Lawrentian THE
SPRING 2017
A GLOWING MODEL The cancer research of two Lawrenceville classmates is shining brightly.
26 MYSTERY: WHERE’S THE ‘MISSING’ WINDOW? 16 SOCK IT TO ME 39 THE LOWERING OF OLD LOWER SPRING COVER 2017.indd 3
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FEATURES
DEPARTMENTS
26 On the Cover: Surgeons John Y.K. Lee ’90 and Sunil Singhal ’90 are saving lives together. Photo by Michael Branscom
20 A WINDOW’S WHEREABOUTS The search for a missing Tiffany memorial yields an unexpected result.
26 FRIENDS FOR LIFE Their glowing-tumor technology has two Lawrenceville classmates shining brightly for Penn Medicine.
34 FROM RUSSIA, WITH LOVE From Moscow, Marcus Montenecourt ’87 is helping connect students with Lawrenceville.
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2 FROM THE HEAD MASTER 3 EDITOR’S NOTE 4 A THOUSAND WORDS Girls’ and boys’ indoor track won their 13th consecutive M.A.P.L. titles this winter.
6 NEWS IN BRIEF L’ville acquires Summer Scholars, Barnes lauded by CASE, School unveils new website
10 ON THE ARTS! Freshman Shakespeare at Winterfest, Fitzpatrick presents ‘Looking’
12 SPORTS ROUNDUP
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ASK THE ARCHIVIST
14 GO BIG RED! The versatile Ron Kane ’83 P’20 wears multiple hats.
16 TAKE THIS JOB AND LOVE IT Sage Disch ’09 takes foot fashion to a new level of style.
18 TABLE TALK Q&A with Religion and Philosophy master Jason VonWachenfeldt, Ph.D.
39 TIME WAS… 84 BY THE NUMBERS Alumni Weekend
85 STUDENT SNAP Olalla Duato ’18 and the palms wave goodbye to 2016.
ALUMNI
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40 ALUMNI NEWS 41 CLASS NOTES
ON THE ARTS
SPORTS ROUNDUP
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FROM THE HEAD MASTER • THROUGH DIFFERENT LENSES
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eep it simple, E.B. White might say. But, of course, when we examine an issue through different lenses, we see greater complexity, we perceive subtlety, and we lose the comfort that the one-dimensional view offers. Like reading the same story side by side in The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal. Or hearing your classmate across the Harkness table offer a strong rebuttal of your idea. Dr. Joseph T. Cox came to campus recently as our James Merrill ’43 Visiting Poet. Retired from the Army with the rank of colonel, commander of a battalion in the 101st Airborne, awarded two Bronze Stars in Vietnam, tenured English professor at West Point, beloved headmaster of the Haverford School, and a poet, my friend Joe has had quite a career. Listening to his poems in the Chapel a few weeks ago, I saw Joe through new lenses; I heard him speak with new voices. I heard a son’s voice, trying to fathom his father’s war-wounded “austere silence”; a father whose “life ran russet in the snow of Bastogne”; a father who was part of the ill-fated “last offensive over the frozen sheaves of the Hürtgen Forest, your unit’s cowardice, you left for dead…” I heard the voice of a father who had a son serving overseas in Iraq, trying to make sense of the combat death of a boy he had coached in youth soccer:
Remembering you when you were my son’s age the night he told me about your death, I feel a father’s grief. And I heard Joe searching to understand his own experience in Vietnam:
Such haphazard senseless destruction: a booby trap, a mine, a causal rocket, an unseen sniper, desultory violence and the random waste of lives, American and Vietnamese, soldier and civilian… In his poem, “Notes from Ban Me Thuot,” he recalls an afternoon spent in a French colonial hotel, “… inventorying dead men’s memories … silently drinking neat whiskey like cowboys in a bad movie”; in the distance, the “… echo of B-52 strikes just over the Cambodian border.” In this last poem, I am haunted by the heartbreaking image of a “…teenage woman on the back of a moped hit by a speeding GI truck: lying face down in sticky, fly-covered blood…” A nameless victim left in the wake of war. I am not sure why I can’t get the stark image out of my head, until I recall, almost exactly a year ago, a very different poetry reading in the Edith Memorial Chapel, and an image also set in Vietnam:
Ocean Vuong, winner of the Pushcart Prize and the Whiting Award for Poetry, was last year’s James Merrill poet. Born in Saigon more than a decade after the departure of the American military, Ocean is a child refugee from Vietnam, an immigrant to the United States, and openly gay. In this particular poem, “Aubade with Burning City,” read with his intensely quiet, reedy voice, he imagines the chaos of the departing U.S. military during the final evacuation from Saigon; the suffering, mangled dog just part of the detritus left in the aftermath. In another poem, “Telemachus,” I heard Ocean, like Joe, searching through poetry to know and understand his father:
Like any good son, I pull my father out of the water, drag him by his hair through sand, his knuckles carving a trail the waves rush in to erase. (…) I kneel beside him to see how far I might sink. Do you know who I am, Ba? But the answer never comes. The answer is the bullet hole in his back, brimming with seawater. How far apart these two writers are, and yet connected through their past and in their search for meaning through poetry. Our Third Formers gave Joe a standing ovation in the Chapel after his reading, and I recall last year the eager questions they had for Ocean in that very same space. Each poet brings his perspective; each poem offers a lens through which to peer. I marvel daily at the experiences our students have, the various ways we stretch them, draw them into debates, and help them to see the world in multiple ways, from various points of view. It is what we do best; it’s what I love about Lawrenceville.
Great cathedrals copy ancient wood... Because the bombed – from Nesting by Joseph Cox cathedral is now a cathedral of trees. – from Telemachus by Ocean Vuong Sincerely,
Stephen S. Murray H’55 ’65 ’16 P’16 ’21 The Shelby Cullom Davis ’26 Head Master
A military truck speeds through the intersection, the sound of children shrieking inside. A bicycle hurled through a store window. When the dust rises, a black dog lies in the road, panting. Its hind legs crushed into the shine… 2
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THE
Lawrentian S P R I N G 2 0 1 7 | VO LU M E 8 1 N U M B E R 2
PUBLISHER JENNIFER SZWALEK EDITOR SEAN RAMSDEN ART DIRECTOR PHYLLIS LERNER STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER PALOMA TORRES PROOFREADERS ROB REINALDA ’76 LINDA HLAVACEK SILVER H’59 ’61 ’62 ’63 ’64 GP’06 ’08 CONTRIBUTORS
EDITOR'S NOTE
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ust weeks after I began my time at Lawrenceville, I spoke at length with then-new Head Master Stephen Murray H’55 ’65 ’16 P’16 ’21 in order to write my first profile for The Lawrentian, “Leading with Integrity,” which appeared in the fall 2015 issue. At that point, I was digesting large chunks of information every day about the School, eager to get up to speed on its history, its culture, and its people so that I might offer a view of Lawrenceville that would seem at all familiar to its alumni. In our conversation, Steve mentioned one thing that stood out to me at the time, and it often bubbles to the top of my recollection when I talk to alumni about their stories. He was speaking about the importance of character and the way it shapes graduates of schools like Lawrenceville. Straight from my notes of July 2015, Steve said:
SCARLET AU ’19
Outsiders have the impression that these places foster old-boy networks and
TRISH BANSAL '19
entrées into certain situations, but the truth is, in terms of the experience leading
KATHERINE BIRKENSTOCK MICHAEL BRANSCOM HADLEY COPELAND ’18 OLALLA DUATO ’18 LISA M. GILLARD HANSON BARBARA HORN SARAH MEZZINO
to success, however you define it, it’s much more about character and the kinds of things you believe in. So if I’m going to partner with you on any kind of enterprise, and I know you went to a school like Lawrenceville, or we share that experience in some fashion, it’s really more a question of, “I know I can trust you; I know the
TIFFANY THOMAS '18
things you believe in, and I know what you were raised on as a young person. And
ALEXANDER ZABEGIN
therefore, when the going gets tough, when your integrity is tested, when you’re
The Lawrentian (USPS #306-700) is published quarterly (winter, spring, summer, and fall) by The Lawrenceville School, P.O. Box 6008, Lawrenceville, NJ 08648, for alumni, parents, grandparents, and friends. Periodical postage paid at Trenton, NJ, and additional mailing offices.
The Lawrentian welcomes letters from readers. Please send all correspondence to sramsden@ lawrenceville.org or to the above address, care of The Lawrentian Editor. Letters may be edited for publication. The Lawrentian welcomes submissions and suggestions for magazine departments. If you have an idea for a feature story, please query first to The Lawrentian Editor. Visit us on the web at www.lawrenceville.org. www.lawrenceville.org/alumni/the-lawrentian POSTMASTER
Please send address corrections to: The Lawrentian The Lawrenceville School P.O. Box 6008 Lawrenceville, NJ 08648 ©The Lawrenceville School Lawrenceville, New Jersey
operating in a headwind, I know I can count on you. And I can partner with a person like that.” These words sprang to mind again this past winter when I spoke to Dr. John Y.K. Lee ’90 and Dr. Sunil Singhal ’90, both surgeons at the University of Pennsylvania, who recently partnered on an innovative technique that illuminates tumors in real time during surgery. Though the two were friends during their Lawrenceville days, the intervening years had seen both follow their careers to different universities and hospitals until they were reunited at Penn Medicine. As their research progressed, both saw the opportunity to partner on this groundbreaking advance that is already leading to more precise excisions of cancer cells. What’s more, the neurologist and the thoracic specialist knew they could trust each other’s expertise and integrity in teaming up to save lives. It hasn’t taken long for me to see just how often Steve’s comments on character and trust come alive in real ways. Those words didn’t even make it into the story that fall, but they have stayed with me as much as any from that interview, and they have been essential in helping me frame the stories we bring to you in every issue of The Lawrentian. All the best,
Sean Ramsden Editor sramsden@lawrenceville.org
All rights reserved.
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A THOUSAND WORDS
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‘HURDLING’ TOWARD ANOTHER TITLE
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Photograph by Paloma Torres
In the history of the Mid-Atlantic Prep League, only one school has ever won either the boys’ or girls’ indoor track championship. Want to guess who that might be? Competing at the M.A.P.L. championships in February, the Big Red girls and boys easily outpaced their rivals by wide margins. Earlier, both teams also overwhelmed the field at the N.J.I.S.A.A. Indoor Track championships.
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NEWS IN BRIEF
Fundraising by the Book
Three
student-led community-service groups spearheaded a campus book drive and sale in December to provide reading materials and raise money for children in China and India. Dumplings for Dreams, Dreams for the Future, and Helping Hands of Huang Fan collected hundreds of used books from Lawrentians, who placed them in boxes located in student Houses. Some were donated to a chosen school in India, with the remainder made available to purchase
MLK Day of Service
at a second-hand book sale during lunch and dinner in Irwin Dining Hall. The books were sold at significantly discounted prices, ranging from $3 to $30, and represented
Lawrenceville students honored
five categories: fiction, nonfiction, textbooks, SAT/ACT/AP/other test prep, and chil-
the memory of Dr. Martin Luther
dren’s books. – Scarlet Au ’19
King Jr. through volunteer work and community service projects at organizations throughout New Jersey and Pennsylvania on January 18. The Martin Luther King Day of Service has been a staple
FIVE VIE FOR PRESIDENTIAL SCHOLARSHIPS
MICHAEL MAN ’17, MAXWELL RAMSAY-BURROUGH ’17, PANOS
VANDRIS ’17, JAY YALAMANCHILI ’17, AND MICHAEL ZHAO ’17 WERE SELECTED AS CANDIDATES FOR A 2017 PRESIDENTIAL SCHOLARSHIP IN FEBRUARY. THEY WILL NOW COMPETE TO BE AMONG THE FINAL 121 STUDENTS TO RECEIVE AN EXPENSE-PAID TRIP TO WASHINGTON, D.C., IN JUNE TO RECEIVE THE U.S. PRESIDENTIAL SCHOLARS MEDALLION AT A CEREMONY SPONSORED BY THE WHITE HOUSE.
at the School for more than a decade. The majority of volunteer efforts benefited local day care centers and pre- and elementary schools. Rachel Cantlay P’07 ’09 ’11, director of the Community Service Program, estimates that nearly 3,000 local children were served by Lawrenceville students over the course of the day. Last year, Lawrentians provided more than 13,000 hours of service at nonprofit agencies and organizations, mostly in Mercer County.
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School Unveils New Website
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ivid photography and a cleaner, fresher look are some of the defining hallmarks of Lawrenceville’s newly redesigned website, which debuted February 15. Visitors to the home page will be struck by the colorful full-screen photography depicting the School’s rare blend of academic culture, athletic and artistic achievement, and opportunities for community service. The latest campus headlines and an engaging “Lawrenceville at a Glance” also serve to draw visitors into the site to learn more about the School. See what it's all about at lawrenceville.org.
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LAWRENCEVILLE ACQUIRES SUMMER SCHOLARS The Lawrenceville School became the exclusive owner and manager of its promising summer school, Lawrenceville Summer Scholars, in December.
A ‘Grand’ Time for Cuffee Janean Cuffee ’17 topped the 1,000-point mark for her high school career in a game against Oak Knoll School of the Holy Child in Lavino Field House in January. The allM.A.P.L. and all-N.J.S.I.A.A. selection was averaging 19
The summer 2017 Summer Scholars program will feature two threeweek sessions, starting July 2, which will fill Raymond and Dawes Houses with sixth- to ninth-grade boys and girls from many states and countries. Lawrenceville Summer Scholars uses time-honored principles of House and Harkness to cultivate passionate, talented young Lawrentians-in-training. Lawrenceville Summer Scholars is making the transition from a day program to one that is primarily boarding-based. The scholastic program also mimics many of the School’s traditional methods, including Harkness-based instruction and House-based socialization.
points per game for Big Red when she passed the milestone. “Janean is a competitor. She has always answered the call when the team needed her most, and I admire that about her,” said Antoine Hart, Lawrenceville’s head girls’ basketball coach. “[She] is the kind of player that other teams worry about late at night.” The versatile Cuffee is a four year, tri-varsity athlete, competing in volleyball, basketball, and outdoor track.
LEAPING AHEAD AT LAVINO RELAYS Big Red boys and girls finished first at the 45th Edward Lavino Relays in December, competing against more than a thousand athletes from 30 teams at Lavino Field House. Sparked by an individual top performance by Michael Troup ’17, the boys captured the long-jump relay, as well as the high-jump relay and the triple-jump relays. Isabelle Huang ’19, Amy Aririguzoh ’20, Ariel Claxton ’17, and Jesse Brewer ’18 teamed up to win the girls’ sprint medley in a smoking 4:22.95, good enough for a top-five performance of the year in New Jersey. – Tiffany Thomas ’18 SPRING
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ON THE ARTS
SHAKESPEARE, SWORDS AND ALL Romeo and Juliet, the quintessential story of starcross’d lovers, came to life on the stage of the Kirby Arts Center’s Black Box Theatre for two nights in February. Dramatic twists, hair-raising action, and uniquely choreographed stage combat kept the audience hooked during the latest installment of Lawrenceville’s traditional Second Form Shakespeare, directed this year by Performing Arts Master Matthew Campbell. Lawrentians of varied talents worked together to create a successful production, including set designers, scenery designers, stage managers, costume designers, tech crew, and of course, the actors. This year, Second Form actors were trained in stage fighting by Dr. Sean McCarther, an assistant professor of voice at nearby Westminster Choir College, who also teaches classes in unarmed and single-sword stage combat. “The characters these students are portraying would have trained in combat and swordplay
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from a very early age. It would influence every aspect of their lives.” McCarther explained. “We begin with how to stand, how to hold the weapon, how to move. From here, we added all the flashy things in a believable but safe way. It gets rather complicated quickly, but the students put some really great fights together.” Jax Floyd ’20, who played Romeo, embraced this unique element of bringing Shakespeare to the stage. “It was great working with professionals trained specifically in this area of expertise,” he said. “This year’s cast is so talented, and I love getting to spend time with all of them,” said Emily Shapcott ’20, who starred in the other title role. “The great chemistry between characters is a reflection of the amazing friendships we formed during the process of this production.” – Trish Bansal ’19
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Allen Fitzpatrick (left) and Harry I. Naar, director of the Rider University Art Gallery, examine one of Fitzpatrick's paintings that hung in his exhibit, Looking, this winter.
FITZPATRICK PRESENTS ‘LOOKING’ AT RIDER GALLERY Paintings by Allen Fitzpatrick ’73 H’85 ’89 P’99 ’04, chair of the Visual Arts Department, were displayed in the Rider University Art Gallery in Lawrence Township, N.J., during a month-long exhibit this winter. Looking featured both still life and landscapes, created from Fitzpatrick’s direct observation.
In a conversation with Harry I. Naar, professor of fine arts and director of the Rider University Art Gallery, Fitzpatrick explained his love of landscapes and said that while scenic spots may be easier to come by in Tuscany or Vermont than his local environs, the key is mostly in the light. “I look for beautiful light as it falls across and through the land. The magic hour for photography is the time right before sunrise or sunset; alas, it is quite fleeting,” he said. “One of the biggest challenges of plein air painting – my preference – is capturing the often fickle light or quickly moving clouds and reducing billions of bits of information into a coherent shorthand.” Fitzpatrick is a graduate of Middlebury College, where he majored in studio art, and received his M.F.A. from the New York Academy Graduate School of Visual Arts. He returned to Lawrenceville to teach in 1979 and served as chair of the Visual Arts Department from 1989 until 1999 before being reappointed in 2007. Fitzpatrick is also the head coach of boys’ varsity lacrosse, which has earned 14 state championships under his guidance. SPRING
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SPORTS ROUNDUP
M.A.P.L. CHAMPIONS
Record: 14-11 Coach: Ron Kane ’83 P’20 Captains: Ezra Swell ’17
Isaiah Wingfield ’17
Record: 10-12 Coach: Antoine Hart Captains: Amarachi Chidom ’17
Janean Cuffee ’17
N.J.I.S.A.A. CHAMPIONS MERCER COUNTY CHAMPIONS Record: 7-18-3
Coach: Etienne Bilodeau Captains: Conor McDonough ’17
WINTER SEASON STATS
Record: 9-10 Coach: Nicole Uliasz Captains: Reilly Fletcher ’17
Jessica Haviland ’17 Emily Walther ’17
Record: 6-2 Coach: Rich Beischer Captains: Matt Kim ’17
Bryan Lee ’17
Record: 6-1 Coach: Rich Beischer Captains: Wynne Emma ’17
Katie Santamaria ’17 Dorothy Waskow ’17 Jessie Zhao ’17
N.J.I.S.A.A. CHAMPIONS M.A.P.L. CHAMPIONS Record: 4-0
Coach: Katie Chaput Captains: Ariel Claxton ’17
Amy Dykman ’17 Charlotte Palmer ’17
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N.J.I.S.A.A. CHAMPIONS M.A.P.L. CHAMPIONS Record: 4-0
Coach: Erik Chaput Captains: Injil Muhammad ’17
Sam Noden ’17 Marcus Trenfield ’17 Michael Troup ’17
Record: 3-1 Coach: Brent Ferguson Captain: Patricio Madero ’17
PIONS
BOYS’ RELAY BLAZES TO RECORD The boys’ 4x400-meter relay team broke the School record at the Eastern State
Record: 4-2 Coach: Stefanie Harrison Captains: Vivienne Gao ’17
Christa Sowah ’17
M.A.P.L. CHAMPIONS Record: 5-8
Coach: Mark Price Captain: David Kim ‘17
Indoor Track Championships this winter, blazing to the finish line in 3:24.15 to qualify for the New Balance Nationals Indoor. The girls’ 4x200 relay team also qualified for Nationals.
M.A.P.L. CHAMPIONS Record: 7-8
Coach: Narelle Krizek Captains: Carly Martinson ’17
Virginia Schaus ’17
Record: 8-9 Coach: Johnny Clore Captain: Arthur Benson ’17
Owen Jones ’17 Will Kuenne ’17
For the most current athletic news visit www.lawrenceville.org/athletics
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GO BIG RED
A MAN FOR ALL SEASONS Coaching across an array of sports, the versatile Ron Kane ’83 P’20 is grateful for the opportunity
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o matter the season, it’s impossible to discuss the two most recent generations of Lawrenceville athletics without invoking the name of Ron Kane ’83 P’20. First as a student, and for the past thirty years as a coach, Kane has become as synonymous with Big Red as the coaches he played for, the names of whom grace some of the School’s proudest athletic facilities. But Kane’s path to Lawrenceville wasn’t a straight line. In fact, it came about from a detour off Route 1 during his childhood in 1978. Kane, then a star middle-school athlete on Long Island, and his family found themselves hungry on the way home from their vacation in Florida. Curious to see the fabled village of Princeton, they decided to make a stop at PJ’s Pancake House. As they walked along Nassau Street, Kane’s father, Ron Sr., sized up a teenage boy not much older than his own son, standing outside Princeton University’s Harvey S. Firestone Memorial Library. He wanted to know: “Where do young men like you go to school?” “And, the young man, in so many words said, ‘I go to Lawrenceville, sir. It’s three miles down the road, sir. It’s a great school, sir,’” recalls Kane of his father’s inquiry. “There were no websites at the time, but my father looked into it, and we came back to visit.” During his trip to campus, Kane glimpsed the football team coming out for their game that crisp
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A veteran of 25 seasons as the head boys' basketball coach, Ron Kane assumed the reins of the baseball program this spring.
October afternoon, and he was hooked. “I’ll never forget, I saw the red shirts with the traditional stripes on their sleeves – the Princeton stripes – come out of the locker room, and it was over for me,” he says. “It was over. I had to compete on that field.” Kane enrolled, eager to make his mark as a competitor, and he did exactly that, becoming the first student-athlete in School history to earn twelve varsity letters while netting all-state honors in football, basketball, and baseball. Aside from the four years he spent as an undergraduate
at Franklin & Marshall College, Kane has rarely been absent from Lawrenceville’s campus since that fall afternoon in the late 1970s. For all the years he has invested in Big Red Athletics, however, Kane finds himself in a unique position during the 2016-17 academic year. Having recently completed his twenty-fifth year as the head coach of boys’ basketball, the change in seasons sees Kane leading the baseball program for the first time this spring, taking over from the retired Champ Atlee ’62 H’74 ’75 ’79 ’83 ’84 ’06 P’92. One might imagine there is a
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paradoxical challenge in assuming the reins of one team, while already having logged a quarter century leading another, but Kane waves off the suggestion. The versatile leader says his coaching philosophies are applicable to any sport. “What a team does off the field or off the court is paramount to me,” says Kane, whose baseball team enjoyed a weeklong bus trip to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, to train at the Cal Ripken Baseball Complex in March. “By design, I’ve opted for a bus instead of flying down there. I think it’s good for chemistry and team unity. We’re not getting on planes and renting vans and splintering off down there to eat. We’re doing it all together on a bus.” That unity, Kane says, lends itself to enjoyment, even in practice. “Young people are under an enormous amount of pressure now – academic pressure, social pressure – so my biggest thing is that I see joy between 3:30 and 5:30,” Kane says. “Joy in the competition, away from social media and technology, away from checking in on college applications, and away from a spat with a boyfriend or a girlfriend. That’s important.” Kane is just as quick to highlight the idea of “opportunity” and its many applications to sports at the School. “I use the word all the time,” he explains. “A practice is an opportunity to be a better teammate and bring out the best in other people. A game is an opportunity to represent Lawrenceville, with it stitched across one’s chest. An away trip is an opportunity for our team to build team chemistry and to know that there are things that are as equally important as points on a scoreboard.” That opportunity is not lost on the players who have competed for Kane’s teams, and during his 25th season on the hardwood this past winter, a group of former basketball players created their own occasion to recognize and honor their former coach. Joe Bucci ’96 and Steve Brown ’96, co-captains of Lawrenceville’s 1995-96 squad that produced a stellar 23-2 record, organized an alumni basketball game. Eighteen alumni, ranging in age from their twenties into their forties, traveled from as far as San Francisco and Texas to be there. Kane humbly admits he was touched by the effort his former players made to be there, but was just as happy to share the event with his current team, who could appreciate a sense of the program’s lineage. “With some luck, maybe I’ll have the opportunity to coach the son of a former player,” he says, breaking into a smile as he notes how much he enjoyed seeing the children at the event. “I guess that would make me a grand-coach!”
Since arriving at Lawrenceville as a Second Former in 1979, Ron Kane has become synonymous with Big Red athletics.
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TAKE THIS JOB & LOVE IT
NOT YOUR GRANDFATHER’S SOCKS Inspired by their elegant forebear, Sage Disch ’09 and his brother took foot fashion to a new level of style.
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emember when a man’s sock drawer might be filled with all the colors? Blue, black, and gray, that is? On the weekend, a fella might even select a muted pattern, or sport an argyle look on the golf course, but was likely careful not to step too far out of line. After all, there’s nothing wrong with self-expression; that’s what ties are for. To hear Sage Disch ’09 explain it, that’s a tenet from another time. For Disch and many other stylish young men, haute couture is experiencing a renaissance, and that means socks are putting their best foot forward, too. That’s why he and older brother Cody Disch established Ace & Everett, makers of sophisticated, high-quality, made-in-the-U.S.A. socks for men. With spring colors and patterns like The Casper in siren red, and The Finn in blustery blue, Ace & Everett brings a chic urban sensibility to modern foot fashion, but in a way that remains very much in step with old-fashioned value. It’s an approach Disch says was inspired by their late grandfather, Raymond Everett Disch Sr., the World War II veteran whose middle name inspired their company moniker. “He was always known for an immaculate
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attention to detail, in both personal attire as well as in his public life,” Disch explains of the man who returned from the war to found a construction company. “He was the type of guy who would show up to a worksite in a three-piece suit, and not only is he the first entrepreneur in our family, but also the gentleman who taught us the lesson of never distinguishing between a professional polish and a signature style.” Raymond Disch’s penchant for style was passed down to his grandsons, who now champion his outlook. “I got more into fashion design when I was at Lawrenceville, and I was trying to understand how I could use clothing as a form of selfexpression and differentiate myself while still dressing within the dress code,” says Disch of the company’s origins, noting that Cody, an avid sneaker collector, was similarly fascinated by design, color, and pattern. As Sage was finishing up his bachelor’s degree in sociology at Haverford College, and Cody was attending Brooklyn Law School, they noticed their personal interests were aligning with a movement in men’s style. “We saw that there was this massive change in men’s fashion from a societal level, where guys were really starting to pay attention, to care for, and to understand branding, design, fit, and
quality,” Sage says. “On top of that, we saw that the workplace was becoming more casual. Ties were on their way out, and socks were replacing them as the quintessential vehicle for male selfexpression. We saw all of this happening, and we didn’t see anyone out there who was doing a design-driven, high-quality, American-made sock.” Disch explains how this evolution in consumer consciousness is also tied to a distinct Millennialgeneration ethos concerned with authenticity and care for a product’s origins. “I think that’s something that we’ve been very focused on since our founding: being authentic, telling a true, genuine story, having transparency around how and where our products are made, and what type of materials we’re using,” Disch says. Ace & Everett began producing socks in early 2014 after a successful fundraising campaign on Kickstarter, an online funding platform for creative projects, and with the money in place, it was time to launch the brand. They partnered with a fifth-generation, family-owned and -operated mill in North Carolina currently run by three brothers. Disch says the appeal of the family-operated business was obvious to him and Cody, and enhances the story they want Ace & Everett to tell.
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“When we went down there to visit the facility, there was a family connection,” he says. “There was a mutual appreciation and dedication to quality, as well as the capacity to be able to continue to grow and scale, so we’ll be able to maintain this partnership and grow alongside them.” Bolstered by inventive promotions such as its Boys Club, through which subscribers receive a new pair of socks not available for individual sale on the first of every month, Ace & Everett now sees its products carried by boutique shops in a dozen states, as well as Puerto Rico and Japan, and online. The company’s designs are evocative of New York City architecture; for instance, The Blake is redolent of construction-site fencing but stylized with a classic medallion jacquard.
With a distinctly cosmopolitan backdrop, each season’s suave styles lend themselves well to the kind of fashion photography made for the age of Instagram. In fact, the brand’s account on the popular photo-sharing social medium showcased a series of dramatic, first-person perspective shots with Ace & Everett-clad feet dangling from various Manhattan skyscrapers. After appearing on the online news outlet Buzzfeed, the story and the dizzying photos went viral, and the subsequent buzz helped to catapult Ace & Everett into the public consciousness. The brothers also spent several weeks on the road last spring promoting their brand on their Great American Road Trip. They were able to speak with retailers in a number of cities, but also detoured well off the beaten path. The brothers’
willingness to inject themselves into totally unfamiliar cultural milieux, such as the Louisiana Bayou, made for rather unexpected imagery. “What we were trying to do, especially around content marketing, are events that are visually compelling and eye-catching, and that have the potential to be shared in a viral component,” Disch explains. “The Road Trip was that as an opportunity to get out there, to physically interact with customers, wholesalers, and different creatives in each one of the cities that we stopped in, and let them know, ‘Hey, we are two brothers who are extremely dedicated and passionate about our company and about our product.’” Sock it to your sense of style at aceandeverett.com.
Sage Disch ’09 doesn’t require the Manhattan backdrop to display the cosmopolitan sense of style he’s built into Ace & Everett.
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Q&A
TABLE TALK
WHAT’S HAPPENING INSIDE THE CLASSROOM AT LAWRENCEVILLE? As a teenager, Jason VonWachenfeldt, Ph.D., imagined becoming a minister in his Evangelical Christian faith, but a serious illness in college changed his focus. Now, as a religion and philosophy master, he helps Lawrenceville students learn more about the plurality of faiths they encounter every day, as
well as to examine many of life’s often unknowable questions. VonWachenfeldt explained to The Lawrentian how staring at death spurred him to make meaning of life.
College is a time when many students are trying to figure out how they fit into the “Big Picture,” but you were also wrestling with your own mortality. Exactly, but what was really interesting for me, though, was that in the form of Evangelical Christianity I’d been raised with, the goal was “heaven.” There was even a kind of idolizing of the martyrs who sacrificed everything, and I think for me, I got to the point where I was like, You know what? I don’t really want to die.
That’s a pretty strong pivot. You’ve earned three degrees that involve religion and/or philosophy. In what part of your life is that rooted?
What made you want to approach religion and theology from a more philosophical point of view?
I was raised in a traditional, very religious Christian home, and I thought when I went to college that I was going to actually be a minister. Then I got there [the University of Mary Hardin-Baylor] and found that, rather than learning things in order to be a minister, I actually liked learning philosophy and theology.
I guess the biggest thing that shifted was when I was a sophomore in college and I was diagnosed with a brain tumor. That experience, in line with my education, completely changed my outlook, my philosophy, and my way of seeing the world. It left me with a lot more questions than answers.
There’s a relationship between those lines of study, no?
It fueled a kind of searching, a quest to learn what to do with these questions, like what does it mean? It drove me to think it was less important for me to be a formal minister, and more to search all these questions; to think about the broader issues that came up with this: Whether there is a God, or is there a purposed meaning to my life, or to anyone’s life?
I like to think of theology as philosophy applied to religious beliefs, so that became my passion and drive. I realized, Oh, I don’t really want to do ministry, per se, but I find these kinds of questions very interesting. They’re something that a lot of people have.
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What kind of questions?
There’s something really valuable to life right here, so it made me ask questions more like “what does it mean to make meaning of life right now?” Not that it necessarily contradicts that [Evangelical] tradition, but it made me ask, “Is that the perspective I want to take?”
You earned a master’s degree in systematic theology at the Union Theological Seminary in New York before your Ph.D. at Georgetown. How did you realize that you connected with teaching as a career? Before my diagnosis, I worked as a youth minister so I was teaching, but more in a confessional way. I guest-lectured and substituted at an independent school in North Carolina before going to grad school, and I enjoyed it. Then I was a teaching assistant at Georgetown and taught my own course there as I was finishing up my Ph.D.
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What directed you to Lawrenceville? Right before I was about to defend my dissertation, we started a recurring graduate-and-faculty poker night. One night, a buddy of mine, who had been a teaching fellow here before he went to the Ph.D. program at Georgetown, said, “Hey, you know, this school in New Jersey where I taught is looking for somebody, and I think you’d be great for it.” I told him I wasn’t really thinking about teaching high school, and he said, “You have no clue what you’re talking about. You have to go check this out.”
Lawrenceville probably wasn’t the kind of high school you were imagining. Yeah, I say that it functions more like a small liberal arts college. I feel like by coming here, I fell into my vocation. This is probably the best place for me to be and that goes with House-mastering, too. Being there to help students, talk through problems, and help them to grow as persons … I love that.
It is, in a sense, a type of ministry. In its own way. It’s a very nonreligious ministry, but, yeah.
This campus provides such a rich diversity of faiths. Does that in any way shape the Religion and Philosophy curriculum?
What do you mean when you say the “skills of religion”?
We had an intro course about world religions and when I got here [in 2014], you would cover three to five of the major world religions, exposing students to them, and talk about it. After my first year here, Thomas Collins [chair of the Religion and Philosophy Department] asked me how I felt about the class. I said I felt like we were rushing because it’s a one-term class. How can you teach any religious tradition in two weeks?
We look at what it means to read religious texts or practices, and from a religious studies point of view, what it means to write about it and what some of the problems are. We focus on what it means to critique and how you critique from a religious studies perspective. It’s not a matter of saying “you’re wrong,” but rather, pointing out what lenses are being used, who’s being left out of this conversation, and ask, Why is that important?
That’s a pretty frank assessment. How did he receive it?
Understanding religion has many practical, secular applications, too, no?
He said, “Well, if you could do it differently, what would you do?” I said I would focus more on the skills of religion before exposing students to the other traditions.” He said, “Do it.” We want students to be exposed to the different traditions of the world, but we also want to give them a place that shows them that even if you’re completely nonreligious or have no personal religious belief, there’s a place for you in religious studies. It’s a place to study the phenomena of religion.
Right. John Kerry actually made a statement about that as secretary of state, how one of the most important things in geopolitics today is a clear understanding of world religions.
Students today are so highly attuned to diversity and respect. Does that ever hinder honest conversation around the Harkness table? I’ll usually ask on the first day if anyone comes from a religious background, and if so, which? And one thing I didn’t necessarily anticipate is that 85 to 90 percent will say, “Well, my parents
are Presbyterian but I’m not religious.” Or, “My parents are Muslim, but I’m not religious.” So they’re coming here saying, “That’s not my identity, that’s not who I am,” which allows them to feel more comfortable. I think because of this, a lot of them don’t feel like they’re attacking somebody if they talk about someone else’s faith in critical terms.
Do you get feedback from students after a course who might say, “This is really not what I expected”? Yes, but I actually get it more from parents who say, “My son was never interested in religion, but he loves this course,” or, “She came back with all these interesting questions, and it made me wonder: What are you studying? What are you doing?”
That must be gratifying, knowing you helped spur that level of curiosity. I definitely think a lot of students really get excited about the idea of having a space where they can actually question it and think through. It’s kind of a safe space, if you will, to just open up and go into that kind of examination. That’s actually kind of rare.
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ASK THE ARCHIVIST
Whither the ‘Missing’ Window? BY SARAH MEZZINO
After a pair of century-old clues, a search for a missing Tiffany memorial yields an unexpected result.
T
hree of us were seated in Buckley’s Tavern, in Delaware, celebrating the September 2015 opening of the Tiffany Glass: Painting with Color and Light exhibition at the nearby Winterthur Museum, Garden,
and Library, when I made the declaration:
“Lawrenceville has Tiffany leaded glass windows in the Chapel…” Around the table, there was a significant pause
in the conversation following my words. My companions for the day, both from The Neustadt – the premier repository of Tiffany lamps, windows, and sheet glass from Louis Comfort Tiffany’s enterprise – were taken by surprise. To my immediate left was Morgan Albahary ’10, The Neustadt’s curatorial and collections assistant, and across from her was Lindsy Parrott, the museum’s director and curator. Morgan was the first to break the silence: “I’m going to check ‘The List’ tomorrow!” The “list” to which Morgan referred was Tiffany Studios’ A Partial List of Windows. Originally
published in 1910 as a marketing tool for the company, it now serves as a general catalogue of historic commissions – but it is general. Tiffany selected specific commissions for the publication, though The List does not record every window the company created. The Neustadt consults The List almost daily. Morgan quickly identified three commissions for the Edith Memorial Chapel at The Lawrenceville School: Medallion Windows, Ornamental Windows, and the Boyd Memorial Window, titled “Easter Morning.” I could not have been more surprised: “We have a memorial window!?”
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I had been in the chapel dozens of times and could easily recall the Medallion Windows – six large, predominantly yellow, opalescent glassworks that featured Judeo-Christian scenes from the Old and New Testaments that flank the nave. I could even recall the jewel-toned brilliance of the ornamental windows, festooned with quatrefoils and enclosed in garland representing the four apostles, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, which rest to the left and right of the pipe organ situated in the apse. But where was the Boyd Memorial Window? And who, for that matter, was Boyd? Maureen Kane P’20, the archives assistant in Lawrenceville’s Stephan Archives, and I did a cursory examination of the Chapel, followed by a second, in-depth, onsite inspection with Morgan. We read every plaque and gazed endlessly at each of the medallions, hoping that one of them was a representation of “Easter Morning,” and even searched for physical hints of past construction. (We theorized that perhaps the window had been removed from the Chapel.) I even went so far as to request entry to the turret and bell tower to see if the window was situated in this obscure section of the building. Sadly, our efforts were fruitless. Without evidence from the present to indicate what happened to the window, we had to focus our search on the past. Edith Memorial Chapel was designed by the architecture firm of Peabody & Stearns and
constructed in 1895. By this time, Louis Comfort Tiffany (1848-1933) had built an established business and reputable career. The son of Charles Lewis Tiffany (1812-1902), who founded Tiffany & Co., Louis C. Tiffany began as a painter who had an aptitude for depicting color and light. Transitioning artistic mediums was inevitable with his talent, and by the late 1870s he was experimenting with glass. In 1885 the younger Tiffany began his own decorative arts firm, which capitalized on the religious building boom in the late nineteenth century. Commissions for ecclesiastical work soared, and in 1889 he created a department solely dedicated to this endeavor. The Ecclesiastical Department would ultimately become Tiffany’s most successful and enduring business venture. Tiffany was heavily involved in his business and would visit departments weekly. He hired both men and unmarried women as designers and gave them public credit for their work. These designers would often collaborate on projects depending on their individual talents. The most notable window designer within the Ecclesiastical Department was Frederick Wilson (1858-1932), a native of England who studied art. Wilson was heavily influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites and would ultimately gain fame for the charismatic figures he created in glass. Tiffany not only financially supported his
Left: This Tiffany Studios stained glass, titled “Easter Morning,” is prominently featured at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church in Charleston, S.C. It would be identical to one commissioned by Peter Boyd in 1909 to hang in Edith Memorial Chapel in honor of his son, Malcolm Boyd, Class of 1910, who died during his Fourth-Form year. Below: The apse of Edith Memorial Chapel prior to a late1960s renovation to install a pipe organ shows the placement of several Tiffany windows.
employees, but he created an image and artifact library for them to reference while developing commissions. He sourced images from galleries during his travels (he did two grand tours) and encouraged his designers to blend regional styles to create a distinctly American look. Because Wilson joined the firm in 1893, there was a chance that the Boyd Memorial Window would have been designed by him and would have been uniquely American in style. Records regarding the Boyd Memorial Window in the Stephan Archives were sparse. A single article from The Lawrence, dated October 2, 1909, surfaced. Headlined “New Window for the Chapel,” the account indicated that Peter Boyd of Philadelphia offered the School a Tiffany window for the Chapel in honor of his son, Malcolm Boyd, Class of 1910, who had died the previous April. The window was to be a replica of another Tiffany work that rested at a church in Charleston, South Carolina, and would depict the “Three Marys at the Tomb.” Malcolm Boyd’s student record yielded a bit of information, but even more mystery. Malcolm Peter Boyd was born February 13, 1893, and died April 16, 1909, from typhoid fever as a Fourth Former living in Dickinson House. Shoved into the student record amongst application materials and correspondence was an onion-skin carbon copy of a letter, presumably written by Head Master Simon J. McPherson. It reads:
“…A memorial window to Malcolm in the Lawrenceville Chapel is very handsome and generous. Personally, I should greatly like to see a memorial to Malcolm here where he was so highly regarded, and such a window as you suggest would be a fine dignified ornament to our Chapel. I approve of the subject proposed. But the Trustees still insist upon my lying fallow until September 1st. As you know, Mr. [Charles] Raymond has been put in charge by them not only actually but formally. I have tried to communicate with Mr. [Henry] Green to give your plan my personal approval but I have been unable so far to reach him. I am now turning your letter ov[er]…Raymond who will submit it to Mr. Green, the President…” SPRING
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Lindsy Parrott and Morgan Albahary ’10 of The Neustadt review samples of Tiffany glass with Sarah Mezzino, the curator of decorative arts and design for the Stephan Archives at Bunn Library, who researched the “missing” Boyd Memorial Window.
When McPherson took a medical leave in 1909, Charles Raymond was appointed interim head master. One wonders whether Raymond, or even Henry Green, the president of the Board of Trustees, rejected the memorial. Or did they relocate the window to a different building on campus? Surely, leaded glass windows would have been stylistically appropriate for the architecture of the Circle; original Peabody & Stearns schematics depicted windows with intricate panes. But, with a religious subject matter, the Chapel would still be the most logical location for such a window. After I contacted Morgan with the information, Maureen and I began to pull records on the Chapel.
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To our disappointment, we discovered that, like Boyd and the window, there was very little information on the Chapel in the Archives. We spent a year searching through records to learn that the Chapel had undergone one significant renovation – the apse was reconfigured to accommodate a pipe organ in 1968. Construction was extensive. Several Tiffany windows were removed and the shape of the apse was changed from a half-circle to a rectangle. From the few historic photos and drawings that exist to document the project, the windows appeared to be ornamental. There was, however, still a chance that the Boyd Memorial Window was originally in this space.
With records lacking, I searched for recollections. As I began to contact a list of longtime campus stalwarts to ask if they could remember a window fitting the description from The Lawrence anywhere in the Chapel or on campus, I received an email from Morgan at The Neustadt. She had located an “Easter Morning” Tiffany window dating from 1897 at St. Michael’s Episcopal Church in Charleston, and she had even found a photograph of the window on the social media site Pinterest! Even though the leaded glass window appeared exactly as it was described – Three Marys at the Tomb – the color and texture of the glass created an almost ethereal quality, especially through the undulating tones of
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The Neustadt, in New York City, is the premier repository of Tiffany lamps, windows, and sheet glass, such as these samples, from Tiffany Studios.
green in the rocky landscape. The figures were quintessentially Wilson in design, marked by flowing Pre-Raphaelite gowns. I attached the photograph in my correspondence to the list of Lawrenceville long-timers and awaited their responses with hope. In both the representations of the Three Marys and its landscape, the Pinterest image of “Easter Morning” displayed the use of several types of glass with never-before-seen colors created by English master craftsman Arthur T. Nash at Tiffany’s behest. In addition to the company’s exquisite use of color in glass, Louis encouraged the use of textured and patterned glass. Drapery glass, fan glass, feather glass,
ripple glass, hammered glass, and glass jewels all have three-dimensional qualities that enhance depictions such as the cloth folds of garments or angels’ wings. If the Boyd Memorial Window was a variation of “Easter Morning,” it was certainly a precious piece of art and craftsmanship from Tiffany’s studio. My inquiries were returned with a resounding “no” – not one person remembered seeing the Boyd Memorial Window in the Chapel or on campus. I relayed the news to Morgan and Lindsy from The Neustadt. Lindsy’s response was pragmatic: There were a few instances of commissions mentioned in A Partial List of Windows not actually being fabricated. Perhaps
Boyd’s window fell into this category? It was a reasonable theory and much more palatable than a second alternative. Dr. Richard Guy Wilson, chair of the Architectural History Department at the University of Virginia, told me that the popularity of Tiffany’s ecclesiastical windows fell drastically following his death in 1933. Between approximately 1940 and 1960, these windows were often removed and discarded. Morgan, however, procured another bit of hope. She had randomly entered the name “Boyd” into the Lawrenceville website’s search engine and came across an article written in 2013 about the bronze statue in rotunda of the Fathers Building. The bronze has three names – “The Boy with the Thorn” or “Spinario” or “Marsia” – and was given to the School by Austin Boyd. I attempted to locate donation records for more information in the archives, the Alumni & Development Office, and the Hutchins Gallery, but my search failed. I did discover through Ancestry.com that Austin Boyd was Malcolm’s older brother. Days later, weary from research and doubtful of any further discoveries, I randomly entered “Marsia” into the Stephan Archives’ digital database of historic Lawrence issues, and was stunned to see the headline “The Malcolm Boyd Memorial – School Presented with Beautiful Statue” immediately appear. I had typed Malcolm’s name into the database dozens of times but it never linked to this article – the linchpin to our search. Such are the perils of technology. Peter and Austin Boyd donated the statue of Marsia, along with several prints depicting early American history – and not a Tiffany window – to The Lawrenceville School. Peter is recorded as saying in the January 21, 1911, issue of The Lawrence:
“I am very glad to be able to be back today to present to The Lawrenceville School the statue of Marsia … It is an exact copy of the original bronze, which is now in the Capitoline Museum in Rome … Malcolm had always admired the statue and his brother … Austin is giving the Marsia on account of its beauty, as a memorial, and on account of the legend connected to it … The statue stands for all time symbolical of loyalty and devotion.”
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The statue of Marsia was placed outside the doors of the original auditorium in Memorial Hall (now the Heely Room) and was eventually relocated to the Pop Hall rotunda. Its symbolism proves relevant to this experience as well. Without loyalty and devotion, we would never have found a conclusion to our search for the Boyd Memorial Window nearly two years after we began. And, to an extent, the conclusion is still forthcoming. Morgan has identified twenty-five renditions of “Easter Morning” windows created by Tiffany that exist across the United States and that number continues to grow. Additionally, as I write, Lindsy, Morgan, and I continue to research the existing Tiffany ornamental and medallion chapel windows. The medallion windows are especially interesting and may indeed lead to our next campus adventure into the past. Z Thanks to Sarah Mezzino, the curator of decorative arts and design for the Stephan Archives at Bunn Library, for sharing her story in this special edition of “Ask the Archivist.” Archivist Jacqueline Haun’s column will return in the summer. Top: Morgan Albahary ’10, The Neustadt’s curatorial and collections assistant, examines a piece of Tiffany sheet glass under light. Bottom: The statue of Marsia, which still stands proudly in the rotunda of Pop Hall, was originally placed outside the doors of the original auditorium (now the Heely Room) in Memorial Hall in memory of Malcolm Boyd, Class of 1910. The statue, a gift from his family, was the manifestation of an idea originally conceived by Boyd’s father as a stained-glass rendering of Tiffany’s “Easter Morning” to hang in the Chapel.
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BY SEAN RAMSDEN • PHOTOGRAPHY BY MICHAEL BRANSCOM
The cancer research of two Lawrenceville classmates is shining brightly for Penn Medicine.
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John Y.K. Lee ’90, M.D., M.S.C.E., performs an endoscopic transsphenoidal resection of a pituitary tumor using intraoperative molecular imaging – known more colloquially as glowing tumor technology – a process he pioneered with Lawrenceville classmate and current Penn Medicine colleague Sunil Singhal ’90, M.D. Here, Lee and Penn Medicine residents, fellows, and students focus their view on an auxiliary monitor, on which the tumor appears to glow.
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rancie Howat makes no bones about it: She is alive and cancerfree today because of an innovative tumor-detection process that makes cancerous cells appear to glow in bright, fluorescent hues under near-infrared light. After being referred to the University of Pennsylvania’s Abrahamson Cancer Center, Howat went in for surgery to remove a tumor from the lower-right lobe of her right lung. Even as she went under anesthesia, Howat believed she was being treated for that solitary mass. “But then they went searching around and spotted the other one,” says Howat, a resident of Delaware County, Pennsylvania, in a video provided by Penn Medicine. To Sunil Singhal ’90, M.D., her thoracic surgeon, the unexpected find only lent additional credence to the use of the process – known officially as intraoperative molecular imaging – in which the fluorescent dye is injected into patients an hour or two before surgery. “We have gone in to perform a routine operation, but all of a sudden now, because tumors are glowing, we can find other cancers we aren’t expecting,” Singhal says. Howat’s second tumor was removed during the clinical trial and determined to be cancerous. “It really was a game changer for her, because here we have somebody who would have had [what we believed was] a very successful cancer operation, but she would’ve come back three years later with other spots, and she likely would have died,” he says. “And fortunately, we caught these spots when they were still under a centimeter. We were able to take them out, and she didn’t need chemo or radiation or any further therapy.” Howat, who is now 100 percent cancer-free, sees her good fortune in the clearest terms. “If I had gone to any other facility that didn’t have the green dye that’s attracted to lung cancer,” she says, “they never would’ve found the second tumor.” Singhal and his Lawrenceville classmate, John Y.K. Lee ’90, M.D., M.S.C.E., associate professor of neurosurgery and co-director of the Center for Precision Surgery at Penn, have collaborated over the past three years to develop the use of the innovative technique, which not only allows surgeons to better detect cancerous masses, but to localize them, as well. And though their research continues, Singhal and Lee’s groundbreaking studies have been published in such esteemed medical journals as Neurosurgery and Annals of Thoracic Surgery. This investigational approach, which is awaiting approval from the Food and Drug Administration, owes its success to the injectable dye, which is engineered to accrue in cancerous tissues at a concentration significantly higher than in normal tissues. Prior to surgery, patients receive the dye, which causes cancer cells – many of which would normally be invisible to CT scans – to glow under near-infrared light. The affected cells normally take on a green hue, though Lee says the color can be determined at will by surgeons.
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A view of near-infrared (NIR) imaging beneath the brain’s dura layer during surgery to remove a glioblastoma. Superimposed over the visible light image, the glowing, bright yellow/red NIR image helps Lee and Singhal localize tumors and potentially identify residual disease.
“We can make the color anything we want, because the near-infrared is not a real color,” he explains. “It fluoresces in a part of the spectrum that we cannot see with our own eyes, so it’s a pseudocolor representation. We often pick green because usually when we’re operating, there’s nothing else that’s green.” Singhal hatched the concept in 2007 after performing lung-cancer surgery on a college-age woman. The procedure had initially seemed successful, but within four months, there was a recurrence of the tumor. “What surprised me – shocked me, really – about that case was that the tumor came back right where we had been operating three or four months
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“I started thinking, why is it that even though surgeons take out half these patients’ tumors, they still develop a recurrence about one out of every three times?” Singhal says. “The idea came to me that it would be great if we could make these tumors glow.”
Nearly thirty years after training together for their respective sports as Lawrenceville classmates, Lee and Singhal are now teaming up to save lives at Penn Medicine through their use of the innovative glowing tumor technology. Behind them is Thomas Eakins’ 1889 oil painting, The Clinic of Dr. Agnew, at Pennsylvania Hospital.
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John Y.K. Lee ’90, M.D., M.S.C.E., an associate professor of neurosurgery, is the co-director of the Center for Precision Surgery at the University of Pennsylvania.
earlier. I couldn’t believe it. We had just been there,” he recalls. “It really made me start thinking about ways we can make sure that when a surgeon does the operation right the first time to get everything out.” Singhal says that 1.7 million people develop solid cancers each year, and roughly half of them opt for surgery to remove the tumor, which is seen as the most direct route to a cure. “I started thinking, why is it that even though surgeons take out half these patients’ tumors, they still develop a recurrence about one out of every three times?” he recalls. “The idea came to me that it would be great if we could make these tumors glow.”
Inside the Penn Medicine Thoracic Surgery Research Laboratory, which he directs, Singhal and his team worked for years to develop the right kind of dye before turning their attention to camera systems that would help surgeons better visualize the tumors and concentrate the effect of the dye by eliminating the other light entering the camera. “When you see light, you see red, yellow, green, and blue, but if you could shut down yellow, green, blue, you would see the red ten times brighter,” explains Singhal, who is also an associate professor of surgery. “This is the same concept. We were developing cameras to see if we could see just one wavelength that would make the tumor brighter.” By the time the clinical experiments advanced to trials on human subjects, Singhal and his friend, Lee, were ready to forge ahead and apply the new technology to neurosurgery. “John and I have been good friends for a long time, going back to our days at Lawrenceville. In our conversations, John started identifying new direction based on how well it was working in lung cancer,” Singhal says. “He said, ‘Why don’t we try it on brain tumors?’” Lee asked Tamara Turman, who was diagnosed with a brain tumor after complaining of terrible headaches and compromised coordination, to participate in a clinical study. She would be the first brain tumor patient to undergo surgery using intraoperative molecular imaging at Lee’s scalpel. “It really was remarkable. As a surgeon, I see a lot of amazing things and this was like a light bulb,” Lee says in another Penn Medicine video. “The tumor was a bright as a light bulb. Based on her MRI, and based on my impression, this would be considered a gross total resection – everything is out.” Lee says that one key advantage of intraoperative molecular imaging is the ability to see cancerous masses through the dura mater, the tough, leathery covering of the brain. “The brain is soft; it’s kind of like tofu, and the tumor is embedded in the tofu,” he explains. “Normally, you have to open the covering before you can even see the tumor, but the dye is in the near-infrared range, and the near-infrared range is longer than visible light. Longer wavelengths can penetrate through tissues. It’s the reason why radio waves can go through walls and you can listen to music even though you’re inside the house. So, sometimes, depending on how deep it is and how much dye accumulated, I can see where the tumor is located even before I’ve opened the cover to the brain, which is incredible.” Turman, a diabetes care specialist, says her experimental brain surgery has made all the difference to her. “Dr. Lee, I always tell him, he saved my life,” she says.
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hirty years ago, John Lee and Sunil Singhal arrived at Lawrenceville as Second Formers. Lee commuted daily from his parents’ home in North Brunswick, New Jersey, while Singhal took up residence in Dawes House before moving on to Kennedy. The pair were both talented students and competitive athletes, and Singhal recalls a friendship forged in part by training together for their respective sports. “John and I actually use to work out a little bit together, because he was on the wrestling and crew teams and I was on the swim team,” he says. “We spent a lot of days working out at the gym together and eating in the dining halls afterwards.” “But then he went to Dartmouth, and I went to Yale, and we lost track of each other for a few years,” says Lee, who studied molecular biophysics and biochemistry in New Haven. He did not enroll there with the intention of becoming a surgeon. “Yale is well known for its legal scholars, politicians, and study of history, while I was science-oriented,” Lee says. “But Yale’s education taught me cutting-edge scholarship, so I was very focused on next-generation science and biologic sciences.” He wound up returning to New Jersey to attend Rutgers – Robert Wood Johnson Medical School, and although he was already interested in cancer as a field, Lee says it was more as a researcher. His future in neurological surgery was not quite apparent to him – yet. “It’s not like I had any real knowledge or understanding of brain surgery,” says Lee, who did his summer cancer research at Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York. “I don’t have any doctors in my family. My parents always told me I should be a doctor, but my dad worked for the telephone company as an information technologist, and my mom was a homemaker.” In many ways, however, it was the tactile, applied skills he earned working side by side on weekends with his father that sparked Lee’s interest in surgery. “My dad was an immigrant from Seoul, South Korea, and he owned multiple rental properties in New Jersey. We spent every weekend fixing toilets, repainting walls, troubleshooting plumbing, and doing electrical work,” he says. “Watching my dad sweat a copper pipe, and then solder a joint together, and trying to figure out: Why isn’t it working? Well, it’s still wet because we couldn’t close that one valve tight enough, so water’s still leaking, which is why I can’t heat it up … It was just little things like that. I gained a very practical, hands-on knowledge, and using my hands like that helped me go into surgery, because that’s such a practical field. It was a formative experience.” Singhal’s path to the operating room was a bit more direct, though he also drew inspiration from a member of his family. “I was actually a physics and math major [at Dartmouth]. I thought I was going to major in engineering or physics,” he says. “But I have an older brother [Arun Singhal ’83, M.D.] who went to
“John and I together have done more of these cases than anybody in the country, if not the world,” Singhal says, adding that the technology is now being applied to a list of tumors that includes thymoma, esophageal cancer, prostate cancer, and bladder cancer. “We’ve exploded in terms of productivity in the last year or two, and it’s really beginning to redefine all of cancer surgery.”
Sunil Singhal ’90, M.D., an associate professor of surgery, is the director of the Penn Medicine Thoracic Surgery Research Laboratory.
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“It really was remarkable. As a surgeon, I see a lot of amazing things, and this was like a light bulb,” Lee says. “The tumor was a bright as a light bulb.” Lawrenceville and ended up pursuing medicine. He really liked it, and that enticed me. He became a thoracic surgeon, and I followed in his footsteps to become a thoracic surgeon. It was a great decision. I love what I do.” Even during his undergraduate days, however, Singhal says his career still wasn’t in focus. “When I went to Dartmouth, the biggest thing in my life at the time was swimming,” he says. “I was really into the sport and had a great time doing it.” Still, he kept moving forward, earning his M.D. from Penn before spending seven years in residency at Johns Hopkins, where he became a cardiothoracic surgeon. He returned to Penn in 2005 as a fellow in cardiothoracic surgery and joined the faculty of Penn’s Perelman School of Medicine in 2008. All the while, Lee was also making a name for himself in the field of neurosurgery. After seven years as a resident at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, which boasts one of the top neurosurgical training programs in the country, he arrived at Penn Medicine in 2005 and was asked to direct the Gamma Knife program, the hospital’s focused radiosurgery program for brain tumors. Before long, Lee and Singhal realized that a decade and a half after graduating from Lawrenceville, their paths had crossed again. “When we first arrived, even before all of this glowing tumor business, before he had even conceptualized this idea, we went to Sesame Place with our kids,” Lee says of the Sesame Street theme park in Langhorne, Pennsylvania. “We talked about collaborating then. We had some different ideas, but he was working on different topics, and we didn’t really find any major common interests. I operate in the brain; he operates in the lungs.” Meanwhile, Singhal’s research at the Thoracic Surgery Research Laboratory progressed until he knew the time was right to apply the technique to brain surgery. In doing so, he knew that in Lee, he had a partner he knew he could trust. For all the top medical training and experience they had acquired, their shared experience as teenage students assured Singhal he was collaborating with an ideal partner. “To this day, there are two feelings you get when you meet somebody from Lawrenceville. First is, you know that there’s a work ethic. You know that that person’s going to be a hard worker, and I find enormous value in that,” Singhal says. “The second thing is that there’s a certain value system ingrained in you there. We are taught the importance of contributing to society and moving our civilization forward.” The pair combined to create the Center for Precision Surgery in March
2016, one of several emergent centers of precision medicine at Penn, and since developing intraoperative molecular imaging, they have treated nearly five-hundred cancer patients over nine clinical trials. “John and I together have done more of these cases than anybody in the country, if not the world,” Singhal says, adding that the technology is now being applied to a list of tumors that includes thymoma, esophageal cancer, prostate cancer, and bladder cancer. “We’ve exploded in terms of productivity in the last year or two, and it’s really beginning to redefine all of cancer surgery.” Although the professional linkage he shares with Singhal is on the rise – “absolutely, it’s getting stronger and stronger,” he says – Lee says it has been three decades in the making. “We’re both Lawrentians, we’re both Ivy League grads, we’re both surgeons, we’re both surgeons at Penn, so there are so many lines of connection,” he says. “But it all started at Lawrenceville.”
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We’d love to thank you.
Please tell us if you have included Lawrenceville in your will or living trust, or as a beneficiary of a retirement account or life insurance policy. We want to welcome you to the John Cleve Green Society – alumni, parents, and friends who have committed to keeping our school great for generations to come.
For more information on leaving a bequest to Lawrenceville or for other planned giving opportunities, or if you’ve included Lawrenceville in your will but not yet informed the School, please contact Jerry Muntz at the Lawrenceville Office of Planned Giving at 609-620-6064 or jmuntz@lawrenceville.org, or go to www.lawrenceville.planyourlegacy.org.
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Marcus Montenecourt '87, seen here at his Moscow office, has been helping Lawrenceville connect with talented prospective students in Russia.
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Foreign Service YEARS AFTER LAWRENCEVILLE SPARKED HIS LIFELONG INTEREST IN RUSSIA, MUSCOVITE MARCUS MONTENECOURT ’87 IS DOING GOOD FOR THE SCHOOL. BY SEAN RAMSDEN PHOTOGRAPHY * ALEXANDER ZABEGIN
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t a time when it’s difficult to clearly understand the relationship between the leaders of the United States and Russia, it almost seems like another lifetime when the Cold War animated our understanding of the dynamic between the world’s superpowers. Teenagers in the 1980s came of age as these tensions were also spilling over from the geopolitical realm into pop culture, and they were watching when the Soviet Union was frequently depicted as an ever-looming threat by Hollywood. In November 1983, the ABC movie The Day After, which portrayed the aftermath of a nuclear exchange between the two nations, became the most-watched television film in history. Ironically, it was also in this milieu that a young Marcus Montenecourt ’87 began what became an enduring affair with Russia, its culture, and its language. That autumn, when so many of his peers were turning away from the Russian language as an academic pursuit, the Second
Former decided to embrace it. To Montenecourt, the moment couldn’t have been better. “Oh my gosh, yeah, it was timely. It was everything. As a kid developing a consciousness for world events and globalization, the timing
was perfect,” says Montenecourt, who today is based in Moscow, serving as the vice president international for Europe, Russia/CIS, and Asia for Amsted Rail, a diversified manufacturer of steel and equipment for the global railway industry.
Lawrenceville students enjoyed the opportunity to study abroad in Moscow and St. Petersburg, Russia, in June 2015.
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Learning the language gave Montenecourt his first insights into Russia, but a visit under the tutelage of Harding and Doyle as a Third Former was when he began to connect deeply with the culture.
These two superpowers were battling it out and you see Russian as a way to potentially play a role, to gain an understanding, and potentially be a diplomat to help figure it all out.” Now, thirty years later, Montenecourt – known to friends as “Monty” – has begun to employ diplomacy, of a sort, helping to steer talented and interested Russian students toward the place where it all began for him, Lawrenceville. “Many Russians today still believe that the U.K. has the best boarding-school environments for them, and they’re going for these A-level potential universities in the United States,” Montenecourt says. “But they’re starting to realize now that a better preparatory approach would be to go to a boarding school in the U.S., because a lot of these kids are looking at universities and colleges in the U.S. for their undergraduate education.” To that end, Montenecourt has begun tapping into his extensive network of Russian colleagues, American ex-patriates, and even fellow Lawrenceville alumni – in cooperation with the Admission Office – to help identify qualified students who could benefit from the globally conscious perspectives he acquired as a student. It began simply enough, from talks Montenecourt would give to Lawrenceville students visiting Russia on study aboard trips with Russian Master Tim Doyle ’69 H’79 P’99. “I would give spot lectures to students who came over wanting to know a little bit more about Russian activities and what was going on. I would share what I was doing and a little bit about the flavor of the moment,” Montenecourt explains. “Things like, what was going on with the geopolitical relationship, or business, or the latest crisis, or the ruble diving, or whether oil was up or down – all that stuff.” Montenecourt has spent the past quartercentury in Russia, so he is as culturally and linguistically fluent as many who have lived their entire lives there. But the New Jersey native’s easy facility of all things Russian had a starting
point. When he enrolled at Lawrenceville, Montenecourt started his language requirement by studying Latin, but a bit of pragmatic persuasion by Sam Harding H’85 ’86 P’87 ’89, who taught Russian before becoming an associate dean of admission, helped spark his Russophilia. “Sam was the guy who actually leaned on me at the end of the Latin classes and strongly encouraged me to consider Russian,” Montenecourt says, noting that the political climate of the times had interest in Russian on the wane. “I think his goal was to try to fill the classes so the School didn’t abandon the program. At the time it was suffering. There weren’t a lot of kids interested in taking it, so he strongly encouraged a lot of them. He worked his magic on me, and it took root.” Doyle, who also helped foster Montenecourt’s early interest, says that during the Cold War, it was a particular kind of student who elected to learn Russian. “We always got the kids who were pretty adventurous, the students who felt pretty confident about their ability to take a foreign
language and were willing to sign on,” Doyle says. “There’s no doubt in my mind that the Cold War had added a glamour to the language. Back then, Russian was the language of the enemy.” Learning the language gave Montenecourt his first insights into Russia, but a visit under the tutelage of Harding and Doyle as a Third Former was when he began to connect deeply with the culture. “We went to Moscow, Leningrad, and a couple of Baltic states,” he recalls, noting that the trip was also marked by the sudden death of Konstantin Chernenko, who had succeeded Yuri Andropov as general secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union only the year before. “It was an amazing experience being able to come over, and it was formative for me in terms of impressions and getting to know more about the culture behind the language.” Montencourt’s interest in the language and culture of Russia was also stoked by his friendship with classmate Eugene Kashper ’87, who had recently emigrated from the Soviet Union during their days at the School. “Eugene would invite me over to his dorm
Marcus Montenecourt '87 (center) helped Lawrenceville host a parents' reception at a Moscow restaurant in 2016. Here, he speaks with History Master Cara Hyson P'14 '16 and the parent of a prospective student.
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Imported Intelligence in Kennedy House to hear him call home,” says Montenecourt, who still maintains his friendship with Kashper, the former chief executive office of Pabst Brewing Company who remains the chair of the Pabst board. “I would listen to his spoken Russian and proper pronunciation, and that was very helpful, too.” Montenecourt, who has no familial connection to Russia, continued to feed his interest at Lehigh University, where he majored in economics and Russian area studies, an amalgam of its language, history, and literature. He was able to spend more time abroad through the American Council of Teachers of Russian program as a college sophomore before spending a full year in Russia as part of Middlebury College’s student exchange consortium during his final year at Lehigh. During that final stretch, he was laying the groundwork for a big move. “When I was in school over here, I would scour American companies that were operating in Moscow,” says Montenecourt, who landed a role with Pan American Airlines. Working in their ground operations group, he would log all his hours before the start of the school day. “Then I would get on a bus and go to school, and that led to me getting to know the ex-pat community over here. Before long, I met a couple colleagues of mine who were former students and already working in the service transportation business.” By the time he received his diplomas simultaneously from his Russian university and from Lehigh in 1991, Montenecourt had a job offer in the very place where he had cultivated his network. “I flew back to the U.S. for graduation and was only there for two or three days before I got on a plane again and came back [to Russia] to start my professional career,” he says. “I was already off to the races.” His bilingualism made Montenecourt attractive to Sea-Land Service Inc., an American container shipping line. “They were desperate for U.S. expats who had knowledge of Russian and could
LIKE ITS PEERS, LAWRENCEVILLE RELIES ON A ROBUST MIX OF INTERNATIONAL STUDENTS.
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lthough Lawrenceville’s efforts to enlist students from Russia remain relatively nascent, the School’s focus on attracting international learners is nothing new. As the world becomes increasingly globalized, international recruitment has become a fundamental part of shaping an incoming class for boarding schools across the United States, according to Tom Sheppard, dean
of admission and financial aid at the School. “It’s like any other piece of our enrollment. Managing it, taking care of it, and
being proactive about it is a multifaceted undertaking,” says Sheppard, who came to Lawrenceville in 2008. “It’s like anything else in our process. We have to pick and choose where we can devote our time and resources.” Sheppard says that although Lawrenceville enjoys longstanding relationships in some markets that produce great numbers of applicants, others nations have historically produced far fewer candidates over the same time. Other markets are still in the exploratory stage. “We’re always trying to fine-tune that balance. In some markets like Hong Kong, we have a long history, with a longtime, loyal group of alums, and we do have a significant amount of time and resources there,” he explains. “Other places, like Turkey, we go and see what we can do.” Lawrenceville currently boasts students from an astounding forty countries, and though Sheppard says that reflects the School’s reputation globally, the mix of nations is constantly morphing. “In the early eighties, it became increasingly popular for schools to start recruiting overseas, and they started in Asia because that’s where they were getting the most athletes,” he says, noting that many Asian nations remain a stronghold. “But as things have expanded, schools have started going to Europe, Latin America, and the Middle East. There aren’t too many places that are left untouched by one school or another.” Approximately 15 percent of the School’s current student body has a primary address outside the United States, a figure Sheppard says has remained stable for some time. And while the Admission staff seeks continually to maintain that mix, he admits that having faculty members like Cara Hyson P’14 ’16 and Tim Doyle ’69 H’79 P’99, along with engaged alumni living overseas such as Marcus Montenecourt ’87, pick up the slack is a significant help. “It’s always a balancing act, and Russia’s a good example. I’m so grateful that Cara and Tim, through Marcus, have taken this on, because that was a place, quite honestly, that we were having trouble fitting into our schedule,” Sheppard says. “If you can have consistent numbers of two or three students coming over from a lot of these countries, that’s pretty good. Two or three at any time, they really add flavor to the school.” - S.R. SPRING
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“A lot of kids got left behind. So, Sam got involved in this project called Friends of Russian Orphans, and he collected a bunch of people he knew here to publicize it and fund-raise.”
help them establish a market presence in Russia,” he says. “I became part of the initial team that opened that office, and since then my career has been based in Russia.” Within five years, Montenecourt created his own engineering services transportation and railway business, Transolutions Inc., and ran it for ten years before selling it to the Chicagobased Amsted Rail in 2006. Since then, he has been running Amsted Rail’s operations in Russia, Europe, and Asia – the company’s largest future growth markets – from his base in Moscow. That expansive region represents the entirety of Amsted Rail’s footprint in the northern hemisphere and includes four production facilities in China and Russia. “We’re basically a specialty steel and manufacturing company catering to the railway business. We make a lot of products, such as railway wheels, bearings, undercarriage, and cushioning systems that go into freight and passenger rail cars as well as locomotives,” he says. Montenecourt says the Lawrenceville community living in Russia enjoys a kinship that its members are able to count on when in need. More than a dozen years after graduating from the School, he again has the chance to collaborate with Harding – this time, in the city of Yaroslavl, an industrial city about an hour outside of Moscow. “After Sam retired [from Lawrenceville], he was involved in starting an orphanage for kids whose parents, during the nineties, had just sort of given up,” Doyle recalls of the days following the collapse of the Soviet Union, before the new Russian economy gained its legs. “A lot of kids got left behind. So, Sam got involved in this project called Friends of Russian Orphans, and he collected a bunch of people he knew here to publicize it and fundraise.” Montenecourt was glad to help his friend
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and mentor identify needy orphanages, raising money to rebuild and refurbish them. “The Lawrenceville community is pretty close,” Montenecourt says. “I served on the board with my other buddy, [Moscow resident] Johnathan Sparrow ’81, so we were tapped in helping Sam with the various efforts there.” More recently, Doyle and History Master Cara Hyson P’14 ’16 led another study abroad trip to Russia when they approached Montenecourt about lending a hand with Lawrenceville’s efforts to recruit students to attend the School. He was happy to oblige and last year hosted an alumni event that doubled as an informative open house for interested and prospective students from the Moscow region. “They’re recruiting for the Admission Office from a database of people from Russia who have expressed interest, so we sent all those people invitations to come join the event, and they did,” Montenecourt explains, noting that the first event last June was attended by a slew of prospective students and their parents, as well as educators and guests from the U.S. Embassy, which actively encourages American educators to make presentations to Russian students. “And then I had another alumni event back at my house that Saturday, just trying to build a rapport among the group. We had current Lawrenceville students and alumni, as well as some faculty and prospective students who happened to be here in Moscow,” he says. “It was a fun get-together, and hopefully we’ll make it an annual thing. I’ve kind of signed up for that as long as we’re here.” Montenecourt is looking to boost the number of attendees at this year’s event, based on advertisements in newspapers and journals, but says his relationships in Moscow play pivotal roles, too. “I work very closely with the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia, which
is a membership of five-hundred small and medium-sized U.S. companies and international companies working over here,” he says. “That’s a very fertile ground for getting exposure because they love education. They support U.S. corporate trade and commerce, but they also have a large support mechanism for non-governmental and nonprofits.” Doyle and Hyson are glad to team up with such an enthusiastic, well-connected partner. “What’s great about it is that this was really Marcus’s thing. The idea came from Cara but Marcus underwrote the whole thing. He hired the restaurant and reserved the terrace room for us, and brought the TV and the slideshow,” Doyle says. “It really is a great example of an alumnus who said, ‘I want to give back to the school.’” Montenecourt’s efforts don’t end at the borders of his adopted country. Last spring, he accompanied one interested student, whose father is an associate of his, on his visit to campus. “He’s following kids and directing them toward us,” Hyson adds. “He’s finding people through his network and pushing them in our direction.” Hyson says that though there are very few students from Russian on campus right now, its Russian-speaking culture, led by affinity groups such as the Slavic Circle, is flourishing. “It’s a club on campus for Eastern European students, and that’s one of our recruiting tools,” she says. “We can say, if you’re a Russian student, there are other kids on campus who speak Russian. Not that they’re going to be hanging out with only them, but it's just nice to have a touch of home. “I think it’s good at Lawrenceville to have an idea that’s different, that makes you feel special,” she continues, “because it’s so competitive and hard here.”
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TIME WAS...
Torn str aight
from the pages of past
75 Years Ago in ‘The Lawrentian’ Spring 1942: A War Hero A Lawrenceville father, Vice Admiral William F. Halsey Jr., [left] becomes one of the early heroes of the war. He was decorated in March with the Distinguished Service Medal in recognition of his feat in leading the naval force in the Marshall and Gilbert Islands raid. Later he led the March raids on Wake and Marcus Islands. The admiral’s son, William F. Halsey III, graduated with the Lawrenceville Class of 1934. At that time his father was attached to the Army War College.
50 Years Ago in The Lawrentian Spring 1967: The New Organ… The last daily Chapel service of the winter term was the last service for the old organ. During the vacation work got underway for the renovation of the apse and construction of the new organ. … Until the new organ is installed, in about a year and a half, music for Chapel will be supplied by a small, one-manual organ installed temporarily in the transept on the Mem Hall side. This organ, a more nearly Baroque instrument than the old organ, was originally built in 1899, was purchased by the School, and was installed by Mr. Eugene Kellery of Rider College and Mr. [A. Graham] Down, chairman of the music department.
25 Years Ago in The Lawrentian Summer/Fall 1992:
The Lowering of Old Lower With a cacophony of bangs, boinks, screeches and groans – and a great puff of dust – Old Lower, one of the most gracelessly efficient buildings on the Lawrenceville campus, was methodically dismantled and carted off during the first few weeks of August … The decision to drop Old Lower was made seven years ago in the process of planning the new Crescent Houses, the girls’ residences which until this August had been hidden behind Old Lower’s broad institutional eminence.
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ALUMNI NEWS
THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE
2016/2017 PRESIDENT
Jennifer Ridley Staikos ’91
FIRST VICE PRESIDENT Ian S. Rice ’95
SECOND VICE PRESIDENT David B. Stephens ’78 P’06
EXECUTIVE COMMITTEE Vincent J. “Biff” Cahill, Jr. ’68 P’09 Frederick “Fritz” E. Cammerzell ’68 P’18 Morgan Dever ’06 Bruce L. Hager ’72 Kevin Huang ’05 Charlie C. Keller ’95 Neil Mehta ’02 Greg G. Melconian ’87 Brockett Muir III ’80
ALUMNI TRUSTEES Kathleen W. McMahon ’92 Leigh Lockwood ’65 P’97 ’02 Jonathan G. Weiss ’75 Tim Wojciechowitz ’78 P’06 ’10 ’12
SELECTORS George Arnett ’79 Heather Elliott Hoover ’91 Patricia Gadsden Hill ’01 Mark Larsen ’72 John C. Walsh ’99 Martha “Perry” Nelson ’96
FACULTY LIAISON Timothy C. Doyle ’69 H’79 P’99
FROM THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION PRESIDENT
W
hen this issue of The Lawrentian “hits the shelf,” I will be winding down my days as president of the Alumni Association and ready to welcome our new officers. After three tremendous years as president and over ten consecutive years serving on the Executive Committee, my life will certainly shift. I have greatly enjoyed serving our School in this capacity and am thankful and honored for the opportunity. I am constantly in awe of the great changes to our beautiful campus, but also frequently reminded how “the more things change, the more they stay the same.” The ethos of our School remains unchanged. I vividly recall arriving at Lawrenceville in fall 1989 with my mother and father, nervously excited for what was ahead. I was leaving my parents and five siblings behind, an hour away, and it was a monumental teenage milestone. Driving through the front gates was truly symbolic of the opportunities becoming a Lawrentian would mean, both on that day, and in life. I started drafting this letter by recalling “my” Lawrenceville moments on Post-it notes. My Lawrenceville story unfolded like a storybook in my mind and soon became single words, scribbled on that packet: Masters, friends, athletics, Harkness tables, Houses, the Circle and Crescent, the playing fields, hockey road trips in tiny vans, education, campus, The Jigger, Irwin, Kirby Arts Center, Mem and Pop, Reynolds, the greatest gift, and so much more. My Post-its soon captured my time as an adult – a volunteer, a neighbor, a friend, visits to campus with my children and dogs, “Hill Weekend,” reunions, and everything in between. How would I ever condense it into one letter? In March, my mother joined me for her first visit to campus since my graduation in June 1991. The timing was ironic as I reflected on nearly three decades of life “with” Lawrenceville. Her reaction was how “familiar” the campus was; it felt exactly how she remembered it. While the campus has grown in many ways, it truly is the same School we remember and love. It was evident to her, as much as it always is to me, that the heartbeat of Lawrenceville is its students and alumni. We stood in Lavino Field House and watched happy, energetic Lawrentians laughing, celebrating life, and strengthening their love for Lawrenceville – exactly as we all have done and continue to do. Soon, those enthusiastic students will join us as members of the Alumni Association, continuing to write their own Lawrenceville storybook. For 207 years, Lawrentians have been excellent stewards of our School and through the work of the Alumni Association, they have provided counsel and leadership to ensure the future is just as “familiar” in the centuries ahead. Without exception, all the members of the Committee and all the volunteers with whom I have worked over the past decade have done extraordinary work. I would also like to thank the trustees, the head masters with whom I have worked, the Alumni Office and the many masters, classmates, coaches, and alumni who have been instrumental in the continuing success of our School. All alumni should be grateful to an extraordinary team of volunteers and staff who care so much for our School. Virtus Semper Viridis. Sincerely, Jennifer Ridley Staikos ’91 President, Alumni Association jstaikos@gmail.com
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The years simply melt
BY THE NUMBERS
away when classmates
Same Time, Next Year
return to Lawrenceville for Alumni Weekend. Youthful laughter rings out and old friends are transported across time, even for a few days, to celebrate the spirit of days gone by.
2,347
Number of cheeseburgers consumed at the Saturday picnic in 2016, along with 1,806 hot dogs
8,062
Miles from Hong Kong, the furthest distance an alum has
132
traveled to attend Alumni Weekend, earning the Marco
Total number of victories
Polo Award
versus The Hill School over Alumni Weekend
740
Total hours logged by the Alumni & Development staff over Alumni Weekend
749
1,225
Number of chairs rented for Alumni Weekend 2017
Greatest number of alumni to attend Alumni Weekend,
57
Number, in minutes,
May 2013
of the longest reunion dinner speech given by a classmate (who will remain anonymous)
245
Number of rosettes handed out to Fifth Formers at the pinning ceremony last year, symbolizing prosperity, good fortune, and strength
504
666,748 15,366
Amount, in dollars, presented by the
116
Number of years
Class of 1960 at its
Lawrenceville has held
Total square footage of tents
40th reunion, the largest
reunion gatherings, starting
used for Alumni Weekend
class gift on record
with “Alumni Day� in 1902
T O TA L D I S TA N C E , I N M I L E S , T R AV E L E D F O R S H U T T L E S E R V I C E B E T W E E N T H E H YAT T R E G E N C Y P R I N C E T O N AND CAMPUS EACH YEAR, EQUAL TO THE MILEAGE BETWEEN TRENTON, N.J., AND BAR HARBOR, MAINE.
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STUDENT SNAP: OLALLA DUATO'18
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Lawrentian THE
usps no. 306-700 the Lawrenceville School Lawrenceville, New Jersey 08648 Parents of alumni: If this magazine is addressed to a son or daughter who no longer maintains a permanent address at your home, please email us at vavanisko@lawrenceville.org with his or her new address. Thank you!
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