“Quite to my surprise, I bloomed there. Although I earned a B.F.A. in painting and drawing, it became obvious that my real talent lay not in the making of art but in writing the history of art. I applied to NYU’s graduate Institute of Fine Arts and in 1976 completed my Ph.D. “With the support of a fellowship to the American Academy, in 1971 I moved to Italy for three years of dissertation research. In 1974, I started teaching at Oberlin College with primary responsibility for the history of Italian Renaissance art. In December 2007, I retired and came to New York in January 2008 as a visiting professor at Columbia University until 2010; since then I have been visiting professor at the Institute of Fine Arts, my old graduate school. “Over the years, I’ve published a number of scholarly articles and given dozens of papers. ‘Fra Angelico at San Marco’ (Yale University Press, 1993) is a book about an extensive group of frescoes by the 15th-century Florentine painter. In January 2000, I delivered a paper about Michelangelo’s mastery of the male nude; that led to the book I’m writing now, ‘Best Men: Fortunes of the Male Nude.’ I’ve also started writing general non-fiction, and I published a piece in the April 4, 2013, issue of The New York Times. “Today, I’m a student in the 67th grade. Last May, I celebrated 31 years of recovery from alcoholism, and the fellowship of recovery, along with my parish church in New York, is at the center of my life. What’s more, I haven’t had a serious depression in a decade. I’m sustained by an abundance of intellectual, spiritual, and emotional nourishment, and at its heart is my partner, John Soppe. Grace is amazing. “Episcopal High School in Retrospect – Most teachers don’t force rowdy boys to ponder the meaning of life, but ours did. They also demonstrated the human capacity to create knowledge. Even today colleagues can hardly believe that Mr. Karlsen lectured to us about Ernest Jones’ biography of Freud (some of us developed instant Oedipus Complexes); and recently I astounded somebody by
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saying that I’d written a paper for him on Berthold Brecht’s ‘The Caucasian Chalk Circle.’ In Peter and Mike Sevareid’s family, I met people who had big ideas and unconventional opinions (i.e., Eleanor Roosevelt was not the Bride of Frankenstein). Deane Hall’s parents often invited us to dinner, where they gave me the incomparable consolation of feeling truly at home. “Even so, EHS was a boot camp of the implacable demands made on impressionable boys as they were pressed into a rigid template of ‘manhood.’ The School’s relentless emphasis on athletic competition and the scramble for recognition as jocks; the public display of individual students’ grades; and, at the core of it all, the institutionalized bullying known as the rat system: these were the training exercises that separated the winners from the losers. I don’t recall that any adult ever inquired about me with the intention of listening, or initiated even a banal conversation about how to imagine my future. As a seasoned teacher of young people, I think that EHS’s neglect of our wellbeing when out of the classroom or off the playing field was unconscionable. However, all of that seems to be in the past. If so, the change is a great improvement.” Marion Kemper Humphries III: After EHS, Kemper graduated from the University of Virginia in 1962 with a B.A. in biology. He received his M.D. from the University School of Medicine in 1966. Kemper completed a medical/surgical internship at the Medical College of South Carolina followed by one year of residency in internal medicine. Kemper next completed training in ophthalmology at the Medical College of Virginia in 1971. He joined Vistar Eye Center in Roanoke as one of six ophthalmologists in 1971, and the practice had 16 when he retired in 2005. Kemper has been very active hiking the Appalachian Trail, biking, and running multiple races throughout his life. He particularly enjoyed the “Lynchburg 10 miler.” In 1997, Kemper sustained a heart attack and underwent coronary artery
bypass grafting. He retired in 2005 but has remained active in health care. “I joined and trained with one of the recovery teams which are the “hands” of the Red Cross after disasters occur. We were sent to the Biloxi/Gulfport area following Hurricane Katrina. What complete devastation we encountered, especially eight to 10 blocks from the shore! The team not only attended to physical needs but also spiritual and emotional ones. Based on my experiences with the recovery team, I know that pictures of devastation in Oklahoma cannot do justice to what is seen in person. As a result of my health issues, I cannot be on the ground helping in affected areas any longer. Because I was so blessed by my experiences in disaster recovery, I have thoroughly enjoyed my volunteer work at a local hospital where I serve as a friend, pastor, and encourager. My wife, Jane, and I visit the local nursing homes. We also have ‘adopted’ a 95-year-old man and his 98-year-old wife who still live at home. I am constantly blessed by those I encounter. Just last week as I prayed for a lady with severe chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), she offered a prayer for my wife and me. What a surprise and uplift! “Four years before I retired, Jane and I moved to Smith Mountain Lake. It is a great place to live with all water sports – fishing, boating, swimming, etc. Our 12 grandkids range in age from 5 to 23 years old, and all enjoy the water. I have thoroughly enjoyed teaching these children the joy and the respect that is needed, especially around lake water. “The one EHS memory anchored in my mind is from the winter of 1957. Billy Wood was my roommate. With a heavy snowfall, there was a deep snow drift just below our window. Some of the guys thought it to be a perfect opportunity to jump out the window into the drift. As I recall, no one was severely injured, but one or two had sprains! Mr. Callaway was truly a gentleman and a scholar, and he was exactly what I needed as a rat entering as a sophomore – and what a tennis talent he was! I also benefitted from Mr. Ravenel’s precise instruction, and
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