Volume 26 - Issue 4

TheNewJournal

TheNewJournal P u BLISH ER

Monica Pong

Volume 26 , Number 4

E DIT OR- IN- C H IEF

jose Manuel Tesoro

The magazine about Yale and New Haven

January 28, 1994

MANAGING E DITOR

jay Porter B usi NESS MANAGE R

Cheryl Sheinkopf

STANDAJUDS -----------------------------

D E SIGNER

Caroline Kim

3

About this Issue

20

Between the Vines: Getting In, Coming Out. by Jay Porter.

PRODUCTION MANAGER

joshua Civin PHOTOGRAPHY EDITOR

Katie Brandi Assoc iATE EDITOR

David Gerber Suzanne Kim D EVELOPME NT DIRECTOR

Susan Comins joshua Au"bach • Ekna Chnney Sarah Di]ulio • R~gina G~iin ]acki~ Goldb~rg • John Gorham Adam Grifr • Laura Hodes Sonya ]oo • Ben Lumpkin Edward Kim • Annim Kirchn~r M~lissa Mosko[• Kau Schuler *Elected to staff January 22, 1994

' FEATURES----------~------------------

4

The View from the "Q." by·Kate Schuler. Encounters with Yale students decrease the distance between Dixwell and Yale.

6

Death of the Yale Man. by Elena Cherney. How enduring is the my th ofthe Yale man?

M~mbn-s and Dir~ctors: Edward B. Bennett III • Constance Clement • Peter B. Cooper And y Court • Brooks Kelly • Pa tricia Pierce • Kathy Reich • Fred Strebeigh Thomas Strong

Friends: Anson M. Beard, Jr. • Edward B.

Bennett, Jr. • Edward B. Bennett III Blaire Bennett • Paul S. Bennett • Gerald Bruck • Jonathan M. Clark • Louise F. Cooper • Peter B. Cooper • Jerry and Rae Court • David Freeman • Geoffry Fried Sherwin Goldman • Brooks Kelly • Roger Kirwood • Andrew J . Kuzneski, J r. • Lewis E. Lehrman • E. Nobles Lowe • Peter Neill Julie Peters • Fairfax C. Randal • Nicholas X. Rizopoulos • Arleen and Arthur Sager Dick and Debbie Sears • Richard Shields Thomas Strong Elizabeth Tare • Alex and Betsy Torello • Allen and Sarah W ardell Daniel Yergin

2.

TH£ NEW j OURNAL

12

Through Women's Eyes. by Caroline Kim. Six of Yale's first women share their th oughts on Yale then and now.

17

Back to School. by Clare Connors. For some Yale alums, a Yale education never ends.

Cover Design by Caroline Kim and Jay Porter.

Photos on cover and pages 9, 10, 12, 13 courtesy ofYale Manuscripts and Archives.

Photos on pages 12, 13, and 15 courtesy of Th~ Yak Daily N~s.

(Volume 26. Number 4. TIN Nn~~ ]ourn4/ i.s published five times during the school year by TheN~ journal at Yale, Inc., POSt Off.ce Box 3432 Yale Sation, New Haven, cr 06520. Copyright 1994 by The New journal at Yale, Inc. AU rights reserved. Reproduction either in whole or in part without written permission of the publisher and editor-in-chief is prohibited. This maFne is published by Yale College students, and Yale University i.s not responsible for itS contentS. Eleven thousand cop•es of each issue are distributed free to members of the Yale University community. TIN Nnv ]~is printed by Turley Publications of Palmer, MA. Booldceel'!ng and billing services are provided by Colman Bookkeeping of New Haven, Cf. Office address: 305 Crown Sueet, Office 312. Phone: (203) 432-1957. Subscriptions are available to those outside the Yale community. Rates: One year, $18. Two years, $30. TIN Nnv joiiT1Uliencourages letters to the editor and comments on Yale and New Haven issues. Write to Jose Manuel Tesoro. Editorials, 3432 Yale Sation. New Haven, Cf 06520. All letters for publication must include address and signature. TIN Nnv ]ourruJ reserves the right to edit all letters for publication.

jANUARY

28, 1994

-AaouT THIS IssuE

he only 'A' you need is the 'A' in Yale, " said a Yale student to one of our writers this past summer, echoing an oft-repeated if cynical view on campus, that we pay for the name-and the image-as much as for the education. Many of us come here with stars in our eyes, hoping to partake of an American legend: an academy; bound in traditions older than this nation, that could turn us into presidents and potentates, renowned scholars or respected practicioners of the arts, simply through the mystical resonance of its name.

When we arrive, however, we d iscover that there are two kinds of Yale, the mythic and the quotidian. The image of a campus populated by the young William Howard Tafts or Nathan Hales and led by Nobel laureates or poetphilosophers gives way to the day-to-day cycle of classes, office work, study, research, socializing, meetings, and so on. Only within this university community do we find those who have come to the same realization: our imagined Yale is more real off-campus than on-.

How those who are outside Yale in some way see this university is the subject of this theme issue. We sent our writers as far from our daily Yale as we could, to see if they could discover how Yale looks from the outside. Kate Schuler talked to children and staff at the Dixwell Q House ,, T

about how some in the New Haven community perceive the Yale they encounter. Elena Cherney hit the books to characterize the enduring image of the "Yale Man" i~ literature. Caroline Kim asked some in Yale's first class of undergraduate women how they saw Yale when they were here, and how they see Yale now. Clare Connors also talked to alumni, who have come back to study at the Yale they once knew, about their perceptions of a changed and changing university. And Jay Porter rounds out the issue with a personal look at the image of Yale as a gay school.

We realize that we enter largely uncharted territory by examining others' perceptions of Yale-invading the realm of impressions and ideas, of prejudices and preconceptions. An issue on such a wide-ranging and complex topic can never pretend to be comprehensive, and so we p resent, without apology, a patchwork of images that coexist as well as conflict: traditional, liberal, elitist, egalitarian, homogeneous, diverse, straight-laced, queer. We hope to spark some thoughts about the Yale image, the Yale mystique-because the mythic Yale will be a Yale we will live with long after we have left campus. "Who the hell do you Yalies think you are?" is the question sometimes posed by those with a less-than-complimentary picture of Yale. We answer: We're not sure. You tell us.

-JMT

NEW YEAR, A NEW DESIGN, NEW EDITORS .••

HARSTYl.ES For Men and Women

AND A NEW YOU .

Some things change; others don't. We're always looking for the best writers, photographers, business people and designers on campus. So come and show us your stuff. \

jANUARY 28, 1994

82'12 WsA St. (865-91sn

.,g

Broadway (865-9182)

We t2ITY Malrtx, Nexxus, ~ ..

KMS and Paul Mllchell Products.

No Appointment Nec:e...ry

THE NEw JouRNAL 3

The View from the "Q'' Kate Schuler

Y

ale's austere Gothic buildings dwarf passersby.

Colorful posters plaster gates and kiosks for singing group jams, political forums, and theater productions. The intersection of Elm and High Street, the center of Yale's campus, bustles with purposeful students who have ~ seemingly little regard for the local traffic. ~ A mere three blocks north, boarded up buildings, dilapidated tenements, storefront churches, and funeral homes line pothole-marked Dixwell Avenue. In the center of the Dixwell neighborhood, graffiti-covered plywood blocks the entry to a closed library. A busy intersection attracts clusters of teenagers who idly observe pa$sing cars.

Yale students generally shy away from the Dixwell area: .ÂŁ The literature and safety workshops Yale uses to educate c~ about New Haven make students all too aware of the dangers of attending school in a city. Many students envision crime, drugs, or gang violence lurking beyond the sacred 80 boundaries of the blue phones. Students rarely jog or ride ..c their bikes in Dixwell, opting instead for the safety of c..

Prospect Street. Few students venture north past Payne

1

Whitney Gymnasium, the last Yale edifice before Dixwell Avenue merges with familiar Broadway.

While Yale students shun the Dixwell area, the residents of Dixwell cannot block Yale's presence from their city. The fortress of Old Campus and the cast-iron gates of the residential colleges establish and maintain the division between Yale and New Haven. Yale, one-time home to George Bush (DC '48) and Bill Clinton (LAW '73), seems 4 THE NEw JouRNAL

to many New Haven residents a powerful assembly line for the production of the country's leaders. According to one Dixwell resident, most of his neighbors look at Yale students and "don't see middle class distinctions; all they see is rich, white. They see so few blacks" among Yale students.

Dixwell residents rarely feel that their world and the world of Yale meet on equal ground. The Dixwell Community Q House allows a chance for stereotypes of Yale and Dixwell to break down. The Q House sponsors daycare and educational programs, and provides outreach programs like teen drop-in centers, food d istribution, support groups for parents, peer counseling, and summer camps. In an after-school program, 36 Yale students tutor and help supervise¡ the children who use the facil ity. While both Yale students and Dixwell residents approach the program with preconceived ideas about the "other," they often take away new perspectives.

Diane Brown, program supervisor of the Q House, explains that more negative comments about Yale come from Dixwell residents who have not spent time with Yale students. "I hear people talking about those rich, white... " Her voice trails off; she is reluctant to repeat the words people use to describe Yale students. Often, the pervading perception ofYale students is of their wealth, Brown says. Dixwell residents' perception of Yale as a bastion of privilege makes it difficult for them to believe chat Yalies actually work. Brown tells of a Yale volunteer who left the center early one afternoon, explaining that she had to study for an exam. "One little boy was amazed and said to her, 'You don't need to study, you go to Yale.' This is what the kids think. They're surprised to find out [Yalies] work hard."

The image ofYale students as the idle rich disintegrates as the kids and volunteers spend time together. "It's good when the kids hear that the student may only have one pair of jeans because they can't afford to buy more," Brown comments. "I hear tutors telling the kids about their part-time jobs to help pay for school."

Brown focuses on the black Yale students who visit the Q House as particularly important in challenging stereotypes. "The kids here need someone to say to them, 'Look jANUARY

28, 1994

I'm black, and I go to Yale."

What the kids at the Q House say about their tutors supports Brown's observations. Alicia, 10, is a four-year veteran of the Q. Before she came to the Q House, she thought all Yale students were rich and snobbish. Alicia has changed her opinion, but comments, "My friends at school still think that." Alicia suggested planning a party to thank the Yale volunteers. "They help me a lot with my homework, and they play with us," she says. Six-year-old Parris concurs. Wearing her dark green school uniform, her eyes wide with energy, she speaks freely of her affection for the volunteers. "I love them because they help me, and when they're done they help other people. It's very nice," she says with conviction.

While Yale volunteers go some distance in dispelling their elitist image, not all New Haven residents are convinced of the sincerity of their volunteering. The drive and ambition of Yale students can lead to assumptions that students are simply padding their resumes.

"I can see a lack of zeal, a sense of just going with the flow," says Zaid Qawiyy, the educational specialist at the center.

Yale volunteers may have to overcome this suspicion. Many of the community residents may not realize the time constraints or the difficulties Yale students often must resolve. Brown's experiences with the volunteers reveal that most of the students act selflessly when they volunteer. "These volunteers are giving their time when they could be studying or working at a part-time job. They put up with my strict rules, and I can make it hard for them. They're not getting school credit for it, no one's pushing them to do this. It's a very positive thing," Brown asserts, clearly impressed with and proud of the Yale students she knows. Before Christmas, the volunteers gave the kids a goodbye parry, paid for out of their own pockets. The kids like the Yale volunteers, often picking favorites or even refusing to work until a certain tutor helps them. "Kids can tell when they're being treated right," says Brown.

Cynthia, 8, describes her impression of the university.

"I think it must be fun. They have machines that give you candy, and lots of computers." To her this seems out of reach. "Also, they get a lot of attention there. Our schools don't give us any attention," she says.

T

he interaction at the Q H . ouse also revises the image Yale students have of Dixwell. "This is the first time most of these Yale students have been around a predominantly black neighborhood,, Brown comments. Some jANUARY 28,

1994

Yale students come to the center with the notion that children in the poverty-ridden inner city have little or no future except a life of drugs and crime. "The national media is constantly showing the bad," she says, "the broken homes, the mothers who are junkies."

The volunteers often talk to Brown about their initial misconceptions. "They tell me, 'Diane, I didn't expect to see fath~rs,' or they're shocked to see some of these kids getting As and Bs on their report cards." Brown is pleased that the Yale students are helping to spread the word that things are not all that bleak.

It is impossible to deny that Yale has its advantages. In the end, the differences between Yale students and the people in the Dixwell community prove decisive. "Anyone who graduates from Yale is going to be influential," Brown explains. "I just hope that when they go out in the world that they don't forget us and the things they saw here." IIBJ Kau Schuler, a sophomor~ in Saybrook, is on th~ staffofTNJ. THE NEw JouRNAL 5

heads a bit and wonder, what is this person thinking? What do they think ofYale that makes them breathe "oh!" like that? Where do they get these ideas?

Just as it is impossible to prove what Americans think of Yale, there's no way to prove why they think it. It seems fair, however, in assessing perceptions of Yale, to consider the representations of Yale in widely-read literature-constructed notions ofYale that people encounter.

Arguably, literature-fiction and sometimes non-fiction-in attempting to create character falls back and perpetuates certain ideas of Yale. Yale graduates in public life, mosily men, must answer to and sometimes excuse their association with Yale. The Yale Men of literarure have so strongly influenced the identity of the Yalie as a wealthy, white male that Bill Clinton (LAW '73) was accused ofa privileged background despite the realities of his humble beginnings. The mystique established by Yale Men in literature lives on in the public imagination, despite its dissociation from reality.

The figure of the Yale Man dominates the image of the university in literature. There are, of course, no women.

The refined Dink Stover and his better-known descendants, F. Scott Fitzgerald's Nick Carraway of Th~ Great Gatsby and Tom Wolfe's (GRD '57) Sherman McCoy of Th~ Bonfire of th~ Wlnitin-these elegant, arrogant men overshadow Yale itself. Their authors describe their confidence, their chins and their neckties-their Yaleness-without describing Yale. Readers are more likely to remember that Nick Carraway went to Yale than that Yale is in Connecticut.

(Many guess Boston.) Nick was "at New Haven," but nobody remembers that; they just remember Yale, and Nick, and the Long Island mansions, and the formalwear in the movie of Th~ Great Gatsby. Yale in these novels is an intangible, almost invisible entity, uncharted, that exists merely to churn out these specimens ofYaleness. Hence, the mystique of the untouchable, the indescribable.

The Yale that Dink Stover discovers best exemplifies that mystique. This hero of Owen Johnson's 1911 novel Stowr at ~le, gets off the train and steps onto a Yale campus that today's students, professors, and alumni would not recognize. Wearing suits and ties throughout, the men of Yale •heel" various activities in order to make their names known so that they have a chance of being tapped for sec~ societies. If the students attend any classes or do any studying, Owen Johnson is blissfully ignorant. Any reader of

e Yale M an Elena Cherney

l~ ~

~

-.,

~ ~

z {: ~

~

.2 .!:!

1(,3

Dink Stover, freshman, chose his seat in the afternoon express that would soon be rushing him to New Haven and his first glimpse ofYale University.

He leisurely divested himself of his trim overcoat, folding it in exact creases and laying it gingerly across the back of his seat; stowed his ttaveling bag; smoothed his hair with a masked movement of his gloved hand; pulled down a buckskin vest, opening the lower button; removed his gloves and folded them in his breast pocket, while with the same gesture a careful forefinger, unperceived, assured itself that his lilac silk necktie was in snug contact with the high collar whose points, painfully but in perfect style, attacked his chin.... Each movement was executed without haste or embarrassment, but leisurely, with the deliberate savoir-faire of the complete man of the world he had become at the age of eighteen.

-from Stover at Yak, by Owen Johnson.

T

here is no way to know or prove what Americans think of Yale. Perhaps those of us with a stake in Yale's public image are guilty of conceit; most of the country and indeed the world does not care about Yale. Yale probably matters less to more people than most of us would care to imagine. ("Yale, huh? That's nice.")

Often, however, the mention ofYale does matter-it elicits wide eyes, an intake of breath, a hushed "oh," or a taken-aback, "oh," or a you-must-think-you're-really-something "oh." Yalies have all seen these reactions, and joke about how to avoid telling people where they go to school. ("Just a lit de college in Connecticut," and, when pressed, they offer their residential college name.) They hang their 6 THE Nnr JouRNAL

jANUARY 28, 1994

Stov~r would also be blissfully ignorant of a Yale student's rience doubts about a system that labels the majority of peoacademic responsibilities. A reader would perceive instead ple the "wrong crowd." He begins to sympathize with a that at Yale, a man labors to secure his "crowd" and status, group of students agitating for an end to the sophomore and ultimately his election to an elite society. society system. Ultimately, he tears off his society pin, Stover's ascent begins that first afternoon on the train, stomps on it, and declares himself opposed to the system. his grooming and mannerisms designed to impress and even He loses several society friends, but gains new ones, truer intimidate. That evening, Le Baron, a sophomore, informs ones, among the "wrong" element of the college, those who him, "You're going to be judged by your friends, and it not "work for Yale" as Stover does. just as easy to know the right crowd as the While Johnson suggests a critique of Yale wrong." elitism with his depiction of Stover's stance Stover asks what Le Baron means against the sophomore societies, in the by "the right crowd," ~nd Le Baron end Stover is tapped for Skull and explains that it is '"the crowd that Bones, clearly the highest achieveis doing things, working for Yale; ment for a Yale Man of the day. the crowd-' In the moment of his election to 'That the class ahead picks the elite, Stover's eyes "blun:ed out to lead us,' said Stover with tears, and he knew how abruptly," interrupting Le much he cared, after the long ~.

Baron.

JJtonths of rebellion, to be no The brutality of the fight longer an outsider, but back Le Baron describes shocks among his own with the stamp Stover, as it would embarrass of approval on his record." the contemporary Yalie. The Stover is a Yale Man to struggle for status Le Baron the end, and Johnson does not depicts represents a Yale chide him for it. Dink plays fair, and rebels according to that few students today even want to recognize. The Yale we so casually over our his sense of fairness. He is What does "working for no radical; even his rebellion Yale" mean? To Le Baron fireplaces stood much nearer to God to is in the name of the most and his crowd, working for sacred of all American valthe Yalies of1911. ues: democracy. The Yale Yale is a kind of holy cruelite recognizes the consersade. Yale to them is the Yale of the blue banners we hang in our rooms. The Yale we vative nature of Dink's revolt and embraces him with their so casually droop over our fireplaces stood much nearer to tap. His friends are proud of Yale and its Men for taking God to the Yalies of 1911. Every football game, every crew him back; to them it evinces Yale's holiness in a new way.

Brockhui:st, the bookish fellow who works for the literary race, was to them a prayer of the faithful.

While Johnson injects from the start a note of irony in magazine but refuses to "heel" it, and disavows any interest his frank dissection ofYale's elite competition and the arro- in the society system, voices his pride in Yale: "Well, Yale's gant young men, he only explicitly critiques the system good enough as it is. It takes an awful lot to stir it, but it's when Stover begins to rebel against it. Stover works hard for the most sensitive of the American colleges, and it will Yale all through his freshman year, laboring unsuccessfully respond. It wants to do the right thing."

But at the end of his speech, Brockhurst seems to but valiantly on the football and then the crew team, making friends with all the right people while learning the change his mind: 'Tm not satisfied with Yale as a magnifinames of all the rest. He is duly tapped for an all-important cent factory on democratic business lines; I dream of somesophomore society and is considered a leader of his class. thing else, something visionary, a great institution not of But in spite of his hard-won success, Stover begins to cxpe- boys, clean, lovable, and honest, but of men of brains, of

'P

jANUA.IlY

2.8,

1994

THJ! NEW jOURNAL

7

courage, ofleadership, a great center of Mockingly, Wolfe describes McCoy's thought, to stir the country and bring self-image, his joy in his "terrific posit back to the understanding of what ture ... terrific to the point of imperiman creates with his imagination, and ous," his pleasure in his "full head of dares with his will. It's visionary-it sandy-brown hair... a long nose, a bookkeeping services will come." prominent chin... He was proud of his chin.

But if Johnson hints at a different, It was a manly chin, a big round 904 wholleiJ overoe more democratic, less otherworldly chin such as Yale men used to have in new hoven. ct CX>S 1S Yale, it has been a long time coming, those drawings by Gibson and at least in literature. The Yalie Leyendecker, an aristocratic chin, if Sherman McCoy represents in Tom you want to know what Sherman r~-------, Wolfe's 1987 New York Times best- thought. He was a Yale man himself."

Cleaners Inc. seller, The Bonfire ofthe Vanities, is an Sherman's Yale chin elevates him almost conscious descendant of Dink above the rules that govern ordinary Stover. But where Johnson suggests his mortals. The arrogance with which he crltlque only indirectly, Wolfe bears his Yale chin plays a large part in DRY CLEANING unleashes a furious attack. He satirizes his story. "As they crossed Park WITH THIS the unfortunate Sherman into a carica- Avenue, he had a mental image of COUPO~II . ture of Stover. Sherman is the Yale what an ideal pair they made; Man swollen wii:h the idea of himself, Campbell, the perfect angel in a priD-y Cleaning • larger than life and ridiculous.· vate school uniform; himself, with his Repairs • Laundry Service • Shirts Sherman McCoy, 38, presumably the noble head, his Yale chin, his big Next to theY ale Co-Op Class of '71 of '72, earns $980,000 a frame, and his $1,800 British suit, the year, lives in a $2.6 million, 14-room angel's father, a man of parts; he visuPark Avenue co-op apartment. He alized the admiring stares, the envious inhabits "the Best section of the capital stares, of the drivers, the pedestrians, of the Western World in the late twen- of one and all." Sherman puts tieth century-" and sells bonds on Campbell on the bus and hops in a Wall Street. He sends his cab to work, where he, a daughter (Campbell, a Master of the family name) to Universe, settles "the Best School himself calmly llou' these .iOJI.i r~f't/Jl' with the Best amid the Girls from chaos of ,r:,n'tl t 1t 11 i l't'l'sit il'.i... t /Jcsc ~ . the the bond 50¢ Drafffs 8-1 0 Families. " trading inheritors r~(tf,c lux tlllrl He thinks room. of himself '"Ho ly \·cri t as !lOll' floc/,:cr/ to 75¢ Draftts 8-1 0 as a Master fucking \\';t/1.\trcct .... ,\ft~st('J'.' r~( of the shit.' How Universe, as the { ln l'l'l'Sl'.' in his daughter's plastic dolls. universities, McCoy's these legatees of $3 Pictures 8-1 0 Yaleness plays a large Jefferson, Emerson, part in his image of himself, Thoreau, William James, one of those tapped for an existence so Frederick Jackson Turner, William elite as to completely absolve him of Lyon Phelps, Samuel Flagg Bemis, and ordinary human responsibilities such the other three-name giants of as marital fidelity, kissing his beloved American scholarship-how these; Campbell goodnight, or stopping his inheritors of the lux and the veritas car after hitting a pedestrian. now flocked to Wall Street .... Masters 148 York St. • New Haven • 865- 1066

COLMAN

I 1· 1· 10% OFF I I ~ II I I I£W I Alteratior~s I I I I I L - - ~==-~- _IIIIi

i

8 THE NEw JouRNAL

jANUARY

28, 1994

MAIN GARDEN

o/1

tn

~

Chinese food

376 Elm Street • New Haven

TEL: l203) 777-3747

of the Universe! The roar filled Sherman's soul with hope, confidence, esprit de corps and righteousness. Yes, righteousness!"

Wolfe sets Sherman up for a fall from his Yale· emi n ence. Sherman takes a wrong turn off the T riboro Bridge into the Bronx on h is way back into Manhattan after picking up his mistress at the airport. While his mistress is driving, the car strikes a young man. They drive away, although Sherman suspects that they have h ie the young m an. In a Stoveresque spirit of fair play, Sherman wants to call the police, but his mistress dissuades him.

Sherman's Universe falls apart as he is arrested and tried for reckless endangerment while the youth he hit lies in a coma, expected to die.

Sherman's Yale chin does nor protect him from his wife's wrath, or the District Attorney's use of h is case for political purposes, or the tabloid journalism of an alcoholic reporter crying to hold on to his job. Everyone wants a part in taking down the Yale Man. As his ordeal drags on, Sherman, who has lost everything, surrenders his Yaleness and renounces the faith. 'Tm not Sherman McCoy anymore," he tells his attorney. "I'm somebody else without a proper name. I've been that other person since the day I was arrested... I'm somebody else. I have nothing to do with Wall Street or Park Avenue or Yale or St. Paul's or Buckley... " The shattering of the Stover Yale Man )ANUARY 28, 1994

Denny Hansen (SM '57) in o er to un Hansen's 1991 suicide. The Denny that Trillin knew at Yale in the 50s seemed co fit the Yale Man of the Stover mold. Denny Hansen was a hero, a leader, a man Le Baron surely would have thought worked for Yale. He traveled the perfect Yale trajectory: swim team, Phi Beta Kappa, Rhodes Scholar. Everyone knew him and everyone liked him.

Lifo magazine covered his graduation.

His friends kidded him about the cabinet posts they'd hold in his administration.

When Trillin remembers H ansen, he remembers the images of Yale and the Yale Man that Hansen upheld co the larger world-the readers of Lifo magazine, and Trillin's own father.

Trillin's father read Stover at Yale ten years or so after its publication, and decided then and there that his son would attend Yale and have the chance to become Dink Stover. Reading Stover years later, Trillin comes to understand the mystique of the Yale Man that has inspired his father. In attempting to capture this man, Trillin quotes a conversation that Stover overhears on the train bound for his freshman._rear: "I say, Schley, you were Hotchkiss, weren't you?"

"Eight mortal years."

"Got a good crowd?"

"No wonder workers, but a couple of good men for the line. What's your Andover crowd like?"

"We had a daisy bunch, but some of the pearls have been

OPEN 7 DAYS A WEEK MON.-THURS.: 11AM-1 AM FRI. : 11 AM-2 AM SAT. : 12 NOON-2 AM SUN.: 12 NOON-12 MID $12 minimum delivery for Yale Students_.aJJI¥.

III/II!J;&

1-800-223-6095

~ ParK_P{aza & ~se 'Bud !F{orists

A dozen roses $9.95 Cash and Carry 208 College Street New Haven, CT 06510 203-562-6095

Credit

Cards Accepted

1217 CHAPEL STREET 787-3988

--------

.Film Developing Sale 1 2 exp ........................ 1.99 115 exp ... .... ................. 2.99 124 exp ....................... .3. 99 136 exp ........................ 5 .99 1Econo - 1 each 3 X 5 glossy prints _......

1I I I I ~ -1

lc-41

negatives only coupon must accompany orders, expires 3/ 31 /9 4

• • • •

--------

DARKROOM SUPPUES INSTANT PASSPORT PHOTOS CAMERA REPAIRS USED EQUPMENT BOUGHT

AND SOLD TH£ NEw JouRNAL 9

sidetracked to Princeton and Harvard."

Exnarainary

Flowers & Pt.-n:s.

Creaave Designs .......... C...&GIIII

-.....a-.. ........

(203) 772-2229

Trillin points out the incongruity of this conversation with the Yale he knew in the 50s and the one we know today, but goes on to reflect that "the more I th ink about it, the more I think that we were closer to the world inhabited by Dink... than we were to the world of today's undergraduates."

Hansen was anointed the king of a realm out of sync with the real world.

As the best Yale Man of the 50s, he had to succeed if anyone else even hoped to. Yet he failed. In his book, Trillin attempts to confront the terrifying truths of Hansen ' s

was the mark of success; the man did, after all, hold a chair at a major university. Reviewers have also criticized Trillin's treatment of Hansen's homosexuality, which Trillin only explores at the end of the book.

What emerges from these reviews is a questioning of the myth Denny upheld as a college student. The end Denny seemed to promise, the shining, all-American happy ending, was not realistic. It was a of the 50s, like the missile gap and the happy housewife. The Yale Man of these years lived an illusory beginning our age cannot match in ending.

Trillin observes in Denny that no man of his generation, Yale or

decline. did not become President. Although he held a chair at the Johns Hopkins School of lnternation Studies, he had not published a book since the 70s, and he did not get along with his colleagues. He was alone; he was not in touch with any of his friends from college; he had no family. He was depressed, and suffered from chronic back trouble.

Trillin has been taken to task by numerous reviewers for the assumption that underpins his entire project, name ly, that Hansen's life was so starkly a failure. Some have pointed out that Hansen only failed if the presidency

otherwise, as reached the Oval Office, or is likely to do so. he Yale Men of the 50s been skipped over by the Baby Boomers, men and women ten years younger, men and women like Bill and Hillary Clinton and their friends.

Perhaps the Men of the 50s simply could not adjust to a world in which there is no Yale Man. Instead, in Denny, they gather in a living room in a scene Trillin calls "The Big Chill," and try to piece together what happened to their hero, the best and brightest of them.

The explosion of the Yale Man, tragic as it is to those who believed in him, opens the way for the fulfillment

dream

On.~Avuu.

r.w Havu, CoM.c:dcut 06510 o.- 1:311 A.M. • 5:30 ...M. SM. I A.M. • S ,._...

·l~l~JD t. CttAF:II) LIFE across from O ld Campus is so convenient.

With apanments ranging from a studio ro a 3-bedroom,we have something to fit

your lifestyle.

Call or just stop in at our office.

Schiavone Management Corporation 1032 Chapel Street New Haven 777-307 1 Business H ours: M on .-Fri. 8:30-5:00

10 THE NEw jouRNAL

jANUARY 2.8,

1994

of the vision Brockhurst expresses at the end of Stover. Trillin talks about the Yale his daughters have known in recent years, a Yale where there are no Yale Men. Younger novelists explore Yale's realities rather than its mystique. Hugh Kennedy (ES '87), in his 1993 novel Everything Looks Impressive, charts a hero at Yale who is poor, neurotic, and stressed. The novel, which received decidedly mixed reviews, pays mo re detailed attention to the physical Yale-the tangible, real Yale- than earlier books. Rather than a mysterious p lace of secret societies that men work for, Yale is a place with classes and dining halls and kids. The kids have parties and problems and learn hard lessons about prejudice and violence. The hardest lesson Kennedy's hero learns is encapsulated in a Talking Heads' lyric that gives the novel its tide: " Everything looks impressive I Do not be deceived., The Yale Man looked impressive but deceived. His demise in literature may enable more accurate perceptions ofYale. Without the Yale Man's mystique, Yale has a chance to emerge as the place of denim and backpacks, long library hours, and bad dining halls that it really is. Trillin agrees, and cites Yale President A. Whitney Griswold ('29) , who in a 1950s report on general education at Yale, derided the Yale mystique. In the visionary spirit of Stover's last lines, Griswold suggested that education at Yale was limited by "a false myth of Yale- the Yale of casual but big-time activity, the Yale glorified and made famous by Owen Johnson and the rest. , As literature lays the myth to rest, perhaps Yale will aspire to and be perceived as Brockhurst's dream: "a great institution, a great center of thought."

181

Elena Cherney, a unior in Branford, is on the staffojTNJ. jAN UARY

2.8, 1994

1& fiLl~S•NGS

TO DINE

.

OR

.

TO GO

That is the choice.

45 Howe St. 624-3557 898 State St. 624-2462 For great Chinese food in a beautiful For fast Chinese food at a setting, come dine with us. reasonable price.

• Special prices for Scorpion bowl •None higher than $6. ' Free delivery 11 :30om- 1Opm.

parties.

caffeAdulis 'Eritrean & 'Etliiopian Cuisine at its finest

"When exotic really is the right word" -New York Times "~~-tr'- Hartford Courant Call for private parties

Lunch: M-Sat. 12-4; Dinner: M-Th. 5-10, F-Sat 5-11 Bar open late for coffee & dessert: 'til 1 M-Th, 2 weekends

228 College Street • New Haven • 777-5081 Private Room A vailable for special occasions

Classic Northern & Southern Italian Cuisine

For F..\c[lli\ilc /Jiuiug

Specializing in the Finest Veal & Seafood

*** Advocate "A Star is Born" *** New Haven Info ** 1/2 New Haven Register 771 Grand Avenue, New Haven • 865-6474 • Valet Parking THE N£w JouRNAL u

ale undergraduate recruiting ftlm in the 1950s: the rilliant sun beams across the freshly-manicured wn of Old Campus. A tall, clean-cut Yale man in a crisp suit strolls over the flagstones. With a white-gloved young lady on one arm, he holds her overnight bag with his . free hand. A sonorous male voice speaks of the "Yale man's" active social life. The subtitle flashes onto the screen: "To Be a Man." Gone are the days of the Yale man with jacket, tie, and white-gloved lady in tow. Long past are the days of mixers and carloads of "weekend women" (as one of Yale's first female undergraduates put it) imported from Vassar and Smith. Nowadays, a sunny day on Old Campus brings upbeat music blaring out of a window, men and women sprawled on the grass in cut-offs, and perhaps a game of coed ultimate Frisbee. Yale has come a long way from a traditional, all-male institution, reminiscent of old Oxford and Cambridge. .

At a time when "Old Yale"-and- the rest of the country-was being shaken to its foundations, tQ.e arriv~l of women at Yale College exemplified the spirit of change.

Rabbi Mindy Porrnoy (TC '73) recalls, "Everyone was trying to be an outsider.... Everybody wore ripped jeans-no one wanted to be the 'quintessential Yalie.' ...Everyone had to rethink their roles, even the old school boy nerwork style, who we learned not to take too seriously because we knew they'd just end up doing what their daddies did." The arrival of women into Yale College represented one of the challenges to the old school boy notion of following what "daddy did," for Yale was no longer simply a place of "school boys." Some of the women who parricipated in this transformation tell us how they saw Yale-then and now. oeducation began well before 1969. Women first studied in Yale graduate programs as early as the late 1800s. The School of the Fine Arts was the first coeducational graduate program, while the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences began to admit women in 1892. In 1886, Alice Rufie Blake Jordan was the first woman to receive a Yale law degree; because she applied using her initials, admissions officials assumed she was a man. The administration subsequently revised rules for admission, and no women officially enrolled until 1919.

In the 1960s, liberal tides swept across college campuses in America and Europe. Yale found itself in the midst of change in marrers ranging from dress codes to socio-political thought. By the late 60s, Yale was more than ready to accept women into its undergraduate program. In the fall of 1968, a few weeks after Princeton announced its decision to go coed, Yale followed suit. The following September, after 268 years of all-male Yale, the school opened its gates to nearly 700 women-230 first-year students and 358 trans-

C

12

THÂŁ NÂŁw JouRNAL

Through

by Caroline Kim fers. For the moment, however, Yale had only opened its gates but a crack; admissions had accepted only one of nine women who applied while admitting one out of four male applicants.

Y a 1 e College did not become. completely coed for years after the arrival of these first w om e .n.

Women were not allowed into the Linonia and Brothers ( L & B ) Reading Room in Sterling Memorial Library until the mid-70s.

Mory's did not allow women as members until 1974, effectively preventing women from hosting activities there on their own. Then-president Kingman Brewster, in a speech . to Yale alumni, announced that he would not reduce the number of men admitted because Yale had an obligation to the country to produce 1,000 leaders each year-apparently he did not think these women, or "intellectual amazons," as the press called them, could be leaders. though many of the first women held a variety of mages of Yale in their minds, few of them really ew quite what they were getting into by accept~ng Yale's offer of admission. "I chink a lot of us were young and naive at the time. I really didn't know what to expect," said

_M

jANUARY

28, 1994

men's Eyes N i n a Glickson (DC '73), associate director of programs at the Yale Alumni Affairs office. "I felt I was in for an adventure. " Rabbi Portnoy, who was a N e w Haven resident at the time s h e applied, admits that she did not have much of a conception of Yale before she got there.

"How could I possibly not go? It was Yale," she says. Rabbi Portnoy, as a "townie," says she never gave Yale much thought while growing up, although she had seen many Yalies. "The biggest joke used to be about how many points we could score by running down Yalies with our cars," she laughs.

For some women, older family members influenced their conception ofYale. Diana Brooks (PC '72), President of Sotheby's and a member of the Yale Corporation, was part of a "devoted Yale family," with her father, brothers, uhcles, and cousins as Yale graduates. She thought there was no other university that she would rather attend; "I loved Yale," she said, "I was there all the time from when I was a little girl." ¡ On the other hand, Cynthia Blum (MC '72), learned JANUARY 28, 1994

from her father that Yale had a somewhat conservative and class-conscious social atmosphere when he was a student.

"My father had gone to Yale on financial aid and had to work in the kitchen. At that time, people who worked in the kitchen were looked down on," she recalls. "But that was no longer the case when I got there." Blum, a graduate of Harvard Law School and now a tax law professor at Rutgers University, transferred to Yale after a year at Barnard.

Glickson also had some ideas of Yale as a snooty, tradition-bound school. "I think a lot of people still do. But that's a very stilted view. It has no relation to reality, because when you get here, it's not true," she comments. "I found that the people were all so interesting and diverse."

Judith Albert {BR ' 72), vice-president of the Latin American corporate finance group at J.P. Morgan, transferred to Yale after a year at Cornell. Shortly after she was accepted to Yale, she visited the campus and was impressed with the way the administration handled campus agitation at a time when riots and sit-ins were regular occurences on university campuses. "I was impressed because the atmosphere was more pro-active and civilized," she says, "whereas the Cornell campus was explosive, and the administration was reactive. At Cornell, we had something like 8,000 students taking over buildings, and the whole time the administration took an authoritarian approach, threatening students in a disciplinarian way... At Yale, Brewster went to the dining halls to talk to the students. He said he would talk to any students about anything, as long as they scheduled an appointment. I was impressed that the administration was willing to listen to the students, as long as they adhered to the civilized terms of the system."

In the fall of 1969, these women finally met the realities of undergraduate life as the pioneers of coeducation at Yale College. "I realized that this was a man's university," says Glickson. "I always felt that there were not enough women." She feels that the administration handled the first year of coeducation well. She did, however, encounter some difficulties. "There were so many things they had just never thought of," she pauses, "like sports." Not only did the women have to organize their own sports, but none of the male staff of the Yale Daily News would cover women's events. In addition, Glickson says with a slight smile, "We could never find a ladies' room. I remember we always had to tun all the way to the second floor to fmd one."

Did these women feel at all like outsiders? Blum recalls that although some seniors resented the arrival the new women, most male students were quite accepting. Judith Albert recalls, "I didn't feel like an outsider any more than any other new place might have made me feel."

Regardless of how accommodating most students were, there were still some Yale men who apparently felt that THE NEW jOURNAL 13

GREAT COFFEE FINE PASTRIES D ECENT PEOPLE

POETRY SLAMS

"Best coffee, cappuccino, caffe mocha and espresso in New Haven. " - CT Magazine 316 Euvt STRFEr Arn.oss FROM YALE Co-oP

776-5063 OPEN 7 DAYS UN1lL 1 AM

ST~

We do to serve you & you1i··~·~··.-· j~·~~er our prices[ • Student Newspapers • Magazines • Newspapers • Newsleners • Program Books

-Complete Design & Production Services Available- Commercial_Printing-

Turley Publications Inc; ·

24 Water Street, Palmer, Massachusetts 01069

.

For more information call us at (413) 283 ..8393

Best Japanese 1M Place

~~HAMA JAPANESE RESTAURANT

Enjoy HAMA BOAT $395U CHEF'S SPECIAL OF SUSHI & SASHIMI FOR 2 PEOPLE Enjoy a wonderful variety of fresh Sushi and traditional Japanese dishes.

1206 Dixwell Ave., Hamden Dinner: Sun. 5:30--9:30; M, Tu, W, (Across from Chimney Square) Th & Sat. 5:30--1 0; F 5:30--10:30 2 81-4 54 2 Lunch:Tu-F 11:30--2:30

Thanks from The New Journal Stephanie Atiyeh • lvo Banac • Matt Borgmeyer John Boswell • Rosita Choy • C lare Connors Aaron Craig • William DiCanzio • Sara Di]ulio Mike Gerber • Kathy Hung • Rosemary Huxler Annette Kirchner • Brendan Koerner Christoph Kraemer • Leslie Park • Pierson College Judy and Larry Porter • Nicole Rice • Nye Wright 14

THE NEW j OURNAL

these new Yalies were allowed a special privilege to attend Yale. Mary Corliss Pearl (SY ' 72), executive director of Wildlife Preservation Trust, refused to feel like an outsider at Yale. "I remember one professor getting really angry at me," she chuckles. " I said I didn't like the class atmosphere because there were so few women in each class. I mean the ratio of women to men was pathetic. I said it was somewhat of a hostile environment to contribute in class discussion. This infuriated him. I mean, who was I to complain?" she laughs. "This was a rare privilege!. .. But I felt that if I was at Yale as a regular student, there was nothing that shouldn't come my way."

In the eyes of some of Yale's first class of women, the disproportionately small female population not only made for awkward class dynamics, but also hindered networking and group collaboration among women at the time. "Femin ism was young and fresh," Judith Albert says, "There was little solidarity among women. Our buddies were guys, and it was as true for p reps as it was for radicals." Albert expresses the complexities of the coeducational experience for women. " I never would have admitted it at the time, but looking back, I feel something was missing that I didn't find until later.... Quite a few women didn't come out fully whole to the point at which you could be confideP.t in your right to be. As a woman in a largely male environment, it takes a little bit more to stand out, and I think women who went to an environment where they didn't have to deal with so many men had more of an opportunity to develop and express thei r own thoughts."

M

w years back, former presint Benno Schmidt (TC '63, Y/1 '66) called Yale's decision to go coed the best decision Yale has ever made. Today's campus, with its .

42.4 percent female population, stands jANUARY 28 ,

1994

• cafe :n:t.:ne the musician's livingroom in sharp conrrast to the 1969 Yale, with eight men to every woman. As graduates of Yale College who now see the school from the outside, these women express their views and some specific concerns about issues that may affect the future of Yale.

Corliss Pearl views the splintering of the student body into small special interest groups as problematic. "When I was at Yale, those of us who were outsiders going to Yale were quick to embrace the community rather than emphasize how we were different," she explains, "I guess I don't like to cast myself as a victim."

On the economic side, Rabbi Portnoy worries about the rising cost of a Yale education . 7I might one day want to send my children to Yale, but I worry because the tuition rises each year," she says. "I hope this does not cause Yale to become a place only for the rich elite again. I don't mean the academic elite, because I strongly believe in strict standards of excellence in education , but I don't believe it should be limited to the upper class."

In comparison to the $2,350 tuition she paid in the late 60s, today's price tag of $18,000 might cause pepple to write offYale as too expensive.

Yale Corporation member Brooks believes that, "New H aven is the university's biggest challenge." With the rise in homelessness and crime rates, town-gown issues are of great concern.

Similarly, Corliss Pearl remarks, "We didn't have very many locked gates, but now there's probably a lot more conrrol...that really saddens me.

Students are still active in the commuJANUARY 28, 1994

nity but they're dealing with horrible problems now, like AIDS and crack."

Brooks also decried the problems with freedom of speech and thought in the academy: "Political correctness is a real danger," she says. She believes Yale ought to remain a place for freedom of expression and exploration of ideas. She continues, "My hopes for Yale are many-that it remain in the forefront of liberal education ... that it play a leadership role ... that it be fearless in its willingness to change, to adapt to new ideas without losing sight of our past, and our great history and traditions."

Rabbi Portnoy recalls the reactions of people when they discover she is a Yalie, "It's still impressive as hell.

People often say, ' Gee, you must be smart, you went to Yale.'" Some people become defensive, adds Albert, and "try to cut you down. They think, 'Who do you think you are with your Yale degree?"'

Corliss Pearl reveals another type of response to a Yale woman. "It's been a help in my career. Especially because women and minorities need that kind of extra assistance," she says. "I always advise women to get the highest degree possible because in the work force, it's much harder for women and minorities, and I've always thought that this high establishment credential has helped me as a woman."

Despite some of the difficulties of being among the first women at Yale College, Albert, Portnoy, Corliss Pearl, Glickson, and Brooks feel enthusiastic about Yale and support its standards of excellence. Brooks believes that "Yale

great lunches quality sandwiches daily specials orders to go

11 :30-4 mon-fri

musical adventures six nights a week

Jazz Jam Saturday afternoon

3-7 250 State St.(@ Crown) 789-8281

new haven

A F€MINisr BOOK STOR£

91SStAT&ST.'NEWHA\OIIi6SII rm.lUJ-

THE NEw JouRNAL 15

Everything from Apple Bran Muffins to Zucchini Lasagne Eat in or take out delicious vegetarian food.

clairis

·c:;~\' SJ 1000 Chapel Stre~t at Colleg~ • 562-3888~\~ <:<} ./ 8 a.m. til 10 p.m da1ly. ./ _

Under strict Rabbinical Supervision

,. ~·

Dress Globally

:.

/

...

./ ·

2100 Dixwell Avenue, Hamden 230-0039

Shop Locally

Visit us and see ~hy we were voted New Haven's #I boutique! See our fun stuff including·a large selection of tapestryI bedspreads, handmade pottery and jewelry, and natural fiber clothing in sizes from XS to 3+.

Open 7 days

Expecting Parents, Relatives, or Friends?

Newly Renovated.

THE COLONY \\

It's New Haven. It's THE COLONY. • Relax with Yalies in our luxurious lobby.

• Fine food and entertainment at Charlie B's Steakhouse.

• Elegant private suites and guest rooms with advanced telephones and cable TV. • Indoor hotel parking.

• Offering facilities and catering for conventions, celebrations, and scholastic milestones.

• Location ideal for business or pleasure.

Only one block from the Yale campus.

1157 Chapel Street • New Haven • CT • 06511-4892 (203) 776-1234 For reservations call directly: THE COLONY

Book in advance: 800-458-8810 16 THE NEw JouRNAL

·

offers the greatest undergraduate education in the world." Albert concurs.

"I'm glad I went to Yale rather than Harvard [where she attended law school]," she says. "It's a wonderful place for people who are out on their own for the first time exploring the world and their identities."

Corliss Pearl asserts that Yale was "a wonderful experience" for her.

"They don't make these beautiful buildings and wonderful facilities for people who they don't think will be leaders," she says. "I felt empowered, perhaps naively in retrospect, because it's a long struggle for women today to get on a par with men in the workplace, but I felt all these powerful symbols on campus and embraced them."

'ceveryone was trying to be an outsider. .. no one .wanted to be the quintessential Yalie. > » Coeducation at Yale marked a change that reached far below the surface ofYale's Gothic exterior. At a time when Yale was no longer carried along by the steady stream of tradition, women as well as men made their imprint upon Yale's ivied walls. But not only the school changed. By opening its doors to these women, Yale influenced them. Coeducation toppled the assumption that Yale meant male. These women have carried the power of Yale's symbols on campus beyond Yale, to defy Kingman Brewster's notion that women could never be leaders.

Cons;dering the image of Yale today, "To Be a Man," is no longer an appropriate Yale slogan-in fact, it is just as appropriate to say "To Be a Woman."

1111

Caroline Kim, a sophomore in Ezra Stiles College, is tksigner ofTNJ. jANUARY

28, 1994

/ /

Back to School Clare Connors

N

ostalgia overwhelmed him as he once again strolled through the Woolsey Rotunda-as much a student as the 20-year olds bustling about him. More than 50 years after graduating from Yale, Maxfield S. Gibbons (TD '45W) felt ready to embark upon his second Yale experience. Like other members of the accelerated wartime class of 1945, Gibbons sped through his undergraduate career in order to join the war effort. "To tell you the truth," said Gibbons, "my education at Yale was a bad one. The administration was more worried about keeping the place glued together and finding turnips to feed the undergraduates." Now, Gibbons is back for more than just his turnip ration.

Gibbons is one of a unique group of alums who, either after retirement or while still fully employed, has again become actively involved in the undergraduate community. Unlike most former Yalies, Gibbons has assumed the role of student and not simply that of a revered source of opinions or money. As a participant in an innovative program called Term Time, he pays a fee for each class he attends and chooses any course he wants. Although he must secure the permission of the seminar instructors, he can take part in discussions, attend sections, and even work with the faculty on a one-to-one basis.

Football games, tailgates, cocktail parties, and fancy dinners-these comprise the usual fare of the alumni experience. Designed to impress, as well as to rekindle memories of"Bright College Years," these gatherings aim to reconnect former students with the present university and to secure the monetary commitment of the alumni.

But while some alumni organizations plan their social event calendars for the forthcoming year, other alumni programs have a somewhat different agenda--one linked with what some believe is more in line with the actual purpose of a university education. As one of the pioneers in the business of providing educational opportunities for alumni, Yale jANUARY

2.8,

1994

became the first university to devise a program by which alumni could come back as undergraduate students. ecause of Yale's preoccupation with the war, Gibbons could select virtually any class he desired. As an English major, he took nothing but literature courses. After retiring from a successful career in journalism and advertising, Gibbons traveled extensively. But while exploring the temples of Athens, Gibbons began to regret not having taken any history courses in college. So he came back to Yale, enrolled in Term Time, and signed up for a team-taught course called Periclean Athens.

Setting a rather different example from most Term Timers, Gibbons decided to take his course for credit rather than auditing it. "I just wanted to see if I could do it," he insisted. Eight years later, Gibbons would still be taking courses for credit if his doctors had not told him to cool it. Despite recurring heart problems, he faithfully attended David Montgomery's course on the Civil War and Reconstruction. Unlike most students, he misses writing the papers, but like other Yalies complains that he is behind in his reading. Gibbons realizes that this too adds to the experience. "It makes me a true undergraduate," he said.

Although experiences vary significantly between returning veteran undergraduates, their general response appears to be one of overwhelming enthusiasm. Like Gibbons, many Term Timers consider this program a perfect opportunity to fill in the gaps in their academic pursuits. For instance, Peter West (DC '53) studied industrial engineering the first time around. Now, after participating in the program for five years, he has been hailed by friends as a foremost expert on Renaissance Art. Raleigh D'Adamo (SM '53) uses the Term Tune program to add to the catalogue of languages which he has studied. He has attended classes in the morning, as well as

B

THE NEW jOURNAL

17

in the evening after work. Among other things, he has audited three language courses-Swahili, Zulu, as well as a course on Egyptian Hieroglyphics.

"It saves me from a simple and ordinary existence," said D 'Adamo, who is c.urrendy studying Arabic.

Simple and ordinary surely does not describe the experience of Neil Lombardi OE '49), and his wife, Ann. They participated in the program in the fall term of 1991. Lombardi, a lawyer from Kansas who learned about Term Time at a cocktail party, was beset by the extra task of finding satisfactory living arrangements.

Once situated in New Haven, Lombardi and his wife perused the blue book. "Our approach was that the professor was more imporrant than the subject matter," he wrote in a term paper submitted to the Association of Yale Alumni. (AYA) While shopping classes he happened upon a Yale legend. "I walked into this class and found the professor leaning on his elbows across the broad seminar table with the pained and disheveled look of a man who has just gotten out of bed and doesn't like it," he wrote. "I had lucked onto Harold Bloom."

Lombardi also expounded on the student body. "They were a diverse, handsome, and lively group," he said. "[They] seemed to be both serious and full of fun." After much thought, the Lombardis decided not to don the rather "eccentric" outfit of the 90s college student. "If they regarded us as ancient oddballs, they were tactful about it, and gave us only an occasional quizzical glance," wrote Lombardi.

Despite almost being run over by a unicycle and two skateboards, Lombardi had few qualms about the current undergraduates. The impartiality with which he recounted information posted at Ashley's, however, revealed perhaps the aspects of Yale which Lombardi found most altered and "contemporary." Notices for 18 THE NEw JouRNAL

Homicidal Lesbian Terrorists, African drumming workshops, and a group called Born Against highlighted his rather outlandish list.

In contrast to the variety of activities announced by the posters, certain student organizations remained Yale staples. "The Yale Daily News has a mixture of genuinely thoughtful editorials and gratuitously sarcastic criticism of the administration," Lombardi marveled."No change here from the 40s."

So then what has changed since these alums were students? West and his wife enrolled in the program at the same time

that t h e youngest of their three children, Stuart West (DC '92), was also an undergraduate. The three family members found themselves reunited weekly in John Boswell's lectures on the Middle Ages.

A family affair? The elder West says that the experience offered him an entirely different perspective. "We were on the same wavelength. " Although West believes students might have been more strongly motivated in his day, he still finds present Yalies bright and eager.

Though still bright and eager, the

Yale student body of today no longer remains the exclusive, fraternal club that most alums remember. "Men bonding as men-there's no substitute for the camaraderie," said the language connoisseur, D 'Adamo. Nevertheless he believes that the presence of women allows for a more natural existence.

West also hails admitting women as a tremendous improvement. "The whole place has a completely different type of feeling," he..said.

While applauding the increased diversity of the student body, some alumni lament the crumbling residential college system. "I decry the growing number of off-campus undergraduates because it reduces Yale and its benefits to the community," D'Adamo said. Soon, he fears, Yale might resemble the European system where stu. dents come only for their classes.

He believes that the college system engenders a loyalty to Yale that suffers if one does not fully participate.

Since D' Adamo enrolled in Term Time, he himself has worked to stem this trend. Once again he has become deeply involved with his former college, Silliman. In addition to supplying the college's print shop with valuable and technologically up-todate equipment, D'Adamo is also willing to assist whenever extra help or expertise is needed. As an associate fellow of Davenport College, he also enjoys spending mealtimes with students and has on occasion invited students to his home for dinner.

But D 'Adamo feels saddened by the deterioration of propriety among students since his days at Yale.

"Perhaps too much was tossed out in the 60s," he said. "Students have lost a certain amount of refinement-not snobbishness, but things such as dining room manners and higher methods of dress." Nevertheless, these surface criticisms belie his continuing admiration for today's Yalies. He considers the present college students a great inspiration. "If this is what the jANUARY 18,

1994

future has in store, my hopes and expectations are great," he said.

Lombardi echoes D'Adamo's enthusiasm but recounts one rather disturbing experience. One night the cacophonous sounds of partygoers reached unbearable levels. Car alarms seared through the otherwise customary orchestra of noises. At their wits' end, the Lombardis called the police.

The police Hstened attentively but did not take any action, for no shooting had occurred.

Perhaps this experience symbolizes what is no more than a generation gap between the Term Timers and present Yalies in New Haven. It is exactly this generation gap which Gibbons relishes. Attending these classes not only provides a chance to keep his mind active, but also offers the opportunity to become more connected with "Yale today."

Reconnecting alumni with the university was what the AYA had intended when it established the Term Time program. "It allowed alumni to come as a matter of right," said Eustace Theodore (PC '63), executive director of the AYA. Judy Cole, senior assistant director of the AYA, admitted that the Association's emphasis on keeping alumni engaged and committed is not without its monetary aims. No institution can afford to ignore alumni primarily because they provide both funds and input, without which a university cannot operate. Theodore further notes, however, that Term Time enhances perceptions of Yale. "Not many alumni say that Yale only wants money anymore."

Although the large majority of former Yalies do not participate in Term Time, the thought that they can reassures them that Yale is still striving to fulfill the original purpose of the university. By demonstrating the viability of Yale's commitment to furthering education, the AYA hopes that alumni will more eagerly involve themselves in the institution, either through financial or personal means. ) ANUAJlY

28, 1994

While D'Adamo works in the print shop, Gibbons has directed his energy towards chairing his class' reunion functions.

Since Term Time is relatively new and still in a state of evolution, it is not without its

JJ,c Yt~lc stut!c!lt

/;otfJ' 110 lo11ucr . ¡" rcn1tti11s the cxclusil'C club II/OS! ttft/11/S

re 11/C111 be1: glitches.

"Once M you've been through the administrative briar patch," said Gibbons, "you learn to find your way around." ut if Term Time is in fact a technique by which to secure financial commitment and input from alums by re-introducing them to their alma mater, then is Yale's approach really an honest one? While the AYA seeks to provide a rewarding experience for its alums, does the perception generated paint a truly complete picture of the contemporary Yale? Certain things alums experienced did indeed disturb them, such as the loud, late-night parties, the deteriorating residential college system, and student behavior. Although by" their own accounts, their experiences were undoubtedly positive ones, the question remains whether or not they still fit into a campus now dominated by the youth of the 90s. Closing the generation gap, although not high on the list of AYA objectives, might simply be impossible.

Despite these questions, Term Time at least recognizes the existence of these issues and seeks to address

B

them. For years Yale has offered its alumni opportunities by which they can in effect "reenter" the academic aspect of Yale. Since 1977, the AYA has also sponsored a two-day event every June, during which time the alumni are not only wined and dined, but are also exposed to some of the most highly acclaimed professors at Yale. Term Time, though, provides a much more sustained and comprehensive opportunity to engage in the ongoing process of learning. "Term Time," notes D'Adamo, "engenders in me warmer feelings about the university, much more so than if Yale were [only] to throw cocktail parties."

Gibbons adds that Term Time provides an attractive aspect to Yale because it discards the "superficial view" of the alumni experience.

Although he does not discount the monetary tenets underlying such programs as the June Seminar, which he referred to as a showcase of sorts, he relishes the way which Yale provides alumni with an atmosphere reminiscent of the times they spent together at Yale. Theodore also mentions that when alums are again put in contact with the great minds ofYale, they have the chance to relive the experience they had when they were here for the first time.

Yet the number of alums who participate in Term Time remains comparatively small. Obvious reasons, such as basic demographic restrictions, account in part for this disparity. In addition, few alums have the time to engage in such a long-term commitment. Lombardi, though, maintained, "The only reason that more people haven't done Term Time is that they don't know about it."

According to D ' Adamo, Term Time is Yale's best kept secret. More people, he believes, should participate for one very basic reason: "When you stop learning, you stop living." ..:1 Clare Connors is a sophomore in Ezra Stiles Colkge.

THE NEW JouRNAL 19

-BETWEEN THE-VINES - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

Getting In, Coming Out jay Porter t's easy to get a picture of Yale if your father or reacher or neighbor went here. Complications arise if, like me, you never met a Yale man or woman until after you were admitted. I knew at an early age that I wanted to leave my home state of Oklahoma for college. At some point, before doing any real research, I decided that Yale, Harvard, and Princeton were on my short list. Why? people would ask. I still can't give a simple answer, even with the benefit of hindsight.

When pressed, I would say, ÂŤBecause they're the best. " I wasn't trying to be a snot, and people generally believed it.

It seemed like a better answer than, " Because I have to escape." The closest I could ever come' to expressing why was that I was tired of my conservative upbringing and wanted to go "back East" and get a "liberal education." (In those halcyon days, I used the labels in their purely political senses: I realize now that they stand for a lot more.) But in some place, far beneath the layer of achievement, the veneer of the "good school citizen," I saw myself on the lam, a fugitive from something unnamed. In spite of myself, in spite of my love of home, in spite of the lucrative scholarships offered to me to stay in state, I knew that I was pushed and pulled by very powerful forces to flee to some imagined ivydad paradise.

I finally decided that if I could only get to the Ivy League, I could stop running. I could sit back and say, "I have arrived. " I imagined becoming a Yale man through some ancient rite of passage. My demonswouldbeexorcisedandicould continue my path to success. In the fall of 1991 I finally did arrive at Yale, and for a while my dream seemed real. Those were heady days; I su rrounded myself with c onscant activity. I found that the sadness that seeped up from the flagstones wouldn't stick to the soles of my shoes if I ran ~ fast enough. As long as I traveled in packs and didn't look ~ down. As long as I allowed C) myself to be subsumed into Camp Yale, and eventually into ~ the larger chaos of freshman year.

"V

I

like to sell: happy campers, busy bees, future leaders. I tried to be all those things. When I arrived, I understood myself to be part of the visible majority of Yale students: I am a WASP male. Looking around, I was exs;jted by the cultural diversity that Yale promised, a kind of diversity I had never seen. My first friends at Yale represerved a vast array of states, races, and nations. I was fascinated that they spoke Turkish, Korean, and Joisey when they called home; they, in turn, laughed at the Okie twang I assumed when I called home.

While I could see Yale's promised diversity, I began to notice a homogeneity of outlook. Most of us came from si milar middle-class backgrounds, held similar political views, and when asked to describe how we saw ourselves in 20 years, came up with similar idealized dreams of money, fame, and 2.5 kids. That's what I wanted, too. At least that's what I said.

When I look back on the fall of my freshman year, I realize that I should have recognized one habit as a symptom of inner turmoil. I would sit on the window seat of my room in Bingham and write in my journal while staring at the gold-capped steeple of the United Church on the Green. I was ostensibly where I wanted to be, living my dream, but outside of the gates of Yale-and outside of the realm of the describable-something glinted in the sun and caught my eye. I would sit for hours and stare at it; when winter's gray overtook the skies, I lost even that small pleasure.

As the semesters bled by, I 11 began to feel more and more alone, dangerously different from the busy Yalies around me, the people who played intramurals and planned screw-yourroommate dances. I poured myself into my work and this magazine, and poured myself too many drinks at parties.

I realize now what was missing. Yale had promised me something, and I felt a lit~ de bit cheated, even though things turned out all right.

-~ When I visited Yale the April after

SILENCE--DEA'JH

0

Q

viâ&#x20AC;˘io~e!r~.~~ ~~:;~d~i~~~~~:k::" .~0 20

THE NEW jOURNAL

f:'i

. . . . ,.

$:$

i:J-.0

~ B~~ ~~=~::!o~;~~!;'~:::

~ C'otTNI1_t{. ~

jANUAJtY 28, 1994

about "One in four, maybe more." As a freshman and sophomore in Davenport College, I certainly didn't see much of it. I wish I had known at least one person living in my college who was openly gay: it might have saved me a lot of loneliness. Sure, I heard about the meetings and marches, but I wasn't ready for that. I could argue eloquently for gay rights in the abstract-as a good Yale liberalwhile maintaining the fading fiction that I was straight.

Once I moved into Davenport, there was no chance I was going to deal with

bisexual ever to graduate from Yale, will wake up one morning and come out publicly. I have even constructed a small shrine (actually, just a pile of books) to openly gay professors such as Wayne Koestenbaum and John Boswell. I'm intent on making up for the time I wasted trying to be a eraditional Yalie; now I'm just trying to be myself.

Incorporating gays and lesbians into the mythology of the Yale "man" helps me do that. If it upsets Old Blue, that's just too bad.

To that end, I

I realize now what was missinO' Yale had o·

my sexuality, no way to face the facts of desire and denial. Looking · back, I see that beautiful courtyard as one great big closet: gray slate C Gothic on the out • •· . side but-surpriseGeorgian and green on . . the inside. I have a lot of friends in Davenport, but every time I walk inside I feel like I have something to hide. I have a theory that George Bush (DC '48) and William F. Buckley (DC '47) cast some sort of conservative spell on the place, but that's another story. Everyone told me Davenport was the most straight-laced residential college.

The one image of Yale I needed the most to be true failed me for a time, only to prove itself intact later. I had to move off-campus to deal with mysel£ Once I was safely setded in my apartment, with two very supportive roommates, I found the gay Yale that had been promised by the slogan and began the long process of coming out. Better late than never. I think a lot of my classmates will be saying the same in the next few years: perhaps not quite one in four students are openly gay, but I think a lot of people here are less straight than they appear. My tenth reunion will be very revealing.

~pent some rime took-

tng back on the recent

d h· d Ifielt a l'lftte .1 b . history of the whole promtse me somet. tng, an lt controversy-kicked off h d I .h I h d k by a Wall Street journal 1

eate · WlS a nown at teast One article written in the summer of 1987-and person ltvtng tn my co/lege who was openly I think it illustrates . some of the strange gay: tt mzght have saved me a lot ofloneftness. properties of the Yale

've been thinking recently about the whole concept of gays at Yale. We don't have a gay studies course, but there is something of an informal syUabus. I've read the famous Gay Yale Authors, from Larry Kramer (BK '57) to Paul Monette OE '67) to David Leavitt (TC '83). I've listened to the Cole Porter (' 10) songbooks religiously. I ding to the hope that Jodie Foster (CC '84), the most beautiful

I

jANUARY 28, 1994

name. A short feature by freelance writer Julie Iovine (SY '77) appeared deep in the bowels of the journal. Titled "Lipsticks and Lords," it purported to expose a thriving gay community at Yale so large and powerful that it could draw over 1,000 students to its Spring Gayla. Iovine somehow deduced from this figure that one in four Yalies are homosexual. If the article had appeared in the San Francisco Chronicle or had discussed a less-famous college, it would have raised precious few eyebrows. But five decades of wealthy Old Blue alumni were left fuming in the concrete canyons of Wall Street. Imagine their shame when they read that fateful line: "Suddenly, Yale has a reputation as a gay school."

If people didn't know it before, the ensuing ruckus ensured that all of America heard that "Yale [is] now colored mauve," as the National Review charmingly put it. The New York Times, Time, Newsweek, and dozens of other news outlets picked up the story. It faded soon enough: the story was shoddily reported, and the assertion that attendance at a dance equals sexual orientation was recognized by all to be laughable. Homosexual students were hun when President Benno Schmidt (TC '63, LAW '66), who had been at the Gayla himself, wrote an indignant letter to concerned alumni decrying the story as "nonsense," "ludicrous," "drivel." It wasn't that far &om the truth, certainly not far enough for THE NEW JouRNAL 21

A FasO.nating Excursion into the Orient IS onlymmutes away afilie

(~ ~¥-=tf ~)

D'tienta[,~anh.y The Fin est Oriental Groceries in New Haven

China, Korea, japan, India, Indonesia·, Thailand, Middle East, Fresh Produce, Specialties, Cookbooks, Gifts, Utensils, Lunch, Video 374 Whitney Avenue, New Haven 865-2849

ARETHUSA

BC> C>K. S~C>.P Out of print and used books Essential re·a ding from Baudelaire to Einstein to Willa Cather.

87 Audubon Street New Haven CT 06511 (203)624-1848

BODY AT

1020 CHAPEL STREET NEW HAVEN CT 3 8 2 4 8 6 5

22

THE NEW jOURNAL

1 ~·6HI'IJI

l ·i,~~~ . ~11_1111111

I

~~~~at'

:,;.-~ij' .

-~ ~-··

~-

......

­ . ~~ ·:. ,

those dyspeptic.Yalie bond traders (but then again, 1987 was a bad year for them altogether). · at did the story do, then?

Clearly, no applicant who would meet minimum Yale standards of tolerance rejected an offer of admission because of it. On the other hand, it seems possible that a number of qualified gay and lesbian applicants have felt more comfortable accepting Yale's offers in the years since because of the story: how could Harvard or Princeton compete with a whopping (if inaccurate) 25 percent?

In pragmatic terms, a few of those indignant alumni pulled their contributions, but the endowment didn't collapse and Yale weathered the storm.

Unfortunately for me, though, my grandparents read the Wall Street journal, too. I've never heard them mention "one in four," but I know they have pretty good sense of what goes on at Yale. They love the fact that I share an apartment with a FrenchGerman male and an AfricanAmerican Jewish woman; it would not, however, be o.k. if they knew that Christoph is gay and Sara comes from a long line of communists.

The point is, they know that Yale is extremely liberal and fear that I get more so with every day I spend here.

W

Over Christmas break of my sophomore year, my grandfather called a family meeting-in my absence-to discuss just how far left I had strayed.

(Over the dinner table the previous night I had suggested that fellow Yale man Bush should be indicted; someone tried to change subjects, and I ended up defending Madonna's sex book.) When my mother told me what had happened, I was mortified.

They seemed ready to disown me for my politics: it convinced me that my sexuality was even more unacceptable and I rededicated myself to denying it.

Luckily, a crisis was averted; they calmed down and we now try to avoid politics altogether.

My parents' response to my coming out has been textbook-perfect.

They love their Yale boy unconditionally: sexuality, politics, and all. Ifl were to flunk out tomorrow, they still would. But my grandparents-who are by now rather impatiently waiting for me to find Ms. Right-liked the preYale me better. For them, it's not qui-;:e a fair exchange: a great education, a liberal worldview. When they find out I'm gay, though, all bets are off.

I hate to tell my conservative friends (someone has to do it) but the fact is that "liberal" is the one word I most often hear when people ask me jANUARY 28, 1994

about Yale. Perhaps it's just a semantic problem (liberal arts vs. Liberal D emocrat), or a demographic quirk of Oklahoma, but I doubt it. The fact is, quite simply, that people at home perceive Yale to be a hotbed of just about everything: political co rrect ness is assumed to dominate every aspect o f life, and my old friends have visions of radical feminists and tree-h ugging environmentalists running amok. I just smile and pull out my pictures: the vast oceans ofJ. Crew assuage their fears.

I try to keep a sense of humor about the whole thing. Since I spent so many years saying " liberal" when I really meant "gay," a lot of things throw me off balance. When I visited my high school over Christmas, my old principal smiled broadly and asked, "So Jay, did you go off to Yale and turn into some big liberal?" I took a deep breath, looked him in the eye,

lm intent on making up for the time I wasted trying to be a traditional Yalie; now, lm just trying to be myself and said, "No, Mr. Mathers. I was born that way." There was a moment of tension and then, inexplicably, we both laughed.

Little encounters like that make me realize how being a Yale will make my life easier. People in the real world, like Mr. Mathers and even my grandparents-who otherwise wouldn't tolerate me as liberal or gay-may cut me a little slack. There are no sure talismans against hate and prej udice, but I'm hoping that a little of that old Yale magic still goes a long way. ..,.

jay Porter, a junior in Davenport Colkge, is managing editor ojTN]. jANUARY 28,

1994

Since 1934, g

or t e discerning

America's Largest and Foremost Tobacconists •Music Boxes, Russian Lacquer Boxes •Expert Pipe Repairing •Chess, Backgammon •Tobaccos Blended To Individual Taste •Writing Instruments, Bookends, •Figurines, Wood Carvings .Crystal, Cutlery, Art Glass Paperweights

624-3250 • 268 College Street, New Haven, CT 06510

SAMURAI M •

·

JAPANESE RESTAURANT " '

230Colleg~~:~;r6~ew Hawn

•

for the finest in ] apanese CUiSine ***Hartford Courant

Featuring: Traditional Japanese Sushi Bar• Full Service Bar· Dally Lunch Specials ·Ternpura and Tertyakl Dinners Hours: Mon-Thurs 11 :30AM-1 O:OOPM I Fri-Sat 11 :30AM-11 :OOPM & Sun 3:00PM-1 O:OOPM Across the street from the Shubert Theater • Excellent for Christmas Parties

YaCe Symphony Orcliestra

James 1Wss, Music 'Director

Dohnanyi Variations on a Nursery Song Andrew Gerle JE '94, piano Schumann Phantasie Orchestrated by Mark Bradley Ravel Mother Goose Suite

Satunfay, ~e6ruary 5 at 8:00pm in WoolSey !J{af{ Win. the Lottery & 'IDP 5\VAYS Move to Tahiti 'ID Transcendental Meditation IMI>f{()VE YOUR OUTLCJOK ON LIFE

Leave Your Spouse

Psychoanalysis DINNER AT SHAWN'S Dinner rest!lv.lcions rccornmcndcd

Open 7 days . Major credit cards~

THE NEW jOURNAL 23

Resumes) tabletents) posters) course Wtaterial) typesetting froWt Macintosh disks &whatnot ...

4-32-copy (432-2679) September, ()ctober, January) February: 8-6:30 Mon-Fri lVovember, l)ece~ber, March) April) May: 8-s:oo Mon-Fri

Copies only

4-¢*

Still the lowest • przces in Elm City!

• per copy for more than ten copiu ofthe same origi,ai; the price is 4J.} cuus each for one to tm copies.