Reed College Magazine Spring 2025

Water's Hand

Inside Art 350, where studying art history reveals insights about our changing climate.

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Spring 2025 Volume 104, No. 1

EDITOR

Katie Pelletier ’03

ART DIRECTOR

Tom Humphrey

WRITERS/EDITORS

Bennett Campbell Ferguson

Cara Nixon

CLASS NOTES EDITOR

Joanne Hossack ’82

REEDIANA EDITOR

Robin Tovey ’97

GRAMMATICAL KAPELLMEISTER

Virginia O. Hancock ’62

CREATIVE DIRECTOR

Lauren Rennan

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS AND COMMUNICATIONS

Sheena McFarland

Reed College is an institution of higher education in the liberal arts and sciences devoted to the intrinsic value of intellectual pursuit and governed by the highest standards of scholarly practice, critical thought, and creativity.

Reed Magazine provides news of interest to the Reed community. Views expressed in the magazine belong to their authors and do not necessarily represent officers, trustees, faculty, alumni, students, administrators, or anyone else at Reed.

Reed Magazine (ISSN 08958564) is published quarterly by the Office of Public Affairs at Reed College. Periodicals postage paid at Portland, Oregon.

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From the Editor

Leave Something Splendid

“The environmental crisis is a crisis of the imagination,” said writer Amitav Ghosh in The Great Derangement. He was diagnosing a problem, but for Professors Sarah Wagner-McCoy [English] and Kristin Scheible [religion] this crisis became a challenge to meet.

In 2022 they were awarded a 3-year $500,000 grant from the Mellon Foundation to fund new ways of seeing and understanding our environment through humanities and arts curriculum. In this issue, we explore this Environmental Humanities (EH) initiative, alongside another story of transformative vision— Bill Naito ’49 ’s impact on Portland’s urban landscape. Together with our featured alumni books and class notes, these features remind us of imagination’s power to transform the spaces we inhabit.

For our cover story, “Water’s Hand,” writer Cara Nixon immersed herself in one of the new Mellon-funded environmental humanities courses, Art 350: Oceans, Rains, Rivers, Pools: Histories of Water, taught by Professor of Art History Shivani Sud. In learning to see deeply, Sud’s students examine human creative responses to their environment and trace the histories of environments and social justice that those creations reveal. The EH initiative,

with its focus on place and environmental context, brings together theory and action and is having a profound impact on the work of environmental stewardship, sustainability, and community on campus and beyond.

Chris Lydgate ’90 delves into a new biography of Bill Naito by his granddaughter Erica Naito Campbell ’04. Naito, son of Japanese immigrants, had a profound effect on the development of Portland. He imagined possibility where other people saw decay, and through his tireless work, investment, and leadership, transformed the city. He was a trustee of the college for over twenty years, and was honored with the naming of Reed’s Naito Hall, built in 1997. A plaque inside the dorm bears an inscription with a quote by Naito: “Leave something splendid. Right here. It doesn’t have to be physical. It could be an idea. Leave something splendid.”

I hope this issue inspires new avenues of inquiry for you, invigorating your work to leave something splendid, big or small, wherever you are.

—Katie Pelletier ’03, Editor

REED MAGAZINE

Students tend to the Garden House beds during September’s Sustainability and Environmental Justice Collective celebration.

How Bill Naito ’49 Shaped Portland By Chris Lydgate ’90

Inside Art 350, where studying art history is revealing insights about our changing climate. By Cara Nixon 30 Living Laboratory

Fall snapshots from Reed’s Environmental Humanities initiative where community, place, and scholarship converge to solve pressing issues of our time.

The D.C. alumni chapter recently visited head curator Leslie Overstreet ’71 at the Smithsonian’s Cullman rare book library to learn what clues lie within the materiality of books. See page 10.

Cover image: Prince Amar Singh II Walking In the Rain, ca. 1690, Rajnagar, Rajasthan state, India. Art 350 students examine this artwork on the first day of class.

Eliot Circular

Students in Reedbotics 101: Reedie Controlled Cars got a crash course in vehicular robotics.

Peek into Paideia 2025

This year’s festival of learning, Paideia, was jam-packed, offering 30+ classes a day. The dizzying number of choices ranged from playful to scholarly. Coding, line dancing, Reed history, solutions journalism, wildlife tracking, archaic calculation methods, robotics, documentary filmmaking, japanese calligraphy—there were too many fascinating courses to attend or cover. Of the ones I attended, these stood out.

For the third year in a row, Reed’s self-produced version of CBS’s hit reality TV show Survivor —the infamous series in which contestants compete for the title of sole survivor or get voted off the island— took place in the Vollum Lounge. Led by Gavin Leonard ’25 , Miles McCall ’25 , Lily Hahm ’25, and Noah Goodman ’27, challenges included word scrambles, puzzles, and blind obstacle courses. Audience members saw firsthand that Reedies are not afraid to get their hands a little dirty when bragging rights are at stake. Other popular-culture themed Paideia courses included Building Reed College in Minecraft and The Evolution of Hip-Hop.

Among the more scholarly offerings, “How to S*xt Like Joyce,” taught by Caleb Stanco ’25, delved into James Joyce’s explicit literary output during a time of governmental censorship in Europe. Joyce, a pillar of the modernist movement, was born into a devout Catholic family in Dublin, but his faith was shaken during his teenage years. In the early 1900s he met his future wife, Nora Barnacle. Caleb presented the explicit letters between Joyce and Barnacle from 1909, the centerpiece of the class, pointing out how the erotic and romantic content, in addition to the story-like elements and ekphrastic evocations of past and future scenarios shaped the intensity of their desire for one another. Caleb’s final words were in defense of Joyce’s unabashed proclamations of love and lust, asserting that “there are things a thousand words can say that a picture cannot.” Other literature-infused courses included Memoir Writing, Ukrainian Art and Literature 101, and Afro-futurist Time Travel Club: Octavia Butler’s Kindred and Norbert Wiener’s The Human Use of Human Beings — Faolan Cadiz ’25

PHOTO BY LAUREN LABARRE

Biology Professor Sam Fey Wins Swanson Promise Award

The award honors junior faculty members who display exceptional potential.

Prof. Sam Fey [biology] is a recipient of the Swanson Promise Award, becoming the fifth Reed faculty member to receive the award in eight years.

“I’m happy to accept this award, but I really see it as being for work that’s done by all the folks in my lab,” says Fey.

The award is bestowed by the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust on promising junior faculty members. Previous Reed professors who have been selected include Prof. Kelly Chacón [chemistry] (2023), Prof. Anna Ritz [biology] (2020), Prof. Alison Crocker [physics] (2019), and Prof. Sarah Schaack [biology] (2016)

“It’s not an accident that Reed gets this kind of recognition,” Fey says. “It’s a great environment to learn about how to do science in the classroom; it’s a great environment to learn how to do science in a more informal, hands-on way

during the summer months. I hope that keeps happening.”

As an ecologist, Fey studies how population and community dynamics are shaped by environmental variation. “In ecology, there’s been a lot of focus on how big drivers of environmental change affect organisms,” he says. “The contribution of my lab has been to focus explicitly on the change in the environment— even environmental change over a single day.”

Fey, who works under the watchful eye of his stoic wheaten terrier/ poodle hybrid, Watson, has published 22 scientific papers since joining the faculty in 2017—and still found time to mentor 25 senior thesis students and 32 summer students.

“The contribution of students has just been phenomenal,” Fey says. “The number of unique, really talented, really hardworking students that have contributed to this is impressive. And I’ve been really lucky to work with that cast of characters.”

—Bennett Campbell Ferguson

Finding the Words

In 2024, Aidan Mokalla ’25 traveled to Tajikistan to study Persian as part of the Critical Language Scholarship program.

For Aidan Mokalla ’25, learning Persian was about more than studying a centuries-old language spoken by millions. It was also about communicating with his grandmother, who taught Persian literature in Iran.

“It’s my grandma’s only language, pretty much,” Aidan says. “I’ve always known how import-

ant the language is on a personal level in my family, but also on a cultural level.”

For Aidan, the personal and the cultural collided when he was selected from more than 5,000 applicants to join the Critical Language Scholarship (CLS) Program, allowing him to study Persian in Tajikistan in the summer of 2024.

The Fey Lab working near Mount Saint Helens in June 2022, including (left to right) Emma Campbell ’24, Danny Gibson ’23, Hannah Meier ’21, Sam Fey, and Isaac Schuman ’21.

The CLS Program, which is sponsored by the U.S. government, was founded to increase the number of Americans studying foreign languages. Aidan was so passionate about joining that he applied three years in a row before being accepted.

In Tajikistan, Aidan lived with a host family in a Soviet-style apart-

ment, while taking four hours of classes per day and spending two to three hours on cultural activities (including calligraphy, cooking, dance, and poetry).

Aidan also enjoyed hitchhiking across the country, which is common in Tajikistan. “I really miss that sense of kinship,” he says. “It’s a different climate and

how you interact with strangers is different.”

That climate transformed some of Aidan’s interactions closer to home. “I’ve had a conversation with my grandmother for the first time without having someone else interpreting for me,” he says. “Which is really cool.”

Bennett Campbell Ferguson

PHOTO

Going Beyond “Sink or Swim”

Martha Darling ’66 & husband Gilbert Omenn, MD, PhD, donate $10 million to reimagine student success for Reedies.

When Martha Darling ’66 was a student at Reed, she was student body president, took part in a student leader delegation to Southeast Asia, worked as a summer intern in Washington, DC, in 1964, and participated in rousing lunchtime debates in Commons.

“We would have epic arguments with Prof. John Pock [sociology 1955–98] about the utility of going to graduate school, beyond just academics,” Martha recalls. “It was terrific. A lively discussion could be had most days of the week.”

As one of Reed’s most engaged and generous alumni, Martha, who has previously endowed support for student services, has inspired plenty of discussions of her own. In 1993, she led a multidisciplinary committee that included students, faculty, staff, and trustees, producing the formative President’s Commission on Student Life at Reed College.

It was, Martha remembers, “a time when there was quite a bit of divisiveness in the college, between those who liked the old Reed ‘sink or swim’ approach” and those who wished to provide support to students to “allow them to, frankly, enjoy the real fruits of the academic rigor.”

Now, Martha and her husband, Gilbert Omenn, MD, PhD, are strengthening that support with a $10 million donation. It is the largest gift to bolster student success in Reed’s 116-year history—and a new chapter in Martha’s quest to ensure that the opportunities that were available to her as a student are equaled and exceeded for current students.

“Reed is about rigorous academics, but it is also about providing students with the nonacademic skills and knowledge they need for productive lives,” Martha said when the gift was announced. “This fund will help create new student support and strengthen existing support in ways that make me envious that I’m not a student right now.”

Martha’s gift will profoundly affect all Reed students, but will be especially beneficial to those who are in their first two years—including sophomores who may be feeling frustrated and adrift after the inaugural rush of their freshmen year.

“The sophomores are sort of at sea,” Martha says. “The freshmen at least have humanities to rally around, to unify them, if you will. And once you’re a junior, you’ve got a major, and therefore another group of people who are coreligionists.”

With the aid of the Center for Life Beyond Reed (CLBR), Martha hopes to help sophomores find dry land. Her gift has given rise to the Sophomore Career

Exploration Program, which enables sophomores to meet with CLBR staff as they seek internships, fellowships, and more.

Additionally, the Martha Darling ’66 Fund will endow a residential college program director, first-year academic support counseling, and expanded student mentoring and leadership. These positions, Martha says, are crucial to helping students develop both academic and nonacademic skills.

Martha has led a vibrant and varied career in business and politics. She worked as a senior manager at Boeing, and also served as executive assistant to Secretary of the Treasury W. Michael Blumenthal and as senior legislative aide to U.S. Senator Bill Bradley.

The Reed Promise

A new initiative focused on families whose income is under $100,000 will make a Reed education more accessible than ever before.

Reed College has made a long-standing commitment to meet 100% of students’ demonstrated financial need, ensuring that an education at Reed can remain within reach. A new, groundbreaking initiative builds upon that pledge—as of December 19, 2024, Reed will offer tuition-free education for newly admitted Oregon, Washington, and transfer students from around the U.S. whose family income is under $100,000.

By eliminating financial barriers, the Reed Promise allows students to pursue their dreams at one of the nation’s top liberal arts colleges, while also reaffirming the college’s dedication to fostering a diverse, inclusive, and intellectually rigorous community.

“Our graduates leave Reed College ready to make significant contributions to society by tackling some of the biggest challenges facing our world,” said Reed College President Audrey Bilger. “I am excited to implement this initiative that will allow even more students to access Reed’s multidisciplinary academic program and join our vibrant community.”

Fall thesis parade got buggy this year. In addition to a brass band led by a bow tie–wearing drummer, the parade featured an attendee in a beetle costume, rolling a faux ball of dung. No word on the identity of the beetle’s adviser or if the new thesis hub is accessible to arthropods.

Rupert, Reed’s McFish playground toy (named after Rupert Page ’94), is gone but not forgotten. After Rupert was retired due to safety concerns, posters appeared across campus, describing Rupert’s appearance (“hair: brown, with sesame seeds”) and imploring anyone with knowledge of his whereabouts to contact community safety. Fear not: Rupert hasn’t been fried, he’s just in storage.

Yet to Reedies, Martha—who also established the Munk-Darling Lecture Fund in International Relations and the Lu Ann Williams Darling ’42 Scholarship, which was named in memory of her mother—will always be best known as a great champion of student success.

“Leadership is not the Il Duce standing on his platform, ordering this, that, and the other thing,” Martha says. “It happens in our conference system.” By helping to maintain and sustain that system, Martha is empowering students to learn from others and lead themselves.

—Bennett Campbell Ferguson

Incredible financial aid donors help make ambitious programs like this possible. Along with this new initiative, Reed will continue to meet 100% of demonstrated financial need for all students for all four years, and the college remains committed to making higher education affordable for future generations of students.

“Reed College has long believed that our student aid program ensured access to the best educational experience higher education can offer,” said Milyon Trulove, Reed College vice president and dean of admission & financial aid. “I am excited to offer this financial promise to our prospective students in the Pacific Northwest and transfer students from around the country.”—Cara Nixon

What’s sweeter than intellectual stimulation? The candy bowl at the Reed library’s reference desk was recently voted one of the most popular spots on campus. No kidding: the bowl is so beloved that the library hands out 4,000 pieces of candy per semester.

PHOTO BY LAUREN LABARRE

Beyond the Great Lawn

A Repository of Human History

The D.C. alumni chapter recently visited head curator Leslie Overstreet ’71 at the Smithsonian’s Cullman rare book library to learn what clues lie within the materiality of books.

On a frigid Saturday in January at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C., Leslie Overstreet ’71 carefully took 60 rare books down from their shelves and placed them on wooden tables. That way, on a tour of the Joseph F. Cullman 3rd Library of Natural History, the D.C. alumni chapter could analyze their details up close: their bindings made of pigskin and vellum; their differing print formats, whether folio, quarto, or octavo; and their hand-colored illustrations of delicate foliage, colorful fish, and vibrant birds.

The contents of books tell stories, of course, but their physical characteristics tell their own tales, too, which was the inspiration for the theme of the tour led by Leslie: the materiality of books. “Every book we look at tells us something new, and every day is fun, in a way, going to work,” Leslie says. She joined the Smithsonian Libraries in 1980 and has headed the Cullman Library since it opened in 2002.

When she graduated from Reed with degrees in English literature and teaching, Leslie says she didn’t envision her career turning out the way it has. But, “I do feel that what I am doing now is in harmony and in tune with the values and interests and skills that I learned, or were reinforced at least, at Reed—a commitment to scholarship, to service, and to inquiry,” she says.

The selection of books Leslie chose for the tour was only a tiny portion of the Cullman Library’s

20,000-volume collection spanning the period of 1450 to 1840, mostly covering the fields of zoology, botany, mineralogy, and anthropology. On the tour, alumni guests got the chance to survey and handle— with freshly washed hands—some of these books, ranging in period, genre, and style.

Leslie has led many tours of the rare books library in her decades at the Smithsonian, but she gets particularly excited when alumni chapters come to visit. They always have great questions, she says. And whether exploring Charles Darwin’s The Voyage of the Beagle, Maria Sibylla Merian’s Metamorphosis Insectorum Surinamensium, or Mark Catesby’s Natural History of Carolina, Florida and the Bahama Islands —which Leslie has dedicated the bulk of her own research to—the hope is that tour goers begin to understand why the rare book library exists, how it’s useful, and what kind of important research happens at the Smithsonian.

The information these rare books provide is often important to natural scientists, because the books contain historical clues relevant to their fields. Part of Leslie’s job involves helping scientists uncover those clues in the rare book collection.

“We literally have books that are 500 years old, and they’re in better condition than books 100 years old because they’re made of linen-paper and leather, and they’re literally sewn together, and they will remain useful for another 500 or 5,000 years if they’re properly preserved,” Leslie explains. “And I mean, that’s my job, to make sure they are here 500 years from now. I want people to appreciate that they are the repository of human history.” —Cara Nixon

From left to right, Emmie King ’18, Paul Levy ’72, Leslie Overstreet ’71, Nancy Huvendick (Paul’s spouse), and Rennie Myers ’15 get a closer look at Naturalis Historia by Pliny the Elder.

The Library Is the Beating Heart of Reed College

President Bilger and Reed library leaders discuss the impact of the campus hub.

By Sheena McFarland

When one thinks of the library at Reed College, many feelings may surface: the joy of falling in love with a new author, the stress of time spent at a thesis desk, the excitement of learning together with classmates who became fast friends. One feeling that the librarians hope visitors take away with them is the sense of being cared for.

“We’re looking at students in a holistic way, and much like a lot of other places on campus, we have a culture of care in the library, and so we’re looking at the students as whole people and thinking about what other ways besides their classes do they need support around,” says Ann Matsushima Chiu, social sciences and zine librarian. “They need to grow as people. They need to get connected with the resources. They need to get connected outside of Reed and plugged in with their community. They need arts and culture and all of that.”

The library is the heart and hub of campus and a central, vibrant place that offers resources within its walls as well as an expansive sharing library with other academic libraries in the Pacific Northwest. It’s a place where students, faculty, staff, and alumni can find tr oves of information and also share their own findings and stories with others.

“I think it’s easy to say, ‘Oh, this is a place where rigorous scholarship is happening,’ but also it should be joyful,” says Tracy Drake, director of special collections and archives. “Your years here at Reed should also elicit joy.”

That’s an idea Reed College President Audrey Bilger supports and has expressed since her first presidential interviews at Reed: that “rigor doesn’t have to be rigid.” The pandemic disrupted some of the joy students were able to find as the library closed for five months in 2020. Its culture was stymied during that time, and was also hindered as a large portion of the building went through seismic upgrades from December 2021 to March 2023.

“We really had a generation of students who didn’t get an opportunity to experience the library culture,” says Dena Hutto, the Norman F. Carrigg College Librarian. “So really, my marching orders for all the library staff were to get students back in the library. And the staff really delivered. In terms of the number of students in the library, using collections, participating in classes and outreach events, we are exceeding what we used to do prepandemic. I think at this point, that is exciting.”

Increased numbers of community events, such as Zine Fest and bringing alumni authors to campus, and deeper engagement with the library’s visual resources center

and archives have brought more students to the library than ever. That also means there are more opportunities for patrons to build relationships with the librarians and each other.

Some of the important connections that form are between alumni and current students. That can be when a student visits the thesis tower to find previous research to build on or interactions when alumni come by to access the archives or walk the stacks as they remember their time at Reed.

“It’s almost as if alumni become mentors themselves,” says Chlöe Van Stralendorff, visual resources

curator. “We talk about librarians and library staff becoming mentors to current students, but alumni also fit that role, too.”

Mentorship continues with the materials found at the library, often with the expert guidance of librarians who ask the right questions to direct a patron to the resources they need. At the archives, documents and multimedia are housed for patrons to reference as they continue to create new knowledge to put out into the world. The archives open a window into the past that allows viewers to see the future.

“I think that what we’ve been able to do is shift the idea of the

archives from this place of showand-tell, where we’re just showing these really old documents to helping students to understand that it is a place where rigorous scholarship can happen,” Drake said.

Scholarship is also happening in the zine library, where students are able to tell their own stories and express their own lived experiences. Zines are an accessible way for folks, especially those from marginalized backgrounds, to share voices which might not otherwise be heard. The visual resources center provides specialized equipment and supplies for documenting, creating, and researching artwork. The

risograph in the visual resources center is one of the pieces of equipment that patrons use to easily produce multiple copies of a zine that can be used for their own personal enjoyment or used as part of an academic endeavor.

“It’s so heartening to see even more engagement with the library because what we know in terms of helping our students succeed and thrive and feel a sense of belonging is that those relationships are critical,” Bilger says. “And our talented librarians model for them what it is to be intellectually engaged with resources and materials. The Reed library truly enriches the lives of our students.”

BY THE NUMBERS

(7/23–7/24)

Visits: 160,402 up 29% from 2022–23 (and the highest library “gate count” since 2015–16)

Hours open per week: 112.5

Library branch: 1—the performing arts resource center in PAB, aka the PARC

Print/media collections: 442,924 items

Digital/electronic collections: 2,290,179 items

Total print and digital collections: 2,733,103 items

Print/media titles checked out: 18,863 items

Digital/electronic items used: 209,937 total; includes 52,584 books and media and 157,353 journal and database articles

Books and articles borrowed from other libraries: 5,784

Reference questions: 3,232

Virtual reference questions: 1,456

Student consultations with librarians (i.e., appointments): 394

Presentations to classes: 161, attended by 3,944 students

Virtual presentations to classes: 6, attended by 90 students online

Ann Matsushima Chiu, Chlöe Van Stralendorff, Audrey Bilger, Tracy Drake, and Dena Hutto in the Library North Reference Room.

The Iconoclast

How Bill Naito ’49 reshaped Portland.

By Chris Lydgate ’90

In the 1970s, the outlook for downtown Portland was bleak.

Central cities around the nation were crumbling like sand castles before a confluence of historical trends: the growth of suburbs, the rise of the automobile, the demise of the streetcar, rising unemployment, population decline, and a sputtering economy.

A key factor in Portland’s decline was the advent of the suburban shopping mall. Starting in the 1950s, malls like Eastport Plaza, Lloyd Center, and Mall 205 had been siphoning shoppers away from downtown, leaving behind boarded-up storefronts. Downtown was being hollowed out, a crumbling ghost town unable to withstand the relentless march of a cookie-cutter, Disneyfied suburbia.

Bill Naito ’49 was appalled.

Naito was a true son of Portland. Born and raised in the city, he knew its streets and alleys, its schools and libraries, its quirks and prejudices. A relentless entrepreneur, his business was rooted in downtown Portland; he wasn’t going to let it go without a fight.

So he made the biggest gamble of his career.

The remarkable life of William Sumio Naito, and the story of his big bet, is recounted in a magisterial biography by his granddaughter, Erica Naito-Campbell ’04, titled Portland’s Audacious Champion: How Bill Naito Overcame Anti-Japanese Hate and Became an Intrepid Civic Leader, published by OSU Press in 2024.

For the better part of four decades, Naito was an inescapable part of Portland’s political landscape. An entrepreneur, business leader, and

civic dynamo, he played an outsized role in scores of projects, big and small, that shaped the city as we know it today: Old Town, MAX, Pioneer Courthouse Square, the Portland Streetcar, Montgomery Park, Import Plaza, Saturday Market, Artquake, the Pearl District.

The book does yeoman service in explaining how Naito revived Portland’s fortunes through his myriad business ventures and civic projects. It also provides an insightful look into the history of the Japanese American community in Portland and the successive waves of hysteria and prejudice that turned their lives upside down.

But the book’s most striking contribution might be its delicate, nuanced exploration of Naito’s turbulent personality. A rebellious child who defied his parents by refusing to eat. A painfully shy teenager who became a world-class extrovert. A young idealist who endured bigotry, discrimination, and exile because of his race but who remained intensely patriotic. A self-made millionaire who felt he had something to prove. A skeptic who loved Christmas—and who was a mainstay of Reed’s annual Boar’s Head holiday tradition.

The unresolved tensions often erupted in extraordinary bursts of ingenuity. Naito had, as Herbert Asquith once said of Winston Churchill, a “zigzag streak of lightning in the brain.” Buy a London double-decker bus to shuttle shoppers to Old Town. Bring back the streetcar. Give away 100 free bikes for people to share. Make MAX free. Save the Benson Bubbler drinking fountains. Turn the neon White Stag sign into an advertisement for Portland.

PHOTO FROM THE OREGONIAN

Bill Naito ’49 above SW Morrison Street, where he revitalized numerous properties including the Galleria and Pioneer Courthouse Square.

The Iconoclast

Naito was a pivotal figure in the revival of downtown Portland. Along the way, he helped cement the city’s reputation as a haven for the unconventional, the different, the misfits, the dreamers, and the doers—a home, in other words, for people just like him.

The young man who arrived on Reed’s campus in the fall of 1946 wasn’t just quiet—he was, in his own words, “pathologically shy.” Like many of his classmates, he was a veteran returning from service in World War II. But his Japanese heritage marked him as different—a difference he was acutely aware of. “The ‘T’ for traitor still stung on my face,” he said.

Naito was born in Portland in 1926, the second child of Hide and Fukiye Naito, both Issei (first-generation) immigrants who were part of Portland’s growing Japanese community. Ironically, their presence was in part due to American prejudice against Chinese immigrants. Resentment and fear that Chinese immigrants were taking jobs from white Americans fueled passage of the Chinese Exclusion Act in 1882, forbidding further immigration from China. The resulting labor shortage spurred a wave of immigrants from Japan, many of them farmers or craftspeople seeking opportunity in the United States. In the 1890 census, Portland counted 20 Japanese residents. By 1910, the number had grown to 1,400. And by 1920, Portland’s Japanese community had grown to more than 4,000 people, most of them living in Nihonmachi (“Japan town”), a thriving enclave north of the Burnside Bridge, featuring hotels, shops, restaurants, doctors, and dentists— all serving the community, which included Issei and their children, known as Nisei (second generation).

Naito’s father, Hide, ran a successful shop in downtown Portland selling curios and imports such as Japanese paper, prints, porcelain, decorated candles, haori jackets, and garden shears. When the Great Depression struck in 1929, Hide adapted by selling cheaper goods, including house plants, novelties, ashtrays, and salt and pepper shakers.

Bill’s childhood was full of challenges. As a young child, he suffered from rickets, which required him to wear leg braces.

Because the family spoke Japanese at home, Bill went off to his first day of first grade without knowing a word of English. When he rode the streetcar, white people refused to sit next to him.

But the toughest obstacles he faced stemmed from the complex dynamics of his own family. He was in constant conflict with his strict mother, Fukiye, who favored his elder brother, Sam. Bill sometimes rebelled by refusing to eat, which may have contributed to his rickets. He always seemed to be in trouble with his parents, which stoked an overwhelming dread of disappointing them. The right side of his face was partially paralyzed, a condition his mother blamed on his disobedience.

A tide of anti-Japanese sentiment was on the rise during the 1930s. A series of racist laws took aim at the Japanese American community. Japanese immigrants could not become US citizens, and were forbidden to own property in Oregon by Oregon’s Alien Land Law of 1923. The National Origins Act of 1924 clamped down on immigration. Rising tension between the US and Japan,

especially over Japan’s actions in China during the Sino-Japanese war, stoked local incidents. In 1939, more than 2,500 people rallied in Portland to shut down iron shipments to Japan.

Despite the tension, the Naito family scraped by—until the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. “Bill had gone to bed on Saturday as an American and had awakened on Monday as an enemy of the state,” Naito-Campbell writes.

Overnight, the nation plunged into hysteria and panic. Rumors circulated that the Japanese were planning to blow up the Bonneville Dam, bomb Portland, and launch a full-scale invasion. Oregon’s governor ordered all Japanese immigrants to stay in their homes. Sam hid the shortwave radios he built as a hobby; Bill threw his BB gun in the pond in the backyard. The authorities ransacked the Naito home and shut down Hide’s business. The Portland City Council revoked the business licenses of all Japanese immigrants. Editorials in The Oregonian thundered that the US had been too “lax, tolerant, and soft” toward the Japanese

Bill at Crater Lake in 1949, the year he graduated from Reed.

community and claimed that Shinto temples were spying on the US. Bank accounts were frozen, children were fingerprinted. The atmosphere of paranoia culminated with President Franklin D. Roosevelt issuing Executive Order 9066, which authorized military commanders to “evacuate” civilians of Japanese descent (roughly 120,000 people) within 200 miles of the western coastline. They could leave the zone voluntarily or be forced into prison camps.

For most Japanese Americans, voluntary resettlement was impractical. The community was heavily concentrated on the West Coast, with few relatives living inland. Landlords were unwilling to rent rooms or apartments to a population that had been labeled as a security risk. Japanese Americans had nowhere to go, and with their bank accounts frozen, they had no way to pay for it anyway. Given the short deadline, only 10% of Japanese Americans were able to avoid imprisonment.

The Naitos were among the lucky few: Fukiye’s sister lived in Utah, which hosted a small Japanese American community. The Naitos piled their belongings into the family car, took back roads through eastern Oregon and Idaho (Japanese Americans were banned from the highway), and set up a new home in Salt Lake City. There Bill showed an early flair for seizing opportunity. He suggested that they raise chickens. The family built two coops in the backyard and began selling eggs. Eventually they raised as many as 600 chickens, providing a crucial source of income to tide the family through the war.

Bill graduated from high school in 1944 and signed up with the US Army, joining an elite unit of military translators known as the Zebra Platoon. By the time he had completed his training, the Japanese Empire had surrendered, but Bill was dispatched to Japan anyway to assist in the occupation. After two years of service, he arrived back in Portland, ready for the next adventure—Reed.

For most of his young life, Bill had been a loner and an outcast, beset by crippling social anxiety and low self-esteem. For the most part, he had been able to escape into books and an inner life. But Reed challenged him to open up. The college

was built on the premise that intense discussion and debate was the way to create scholars and thinkers. NaitoCampbell quotes Reed President and longtime trustee E.B. MacNaughton [1948–52]: “It’s the academic and scholarly atmosphere,” he said. “We specialize in it as much as West Point specializes in a military tradition. The scholar is our hero.”

In Hum 11 conference, there was nowhere to hide. When his professors called on him, Bill had to find something to contribute. Hesitant and stammering, he began to participate. As he did so, he found something he had never had before: people who believed in him.

In the years following WWII, Reed’s student body included many returning veterans who went to college on the GI Bill—

island. In Hood River, the local chapter of the American Legion struck the names of 16 Nisei soldiers from the honor roll of residents who died in the line of duty during WWII.

But Reed offered flickers of hope. In 1945, MacNaughton (who was soon to become president of Reed) organized a public meeting with Oregon Governor Charles Sprague attended by more than a thousand people. In what was called “the greatest speech of his life,” MacNaughton urged Oregonians to trust in Japanese Americans as they trusted in the Constitution.

Bill majored in economics and wrote a thesis comparing how the federal government funded WWI and WWII to see if there was any improvement. (“In typical Reed fashion, the answer was yes and no,” writes Naito-Campbell.)

Bill Naito had a hand in scores of projects, big and small, that shaped the city as we know it today: Old Town, MAX, Pioneer Courthouse Square, the Portland Streetcar, Montgomery Park, Saturday Market, the Pearl District.

veterans who saw in Bill a kindred spirit. At Reed, he would form strong bonds with students like Bill Daw ’49, Orval “Bill” Clawson ’49, Don Morey ’50, and Dan Momyer ’48. After class they would debate socialism and government intervention over games of bridge and bottles of beer.

Bill also found a mentor in Prof. Art Leigh [economics 1945–88]. Nearly blind, Prof. Leigh hired students to read aloud articles and papers to him so he could keep up on research in his field. Leigh hired Bill as one of his readers, despite Bill’s shyness and stammering. (Ironically, one word Bill struggled with was “entrepreneur.”) With Leigh’s support, Bill learned to build his confidence, find his voice, and speak his mind. “My hero,” Bill called him.

Anti-Japanese prejudice still ran deep in American society, and Oregon was no exception. Zealots in Pendleton and Albany bellowed that Japanese Americans would soon “out-breed” white people and called for them to be exiled to a remote Pacific

Bill considered his time at Reed to be one of the happiest in his life, and his friends and mentors helped buoy him through the prejudice he faced. (An adviser at Reed told him not to go to law school, because no one would hire a Japanese American attorney. “Bill, you’ll starve,” he warned.)

After graduating in 1948, Bill set off for the University of Chicago, where he studied under the influential economist Milton Friedman. Bill became an enthusiastic proponent of an open society and a free market. He also met his future wife, Micki. They wed in Chicago in 1951 (Oregon law forbade mixed-race marriage). Bill intended to stay and finish his PhD, but his family called him back to Portland to help out with the family business.

In the teeth of ongoing anti-Japanese prejudice, Bill’s father, Hide, had successfully revived his import business. The business thrived selling all kinds of goods, from bone china to coffee mugs to furniture. Bill worked late hours, puffing on cigars,

turning over expense reports, always on the hunt for new opportunities. Over time, Bill and his brother Sam played an increasingly dominant role in running the company. The brothers frequently disagreed; employees learned not to linger in the walkway between their two desks lest they get caught in the crossfire. But Bill and Sam had a strong working partnership, even if their personal relations were sometimes frosty.

In 1962, the Naitos bought the Globe Hotel, a notorious flophouse whose creaky bunks cost 50 cents a night, and transformed it into Import Plaza, a retail mecca stocked with goods from around the world: wooden shoes from Holland, lingonberries from Sweden, Buddhas from India, wicker furniture, hookahs, and a generous assortment of obscure delights.

Like any retailer, Bill had a vested interest in the fortunes of the neighborhood. But his fascination with Portland ran deeper than that. He taught himself about architecture. He roamed the streets of Portland (often pedaling a squeaky old Schwinn) trying to pinpoint what made

a neighborhood feel charming, what made it feel bleak. Led by Bill’s nose for a deal, the Naitos began to buy up worndown historic buildings in Old Town at bargain-basement prices, restored their architectural splendor, and gave them new life, often by offering steep discounts to artists and hippie entrepreneurs chasing half-baked dreams. (One of them was Phil Knight, the founder of Nike.)

Bill’s track record of reviving old buildings came at a time when business confidence in downtown Portland was crumbling. The doubts and uncertainty came to a head in 1974, when the Rhodes Department Store finally closed its doors.

In truth, the sad day had been a long time coming. The stately Rhodes building, constructed in 1910, had once been the home of Olds, Wortman & King, the biggest department store in the Pacific Northwest. Occupying an entire city block at the intersection of two streetcar lines, the store practically oozed glamor, boasting a giant

skylight, a graceful atrium, grand stairways, an elegant tea room, and the legendary Big Top Circus Toyland.

Over the decades, however, the building lost its luster and changed its name several times. The streetcars stopped running. There was nowhere to park. Cheap renovations buried the skylight and robbed the interior of its grandeur. The opening of Washington Square, a sprawling retail colossus in the suburb of Tigard, was the final nail in the coffin. The Rhodes struggled on for several months and shut down on a bleak day in February. Portland’s civic leaders shivered. Every time they passed the empty, boarded-up building, they tried not to see it as a monumental gravestone. Naito didn’t share their pessimism. He sensed an opportunity.

The Naito brothers bought the rundown building for $565,000—a song. They stripped the structure down and opened it up, restoring the dramatic atrium and skylight. They stripped back the false ceilings and exposed the pipes and ductwork. They stuck 114 parking

Bill with his brother Sam (left), at the Erickson Building, NW 2nd and Burnside, from the cover of The Oregonian's Sunday insert, Northwest Magazine, March 1985.

PHOTO BY DANA E. OLSEN | THE OREGONIAN

spaces in the basement. They named the project the Galleria. It was one of the nation’s first urban shopping malls.

Instead of generic national chains, the Naitos recruited scores of quirky local retailers to fill the building, like London Underground, Josephine’s Dry Goods, Galadriel’s House Plants, Mario’s, and Antique Estate. For the grand opening, they held a parade with a hand-drawn fire engine and two brass bands.

The response was overwhelming. Shoppers came in droves. They flooded in from Gresham, Beaverton, Hillsboro, and Milwaukie, drawn by the unique mix of shops and restaurants and the undeniable atmosphere of Portland authenticity. Naito-Campbell quotes journalist Maggi White in the Downtowner: “All these people, the hustle bustle, the hum of activity, the organist playing, the restaurants full, people eating ice cream, and a mailman drinking coffee and watching people go by.” The Oregonian hailed it as “the most exciting development in downtown merchandising in several decades.”

The Galleria marked a turning point for downtown Portland. Emboldened by its success, civic leaders launched a string of projects designed to revive the central city, such as the Nordstrom building and Pioneer Courthouse Square.

As business boomed, the Galleria inspired a wave of urban malls around the nation. “Bill Naito is intuitively a genius

at putting things together,” an industry analyst concluded.

But Naito was just getting started. A lifelong railway fan, he pressed Portland’s political leaders to build a light rail system to bring suburban commuters downtown; the first MAX line opened in 1986. He also worked tirelessly to bring back streetcars to help people move around the central city. (Before a single foot of track had been laid for the streetcar, Naito bought four wooden trolleys from Lisbon, shipped them to Portland, and displayed them in one of his buildings to build momentum for the project.) “His true talent was shameless persistence,” writes Naito-Campbell.

repaired them, painted them yellow, and released them onto the streets of Portland for anyone to borrow and ride.

Naito had an outsized impact on Reed. In 1974, President Paul Bragdon [1971–88] recruited him to join Reed’s board of trustees, where he supported the college in many ventures, including the Campaign for Reed, which raised $65 million. After he died, Naito Hall was named in his honor.

The full list of Naito’s projects would take many pages to enumerate. He served on the Urban Forestry Commission, overseeing the planting of more than 30,000 trees. He championed a bond measure to restore the elegant Central Library, where he had spent so many hours as a boy. He revived a disused Montgomery Ward warehouse and turned it into a retail and business center named Montgomery Park (saving money by changing only two letters on its landmark neon sign). He even lent a hand to the visionary Yellow Bike Project, which collected worn-out old bikes,

One of Naito’s most significant legacies, however, lies in Old Town. Head north on the waterfront from the Burnside Bridge, and you’ll find the Japanese American Historical Plaza, a public park that Naito worked tirelessly to create.

Dedicated in 1990, located just a couple blocks from the historic heartbeat of Nihonmachi, the park is a monument to the resilience of the Japanese American community. One of the stones carries this inscription:

With new hope

We build new lives.

Why complain when it rains?

This is what it means to be free.

It is a fitting tribute to one of Portland’s most influential citizens.

Portland's Audacious Champion by Erica Naito–Campbell ’04 (OSU Press)

Left, Portland mayor Bud Clark ’58, Vancouver mayor Bryce Seidl, and Bill with a model for the Montgomery Park business center redevelopment. Right, Erica Naito-Campbell ’04 in front of the former White Stag sign that her grandfather turned into an an advertistement for Portland.

Water's Hand

This watercolor artwork, Maharana Sangram Sing II at the Ganguar Boat Procession, depicts the watersurrounded city of Udaipur, India, in the early 18th century.

Inside Art 350, where studying art history reveals insights about our changing climate.

By Cara Nixon

A Return to the Sea

On a typical overcast Portland day in early November, the class sits quietly in Reed’s Hauser Memorial Library basement. Save for a leaf blower whirring outside—and a dog barking at it—the space is totally silent as the clock ticks on. The students all stare at a projector screen displaying John Singleton Copley’s A Boy with a Flying Squirrel, willing the painting to reveal new clues to them. A whole nine minutes pass before Prof. Shivani Sud [art history and humanities] finally breaks the silence and asks, “Now, what did you notice?”

The portrait depicts the artist’s stepbrother, Henry Pelham, holding a gold chain leashed to a pet squirrel. A halffull—or half-empty, depending on your perspective—glass of water sits in front of the subject. It’s the only water featured in the painting, and yet, Sud wants her Art 350: Oceans, Rains, Rivers, Pools: Histories of Water students to inspect it closely. Art historian and Harvard University professor Jennifer Roberts says she requires her own students to stare at works like Copley’s for three full hours before they can even begin writing about them. “I’m not going to make you stare at this for three hours,” Sud assured the class before they started their analysis, much to their relief. But she did set the timer for nine minutes, an uncomfortably long period to focus on a work of art.

Water's Hand

The activity yields results, though. In the discussion that follows, a student points out that since you get bored looking for so long, you start to search for new things to notice. Some say they paid more attention to the rich colors and textures of the painting as time went on. One admits that around minute eight they started to contemplate the direction of the subject’s gaze—what exactly is Henry looking at? “Just because we’ve looked at something doesn’t mean we’re really seeing,” Sud says. And by staring at the boy and his squirrel for an extended time, students learn not just to look, but to see.

Closely examining art, like in many art history classes, is an every-session occurrence for Sud’s course. But Art 350 specifically asks students to consider the role of a particular element in art water. Sud invites them to contemplate: How is water depicted across time? What can art portraying lakes, rivers, and oceans tell us about colonization, climate change, and the history of our environment? The class raises questions about water’s role in art, even when it’s not the main subject, as in Copley’s famous painting.

In 1765, Copley sent the work on a transatlantic journey from Boston, Massachusetts, to London, England, in search of feedback from artists he admired. He had to wait months for the painting to reach London, more months to see feedback, and then even more months to receive clarification on the feedback (which was, thankfully, mostly positive). The only water actually present in A Boy with a Flying Squirrel is that small glass in the bottom left corner, but geographic and temporal intervals related to water profoundly affected Copley’s painting. Rapid transportation in our era has made the experience of long-distance journeys over water an overlooked aspect of movement. Sud wanted to defamiliarize contemporary notions of travel to help students explore water’s role in shaping culture.

Art can hold clues to our past, which can ultimately inform our present and future. (As just one recent example, journalist Mark Schapiro reported a story for Smithsonian Magazine in November 2024

Water may be a subtle detail in John Singleton Copley’s A Boy with a Flying Squirrel (1765), but the painting’s transatlantic journey made it crucial to the artwork’s history.

on an Italian woman investigating art for clues about forgotten produce, which she helps farmers bring back into cultivation.) But a 2017 study in the journal Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts found most museum patrons only look at works of art for an average of 27 seconds. In this art history course, students learn how to slow down, analyze, and make new observations about artworks ranging in time, place, and medium, from 16th-century Indian watercolor paintings to 21st-century Arctic photographs.

Offered as part of Reed’s new Environmental Humanities initiative, Art 350 centers interdisciplinarity and collaboration. Funded by the Mellon Foundation and led by principal investigator Prof. Sarah Wagner-McCoy [English and humanities] and co–principal investigator Prof. Kristin Scheible [religion and humanities], the EH

histories, informed by disciplines like environmental science and anthropology.

Conservationist Rachel Carson predicted in 1951 that humans would one day make a return to the sea from which they came, but this time, they’d do so “mentally and imaginatively.” This is the driving principle of the blue humanities, a subfield of environmental humanities that emerged in the early 21st century and has gained traction in recent years. Coined by St. John’s University English professor Steve Mentz, the blue humanities asks people to consider human relationships with water, whether it be fresh water, our oceans, ice, or even water vapor. Colleges like Stanford University and Arizona State University have started implementing blue humanities curriculum and initiatives. By studying the blue humanities, historian John R. Gillis says we can return

Closely examining art is a frequent occurrence in many art history classes. Art 350 specifically asks students to consider the role of a particular element in art—water.

program connects diverse fields of study— from art and music to history and political science—to urgent, complex questions of social and environmental justice. The initiative provides opportunities for faculty to develop and improve their curricula with summer incubators, an opportunity Sud took advantage of in 2023 to reimagine Art 350. “The summer incubators have been transformative across the college,” says Kathy Oleson, dean of faculty and Patricia and Clifford Lunneborg Professor of Psychology. “They are not only the catalysts for new, intellectually rich interdisciplinary courses like Sud’s Histories of Water, but are also hubs for faculty collaboration and scholarly exchange.”

Sud says the incubator led her to incorporate more insights from environmental humanities and explore new topics, including critical animal studies and new materialism, which she later brought to her students. The class examines art, reads poetry, watches films, and comes to understand water’s hand in cultural and artistic

to our beginnings, and, in understanding the world’s water, learn to better understand the world as a whole. Sud, who completed her PhD in art history from UC Berkeley before arriving at Reed, situates water-centered art in a global context, wielding her expertise on South Asian art, environmental histories, and colonial visual cultures. The first summer incubator also supported other faculty developing courses around the oceanic turn. Inspired by this work, Wagner-McCoy designed a new blue humanities course in the second round of workshops: English 341: Humanity at Sea: Personhood from Moby Dick to Moby Doll.

Students in Sud’s course lead class discussions, and, as a final project, develop their own 10-week course plans focused around an element depicted in art—examples from the fall class include natural earth elements in Aztec art and fire imagery in European works. Students are often inundated with writing assignments, particularly seniors who are working on their

Water's Hand

theses. “So, I did not want students to write a long research paper, but I did want students to conduct research, critically analyze sources, and think creatively,” Sud says. She encourages students to teach the courses they design at Paideia.

Along the way, students become equipped to unravel mysteries about our aquatic environments and grapple with their own relationships to the world’s water. By exploring religious depictions of water, colonial histories, historical and modern-day responses to climate change, and more, students make a return to the sea—and other bodies of water—not only to ask, but to answer pressing questions related to our environment and our society. Sud says of the class, “We’re not only thinking about water as a subject of history, but really as a methodological approach by which to study history.”

The Ocean as an Archive

In 1725, a flat-bottomed sailing ship cut through the South China Sea, slicing a path from what is now Guangzhou towards present-day Jakarta, once a Dutch trading port. It would never reach its intended destination. Somewhere on its journey, the vessel caught fire and sank beneath the waves, taking with it the ship’s crew and all of its precious cargo.

Almost 300 years later, in 1998, Vietnamese fishermen discovered the wreck off the Ca Mau Peninsula. From inside the ship’s troves, more than 130,000 pieces of porcelain were retrieved, including a porcelain flower pot transformed by the sea, known as Sea Sculpture. Glazed cobalt blue plants reach around the curve of white porcelain, and shells and clams encrusted over the pot seem to bloom from its opening, making their homes inside nine attached broken bowls. The makers, the caption will tell you, are now unknown.

Senior art major Sadie Burke ’25 leads a discussion on the artwork in early October, inviting peers to partake in a visual analysis exercise. They ask seemingly simple questions: What is it? Who made it? When? What feelings does it evoke? But the answers are complex, complicated by the object’s connection to the natural world, and to disaster. Students offer an alternative to the sculpture’s maker being unknown: they say, rather, the art can be credited

to both humankind and nature, working together to create something uniquely and unintentionally beautiful. One student says you can’t see where the sea life ends and the porcelain begins. What was once a common porcelain flower pot has become an example of the art shipwrecks can create and the ways the ocean becomes an archive, for lost things, for wrecked things, for things that, when found, can tell us stories that would have otherwise faded into obscurity.

On a field trip to the Oregon coast, the class examines some of these stories up close, joined by Wagner-McCoy’s English 341 class, who are also engaging with 19th-century sea travel, imperialist expansion, and extractive capitalism in Herman Melville’s Moby Dick Sud says it’s important for her own students to be physically present with the ocean to better understand it. Before their trip, in an earlier class discussion, Anahi Sanchez ’25 asks her peers to consider their sea experiences. What connections do they have to the ocean, if any at all? What does it mean to them? For Anahi, who grew up in the small coastal town of Ixtapa, Mexico, her relationship to the sea was “very much a special one.” Some of her peers grew up along the coast, too, associating the ocean with recreation. Others, from landlocked

places, haven’t spent much time, if any at all, near the ocean. That changes when they visit the coastal town of Tillamook. There, students from both Sud and WagnerMcCoy’s courses exchange readings and ideas, and find that they’re learning many of the same things, but from different perspectives. As the fog rolls across the expanse of Tillamook Bay, they explore the nearby Octopus Tree and attempt whale watching. Later, at the Tillamook County Pioneer Museum, they analyze objects saved from the Spanish galleon shipwreck Santo Cristo de Burgos. A hunk of beeswax and tiny porcelain arrowheads sit in glass boxes, calling to mind history shaped by the dangers of seafaring.

There’s an intrinsic uncertainty to journeys. In the Performing Arts Building one day in early October, Sarah’s Moby Dick students demonstrate this idea. They meet for a special session affectionately called the “Passage Party” to celebrate their completion of the novel, and Sarah pulls up a map of the Reed campus on the whiteboard, inviting the class to draw their paths to the PAB that day. When everyone’s finished, and Sarah has turned off the projector, what’s left on the whiteboard is a complete mishmash of green, pink, blue,

BY

Professor Shivani Sud (left) often took her Art 350 students outside to drive concepts home.

PHOTO

LAUREN LABARRE

and black pathways, starting in different places, making different turns and pit stops, but ending in the same place. A guest of the class, environmental journalist Michelle Nijhuis ’96, points out that the Reed canyon wasn’t always connected to the ocean as it is now. Today, the canyon feeds into the Willamette River, which feeds into the Columbia River, which feeds into the Pacific Ocean, connecting campus to the sea. “This is a quiet but powerful change,” Michelle says. She’s drawn her own long journey on the board from White Salmon, Washington, marking her trip across the Columbia down south to Reed. She ran into traffic on the way, an unexpected obstacle. The exercise shows the unpredictability of journeys, a central theme of Moby Dick, and of sea travel. In the early modern period, unpredictability went hand in hand with seafaring. The Santo Cristo de Burgos, like the Ca Mau shipwreck, arrived at an unintended destination. The ship was originally headed for Acapulco, Mexico, in the late 17th century, but wrecked, possibly in a storm, and was rediscovered on the coast of Astoria, Oregon, in 2013. Known as the Beeswax Wreck, the ship had been hauling porcelain, pottery, and valuable wax. As early as

1813, the wreck and its wax were recorded. The Clatsop tribe was said to have used the beeswax for trade, and shaped the broken pieces of porcelain into arrowheads. These shipwreck treasures transformed in both value and purpose: wax became currency, and porcelain became weaponry. The tragic ends brought on by shipwreck created new beginnings for the objects they carried, and students find that the sea does not only hold history in its depths, but the sea itself is history. And it has many tales to tell.

Sacred Water

In the “Isarda” edition of the Bhagavata Purana , an ink and opaque watercolor painting, the Hindu deity Krishna enters the blue, rushing waters of the Yamuna River, followed by his devotees (see p. 28). They sweep past the landscape of Braj, the homeland of Krishna and, today, a pilgrimage center in north India, gliding past trees and grazing animals, the water flowing beyond the confines of the paper. Water in Braj at this time was seen as simultaneously life-threatening and lifesaving, a central narrative to these artworks, art historian Sugata Ray says. In Hindu mythology, Krishna shelters Braj from rain that may flood the riverbanks, while the water

of Yamuna also sustains the agricultural and pastoral communities of the area. When it was estimated to have been painted, a period known as the Little Ice Age was affecting the planet. As Ray points out, the name of the event itself has been colonized, representing the experiences of those in North America and Europe, who encountered extreme cold at the time. Other parts of the world, however, like India and Africa, endured an abnormally high occurrence of the warm phase of El Niño, causing failed monsoon seasons and resulting in drought. Why then, Sud asks students, did artists from the regional courts of India paint poetic visions of rains, lakes, and rivers during this time?

In an earlier Bhagavata Purana, “Palam,” the Yamuna River serves as a flat decorative background as Krishna and his devotees dance across the scene. In “Isarda,” however, the river takes center stage, marking a significant change in feelings toward Yamuna in the short span of 30 years. Comparing these works encourages the class to consider: Was the change in feelings toward Yamuna caused by the very absence of water over the course of that period?

Another water-related change in Braj was architectural. The Sati Burj, a red sandstone tower, included a viewing portal. At one time, such windows were used to view the emperor, who was considered divine. In Hinduism, this act was considered “darshan,” or the act of viewing a deity or divine person. Eventually, the portal came to be a means of viewing the Yamuna River instead. Sud explains to the class that with this change, people began “doing darshan” to the river, viewing the river in the same manner in which they would pay homage to a god or a divinely ordained emperor. Hindu scripture says, after all, that “Yamuna purifies one who beholds it.” Beholding the river became a multisensorial experience, stretching past sight into smell and sound. Water, in its scarcity during the drought, expanded beyond the environment, Ray says, into the theological and the aesthetic.

In the 18th century, the rulers of Udaipur, the capital of the Mewar Kingdom in western India, reimagined courtly spaces as a medium for sensory experience and symbolic power by shifting palaces from being on land to being on lakes

Sea Sculpture, retrieved from the ship that wrecked off the the Ca Mau Peninsula in the early 18th century, is just one example of how the ocean, as an archive, can destroy and recreate.

© VICTORIA AND ALBERT MUSEUM, LONDON

Water's Hand

Such structures, like the famous Jagniwas Palace on Lake Pichola, served as hubs for leisure, festivities, and diplomatic encounters. Lake palaces combined pleasure with politics and blurred lines between leisure and diplomacy. Jagniwas became a “powerfully effective frame for praising the king,” art historian Dipti Khera writes. At a time of increasing drought and climate change, water, a substance inextricably tied to life and sustenance, became a way of exerting power and control. And it was not the first or last time humankind has used water as a tool for domination of a place or a people.

The Ship

There are two main institutions of modern slavery, historian Marcus Rediker writes: the plantation and the slave ship. But while the former has been studied a great deal, the latter has often been forgotten, despite its crucial role in the slave trade. Rediker refers to such ships as factories, vessels that produced labor power by helping to create the commodity of “slaves,” and subsequently forming categories of race. “Essential to the production of both,” Rediker writes, “was terror.” One of these tools of terror involved the sea itself, as a means of kidnapping and then stranding enslaved Africans. Enslavers, too, mobilized the ocean’s predators as additional horrors that they inflicted upon those they enslaved, specifically sharks.

In the late 18th century, abolitionists pointed to sharks as one example of the extraordinary violence that took place on slave ships, as they relayed instances of enslavers feeding Africans to these animals on the transatlantic journey. The destruction of slave corpses by sharks was a public spectacle and part of the degradation of enslavement, Rediker explains. A famous work by romantic painter J. M. W. Turner provides a visual of the connection between slave ships, sharks, and the terror enslaved Black people endured on trips across the Atlantic. The slave ship he captures is unnamed, allowing it to stand, academic Christina Sharpe writes, “for every slave ship and every slave crew, for every slave ship and all the murdered Africans in Middle Passage.” It could have been the Zong, a slave ship on a journey to Jamaica in 1781 which filled its holds

with 442 abducted Africans, twice the amount they knew the vessel could carry. The ship overshot its destination, and its crew reported that they decided to kill some of the enslaved by dropping them from the Zong to “save the rest of the cargo.” The British public learned of this, as Sharpe recounts, when the ship’s owners sued the underwriters for the insurance value of those murdered Africans. The story of the Zong comes through in Turner’s painting, though the ship depicted is unnamed. In Sud’s class, students discuss how the Zong

and stories like it display another kind of violence within the slave trade, off land and made possible by sea travel, centered around the dehumanization of Africans through tools of terror like sharks and the ocean itself.

Students learn in Sud’s course that the connections between water and racism didn’t end with the institution of slavery. Climate change too has become a manifestation of racism, specifically environmental racism, particularly against Black populations. When Hurricane Katrina, the severity

The Slave Ship, painted by J. M. W. Turner in 1840, depicts horrors of the transatlantic slave trade.

of which is thought to be due in part to climate change, hit in 2005, the low-income Black communities of New Orleans were hit the hardest. In Spike Lee’s documentary When the Levees Broke: A Requiem in Four Acts, which Sud’s students watch, Black interviewees consistently connect the experience of Katrina to slavery. One resident, Gina Montana, says being forcibly bused out of town to an unknown destination roused “an ancient memory” of being enslaved. Another resident, Fred Johnson, says he and his friends believe Katrina was

a sign that the spirits of the Africans who died in the Middle Passage were dissatisfied with the conditions forced upon their descendants in New Orleans. Here, again, art shows that water has been used as a tool to subjugate a population, now through the means of climate change.

The Aestheticization of Destruction

In 1855, when asked to sign a treaty by white settlers, a chief of the Cayuse tribe (which now shares a reservation and government with the Umatilla and Walla

Walla tribes of Oregon) inquired, “I wonder if the ground has anything to say? I wonder if the ground is listening to what is said?” Throughout Native American history, the land has been referred to as something alive, students read in author Amitav Ghosh’s book The Nutmeg’s Curse. White colonizers saw things differently. In a time of conquest and manifest destiny, made possible by sea travel, they saw land as an object, something to be gained for political and economic power. Ghosh refers to these processes as “wars of terraforming,” or, changing an entire landscape for the purposes of conquering and colonizing. The environment and nonhumans played a role in these biopolitical conflicts, transformed into weaponry.

Terraforming was only the beginning of a long history in which colonizers began to act through the frame of “world-asresource.” Instead of personifying it as a living entity with feelings and reactions, as Native Americans saw the landscape, white settlers viewed nature as a factory, something to be used and controlled. “To see the world in this way requires not just the physical subjugation of people and territory, but also a specific idea of conquest, as a process of extraction,” Ghosh writes. Once the landscape has been extracted from, and conquest thus achieved, he explains, the object begins to be seen as inert by the conqueror. The land holds no more mysteries, and the challenge of dominating it has ended. This same presumption, Ghosh speculates, is what leads billionaires today to dream of conquests to Mars. But, he writes, “what Earth is really exhausted of is not its resources; what it has lost is meaning.”

In becoming familiar with land, and with Earth, Ghosh explains, the planet is viewed as inanimate, something that does not act. But, really, we know that it does, and more and more we witness its action. Wildfires, hurricanes, and other natural disasters increase in both frequency and intensity. Plants and animals go extinct. Biodiversity disappears. Polar ice caps melt and sea levels rise. Earth responds as if alive, as if something, or someone, rather, who may have replied to the Cayuse chief, “Yes, I’m listening, and yes, I have something to say.”

This process of an extraction and its subsequent consequences appear in art

Water's Hand

through the centuries. In impressionist painter Claude Monet’s famous artwork Sunrise, a spherical red blaze rises above the horizon, shining through a blue-gray haze. Rowboats slice through slow, calm waters. In the distance, the smokestacks of pack boats and steamships stand tall above the river Seine, mere shadows through the new smog settling over France. When he painted this work in 1872, Monet couldn’t have known he wasn’t capturing only the port of Le Havre on a quiet early morning, but a key shift affecting all of Earth: the beginnings of air pollution, and thus, the inception of wide-scale, human-made climate change. The painting is hazy because France, at this time, was becoming hazy itself. Sud explains in one class how pollutants mean more aerosols, and more aerosols means less visibility and definition when viewing objects. To understand art like Monet’s, Sud explains, it’s key to understand the environment the artist was affected by and the science behind it. (As an example, journalist Carolyn Y. Johnson wrote a story in The Washington Post in December 2024 about how astrophysicists have been analyzing Vincent Van Gogh’s Starry Night for clues about turbulence.) Monet’s artwork is an early example of the way we aestheticize the Anthropocene, as visual culture theorist Nicholas Mirzoeff puts it, even as we destroy it.

But aestheticization of the ways our climate is changing can contribute to action, too.

On the last day of class, on a cold December morning, students analyze the photos taken of the Arctic by Indianborn American photographer Subhankar Banerjee. In the early 2000s, Banerjee set out to capture all of the seasons in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). The idea was to show the space as a living, breathing ecosystem, affected by the seasons and necessary for sustaining the life of many plants and animals, rather than as a blank slate. In one photo of the east fork of the Chandalar River, the view is full of vibrant color, a stark contrast to how the Arctic is typically depicted—the picture transforms the imagined barren wasteland to a natural landscape full of life. The color evokes an emotional response, Sud’s students say, and thus a desire to save the space. The caption describes how the trees

climbing up the hill are moving northward due to global warming.

“Cast your eyes on this,” insisted Democratic Senator Barbara Boxer during a 2003 Senate debate, holding up a photograph by Banerjee of a polar bear crossing a frozen harbor. At the time, former President George W. Bush hoped to open the ANWR to oil drilling. Senator Boxer displayed the photographs in hopes of convincing her colleagues to vote in favor of an amendment to prevent the drilling. Her amendment was approved, halting plans to drill the ANWR, at least for a little while. Banerjee’s visual documentation of the Arctic assisted the landscape and the life that’s sustained there.

Water has existed as both an invisible entity in art history and as a catalytic environmental force across time, Sud explains. In Art 350, “I wanted to confront those tensions and think through what we as art historians can do when we centralize water and what this methodological maneuver can do to our discipline and modes of thinking about the world,” she says.

Senior English major Caroline Steele ’25 said of the class, “You think about how all the oceans are connected. But you don’t really think of it from a global perspective. I feel like I was very zoomed in before, and this [class] zoomed me out.”

Historian Finis Dunaway argues that we shouldn’t think of the Arctic as the “Last Frontier,” as something far removed from ourselves, but rather as a place intimately tied to the history and ecology of the modern world. That sentiment echoes across the other forms of water studied in Art 350, too. From the Oregon coast to the South China Sea; across the Indian Ocean and through the Yamuna River; over the Atlantic and the glaciers of the Arctic, students traced the intricate ways water is entwined with human and nonhuman history. They analyzed its use in both creation and destruction. And the bodies of water they studied have all changed dramatically with time. The oceans are warming. The Yamuna River is filled with toxic pollutants. The Jagniwas, which has been turned into a hotel, stood in an expanse of dry land for a period in the 2000s due to drought. The Arctic is melting, and oil drilling is accelerating its obliteration. Through examining art in Sud’s course, students learn how climate change isn’t only a scientific or technological challenge, but a cultural, ethical, political, and, as Sud puts it, a “profoundly human” one. One that, perhaps, can be helped by looking to our oceans, rains, rivers, and pools, and the art that’s documented them across time and place.

The Hindu deity Krishna and his devotees flow through the Yamuna River in the Bhagavata Purana “Isarda” from the 16th century (see p. 25).

Environmental Humanities Takes Root at Reed

When students pointed out that there was a lot of overlap in readings assigned in Reed courses on environmental issues, Prof. Sarah Wagner-McCoy [English and humanities] and Prof. Kristin Scheible [religion and humanities] saw an opportunity. What if the overlap were intentional? What if there were an entire initiative at Reed dedicated to fostering these cross-disciplinary ties while exploring how humanistic thinking can address complex environmental challenges we face today? Building on programs at Reed, they worked together to establish an interdisciplinary environmental humanities initiative that was implemented in fall 2023. “The best things at Reed happen because of our students,” says Wagner-McCoy, principal investigator (PI) of the project.

With 14 faculty members in 10 different departments across four divisions of the college after just two years, the initiative encompasses an array of course offerings that center environmental justice and the literary imagination. In addition to theory, the initiative fosters experiential learning both inside and outside the classroom, through initiatives like the new Sustainability and Environmental Justice Collective, in collaboration with Sustainability at Reed and Student Life.

A three-and-a-half-year, $500,000 Mellon grant supported their work to host summer workshops, or “faculty incubators,” where professors created new environmental humanities courses and enhanced existing ones. These collaborations led to interdisciplinary experiences that connect classroom theory with hands-on learning. “What I came to realize through these incubators is that our curriculum is much more than the classes we teach,” Wagner-McCoy says. “It’s about the communities we create, and the relationships we build together.”

Building community would become a major theme of the initiative. As would several framing questions: How can we connect academic inquiry to the challenges of the climate crisis? How do environmental justice frameworks deepen our understanding of the complexity of collective action and justice? How does writing, past and present, reimagine our relationship to place and those who share it?

Students grapple with these questions across courses, often finding overlap. Co-PI Scheible spoke of one student who shared: “This year, by total accident, I ended up taking two environmental humanities courses at the same time: ‘Environment, Ethics, and Religion’ and ‘Nuclear Literatures.’ So much of what I read in one class complemented what I read in the other . . . These different lenses both complicated and complemented one another, creating what turned out to be a truly entangled semester.”

Wagner-McCoy and Scheible anticipated substantial faculty and student interest in the initiative. But, Scheible says, “We have been staggered by the scale of it, and inspired by our students’ deep engagement with the challenges our initiative is working to address.”

Fall 2024 Environmental Humanities Course Offerings

English 341: Humanity at Sea: Personhood from Moby Dick to Moby Doll, Sarah Wagner-McCoy

English 206: Writing Reed, Sarah WagnerMcCoy and Simone Waller

Religion 374: Entanglement: Environment, Ethics, and Religion, Kristin Scheible

Art 172: Painting I—Imaginary Worlds, Juniper Harrower

Art 370: Environmental Art, Juniper Harrower

Art 350: Oceans, Rains, Rivers, Pools: Histories of Water, Shivani Sud

History 270: Introduction to American Environmental History, Josh Howe

History 345: Whole Earths, Globalizations, World Pictures, Ben Lazier

Political Science 338: Energy Politics and the Climate Crisis, Fathimath Musthaq

Russian/Literature 392: Nuclear Literatures: A Comparative Approach, Naomi Caffee

Professors Sarah Wagner-McCoy and Kristin Scheible, principal investigator and co-principal investigator on the Environmental Humanities initiative.

PHOTO BY OSCAR PULLIAM ’25

Living Laboratory

Fall snapshots from Reed’s Environmental Humanities initiative where community, place, and scholarship converge to solve pressing issues of our time.

As a transdisciplinary approach, the environmental humanities seeks answers to questions about the environment and our relationship to it.

“The environmental crisis is, as author and academic Amitav Ghosh says, a crisis of imagination, a failure of cultures to represent or respond to a changing world,” says Professor Sarah Wagner-McCoy [English], principal investigator of the Mellon-funded Environmental Humanities initiative at Reed, “but not all cultures have failed.” By using shared questions to reimagine disciplines, perspectives, and methodologies, Reed’s EH initiative builds on existing strengths in arts and humanities to enage vital questions in both the classroom and the community.

The initiative’s reach extends far beyond what we can show here—from Swinomish camas research to Princess Mononoke screenings under the stars, from mason bee habitat projects to natural dye workshops. Each location on this map offers a glimpse into this web of engagement, where different ways of knowing converge to deepen our understanding of place.

Spaces For Discovery

1 At the Garden House: This reimagined living-learning community serves as a center for environmental praxis, bridging theory and practice, with Sustainability and Environmental Justice (SEJ) Scholar Esmé Kaplan-Kinsey ’24.

2 Around the Canyon: In Prof. Josh Howe’s History 270, students trace ecological transformation at Reed through archival research and canyon walks with Zac Perry, who led the restoration of the canyon (and addition of the fish ladder) in the ’90s.

3 Under the Oak Tree: In Religion 374, mathematical topology illuminates Buddhist conceptions of cosmic interconnection as students explore knot theory through an activity with Prof. Kristin Scheible [religion] and Prof. Kyle Ormsby [math].

Performing Arts Building

Text & Territory

4 Communal Voyages: At the Performing Arts Building, intergenerational dialogue emerges when alumni join students to explore Melville’s Moby Dick and discuss literary and personal voyages in Prof. Sarah Wagner-McCoy’s English 341.

Garden House

Oregon Coast

Joshua Tree Preserve

5 Faculty Incubator: Mellon-funded summer workshops foster innovative pedagogical approaches through collaborative faculty development. Faculty read common texts and share ideas while also working on their own projects.

6 Writing Reed: In English 206, Prof. Sarah WagnerMcCoy and Prof. Simone Waller guide students in developing research projects based around “place” by engaging with the cultural histories of the Reed campus.

Art & Environment

7 On the Oregon Coast: Maritime histories intersect with environmental studies as blue humanities courses Art 350 and English 341 collaborate to examine art, literature, and oceanic ecosystems in Tillamook on the Oregon coast.

8 With the Joshua Trees: At California’s Prime Desert Woodland Preserve, art practice meets ecological research as Prof. Juniper Harrower leads students to develop new modes of environmental understanding through creative inquiry.

Woodstock Blvd.

Reed Canyon

Eliot Hall

Edited by Robin Tovey ’97

Tales from the Aegean

In these biographical stories of consuls, divers, monks and lighthouse keepers, William McGrew ’56 describes a life across the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean seas where he pursued careers as diplomat and educator. The former president of Anatolia College and the American Farm School, both located in Thessaloniki, Greece, he enjoyed many adventures in his modest sea craft named Foukaras (poor rascal). (Kapon Editions, 2023)

Between the Night and Its Music

Edited by Lauri Scheyer ’74, this latest volume in the Wesleyan Poetry Series presents new and selected works by A.B. Spellman. An acclaimed poet, music critic, and arts administrator, Spellman is recognized as a leading figure in the Black Arts Movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Scheyer’s introduction situates Spellman’s work within jazz writing, Black Arts, and American poetry. (Wesleyan University Press, 2024)

Out of Sight

In this “Memoir of a San Francisco Hippie,” Barbara Sanford Rahder ’73 tells a coming-of-age story focused on 1966 through 1974 and including her years at Reed. She describes her experience of a transformative time with unflinching observations on gender, race, and power as well as disturbing family tensions. Things that are hidden “out of sight” are not easily confronted, but secrets have a way of surfacing. (FriesenPress, 2024)

Code Name Puritan

Greg Barnhisel ’92 has written a biography of Norman Holmes Pearson, an unlikely figure to transform American postwar culture by being at the nexus of poetry, espionage, and political power. Pearson was a professor and spy, a man who combined modern literature and service to his country in an unassuming manner. Everyone from Kim Philby to Gertrude Stein, from Hal Holbrook to Ralph Ellison, walked through his life, and Barnhisel meticulously maps it all. (University of Chicago Press, 2024)

How the World Ran Out of Everything

Peter Goodman ’89 guides us through the chaos of the worldwide supply chain, exposing the pathways of manufacturing and transportation and the factors that have led to the dangerous vulnerability of an elaborate system. By showcasing the triumphs and struggles of the human players who operate this fragile network, he shows how it is sabotaged by ruthless business logic and worsening working conditions—and in doing so makes a forceful argument for reform. (Mariner Books, 2024)

Rethinking the End of Empire

This new book on state formation and international order by Lynn M. Tesser ’93 considers why nation-states replaced empires around the world in the modern period, arguing that empires brought about their own demise. Her exploration of how separatist figures of the era were more likely seeking autonomy or striving for higher status can help readers make sense of Donald Trump’s 19th-century perspective on global relations. (Stanford University Press, 2024)

Blood Loss

Poet, essayist, and psychotherapist Keiko Lane ’96 has written her first book. This memoir weaves together love stories of AIDS, activism, and art with afterlives of queer resistance and survival. Lane interrogates the social construction of power against and in queer communities of color and the recovery of sexual agency in the aftermath of violence, after those we love have died. (Duke University Press, 2024)

Writing Time

In his latest book, Sean Franzel ’00 shows how serial literature between 1780 and 1850 shaped the concept of time at a transformative moment in Europe. Through case studies of Bertuch, Böttinger, Goethe, Börne, and Heine, he analyzes how they “write time” and how this becomes a privileged mode of social commentary and literary entertainment via journals, anthologies, and caricature. (Cornell University Press, 2023)

The Ghost Town Collectives

In her debut short-story collection, winner of the 2023 Osprey Award for Fiction, Brittney Corrigan ’94 explores the delicate intricacies of human experience through a blend of poetic prose and magical realism. Set against the backdrop of the Anthropocene, Corrigan’s stories reflect contemporary ecological and social challenges, from rising sea levels to societal shifts demanding new innovations and vulnerabilities. (Middle Creek Publishing, 2024)

Burdened

Ryann Liebenthal ’05 looks at why American college education is characterized as a luxury item, exploring the history of education policy as well as the players who manipulated it—and in doing so contributed to the idea of student debt as an individual failing instead of a compelling societal concern. In examining a broken system, she offers insight into how the burden of debt impacts cultural milestones of adulthood and provides analysis to make the case for alternative systems. (Dey Street Books, 2024)

Life by 1,000 Tiny Pencil Strokes

Considering the age-old question of whether genius owes more to nature or nurture, The New Yorker’s Katharine S. White—arguably the magazine’s most consequential editor you’ve never heard of— came down on the side of nurture. The rich content that she solicited from her writers resulted from inducement more than manipulation. “She treated everyone as if they were just about to hit that sweet spot between their talent and The New Yorker’s needs,” writes Amy Reading ’98 in The World She Edited. This enthralling biography shows how White struck that balance, leaving her remarkable imprint through written correspondence and pencilings on early drafts of celebrated works that were transformed by her incisive feedback.

From 1925 to 1960, White developed talent, improved manuscripts, and became a quietly influential figure of American literary culture. Until a few years before her retirement, when she hired her own female successor, White was the only woman on the masthead of The New Yorker. Though she was a singular talent, her commonality with others aided her in cultivating the professional and personal growth of some of the century’s most distinctive voices. Reading suggests that the defining feature of White’s tenure was bringing outstanding women writers into the fold and making sure they stayed. She discovered Elizabeth Bishop and Janet Flanner, and she worked closely with Nadine Gordimer, Mary McCarthy, Adrienne Rich, and many others.

In anecdotes that span multiple years, Reading highlights how trust, continuity, and mutual regard defined White’s mentorship. She was receptive to what her writers shared of themselves—allowing for, and even honoring, their vulnerability—and in exchange, revealed a bit of herself via “the personal editorial letter.” As our guide, Reading is fastidious and intuitive, showing how White’s

penchant for deciphering words and people grew out of a childhood in which “she was paying close attention to adult reading habits, the curation of an interior life.” Tracing the details of an ostensibly charmed life that was repeatedly interrupted by death, loss, and illness, Reading connects the dots between coping mechanisms White employed to persevere, while chronicling her formative years at Bryn Mawr, the intensity of two very different marriages, and her devotion to her three children.

White had great intellectual acuity, but also a refined sense of emotional intelligence. While the labor of editing is nearly invisible, one of White’s most generous acts was expanding the field of vision for individual writers and, by extension, the appeal of The New Yorker. What could be a more generative model of care and cultivation upon which to build a legacy? —Robin Tovey ’97

PHOTO BY JAMIE LOVE

Class Notes

Edited by Joanne Hossack ’82

1951

A retrospective of some of Robert Richter’s documentaries, including three Oscar nominees, was screened October 5–8 at DCTV Firehouse Cinema in New York.

1955 70TH REUNION

First known use of the term artificial intelligence.

1956–61

First known use of the term postapocalyptic—glad we’ve started thinking ahead!

1962

Robert Johnson coauthored several books with the late Philip Zimbardo, including Psychology According to Shakespeare (2024)

and the third through eighth editions of Psychology: Core Concepts. Robert also founded the Pacific Northwest Great Teachers Seminar, and in 2004 received a Two-Year College Teaching Excellence Award from the American Psychological Association. He retired from Umpqua Community College in 1999.

Then and now: walking to class in front of Eliot Hall, 2025 and 1965. Now photo by Oscar Pullium ’25.

1963

Birds are not aggressive creatures, Miss. They bring beauty to the world.

1964

Majda Sajovic Jones writes, “I recently moved into an independent living senior community that has care available if needed in later

years. The downsizing process was wrenching, especially shedding most of my art collection. Before it was over, I was invited to speak at the Jewish museum in Augsburg, Germany, where my mother was born and raised. I donated objects, photos, and letters related to our family’s tumultuous history during the 1930s in Germany and France. They escaped Europe through Lisbon. I was honored to publically recount what I know about those times as part of an annual series of interviews sponsored by the city of Augsburg and the regional government.”

1965 60TH REUNION

T.G.I. Friday’s begins in Manhattan as one of the world’s first singles bars. It was very successful, in part because 480 stewardesses lived nearby.

1966

Computernik. Allegedly a word. Did anyone ever call you that?

1967

John Cushing finished the Portland Half Marathon. It took him 51 seconds longer than it did in 2013.

In February 2024, Joanne D ’Antonio was elected chair of the Los Angeles Community Forest Advisory Committee, the city’s

tree commission that meets at Los Angeles City Hall. She has been serving as its representative from her council district since 2019. She also is chair of the Trees Committee of the LA Neighborhood Council Sustainability Alliance, a grassroots organization she founded in 2016 that now comprises 180 tree advocates from throughout the city of Los Angeles. Joanne writes that convincing the city to both fully appreciate the value of preserving tree canopy and change its outdated tree policies has been a formidable task.

1968

Paul Groner was just awarded the 58th Cultural Award from the Society for the Promotion of Buddhism (Bukkyo dendo kyokai). Although not known in much of the West, this is an important Japanese award, not given to many foreigners. The inscription for the award reads: “He has devoted himself to study Japanese Buddhism and its culture for a long time. Through his research activity, he has introduced Japanese Buddhism to many countries in English.”

Last fall, Barbara Robinson was honored by two different organizations for her life’s work in preservation of the eastern Columbia River Gorge. In October, Barbara received

3.

1. A retrospective of the work of Robert Richter ’51 was held in NYC in October.

2. John Cushing ’67 finishes the Portland Half Marathon.

Joanne D’Antonio ’67 is chair of the Los Angeles Community Forest Advisory Committee.

the 2024 Lifetime Achievement Award from the Washington State Trails Coalition. In November, the Friends of the Columbia Gorge premiered a short film about Barbara and her work in the Gorge, The Wildflower Woman. The premiere, at the Columbia Gorge Discovery Center & Museum, was preceded by an hour of planting native wildflowers and removing invasive weeds with the Wildflower Woman herself; the film can now be seen on YouTube.

1969

First appearance in print of ageism, dust mite, ew, and yech. Ew. Yech.

1970

55TH REUNION

Concert pianist Terry Boyarsky and Siberian balalaika virtuoso Oleg Kruglyakov are now performing as Duo Balalaika. They are still the only professional touring balalaikapiano duo in North America—merging music of different cultures, creating universally uplifting music for diverse audiences, and offering a one-world community of music. Find out more at duo-balalaika.com.

1971

Weebles wobble, but they don’t fall down. Be a Weeble!

1972

John (Jock) Dalton and his wife Pam were named Oregon’s 2024 Outstanding Tree Farmers of the Year for their Shady Place LLC tree farm. This is one of many awards Jock has earned over the years.

He did not seek reelection to the Polk Soil and Water Conservation District Board of Directors in November, having served for over 25 years. Jock has been very hands-on in caring for his property, building roads and other improvements himself, with minimal help. He has had a lifetime commitment to practical conservation. Jock is another Reedie who has had experience flying in Alaska, spending 10 years flying mostly DC-3s into small villages, including landing on beaches. He lives on the tree farm where he grew up, which is separate from the Shady Place property that won the award. You can find a short video about Shady Place at https://www.otfs.org/tfoy.

1973

Susanna M. Lundgren writes, “I have now joined alumni reading groups, thx Tess Buchanan. As a calligrapher from Reynolds-PalladinoSvaren years, I am attending and assisting the Scriptorium. Still an art/art history prof locally, choir singer, lit buff, soon to be published poet. All thanks to Reed. ” (The calligraphy champions to whom Susanna refers are Profs. Lloyd Reynolds [English and art 1929–69] and Robert Palladino [art 1969–84] and alumna Jaki Svaren ’50. —Ed.)

The last half of 2024 saw six letters to the editor from Seth Wittner in major publications: three in The New York Times (including the one reported in Winter 2024 Class Notes), two in The Washington Post,

and one in The Atlantic. Seth’s second letter to the NYT: “Evan Ratliff makes a convincing case for the inability of A.I. voice agents to provide the warmth and companionship of human friends and associates. Even though American students do not score very high on standardized tests in subjects like math and science, it might be a good idea to spend some time teaching young students conversational skills such as listening and asking questions that convey a sense of caring about someone else. With A.I. voice clones becoming more prevalent and leaving the human listener with a sense of loneliness, we need to become more skilled at communicating thoughtfully with one another.”

1974

Have you never been mellow?

1975 50TH REUNION

Or had a runner’s high?

1976–79

And then a brewski in a fern bar?

1980 45TH REUNION

Marcia Watt and Alan Watt ’78 celebrated their 40th wedding anniversary with a cruise along the Danube River and a side trip to Prague. Alan recently retired from a career in IT, and Marcia continues with her calligraphic adventures. Juliet Wurr MAT and Susan (Robertson) Rotramel MAT ’68 met during Road Scholar’s “On the Silk Road in Central Asia,” October

1. Paul Groner ’68 receives the Cultural Award at the headquarters of the Association for the Promotion of Buddhism, Tokyo.

2. Terry Boyarsky ’70 and Oleg Kruglyakov are now performing as Duo Balalaika.

3. Susanna M. Lundgren ’73 channels Andy W.

11–30, 2024. “The fascinating 20-day journey included stops in Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan,” wrote Juliet. “The region is fascinating, particularly since the fall of the USSR. We even saw a few camels!”

1981–82

RIP Philip K. Dick.

1983

John Bergholz ran the Tokyo Marathon and has thus completed all six of the World Marathon Majors.

Sara Nichols has started a live webcast Wednesdays at 9 a.m. called The Conscious Reality Show . The producer is Sandra J. Childs. The first guest was documentary producer/philanthropist/entrepreneur Russ Haan. Sara has also interviewed Paul Edison-Lahm , the retired attorney and educator who is now the communications director of the Geological Society of the Oregon Country, as well as cutting-edge investigative journalist Jen Byers ’13—but she swears not all guests are Reedies! Find the podcast at https://www.youtube. com/@ConsciousRealityShow.

1984

Women earn right to vote in Liechtenstein.

1985 40TH REUNION

Roger Gross completed the live online course Financial Investment

Principles, taught remotely from the Department for Continuing Education at the University of Oxford, Oxford, United Kingdom. The course provided a broad overview of the financial markets along with valuable instruction around portfolio construction, risk management, and valuation.

1986

Neville McClure swam the Hellespont!

Sarah Wadsworth recently completed her 20th year as a professor of English at Marquette University. Early last year, Sarah published her third book, a coedited collection of essays titled Global Voices from the Women’s Library at the World’s Columbian Exposition: Feminisms, Transnationalism and the Archive. In 2021, Sarah entered a new phase of her academic career with her appointment as director of Marquette University Press, a role that makes her especially thankful for the strong interdisciplinary foundation in the humanities she gained at Reed.

1987

Recovering Republican Ron Huddleston has officially completed his 12-step program, culminating in Canadian citizenship. He now says “sorry” unprompted, and he has embraced universal health care and the art of subtle sarcasm.

1988

Jeremy Appleton, a naturopathic physician, has worked for the last 25 years in medical and scientific affairs in the natural products industry. He helps develop bestin-class, science-backed botanical and nutritional ingredients for the world’s largest brands of dietary supplements, beverages, and functional foods. Two years ago, he and his wife Deah, a psychotherapist, relocated from Portland to a tiny town in the Monadnock region of Southwestern New Hampshire. After a 35-year hiatus, Jeremy is thrilled to be doing theatre again, acting in the Firelight Theatre Worskhop’s fall production, The Interventionists, an unscripted play informed by values and techniques of Sanford Meisner and Chicago improv. You may also find him playing upright bass at the occasional coffee house or open mic, but mostly in his living room.

1989

Right-click and rightsize that scrunchie!

1990 35TH REUNION

Cyberculture or LARPing?

1991

David Evers is now an honorary research fellow at the Department of Urban and Regional Planning at the University of Amsterdam in addition to his regular work as a senior researcher at the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency.

4. Marcia Watt ’80 and Alan Watt ’78 near the Charles Bridge in Prague, Czech Republic.

5. Juliet Wurr MAT ‘80 (left) and Susan Rotramel MAT ‘68 explore Samarkand, Uzbekistan.

6. The World Marathon Majors: John Bergholz ‘83 has run them all!

Last summer, David published a book, Urbanization in Europe— Past Developments and Pathways to a Sustainable Future.”

Peter Ives, too, has published a new book, Rethinking Free Speech He and Tempel Smith met up in Victoria, British Columbia, in May 2023 after far too many years.

1992

Greg Barnhisel’s new book, Code Name Puritan: Norman Holmes Pearson at the Nexus of Poetry, Espionage, and American Power , was published in October by the University of Chicago Press. Greg launched the book at Powell’s— with conversation partner Christopher Zinn [English 1985–92], who had been one of his professors—and was also interviewed by Helen Raptis on KATU’s AM Northwest . “I’m doing dozens of events to promote this book but the Powell’s one was the most special to me, because I was born in Portland and learned to be a writer at Reed (and at Powell’s).”

1993

Kurt Huffman was surprised to be named one of “50 People, Places and Things that Transformed Portland” by Willamette Week on its 50th anniversary. “To be included in a list with one of my heroes (and distinguished Reed alumnus) Bill Naito [’49] is very humbling.” Kurt received this recognition for the company he founded in 2008, ChefStable, which partners with chefs to design, build, and operate restaurants (including some of Portland’s best). You can find the article at wweek.com.

1994

Husband-and-wife law partners Laurence Canter and Martha Siegel post the first massive commercial spam on Usenet in the United States. They are not Reedies.

1995 30TH REUNION

Appearing in print for the first time: meatspace, instant messaging, and cyber defense.

1996–99

Is that your final answer?

2000 25TH REUNION

Happy century leap year!

2001

David Gregory Clark catches up after a busy year-plus: “In September of 2022, I married my amazing girlfriend of two years in a small, private ceremony in Denmark. Had a lovely but all too short week of celebration before returning home. In March 2023, after much consideration, we moved to Brazil, my wife’s home country. Quite a change from the temperate North American and European climates I’m used to, but such a wonderful place! Our beloved rabbit died in June. Then, in October 2023, we unexpectedly adopted a dog. My first, and an adorable and sometimes frustrating learning process, as I’m accustomed to cats. 100% worth it!”

2002–04

Congratulations to Dick Van Dyke on earning his high school diploma!

2005 20TH REUNION

Margaret Boyle was interviewed on the America the Bilingual podcast; listen for her shout-outs to Profs. Libby Drumm and Ariadna García-Bryce [Spanish]. Margaret

is hoping to make it back to Reed for her 20th reunion (!) this spring.

Jeff Schroeder and some Portland friends formed an experimental rock-pop band called Time Stop. They just released their debut album, Rainbow Eyes. The album explores the shifting relationships between humans and machines, narrating a journey into the internet wilderness, love affairs with robots and AI, apocalyptic visions, and the struggle to maintain sanity and cultivate empathy in the midst of a bewitched society. Check it out! A squishy Doyle Owl enjoyed Halloween in Salem, Oregon, with Jessica (Weichert) Shumate.

2006

New term: dumpster fire. It will come in handy later.

2007

Exciting news from Tina SohailiKorbonits : “We are thrilled to share that we welcomed our second daughter, Layli, just after midnight on August 19 at 8 lbs 13 oz! We have loved getting to know her, as has her amazing big sister, Maryam, who was 19 months old at the time and is obsessed with her. We are so grateful to be a family of four and to get to raise two future Reedies!”

2008

2024 was a banner year for Flourish (formerly Madeline) Klink : they gave birth to a child, Trinity Ada, in June, then were ordained an

1. Tempel Smith ’90 and Peter Ives ’91 rethink free speech in Victoria, British Columbia, in 2023.

2. Ron Huddleston ’87 is a Canadian citizen!

3. Flourish Klink ’08 gave birth to Trinity Ada in June.

Episcopal priest in September. They now serve at the Church of St. Matthew & St. Timothy/Iglesia de San Mateo y San Timoteo on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.

2009

Gourd Squashington won Race Three of the West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta, fulfilling a yearlong fever dream of participating in competitive Cucurbita paddling.

2010 15TH REUNION

Arianne (Rivard) Ekinci finished her PhD in Asian and global history and welcomed her second daughter in 2024. Arianne currently lives with her family in Moldova, where she is the Human Rights Officer at the U.S. Embassy.

2011–12

First Klingon wedding held in United Kingdom.

2013

Matthew Castillo-Kohlenberg and Alexander Castillo-Kohlenberg (son of Toby Kohlenberg ’97) were married at the Olivas Adobe in Ventura, California, on April 27, 2024. Lauren Sanders ’11 and Nick Bradish ’09 were in the wedding party, and David Wills-Ehlers ’12 opened the ceremony with a musical prelude.

2014

Betty White awarded Guinness World Record for “Longest TV Career for an Entertainer (Female).”

2015–19

Hodor!

2020 5TH REUNION

Merriam-Webster lists only one new term for 2020 that is not disease-related: “wandering dude.” Did a wandering dude keep you company while you finished your thesis?

2021

(A “wandering dude” is a plant. According to Merriam-Webster.)

2022

Emmett Egermeier wrote in November, “Hiya friends! Long time, no see! Excited to catch you at the holiday party. :)” We hope Emmett caught you!

2023–24

Reed alumni find that AI is not a reliable source of words first seen in print in 2023–24. We put the question to your genuine intelligence.

4. At the CastilloKohlenberg wedding, left to right: Nick Bradish ’09, Katie Tanner ’09, Roswell Coles ’09, Maxwell Hallock ’09, Fall Cottingham ’10, Alexander Castillo-Kohlenberg, Matthew CastilloKohlenberg ’13, Michelle Carroll ’10, Harry Traulsen ’11, Lucy Bellwood ’12, KC LeDell ’09, Lauren Sanders ’11, and Zan Kocher ’90.

5. Gourd Squashington ‘09 crushes the competition in the West Coast Giant Pumpkin Regatta.

6. Sisters and future Reedies Maryam and Layli are the daughters of Tina Sohaili-Korbonits ’07.

7. A squishy (and spooky!) Doyle Owl enjoys Halloween in Salem, Oregon (photo courtesy of Jessica [Weichert] Shumate ’05).

8. The experimental rock-pop band Time Stop includes Jeff Schroeder ’05 (in maroon plaid shirt) and “honorary Reedie” Alan Rahi (in blue hoodie).

In Memoriam

Edited by Bennett Campbell Ferguson

Oregon’s Greatest Environmental Advocate

Bob Sallinger ’91

October 30, 2024, in Portland, Oregon. Conservationist, activist, and animal lover Bob Sallinger ’91 passed away unexpectedly at the age of 57. He was undeniably Oregon’s most impactful environmental advocate. “ Without question. It might be an understatement,” says Bob’s friend and colleague Neal Schulman ’92

Bob had a 30-year career at the Bird Alliance Oregon (formerly the Portland Audubon Society). Recently, he had started a new chapter as the conservation director, and then executive director, of Willamette Riverkeeper. Still passionate about protecting birds, he also founded Bird Conservation Oregon, which continues his work.

At Reed, Bob majored in biology, writing his thesis under Professor Helen Stafford [biology 1954–87]. He, along with Neal, led backpacking trips during Orientation Week. During one in 1989, he met Elisabeth Neely ’94. They dated during their years at Reed, then enjoyed a long marriage, remaining together for 35 years.

After graduating from Reed, Bob worked at a veterinary clinic on East Burnside Street. One day, he contacted the Audubon Society to inquire about care for an injured falcon that had been brought into the clinic. This led him to Audubon’s Wildlife Care Center, where he quickly realized he was meant to be.

Starting as the temporary, part-time assistant in charge of cleaning animal cages, Bob

eventually became the organization’s conservation director— and sometimes got so busy he’d sleep in his 1979 Volkswagen bus. Once at Audubon, he never looked back, taking on increasingly influential roles in wildlife protection.

Among his scores of accomplishments, Bob worked collaboratively to protect the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge, the Elliott State Forest, and West Hayden Island. He also pressured Ross Island Sand and Gravel Company to restore Ross Island, advocated for the protection of Portland’s tree canopy, and spearheaded the passage of Oregon’s “Beaver Bill,” a 2023 law changing the keystone species’ classification from “predator” to “furbearer,” adding protections to their habitat.

Bob had an insatiable work ethic, frequently working between 60 and 80 hours a week. He often drove his bus overnight,

journeying to far-flung parts of Oregon to testify in front of government and regulatory boards, or to meet with ranchers, conservationists, and community members. Bob showed up at those meetings wearing plaid shirts and baseball caps that somewhat tamed his shock of long, curly hair, which complimented an equally bushy beard.

“It’s one thing to understand how to get conservation done… and another to inspire people,” Neal says. He attributes Bob’s successes to a “phenomenal depth and breadth of knowledge,” a dry sense of humor, and a clear focus on what mattered most to him: “animals and people come first.”

cite dense regulatory and legal texts by page number and line. Unlike many activists, Bob was willing to find common ground with those he disagreed with. “One of his most astounding qualities is that he treated everyone with respect,” Xander Patterson ’86, a close friend

“It’s one thing to understand how to get conservation done… and another to inspire people.”

In 2007, Bob earned a law degree from Lewis & Clark Law School—not to become a lawyer, but to better understand environmental law. His knowledge and dedication enabled him to

and former colleague, remembers. “Even people whose positions on one level he loathed, he treated with respect. He negotiated when he could and sued when he had to. He was incredibly practical.”

Bob’s open-mindedness and collaboration led him to help found the Portland Urban Coyote Project, which tracks sightings of coyotes in Portland.

The group works with the Feral Cat Coalition of Oregon, advancing public policy and other efforts—including the popular annual Catio Tour—to reduce the feral cat population, thus protecting birds and wildlife.

“Bob’s novel idea to bring cat and bird advocates together was not only visionary but remains unique today,” the Feral Cat Coalition of Oregon wrote on its Facebook page.

Accolades from every corner of Oregon filled social media at the announcement of Bob’s passing. “The passing of Bob Sallinger is a loss beyond measure,” wrote Senator Jeff Merkley. He hailed Bob as “a trusted voice” whose achievements were the result of “tireless hard work, grit, collaboration, and compromise.”

At a celebration of life that packed Lola’s Room inside the Crystal Ballroom, Bob was remembered for loving froufrou drinks with little umbrellas, excessively long road trips, black-and-white photographs, Woody Guthrie, and the Muppets. Attendees sang “The Rainbow Connection.”

Bob is survived by his wife, Elisabeth, and three children.

—Amanda Waldroupe ’07

A Man of Science, and Style

Prof. Laurens Ruben [biology 1955–92] October 10, 2024, in Portland, Oregon. Laurens “Larry” Ruben transformed Reed’s biology programs over the course of his tenure, solidifying the department’s research-driven focus and beguiling colleagues with his peerless sense of style. He was one of the most influential professors in Reed’s history,

having taught for 37 years and mentored distinguished alumni such as Larry Sherman ’64 and Roger Perlmutter ’73.

“Larry loved teaching, and his students benefited in terms of learning how to appreciate science and to think critically about it,” says Prof. Peter Russell [biology 1972–2011], who remembers his colleague as “a staunch advocate for Reed, particularly what it stands for as an institution.”

completed his doctorate at Columbia University.

After completing his post doctoral work at Princeton, Ruben moved the family to Portland. Reed proved to be a perfect fit for Ruben, who loved teaching bright, engaged stu dents—and frequently pro

“Larry had that aura of the oldfashioned gentleman scientist about him.”

An only child who survived polio, Ruben was born in New York in 1927 to Samuel and Rena Ruben. He received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in biology at the University of Michigan, where he met the love of his life, Judith, who would become his wife of 74 years. Together, they moved to New York City, where Ruben

vided them with the opportunity to work in his lab and publish research in professional journals with him. When Ruben officially retired, students paid tribute to his impact on their professional and personal lives.

One of the students who was most affected by Ruben’s mentorship was Stephen A. Mette ’78, whose first biology class at

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In Memoriam

Reed was Ruben’s embryology course. Stephen would go on to teach medical students and residents as an assistant professor at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.

“Larry Ruben was quite simply one of the most remarkable influences in my life,” Stephen told Reed Magazine in 1992. “My view of science matured, and I was introduced to analytical thinking by Professor Ruben. He became a father away from home, and he and Judith treated me as family. He would drop anything if he thought he could help his students.”

During his time at Reed, Ruben was renowned for his professionalism and elegance. “Larry had that aura of the old-fashioned gentleman scientist about him,” says Prof. Janis Shampay [biology]. “He always wore a tie and jacket, even after he retired. Very dignified.”

In addition to his passion for teaching, Ruben conducted basic immunology research using amphibians, contributing important insights into how the immune system functions and its role in cancer biology. He published many papers on the subject, frequently with the help of thesis students who served as his coauthors.

“Being a teacher makes you a better scholar, and being a scholar makes you a better teacher,” notes Prof. Jay Mellies [biology], who remembers Ruben for his “humility” as much as his prestige.

Ruben kept his lab open until he was 86 years old and his office open until age 89. When not studying biology, he submerged himself in the performing arts, becoming a dancer, actor, and singer—and starring in musical theatre productions even after he started at

Reed. He could dance anyone off the floor and sang with a Reedbased rock and roll band.

After retirement, Ruben maintained his intellectual curiosity through conversations with friends and colleagues, while always finding time to sing with Judith. He remained devoted to Reed, telling Reed Magazine, “Reed is a gourmet restaurant, not a cafeteria. After living through severe trials and triumphs here, I know it as a fragile jewel that needs everyone’s dedication.”

In recognition of Ruben’s dedication to Reed, an anonymous donor created the Laurens N. Ruben Professorship in Biology, which is currently held by Prof. Keith Karoly.

In the wake of his passing, Ruben was praised by one of his most famous thesis students: Suzan DelBene ’83 , who represents the 1st District of Washington in the House of Representatives. Reading Ruben’s name into the Congressional Record on December 16, 2024, DelBene hailed her mentor as “an inspiring teacher” also renowned for his “exceptional dance moves, which left a lasting impression on everyone fortunate enough to witness them.”

Ruben is survived by his wife and three children. A celebration of life will be held on Sunday, June 15 at 10:30am in the Eliot Chapel, followed by a reception in Gray Lounge, Kaul Auditorium.

Warner Eliot ’46

October 3, 2024

Warner Ayres Eliot was born in Cleveland, Ohio, to Theodore Eliot ’21 and Mignon Eliot ’22. He attended Reed until he was drafted for service in World War II. In later years, Warner remembered his short time

at Reed fondly and regretted that his military service forced him to complete his education elsewhere.

Warner fulfilled his service by enrolling in the Navy’s V-12 Program at the Illinois Institute of Technology. Upon graduating with a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering, he was commissioned as an ensign and served until the end of the war. He then spent 14 years at the MITRE Corporation, where he was part of management.

with the first of many children arriving soon after. In 1958, they moved to Los Angeles, settling in Hancock Park.

Together, Phil and Mary raised a family while Phil’s retailing career grew. He led

“In Portland, Phil and Mary started their own small business, the Broadway Ice Cream Bowl.”

For 62 years, Warner was married to Amy Frances Barnes, who shared his love of birding, gardening, and armchair travel. He was preceded in death by Amy and is survived by a daughter, Kristin Benitez.

Philip Hawley ’47

May 25, 2023

Philip Metschan Hawley was a dedicated entrepreneur, a devoted family man, and a steadfast Reedie who served on the board of trustees. He was the brother of Willard P. Hawley III ’44 , a pre-meteorology cadet in training at Reed, who died serving in World War II.

During World War II, Phil attended UC Berkeley and was a member of the V-12 Navy College Training Program, while earning Phi Beta Kappa honors. Shortly before graduation, he met Mary Catherine Follen. He knew instantly this vivacious Irish Catholic girl was the perfect match for his even-keeled Protestant personality. Within six weeks, the couple were engaged.

In Portland, Phil and Mary started their own small business, the Broadway Ice Cream Bowl,

Broadway Department Stores and oversaw the national expansion of Neiman Marcus. His children would marvel at how, despite the demands of his career, he never missed a child’s birthday or family celebration.

Phil was predeceased by his wife, Mary, and is survived by eight children.

Paul Van der Veldt ’47 September 22, 2024, in Astoria, Oregon.

Paul Van der Veldt owned and operated Shallon Winery in Astoria. A self-described “egghead” in his youth, his fascination with religion and philosophy led him to Reed, though he ultimately left and attended Cal Poly (and undertook a Buddhist pilgrimage).

During the Korean War, Paul served in the U.S. Navy, finishing his service as a personnelman aboard the USS Ajax (AR-6) in Japan. At Cal Poly, he studied engineering and English, and

became enamored with Harley Davidson motorcycles.

Paul had a lifelong interest in and love of Japanese cultur e and Buddhism. The 1970s brought about a segue from construction to winemaking—and while Paul went out to sea as a cook on tugboats, the study of fermentation took up the bulk of his time.

Upon completion of the remodel of the Wicks Building at 16th and Duane streets, Shallon Winery was opened to the public in July 1980, remaining open every day until 2021. He was known for formulating and perfecting worldclass whey wines—and personally received and served some 80,000 guests during his tenure there.

Paul was predeceased by his former wife, Nancy Butterfield.

Arthur Edmond Worden ’49

August 15, 2024, in Beaverton, Oregon. Born in Portland, Oregon, Art joined the Navy in 1946 and was honorably discharged in 1948. Subsequently, he attended Reed, then graduated from Oregon State University with an engineering degree in 1952.

While pursuing his college degree, Art married Bonita (Bonnie Bryant) Worden. After graduating, he was employed by Pacific NW Bell Telephone Company, where he worked until 1986, retiring after 34 years. Art loved retirement, enjoying making projects with Bonnie and traveling around the United States in their RV.

Robert L. Warnock ’52

December 12, 2022, in San Francisco.

Robert “Bob” Warnock was a physicist who published over 100 papers from 1959 to 2022. He enjoyed elegant mathematical equations and always had a notebook with calculations on his desk.

Bob earned his BA in physics from Reed, writing a thesis titled “Electric Circuit Theory Using Matrix Analysis.” He subsequently won a Fulbright Scholarship and spent a year in Europe before continuing on to Harvard University for his PhD in theoretical physics (under the mentorship of Nobel laureate Julian Schwinger).

Over the years, Bob took hundreds of high-quality photos of architecture, sculptures, and flowers, developing them in a darkroom he built with his sons. Thanks to his early training at Buckman School and Benson Polytechnic, he was proficient with myriad tools and could often be found working in his machine shop.

At Harvard, Bob met Martha Lawall. The couple married in 1959 and moved to Seattle, where Bob worked as a visit -

Robert “Bob” Warnock was a physicist who published over 100 papers from 1959 to 2022.

His work took him to the Argonne National Laboratory, Fermilab, CERN, Los Alamos National Laboratory, and the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, Italy.

When life called for a change of scenery, the Warnocks moved to San Francisco so that Martha could join the faculty at UCSF and Bob could work at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and then the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, where he remained until his death at age 92.

Darrell W. Brownawell ’54

August 28, 2024, in Bend, Oregon. Darrell William Brownawell was born on February 21, 1933, in Bismarck, North Dakota. He lived an eventful and meaningful life, and was married to Marilyn Brownawell ’55 for 68 years.

At Reed, Darrell wrote a thesis on potassium carbonate ammonia water, with advising by Prof. Fred Ayres [chemistry 1940–70]. Darrell and Marilyn remained connected to Reedies throughout their lives, including the legendary Prof. Thomas Dunne [chemistry 1963–95].

Over the course of a long career at Exxon, Darrell was awarded 51 U.S. patents, which gave him the opportunity to live for several years in England. He is survived by his two sons, David and Mark.

Barbara Kamb Marinacci ’54

July 18, 2024, Pacific Palisades, California, of cancer.

Author, editor, and activist Barbara Kamb Marinacci grew up with her older twin brothers and mother in the San Francisco Bay Area and San Jose, California, before relocating to Pasadena. She attended Reed, UC Berkeley, and the Chouinard Art Institute (later CalArts), at which she met her future husband, Rudy Marinacci.

Barbara published six nonfiction books and was a coauthor, editor, researcher, and ghostwriter of numerous texts. Her books covered subjects such as 19th-century actresses, Walt Whitman, commodity speculation, and Spanish place names (in a book cowritten with Rudy).

Art is survived by Bonnie, his wife of over 74 years, and their three daughters, Debra Worden, Janet Wyatt, and Cynthia Johnson.

ing assistant professor at the University of Washington. After two years in Seattle, Bob started work at the Illinois Institute of Technology, where he was a tenured professor and researcher for 17 years.

Bob’s specialty was the basic physics of elementary particles and the dynamics of beams in particle accelerators.

Darrell was active in the civil rights movement, funded the college education of several disadvantaged children, and helped build homes for Habitat for Humanity. He was also an elder at the Fanwood Presbyterian Church and delivered the readings for the Shepherd of the Hills Church.

During the Korean War, Darrell volunteered for service and was sent to Germany as a medical technician. After Darrell was discharged, he and Marilyn toured Italy and Greece by motorcycle and ferry.

Most notable was Barbara’s editing of Linus Pauling’s book In His Own Words, which detailed more than 60 years of his life and work. She was also instrumental in the publication of Dr. Pauling’s book No More War! , and many years later worked with him at the Linus Pauling Institute.

In the mid-1980s, Barbara worked as editor in chief for the history book division of Windsor Books. Later, postdivorce and residing in Mar Vista, she became a consultant to nonprofit organizations dealing with mental health, education, and ethnic-minority issues. And with her project the Cosmos Circle, she created an

In Memoriam

HIV/AIDS psychosocial support group and networking program, despite a climate of fear and stigmatization.

Barbara was preceded in death by her ex-husband Rudy. She is survived by her children, Michael, Christopher, and Ellen.

Karen “Lulu” Ezekiel ’56

December 2, 2023, in San Francisco, California.

Karen Kals Ezekiel, known as Lulu, was a creative spirit who dedicated her life to helping her community through art. She was born in Vienna, Austria, in 1935, as Karen Kals; her family changed their surname from Katz to Kals to conceal their Jewish heritage, a fact Lulu learned about much later in her life. Fleeing Austria after Hitler annexed the country in 1938, the family moved to France before immigrating to Vancouver in 1939.

Along with her sister, Maria, Lulu attended the Windsor Mountain School in Massachusetts. She went on to study at Ecole d’Humanité in Switzerland and then attended Reed, where she earned a bachelor’s degree in English and psychology in 1956, writing her thesis, “The Uses of the Past in Southern Fiction,” under the mentorship of Prof. Donald MacRae [English 1944–73].

College of Arts and Crafts, Lulu worked in painting, sculpture, textiles, and illustration, authoring children’s books and painting murals in homes, schools, churches, and health centers.

Through her art and teaching, Lulu sought to improve her community’s mental health. She worked as a mental health counselor and a preschool teacher and program director in San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and New York. From 1975 to 1983, she also taught at the San Francisco Art Institute. Her daily routine included drawing, practicing tai chi, and tending to her beautiful garden and beloved North Beach home.

Robert Hoyt ’56

June 1, 2024, in Portland, Oregon.

A man who appreciated beauty in many forms, Robert “Bob” Allan Hoyt attended public schools in Portland throughout his youth and studied at both Reed and the Art Institute of Chicago. He was a member of the U.S. Army, but dedicated much of his life to literature, working at the Old

Fleeing Austria after Hitler annexed the country in 1938, Karen’s family moved to France before immigrating to Vancouver in 1939.

At Reed, Lulu met and married Jonathan “Zeke” Ezekiel ’56 . Their marriage lasted until the late 1960s, and the two remained friends after parting ways. After continuing her studies and earning a master of fine arts in painting from the California

Reuben Sandler ’57

September 8, 2024, in San Francisco, California.

Reuben Sandler was born and raised in the Los Angeles area. He completed his undergraduate study at Reed College, where he wrote his thesis on game theory, and received a PhD in mathematics from the University of Chicago at the age of 24.

Following school, Reuben authored four books on the subject of mathematics and held professorships at Victoria University of Wellington, the University of Chicago, the University of Illinois Chicago, the University of Hawaii, and Technion University of Haifa.

At the height of his successful mathematics career, Reuben opted to leave academia to live communally on Waiheke Island in New Zealand, where he farmed, participated in the island’s early wine production, and cofounded the island’s credit union.

In 2006, Reuben became a member of the University of Chicago Physical Sciences Division Visiting Committee, becoming chair in 2012. He was also a founding member of Intelligent Optical Systems, Inc., where he served as CEO and chairman of the board until shortly before his death.

Reuben is survived by his children, Ora, David, and Julia, and his long-term companion, Emily.

Marrine Lind ’58

Oregon Bookstore and as an independent appraiser of rare books. In addition to literature, he had a passion for art, film, music, cars, nature, and animals. He was predeceased by his wife, Darlene.

April 7, 2024, in Port Angeles, Washington, of age-related causes.

Marrine Lind, born May 27, 1936, lived almost her entire life in Port Angeles, Washington. As a

child, she attended Lincoln Elementary School and Roosevelt High School, enjoying horses, reading and writing poetry, and playing music, interests that continued throughout her life. Marrine attended Reed for a short period in the late ’50s and was later employed by the North Olympic Library, where she served for 23 years before retiring. She ultimately married Gus Lind, and they moved to O’Brien Road in Port Angeles, where she remained for the rest of her life.

Marrine was preceded in death by Gus in 1975; her daughter, Kathleen Marie, in 1977; and her son, Mark Gilbert, in 1982. She is survived by her daughter, Lori Stevens.

Joe Colony ’59

August 3, 2024, in Hagerstown, Maryland, of complications from Parkinson’s disease.

Joe spent most of his young life in Oregon and put himself through school at Reed, earning a degree in chemistry and writing his thesis, “Ionization Detection for Gas Chromatography,” under Prof. Frederick D. Tabbutt [chemistry 1957–71]. After graduation, he served in the U.S. Army.

While working at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, Joe had the good fortune to meet his future wife, Peggy, on a blind date. Though it was not exactly love at first sight (Joe did not like Peggy’s outfit, and Peggy thought he was too quiet), it wasn’t long before the pair fell in love.

Joe worked as a chemist at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center for most of his career, notably on the Hubble Space Telescope, which first launched in 1990. Though he was a man of few words (Peggy was right

about that on their first date), he was kind, witty, and razor-smart.

Joe died at 87 and is survived by his wife of 62 years, Peggy, and his children, David, Michael, and Patrick.

Carl Richard Levin ’60

September 12, 2024

Carl “Dick” Levin was born in 1938, in Los Angeles, California. He earned a bachelor’s degree from Reed, where he wrote his thesis, “A Classical Consideration of Deuteron Scattering,” and majored in physics.

Dick subsequently earned a human development master’s degree at the University of Kansas, and studied modern dance under Martha Graham. A long-time resident of Lawrence, Kansas, he was an innovative thinker and an avid outdoorsman.

Susan F. Mines ’61

July 29, 2024, in San Rafael, in California, of complications from myositis.

Susan was born Susan Fay Edmonds, in Stockton, California, and spent most of her early life in Los Angeles. She received her bachelor’s degree from Sonoma State and did graduate work at the University of San Francisco. A voracious reader and prolific writer, Susan enjoyed seeing her work published, including in The Marin Independent Journal’s “How It Is” essay feature. Susan was predeceased by Alan, her husband, and is survived by stepdaughter Wendy Mines and stepson Russell Mines.

Robert Buckley MAT ’64

February 8, 2024, in Depoe Bay, Oregon.

A soldier who served on the front lines of the Cold War and a teacher who delighted his students for decades, Bob was

born in 1933, in the village of Morral, Ohio. He was the 11th of 12 children and stood out early in life, graduating first in his high school class and joining the U.S. Navy.

During the Korean War, Bob was stationed in Japan for four years, most of which he spent on seaplanes while tracking Russian submarines. With the help of the GI Bill, he attended Bowling Green State University, graduating in 1959 with a BS in mathematics and minors in English and geology.

In the summer of 1962, while visiting a Navy friend, Bob was introduced to Lois Ann Peterson and married her six weeks later. He subsequently earned his MA in teaching at Reed, writing his thesis on congruences under Prof. John Leadley [math 1956–93].

Bob returned to Ohio for one year of teaching before moving to Oregon. He taught math, was an administrator, and coached numerous sports at Gervais High School before moving to Estacada in 1971, where he taught math and computer science. He was predeceased by Lois and is survived by two daughters, Marcia (who is a judge of the Oregon 17th Judicial District Circuit Court) and Sharon.

Marianne Ott MAT ’64

August 15, 2024, in Gresham, Oregon, of age-related causes.

Marianne Ott was born in 1925 to renowned Portland landscape architects W alter H. and Florence Holmes Gerke.

After attending Catlin Gabel and Lincoln High School, Marianne continued her education at Oregon State

Agricultural College (now Oregon State University) and went on to pursue a career in teaching. She taught high school, first in Bend (where she could pursue her avid love of skiing) and then in Gresham, where she taught at Gresham Union High School and met David Ott, whom she married in 1951.

Marianne later attended Reed, where she earned a master’s degree in the history and structure of the English language (the basis of her reputation for heavy use of her red editing pen!). Her thesis was titled “High School French: A Curriculum Study.”

At Gresham High, Marianne taught a variety of classes including English, French, and pottery, though her first love was French. Many of her students became lifelong friends (she called them her Foreign Legion), and she concluded her career as chair of the language department. Throughout her life, Marianne was committed to education, as evidenced by her decision to create the Marianne Ott Scholarship, which offered first preference to students from Oregon.

In 1986, David Ott died, and in 1990, Marianne found another person to share her life with, Lloyd Slagle. Marianne

was active in the community and was a long-time volunteer for the Gresham Art Committee and a member of the Mazamas (she was one of the first women to receive the coveted 16 Peaks Award).

Although Marianne gave up mountain climbing in her 50s, she continued to hike, swim, and tend to her three acres. In addition, she grew her artistic skills by focusing on woodworking, painting and pottery, selling her “Ott’s Pots” (she also specialized in lamps, bird feeders, and butter dishes). She was predeceased by Lloyd and is survived by her daughter, Kerri Nelson.

Ken A. Foote ’65

August 25, 2024

Kenneth Foote was born in 1943 on the Luke Field Army Air Corps Base near Phoenix, Arizona. He spent his childhood and adolescence living around the world—Texas and California, as well as Brazil, Switzerland, and Saudi Arabia. It wasn’t until he attended Reed College that Ken found his home in Portland. His Reed contemporaries included future Foster-Scholz Club president Jim Kahan ’64, with whom he remained friends throughout his life.

Susan Mines ’61

Ken Foote ’65

In Memoriam

Ken was defined by his intellect, his curiosity, and his love of flying. He was a certified flight instructor and ran several companies (including Avrotec) throughout his life, focusing on the intersection of electrical engineering, software design, and aviation. He is survived by his three children.

Roberta Tichenor MALS ’67

September 3, 2024

Roberta “Bobby” Tichenor, cofounder of Multnomah Village’s beloved Annie Bloom’s Books, was born in Bend, Oregon, in 1944. She spent her childhood hiking, exploring the Cascades and the high desert, riding horses, tending to animals (including her sheep, Twinkle Toes), and, in her own words, “being a tomboy generally” with her older brother, Bill. Bobby began her lifelong love of books and reading after becoming “smitten” with Teddy Roosevelt’s book Through the Brazilian Wilderness at age nine. She moved, rather reluctantly, with her family to Milwaukie, Oregon, when she was 15. At Milwaukie High School, she met her future husband, Keith Tichenor.

Shortly after their wedding, Bobby began graduate studies at Reed College in

Portland, while Keith pursued a law degree at the University of Washington in Seattle. In 1969, Bobby and Keith settled in Portland and began their family together. Their first son, Seth, was born in 1970, and their second, Sean, in 1972.

Bobby finished her master’s degree at Reed (where she wrote a thesis on James Dickey’s Into the Stone) in 1973 and then began pursuing her own law degree at Lewis & Clark in 1974. She practiced law part time for a little over a year, but found it didn’t suit her temperament.

In 1978, over a bottle of red wine, Bobby and Susan Bloom dreamt up a plan to open a bookstore in the then-dilapidated neighborhood of Multnomah Village. Annie Bloom’s Books opened in late October of 1978, while Bobby was still in law school, at 7829 SW Multnomah Boulevard. The store was named after its two founding partners: Bobby, whose middle name was Ann, and Susan Bloom.

Annie Bloom’s moved across the street to its present location at 7834 SW Capitol Highway in the fall of 1984, and was remodeled in 1994. The store was a catalyst of renewal in Multnomah Village, and an economic and cultural anchor for the neighborhood as well. A second branch opened on NW 23rd and Glisan in 1985, but closed a few years later. In recent years, Bobby took on a more reserved role at Annie Bloom’s, officially turning the store over to Will Peters in 2021.

Bobby held a deep belief that the power of books came as much from their being shared and discussed as from being read—that they needed to be experienced, seen, and touched within a community that cared for them in order to

be appreciated. By cofounding Annie Bloom’s Books, she created a bibliophile’s sanctuary.

Bobby is survived by her husband, Keith, and her sons, Seth and Sean.

Gerald Chakerkian ’68

May 1, 2024

Gerald was born in Albuquerque, New Mexico, in 1946. While he spent his career as a lawyer for the federal government in Washington, DC, his passion for philosophy never flagged as he voraciously read his way through the Western canon.

Discussions of philosophy with Gerald could veer to the mystical, often undercut by his mordant, earthy wit. While Gerald was studying philosophy at Reed, he wrote a letter to The Quest in response to an anti-religious article, quoting Shakespeare: “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”

Gerald felt most at home in the beautiful surroundings of the Rio Grande Valley and Sandia Mountains in Albuquerque, where he returned after retirement to settle in the Corrales area. Deeply rooted in his Armenian heritage, he warmly cherished living in the same town as his brother Armen, his sister Artemis, and his extended family.

A deliriously proud grandfather, Gerald kept in close touch with his daughter and his son and their families on the East Coast—and died just the week after returning from a visit to his son, his daughter, and his four grandchildren. He is survived by his daughter, Joanna, his son, Stephen, and his brother, Armen Chakerian ’63. —Contributed by Michael McPherson ’68

September 4, 2024, in Taos, New Mexico, of Parkinson’s disease.

A renowned photographer and professor, Joe first studied photography in 1969 with Minor White in a special program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He went on to complete a BA at Reed and an MFA in photography at the Rhode Island School of Design, Providence.

In 1999, Joe began teaching at the University of New Mexico and taking panoramic photographs of the Southwest landscape. His work is represented in the Seventh Annual Portfolio of the Photographic Education Society at the Rhode Island School of Design, the MIT Museum in Cambridge, and in treasured private collections of photographs.

Joe is survived by his half sisters, Erica and Rebecca, and by a community of fellow artists and adventurers.

December 4, 2020

Joseph P. Ciaglia ’71

Jeff Falen ’80

Jeff, who founded Persephone Farm in Lebanon, Oregon, was

born in 1957 in Arkansas City, Kansas. Jeff and his older brother Mike were born with a primary immune deficiency called X-linked agammaglobulinemia, and much of their childhood was spent in doctors’ offices and sickbeds.

After a year studying at Northern Arizona University, Jeff transferred to Reed. His thesis, “The Rat and the Herbicide,” studied bile salts, enzymes, herbicides, and toxicology.

Jeff and his father, Ted, spent over a year looking at farms before his parents purchased the land which became Persephone Farm. Jeff moved to the farm in February 1985, despite his van breaking down several times along the way. Right away, Jeff achieved organic certification for the farm through Oregon Tilth, and began selling crops to distributor Organically Grown Company, two key relationships which continue through today.

On April 1, 1990, Eleanor O’Brien started work at Persephone as an apprentice. She and Jeff quickly grew attached and decided to live and farm as partners. Year in and year out workers came and went, Jeff and Eleanor would look at each other and say, “Well, we’re still here.”

In the last two weeks of his life, Jeff stopped all medications, treatments, and therapies except for a few to keep him more comfortable, declining any further efforts to prolong his life. Though he is no longer present, the farm is imbued with the essence of his life and work.

Carolyn Lea Winch MALS ’95

September 25, 2024

Carolyn was born in Colorado Springs, Colorado, in 1942. She earned a master’s degree in liberal arts from Reed College,

graduating the same year as her daughter, Paula Winch ’95

For years, Carolyn worked as a Montessori teacher and taught children from other countries, first in Portland, then in Redmond, shepherding an afterschool program for mothers promoting Spanish literacy and cultural pride using textbooks from Mexico.

Carolyn developed relationships with a wide variety of people, who recognized and valued her genuine, gentle, and generous way of being.

In the last weeks of her life, she said, “If anyone asks for me, tell them I am resting, and surrounded by love.”

Sasha Stein ’97

June 20, 2024, in Portland, Oregon, of cancer.

Sasha Stein was born in 1974. In the mid-90s, he attended Reed, earning a bachelor’s degree in biochemistry and molecular biology, and writing his thesis, “Use of Alkali Metal Cations to Probe the Function of a Human Neuronal Excitatory Amino Acid Transporter,” under the mentorship of Prof. Stephen W.Arch [biology 1972–2012].

Sasha went on to receive a PhD in neuroscience from the University of Washington in 2006, and then his law degree from the University of Utah in 2009. He became an

intellectual property attorney at a midsize firm in Salt Lake City, specializing in the area of biotechnology. Sasha is sur vived by his wife, Tatiana, and his children, Pascal Silliman, Praxeda “Sadie” Stein, Atticus “Bucky” Stein, and stepdaughter Vlada Voznesenskaia.

Prof. Larry Church [chemistry 1973–80]

July 20, 2024

Larry Church, best known to Reedies as the director of the nuclear reactor, spent his childhood in Tenafly, New Jersey, and Rochester, New York, where he attended the University of Rochester for his bachelor’s degree. While there, he met Nancy, who would become his wife of 54 years.

A lifelong lover of science, Church pursued his PhD in nuclear chemistry at Carnegie Mellon University. He taught at SUNY Buffalo for a period before moving to Portland to join the faculty at Reed, where he taught chemistry and served as the director of the reactor from 1973 to 1980.

Church transitioned to a role at Tektronix and eventually retired from the Oregon Center for Advanced Technology Education. After Nancy passed, Church moved to Lake Oswego, where he met Louise Wilson. The two married in 2023 on the banks of the White Salmon River.

Church is survived by Louise and his sons, Scott and Matt.

Forthcoming obituaries: Caroline Mervyn ‘51, Audrey Stolz ‘52, Yvonne Phillips Hajda ‘55, Hardy Hargreaves ‘57, Patricia Rose Matisse ‘59, James Willard Moore ‘59, David Ragozin ‘62, Howard Williamson ‘73, George Lane ’74, Doug Grotjahn ’80, Kurt Blair ‘91, Seth Peterson ‘92, Edward Martin Lightfoot ‘96, Trustee Morris J. Galen

When you establish a charitable gift annuity at Reed, you can:

• receive fixed payments for life;

• earn a charitable income tax deduction;

• reduce recognition of capital gains taxes by donating stock;

• make a lasting impact on the Reed community. SUPPORT FOR YOU OR A LOVED ONE.

Contact Santi Alston to receive a custom gift calculation at: alstons@reed.edu or

Object of Study

Nina Simone’s Gum

In Religion 363, Holy Sh*t: Religious Things, we begin the course reading a book titled Nina Simone’s Gum by musician Warren Ellis. Collaborator and frequent bandmate Nick Cave introduces the book by initiating readers into the intimate details of one night: Simone’s London performance on July 1, 1999, in which Warren Ellis nabbed the gum chewed by Simone, “a god to me and my friends.” From backstage that night, Ellis tracked the chewing gum as Simone removed it from her mouth and

stuck it under the piano. After the performance, Ellis dashed on stage to snag the gum and used Simone’s sweaty hand towel to wrap it. Ellis preserved the gum in shopping bags, a briefcase, and a home shrine over 21 years before he “released” it to the world, to end up on display at Nick Cave’s 2021–22 exhibition at the Royal Danish Library. The gum is a compelling object of study because it allows Ellis to construct his musical journey, demonstrate collection practices and detailed observations, and

express his devotion to Simone through preservation of her thrown-away object. The journey of the gum exists because Ellis kept it; students curate their own briefcase collections over the semester as we contemplate collection, values, insurance rates for the gum, 3D modeling, and a modern transformation of a thing into a religious artifact. —Candace Mixon, Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion

3203 SE Woodstock Blvd.

Portland, Oregon 97202-8138

Maha Fawzi ’27 and friends create pinch pots at a ceramic handbuilding class during Paideia.

PHOTO