words don’t say climate change – Alaska, palm – then you’re not thinking too hard.”

• Asked about the coolest thing he’s ever found, he said,“An impossible thing to answer because I find cool things every year,” but “Last summer on the border of Montana and North Dakota we found seven triceratops on one hill. Bing, bing, bing.”

• He credited Lakeside Outdoor Program’s “long tradition of taking students to really remote places and testing them” for helping shape him, specifically a trip he took “skiing across Yellowstone Park in the middle of winter in minus-40 degree weather. None of us knew how to ski or be outside in the cold … We saw the incredible geology … experiencing that place changed my mind forever about how it’s possible to do crazy things. … I left the school thinking I could go anywhere and do anything, the world is my oyster.”

He noted that recently, 40 years later, he was back at Yellowstone to do a three-hour PBS special that will air in June or July. But because of dramatic changes, he said, the temperature doesn’t reach the cold depths it did in his Lakeside days.

• He had a T. rex skeleton “Fed-Ex’ed” from Montana to his museum, where it will be a centerpiece of the new Deep Time Hall, highlighting the history of life on this planet, which opens June 8, 2019.

“The exhibit will extend 100 or 200 years in the future,” he said, “because the future is coming faster than it’s ever come before. The next century is going to be tremendously interesting.”

Find links to his Lakeside assembly speech and read the cover story about him in Lakeside magazine’s Spring/Summer 2015 issue, “The people’s paleontologist,” at www. lakesideschool.org/magazine. ■

Alumni news

43

1953

FROM THE ARCHIVES

by LESLIE SCHUYLER

LAKESIDE ARCHIVES

1939

At left, a newspaper clipping shows Lakeside students and their dates doing the “Lambeth Walk” before the Junior Assembly Dance, Oct. 14, 1939.

1960

Above, couples in the halls of Bliss during a school dance in 1953.

At right, “beats” stomping it up in 1960.

LA KESID E AR

CH IVES

DANCING INTO THE FUTURE

A history of Lakeside School dance culture 1930-2016

A

LA KESI DE

ARCH IV ES

s some of the oldest standing

culture blossomed. Students held four

traditions at Lakeside, school

to six dances a year with themes both

in other ways, too. In 1948, for example,

dances are an excellent lens

lighthearted (the shipwreck dance) and

the senior class hosted the Hobo Dance:

through which to view the evolution of the

serious (a number of dances related to

“One wall was painted to represent a

school’s attitudes and values and broader

World War II).

shanty-town; the opposite wall, a train—to

societal changes surrounding class, race, and sexual orientation.

The first reference to a school dance

Among them was a 1940 Blackout Dance in which “Flags hung from the gym ceiling and guests entered through

Class distinctions were in evidence

make the rail-riding brotherhood feel at home.”

By the 1950s, as scholarships

appears in a 1930 student newspaper.

a sandbag-banked dugout … to give

were established, and the mid-’60s, as

It was held at the Seattle Tennis Club,

the impression of conditions in war-

Lakeside reached out to the broader

a venue that catered to the city’s upper

torn Europe.” After the U.S. entered the

community, students of varying

class. Students wrote that they hoped

war, Tatler articles advertised upcoming

backgrounds began enrolling. But that

attendees would “dress for a formal

dances while paying special tribute to

didn’t immediately alter social norms,

dance, but no one need be ashamed

alumni who returned from the war injured

including at dances.

of his dark blue suit.” In the midst of

or didn’t return at all.

the Great Depression, with a shrinking

In the prosperous postwar era, dances

In the late ’60s a white student from an all-girls school in Seattle invited Fred

enrollment and the new campus

moved from school cafeterias and gyms

Mitchell ’68, a black Lakeside student,

construction loans in default, Lakeside

to more formal settings, such as hotel and

to her prom but her school barred him.

students Lindy Hopped their way out of

club venues. Alternately, since in those

Mitchell and friends unsuccessfully

the gloom.

days Lakeside drew largely from Seattle’s

petitioned Lakeside’s administration to

upper class, some students’ families

fight the ban. T.J. Vassar ’68, who with

economic times, enrollment had

made available their large private homes

Mitchell and Floyd Gossett ’68 was one of

increased significantly and dance

or mansions.

the first three African-American students

By the early ’40s, with better

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1970

s

PAUL HARPER ’65

Students boogie circa late 1970s, with Steve Goldfarb ’81 and Nancy Colwell ’81 in the foreground.

2008 High spirits at a 2008 Tolo dance. In 2015, Tolo (girls ask boys)

and Olot (the reverse) were changed so students could feel free to ask anyone of any gender.

to graduate from Lakeside, recounted in

not as comfortable as she was about

and Spring Formal. “We would like these

an oral history how disappointed they

being identified as gay in the school

dances to be inclusive of all gender and

were. Vassar considered it a victory, at

community.

sexual identities,” explained a group of

least, that they got Lakeside to move its

More than a decade would pass

seniors who petitioned for the change.

prom from The Rainier Club, which would

before Lakeside students organized the

“… we are removing the historical

not accept women or black people until

first LGBTQ groups, among them GLOW

connotation that created ‘unwritten’ rules

1978. Gossett recalls that Mitchell’s date

(Gay, Lesbian, or Whatever), which in

or guidelines about ‘guys/girls’ asking.

came to the Lakeside prom.

2002 created the GLOW dance to raise

This way, everyone in our community can

money for the organization. Student

enjoy attending these events and asking

Lakeside’s Board of Trustees held its

organizers rented black lights from a

whomever they choose.”

meetings since 1931. In 1969, a year after

theater company so that dance attendees

Vassar, Mitchell, and Gossett graduated,

would “glow” in a rave-like atmosphere.

equity and inclusion, the Parents and

headmaster Dan Ayrault appealed to

GLOW members Rachel Popkin ’04

Guardians Association worked to make

trustees for change: “Discrimination

and Frank Paiva ’05 remember that

proms more inclusive, too. The PGA

remains a blight on our society and city

Tolo (traditionally a girl-ask-boy dance)

underwrites actual costs so ticket prices

not so much because men have evil

and Olot (its reverse) were stressful for

can be kept at $100 per student; for

intent but because too many people do

LGBTQ students at Lakeside.

students on financial aid, prom costs are

The Rainier Club had been where

not wish to rock the boat, because too

A different kind of controversy

By 2015, with the school’s focus on

figured into their financial aid awards.

many people wish to continue doing what

emerged around this time, over freak

is accustomed and convenient. It would

dancing. One teacher explains: “None

experience for seniors, the school has

seem that if Trustees agreed specifically

of us wanted to chaperone because we

de-emphasized dates, with the goal of the

with what the school was attempting

hated seeing our students dancing in

entire class attending.

to accomplish educationally (teaching

such a sexual way, and especially in a

against discrimination), that they would

way that was so demeaning to women

today’s prom, much has changed on the

not be meeting in the Rainier Club.”

… .” The administration tried various

dance floor that reflects social progress

In 1971, the board stopped holding its

kinds of persuasion short of forbidding

at Lakeside and in society. What remains

regular meetings there.

it but nothing worked, and by 2010 it

is the essence of what has appealed to

In 1975, Storme Webber ’77 invited

Because prom is considered a class

From the first dance in 1930 to

banned freak dancing at school events.

teenagers through the ages: the sense of

her girlfriend to a dance at the private

Many students who’d felt pressured to

excitement when the lights go out and the

home of a Lakeside parent in what was

participate were as relieved as teachers

music comes on.

the first known instance of a same-sex

were.

couple attending a Lakeside dance. As

Another move toward inclusivity

Webber remembers it, few blinked an

came in 2015, when the names of Tolo

eye, though she recalls others were

and Olot were changed to Winter Ball

■

Leslie A. Schuyler is the archivist for the Jane Carlson Williams ’60 Archives at Lakeside School. Reach her at 206-440-2895 or archives@ lakesideschool.org. Please contact her if you have questions or materials to donate, or visit the archives.

Archives

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IN MEMORIAM

ST. NICHOLAS ALUMNAE JEAN FARRELL RENNY ’41 • Jan. 13, 2017

To share a remembrance about a St. Nicholas alumna or Lakeside alumna/ alumnus, please email the alumni relations office at alumni@ lakesideschool.org or call 206-368-3606.

The following are reprints of paid notices or remembrances submitted by family members.

Remembrances are subject to editing for length and clarity.

The deadline to submit one for the fall issue is July 15.

Jean Farrell Renny passed away at age 93. She was born Nov. 5, 1923, the only child of James and Helen Farrell. After graduating from St. Nicholas, Jean got a degree in Far Eastern Studies from the University of Washington, where she was affiliated with Kappa Alpha Theta sorority. Jean had a strong Christian faith and was a longtime member at Seattle First Presbyterian Church. She married Ronald B. Renny in 1961. He was president of Craftsman Press. He died in 1993. Jean moved to Horizon House in 1998 and lived there until her death. She was a member of the Women’s University Club, Sunset Club, and Seattle Golf and Country Club. She contributed regularly to The Salvation Army and provided homework and study assistance for children in White Center. She established the Jean Renny Endowed Directorship of Craniofacial Medicine at Children’s Hospital and contributed generously to Horizon House residential assistance funds. She leaves two cousins, Marcia Fletcher and Lael Grove, and many grandnieces and grandnephews. Jean will be remembered for her faith, generosity, and beautiful smile.

BARBARA LEAVITT FAIRES ’44 • Nov. 8, 2016

Barbara Leavitt Faires was born March 3, 1926, in Ogden, Utah, to Jesse Bott Leavitt and James Quincey Leavitt. She was the wife of Dave Shone Faires and is survived by her two sons, David C. Faires and Brian J. Faires, four grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren. As a child, Barb was ill with rheumatic fever and was homeschooled until 8th grade. Thanks to the invention of penicillin, she was finally able to attend and graduate from St. Nicholas School. At the University of Washington, she pledged the Delta Gamma sorority and met her future husband, Dave. They honeymooned in 1947 in St. Moritz, where Dave competed as a skier in the 1948 Olympics. As their family grew, they built their dream home on a magnificent waterfront lot on Mercer Island and also had a condo in Sun Valley, Idaho; they lived a fabulous life, boating, sailing, fishing, hang gliding, and skiing. Barb was a member of the Seattle Co-Arts Club, Quad-A Arts Club, The Pheobe Foundation, and Ryther Child Center. She was a former member of the Washington Athletic Club, Seattle Tennis Club, Seattle Yacht Club, Penguin Ski Club, Sun Valley Ski Club, and the Ancient Skiers.

When Dave became ill, Barbara was hired by John Jacobi at his first Windermere office in Sand Point and enjoyed many years as a successful real estate saleswoman. Once Barb retired, they moved into

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Park Shore in Madison Park. Dave passed away in 2005. This past summer she moved to Safe Haven Bell Mountain in Idaho, where she was closer to her son, Brian. She loved it there. She lived a life of love, laughter, peace, and joy.

MAROLYN SMITH MAHON ’41 • Aug. 15, 2016

Marolyn Smith Mahon passed away peacefully at home after recently celebrating her 90th birthday. The daughter of Dr. C. Luverne and Miriam Smith, Marolyn was born and raised in Seattle. Marolyn attended St. Nicholas, Whitman College, and University of Washington. Marolyn spent most of her life in the area, moving to Mercer Island in the 1950s. She was an avid hiker, skier, and member of the Mountaineers.

Her lifelong Girl Scout moniker was “Marmot.” She hiked the Wonderland Trail, toured Europe on a bicycle, and lived in Germany for two years. She climbed the Matterhorn, Rainier, St. Helens, Adams, Hood and Baker, among others, in the 1940s. While working at Boeing, Marolyn met her husband Bryan Mahon. With her family she continued to travel and enjoy sailboat racing, hiking, boating and car trips, and a seaplane trip to Inuvik on the Arctic Ocean. She loved rowing with Conibear Rowing Club, studied Northwest Native art, and volunteered at Corinthian Yacht Club, Girl Scouts, and the Burke Museum.

Marolyn is survived by son Ross Mahon, daughter Lilette Player, brother Dr. Mackenzie Smith, and three grandchildren.

ELIZABETH CALVERT GRAHAM ’48 • Sept. 1, 2016

Betty Calvert Graham died peacefully at age 86. She was born in Seattle to Lawrence Cragin Calvert and Elizabeth Skinner Calvert. After St. Nicholas School, she attended Briarcliff College in New York and the University of Washington, where she was active in Delta Gamma sorority. In June 1952, she married her childhood sweetheart, James Charles Graham (Jim). They were married for 63 years before his passing in 2015. They lived in Tacoma, Vancouver, B.C. for seven years, then Bellevue, before retiring in Seattle. They enjoyed 20-plus years of tennis, golf, and entertaining while wintering in the Palm SpringsLa Quinta, Calif. area and summered with family and friends cruising the waters of Puget Sound, the San Juans, and Desolation Sound. We will miss Betty’s quick wit, the twinkle in her eyes, and joyous laughter.

Betty is survived by her children: Kathleen Graham, James Charles Graham Jr., Jeffrey Lawrence Graham (Kari); her four grandchildren; her two sisters; and many nieces and nephews.

BARBARA CAMPBELL CARLTON ’49

Barbara Carlton, daughter of Wallace Campbell and devoted mother of Brad and Jeff Carlton, passed away in Chicago in December. She was brought back to Seattle, which was her home in her heart. After graduating from St. Nicholas School, she attended the University of Washington.

SALLY SCRIPPS WESTON ’ 51 • Sept. 6, 2016

Sally Scripps Weston was born May 16, 1933, in Seattle.

After graduating from St. Nicholas School, she attended the University of Washington and Finch College in Manhattan. She lived in many areas of the country but spent most of her life in La Jolla, Calif., and later in Reno, Nev., with her husband, Lee Weston. In 2012, after Lee’s passing, she moved to Seattle to be closer to her family. Sally always had a smile on her face and was one of the most positive people you could ever hope to meet. She lived her life to the fullest and in that way set a wonderful example for others. She is survived by her daughter Marion Hopkins (Craig Hopkins) and two grandchildren.

BETSY BLEDSOE JOHNSON ’ 58 • Sept. 23, 2016

Betsy Bledsoe Johnson, along with her twin sister, Judy, was born July 14, 1940, to Dr. Clarence W. Bledsoe and Elizabeth “Sis” Bledsoe. She was a 12-year girl at St. Nicholas School. Following graduation, she attended Mills College and then got a degree in philosophy from the University of Washington, where she was a member of Kappa Alpha Theta. An avid supporter of Seattle Homeless Cooking Project, Betsy was treasurer and a top notch “choppinista.”

Betsy was a free spirit who enjoyed traveling, the outdoors, horticulture, helping others, cooking, oenology, literature, politics, giving back, animals, and everything French. She was a voracious reader and had a remarkable wit. She was preceded in death by her parents, sister Judy Bledsoe Addington, and brother David Bledsoe. Betsy is survived by her sons, Marty Knox and Tom Knox. She passed quietly at home under the loving care of her husband, Marv Roberts, with her beloved Bengal cats, Tag and Muko, by her side.

LAKESIDE ALUMNI WILLIAM MCEWAN BLACK ’41 • Jan. 27, 2017

Bill Black lived life to the fullest and made it fun for those who were lucky enough to share parts of his journey.

Bill was an outdoor enthusiast with a marvelous sense of adventure and innate integrity. Born to Leo Black and Dorothy McEwan Black, Bill graduated from Yale University after serving as captain of a minesweeper in Japan during WWII. In 1948, Bill married Mary Fite. Bill’s mantra was “Let’s go!” They built a cabin on Whidbey, sailed, camped, climbed mountains, fished, and skied with their four children and friends. In his middle years, Bill was president of Seattle Cedar Lumber Company in Ballard. He helped start the Crystal Mountain ski resort and served as its first president. He also served on the board of Ballard Hospital and was a strong supporter of environmental causes. After racing sailboats to Hawaii three times, Bill proposed trying something more ambitious. Mary said “Why not?” and so they sailed around the world on their 40-foot sloop, Foreign Affair, from 1975 to 1981 — the defining adventure of a lifetime. From 1990 to 1992 they circumnavigated the North Pacific. Bill eventually succumbed to cancer but remained engaged and active up to the end. He was hiking on the beach and watching the PBS NewsHour just days before his death. Bill died comfortably at his beloved Whidbey cabin at the age of 93. He is survived by his wife, Mary; their four children, Ann Lyle (Greg), Lydia Cooper (Craig), Hunter Black (Audie), and Will Black (Shelley); 11 grandchildren; and nine great-grandchildren.

JAMES DOSTER “DOC” ROLFE ’41 • Oct. 28, 2016

James “Doc” Rolfe passed away in Seattle after several years of declining health, following the loss of his wife of 72 years, Prudence, in 2016. He was born the second of Hamilton C. and Anna Hoge Rolfe’s five children. He grew up hiking and summiting many of the peaks in the Olympics, skiing in the Cascades, and cruising the inland waters of Washington and British Columbia. He met Prudence Talbot his senior year of Lakeside. He attended Dartmouth College the same year as Pearl Harbor, when the Navy summoned him. He attended Officer Training School at the University of Washington, and he and Prudy were married in 1944 before Doc went off to sea, assigned to the destroyer USS Haraden. He returned to earn a J.D. from the UW Law School and joined the law firm of Devin, Hutchinson & Rolfe and later, Graham & Dunn.

Doc introduced all his children to hiking, skiing, and cruising, spending winter weekends in a ski cabin at Snoqualmie Pass and summers aboard the Sea Bell or later boats. Doc and Prudy also enjoyed international travel. Doc’s family includes five children, Tad (Marilou), David (Shelley), Laurie, Stuart (Lee), and Greig; nine grandchildren; and 10 great grandchildren. Doc especially enjoyed his years as a Boy Scout and scout leader, as well as his longtime memberships at the University Club of Seattle and the Seattle Tennis Club.

Doc’s honor, intelligence, and personal integrity, Doc and Prudy’s long marriage, their many close friendships, and their strong family ties will leave a lasting impression on all who knew him. ➢

In Memoriam

47

➢ IN MEMORIAM: alumni EARLE M. CHILES ’51 • June 23, 2016

Portland businessman and philanthropist Earle M. Chiles passed away June 23. Earle was the CEO of Earle Chiles and Affiliated Companies and president of the Chiles Foundation.

Born and raised in the Northwest, he was the son of Earle A. and Virginia (Hughes) Chiles. Earle received his undergraduate degree from Menlo College and pursued graduate studies in business administration at Stanford University. In 1949, his father established the Chiles Foundation. The younger Earle was the executive director of the foundation from 1968 to 1983 before becoming president. The foundation benefited thousands of Oregonians through its grants to nonprofits, especially in higher education and medical research, and making significant donations to such institutions as Portland State University, Harvard University, Stanford University, and Boston University. But he was especially connected with the University of Portland, where he first met the priests and brothers of the Congregation of Holy Cross as a young child.

He became a member of the university’s Board of Regents, and the Chiles Foundation provided the university many gifts, including the lead gift to construct the Earle A. and Virginia H. Chiles Center, a cultural and athletic center. Chiles was a longtime supporter of providing exceptional health care at Providence Health & Services in Oregon, particularly supporting scientific research for cancer. He was an honorary member of the advisory board of the Institute of International Education in San Francisco; a senator of the board at LudwigMaximilians University in Munich, Germany; a past advisory board member of Menlo College; and a past board member of the Graduate Schools of Business at Stanford and Harvard universities. He was a trustee emeritus and overseer of Boston University and overseer emeritus of the Boston Symphony Orchestra; a lifetime member of the board of the Oregon Symphony Association; and a life trustee of the High Desert Museum in Bend. His devotion and generosity resulted in many awards and distinctions throughout his life.

WILLIAM CALVERT JR. ’51 • Oct. 19, 2016

William “Bill” Calvert Jr. passed away peacefully in San Mateo, Calif., surrounded by family and loved ones. Bill was born Nov. 6, 1933, in Seattle to Alma May Ballinger Calvert and William Calvert. He attended Lakeside School and the University of Washington, where he was a member of Phi Delta Theta and the ski team. The UW is also where he met Diane Link, his loving wife of more than 60 years.

After graduation Bill served in the United States Navy attaining the rank of lieutenant junior grade. Bill worked at San Juan Fishing and Packing, then, for over 25 years, was a stockbroker at Blyth & Co., Eastman Dillon, Paine Webber, and Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette. Bill was adored by his children and spent countless hours teaching them to throw, catch, hit, kick, and ski. For years he coached the junior racing team at Crystal Mountain. He was a regular at the Seattle Tennis Club, Mercer Island Tennis Club, and

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the Central Park Tennis Club, where Bill was a founder and director. Winters, Bill could often be found on the slopes at Crystal or his beloved Sun Valley. Bill’s life, and that of Diane’s, changed drastically in December 1986 when a skiing accident left him with a severe head injury. Diane remained his constant and loving companion for the past 30 years. While Bill’s daily activities were limited, he kept a smile on his face and looked forward to each day. Bill is survived by the love of his life and devoted wife, Diane; sons Bill (Missy) and Chris (Lorelei); daughter Wendy (Jim); and eight grandchildren. He is also survived by brothers John (Alice) and Craig (Kathy), and sister Carol (Rob).

DAVID CHARLES CORREA ’53 • Oct. 20, 2016

David Charles Correa was born July 20, 1935, to Dr. Roy J. Correa and Flora Marie Horst Correa. He graduated from Lakeside School, the University of Washington with a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics and Statistics in 1958, and continued graduate studies toward a Ph.D. He was a member of Delta Chi and Pi Mu Epsilon, began his employment with Boeing in 1959, and continued there until his retirement in 1995. He married Vernalee Winters in 1979. He was a fan of the Seattle Seahawks, Sounders, and Mariners, a bird hunter and fly fisherman, and enjoyed poker, bridge, and horse racing. David is survived by Vernalee; stepsons James Bunn and Kelly Bunn; stepdaughter Kathleen Schacht; nine grandchildren; five great grandchildren; his brother Dr. Roy J. Correa Jr. (Mabelan), and extended family including niece and nephew.

DONALD SMITH ’53 • Oct. 6, 2016

Donald Clinton Smith, age 82, was born in Monarch, Wyo., on Jan. 7, 1934, to Sumner “Smitty” Smith and Rosa Benedict Smith, who moved to the Seattle area when Don was 4. He is survived by his beloved wife, Charlotte; children Dustan (DC) and Dale; sister Jacquie (Steve Weiss), nieces and nephew and extended family. He was employed by Henry Bacon Inc., and later with his father owned Smith and Son Building Materials.

Don was a devoted family man. He enjoyed camping, fishing, hunting, football, basketball, and especially rodeo. Don was a devoted member of the Masonic bodies Queen Anne Lodge #242, Scottish Rite, Royal Order of Jesters, Order of the Q, and Nile Shrine, including the Director Staff. He was a member of the Ballard Elks Club.

TIMOTHY MICHAEL SETH ’55 • Oct. 3, 2016

Tim Seth was born in Seattle on Feb. 13, 1937, to Dr. Raymond E. Seth and Helen (Wiesner) Seth. He died of heart failure while recovering from cancer surgery. He is survived by his wife of 20 years, Donna Durelle Seth; his brother, Raymond E. Seth Jr.; and the blended family of children, Marie Weiner (Adam), Carolyn Buttafoco (Ralph), Louise Beckett Lasch (Tom), Earl Scott Beckett, and Frederick Alan Beckett; 11 grandchildren; and seven great-grandchildren.

Tim graduated from Washington State University with an engineering degree, but ultimately pursued a career in

human resources, mostly with the state Higher Education Personnel Board. After early retirement, he pursued real estate, founding and serving as the executive officer of the Washington Landlord Association. His past public service included chair of the Thurston County Housing Authority, project lead for state WAC personnel law development, staff for the Washington Executive Salary Commission, and member the Washington Comparable Worth Committee. Tim enjoyed his stamp collection, the outdoors, music, especially classical piano, traveling, astronomy, spending time with family and friends, and his many pets, which he referred to as the “critters.”

JEROME DONALD ANCHES ’57 • Nov. 19, 2016

Jerome (“Jerry”) Donald Anches had great impact on our community. The son of Irving and Reyna Anches and brother of Barbara (Anches) Grashin, Jerry was a graduate of the University of California, Berkeley. With his father, he developed the Tower 801 apartment building in downtown Seattle and was instrumental in the development of the Seattle Sheraton, the Monterey Marriott (California), and several other hotels. Jerry was tireless and generous in his passion for many causes, including Lakeside, Big Brothers of Seattle, StandWithUs.com (Israel Emergency Alliance), Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle, and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. Fifteen years ago, Jerry married the love of his life, Rita (Testa) Anches. They embraced a cultivated life full of family, good friends, wine, food, art, books, and travel.

Books, in particular, were a passion. All who knew him were amazed at his collection lining walls of his homes in Seattle, Honolulu, and Sun Valley. Jerry is survived by Rita; his three children, Jennifer Michelle (Anches) Honey, Eric Nathan Anches, and Aaron Charles Anches; four grandchildren; and many extended family members.

DR. JAY MASON ’58 • Nov. 10, 2016

Jay Cort Mason, 76, died in November from squamous cell carcinoma. Jay was born in Seattle to Cort and Lillian (Van Borg) Mason. He graduated from Lakeside, University of Washington, and Marquette University Medical School.

Jay revered all forms of life. He particularly accepted and respected cultural differences. He said he became a psychiatrist to help others achieve their best. From 1971 to 1974 Jay served in the Indian Health Service in Pine Ridge, S. D. Jay was an assistant professor of psychiatry at the UW School of Medicine and chief of a day treatment center at the Seattle Veterans Hospital. He worked at various public mental health clinics and consulted with schoolbased mental health services in Grays Harbor and Thurston counties. Jay was a lifelong student who loved swimming, surfing, and all things Hawaii, and growing roses and tropical plants. Jay leaves behind his wife of 47 years, Judy (Jamieson) Mason, and their son Joshua Mason.

MELVYN POLL ’59 • Jan. 12, 2017

Melvyn Poll, 75, died in January from complications following cancer treatment. Mel was known equally for his famous tenor singing voice, his love of opera, and his boisterous sense of humor. He earned an English degree from the University of Washington and a J.D. from UW School of Law, but he trained to become an opera singer. A pupil of Marinka Gurewich, Mel started a long and illustrious singing career in Europe. From the German Opernhaus Kaiserslautern as lead tenor, he went on to sing several seasons with the Israel National Opera. He debuted with the New York City Opera as Pinkerton in “Madame Butterfly”; The New York Times praised his “bright, ringing voice.” Returning to Germany, he sang with the Wuppertaler Opernhaus. In 1977, Mel saved a life by donating a kidney for his older brother, Harvey Poll. He sang on opera stages in Seattle, Boston, Chicago, Washington, D.C., New York, and Connecticut, where Gian Carlo Menotti directed him in “The Saint of Bleeker Street.”

As a frequent soloist, Mel appeared with Gerard Schwarz numerous times at the Seattle Symphony and as a guest soloist with symphony orchestras in many major cities.

Returning to Seattle, Mel continued to sing, travel, and teach. An ardent philanthropist, his Lieder evening was the debut vocal recital in Benaroya Hall’s Nordstrom Recital Hall in 1999: a benefit for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, for which he volunteered for many years. In recent years, Mel served as regional chair for the Metropolitan Opera auditions. For the past five seasons, Mel sang the national anthem before every UW home football game. Melvyn and his wife, Rosalind, warmly welcomed friends to their West Seattle home, often to support a charitable cause or give a boost to the careers of young artists. There, they shared many happy times with their children, Sydney and Shaya Calvo and Ryan and Lisa Poll, and beloved grandchildren.

CHARLES “CHARLIE” MIFFLIN TOCANTINS ’78 • Aug. 27, 2016

Charlie Tocantins, 56, of Long Island City, New York, passed away after a courageous battle with pancreatic cancer.

Charlie was born in San Francisco on May 21, 1960. After graduating Lakeside he earned a BA from the University of Washington. Charlie married Jill M. Lehman in Costa Rica in 2009. Charlie was a kind, compassionate, and fun-loving person that could make anyone laugh with his quick wit and crazy faces. Charlie is survived by Jill; his siblings Bill H. Tocantins and Meg L. Tocantins; and the rest of his family and friends. Charlie is preceded in death by his parents, Ronald Tocantins and Margaret H. Tocantins.

ROLLIN CLIFFORD “RC” ROGERS ’79 • Sept. 20, 2016

Banging out a backbeat, pounding a nail, or racing a bicycle, RC approached any activity with quiet intensity. As a loving husband, dedicated father, and steadfast friend, RC spent his life enjoying all the Northwest has to offer. His world ➢

In Memoriam

49

➢ IN MEMORIAM: alumni blossomed when he married Lisa Trager, and together they raised Andy and Mark.

DONALD MACGREGOR TUTTLE ’84 • Sept. 24, 2016

Donald MacGregor Tuttle, beloved son, brother, grandson, nephew, cousin, and godfather, passed away from cardiac arrest after battling vascular disease. Don is widely described as kind, gentle, complex, visionary, adventuresome, brilliant.

His great passion in life, starting at age 5 with his first boa constrictor (Friendly), was critters, the creepier and more vilified, the more he cared. He was an advocate for all things wild and vulnerable, and by the time he reached his 30s, this had morphed into a global perspective.

Don’s concern for earth and its biodiversity was profound.

Fearless, creative, never daunted, and always in pursuit of conservation solutions, he packed more experiences in his 50 years than most would in 100. After Lakeside he attended the UW. He was a graceful athlete and passionate and beautiful fly fisherman. In true entrepreneurial style, Don founded two companies that failed before founding Jadora in 2008. Today Jadora is a pioneering company devoted to sustaining the world’s forests through carbon offsets, while providing vastly improved conditions in the villages within its sprawling boundaries. During decades of travel to some of the most remote places on earth, Don dealt with everything from malaria and jungle fevers to playing host to never-exactly-diagnosed or identified microbes. As his health issues became more challenging, he reflected often and happily on his life choices, repeating his ongoing devotion to sustainability and his gratitude for the experiences he had. Don will be hugely missed by his family, friends, and countless Congolese villagers whose lives he did, and will continue to, transform. He is survived by his parents, Lyn and Jerry Grinstein and Tim and Toby Tuttle; sister Kirsten Sharp (John); stepbrother Charles Grinstein (Krista); grandparents David and Jane Davis and Monique Hussong; and many other family members.

DARRYL WU ’14 • Aug. 30, 2016

Darryl Wu, one of the brightest math minds of his generation, passed away peacefully of natural causes while attending Cornell University. Darryl was born to William Wu and Monica Sung on Oct. 5, 1996. At age 10 he scored a perfect 800 in the math SAT, and then started at Lakeside as an inquisitive and gentle 6th grader. Darryl became the first 6th grader in history to win the Mathcounts national championship for middle schoolers, earning him a trip to the White House and an appearance on national television — but he did not enjoy the spotlight. Among other honors, Darryl was the first person from Washington state to earn a perfect score in the American Region Math League tournament and was a silver medalist in the 2013 Romanian Master of Mathematics competition. His many interests included cello, piano, music

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composition, and online gaming, but it was his passion for linguistics that gained him widespread recognition among his peers: Darryl placed first the three times he competed in the North American Computational Linguistics Olympiad.

At the International Linguistics Olympiad, he was a silver medalist in 2012 and gold medalist in 2014. Dragomir Radev, professor of computer science at the University of Michigan, who coached America’s computational linguistics team, estimated that the nation produces a mathematician of Darryl’s potential about five times a decade. Darryl enrolled in honors chemistry, with a minor in linguistics, at Cornell.

The summer after his sophomore year, in 2016, he worked in the Cornell chemistry lab of Professor Peter Wolczanski, who said various faculty members were hoping that Darryl would choose their respective specialties. Darryl also expressed interest in learning to drive and cook, as he matured and his outlook broadened. He moved into his own apartment, where he died peacefully in bed Aug. 30, 2016. Investigators found no evidence of foul play, drugs, or depression. Darryl died of natural causes, at an unnatural age. “Maybe God needed help on a math problem,” a mathematician wrote. A permanent memorial prize named for Darryl was established at the Cornell chemistry department. Darryl is survived by his parents and brother Darren ’12.

FORMER FACULTY & STAFF TIM S. COUSINS • Aug. 10, 2016

Tim S. Cousins was born Sept. 20, 1936, in Wappingers Falls, New York. He was preceded in death by his son Kenny; parents, Fred and Caron; and sister Frederica. He leaves behind his loving wife of 56 years, Sylvia (Weeks) Cousins; son Doug (Heidi) Cousins; daughters Kathy (Mike) Kennamer, Barbra (Derek) Fether, and Susan (Jeremy) Stafford; sister Betty Silver; 12 grandchildren; and one great-grandchild on the way. Tim earned a BA in education from Seattle University, where he played basketball for the Chieftains, and a master’s degree in physical education at Idaho State University. In addition to teaching at Lakeside, he taught at Highline Public Schools and the Darrington School District, where he retired in 1991.Tim’s other passion was coaching basketball. He was honored as Washington State Hall of Fame High School Basketball Coach, in the Darrington School District Athletic Hall of Fame, and as Coach of the Year for three years. In Darrington, he amassed 284 wins on the court and earned a berth at the A-B State Basketball Tournament on six occasions. Tim spent many summers working as a river rafting guide, and he was an avid reader. His greatest love was his family, especially his grandchildren. He’ll be greatly missed by many. ■

2017 CALENDAR JUNE

Eighth grade graduation Upper School commencement and 50th reunion luncheon 9 Reunion 2017 dinner hosted by Lakeside for classes ending in 2 and 7 10 Alumni lacrosse game and alumni soccer game 10-11 Reunion 2017 individual class events 30 Last day to contribute to the 2016-2017 Annual Fund 6 8

SEPTEMBER 23

Annual Fund kickoff breakfast and notewriting event (tentative) Questions? Please contact the alumni relations off ice of the Lakeside/St. Nicholas Alumni Association at 206-368-3606 or alumni@lakesideschool.org.

2016-2017

LAKESIDE/ ST. NICHOLAS ALUMNI BOARD EXECUTIVE BOARD Crystal Ondo ’99

President Claudia Hung ’89

President Elect Meredith Dorrance ’87

Mission and Governance Chair Maurice Drayton ’89

Activities Chair Trevor Klein ’03

Connections Chair MEMBERS St. Nicholas and Lakeside Classes of 1967.

Maki Arakawa ’93 Bruce Bailey ’59

(Lifetime Honorary Member) Alison Alkire Behnke ’00 Sophie Calderón ’00 Michelle Chang Chen ’90 Ginger Ferguson ’82 Laurie Frink ’81 John Hammarlund ’79 Brooke Loughrin ’10 Sadie Mackay ’09 Alexa Helsell McIntyre ’98 Tyler Moriguchi ’91 Michelle Moore Morrison ’02 Alexander Oki ’08 Trevor Parris ’97

PHOTO COURTESY OF THE JANE CARLSON WILLIAMS ’60 ARCHIVES

REUNION 2017 WEEKEND June 8-11 Celebrating St. Nicholas and Lakeside alumni from classes ending in 2 and 7.

Festivities kick off Thursday, June 8, when the St. Nicholas and Lakeside Classes of 1967 will be honored at a 50th reunion luncheon and lead the Class of 2017 into its commencement ceremony. Lakeside will host a reception and casual dinner Friday, June 9, in The Paul G. Allen Athletics Center at Lakeside’s Upper School beginning at 6 p.m. All reunion alumni and a guest, plus current and former faculty and staff, are invited.

Activities on the morning of Saturday, June 10, will include alumni lacrosse and soccer games. Reunion volunteers are planning individual class events throughout the weekend. Contact the alumni relations office at alumni@lakesideschool.org or 206-368-3606 for more information.

Gen Rubin ’88 Daniel Jeffrey Shih ’90 Ben Stephens ’77 Ishani Ummat ’13 Brandon Vaughan ’06 Elizabeth Richardson Vigdor ’85 Lauren Deal Yelish ’99

In Memoriam, Calendar

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NON-PROFIT ORGANIZATION U.S. POSTAGE PAID SEATTLE, WA PERMIT NO. 738