Spring '11 Owl & Spade

owl&spade

T h e M a g a z i n e o f W a r r e n W i l s o n C o l l e g e SPRING 2011

Asheville Farm School and Dorland-Bell students at the 1937 Presbyterian general assembly in Philadelphia

Tradition of Crafts Service: A Way of Life From Turkey to Warren Wilson Swannanoa Gathering 20th Anniversary

owl&spade T h e M ag a z i n e o f Wa r r e n W i l s o n Co l l e g e

Editor John Bowers

Message from the President Spring 2011

Designer Martha Smith Contributing Writer Ben Anderson Alumni Relations Director Rodney Lytle ’73 Contributors Tracy Bleeker Cait Coffey ‘11 Nicole Connor ’10 Morgan Davis ’02 Melissa Ray Davis ’02 Grace Hatton ‘14 Jack Igelman Julie Lehman Jim McGill Paul Magnarella Erin Pesut ‘10 Lindsay Popper ‘10 Alec Wiener ‘10 Copy Editors Shannon Senn ‘97 Jennie Vaughn Jane Weis ALUMNI BOARD 2010-11 President Susannah Chewning ’87 President Elect Melissa Thomas Davis ’71 Past President Faris A. Ashkar ’72 Secretary Lin Orndorf ‘87 Class of 2011 Nancy Allen ‘64 James Bailes ‘78 Mark Demma ‘99 Dancia Langley ‘95 Bill Miller ‘51 Bo Walker ‘74 Clipper Holder ‘86 Class of 2012 Dennis Thompson ‘77 Donna Kilpatrick ‘88 Richard Neil Thomas ‘84 Christine Toriello Walshe ‘01 DruAnna Williams Overbay ‘61 Tim B. Deuitch ‘83 Samuel E. Ray ‘56 Class of 2013 Peggy Burke ‘56 Mike Nix ‘70 Benjamin Edson ‘00 Barbara Withers ‘66 Dan Scheuch ‘90 Gretchen Gano ‘92 Wade Hawkins ‘07 Graduating Student Representative Able Allen ‘10 Owl & Spade (ISSN Spring/fall publication: 202-707-4111) is published twice a year (spring, fall) by the staff of Warren Wilson College. Address changes and distribution issues should be sent to alumni@warren-wilson.edu or Rodney Lytle, CPO 6376, PO Box 9000, Asheville, NC 28815.

Printed on Environment by Neenah Paper (made with 100% postconsumer waste and processed totally chlorine free). Printed with vegetable oil-base inks. Compared to virgin paper, using this paper saved 81 trees, 29,261 gallons of water, 56 min BTUs of energy (224 days of power for an average American household), 7,049 pounds of emissions, 3,758 of solid waste recycled instead of landfilled!

On February 11 at the Board of Trustees meeting, I announced my plan to retire from the College in June 2012. At the time of my retirement, I will have served six years as the sixth president of the College. I feel very fortunate to have been part of this special community.

My notice to the Board of Trustees at this time will give trustees ample opportunity to plan and conduct a search for the next president of the College. We will keep you informed through our e-newsletter, the website and Owl & Spade about the search process. As in the past, the campus community will play an important role.

My thanks to all of you for the progress we’ve made at the College. For example, we’ve developed an ambitious strategic plan, added key faculty and staff, revised important policies, increased the number of donors, restored Bryson, reviewed all academic programs, brought significant grants to the College, supported undergraduate research, infused the campus with sustainability principles, expanded the number of work crews, and developed a national reputation for environmental leadership. Although many challenges remain, Warren Wilson is in excellent shape, has a loyal following, and is a leader among small liberal-arts colleges.

In the 15 months remaining in my presidency, I’ll work to prepare the campus for the person who follows me in this job. We have much to do. For example, we’ll continue our progress on the strategic plan, address space issues on campus, and continue our efforts to attract donors to support critical needs at the College, such as student scholarships.

It is a privilege to be president of a college that has attracted so many fine faculty, staff and students. Many thanks to all of you for your commitment and contributions to Warren Wilson, a college we’re proud to say is like no other one in the nation.

Sandy Pfeiffer

Mission The mission of Warren Wilson College is to provide a distinctive undergraduate and graduate liberal arts education. Our undergraduate education combines academics, work and service in a learning community committed to environmental responsibility, cross-cultural understanding and the common good.

On the Cover Unidentified Asheville Farm School student and 1937 Dorland-Bell alumna Mavis Shelton Williams demonstrate woodworking and weaving at the 1937 Presbyterian general assembly in Philadelphia.

OWL & SPADE

owl&spade CONTENTS • SPRING 2011

triad news 2 Sylvia Earle to deliver Commencement address • National recognition continues unabated • A Kite in the Wind • Seniors recognized for pursuits in peace and justice studies • The Blue Ridge Parkway names students Volunteers of the Year • Students attend Salzburg Global seminar • New Board of Trustees Chair • Stuber wins North Carolina Service Award • Wares leave generous bequests • Coshocton Scholars • Lytle, Propst recognized at 2010 Homecoming • Alumni Awards • Spasovski Wraps Up Great Career • Collins/Kahl Future Scientist Scholarship • International Photo Contest Winners

FACULTY & STAFF NEWS Features

12 14 Academics, Work and Service: Blurring the lines Connections from North Carolina to Costa Rica Warren Wilson Crafts—A Tradition Renewed Service: A Way of Life for Katie Spotz ‘08 From Turkey to Warren Wilson and Back Again Swannanoa Gathering 1991–2011: A Retrospective

ALUMNI PROFILE

Librarian Bloodhound—Tracking Lost Books

29 Bijan Amini: a Legacy created

ALUMNi Notes

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looking back

34 85th Anniversary of the Warren Wilson College Presbyterian Church

MFA Bookshelf

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Blurring the Lines

Cover: Warren Wilson Crafts

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Swannanoa gathering

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T R IA D N E WS Sylvia Earle to deliver Commencement address Pioneering oceanographer Sylvia Earle, currently National Geographic Society Explorer-in-Residence, will deliver the main address at Commencement on May 14 at 10 a.m.

Since her first scuba dive at age 17, Earle has logged more than 6,000 diving hours while leading more than 50 expeditions. She set the world record for the deepest untethered solo ocean dive (1,250 feet), one of the Earle was the 2007 Davidson Roundtable lecturer. achievements that have helped her earn nicknames such as “Her Deepness,” “Sturgeon General” and “Queen of the Deep.” A longtime champion of the preservation and exploration of marine ecosystems, she was named the first “Hero for the Planet” by Time magazine and a “Living Legend” by The Library of Congress.

“I was swept off my feet by a wave when I was 3 and have been in love with the sea ever since,” Earle has said. “It was and is irresistible.”

National recognition continues unabated The long list of national recognitions achieved by the College has grown still longer over the past several months. Here’s a quick look at recent green accolades: • The Princeton Review’s 2011 Green Rating Honor Roll included Warren Wilson among its select group of 18 colleges nationwide.

The College, which received the highest possible rating, is the only N.C. institution on the honor roll.

• Sierra Club’s Sierra magazine ranked the College among its “Coolest Schools” in the fight against global warming for the fourth consecutive year—every year since the magazine’s inaugural ranking in 2007.

• An inaugural Second Nature Award for Institutional Excellence in Climate Leadership was presented to the College in October at the annual summit of the American College & University Presidents’ Climate Commitment.

• In an online photo feature, U.S. News & World Report’s “Best Colleges” named Warren Wilson one of “10 Eco-Friendly College Campuses.”

The MFA Program for Writers also continues to receive national recognition. Most recently, Poets & Writers magazine ranked the MFA program tied for first among the 46 low-residency MFA programs nationwide.

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TR I AD N E WS A Kite in the Wind This year marks the 35th anniversary of the Warren Wilson MFA Program for Writers, the nation’s first low-residency MFA program. This year will also see the publication of the fifth anthology of essays by its faculty members. A Kite in the Wind: Fiction Writers on Their Craft, edited by Andrea Barrett and former MFA director Peter Turchi, gathers essays by Maud Casey, Stacey D’Erasmo, Anthony Doerr, Kevin McIlvoy and fifteen others. The essays were presented as lectures during recent MFA residencies.

As Barrett and Turchi note in their introduction, the anthology is less an instruction manual than an intimate visit with 20 very different writers as they explore topics that excite, intrigue and puzzle them. These are personal investigations, and the passion and close study that drive them embody the spirit of the Warren Wilson MFA program itself.

“It’s impossible to recreate the intensity of one of the program’s ten-day residencies on paper,” Turchi says. “To be there, on campus, is to feel—and be a part of—a large, unpredictable, and enormously provocative conversation unfolding. But these anthologies of essays based on residency lectures come close, and they have the advantage of allowing the reader to go at his or her own speed: making notes, re-reading, stopping to think. A Kite in the Wind also offers some indication of the wide range of voices, approaches and topics the Warren Wilson MFA residencies bring together.”

The anthology is less an instruction manual than an intimate visit with 20 very different writers as they explore topics that excite, intrigue and puzzle them.

He adds, “It’s worth noting that a lot of these essays—and many of the lectures that preceded them—would most likely never have been written if not for the unique occasion of (and the remarkable audiences at) Warren Wilson residencies. While it may sound presumptuous, after thirty-five years, I think it’s fair to say that the Warren Wilson MFA program, by providing a forum for faculty and students to challenge themselves, by giving them an occasion to rise to, has made a significant contribution to the writing and thinking about poetry and fiction in the United States.”

A Kite in the Wind offers its hard-earned insights with humility, wit and compassion. It provides as well a glimpse into the rich, ongoing discussion of the writer’s craft at the College.

The anthology is available from Trinity University Press.

Other essay anthologies by MFA faculty Bringing the Devil to His Knees: The Craft of Fiction and the Writing Life edited by Charles Baxter and Peter Turchi The Story Behind the Story: 26 Stories by Contemporary Writers and How They Work edited by Andrea Barrett and Peter Turchi Poet’s Work, Poet’s Play: Essays on the Practice of the Art edited by Daniel Tobin and Pimone Triplett Poets Teaching Poets: Self and the World, edited by Ellen Bryant Voigt and Gregory Orr

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T R IA D N E WS Seniors recognized for pursuits in peace and justice studies Seniors Eliana Winderman and Courtney Moles, two peace and justice studies minors, won distinctions in 2010. In August Widerman was chosen from among hundreds of applicants to participate in UNESCO’s Sixth Annual International Leadership Training Program held at the University of Connecticut. UNESCO hosts this annual intergenerational forum to bring together young leaders from around the world for training in the field of human rights. Participants were divided into action plan groups to create a project that would help demonstrate their commitment to human rights. Widerman’s group consisted of people from Serbia, France, New Zealand, Morocco, Tunisia, Bahamas, Fiji, Rwanda, Thailand and the United States. They decided to found an NGO called “Dear UN” to provide a forum for letters from children making requests to the UN for things like clean water, justice, food, a voice, clothes, and similar needs.

In November artwork by Courtney Moles placed second in the Young Peacemaker contest organized by N.C. Peace Action and Witness for Peace Southeast. The contest accepted essays and artistic expression responding to the prompt,

Seniors Courtney Moles and Eliana Winderman with Moles’s artwork “Nuclear Mother Earth.”

“How could tax money being used for war be redirected to meet human needs?

Since 2001, the United States has spent $1.09 trillion just in Iraq and Afghanistan.

What are we really sacrificing by pursuing military solutions around the world?”

Moles’s artwork, a collage, was titled “Nuclear Mother Earth.” In her artist statement, Moles says the image is made up of three entities: a tree, a woman, and

a nuclear mushroom cloud. At the root of the figure are people. Moving up, there are representations of human processes that are perpetuated by and create inequality. The mushroom cloud encompasses how money is being spent. “Notice the contradictions, which are within all humans,” she writes.

“That is where we begin, within ourselves, realizing that all is interconnected.”

The Blue Ridge Parkway names students the Pisgah District Volunteers of the Year Many students spent 2010 spring and fall breaks renovating campsites and working on other Parkway projects.

On October 8 they were honored at a banquet held at the Folk Art Center.

Accepting the award on behalf of the College were, left to right, students Wyatt Smith, Alec Babbit and Ryan Frank along with Blue Ridge Parkway and Smoky Mountain Hiking Club representatives.

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TR I AD N E WS Students attend Salzburg Global Seminar

by Cait Coffey ’11

change through student initiatives at their home universities.

Students traveled to Dachau Concentration Camp Memorial Site during the Salzburg Global Seminar.

On January 3 Laura Lily ’11 and I embarked on a weeklong trip to Salzburg, Austria, to participate in the Salzburg Global Seminar, sponsored by the Mellon Foundation. Established in 1947, the seminar offers an intensive international academic experience for American students. The program is housed in the magnificent Schloss Leopoldskron, the palace featured in the Sound of Music.

Fifty students from Appalachian and historically African American colleges attended the 2011 seminar. Seminar

leaders from Austria, Germany, the United States and the former Yugoslavia guided us in exploring global issues from an international perspective by viewing problems outside of U.S. borders. A combination of lectures, seminars, group discussions and excursions helped us develop a new understanding of global citizenship. The program focused on bringing awareness to issues such as genocide, poverty, environmental degradation and gender discrimination by facilitating group investigation and presentations with the goal of generating

Over the course of the program, several speakers discussed genocide, a vital global concern. Midweek, our group traveled to Dachau, Germany, to visit the memorial site of the former concentration camp.

Traveling through the Austrian and German countryside evokes a sense of serenity and security. Like my own Blue Ridge Mountains, the Alps seem to cradle the tiny towns below. It’s difficult to imagine a place like this holding the history of one of the world’s worst atrocities. Even more startling is the realization that these crimes are carried out in our contemporary world.

The program focused on bringing awareness to problems such as genocide, poverty, gender and environmental issues by facilitating group investigation and presentations with the goal of generating change through student initiatives at their home universities.

New Board of Trustees Chair: It feels like coming home Joel B. Adams Jr., Asheville financial consultant and longtime member of the College’s Board of Trustees, has assumed the position of board chair. He succeeds fellow Asheville resident Ron Hunt, who stepped down after serving as board chair since July 2007.

Adams is beginning his second stint as board chair, having held the position from 2003-2007. He has still deeper ties to the College as the father of two Warren Wilson alumni: son Sam and daughter Sadie.

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“It feels like coming home,” Adams said of his return as chair, “and I look forward to further participation in the College’s future.”

President Sandy Pfeiffer said he is excited about Adams’ second term as board chair. “Joel previously provided excellent leadership as board chair,” Pfeiffer said, “and we look forward to his chairing the board again.

Pfeiffer praised the leadership of Hunt, who joined the Board of Trustees in 2002 and served as vice chair for two years before becoming chair in 2007. “Ron has been an outstanding board chair and forceful advocate of the College,” Pfeiffer said. “He has helped move the College forward in significant ways over the past several years.”

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T R IA D N E WS Stuber wins North Carolina service award

by Grace Hatton ’14

Chloe Stuber, a senior from Savannah, Ga., has won the North Carolina Campus Compact’s fifth Community Impact Student Award. Stuber is one of 34 N.C. college students who received the award for making significant, innovative contributions to their campuses’ efforts to address local community needs. Awardees received a Volunteer Certificate of Appreciation from Gov. Beverly Perdue.

Service has always been important to Stuber. “I define service as community involvement—knowing the issues in my community and dedicating my time to strengthen the community,” she says.

“There are good things happening in the Asheville community, and they would continue with or without me, but it’s the relationship-building activity that benefits everyone. Service builds relationships between the agencies and the College; making that connection and the resulting relationships are meaningful.”

One of the reasons Stuber decided to attend Warren Wilson is because of the College’s commitment to service. “Service was a huge factor because I knew I wanted to learn more about people and later on in life be a professional volunteer. The fact that service was so important to the

Stuber receives her award from Lisa Keyne and Budd Berro.

College influenced my decision because I knew the school shared my values about giving,” Stuber says.

Stuber has been a member of the Service Crew and Bonner Scholar program since 2008. She has led service trips to various agencies, organized weekly trips to alternative school programs, engaged in multiple service-learning courses and participated in a semester-long, servicebased study abroad program. She also

Wares leave generous bequests Pauline B. Ware was a westerner who learned about Warren Wilson College through a college recruiter and then from a former Warren Wilson student from Casper, Wyo. Upon her passing last October in Cheyenne, Ware and her late husband, the Rev. Robert J. Ware, left the college bequests totaling nearly $1 million—among the largest individual gifts in Warren Wilson history. The gifts will be directed toward the College’s general endowment, according to the Wares’ wishes.

Ware, born on her family’s farm in Parkville, Mo., in 1917, was keenly interested in the Warren Wilson College Farm as part of the college’s Presbyterian heritage. She and her husband began giving to the College’s annual fund more than a quarter century ago.

After her graduation from what was then Park College, Ware continued her education at San Francisco Theological Seminary. She married Robert Ware in 1939 in Philadelphia, and led numerous youth groups and hand bell choirs through her husband’s ministry.

The Rev. Ware, who died in 2008, served Presbyterian churches mostly in Nebraska and Wyoming.

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”The fact that service was so important to the College influenced my decision because I knew the school shared my values about giving.”

–Chloe Stuber ‘11

co-led Heart of the Issue workshops on the topics of economic justice and food insecurity.

Stuber wasn’t trying for the campus compact award but she was excited when she learned of her nomination. “I didn’t even know it was an award until I got it. It made me feel much appreciated as a senior on this crew. It was very affirming,” Stuber says.

The awards were presented at two N.C. Campus Compact Student Conferences that brought together more than 300 college students and guests representing 34 colleges and universities in the state. Stuber received her award from Lisa Keyne, the Compact’s executive director, and Budd Berro, Piedmont Regional Director for the Office of the Governor at Johnson C. Smith University.

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TR I AD N E WS Coshocton supports international students The partnership has been a model for church-college cooperation, as the whole congregation gets involved.

Since 1967, the Presbyterian Church of Coshocton, Ohio, has faithfully and generously supported international students at the College. From their global mission giving, they have provided many students with financial and moral support.

The partnership has been a model for church-college cooperation, as the whole congregation gets involved. They have

hosted students in their homes, bought them clothes, showed them around town, taken them out for meals and invited them to speak during worship and Sunday school. There is a tradition of having the students preach a sermon during their senior years. Close and lasting relationships have emerged from this partnership.

Despite factory closings and other impacts of the economic downturn, the Presbyterian Church of Coshocton remains dedicated to helping Warren Wilson international students achieve their educational aspirations. Warren Wilson librarian Mei Mah is one of these students.

“The scholarship helped me complete my education at the College,” Mah says. “After graduating in 1984, I obtained master’s degrees from Purdue University and the University of Illinois. I still remember the warmhearted people with whom I corresponded for years.”

Recently, the church welcomed Julie Lehman, the College’s Director of Church and Interfaith Relations to update members about the College and offer messages of gratitude and updates from their current and former scholars. After church, the mission committee hosted a luncheon for Lehman, inviting past student host families. The College is grateful for this lasting relationship, as are the many past and future Coshocton Scholars.

Close and lasting relationships have emerged from this partnership.

First Presbyterian Church of Coshocton, Ohio

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T R IA D N E WS Propst, Lytle recognized at 2010 Homecoming Two longtime stalwarts who have been major parts of the College for essentially as long as it’s been a four-year school were honored during 2010 Homecoming.

At the Homecoming barbecue, Norm “Old Top” Propst was honored for his 43 years of steadfast service to the College with the establishment of the $25,000 Norm Propst Work Scholarship, funded by a long line of alumni and friends. Over the years Propst has supervised hundreds of students on the Carpentry Crew, teaching them basic and advanced carpentry skills.

In a surprise ceremony during halftime of the alumni basketball game, Rodney Lytle was honored with the retirement of his No. 21 basketball jersey. A 1973 graduate, Lytle has worked at the College ever since in such diverse positions as building services

Kevin Frederick ‘77 (right) honors Norm “Old Top” Propst with the establishment of the Norm Propst Work Scholarship.

supervisor, basketball coach, multicultural affairs director and alumni relations director. Like Propst, Lytle has mentored and touched the lives of hundreds of students during his time at the College.

Rodney Greene ‘89 (right) presents Lytle with his retired jersey.

Al um ni Awards Pat Laursen, former alumni relations director, received the 2010 Distinguished Community Service Award at Homecoming 2010. Mrs. Laursen has shown that family does not mean just “your own.” Many people consider her family because of her continued alumni support in retirement as she runs what has been called the “Warren Wilson hospitality house” on College View.

Dr. Steven Kane ‘87 received the 2010 Distinguished Alumni Award. Prior to beginning his graduate education and professional career, Kane demonstrated his strong belief in service as a missionary at the Geneva, Switzerland Mission. In addition to a plethora of study and work experiences, Kane has demonstrated an extensive research background, with numerous awards,

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TR I AD N E WS Spasovski wraps up great career “Being a part of the College’s basketball team for the past four years has been a great

Aleksandar Spasovski, a senior from Skopje, Macedonia, and graduate of Veritas Christian Academy in Fletcher, N.C., has finished a terrific four years for the men’s basketball team.

“Aleks has been an extremely dedicated player for us over the years,” says men’s basketball coach Kevin Walden. “He’s been here through thick and thin and has contributed greatly has been a great experience that I will cherish to the success of Warren Wilson College basketball. I have no doubt that our current and for the rest of my life. It has helped me become future success is directly correlated to his commitment to our program.”

honor. Every minute played and point scored

the person I am today, and it will continue to help me. I am thankful and blessed to have had this opportunity.”

–Aleksandar Spasovski ‘11

Spasovski has seen the program evolve over the course of his four years mostly because of the investment he has made to the program. During his first year the Owls were undermanned, finishing the 2007-08 season with just seven players and five wins.

The 2008-09 season saw the hiring of current coach Kevin Walden, Aleks’ third coach in two years. His sophomore year was filled with many successes: increased roster size (9), win total (10) and his being named United States Collegiate Athletic Association (USCAA) honorable mention All-American. He also tallied a career-high game versus Division II North Greenville University, scoring 42 points including 10-of-19 from beyond the threepoint line.

The 2009-10 campaign once again brought an increased roster size (11), and the Owls won their last five games of the season to match their win total (10) from the previous year. The back-to-back 10-win seasons were the highest number of wins in a two-year span in 17 years at the College.

During Spasovski’s senior season, for the first time in college career, the Owls had a full squad of 14 players; that increase resulted in a more competitive team. Despite a more challenging schedule, the Owls improved and were the most talented and deepest team in Spasovski’s four years. Serving as the Owls’ lone captain, late in the season he was averaging 10.1 points, 2.6 assists, 2.5 rebounds and 1.1 steals per game while shooting 31 percent from the three-point line. He has amassed over 1,000 career points, but his contributions go way past numbers.

“Being a part of the College’s basketball team for the past four years has been a great honor,” said Spasovski. “Every minute played and point scored has been a great experience that I will cherish for the rest of my life. It has helped me become the person I am today, and it will continue to help me. I am thankful and blessed to have had this opportunity.”

Spasovski is on track to graduate in May with a business degree. When he walks down Sunderland Lawn and across the stage to receive his diploma, he can walk with his head held high—the College and the Fighting Owls basketball program are better now than when he arrived. His dedication and hard work over four years have helped transform a program.

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T R I A D NE WS Collins/Kahl Future Scientist Scholarship Joe Daprano ’86 and several of his classmates are heading up an effort to endow a scholarship in honor of Don Collins, Vicki Collins and Dean Kahl. When funded, the Collins/Kahl Future Scientists Scholarship will be available to students studying science and needing financial aid. “This is such an honor,” Vicki says, as Dean and her husband, Don, nod in agreement.

“I want to express that the success of our graduates has been the real reward. The best part has definitely been the students, and seeing what they do,” Vicki says.

“It’s been a dream job,” Dean says. “I like coming to work. I like the students. I like the people I work with. The students are creative and from that arises great challenges.”

“We have learned so much from the students,” Don says. The interests of the students allow us to get into the literature and learn about the topics and new techniques.”

Vicki continues, “And where else can you have an explosion, which is semicontrolled?”

With almost 120 years of combined service to the College, Dean, Don and Vicki have provided a strong foundation for the chemistry and physics programs and have fostered undergraduate research at the College. In the last 15 years Warren Wilson students have won more N.C. Academy of Science awards for their research papers than students at any other institution in the state.

This success is due to the diligence of Don, Vicki, Dean, and the College’s other science

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faculty. At many schools research opportunities are only available for selected students. Warren Wilson’s science curriculum is unique in that a student-initiated research project is required of all science majors.

Dean, Vicki and Don

Dean, Don and Vicki say they have always had a fair amount of freedom and the chance to be creative in their classes and in the lab. That freedom has benefitted students.

“Many students come in and are afraid of the sciences; our first priority is Chemistry I,” Vicki explains. “If we don’t do a good job there, we have turned them off for life.”

Don says he has been having a lot of fun with the class Earth, Light, and Sky and, of course, the Physics Photo of the Week.

“I love to see students get interested in the world around them,” Don says. Dean, Vicki and Don express their gratitude to Houston Witherspoon, Hugh Verner, Roger McGuire, Hal Ferguson, John and Edith Solomon, the Beattie Foundation and so many other friends of the College for supporting the sciences.

The Collins-Kahl team has all kinds of stories from the old Morse days when they took turns as building manager. At one point they didn’t have toilet stalls, so Vicki had students sew curtains out of “this wild fabric.” There was an orange chemistry cat, Avogadro, who was brought into the deal from a mouse experiment gone bad.

Dichromate, the cool chemistry cat that

succeeded Avogadro, passed on to the big litter box in the sky on February 9. From his favorite couch in the Elvis Lounge, Dichromate served the community as a source of solace and companionship for more than a decade. The famed Elvis Lounge began in Dean’s running days, when he brought back a large Elvis drawing from a cross-country meet in Cherokee and used it to block light in the lab. Over the years, graduates have sent items to grow and diversify the Chemistry Department’s collection of Elvis memorabilia.

Although Vicki, Don and Dean originally planned to be here only a couple of years, the students, the freedom to be creative in their labs and classrooms, the Swannanoa Valley and the core values of the College held them here. It is certainly a better place because of their hard work and enthusiasm.

A day without chemistry (or physics) is like a day without sunshine.

Join others and offer a gift in honor of Dean, Don and Vicki, who have helped many students make their way in the world of science. For more information or to make a gift, call Janet Doyle at 828.771.3756, email jdoyle@warren-wilson.edu or return the envelope in the magazine.

On the Web: http://tinyurl.com/wwcscience

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International Photo Contest Winners Every fall, the International Programs Office invites students, faculty and staff to submit photographs from their travels abroad. Photo submissions are displayed in three categories. Here are this year’s award winners, chosen by community vote.

Christian Diaz ’13 won best crosscultural photo for his photograph taken in Cambodia (left).

Max Strong ’11 won the people’s choice award for his image of a graveyard repairman in Fez, Morocco (below left).

Gordon Jones ’12 won best landscape/ nature photo for his image of the sky above Glenelg Town Hall outside of Adelaide, South Australia (below right).

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Faculty & S taffNews “Teaching the Geoweb: Interdisciplinary Undergraduate Research in Wireless Sensor Networks, Web Mapping and Geospatial Data Management,” an article by global studies professor David Abernathy, was published in the Journal of Geography.

Purchasing supervisor Deborah Anstrom received a bachelor’s degree in business administration from the College in December 2010.

Biology professor Paul Bartels’ article “Allometry and Correcting for Body Size in the Biometric Analysis of Tardigrades” was published in the Journal of Zoological Systematics and Evolutionary Research.

Another of his co-written articles, “Ramazzottius bellubellus sp. nov, a New Species from the Great Smoky Mountains National Park,” was published in the Proceedings of the Biological Society of Washington.

Linda Block, Lead Poisoning Prevention Program coordinator, has been working with the FDA about the safety and labeling of imported traditional pottery.

Flood to leave ELC Margo Flood, executive director of the Environmental Leadership Center (ELC), is leaving the College on May 15 to pursue other interests. “The ELC has contributed greatly to the success of the College,” President Sandy Pfeiffer said. “Margo’s leadership will be missed.” Flood began working part-time for the ELC in 2000. In 2002 she moved to a full-time position, and in 2007 she became the executive director.

John Brock, a faculty member in chemistry and chair of the College’s natural science division, will serve as interim director of the ELC.

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Paul Braese, facilities management director, led a training session on campus sustainability at the College Business Management Institute.

Soufflé Chiffon Gown, a book of poems by writing professor Landon Godfrey, won the Cider Press Book Award and was published in January.

Chemistry professor Stephen Cartier and the Chemistry Department received a grant from the Appalachian College Association to incorporate molecular modeling software throughout the chemistry curriculum.

Chris Hanson, plumbing supervisor, has brought the GreenPlumbers USA core curriculum training program to campus.

GreenPlumbers USA is an internationally recognized accreditation/certification program at the forefront of water and energy conservation training and the installation of water and energy saving products.

Students in professor Ali Climo’s Social Welfare Policy and Services class did a service project with Children First/ Communities in Schools on raising awareness about the Youth Accountability Task Force and the issue of adult sentencing for youth in North Carolina.

As a result, Climo has been selected as a Champion for Children by the Children First/Communities in Schools Board of Directors.

Dave Ellum, sustainable forestry professor and college forest director, presented “Using Leaf Spectral Reflectance to Compare Rapid Acclimation and Developmental Plasticity in Forest Understory Herbs” at the Botanical Society of America annual meeting. At the Black Mountain Arts Council he presented “A Botanical Tour of The Blue Ridge Parkway on its 75th Anniversary.” Ellum’s article “Spatial Pattern in Herb Diversity and Abundance of Second Growth Mixed Deciduous-Evergreen Forest of Southern New England was published in Forest Ecology and Management.

Philosophy professor Sally Fischer authored “Becoming Bovine: A Phenomenology of Early Motherhood and its Practical and Political Consequences for Workplace Policies,” a chapter in the forthcoming book Philosophy and Motherhood, by Routledge Press.

Second-Skin Rhinestone-Spangled Nude

“Plasma Center,” “Kinetic” and “The Slippery Art,” three poems by writing professor Gary Hawkins, were published in Red Line Blues. He presented the paper “Semester Remix: The Evolutionary Portfolio and the Rhythms of Revision in the Creative Writing Classroom” on a panel he chaired at the Conference on College Composition and Communication.

At Penland School of Craft, he was an instructor co-teaching the course Craft, Poetry and Printing.

History/political science professor Dongping Han spoke at Ohio State University on the Chinese Cultural Revolution and the future of China.

Miranda Hipple, director of donor relations, was interviewed for “Bread and Butter: Why Annual Giving is Still the Foundation of Fundraising Success,” published in the October 2010 issue of Currents, published by the Council for the Advancement and Support of Education (CASE). She also presented “Fundraising Strategies for Small College Annual Funds” at the 2010 Carolinas Annual Fund Conference.

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Faculty &S taff N ews Jeff Keith’s article, “Civilization, Race, and the Japan Expedition’s Cultural Diplomacy, 1853-1854,” is published in April issue of Diplomatic History, the journal of record for the Society of Historians of American Foreign Relations.

Library director Christine Nugent’s article “West German Economic Reconstruction and Moral Reconstitution: An Examination of Economic Instability and its Impact on ‘Holocaust Moments’” is published in the Journal of European Studies.

Lucy Lawrence, social work professor and director of field education, has been awarded the Summer Leadership Institute Scholarship from the Council on Social Work Education to participate in the Management Development Program at Harvard Graduate School of Education.

History/political science professor Philip Otterness was a featured historian on NBC’s program “Who Do You Think You Are?” on February 11. Each hour-long episode of the show traces a celebrity’s ancestry and uses these stories to also tell stories of America’s history. These stories are gradually unfolded to the celebrity through various documents and historical artifacts that are explained to them by archivists, librarians and historians.

Photographs of art professor Leah Leitson’s work are published in Advanced Pottery by Linda Bloomfield, 500 Judaica (Lark Books) and 500 Vases (Lark Books).

Director of peace and justice studies Paul Magnarella has become an editorial board member of the Beijing Law Review, published by the China University of Political Science and Law, Beijing. The Council of the Conflict Research Society has designated The Oxford International Encyclopedia of Peace, to which Paul had contributed three articles, as its Book of the Year for 2010.

President Sandy Pfeiffer’s essay, “Cults, Christians, and Confucius: Religion in Modern Japan” was published in the Japan Studies Association Journal. He delivered the paper “Education in Japan: A 2011 Update” at the 2011 annual meeting of the Japan Studies Association. With co-author Kaye Adkins, Pfeiffer completed the production process for a new textbook, Technical Communication Fundamentals and with the

same coauthor is revising the 8th edition of Technical Communication: A Practical Approach, a textbook Pfeiffer first published in 1991.

Outdoor Leadership department chair Ed Raiola authored “Earl Kelley: Education for What is Real,” a chapter in Sourcebook of Experiential Education, Key Thinkers and Their Contributions,” published by Routledge. The book is composed of selected biographies of individuals whose philosophy and practice exemplify a biographical and historical model for reaching a deeper understanding of experiential education.

Writing professor Alicita Rodriguez participated in the panel presentation, “Fictional (Mis)Representations of ‘Natives’” at the 20th Annual British Commonwealth and Postcolonial Studies Conference.

Psychology professor Bob Swoap presented “When Knowledge Isn’t Enough: Reducing Mental Illness Stigma in the Classroom” at the 33rd Annual National Institute on the Teaching of Psychology.

Religious environmentalism op-ed columns by outdoor leadership/environmental studies professor Mallory McDuff have been published in USA Today, Huffington Post and the Charlotte Observer, among other media outlets. In fall 2010 she presented her book Natural Saints at the North American Association of Environmental Education meetings, the North Carolina Council of Churches Critical Issues Forum and the Lansing Lee Conference at Kanuga Conferences.

Chemistry professor John Brock has been awarded a grant by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to study the human health impacts of climate change in Appalachia and the southeastern United States. Brock will combine existing databases on climate and health to develop new models to assess and predict the human health impacts of climate change. Brock will adapt the project for continued research with undergraduate students at the College.

“Our Stories,” a poem by Joan Beebe Teaching Fellow Rose McLarney ’04 MFA ’09, won Alligator Juniper’s National Writing Contest in poetry.

Two research scientists will mentor and supervise the project: David Easterling of the National Climatic Data Center and George Luber of the CDC. Easterling and Luber are members of the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

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Brock to study health impacts of climate change

“I have been looking for ways to bring together my interest in public health and the environment,” Brock said. “In addition, I have been trying to find projects of interest to students for research that can be done relatively inexpensively on campus. This project fits the bill perfectly.”

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Academics, work and service:

Blurring the Lines

by Lindsay Popper ’10

It’s like one of those ongoing jokes that you can drop into without explanation, except we’re serious about it. As we drive around in Nathan’s clunky, faithful truck, we’ll pass sunny patches of grass and simply say, “There.” After just a few months growing food in Tallahassee, I’m beginning to see possible gardens everywhere.

I

had grown two things, a cup of grass seed in kindergarten and a kohlrabi in third grade, before I moved to Florida to join Nathan Ballentine with his business of helping people grow their own food and share it.

Within 12 hours of getting off the bus, I’d sown rows of turnips, beets, carrots and rutabagas; within 24 hours I was helping kids at Nathan’s church plant a garden of vegetables to give away at the food pantry. Within a week I had learned how to build the raised-bed gardens that serve as the moneymaking center for Nathan’s Tallahassee Food Gardens. After two weeks, I had found the first two churches whose community gardens I would be helping to start or expand; learned how to install micro-irrigation; and helped lead two workshops, one for the food pantry and another for teens with developmental disabilities. I was learning.

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Lindsay Popper and Nathan Ballentine reaping the harvest.

Nathan graduated from Warren Wilson in 2008 with an integrative studies degree in community organizing and returned to Tallahassee with the thought of re-rooting himself. When I ask him how he started his business, he launches into vaguely connected stories with the take-away of, “Well, I really don’t know.” He jump-started Tallahassee Food Gardens by standing by the roadside in overalls with a pitchfork, à la American Gothic, holding signs reading, “Grow your own food and share it,” “Honk if you like food gardens” and “We can grow food.” The signs are in his closet waiting for his next roadside show.

Raised-bed gardening

As Warren Wilson graduates, Nathan and I are well-schooled in blurring the lines between academics, work and service; now, the lines have all but disappeared.

In two years, Nathan has built both a successful business and a good name for himself inTallahassee. His studies in community organizing have helped him work with different communities to start gardens. His two years working on the Landscaping Crew taking care of the EcoDorm permaculture garden have given him the practical know-how to plan and maintain a variety of foodscapes.

I arrived in the fall, hoping to learn about growing food and working with people while maintaining a healthy idealism and making a bit of money. As Warren Wilson graduates, Nathan and I are wellschooled in blurring the lines between academics, work and service; now, the lines have all but disappeared. Raised-bed garden placement (work) necessitates researching plants and their growing seasons, and thus can be a scholarly endeavor. Listening to elders tell stories about growing up on farms teaches me enormous amounts, but it’s happening in Miss Mitchell’s Senior Center healthy living classes, so does that make it service? And if we create a garden at a church for a reduced rate, spend an evening helping the youth group plant food, then return for problem solving, is that work, or is it service, or is it just another learning experience for us? Categories have blurred to the point where they’re irrelevant.

People ask, “What do you do?” One answer is this: We install and plant raised-bed food gardens and take home checks (and, a few bewildering times, hundred dollar bills). We use the money to subsidize the free work we do in the community.

Really, though, the work we do is a litany of food-related activities: We develop and lead workshops to teach people how to grow their Nathan Ballentine, à la American Gothic own food; we collect and publish community garden stories to instruct and inspire; we walk When we drive home at around with pastors who want their the end of a full day, we see congregations to start growing food in their church’s parking lot; we organize our empty lots full of weeds, trash community to host a visit from Will Allen, and grass. More and more, urban farmer extraordinaire from Growing though, as we drive through Power in Milwaukee; we meet with city planners who want to create community Tallahassee, we see things gardens; we dream about starting a lettuce starting to grow: collard growing and delivery business; we eat a lot of home-grown food and laugh with our greens, turnips, broccoli, neighbors as we figure out what on earth to lettuce. We see gardens taking do with daikon radishes. Every day, we set out with the goal of finding ways to support root, and we see our part in the dream of Tallahassee being able to feed it. itself.

Lindsay and Nathan were both integrative studies majors who received the Pfaff Cup and Sullivan Award, respectively.

Cucumber harvest from raised-bed garden

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Connections–from North Carolina to

Costa Rica

by Alec Wiener ’10

I

f you asked farm manager Chase Hubbard why he chose to pursue the farming life, he might tell you his family history put him on that path. If you pursued the subject, he might tell you about his family picking corn together or gathering around the kettle to make Brunswick stew. If you asked social work professor Lucy Lawrence about her family history, you might hear similar stories. The people and places they mention might even be the same.

Though Lucy and Chase met eight years ago when she came to the College, they didn’t discover their web of connections until three years ago. When Lucy’s aunt visited the College and learned about the farm, she asked, “You know who [the farm manager] is, right?” To Lucy’s aunt, Chase is the grandson of her brother-in-law’s best friend. As it turns out, Lucy’s father, Lewis Lawrence, and Chase’s grandfather Charlie Hubbard were both farmers in 16

the neighboring North Carolina counties of Chatham and Lee. Lewis and Charlie grew up together in Sanford, attending elementary through high school together.

They were best friends. Many years later, Charlie performed the eulogy at Lewis’s funeral.

In the fall semester Lucy and Chase fused their shared history and taught the study abroad course Eco-social Lifeways in Costa Rica: ¡Pura Vida! Although the class was labeled as a social work course, none of the students involved were social work majors.

This, however, did not concern Lucy. “Social work is interdisciplinary,” she said. Through a social work course, Lucy and Chase merged agriculture with gender dynamics, poverty and eco-tourism.

The first place the class stayed in Costa Rica was called Finca La Flor. Here, students worked for a farm in exchange for meals,

lodging and Spanish classes. The farm’s mission is to produce enough food to sustain all the workers, visitors and animals.

“Finca La Flor was inspiring to us in seeing the mission of the College actualized in Costa Rica,” Laurel Thwing ’11 said.

In her early adulthood, Lucy had wanderlust, leaving the tobacco fields of rural North Carolina to join the Peace Corps in Costa Rica. Afterwards, she continued her professional social work career in Latin America. Coming to Warren Wilson, however, helped her realize the values she learned from living off the land in a close, localized community.

Chase, in contrast, knew early on that he wanted to continue in his family’s tradition of farming. His experiences of working in the fields with family were too valuable to leave behind. Similarly, Warren Wilson students and teachers alike found the sense

Scenes from Costa Rica Clockwise: (facing page) sun-drying coffee beans in Atenas; Casey McManus ‘12 researching medicinal plants; (this page) mountain view from Finca La Flor; students working at Finca La Flor; Jeff Lott ‘12, Sam Wasko ‘12, host brother Luis and Julius Stuart ‘11; San Jose urban lettuce garden

of family and community to be one of the most appealing aspects in Costa Rican culture.

In the Costa Rican town of Cobano, the site of Lucy’s former Peace Corps assignment where she worked in integrated community development, students became part of the relationships she developed more than 20 years ago. The host families were as friendly and welcoming as they were humble.

Students felt they were part of the family.

More than any one place visited or any sight seen, these personal encounters exemplified the philosophy of a cross-cultural experience.

“When people think of Costa Rica, they often think of a tropical paradise,” Lucy said. “But there is more. It’s not just about consuming the natural commodities of the environment; there’s also the treasure of the people.”

On her path to Warren Wilson, Lucy spent more than two years in Cobano and two years working at the Center for Sustainable Development Studies in Atenas, where the WWC group would stay on a shadegrown coffee plantation. During her time in Costa Rica she established relationships with people who would become the hosts,

resources, cultural brokers and mentors for students in the Costa Rica study abroad course.

“Working with Chase allowed me many professional ‘ah-ha’ moments, like working to make clearer connections between social work and agriculture,” Lucy said. “He has helped me reconnect to values related to farming that were instilled in me at an early age. It’s gratifying and inspiring for me to see him carrying on the same types of work that Charlie and Lewis trailblazed decades ago.”

“When people think of Costa Rica, they often think of a tropical paradise.

But there is more. It’s not just about consuming the natural commodities of the environment; there’s also the treasure of the people.”

–Lucy Lawrence 17

Warren Wilson Crafts a tradition renewed

by Morgan Davis ’02

F

or about fifteen years after World War II, Presbyterians and friends of the small mission school in the Swannanoa Valley enjoyed beautiful textiles and wooden goods sold under the label “Warren Wilson Crafts.”

Students preserved Appalachian weaving methods with woven table linens, towels and rugs, and they “learned to do by doing” as they created wooden boxes, turned bowls and other pieces. By 1969, however, the looms made by the Farm School boys during the Great Depression were silent, and the wood shop was torn down. Warren Wilson Crafts was a loose end of the College’s history abandoned to the sepia haze of old photographs— lurking amongst figures preserved without name or time or context—until recently, when students revived the tradition with Work Program crews dedicated to weaving and woodworking.

Warren Wilson Crafts was a loose end of the College’s history until recently, when students revived the tradition with Work Program crews dedicated to weaving and woodworking.

Half of Warren Wilson Crafts was the weaving program that Helen Hickman started in 1928 at the Dorland-Bell School for girls in Hot Springs. Dorland-Bell School for girls was one of the first members of the Southern Highland Craft Guild, and the school helped save many fiber craft techniques from extinction. Hickman visited local weavers and collected old patterns. She learned mountain spinning, carding, dyeing and weaving.

Woodworking was part of the Farm School curriculum from the early days. Throughout the Depression, Oscar Clark taught the boys to make cedar boxes, lamp stands and other items to sell in the gift shop of the Presbyterian Board of Missions in New York. By 1941, the program was under the direction of Gary McGraw and located in a newly renovated shop in the Industrial Arts building. At the time, the purpose of woodworking was to teach the boys “to solve problems which confront them at home…to enable them to select their furniture 18

This tag was attached to woven goods produced by the Dorland-Bell Looms at the Warren H. Wilson Vocational Junior College.

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skillfully, to plan their homes carefully, and to do numerous jobs that confront most men.”

During the war years, the National Board of Missions made the difficult choice to consolidate Dorland-Bell with the Asheville Farm School. Together, they became the Warren H. Wilson Vocational Junior College under the leadership of Arthur Bannerman with Henry Jensen as dean. For a time, Warren Wilson Crafts flourished.

Weaving and woodworking were offered as vocational majors and as work crews.

The weavers under Hickman operated 18 looms in Dorland-Bell, and the woodshop students under McGraw and later C. Hardy Davidson ’18 created objects of beauty and utility.

small, unofficial ways within the larger community. Thus, little by little the vocational emphasis dwindled and that kind of experience was increasingly picked up within the work program.

However, the Work Program was no longer a vocational laboratory so much as an economical means of maintaining the campus. With Warren Wilson struggling to grow on a tight budget and a prevailing attitude that vocational interests appealed only to a “low calibre student,” crafts had little hope.

During the mid 1950s, the vocational track was reduced to four departments: agriculture, printing, secretarial training

and technical engineering. The word “vocational” was dropped from the College’s name, the wood shop was dismantled, and the Industrial Arts building was converted to classrooms and offices. The weaving courses ended, but the work crew continued under Hickman and later Alice Pratt from the Penland School of Crafts. Warren Wilson Crafts survived the final years of the junior college with goods being sold in a gift shop in Sunderland.

As the senior college grew, Owl & Spade ran articles showing professional architectural drawings and seemed at pains to present Warren Wilson as a serious and modern school, attracting students from around the world. Instead of work and

Bannerman and Jensen were visionary leaders who believed that the high school and vocational programs were not a viable future for Warren Wilson. Following the war, with civic improvements throughout the Appalachian region, the need for a mission school dwindled while a growing number of students sought a college education. Warren Wilson responded by providing its first college preparatory program in 1946 and an associate of arts degree in 1951. By 1952, the seed of the four-year college was growing, even though many at Warren Wilson and on the National Board fought it. Jensen believed that it was inevitable. Much was lost to see that seed flourish.

The high school division was decreased throughout the 1950s. Jensen—who was admission officer at the time—discouraged students from applying because he thought the division was “a drain on the institution’s resources” and that the few local students had “generally dubious promise”. A long-range strategy was implemented that focused on increasing faculty and infrastructure while attracting students from beyond the Appalachian region. Warren Wilson graduated its last high school class in 1957.

Weaving Program, c1943

The post-high school vocational programs did not fare any better. Jensen said: While it seemed that weaving and woodworking had been banished for good, crafts nonetheless managed to survive in SPRING 2011

Fiber Arts Crew, 2010

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Oscar Clarke (center) with Asheville Farm School students in the woodworking shop. This photo was used in the school's 1929-30 catalog.

Dan Faulkner-Bond '10 working on a guitar in the Woodjoinery Crew shop.

Christian character rooted in the Southern Appalachian region, the new college emphasized its international appeal, diverse student body and commitment to the liberal arts.

By the time the College graduated its first baccalaureate class in 1969, Warren Wilson Crafts had disappeared altogether, but much did survive those lean transitional years.

The Work Program could have vanished during the early 1960s as it was repeatedly scrutinized. In 1966, work time for students was reduced from halftime to fifteen hours per week. Mark Banker ’73 noted, “Work supervisors suspected that some of the students and staff did not understand the philosophy and purpose of the work program and, indeed, that some simply did not care.”

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Crafts survived in small, unofficial ways within the larger community, but it would take more than forty years for collegesponsored weaving and woodworking to return. For example, in 1973, Roger D. Stuck helped with a craft shop in the old boiler room, and around 1999, students secured space for a woodshop in the new recycling building. By 2009, though, the looms and lathes from Dorland-Bell and the Asheville Farm School were gone. There were no Helen Hickmans or Oscar Clarks to guide young hands. The students who led initiatives to create crafting crews had to rely on their own ingenuity and the kindness of alumni, friends and parents for equipment and training. Thanks to their talent and generosity, Warren Wilson is once again enriched by a renewed tradition of fine handcrafts; the historical loose end of Warren Wilson Crafts has been grafted back into the living institution.

The Fiber Arts Crew started with two students who came from crafting families and with help from friends of the College.

Kathryn Evans ’10 and Allison Hoyman Browe ’10 had been hosting a craft night in Dorland when they got the idea for a weaving crew. They approached Melanie Wilder, a former student, to supervise the crew. Wilder, who holds a degree in professional crafts from Haywood Community College, has volunteered her time and talent ever since. Richard ’59 and Lila Bellando generously donated a loom to the new crew, as did Wilder and chemistry lab manager Joe Young. Weavers of the Highland Craft Guild have also made donations.

The crew has produced beautiful woven goods that combine traditional Appalachian OWL & SPADE

weaving with contemporary ideas, such as weaving rag rugs from old clothes and creating durable shopping totes from plastic grocery bags. The woven goods sell quickly during events such as Festival on the Field at Homecoming. The crew also participates in service projects, such as making scarves for a local women’s shelter.

In 2010, Faulkner-Bond worked with local author and luthier John S. Bogdanovich and learned to create musical instruments.

Bogdanovich donated templates books to help the crew make guitars, mandolins and banjos for the music program and for sale. Furniture making continues under the guidance of student Eric Von Aschwege ’12.

Also in 2009, a second craft crew was organized. Several students participated in a workshop with parent Richard Gordon and the Campus Support Crew. Together, they handcrafted a conference table for the President’s office; a trustee commissioned a second. Seeing an opportunity, students Dan Faulkner-Bond ’10 and Bob Kaplos ’10 created the Woodjoinery Crew with supervisor Doug Bradley. The crew has made beautiful tables and benches of fine hardwoods sustainably harvested on campus.

Today, the Fiber Arts and Woodjoinery Crews are strong. Their handmade pieces embody the ethos of the College—the result of creative student work, made sustainably, they enrich the community. The crews will face challenges in the future, and it will take all of our support to ensure that the renewed tradition of Warren Wilson Crafts remains a permanent, vibrant and meaningful part of our college.

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For more information: Toward Frontiers Yet Unknown (1984) Banker, Mark T. A History of Warren Wilson College (1974) Jensen, Henry W. Thanks to Diana Sanderson for assistance with the College Archives and to Melanie Wilder for information on Helen Hickman.

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Service: A Way of Life for Katie Spotz’08 Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris

by Jack Igelman

W

water and the lack of it can affect daily life.

This motivated her to make sense of water issues on a global scale. “I was in shock at the scope of the problem,” she says. “It’s too big of an issue. I wanted to be involved, and I wanted to help.”

hen the enormity of rowing alone across an ocean became crushing, Katie Spotz adapted by taking her journey one stroke at a time. “Rather than rowing 3,000 miles once, I decided I was rowing one mile, 3,000 times,” she says. And that’s just one from a long list of coping strategies she used to become, at 22, the youngest person to row solo across an ocean. For Spotz, who graduated from Warren Wilson in 2008 with a degree in business and economics, it was ultimately a thirst for clean drinking water that led her across. Not literally, of course; she had plenty to drink thanks to a solar-powered water desalinator.

Rather, Spotz was stirred by the grim reality that worldwide, roughly one billion people don’t have access to clean water.

Upon returning to the States, Spotz enrolled at Warren Wilson, sight unseen, because of the College’s commitment to making a difference. “What’s unique about Warren Wilson is that it has a way of breaking down barriers that connect people. It’s really inspiring to see people do what they are passionate about and to see a side of a person you wouldn’t otherwise see,” she says.

“The real challenge is letting go of those selflimitations.”

It all started in 2007, when Spotz was on an academic exchange in Australia while the nation was in the grips of extreme drought.

She saw first-hand the profound ways that

Whatever her inhibitions, it’s certain that Spotz is an overachiever. The Ohio native enrolled in college at the age of 16; ran her first marathon at 18; was the first to swim

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“To row an ocean is great, but it’s brutal.

The one thing that separates people that get across is the feeling that you are connected to something else.

Knowing that I was able to spread the message for water made the difference.”

–Katie Spotz ‘08

the length of the Allegheny River; and has cycled across the country. The seed was planted for her ultimate adventure when a fellow traveler in Australia mentioned a friend who had rowed across an ocean. It wasn’t long before she was calling home and announcing trans-Atlantic intentions.

“To be honest, most people thought I was absolutely crazy to try something so bold without experience,” she says, admitting that she was among the least skilled on the College’s rowing team and has never considered herself a star athlete.

But row she did, arriving in the South American nation of Guyana on March 14, 2010, 70 days after launching from the west coast of Africa in a specialized 19foot craft. Along the 2,817-mile journey, Spotz paddled ten to twelve hours each day, consuming 5,000 calories each day to fuel her efforts, and listened to hours of music, talk and comedy on her iPod.

“The more that it’s in the spotlight, the more funds are raised. It means I can raise awareness of what’s important.”

After completing her trans-Atlantic trip, Spotz was hired as a market researcher for Kinetico, a water quality systems company based in Ohio. One week each month she is on the road speaking about her journey to raise awareness for global water issues.

It’s a perfect match for Spotz, who remains passionate about the global water crisis. But don’t expect her to cross another large body of water any time soon. Instead, she aims to cross a continent: she and a partner plan to cycle across the country in what’s known as the world’s toughest bike race in June.

They hope to complete the 3,000-mile Race Across America in under eight days and raise funds for the Blue Planet Network and Farm Africa.

“I like the idea of having a blank canvas and not knowing exactly what to expect,” says Spotz. “I love doing adventures that are completely different.” And although her endurance exploits may have a finish line, she sees her commitment to worldly causes as ongoing. She credits Warren Wilson for reinforcing the ethos that service is more than just a requirement. “It’s not like you finish the problem and it’s done,” Spotz says.

“Service is a way of life. You wake up and it becomes your mission.”

Spotz returns to campus on May 12 to speak at the end-of-year athletic banquet and present a lunch & learn on her solo row across the Atlantic Ocean for safe drinking water.

For more information: alumni@warren-wilson.edu or 1.866.992.2586.

Although her trans-Atlantic journey was an impressive physical challenge with profound risks, Spotz points out that for many, the real hurdle is often mental. According to the Ocean Rowing Society, nearly half the rowers who start an ocean crossing fail to complete their journey. Spotz explains that many rowers call for help about a quarter of the way in as they fail to adjust to the rigors of a crossing. This wasn’t a problem for Spotz. In fact, when she reached her quarter-point milestone, her boat was ceremoniously surrounded by a pod of more than a dozen dolphins—close enough, she says, to touch. That’s when she knew she was part of something larger. “To row an ocean is great, but it’s brutal. The one thing that separates people that get across is the feeling that you are connected to something else. Knowing that I was able to spread the message for water made the difference.”

And that’s just it: Spotz is in it for more than just personal glory. To date, her crossing has raised $100,000 for clean drinking water. Nor did her adventure go unnoticed; it was covered by, among others, CBS, CNN and the New York Times—thrusting her from complete solitude to a media darling. Spotz was also among the “Women of the Year” celebrated

by Glamour magazine at Carnegie Hall, where she rubbed shoulders with Kate Hudson, Mia Hamm, and Oprah. “It’s been overwhelming in a good way,” says Spotz.

Spotz, posing with ABC’s Diane Sawyer, was among the “Women of the Year” celebrated by Glamour magazine at Carnegie Hall. Photo by Dimitrios Kambouris

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From

Turkey to Warren Wilson and back again

Hagia Sofia

Paul Magnarella, Warren Wilson College’s Director of Peace and Justice Studies, has a special fascination with Turkey. Why? “Well,” he says, “the country is amazing!” He then goes on to explain:

T

he history of the Turkish people has been marked by dynamic changes resulting from migration, conquest, assimilation and human aspiration. Geographically, historically and culturally, their country straddles two different worlds—Christian Europe and Muslim Asia. Turkey is one of the few Second or Third World countries that did not experience European colonialism or direct domination yet chose to adopt European political and cultural ways. Today Turkey is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, an associate member of the European Union—and also a member of the Islamic Congress.

The modern Turkish Republic was constructed on the crumbled foundations of the Ottoman Empire by the charismatic Mustafa Kemal, who was later honored with the title Atatürk, or “Father of the Turks.” The European victors of World War I had partitioned the Turkish sultan’s lands, and Greek forces had taken control of western Asia Minor. However, Atatürk—the most impressive general in the defeated Ottoman army—revitalized the exhausted Turks into a military force that drove foreign occupation out of Anatolia and secured present-day Turkey as their independent homeland. Atatürk then embarked on the ambitious project of molding Turkey into a modern nation-state.

Believing that Islamic-Ottoman institutions and culture had caused the Empire’s collapse and the Turks’ miserable condition, Atatürk envisioned a new Turkey based on the principles of nationalism, secularism, statism, populism and reform. Among his many revolutionary acts was the abolition of the Caliphate and Sultanate, which were the highest religious and political offices in the Islamic world at that time. Despite these changes, religion still plays an important role in many Turks’ lives. Atatürk ruled Turkey as a firm but benevolent dictator from 1923 until his death in 1938. His successor, Ismet Inonu, continued Atatürk’s secular policies but launched the country into a true, multiparty, democratic political era in 1950. Since that time, the Turks have demonstrated an unswerving determination to preserve their newly formed democratic institutions.

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Today, Turkey is a vibrant country that includes about 12 million Kurds and smaller numbers of Circassians, Georgians, Greeks, Armenians, Jews and Arabs. Most Turks are Sunni Muslims, although a significant number adhere to Alevi and Shiite traditions. More than 70 percent of the population lives in urban areas that exhibit a mix of Western lifestyles and more traditional ways of life. Istanbul (formerly Constantinople) is one of the world’s great historic cities; it contains numerous classic Byzantine and Ottoman treasures, such as Hagia Sophia, the Blue Mosque and Top Kapi (the Sultan’s palace). It also serves as Turkey’s chief seaport and is the nation’s cultural, commercial, industrial, and financial center.

Magnarella first traveled to Turkey in the 1960s as a Peace Corps volunteer teaching English in the public schools of Burdur and Antalya. A fellow volunteer, Sharlene, later became his wife. In the 1970s he returned to conduct anthropological field research for the doctorate he earned at Harvard.

His first major research project resulted in the 1974 book Tradition and Change in a Turkish Town. For over a year he lived with an elderly Turkish couple in Susurluk, a town of about 11,500 people. In addition to longtime sedentary and recently settled nomadic Turks, the town contained Muslim Balkan migrants, Georgians, Circassians

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from the Caucasus region, and Gypsies. Magnarella interacted with a wide variety of townspeople, trying his best to experience their ways of life. He conducted a classic anthropological community study that covered the town’s history, politics, economy, educational system, kinship, social organization, rituals and religious practices.

But Magnarella didn’t just study the town’s people; he formed lasting relationships with them. For example, the elderly couple with whom he lived ritually adopted him as their spiritual son. The couple was illiterate, so they had Magnarella read and write their letters. His “Turkish mother” even instructed him in the lore of traditional folk cures.

Magnarella’s next major project was the study of a tiny mountain village of Muslim Georgians whose ancestors had fled to Turkey in the nineteenth century after Russians had invaded their homeland on the Black Sea coast. He lived with a local peasant family, working alongside them in the fields and taking meals in their home. He also studied the villagers’ history, settlement, agriculture, kinship system, rituals and the beginnings of their emigration to Europe as guest workers. His resulting book, The Peasant Venture: Tradition, Migration and Change among Georgian Peasants in Turkey (1979), was published in both English and Turkish.

Rumeli Hisar

Today, Turkey is a vibrant country that includes about 12 million Kurds and smaller numbers of Circassians, Georgians, Greeks, Armenians, Jews and Arabs.

Most Turks are Sunni Muslims, although a significant number adhere to Alevi and Shiite traditions.

Over the last thirty years, Magnarella has returned to Turkey many times to continue research and give lectures. He has published extensively on Turkish politics, culture and society in academic journals, and for many years he authored the Collier’s Encyclopedia Yearbook articles on Turkey. Many of his academic writings have been republished in the book Anatolia’s Loom. At Warren Wilson, Paul integrates Turkish topics into many of his courses.

Istanbul University

In May 2010, Magnarella revisited the town and village in which he has developed close ties and presented a lecture at the Georgian Community Center in Istanbul. Because the Georgian village Magnarella studied back in the 1970s has changed so markedly, Turkish Georgians consider his book a valuable documentation of a traditional way of life that younger generations will never experience.

Although he has branched out into other areas of study, such as international law—his Justice in Africa (2000) won a book of the year award—he has maintained a special affinity for Turkey. When asked what he values most about his times in that country, Magnarella recounts the many friendships he has made, the gracious hospitality he has enjoyed and the opportunities he has had to experience the rich Turco-Islamic culture and master an exotic, non-Indo-European language. It’s also the country in which he married his wife. They will spend the fall 2011 semester in Turkey, conducting research for updated editions of his town and village books. While there, he will be affiliated with Georgetown University’s Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies.

SPRING 2011

Galata Bridge

25

Swannanoa Gathering 1991–2011: A retrospective of the first twenty years

by Jim Magill

I

n 1991, the Persian Gulf War was broadcast live on TV, Slovenia and Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia, Jay Leno took over the Tonight Show from Johnny Carson, Nolan Ryan pitched a record seventh no-hitter. On a small, southern mountain campus, the Swannanoa Gathering was born.

One day in late November, Doug Orr, the newly appointed president at Warren Wilson, called me to arrange a time to get together and discuss an idea he had. We brainstormed the rough outlines of weeklong workshops in folk music and dance to be held in the summer on campus. Doug had received a presidential leadership grant from the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation; some of those funds were designated for the Swannanoa Gathering, which he asked me to direct.

The first Swannanoa Gathering was scheduled for July 1992, so plans shifted into overdrive. The Gathering’s first brochure began with an excerpt from the poem, “The Fiddler of Dooney,” by William Butler Yeats:

For the good are always the merry Save by an evil chance And the merry love the fiddle And the merry love to dance...

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For the first year, we piggy-backed our new programs onto the front end of an existing campus program, the Great Smokies Song Chase, a songwriting camp run by legendary songwriter and alumnus Billy Edd Wheeler ’53. We debuted with three theme weeks offering classes in music, dance and crafts.

Scottish Week was paired with Bluegrass Week, followed by Old-Time Music & Dance Week. Ninety-three brave souls took a chance on us that summer, and we were off and running.

For our second season, Scottish Week and Old-Time Week ran as stand-alone programs, and the Great Smokies Song Chase was replaced by our own songwriting workshop—Contemporary Folk Week.

By the following year, Scottish Week had expanded to include Irish music and was renamed Celtic Week, and we’d added new programs in Mountain Dulcimer and Blues.

In 1995 we added a children’s program and the Performance Lab; Dulcimer Week expanded to include hammered dulcimers.

The following year saw the transformation of Blues Week into an expanded Guitar Week. It was also our fifth anniversary; to mark the occasion, we established an award to honor the lifetime achievement of those we called Master Music Makers. Its first recipients were Ralph Blizard and folk icon Tom Paxton. The next few years saw the addition of a Dance Week, and another Master Music Maker, the great Scottish singer and folklorist, Margaret Bennett.

With the turn of the new millennium, our good friend from Charlotte, Thistle & Shamrock host Fiona Ritchie, became our fourth Master Music Maker. Dance Week had given way to Sing, Swing & String Week. To celebrate the region’s Native American culture, we introduced Cherokee Heritage Weekend presented in partnership with the Museum of the Cherokee Indian. We also established youth scholarships, funded by donations from Gathering attendees. With the untimely loss to cancer in 2001 of our dear friend and long-time Celtic Week staffer Tony Cuffe, we began the tradition of memorial youth scholarships, which we now award each year in the names of Tony Cuffe, Ralph Blizard, Freyda Epstein and Regis Malady.

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We celebrated our tenth anniversary in 2001 and marked the occasion with three new Master Music Makers: folk legend Jean Ritchie; singer, songwriter and activist John McCutcheon; and Grammy-winning Appalachian musician David Holt. Irish fiddle master Séamus Connolly joined their ranks in 2002, followed by old-time music’s champion Mike Seeger in 2003 and Scottish harper Billy Jackson in 2004.

The 2005 workshops marked the debut of Fiddle Week, our first new program in four years, paired with Guitar and Contemporary Folk Weeks, as well as a partnership with the Swannanoa School of Culinary Arts.

The indefatigable Stranger Malone, whose musical career has spanned the entire history of the recording industry, became our eleventh Master Music Maker.

In 2006, after fifteen years as the College’s president, Doug Orr, the founder of the Swannanoa Gathering, retired. At the Gathering that summer, he was presented with the Founder’s Award, acknowledging his vision, support and guidance of the Gathering. He and his wife, Darcy, continue to be the official hosts of the Gathering.

Also in 2006, the Gathering added a fifth calendar week to give our growing programs more breathing space; Fiddle Week moved to occupy it.

In 2008 Sing & Swing Week gave way for Traditional Song Week, a new program coordinated by singer Julee Glaub. OldTime Week coordinator Phil Jamison, a musician, dancer, dance caller, and WWC professor, became our twelfth Master Music Maker. In 2010 old-time singer Alice Gerrard joined the ranks of our Master Music Makers. That year we began pondering our twentieth anniversary in 2011 and what the future might hold as the Gathering enters its third decade.

This beautiful valley and this singular college have provided an environment where magic can happen as friends old and new gather, mingle and share the music they love.

The music loves them back, and lives are changed. For many it is an annual summer tradition. Unforgettable performances and evenings filled with music under the Carolina stars have left us with memories we will cherish forever. Lifetime friendships have been forged here. Some have met their musical or life partners here. Children have grown up here, learned music, become

youth scholars, then staff instructors. Most importantly, our folk traditions have been nourished, strengthened and passed on to new generations of musicians and dancers.

As the Swannanoa Gathering begins a new chapter in its history, we remember those who have gone before, treasure those whose company we still share, and nurture those who will carry the inspiring music and song of our folk heritage into the future.

In July, we offer the warmest greetings to the new and returning students who join us in our mountain valley to celebrate our twentieth season. As Yeats reminds us, the magic of the music we share will soon set our hearts dancing again:

And when the folk there spy me, They will all come up to me, With ‘Here is the fiddler of Dooney!’

And dance like a wave of the sea.

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Librarian Bloodhound

Tracking Lost Books

by Erin Pesut ’10

A

s she puts on her glasses and leans closer, Ellenor Frelick’s fingers trace the call numbers on a few book spines in the basement of Pew Learning Center and Ellison Library. She consults a sheet of paper, then returns her focus to the shelf before her. She grabs a nearby stepping stool and continues her search for the thing she intends to find: a lost library book.

Frelick, a volunteer librarian at the College, is the library’s detective of lost books. “She’s the library bloodhound,” Lane Emmons ’10 says. “She can find anything.” In Frelick’s office sits a bloodhound stuffed animal wearing the classic Sherlock Holmes hat.

The toy was a gift from a fellow librarian who recognized Frelick’s talent for finding lost books and returning them to their proper places on the shelves—or into the hands of an inquiring student or teacher.

“I love order,” Frelick explains. This passion may explain why she is not only a great detective, but also a great librarian. A career librarian, she has worked in public libraries in Louisville, Ky., and at other colleges. She even worked as a librarian while she and her husband, Paul, who volunteers in the International Programs Office, were living in Africa.

Ellenor and Paul lived in Africa—four years in Cameroon, three in Lesotho— while fulfilling a joint appointment for theological seminary. While Paul taught theology, Ellenor worked in the library.

While in Lesotho, they met a group of Warren Wilson students who were traveling on an overseas seminar and lodging next door. Ellenor and Paul invited them over for dinner and learned about the College and its volunteer program. The College interviewed them shortly thereafter, and they’ve been volunteers for twelve years now.

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Back in the library, Frelick explains that organization in the stacks is crucial.

Books are numbered according to the Dewey Decimal system, which helps keep chaos to a minimum and allows Ellenor Frelick, the detective of lost books patrons to easily find materials. But mistakes do happen, and books are not always in their appropriate places. check to see if the book had been shelved as “Students are already so pressured,” Frelick 373. “Nothing is too wild,” she explains. explains in her lilting English accent.

“When they see we have the book and then When searching for a lost book, Frelick go out to the stacks and it’s not there, it’s the always consults World Cat, the world’s pits. It’s horrendous.” largest library catalog. “One thing I always

do is look on World Cat for a picture. I Frelick, a native of Chester, England, noticed this book was 17 centimeters,” describes how smaller books can slip behind she says, as she grabs a ruler from her others and become lost until someone desk drawer and places her finger at the retrieves them, usually by chance. Knowing 17-centimeter mark. “I’m more of an it is not always easy to track down misplaced inches girl myself, but 17 centimeters, this books, Frelick nonetheless has it down to is pudgy,” she explains. As she disappeared a science. She has a typed list of her most into the stacks, she knew she was looking useful tricks, titled “Bloodhound Training for a thicker book—and then she found it.

Tips: Sit, Come, Down, Heel, Fetch!” The

list includes the obvious, such as checking Frelick says she loves working at the College the shelves again, as well as the innovative. library because of the students. “Where else Sometimes Frelick will try permutations of can you have 900 surrogate grandchildren?” call numbers, reversing and rearranging their she jokes. Whether those “grandchildren” order. For the call number 337, she would use the library for its couches, computers or convenient resources, Frelick’s efforts as a volunteer are crucial, especially with her “The thrill capability of tracking down lost books.

of the chase, “With earthquakes, famine and war, it’s that’s what pretty infinitesimal,” Frelick says, regarding the finding of a lost book. But to students, it’s all it can be a big deal. It could be the one book about.” you needed for that research paper due on Monday or a book you finally have time to read. “If I can help, super! It’s quite the feeling of elation,” she says. And that elation inspires her to be a better detective. “The thrill of the chase, that’s what it’s all about.”

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A LU M NI P RO F I LE Bijan Amini ‘59: A Legacy Created Grateful for the opportunity afforded him

by Warren Wilson, Bijan Amini ’59 and his wife, Mary, created the Bijan and Mary Amini Scholarship for students with financial need. Fully endowed, the fund will endure in perpetuity remembering a proud and thankful alumnus.

B

ijan majored in pre-med at Warren Wilson and received a bachelor’s degree in chemistry from the University of Southwestern Louisiana, a master’s degree in organic chemistry at North Dakota State University and a doctorate from the University of Kansas. Joining DuPont as a research chemist, he had an impressive 28-year career as a bench chemist in manufacturing, research and design, and as a production manager and in finance.

Bijan, in his own words: My mother, an assistant principal in Tehran, Iran, heard about Warren Wilson and the College’s policy of waiving tuition and room and board expenses for some qualified students.

I wrote the College with my transcript telling them I had graduated first in my class. They agreed to consider my request,

but only with a favorable recommendation from the principal of an American school in Teheran. The principal was on vacation, but the assistant principal helped me.

Once accepted, I was eligible to apply for a passport, which required considerable legwork, including police clearance, daily monitoring of the passport application process and obtaining a student visa. In Iran, if you knew someone with influence, you could speed up the process. I did not, and my arrival to the United States was delayed.

Traveling to the United States was also a drama. To save money, I arranged to sail instead of fly. I spent a frightful evening in Le Havre, uncertain if I had passage because the travel agent sold my ticket before I arrived. I finally boarded the SS United States and arrived on November 7, 1957, well past the semester start.

Although I could not enroll immediately, I could work full time on the Campus Crew, which was responsible for equipment maintenance, driving trucks and hauling cargo, as well as clearing forests for farming.

In summers, I worked with other crews,

like painting and landscaping.

One of my memories of Warren Wilson is dinner in Sunderland.

Students were assigned seats that changed weekly, so that each would meet all staff members and students. I recall the mandatory worship on Sunday and the Saturday evening movies in the chapel.

After the movie, a dorm would host a dance party. I vividly recall faculty members— Miss Klemm (chemistry), Miss Lewis, Mr. Richardson (English), Coach DeVries (work supervisor), and Dean Jensen. My experience at Warren Wilson was invaluable; the small community atmosphere made the transition to college life very easy for a foreign student. By the time I went to larger universities, I was older and much more confident than the seventeen year-old who arrived at the College from Tehran in 1957.

What You Do Matters.

Your gift to Warren Wilson College provides our students with a singular educational experience of academics, work and service, and contributes to the good our students and our graduates do in the world.

WARREN WILSON COLLEGE SPRING 2011

Warren Wilson College Fund warren-wilson.edu/give 29

Asheville Normal and Teachers College—Part II

by Nicole Connor ’10

In this story, Connor continues her ANTC history from the fall 2010 issue. We pick up in 1937, 50 years after ANTC’s beginnings as a teacher’s college in downtown Asheville.

A

l though the Asheville Normal and Teachers College (ANTC) lost its major funding and was faced with closure, many believed the college could survive. In addition to the support of faculty, students and staff, Asheville citizens also rallied to the cause. One editorial in the Asheville Citizen-Times argued that “the college belongs today more completely to Asheville than it has at any other time in its history of half a century. The evidence of studies as well as the judgment of education leaders, to say nothing of the Asheville Chamber of Commerce and other civic organizations, testify to the need for this admirable institution.” In an effort to support the school, Asheville citizens appointed a local board to address the problem of impending closure.

Emboldened, Dr. Frank Foster, president of ANTC, moved forward with plans to continue. On May 22, 1940, the newly formed Board of Trustees took control of the property from the Board of National Missions and signed a two-year lease with an option to purchase. The college reopened as Asheville College on October 10, 1940 with Foster as the president. Despite the financial support from students and alumnae, as well as a $10,000 donation from the Board

of National Missions, the college nonetheless faced mounting financial problems.

Student slots became difficult to fill, forcing a tuition increase, but it became clear that ANTC would require $15,000 to continue operation. Some of the students contributed to Boyd Chapel the production of a radio play, the text of which conveys the strong attachment many students felt to the college, as well as the students’ fighting spirit. One character in the radio play said, “Dr. Foster, we aren’t defeated. Now when it looks as though we are licked, we have more school spirit than ever before.” The radio play also conveyed the college’s sense of reliance on donations. The last line of the play is “Citizens of Asheville, it is up to you.”

Hoping to build off the support of the Asheville community, Asheville College began a fundraising campaign in the summer of 1941which emphasized its new changes, including its non-denominational focus, its coeducational status, its bachelor

of science degree and its plans to add night classes and a nursing school. The campaign hoped to raise $44,500, but it only raised around $16,000. Despite the positive changes, Asheville College faced fiscal issues, retaining accreditation and falling enrollment rates due in part to the approach of World War II. A 1942 report from the Board of National Missions concluded that it was not feasible for Asheville College to annually raise money from Asheville residents and recommended the immediate disposal of the property, as it would cost the Board of National Missions $8,000 in annual taxes.

Even though the Board of National Missions was moving away from supporting the college, it did grant the school a final $7,500 gift in 1942. Certain members of the Board of Trustees began to doubt the future of the college and on August 24, 1942, they formally moved to end the fundraising campaign.

Despite the positive changes, Asheville College faced fiscal issues, retaining accreditation and falling enrollment rates due in part to the approach of World War II. Stephenson Hall

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On February 25, 1943, the Board of National Missions informed the trustees of the intention to sell the college. Despite strong opposition from certain members, the trustees voted to relinquish control of the college. The Board of National Missions sold the property the next day to Asheville doctors William Ray and Mark Griffin, two brothers who intended to use the property as a hospital.

However, some of the trustees refused to relinquish control of the property. On May 4, 1943, the Board of Trustees rescinded by vote the decision made in the February 25 meeting to give up the property. The possibility that the federal government could take control of the property and use it as a dormitory for soldiers further complicated the matter. It quickly became clear that legal action would be necessary to resolve the issue. Although the Board of National Missions planned to move forward with officially transferring the property to the Griffins on June 1, the trustees ignored the pending sale and instructed faculty to plan as usual for

The Board of National Missions sold the property the on February 26, 1943 to Asheville doctors William Ray and Mark Griffin, two brothers who intended to use the property as a hospital.

summer courses and the 1943-44 school year. At this point everyone waited for a trial date to be set. Arthur Bannerman, president of Asheville Farm School, wrote to Edna Voss, a secretary for the Board of National Missions, that things could be solved within one or two months or one or two years. “In other words,” he wrote, “uncertainly seems to be the only certainty.”

After a lengthy court battle, the judge ruled in favor of the Griffin brothers. The trustees decided not to appeal the decision and paid the remaining faculty and staff through August 1 before officially closing

ANTC alumnae raised $275,000 to help build ANTC Memorial Hall, a residence hall that opened in 1995.

SPRING 2011

the doors at the end of the 1944 summer school session. The student records, most of the equipment, library books and the proceeds from the sale of Asheville College were sent to Warren H. Wilson Vocational Junior College. After the Griffins acquired the land, the U.S. Army did lease the property until the end of World War II. When the war ended, the brothers operated a small hospital until the Asheville Memorial Mission Hospital purchased the land in 1950 and opened Memorial Mission Hospital in March 1954. The hospital still stands today.

Even though the buildings no longer remain, the alumnae began organizing an annual reunion to remember and celebrate their alma mater. Miriam Plexico and Fran Suttle, two 1942 alumnae, remember the sense of community and pride the women felt while attending college, and they both still hold fond memories. “We [the students] considered ourselves an ongoing part of a family with a real purpose,” Suttle remembers. To help remember Asheville Normal and Teachers College, the alumnae created a scholarships fund, which still exists today, and they raised $275,000 to open the Asheville Normal and Teachers College Memorial Hall. On August 4, 1995, the dormitory opened on the Warren Wilson campus. Regarding the work the alumnae have done, Plexico says, “I think the college had a real spot in everyone’s heart, and it had to for us to still be doing this.” Today the dorm stands as a reminder of the school, its graduates and all that they accomplished.

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A LU MNINOTES ’50s Fran ’55 and Doug Whitfield have returned from a trip to Oberammergau, Germany, to see the Passion Play. Performed only once every ten years, the performance has a cast of thousands and is a realistic portrayal of the persecution, crucifixion and resurrection of Christ.

visited Korea last September and had the privilege of preaching nine times at churches there including the 12,000-member Saemunan Presbyterian Church, established in 1887 by Horace Underwood.

Bay Foundation volunteers.

She enjoys reading, RVing, singing and the outdoors.

Pixie Ward ’66 enjoyed

spending most of October visiting fellow WWC alumni, including Karen Burchinel, Martha and Joel Brodrick, and Tom and Jill Parker. She thanks Warren Wilson College for the memories.

Matthew Whong ’56

’70s Enrique Alonso ’71 is doing well. He hopes to see the rest of the Class of ’71 at their 40th reunion at the next Homecoming.

was installed as pastor of First Orthodox Presbyterian Church of San Francisco in November 2010.

He lives at 1350 Lawton St., San Francisco, CA 94122, with his wife, Susan, and youngest son, Noah.

J. Glenn Ferrell ’71 Melody Dickinson ’59 has

returned to Chapel Hill after 42 years of living in California, 27 of which she spent living in Walnut Creek. She loves being back in North Carolina and has seen more birds in two months then she saw in Walnut Creek in several years. She looks forward to reconnecting with friends.

’60s is enjoying her third year of retirement from teaching elementary school. She and her husband, Carl, have traveled to Costa Rica, Peru, Mexico, and Italy.

They spent Christmas in Guatemala with their son Troy, 34, who is attending language school there and recently returned from military duty in Afghanistan.

Linda Hughes ’66

Nancy Coleman Mace ‘66 lives

on the eastern shore of Maryland with her husband, Tom, and three animals. Her part-time work includes therapeutic music with the elderly. She and Tom are volunteer coordinators of community education for the Red Cross and Chesapeake 32

Mildred Moore Thompson ’75

retired from teaching in May 2009 to become a stay-athome grandmother. She and her husband care for their 17-month old grandson while her daughter works as a pharmacist at Rite Aid. She is the president in the local Lions Club and volunteers at the Georgia Mountain Research Center.

Peter Lorenz ’76 has

been active with his historical resource group, American Musketeer, and serves as a captain in the Battle of Asheville Commemorative Corps. His sons and daughter are all grown. He lives in Weaverville with his two cats, Scout and Pinto, and would love to hear from his classmates and friends from WWC, especially those in the Asheville area.

’80s Patti Kerr ’80 is pleased to announce the release of her book, I Love You ... Who Are You? – Loving and Caring for a Parent with Alzheimer’s, in November 2010. A book tour will take her through New Jersey and Pennsylvania, and then to Chicago and Wisconsin. She would love to connect with classmates while she is on the road.

has published her sixth book and second poetry collection, At Dusk, available through Old Seventy Creek Press. Her novel When Day is Done was reviewed in a recent issue of North Carolina Literary Review. Julia continues to teach at McDowell Technical Community College in Marion, where she lives with her husband, Steve, and their 12-year-old daughter, Annie.

Julia Nunnally Duncan ’82

Michelle Chandler-Barnes ’88 lives in the Atlanta area

with her two daughters and teaches English as a second language to middle schoolers.

She completed a master’s in education from Lesley University in 2009. and Susan ’91 Zipf live in Asheville with their four sons. Michael is waiting for a kidney transplant. Susan has published a book, Stories from the Upper Room, available through PublishAmerica, and is preparing for exams to become an ordained minister with the Church of God (Cleveland, Tenn.). Email them at mdzipf@gmail.com.

Michael ’88

’90s has been serving for the past year as the Washington State Teacher of the Year, an amazing experience

Jamie Yoos ’90

that has afforded him the opportunity see quality education in action around the country. He says his passion for his students was largely generated by his exceptionally positive experience at WWC. and family (wife Amy, children Benji and Mika) are teaching in Nagoya, Japan, for their second year.

Greg Walters ’91

Kari Childs ’94 and her husband, Robert, had a beautiful baby girl, Riley Evelyn, on August 23, 2010. They live in San Antonio, Texas, where Kari is a radiologist in the US Army Veterinary Corps.

David S. MacLean ’97 appeared on the radio show This American Life in early 2010.

The episode he appears in is #399: Contents Unknown. His segment is the last act, titled “The Answer to the Riddle is Me.” His memoir of the same name was subsequently picked up by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and should start showing up in bookstores in mid-2012. He lives in Chicago.

received her doctorate in natural resources in August from the University of Tennessee. Sunshine is a tenure-track faculty member at Frostburg State University where she coordinates the ethnobotany, wildlife and fisheries, and interpretive biology and natural history programs. Sunshine lives in rural Garrett County, Maryland, with her daughter Summer (9), stepson Caeman (15), and husband, Dan Feller.

Sunshine Brosi ’99

Rob Danzman ’99 recently launched Lenapi, a directory of counseling providers across the country. He continues to own and run Aberdium5

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A LU M N I N OT E S mental health services. He became a member of the North Carolina Counseling Association and is researching issues regarding counseling affluent populations. His fills his free time with ultrarunning, providing free services to families, and volunteering to help mental health start-ups in the Raleigh-Durham area.

’00s Kevin R. Fox ’00 married Laura Powell on June 26, 2010, in Los Olivos, Calif. They live and teach at Dunn School, a residential school in Los Olivos.

and her husband, David, welcomed their first child, Samuel Oney, into the world February 3, 2010. Born at 9 lbs. and 21 inches long, Sam is a healthy and jolly baby and mom and dad couldn’t be happier.

Rosa Sprinkle Sleigh ’01

After six years teaching art and environmental education in a remote one-room schoolhouse in northern California, Laurie Adams ’03 is off on an indefinite adventure through South America. Starting in Pisac, Peru, she is volunteering in schools and on farms, learning, teaching, healing, and letting destiny lead her to many magical places.

Jakop Morris Karpen was born December 26, 2009, to Sarah ’03 and Josh ’04 Karpen.

In July 2010, Doug Lane married Laura Maynard in the Swannanoa Valley among family, friends, and the mountains. He can still be found working at the Swannanoa Fire Department, where he is a lieutenant. ’03

SPRING 2011

Andrew Pauly ’03 and Rachel Troyer ’04 have embarked on

the ultimate adventure— parenthood. Solomon Fox Pauly was born at home August 21, 2010.

began a graduate teaching fellowship at the Institute for Public Representation at Georgetown University Law Center. The fellowship focuses on public interest environmental law, and she supervises law students representing individuals and communities primarily in the Washington metropolitan area. She graduated from the University of Texas School of Law in 2009.

Kelly Davis ’04

Sailor Holobaugh ’06 completed

her master’s in social work at the University of Maryland-Baltimore with a specialization in health. She lives and works in Baltimore with her sweetheart, Dre Hummingbird.

married Sean L. Farrar on June 27, 2009.

Sarah DeLeiris ’07

and Shay Tippens, Schafer RD in 2007-08, are planning a wedding in the mountains of Virginia. They bought a condo in summer 2010 and are living in Chapel Hill.

Danielle Baumgartner ’08

has been living in Cambridge, Mass., for the past year, after attempting to pedal across country with Cera McGinn ’09. He has helped to start a composting program, sold pies at a neighborhood bakery, interned with an organization that does performing arts in inner-city schools, made and sold earrings made from scrap metal, and learned racquetball. He misses

the cows, the willow trees, the golden leaves, the Swannanoa River and the rolling roads. is back in her hometown of Montpelier, Vt., where she works as the membership and outreach coordinator for the Vermont Natural Resources Council, Vermont’s leading environmental organization.

She rides sweet mountain bike

Nina Otter ’09

trails with the fellow WWC alumni with whom she’s living.

Jed Bierhaus, English professor from 1972 to 2001, has moved to Oakland, Calif., to be closer to his family.

LOSSES Warren Wilson College Eunice Slagle ‘44 January 31, 2011 Mary J. Scappucci ‘45 February 13, 2011 Oscar McDevitt ‘47 August 5, 2010 W.D. Hickey ‘47 August 11, 2010 Ruth Sams ‘52 October 31, 2010 Etrullia Patterson ‘52 January 18, 2011 Carolyn McDaniel ‘54 January 13, 2011 David L. Jacobson ‘69 August 24, 2010

Asheville Farm School Lloyd Penley ‘28 October 11, 2010

Cameron Lash ’09

Asheville Normal and Teachers College Clara Hensley ‘33 August 11, 2010 Rilla A. Bates ‘38 August 7, 2010 Lois Burchett ‘39 August 31, 2010 Ruth Melton ‘39 August 31, 2010 Mary Wilson ‘39 February 16, 2011 Jocelyn Clayton ‘40 September 4, 2010 Lucille Humphries ‘42 November 22, 2010

Dorland-Bell School Rena Shelton ‘24 January 19, 2011

Faculty Steve Orlen - MFA November 16, 2010

Friends If you are aware of a loss we have failed to acknowledge, please contact

Betty McArthur August 19, 2010 Pauline Ware October 25, 2010

Rodney Lytle, Alumni Relations Director, at 828.771.2046 or rlytle@warren-wilson.edu.

31 33

LookingBack 85th Anniversary of the Warren Wilson College Presbyterian Church The Warren Wilson College Presbyterian Church celebrated its 85th anniversary on November 22, 2010. When the Farm School congregation was officially established in 1925, it had no proper meeting place to worship; the congregation shuffled from building to building on campus. In 1933 under the supervision of Oscar A. Clark, and later, Samuel DeVries, a log chapel was built by staff and student work crews. The completed chapel was named for Elizabeth Williams, a retired Farm School faculty member beloved by students.

Williams Chapel served the church’s congregation until the 1960s, when the present-day WWC Presbyterian Church and College Chapel was completed.

Elizabeth Williams

Williams Chapel

How did you find out about Warren Wilson College? two ways you can help us recruit wonderful students • Refer a student to us. If you know of a great fit for Warren Wilson College, please give us that student’s contact information and we will follow up.

• Sign up as a college fair volunteer in your area.

This will only take a few hours of your time. Also, it is fun and easy and helps us out immensely.

New students are our future.

Call 800.934.3536 or email admit@warren-wilson.edu 34

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Weekend@Wilson

June 24 –26, 2011

Mark your calendars for a fun-filled weekend of workshops, barbecue, dorm living and music for alumni and friends.

Questions?

Contact Ally Donlan, adonlan@warren-wilson.edu or call 828.771.2092 www.warren-wilson.edu/weekend

M FA B o o k s h e l f Awards and works by MFA for Writers alumni Anna Clark ’07

Linda Nemec Foster ’79

Victoria Bosch Murray ’08

She received a Fulbright fellowship in creative writing to work with teens and college students in Nairobi, Kenya.

Talking Diamonds, her new poetry collection, has been published by New Issues Press.

A chapbook, On the Hood of Someone Else’s Car, was published by Finishing Line Press.

Kathleen Jesme ’00

Laura Newbern ’94

Elisabeth Lewis Corley ’10

Her manuscript Meridian won the Snowbound Chapbook Award and will be published by

Her translation and adaptation of Moliere’s The Miser was produced at Duke University.

A translation and adaptation of Jean Racine’s Phedre’s Blues received a concert reading at the Process Series at UNC Chapel Hill.

Elinor Cramer ’92

A book of poems, She Is a Pupa, Soft and White, will be published in 2011 by Word Press. Her chapbook, Canal Walls Engineered So Carefully They Still Hold Water, was published last year.

SPRING 2011

Tupelo Press.

Alison Moore ’90

She received a 2010 Literature Fellowship from the National Endowment for the Arts.

She received a 2010 Rona Jaffe Foundation Writer’s Award, given annually to six women writers who demonstrate excellence and promise in the early stages of their careers.

Tania Rochelle ’97

The World’s Last Bone, her new book of poetry, was published by Snake Nation Press.

35

Make a gift to Warren Wilson and get guaranteed income for life In these uncertain times, a gift annuity is a way to guarantee an income for life. A gift annuity to Warren Wilson College could help you while supporting current and future Warren Wilson students.

Through Dec. 31, 2011, gifts to the College made from traditional individual retirement accounts can be made with no tax or early withdrawal penalty. Certain restrictions apply. Contact Don Harris or Janet Doyle at 828.771.2042.

To learn more about this win-win gift opportunity, call Don Harris or Janet Doyle, at 828.771.2042. You can email Don at dharris@warren-wilson.edu or Janet at jdoyle@warren-wilson.edu.

W

HAT’S GOING ON IN YOUR LIFE? A new job, a new home, a wedding or birth of a child? Please take a few minutes to

let us know about the latest developments in your life by filling out this form. Please print clearly and indicate dates and/or places of events so we get the facts straight. We generally refrain from publishing events that are expected to occur in the future to avoid any mishaps.

If you have a picture of an event or child, please send it along. o I would like the news below printed in the Class Notes section of the Owl & Spade. o It is not necessary to print this news in Class Notes.

Name (Mr./Mrs./Miss/Ms.) ___________________________________________________________________ Class ______________ Street address ______________________________________________________________________ City ______________________ State ____________ Zip _________________ Country __________________ Email _______________________________________ Home phone ________________________ Office phone _______________________ Cell phone _____________________________ Job title _______________________________________ Company _____________________________________________________ Marital status ________________________ Spouse’s name _____________________________________________________________ Class Notes News: Please limit to 50 words or less. Alumni Office reserves the right to edit for space and content. ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ ____________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Please fill out this form and send it to: Alumni Office, Warren Wilson College, CPO 6324, PO Box 9000, Asheville, NC 28815-9000 Fax 828.771.5850 • alumni@warren-wilson.edu 36

OWL & SPADE

Return to campus and reconnect with all that made your time here special. Reminisce with classmates, feast on barbecue, kick up your heels square dancing, run the Homecoming 5K or simply relax in a rocking chair. Regardless of how you spend your time here, be sure to…

return, reconnect and reminisce.

H ome

coming

2 0 1 1 Sept 30–Oct 2

2011 Class Reunions

It’s your reunion year if you graduated in a year ending with a 1 or a 6.

If you have questions concerning Homecoming, please email alumni@warren-wilson.edu, call 866.992.2586, or visit warren-wilson.edu/homecoming.

Reunion Dinners

1941 Alumni with class years ending in 1 or 6 will celebrate reunions Sat., Oct. 1 at

Homecoming. Classes are beginning to organize events, so start talking and planning

1946 with your classmates. Contact Alumni Relations, alumni@warren-wilson.edu or 1951 1-866-WWC ALUM, for more information. You can visit your reunion Web page: 1956 1961 1966 1971 1976 1981 1986 1991 1996 2001 2006 SPRING 2011

www.tinyurl.com/WWCReunions

The GAR—1940s and 1950s The GAR continues at the Holiday Inn. To make reservations, contact Fran Whitfield, FMW815@aol.com, or Peggy Burke, pburke8248@aol.com. Social hour will be 6-7 p.m. with dinner at 7 p.m. Fran will continue to host the hospitality room.

Class of 1961—Golden 50th Reunion Remembering Doc Jensen’s “Dream Big” lecture, let’s continue to dream big as we appreciate those formative years. Hope to see you at our 50th reunion at 2011 Homecoming. Planned

by Betty Jane (Carden) Tago, Druanna (Williams) Overbay, Joy (Ritchie) Powers and John (Johnny) Wykle, wykleg@gmail.com.

Class of 1986—Silver 25th Reunion Dance and Dinner at Bryson. Look for a letter in your mailbox soon. Sign up on our Facebook event page: WWC Class of 1986 25th reunion. For more information contact Christine Laporte, cslaporte@gmail.com, Laurie Bushnell Steenwyk, lsteenwyk@charter.net, or Joe Daprano, jdaprano@metrohealth.org.

WARREN WILSON COLLEGE

Nonprofit Organization U.S. Postage

PA I D

Permit #272 Asheville, NC

PO Box 9000 Asheville, NC 28815-9000 Address Service Requested

The Woodjoinery Crew crafted these instruments, which were on display at 2010 Homecoming Festival on the Field. Local author and luthier/guitarist John S. Bogdanovich donated materials and expertise to help the crew. The crew, supervised by Doug Bradley, continues to make instruments for the music department and for sale.