Hamilton Magazine - Winter 2022

HAMILTON Magazine

Toward a Sustainable Future

Winter 2022

THINGS YOU’LL LEARN What ‘Had I Known’ Former WHCL DJ Dave Bolger ’99 has interviewed dozens of Hamilton alumni for his radio show and podcast. He shares why he keeps the series going and what he wishes he had known. PAGE 9

How to Beat the Big Guys Bill Henderson ’63, founder and publisher of the influential Pushcart Press, describes his journey to becoming “the kid that could” while pursuing his lifelong quest for Truth.

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Yes, That Tablet is 4,000 Years Old And you can touch it! As a true example of “hands-on learning,” professors across disciplines are using resources from Hamilton’s Special Collections to supplement their coursework. PAGE 28

It’s a Partnership Hamilton’s Town-Gown Fund has reached a milestone — $1 million in grants to aid nonprofits and public-service agencies in a town that has been entwined with the College from the very start. PAGE 34

Pennywise Lives in Keehn A lucky tie. A guitar named Hope. A globe-trotting stuffed dog. These are just a few of the special items first-year students brought with them to Hamilton that remind them of home. PAGE 40

On the cover

Chad Varney ’22, cofounder of a company that recycles thrift shop clothing, and Charlotte “Charlie” Guterman ’22, who created apparel from dryer lint, are just two students exploring sustainability through creative projects. See PAGE 22.

PHOTO BY NANCY L. FORD

THIS PAGE: Hoisted back into place after renovations were completed this fall, Hamilton’s once all-white Chapel steeple now features accents of gray and green, and the dome and quill weathervane have gone from a bright new-penny copper to a shade of gold. The colors reflect a meticulous effort to preserve the steeple’s history. See hamilton.edu/chapel for more details.

PHOTO BY NANCY L. FORD

COMMENTS

HAMILTON MAGAZINE WINTER 2022 VOLUME 87, NO. 1 EDITOR Stacey J. Himmelberger P’15,’22 (shimmelb@hamilton.edu) SENIOR WRITER Maureen A. Nolan ART DIRECTOR & DESIGNER Mark M. Mullin DESIGNER Bradley J. Lewthwaite PRODUCTION MANAGER Mona M. Dunn PRODUCTION ASSISTANT Phyllis L. Jackson CONTRIBUTING WRITER Jorge L. Hernández ’72 STUDENT WRITERS Alyssa Samuels ’25 Elizabeth Militello ’22 STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Zack Stanek WEB COORDINATOR Esena J. Jackson SOCIAL MEDIA COORDINATOR Tim O’Keeffe

VICE PRESIDENT, COMMUNICATIONS AND MARKETING Melissa Farmer Richards

CONTACT Email: editor@hamilton.edu Phone: 866-729-0313

Thank You, Maureen

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HIS EDITION of Hamilton will be the last to feature a byline by our senior writer, Maureen A. Nolan, who has retired after more than eight years at the College. Having spent the bulk of her career as a reporter with the Syracuse Post-Standard, Maureen has written dozens of feature articles for the pages of this magazine, more than 100 “Because Hamiltonians” profiles, and countless news items and other content for the Hamilton website. I know that our readers — especially those who have been the subjects of her fine storytelling — join me in wishing her the best as she begins work on her next chapter.

Stacey J. Himmelberger P’15,22, Editor

© 2022, Trustees of Hamilton College

AS A FORMER state legislator in Hawaii and Maryland, I was interested in learning about Assemblyman Ron Kim’s [’02] good work on criminal justice and economic development issues [Summer 2021 issue].

Equally impressive, however, is Hamilton’s policy of giving students like Mr. Kim “another chance” to find the resilience and determination to succeed. As former U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan told the Baltimore Sun six years ago,

“giving people who have made mistakes in their lives a chance to get back on track and become contributing members of society is fundamental to who we are as Americans.”

John Leopold ’64 I WAS DELIGHTED to read about Everett Newton “Newt” Kelsey ’57, my classmate and fellow DKE, in the Summer [2021] issue. However, I was dismayed that there was no mention of Newt’s time in the U.S. Navy. After graduation, both of us entered the Navy Officer Candidate School at Newport, R.I., and three months later became ensigns. Before we reported to duty, he was an usher at my wedding in Ottawa, Canada, where my father was the number-two man in the U.S. Embassy. A gala event.

After that we lost track of each other. I went to sea off the West Coast, and he stayed on the East Coast. After [Newt] died, Roger Pisani [’57], a DKE of course, contacted me on behalf of his widow, and I was able to put them into contact with the Navy in Pearl Harbor to arrange for his ashes to be scattered at sea from a Navy ship.

I remember Newt telling me that one time when he went into a hotel in NY wearing his uniform, a couple asked him to help with their luggage. When offered a tip, he refused and informed the couple that he was a naval officer, not a bell boy!

Tyler Thompson ’57

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HATS OFF TO YOU and your staff for a phenomenal effort and read from stem to stern [Summer 2021 issue]. Truly an exceptional effort, with a great layout and photos. It’s really a piece of art and makes us all proud to be Hamiltonians. I loved “Forever Teachers” and “A Path to Public Service.” It is great to have such a steady, conscientious, and genuine president as a backbone for our great College and that is a friend to all. To David Wippman: YES! — “creating relationships that change lives and endure for decades.” Thank you.

Bill Barton ’69 THANK YOU for the recent Hamilton magazine. I read with great interest the article about Professor Briggs [“Forever Teachers”]. … I took several classes from him, most memorably his course on Ulysses.

I still have my copy of the book (listed price of $2.95). A while ago, I reread the novel with the help of material I had saved from his class. I enjoyed the rereading of the book thoroughly.

A number of years ago, the Dubliner, a bar in Washington, D.C., was sponsoring a multiple-day reading of the book.

I went during my lunch hour, and I think they were reading from the third chapter. I recognized it immediately — it was wonderful. My oldest daughter took a partial junior year abroad in Dublin and, when

COMMENTS THE TRUSTEES David M. Solomon ’84, P’16, Chair Robert E. Delaney, Jr. ’79, Vice Chair Linda E. Johnson ’80, Vice Chair

we were visiting her, we went to the Martello Tower museum, and I bought one of my favorite coffee mugs. It says, of course, “Bloomsday June 16th.”

To keep my mind alert, I am re-reading Les Misérables in the original. I am more that 70% of the way through.

Bob Pasley ’71 ONE OF THE REASONS I selected Hamilton was because of the student-to-teacher ratio. I had many professors who were always available to provide guidance, not only regarding the classwork, but also career advice. That connection was one of the most positive memories I have of Hamilton. Since I was a Romance languages (Spanish) major, I got to know Santiago Tejerina-Canal quite well since I took all of his classes. However, I believe the first time I met him was when he walked onto one of the soccer fields and asked to join our North Dorm intramural soccer team. Of course, we let him join the team.

Since most of us on the team, especially me, had no idea what we were doing, it was like a member of Spain’s World Cup squad had joined our team.

Santi was very supportive of me during my studies, despite the fact that I wasn’t a native speaker. He always took the time to help and made learning the language fun. He also made me fall in love with the Spanish language, and I am proud to say

that I still speak Spanish to this day, both for my profession as an attorney and socially when the opportunity presents itself.

While I always thought that Santi was a great professor, the thing that struck me most about him is that he is such a kind human being. He always displayed an overwhelming sense of thoughtfulness and compassion. While I was a student, he introduced me to his wife and children, who were also very warm and welcoming. I am sure that I am not the only student who had these experiences with Hamilton professors, and my hope is that the bond between students and faculty continues today.

My one regret is that I never spent a semester abroad in Spain.

Since I played junior varsity hockey, the season covered both fall and spring semesters, so I chose to play hockey for four years, foregoing a semester abroad. Back then, I figured that I could visit Spain whenever I wanted. Well, it’s now 34 years later, and, as Three Dog Night sings, I’ve “Never Been to Spain.”

However, my hope is to get there one day. And my guess is that if I tell Santi I’m coming to Spain, he’ll make every effort to meet me somehow. Gracias e un abrazo, Santi!

Joseph Verga ’87

I WAS SO GLAD to read in the Hamilton magazine [Summer 2021 issue] that the College’s Chandler & Price letterpress is still alive and well. My freshman roommate, David Hayes [’81], adopted her, alone and forgotten in the basement of Root Hall, and named her Mildred during our years on the Hill. She breathed new life for the four years I knew her, cranking out quite an array of posters, invitations, and even a catalogue for an art exhibition curated by Leigh Keno [’79] at the Root Art Center in David’s skillful and tireless hands. Helping Dave set type gave me a greater appreciation for the clunky equipment that spit out endless columns of type to paste up print galleys for The Spectator each Thursday night in Bristol.

Gary Rejebian ’81

Send your letters, story ideas, and feedback to editor@ hamilton.edu or Hamilton magazine, 198 College Hill Road, Clinton, NY 13323.

We welcome comments on topics discussed in the magazine or on any subject of possible interest to the College community. Please include your name and class year, and whether you intend for your letter to be published. We reserved the right to judge whether a letter is appropriate for publication and to edit for accuracy and length.

CHARTER TRUSTEES Aron J. Ain ’79, P’09,’11 Mason P. Ashe ’85 Manal Ataya ’01 Richard Bernstein ’80 Harold W. Bogle ’75, P’14 Peter B. Coffin ’81, P’14 Julia K. Cowles ’84 Carol T. Friscia K’77 Amy Owens Goodfriend ’82 Philip L. Hawkins ’78 David P. Hess ’77 Gregory T. Hoogkamp ’82 Lea Haber Kuck ’87, P’24 Sharon D. Madison ’84 Christopher P. Marshall ’90 Robert S. Morris ’76, P’16,’17 Daniel T.H. Nye ’88, P’24 Montgomery G. Pooley ’84, P’16,’19 Ronald R. Pressman ’80 Imad I. Qasim ’79 R. Christopher Regan ’77, P’08 Nancy Roob ’87 Alexander C. Sacerdote ’94 Jack R. Selby ’96 David Wippman ALUMNI TRUSTEES Betsy G. Bacot ’84 Aditya Bhasin ’94 Phyllis A. Breland ’80 Johannes P. Burlin ’87 Mark T. Fedorcik ’95 Eric F. Grossman ’88 John Hadity ’83 Alison M. Hill ’87 Daniel I. Rifkin ’88, P’23 Lindsey L. Rotolo ’97 Greg M. Schwartz ’94 Sharon S. Walker ’90 LIFE TRUSTEES Henry W. Bedford II ’76 David W. Blood ’81, P’12 Brian T. Bristol P’11 Christina E. Carroll P’90 Gerald V. Dirvin ’59, P’84, GP’17 Sean K. Fitzpatrick ’63, P’87 Lee C. Garcia ’67 Eugenie A. Havemeyer GP’00 Joel W. Johnson ’65, P’93 Kevin W. Kennedy ’70 † A.G. Lafley ’69 † George F. Little II ’71, P’04 David E. Mason ’61, P’93,’96, GP’24 Arthur J. Massolo ’64, P’93 Donald R. Osborn P’86, GP’16 Mary Burke Partridge P’94 John G. Rice ’78 Stephen I. Sadove ’73, P’07,’10,’13 † Howard J. Schneider ’60, P’85,’87,’89, GP’17,’21 Thomas J. Schwarz ’66, P’01 A. Barrett Seaman ’67 Nancy Ferguson Seeley GP’17 Chester A. Siuda ’70, P’06 Susan E. Skerritt K’77, P’11 Charles O. Svenson ’61, P’00 Thomas J. Tull ’92, P’13 Susan Valentine K’73 Jack Withiam, Jr. ’71, P’16,’20 Jaime E. Yordán ’71 Srilata Zaheer † Chairmen Emeriti PRESIDENT OF THE ALUMNI ASSOCIATION Josie M. Collier ’97, P’14

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APPLY JAZZ

AS A JOURNALIST, Greg Thomas ’85 keeps busy. Last summer he published a thought-provoking piece in Areo magazine, “Why I Am a Radical Moderate,” and he’s also active in a range of arts and culture work.

At the center of it all is the Jazz Leadership Project, a program he co-founded with his wife, Jewel KinchThomas. The goal is to cultivate workplace leadership and team development by using four principles taken from jazz: excellence, shared leadership, antagonistic cooperation, and ensemble mindset. Participants can also expect to hear some live music.

“What is satisfying to me is sharing this powerful cultural form and model and metaphor, and having people see it, feel it, understand it, and then apply it to their own lives and in work,” says Thomas, a jazz critic and former saxophonist.

Clients have included Verizon, JPMorgan Chase, TD Bank, and the New York Police Department. Recently, the Leadership Project collaborated with the Center for Policing Equity as it partnered with the city of Ithaca to reimagine public safety there. Thomas is excited about being part of that effort.

“It is a way that we can bring this culture-based model, which is grounded in jazz music, and in the principles and practices thereof, to social issues, addressing them in a positive way — not only saying what you’re for or against, but actually taking pragmatic action to work with others to make things better or to present a different model of how things can be done,” he says. n

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NANCY L. FORD

Greg Thomas ’85

CHAMPION INNOVATION

Heather Hage ’02 HEATHER HAGE ’02 went to law school not to work at a law firm but to understand the world through a lawyer’s eyes. “I saw legal education as an opportunity to continue the curiosity for interdisciplinary study and understanding that Hamilton helped me gain,” she says.

While a student at Albany Law School, she met the vice president for technology transfer at the State University of New York Research Foundation, who explained that “technology transfer” meant helping scientists, engineers, and other inventors turn ideas and innovations into life-changing products and services.

At that moment, Hage knew what she wanted to do. “I said, ‘Can I work for you? I think this is what I’m supposed to do with my life,’” she recalls.

She took an internship at the foundation and after law school accepted a full-time job, eventually rising to vice president of industry and external affairs. For 17 years, she worked

at the intersection of science, technology, law, policy, business, and finance. “Every day was different: a new technology, a new really brilliant scientist or engineer who needed help, and a different way that you could add value, and a different way that I could continue my learning,” she says.

In May, Hage took on a new opportunity to learn and lead: she became president and CEO of the Griffiss Institute in Rome, N.Y. Griffiss is a nonprofit “talent and technology accelerator” for the U.S. Department of Defense and an international network of partners. Hage’s charge is to expand the technical and economic impact of the institute, research lab, and surrounding region — the Mohawk Valley, where she grew up.

(Her father, J.K. Hage ’72, and brother, Gabe Hage ’12, also attended Hamilton.) She lives with her three children in what was once her grandparents’ home.

“I had the blessing in my career of working with people all over the world, traveling all over the world, working with R&D programs and ecosystems everywhere,” she says, “and I never found a place that I loved more than the Mohawk Valley. I always wanted to come home.” n

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JORG MEYER

HEAL

Andy Chen ’16 THE AXOLOTL SALAMANDER can regrow not only its tail but also its limbs and parts of its brain, heart, and spinal cord. Based on research of the axolotl’s genome, Andy Chen ’16, along with his former professor at Harvard University and a team that includes the former CEO of a biotech company, have launched Matice Biosciences.

The consumer biotech startup plans to create products that promote scarless healing and, eventually, skin regeneration. Chen is co-founder and CEO; co-founder Jessica Whited is a leading expert in the axolotl and an assistant professor of stem cell and regenerative biology at Harvard’s Stem Cell Institute.

Whited was one of Chen’s professors while he earned his master’s degree in bioinformatics. He worked in Whited’s lab, supporting her pioneering research on the axolotl’s genome, which is closely related to that of humans.

The axolotl’s genome was first sequenced in 2018, around the same time that Whited’s young son suffered a serious facial injury in a bicycle accident. Appalled by the lack of options for preventing scars, the two decided to use their research and knowledge to create Matice Biosciences. In May, the venture received the grand prize of $75,000 in Harvard’s President’s Innovation Challenge.

Since then, Matice secured financing and is running consumer clinical trials.

At Hamilton, Chen majored in biology and minored in linguistics, and after graduation, supported by the Levitt Center, he and

Leonard Kilekwang ’16 co-founded and ran Tecnosafi, a public-health nonprofit in Kenya.

Later, Chen was an early hire at c16 Biosciences, a Harvard-MIT synthetic biology startup working to develop a sustainable palm oil alternative. “I really became enamored with this idea of using for-profit business models and biotechnology to have an impact on the world and on human beings, outside of just regular drugs, which is what biotech has historically been used for,” he says.

That’s his goal with Matice Biosciences, and his liberal arts education has come in handy. “It really helped me understand how to talk to people about science and how to think about how science and the humanities interplay,” Chen says. n

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VALUE EQUALITY A HIGH SCHOOL TEACHER’S FOCUS on the My Lai massacre inspired Carolyn York K’75 to eventually find her calling working for equal pay for women and people of color in the workplace. “He taught me to see the worth of every human being,” she says.

York heads the National Committee on Pay Equity (NCPE), a coalition of labor, women’s rights, professional, and civil rights organizations working toward pay equity. She came to NCPE in a roundabout way. After earning a master’s degree at Cornell University, she worked as an assistant in the library. “One of my co-workers asked me to attend a meeting where Cornell employees were discussing forming a union,” York recalls.

That meeting led to finding her place in union work, including the United Auto Workers Union and the National Education Association from 2002 to 2018, from where York retired as director of the Department of Collective Bargaining and Member Advocacy.

“Throughout my career, the most satisfying moments have been helping employees win pay, benefits, or rights that made a real difference in their lives,” the Rockville, Md., resident says.

As co-president of the Hamilton-Kirkland Class of ’75, York is a member of the Alumni Council. An Asian studies and history major, she once considered a career in teaching.

“One thing Kirkland taught me, however, was the value of finding out what doesn’t work for you,” she says. “It was a place where individual exploration was part of the fabric of the place. I took that sense with me into my adult life and career.” n

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MARY RAFFERTY

Carolyn York K’75

REACH BACK

Torrence Moore ’92 TORRENCE MOORE ’92 is approaching his 30th year on the board of LINK Scholars Unlimited, a Chicago nonprofit that helps promising Black high school students gain access to college. Moore was once one of those students, and through LINK he met the man who would become his mentor and introduce him to Hamilton — Art Massolo ’64.

Moore is a LINK mentor now, so far supporting seven students in their journey to college. He’s never found it burdensome to make time for that work, even as he balances it with family and career.

“A lot of times I see myself in the students, having sat in their seat and been where they are, so for me, it’s easy knowing that you are making a difference in this student’s life or at least helping give them exposure and access to things they may not have normally had,” Moore says.

His career, too, reflects a commitment to giving back. After earning a master’s degree in urban planning and policy, he went into finance and community development. He has

worked at several financial institutions, focusing on increasing access to capital and credit to underinvested and underbanked communities. He also founded and is a partner in TMA Consulting, which works with nonprofits, entrepreneurs, and small businesses on financing, technical assistance, and program administration.

Moore has served as a Hamilton alumni trustee, was founding chair and still serves on the Multicultural Alumni Relations Committee, and is a member of the Days-Massolo Center’s 10th Anniversary Steering Committee. The center is named for his mentor, a Hamilton life trustee and emeritus member of the LINK board. Over the decades, first Massolo and then Moore introduced scores of LINK Scholars to the College. Moore estimates that roughly 30 of them matriculated, but points out that there haven’t been any in the last few years. He’d like to change that.

“I would love to see that connection happen again and keep that relationship going,” he says. n

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PROVIDE A PLATFORM Rashveena Rajaram ’16

FOR RASHVEENA RAJARAM ’16, the world is indeed her oyster. Born and raised in the island nation of Mauritius in the Indian Ocean, the Harvard Business School M.B.A. student and women’s financial podcast co-founder discovered her life’s work when she first ventured to Hamilton in 2012.

At Harvard, Rajaram encountered disappointing numbers when it comes to gender diversity in venture capital: Only about 10% of decision makers in the industry are women, and funding to female founders is under 5%. After discussing those stats with classmate Anvita Dekhane, the pair started a podcast, Women in Venture Capital, to provide a platform to women in a male-dominated field.

“Soon we were releasing two episodes weekly and are excited about our recent 50th episode,” she says. “We reached 10,000 downloads last year.”

At Hamilton, Rajaram majored in economics and spent a semester at Deutsche Bank. After graduation, she worked at Citigroup in New York and rotated through its sectors, including a stint in London where she covered deals in France. “After four years in investment banking-capital markets, I wanted to pivot my career and started at Harvard,” she says.

As to the future, Rajaram plans to join an early-stage venture fund and work on investments in emerging markets, especially Africa, as well as in the U.S.

“Hamilton taught me to communicate goals and ideas effectively,” she says. “I strongly believe the College’s flexibility and encouragement built up my confidence to take risks, something that will continue to be critical in my career.” n

MAKE REPARATIONS

ZACK STANEK

Don Shonn ’67

RETIREMENT IS A RELATIVE TERM for attorney Don Shonn ’67. He spent 25 years in private practice, including work in Surrogate’s Court with a focus on estate and elder law. He also served as village attorney and trustee for his hometown of Akron in western New York, and before that worked for 20 years at an environmental law firm.

Shonn now takes on pro bono work with a legal help desk dealing with property ownership and estate disputes in Surrogate’s Court and serves on a four-person panel for medical decision making such as end-of-life issues for those unable to speak for themselves.

“As I began the slow and winding road toward retirement, I came to understand that the work of lawyers in medical decisions for the disabled or providing assistance in

Surrogate’s Court matters is a form of reparations,” Shonn says. “My volunteer work is a micro program to help those who have been marginalized often.”

After graduating from Hamilton, Shonn began law school at the University of Buffalo but switched to teaching and spent four years in the Air Force, including a tour in Vietnam.

“I call our class year a diaspora,” he says.

“Without deferments, our lives changed in different directions.” He eventually returned to law school, graduating in 1975.

Shonn also serves Hamilton as class president and on the Alumni Council.

“I have always participated in volunteer programs,” Shonn says of his current change of direction. “My work is a form of giving back to the community.” n

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SHOOT FOR SUCCESS Brandon Leibsohn ’10

AS A STUDENT AT HAMILTON, Brandon Leibsohn ’10 knew that he wanted to pursue a career in sports. So, naturally, he applied to law school.

Leibsohn now serves as manager of basketball strategy and legal affairs for the NBA’s San Antonio Spurs. He discovered his passion for the inner workings of the sports world while in Marquette University Law School’s sports law program, both through classes and an internship with the Milwaukee Bucks. While building a network within NBA operations, he realized the best way to land a coveted basketball operations job was to prepare sample work demonstrating his skills and value to a franchise. He did exactly that while practicing as a family law attorney in his native Arizona.

TEACH DIGITALLY

Kristen Eignor DiCerbo ’95

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Six years and over 1,000 pages of legal work later, Leibsohn received the chance to live out his professional dream. He accepted a temporary position with the Spurs, helping the front office with internal team building and external matters such as free agency, the draft, and trades. He also got involved in ensuring compliance with league regulations and negotiating vendor contracts.

“I bet on myself as all I was promised was a one-year internship, and as an intern, I tried

to maximize every day by adding value to our basketball operations group,” he explains.

Leibsohn says that some of his most memorable times with the Spurs came during his internship when he gained scouting and communication skills from coworkers, including Spurs General Manager Brian Wright.

Leibsohn accompanied Wright on a threehour road trip to scout players at Texas A&M. Besides setting a personal record for hours driven, Leibsohn grew his relationship with a seasoned basketball operations professional and learned tricks of his new trade.

Now in his second year in San Antonio, Leibsohn hopes to continue his professional growth with the Spurs. However, he still roots for his hometown Phoenix Suns on occasion — “as long as the Suns aren’t playing the Spurs,” he adds. n

DURING THE COVID-19 QUARANTINE, Kristen Eignor DiCerbo ’95 foresaw the impact of technology in education. “There was a huge increase in usage as teachers and learners looked for online tools,” says DiCerbo, chief learning officer for the Khan Academy. “As we move back into classrooms, we hope people take the things technology can do for learning and weave them into the in-person experience for better outcomes.”

A nonprofit in Mountain View, Calif., Khan’s mission is to provide free education for everyone. “We offer digital multi-discipline instruction for grades K-14,” DiCerbo says.

“We have 121 million and 5.5 million registered learners and teachers [respectively] who use us daily. Others use us more informally to dive into new things they want to learn.”

A lifelong proponent of engaging students, DiCerbo honed her learning skills at Hamilton. A psychology and sociology major,

she studied principles covering learning and assessment, including multiple chances to complete assignments to reach mastery and only then moving forward.

“Mastery-learning approaches are foundational to our work at Khan,” she adds.

After Hamilton, DiCerbo earned a Ph.D. in educational psychology at Arizona State University and eventually joined Pearson as a research scientist. In 2020, she started her current post, leading Khan’s content and product management teams and bringing what is known about learning science research into the design of its offerings.

Among her Khan colleagues is Hamilton trustee Julia Cowles ’84, who serves as general counsel.

“I look forward to helping teachers and schools embrace mastery learning to improve outcomes and engage learners,” she says. n

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WANT TO KNOW Dave Bolger ’99

What’s your best moment thus far during a podcast?

SINCE HIS STUDENT DAYS hosting sports shows on WHCL and even as he built his career — his day job is vice president of consumer marketing for the NFL — Dave Bolger ’99 has harbored a desire to return to the airwaves.

In the spring of 2020, when a handful of Hamilton alumni DJs decided to support their alma mater’s radio station by hosting shows, Bolger went all in. His Had I Known series took off, and he’s kept it going. The show airs Sundays at 8 a.m. on WHCL (whcl.org) and as a podcast draws 400 to 500 listeners for each episode. (See hadiknown.buzzsprout.com.)

The show consists of a friendly conversation between Bolger and a Hamilton guest, and he’s booked some great ones including Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Kat McGrory ’05; writer and actor Paul Lieberstein ’89 (a.k.a. Toby from The Office); and Peter Kosgei ’11, the most decorated athlete in Hamilton history. We asked Bolger a few questions about Had I Known.

Who doesn’t love a good “Where are they now?”

There have been so many episodes, it’s hard to pick one. I’ve gotten to speak to so many interesting people doing fascinating jobs. I’ve heard funny Hamilton stories, heartbreaking stories of personal struggle, and inspirational tales of immense success. If I had to pick my favorite thing about the show thus far, it’s hearing from listeners. I continue to be blown away and so appreciative when fellow alums reach out to tell me they listen, how much they enjoy it, and thank me for doing it. That has made doing this show feel way more fulfilling than I expected. I started this to scratch an itch that had been in my brain for 20 years. To have people react the way they have has completely blown my mind.

What have you learned from speaking with all these people?

I definitely learn something new in each conversation, but I think the biggest thing that stands out is how everyone, when they step foot onto that campus, is struggling with something. Mental health issues, insecurity, questions of self-identity. Almost everyone I’ve talked to has mentioned these struggles, and yet we rarely, if ever, discussed it with others. People like to ask me what my answer is to the Had I Known question, and it’s this: I wish I had known just how many people were struggling. I wish I could have helped friends in their struggles and gotten help with mine. n

What makes the show so appealing?

Alumni have told me the show has provided them a new way to reconnect [with Hamilton]. By listening to people talk about their experiences, listeners have said they end up reflecting on their own experiences. It’s made people appreciate things about the college they either forgot about or didn’t consider at the time. And for some, hearing about the career paths of guests has been inspirational and entertaining. Who doesn’t love a good “Where are they now?”

ZACK STANEK

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RECENT NEWS HIGHLIGHTS from across the Hamilverse

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Although Days before safety the midterm precautions elections, remaintwo in place, Washington live performances insiders resumed — Mark this Elias fall,’90, often general to thunderous counselapplause. for Hillary SoClinton’s was the case for presidentialresident Hamilton’s campaign, improv and Mike troupeDubke Yodapez, ’92, P’19, performed who former White Yodaplay, House communications two acts of quirky director in and characters the Trump soap opera-worthy administration plot points.

— discussed rising political polarization as part of the Common Ground speaker series. Their conversation was moderated SCHAMBACH CENTER Jackie Judd P’14. by veteran journalist The latest Common Ground event — this one focused on the causes, consequences, and response to incomeBUILDING inequality — was held KIRNER-JOHNSON on Nov.becoming 15. Christina Romer, former chair of Before involved with the Levitt the Council of Economic under the Center’s Social InnovationAdvisers Lab, Ishan Obama engaged in a dialogue Mainali administration, ’21 heard only vague explanations withthe Greg Mankiw, former chair of theinCounfor social and economic problems his cil of Economic Advisers under President native Nepal. Thanks to Hamilton funding, George Bush. he spentW. the summer studying educational

inequality — specifically the disparity between urban and rural communities — and teaching in the mountain village of Khungkhani. After ROOT GLEN ways of thinking he never before experiencing Visitors strolling through Root Glen this fall considered, Mainali is using that “knowledge could hear moretothan chirping birds overhead and vocabulary think about social problems and leaves underfoot.

Students and crackling potential innovative solutions.” in Intro to Music, Sound & Tech created compositions to be listened to at specific stops along the red shale paths. Using their phones KENNEDY CENTER FOR THEATRE through the Echo app, listeners experienced AND THE STUDIO ARTS jazz to a foreboding everything from soothing King Stag, a fairy in a fantastical sense of horror as tale theyset charted their course. world of deception and greed, brought ­Bunraku-style puppets to Romano Theatre.

Directed by Professor of Theatre Craig Latrell and created by puppet designer Sara Walsh, the figures ranged from the stag referenced in the title, to a towering bear, to an animated statue. A cast of 21 student actors developed skills to infuse the puppets with personality and lifelike movement.

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Confessional writing — personal, introspective writing from the “I” perspective — at first glance might be considered self-indulgent. But Pulitzer Prize-winning poet Gregory Pardlo disagrees.

The author DAYS-MASSOLO CENTERmet with students for a workshop onand “Mining Yourare Business: Students, faculty, staff who the first in The ofattend Confessional theirEvolution families to college Writing.” met over coffee in November to share stories of the paths that led them to the Hill. The event was part of the national First-Generation Student Celebration month. Some 15.1% of current Hamilton students are first-generation college students.

WANT MORE MORE HAMILTON HAMILTON NEWS? NEWS? Visit Visit hamilton.edu/news. hamilton.edu/news.

WANT And if you’re not receiving our monthly Hamilton Headlines Headlines in in your your inbox, inbox, And if you’re not receiving our monthly Hamilton send aa note note to to editor@hamilton.edu, editor@hamilton.edu, and and we’ll we’ll add add you you to to the the list. list. send

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Recent NEWS HIGHCOMMONS DUNHAM GREEN LIGHTS FROM ACROSS THE HAMILVERSE

For five Hamilton’s Harvest pro-so Why areyears, young adults andFood college students gram has been reducing campus and important to the climatewaste justiceonmovement?

Do hunger Utica. On any given climate week, memyou seein a connection between justice bers athletics Greek organizations, and of other issuesteams, students are raising on camand canofbe packaging pus?service These groups were two thefound questions students leftovers in Commons McEwen dining and faculty addressed and at this fall’s inaugural halls.

The foodFair. is delivered local organizaSustainability Studentto organizers hope tions such will as the Utica and the the event serve as aRescue catalystMission for ongoing Johnson Park Center. and action. campus conversation

COLLEGE CHAPEL 6 LOVEChapel FIELDwas one of many campus buildings 6 The

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Illustration by Tom Woolley

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Thebecame nationally ranked No. women’s soccer that a teaching tool17 last semester for team posted a 14-3-2 record this fall and the course Modern Architecture: 1750 to the advanced to the second round of the NCAA Present.

Students pored over original blueDivision III championship.

The Continenprints, scoured College Archives, and conducted tals enjoyed theirpresenting best seasontheir sincefindings joiningon interviews before the NESCAC for soccer in 2011, reaching the the interactive platform Story Map Journal. semifinals of the NESCAC and Their research showed how championship campus building hosting a conference postseason quarterfinal design aligned with regional, national, and for the first time. international movements in architecture.

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7 SAGE TAYLORRINK SCIENCE CENTER

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All hail Lord Stanley!

Members of theeverymen’s Students curious to learn more about and women’s hockey teams research got up close and thing from student-faculty opportupersonal with the National Hockey nities to formulating a senior thesisLeague’s to what Stanley when it made aa scientist stop at Sage it mightCup be like to become had Rink all as part of Clinton’s Hockeyville celebration. their questions answered at the annual Science

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Research Lab Crawl in January. Participants made stops in labs to chat with faculty in archaeology, biology, chemistry, environmental BURKE LIBRARY studies, geosciences, neurosciences, physics, Stories of the Mitchell Family, who helped and psychology. introduce jazz to the Utica area, and news clippings of Kate Oser, a Clintonian involved in social justice struggles for four decades — these are just a few treasures of the Oneida SIUDA CountyHOUSE Black History Archive that became In August, student workers in Hamilton’s part of Burke Library’s Special Collections Admission Office petitioned the NationalK’74.

Labor thanks to Cassandra Harris-Lockwood Relations Board to oral unionize.

In a Sept.

26 and vote, The 20th-century histories, papers, aphotographs majority selected representation and will were union gathered

by Harris-Locknow collective bargaining. woodenter through her For the Good Foundation.

ILLUSTRATION BY TOM WOOLLEY

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DMC 10 T HIS ACADEMIC YEAR MARKS THE 10TH ANNIVERSARY of the Days-Massolo Center. Through workshops, panel discussions, lectures, and other programming, the center serves as a central resource on campus for exploring intersections among such dimensions of human difference as gender, race, religion, sexuality, ability, ethnicity, class, and nationality. Here’s a look back at just a few of the events the DMC has sponsored over the past decade.

WINTER 2019

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FROM THE CLASSROOM

Diversifying the Economics Curriculum

BY MAU R E E N A . NO L A N

A

MONG ECONOMICS MAJORS, the underrepresentation of women, students of color, and first-generation college students is chronic and widespread, and in 2018, Hamilton’s Economics Department made a significant move to combat the problem. It revamped its curriculum.

The department changed its introductory courses to make them more appealing to a broader range of students, and for that it received national recognition — an Inspiring Programs in STEM Award from INSIGHT into Diversity.

The reform had two other major goals: to broaden students’ perceptions of the issues that economists study and what economics prepares students to do after college (it isn’t just working on Wall Street) and to teach students the introductory statistics they need to use sophisticated data science as they progress through the major. The new curriculum accomplished both those things in the first two years of reform, according to Professor of Economics Ann Owen, who is also the Henry Platt Bristol Chair of Public Policy, and Professor of Economics Paul Hagstrom. Their findings appeared in the June 2021 issue of The Journal of Economic Education.

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Owen and Hagstrom also observed another benefit — female students received higher grades compared to female students who studied economics before the change in the curriculum. That suggests that the revised course was more effective at teaching a broader range of students, Owen says.

At least initially, the professors noted that the percentage of economics majors from underrepresented groups did not increase, largely because the new curriculum proved to be more attractive to all students — overall, the number of economics majors went up, including the number of underrepresented students.

But with the entire Economics Department committed to reform, Owen says, the push for change will continue.

“I think where we are right now is that curricular reform is part of that, but it’s not the whole thing, so we’re having conversations about other things that we might do to have appeal to a broader segment of students,” she explains.

The results don’t show short-term or quick shifts in the composition of students deciding to concentrate in economics, Hagstrom says.

“How this plays out in the longer run remains to be seen,” he adds. “However, we can say that every student who takes this course will gain a better understanding of the degree to which inequality and diversity are central to the understanding of economics, of what economists do, and what students will see in their courses should they continue to take courses in economics.”

“This class pushed me to major in economics because I’m someone who’s definitely more interested in looking at issues of inequality and microeconomics.”

Professor of Economics Ann Owen speaking with students in a Kirner-Johnson classroom.

NANCY L. FORD

FROM THE CLASSROOM

THE DETAILS The department changed its Principles of Economics sequence from two semesters to a single course that combines introductory microeconomics and macroeconomics. The new curriculum increases the amount of econometrics in the courses required for majors, and it includes a new introductory course that students take after the “principles” course.

Economic Theory and Evidence integrates principles of economics and statistics with a theme of inequality.

Unlike the previous intro courses, it incorporates six statistics lab assignments, which are held during a class period that might otherwise be used for lecture or discussion. The approach exposes students to empirical methods and employs active learning strategies that can be effective for a broad range of students.

“It also systematically exposed students to using economic theory and methods to understand the causes and consequences of inequality, including social, structural, and institutional features of the economy that are often overlooked in a traditional introductory sequence,” Owen and Hagstrom wrote.

One of the labs, for example, asked the students to seek and evaluate evidence for partisan gerrymandering. Another, based on a 2004 American Economic Review article, had students test for evidence of labor market discrimination based on applicants’ names.

Avani Pugazhendhi ’22 and Josue Herrera Rivera ’24 both favor the course focus on inequality and how the labs allow them to apply the principles they’ve studied. Pugazhendhi is an economics major who minors in environmental studies; Herrera Rivera intends to double major in economics and anthropology.

They both studied economics in high school and began college already interested in the subject.

“This class pushed me to major in economics because I’m someone who’s definitely more interested in looking at issues of inequality and microeconomics, and so I think it was good to get exposure

to that,” says Pugazhendhi, who was a teaching assistant for the course. She considers the course a starting point for understanding issues of inequality through economics and to “centering marginalized experiences/narratives within economics.”

Rivera is interested in poverty work and says the course gave him a better understanding of the processes related to poverty — and of his own position in society. Students looked at issues such as sexism, racism in the workplace, or implicit biases that people have. “And we saw tangible, statistical evidence of how these things manifest,” he says.

In Owen’s experience, students across the disciplines are interested in the theme of inequality. “To help them think systematically about causes and consequences, they all find that interesting. And then although they don’t like the work involved in doing the labs, they really actually do like doing the labs,” she says. n

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BIG PICTURE THE BIG PICTURE

Our Collective Labour OVER A TWO-WEEK PERIOD IN JANUARY, seven students worked alongside artist Yashua Klos to create a 9-by-24-foot collage-based mural for his exhibition now featured at the Wellin Museum. Klos’ work explores the Black American experience as it is fostered by familial and communal ties. For this mural, titled “When the Parts Untangle,” students created woodblock prints, a technique new to many of them. “As we pieced together mechanical parts to achieve a whole and placed sprawling vines across the canvas, we cultivated the growth of an inanimate object that captured the vitality of Klos’ and our work,” notes Jane Taylor ’22, an art history and biology major who contributed to the project.

Scan the QR code to view a time-lapse video of the mural in progress and to read more from Taylor on her experience. Yashua Klos: OUR LABOUR will be on display until June 12.

PHOTO BY JANELLE RODRIGUEZ

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Scan Here

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VOICES

VIEW FROM COLLEGE HILL

Impressions

BY SUZANNE KEEN Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of Faculty

NANCY L. FORD

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Excerpted from remarks given at the 1812 Leadership Circle Dinner in December.

Suzanne Keen will assume the presidency of Scripps College in July.

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LOUDS SCUDDING FAST ACROSS a peach-lit autumn sky.

That was my view from a garret room in the Bristol Center the very first time I visited Hamilton College. It was late November, the first snow had already come and gone, and I was bowled over by the beauty of Hamilton’s situation, its perch on top of College Hill, those luminous skies, and the swiftly changing weather.

In the years since, I have come to learn what you already know: Hamilton is only as extraordinary as its people; in other words, pretty flippin’ amazing. Washington and Lee was my benchmark for a quality liberal arts education. Hamilton is that benchmark now, as my husband, Fran, and I prepare to leave Clinton for Scripps College where I will serve as president.

What drew me to Hamilton in the first place was an evident set of attitudes about people that showed in its practices and in its ambitions.

Hamilton’s need-blind commitment told me that this College sought to lower barriers, open doors, and welcome students for their demonstrated accomplishments and their potential. We say “need-blind” because that’s the industry lingo, but what this principle really means is that we seek to see through the trappings of privilege, or its opposite, to recognize the extraordinary minds and souls of the next generation of Hamiltonians. It also means that we are making every effort, ingeniously redoubled during COVID, to help potential Hamiltonians to see themselves on the Hill with us. It is our daily joy to work in a place devoted to this mission.

Hamilton’s open curriculum informed me of the College’s confidence in these extraordinary students who, with the help of faculty

advisors and mentors, would navigate the dizzying array of choices and opportunities for their studies. This system depends upon trust — trust in the conscientious work of those devoted advisors and trust in open-minded and curious students. With vanishingly few requirements that would steer students into well-worn channels, the Hamilton curriculum operates with confidence in students’ choices and the faculty’s ability to open up the treasure boxes of their disciplines in a way that encourages intellectual risk-taking and experimentation. After all, a great education should be full of serendipity and surprises.

I also love the multifarious and particular ways that Hamilton demonstrates its commitment to others, with empathy, creativity, and conscientious effort. Even during a time of necessary isolation, Hamilton’s people connect with refugees, with incarcerated people, with children, with the local community, with the Oneida, and especially with one another. It has been such a sweet reunion to join a crowd cheering on our athletes, to see our students perform live theatre, to be part of a packed house for a Common Ground discussion. Gratifying our appetite for the full life of the College has been made possible by the labors of the many who keep us safe, by the cooperation of the whole community with our safety regimens, not least our students, and by the sense that every single one of us matters. For we are at our best when we pull together.

As Fran and I prepare to leave this special place, we will carry with us the treasured memories of a sweet — and challenging — time on College Hill, of beautiful surroundings, honorable and noble practices, and extraordinary people.

Carissima! n

QUOTABLES

Academic freedom means faculty members and students must be able to teach, learn about, and advocate for unpopular positions and contrarian ideas, even if doing so makes some classmates and colleagues uncomfortable.

President David Wippman, co-author of “How Colleges Can Counter ‘Cancel Culture’” in the Nov. 9 edition of Inside Higher Ed.

Emmy Goodwin ’22 on the Hamilton Sustainability Club turning Sadove Student Center into a thrift shop on Dec. 3.

It’s great to have an event that combats the negative impacts of fast fashion and hopefully moves us toward a more progressive consumption model.

The United States Supreme Court issues rulings that validate efforts to limit election participation.

I had this dream of communicating science out everywhere. … Even aliens could someday be listening to our radio transmission.

That’s what radio can do: We’re sending the signal out everywhere.

Assistant Professor of Physics Viva Horowitz, who interviews Hamilton science faculty on her podcast Significant Figures, which airs on WHCL.

No. 2 of “18 Steps to a Democratic Breakdown” as outlined by Associate Professor of Government Erica De Bruin in a coauthored article that appeared in the Dec. 12 Washington Post.

He taught me that despite what the textbooks said, Black history did not end with the Emancipation Proclamation.

In “Alex Haley Taught America About Race — and a Young Man How to Write” published Dec. 17 in The New York Times. The author, Michael Patrick Hearn ’72, describes his experience taking a class with the author when he taught at Hamilton in 1968.

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VOICES

KNOW THYSELF

Bill Henderson ’63 Bill Henderson ’63, founder and publisher of the influential Pushcart Press, also claims this distinction: proprietorship of “the world’s smallest bookstore,” a 9-by-12-foot structure atop a hill in Sedgwick, Maine. The tiny shop contains, among other works, all of Pushcart’s impressive output. For his contributions to Pushcart, the American Academy of Arts and Letters presented Henderson with its 2020 award for Distinguished Service to the Arts. In 2006, the National Book Critics Circle gave him its Lifetime Achievement Award.

Henderson, who is also a writer, divides his time between Maine and East Hampton, N.Y.

START HERE

’49 IN THE BEGINNING The evangelist Billy Graham arrived at Ocean City, N.J. My dad, a fervent Christian, took me to Billy’s rally on a music pier jutting out over the roiling ocean. Billy yelled at this 8-year-old that the world was awash in untruth and sin, and we’d better do something about that or go to Hell. I resolved to follow his instructions.

’57 TRUTH AND HOOPS In high school, having abandoned the literal Biblical truths of my dad, I searched for The Truth in Thoreau and started a Thoreau club. I also co-founded the Philosophy Club. On Saturday nights we kids argued for a while about “Was God or Wasn’t He.” Then we grew bored with the subject and played basketball under the streetlights.

’59 DOWN THE HILL I picked Hamilton instead of a co-ed school because it was like a monastery, remote and rural — and No Girls Allowed. Girls were a distraction on my Truth hunt. I also took German from Herr Colby so I could read the German philosophers in the original. After a few weeks, the No Girls bit didn’t work, and many weekends saw me hitchhiking to Vassar. My hitchhiking buddy was Kirby Williams ’61, a Black guy from Manhattan. This suburban Mainline Philadelphia boy had no idea what to say to the urban Kirby at first. Turns out he became my best friend. We have been talking nonstop for over 60 years, and I recently had the honor of publishing two of his novels.

EYER

JORG M

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VOICES

“ For me, the end of my Truth quest comes

down to these three words: Love and Wonder — a long way from the Billy Graham screed but maybe closer to Billy than I admit.

’72 THE PRESS I started Pushcart Press from a studio apartment in Yonkers, N.Y. Pushcart’s first book was The Publish It Yourself Handbook, a revolutionary anthology of selfpublished authors — Leonard and Virginia Woolf, Anaïs Nin, Stuart Brand of Whole Earth Catalog fame, and Luke Walton (me). That book eventually sold over 75,000 copies. This was my answer to the commercial publishers.

’76 THE PRIZE I published the first edition of The Pushcart Prize: Best of The Small Presses with the help of founding editors Ralph Ellison, Joyce Carol Oates, Paul Bowles, and 20 other literary legends. The 47th edition of this annual anthology of poetry and prose from hundreds of presses has sold more than 250,000 copies over the years.

’70 SOFTBALL EDITOR For some reason Doubleday, the largest publisher in the world at that time, hired me as an associate editor. I worked with John Eisenhower (Ike’s only son) and Otto Preminger on their manuscripts. Better yet I founded the New York Publishers softball league. It took a-year-andhalf for Doubleday to fire me — I loved softball too much.

’83 DOMESTICITY At age 42, I married Genie Chipps, a writer, actor, and TV producer. We left New York for a more rural seaside life on the east end of Long Island. The next year our daughter, Lily, was born.

’64 DIY PUBLISHING Paris. I labored in the attic of a Left Bank hotel on my first novel, The Kid That Could. I thought this was what all great writers did, and I intended to join them with my vision. That novel went into seven drafts in seven years and was totally rejected by the commercial publishing establishment. I published it myself under a pseudonym and got it reviewed in The New York Times. I am still mad at the commercial boys and girls.

’62 THE ONLY QUESTION Having trouble in my God and Truth pilgrimage, I met Ron Stone [’62], who informed me the only question worth asking was, “Do you think life is sacred or not?” I voted for sacred. On that premise I have proceeded ever since. (Ron died of COVID last year.)

’18 SACRED GIFTS Lily presented Genie and me with twin grandsons, William and Hunter, and I began to worry about the world they will inherit. Lily and those boys are a gift from God, a cliché I know. I recognize the sacred in them and in all creation.

’21 LONGEVITY I am 80. I’ve written and published six memoirs and just recently my first poetry collection. I have no idea why I was allowed to live so long and survive those winter hitchhikes to Vassar. However, I am still angry at the commercial establishment for rejecting The Kid That Could. Righteous anger is a great fuel.

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Toward a Sustainable Future Tackling Real-World Issues to Make a Real-World Difference

By Maureen A. Nolan

PHOTOS BY NANCY L. FORD

Ellie Sangree ’24 on the water with her handcrafted floating treatment wetland system. (Right) Removing the device from the reservoir for winter storage.

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LLIE SANGREE ’24 ARRIVED for her first semester at Hamilton equipped with more than the usual college essentials; she came with a concept for an experiment. It involved eutrophication, which is when excessive nutrients, often from agricultural chemicals, taint a body of water.

It’s a major cause of pollution in freshwater and marine ecosystems.

As Sangree navigated her new life on campus, the concept continued to intrigue her. “The idea was to create something that would float on top of a polluted body of water and trap the nutrients, or catch them rather, before they’d be flushed downstream into our bigger water systems,” she says.

Working up her nerve, she approached Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Aaron Strong to see if he had suggestions about how she could explore her idea. To her surprise, he immediately said he’d love to help. Strong considers realworld learning to be foundational for students. “It works really well in environmental studies because our questions are about solving problems, and solving problems by

hands-on experiences is really helpful,” he says. Experiential learning is a College priority.

By semester’s end, Sangree’s idea had taken shape. Her contraption — a solar-powered, floating treatment wetland system made from recycled materials — was anchored in a College-owned reservoir about two miles from campus. The concept she’d harbored since high school had hatched into continuing research.

“The idea behind the floating bed that I’ve designed and built is that within the bed, I’m creating conditions that encourage the growth of the bacteria associated with turning this fertilizer pollution into a less harmful form,” she explains.

Sangree says her project helped shape her post-Hamilton goals. Early on, as she researched the literature, she contacted the CEO of one of the few companies in the U.S. that manufactures floating wetlands and explained her design to him. “He’s been really excited about it and talked about the possibility of me doing an internship over the summer,” she says. If that happens, Sangree says, she’s hopeful that it may lead to a job after graduation.

The idea behind the floating bed that I’ve designed and built is that within the bed, I’m creating conditions that encourage the growth of the bacteria associated with turning this fertilizer pollution into a less harmful form.

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FTW Labeled Plants

Biotic Factors

Intake Pipe

Max Water Level

2

Root Mass

Bell Siphon

Microorganisms

IBC Cage

Hydroton

Abiotic Factors 3

4 Solar Panel Water Pump

Ellie Sangree’s bell-siphon aerated floating treatment wetland design, highlighting biotic and abiotic components, with water flow path numbered.

Filter

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llie Sangree’s floating wetland uses a solar-powered water pump and a passive bell siphon system to intermittently flood the bed with nutrient-polluted water. This creates conditions ideal for certain microbes to grow and transform these nutrients into less harmful forms and release “filtered” water back into the pond. The yellow numbers represent the path of water through the bed.

Sangree believes her design is the first bell-siphon aerated system. A bell siphon is a simple technology, which she borrowed from aquaponics (she’s president of Hamilton’s Aquaponics Club) that allows water to be intermittently drained through a bed without requiring a pump on a timer with a consistent source of electricity. She says that her design, made primarily from recycled and common materials, is cheap and easier to build than all-new plastic alternatives.

“My ultimate vision, once I have the science solidified, is a cheap and sustainably built grow bed that, when placed in the polluted ponds of parks or farms, will transform fertilizer pollution into flowers and produce,” she says.

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Outtake Pipe

55-Gallon Drum

Aerobic Aquatic Organisms

Anchor

My ultimate vision, once I have the science solidified, is a cheap and sustainably built grow bed that, when placed in the polluted ponds of parks or farms, will transform fertilizer pollution into flowers and produce.

From left, Avery Morgan ’22, Lilia Harlan ’22, Margaret Phipps ’23, Environmental Assessment Specialist Sara Soika, and Natural Resource Program Manager Don Croft take a break from their work extending the campus trail system last summer.

“But I think my broader intention is to go into academia either as a professor or a teacher of high school,” she says.

Sangree’s work is among a groundswell of Hamilton student research and projects related to sustainability and the environment.

Last summer, for instance, in research funded by the College, students took on environmental equity and the cosmetics industry; the livelihood of residents and tourists of Muskoka, Ontario, Canada; and local concerns and opposition on the road to a solar-powered New York State, among many other issues on and off campus.

“The fact that we have this climate emergency upon us, which is really an existential threat, has driven a lot of interest in these issues,” says Professor of Government Peter Cannavò, former director of the Environmental Studies Program and current Government Department chair.

Students could address such topics through readings and classroom discussions. “But the actual hands-on experience of learning is incredibly important to really see how environmental issues play out in actual

communities, how they actually impact people, how decisions are made, how policies are made with regard to environmental problems — and all the obstacles and complications and wrinkles that can come up along the way,” Cannavò says.

Also fueling the increase in student sustainability work is Hamilton’s recent investment in the interdisciplinary Environmental Study Program — including creating its first two dedicated tenure-track faculty positions.

Strong has one of the positions; Assistant Professor Heather Kropp, a data scientist, has the other. The program also has a dedicated position for a visiting professor of environmental justice.

Professors in the program are committed to supporting experiential learning, says Program Director Andrea Townsend, associate professor of biology. With the new faculty positions, she says, that commitment is gaining momentum. In the last couple of summers, she’s worked with students on campus reforestation projects that are part of Hamilton’s collegewide effort to reach carbon neutrality.

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Chad Varney ’22 and Sammy Johnson ’20 model samples of their Upcurl “upcycled” fashion designs.

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TUDENTS COME AT THEIR RESEARCH FROM ALL DIRECTIONS:

A FEW YEARS AGO, art major Chad Varney ’22 and sociology major Sammy Johnson ’20 created Upcurl, a company that sells “upcycled” clothing made from items found in thrift stores. The venture traces back to an independent study course, with Strong, that looked at sustainable clothing production and the negative impact of fast fashion. Upcurl is still in business.

Creating (or recreating) garments requires washing, bleaching, cutting, sewing, and embroidering. And because Varney and Johnson started the venture as the pandemic hit, they relied on help from the Hamilton community. Strong and Julia Perdue, costume designer in the Theatre Department, lent their support, and after thrift shops closed, help came from students and staff who sent clothing donations and were responsible for most of the initial purchases.

“The real-world experience has been beyond valuable in terms of learning by making mistakes and growing through them. I, personally, went into this experience with no design or marketing experience,” Varney says.

IN A PATCH OF FOREST ON CAMPUS, Fatima Oliva ’23 used a chainsaw and data to take on buckthorn, an invasive species of trees that hinders the vitality of College forestland.

Through a Hamilton Summer Science Research Fellowship, Oliva worked with data scientist Kropp on a project with potential benefit to Hamilton’s carbon neutrality initiative. Oliva, an environmental studies major, was eager to work with Kropp to learn about land management and the use of drones and remote sensing techniques to measure soil moisture and sap flow.

Oliva loved the independence of summer research. “Professor Kropp was really supportive of that as well,” she recalls. “She would let us dive into our own interests and choose what parts of our research we wanted to focus on more, especially when it came to our abstracts and our posters that we presented on afterward. And so I definitely feel like this experience really helped me figure out what I want to do after Hamilton.” A Las Vegas resident, Oliva plans to attend graduate school, possibly to focus on water security in the Southwest.

The invasive buckthorn

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OWEN ROUTHIER ’23 SPENT A SUMMER examining the feasibility and potential value of blue carbon local sequestration on Cape Cod. Blue carbon refers to carbon that is stored in ocean and coastal ecosystems.

Funded through an Emerson grant from Hamilton, Routhier conducted the study — his advisor was Strong — for the Association to Preserve Cape Cod. Looking specifically at marshlands, Routhier learned to use geographical information system mapping software and applied an existing blue carbon modeling tool to determine the viability of sequestration.

He estimated how much carbon could be sequestered and its financial value, and he envisioned what a climate fund for Cape Cod, paid for by sequestering, could look like.

“I definitely want to continue expanding my knowledge on these mapping systems and coastal blue carbon. Even looking forward to next summer, I’m considering continuing my research, maybe going for another Emerson grant,” he says.

IN A PROJECT INSPIRED BY HER OWN creativity, Charlotte “Charlie” Guterman ’22 fashioned a top and jacket from dryer lint.

“I’m a double major in art and environmental studies, so it’s a fun combination of the sustainability aspect, but also trying to come at it from a creative angle,” she says. “I think a lot of sustainability can be very densely science-based, which is important and urgent, but also less accessible.”

After she graduates in May, Guterman plans to continue her path in the fine arts by pursuing an M.F.A. in the next five years and, in the meantime, creating visuals and graphics for environmental nonprofits — work that combines scientific communication and education. n

Charlie Guterman ’22 modeling her top and jacket created from recycled materials, including dryer lint.

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Teaching Tools i

By

Maureen A. Nolan and Stacey J. Himmelberger PHOTOS BY NANCY L. FORD

d

uring his Hamilton years, Michael Lang ’67 was a habitué, maybe the only habitué, of the Rare Book Room (then known as the Treasure Room), which saw little use by students. That seemed a shame to Lang.

“It’s been my experience, not only personally, to observe that when students are given the opportunity to physically handle and study original source material, there’s some sort of magic that happens; different connections are made, and a greater depth of understanding is achieved when working directly with real historical artifacts — which books and manuscripts are — rather than digital facsimiles, surrogates, or modern reprints,” says Lang, a lifelong bibliophile.

n 2018, Margaret Thickstun, the Jane Watson Irwin Professor of Literature, took a class at the University of Virginia’s Rare Book School in preparation for a new course she was developing, Introduction to the History of the Book. Along with tips on teaching the subject, the instructor offered a caveat: You’re not going to have access to most of these books. Immediately, Thickstun thought, “That’s precisely what we have available in Hamilton’s collection.”

Thickstun and Goodwillie co-taught the class for the first time last fall, drawing from dozens of items to tell the story of the

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These days, Hamilton students and faculty delve deeply into the Lang Special Collections and Archives, and thanks to Lang, access to the trove is greater than ever.

He recently made a $3 million gift to create the position of a Special Collections education and outreach librarian. His gift also established an innovation and acquisition fund to promote the study and use of original source materials.

Even before the Lang gift, Christian Goodwillie, director and curator of Special Collections, was working with professors across disciplines to incorporate the treasures of the collections into coursework. Here’s a look at what students have been working with this academic year.

book — how books were constructed over time, how they moved throughout the world, the kinds of information shared and from whose perspective. Students then each selected an item to research in depth.

“So much of book history is about the materials used over time, what a book feels like, smells like, notes made in the margin or warping in parchment made from animal skin or holes where bookworms have eaten through,” Thickstun says. “There’s no substitute for this hands-on experience.”

p

roduced in 1649, The Workes of that Famous Chirurgion Ambrose Parey is an example of how letterpress printers developed creative solutions to facilitate the printing of images, rather than hand illustrating texts. The earliest printed images were woodcuts, a relief printing process originating in East Asia. European printers laid woodcuts into the form and printed them alongside text, according to Goodwillie.

e

xamining early Qur’an manuscripts and their evolution — with new styles in scripts, decoration, and illumination — helps students in Assistant Professor of Asian Studies Usman Hamid’s Everyday Islam course understand the experiences of Muslims trying to live according to Islamic tradition. “In the Special Collections we have a number of Qur’an manuscripts — both of the entire text and some of just parts of it,” he says.

“One recently acquired manuscript tentatively dates from the 17th century and may have been in the royal library of the Mughal emperor Jahangir. I am currently working on correctly identifying this manuscript.”

Students in Hamid’s Art of Devotion: Islam class also look at objects such as Qur’an tablets. Although the ones in Special Collections are contemporary, these objects have a long history in Islamic Northwestern Africa, where they are used to teach young children to read and write Arabic letters and script, and eventually learn to write and recite Qur’anic verses.

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n their Communal Societies seminar, Professor of History Doug Ambrose and Goodwillie supplement discussion of various religious groups by taking students to visit the Shaker Museum in Hancock, Mass., and introducing them to resources from Special Collections. One example is the Shaker book Dew Drops of Wisdom, a miniature volume of Christian aphorisms, one for each day, used to teach children. Printed

by Elder Henry C. Blinn at the Canterbury, N.H., community, it includes such Shaker sayings as “Hands to work and heart to God” and “Do all your work as you would if you had a thousand years to live, and as you would if you knew you must die tomorrow.”

“Blinn followed a growing practice of producing miniature books as a way to interest young readers. Our students found these items fascinating and, as with many of the less-than-conventional materials that Christian [Goodwillie] brought to class (songbooks, badges, clothing), the items enriched their understanding of the groups we studied,” Ambrose says.

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r f

or her Feminist Research Methods course, Stina Soderling, the Elihu Root Postdoctoral Fellow and visiting assistant professor of women’s and gender studies, took her students to Special Collections during the unit on archival research. “[Hamilton’s] collections of materials on women’s and lesbian rural communities of the 1960s and 1970s is especially strong,” she says.

“It’s important to me that students understand just what an amazing resource we have right here on campus — these are materials that I would travel across the continent to access when I was in graduate school.”

For Soderling, it’s also important that students see how knowledge is shared in multiple ways — not just through academic journals. An example is Kaliflower, a magazine created by a gay commune of the same name with roots in the Beat movement. It served as a clearinghouse for news and advertisements from communes throughout California’s Bay Area.

According to Goodwillie, Hamilton has one of the most complete runs of Kaliflower, and each handmade issue is a work of art in its own right.

epertorium Utriusque Juris is a book on Roman law printed in Latin in 1476. An example of an incunable, a book produced prior to the year 1501, it features beautiful capital letters created using gold leaf and vibrant colors. “Pigments used probably include malachite, lapis lazuli, vermillion, and white lead,” Goodwillie notes, “and some pages include marginalia, small notes or drawings handwritten in the margins.”

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dam Lark, assistant professor of instruction in physics, regularly introduces his astronomy students to pieces from Special Collections.

Examples range from 400-year-old texts from the collection of Christian Heinrich Friedrich Peters, who led Hamilton’s Litchfield Observatory from 1858 to 1890, to Harmonia Macrocosmica (above), an atlas of the solar system written primarily

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in Latin in 1660. “This edition has handcolored illustrations depicting cosmological theories from Claudius Ptolemy through Tycho Brahe and Nicolaus Copernicus,” Goodwillie notes. “It features 29 copperplate engravings and is considered to be one of the most notable works of Dutch cartography, as well as the most beautiful celestial atlas in existence.”

“

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’m an early modern art historian, so when I bring students to look at objects, we spend time describing what we see, try to transcribe some pages, but mostly, look closely at images and think about what stories are being told, and how the book tells those stories,” says Laura Tillery, assistant professor of art history. For her course Race & Racism in the Middle Ages, she introduced students to 15th-century incunabula/early printed books, namely Hartmann Schedel’s Nuremberg Chronicle.

Liber Chronicarum (also known as the Nuremberg Chronicle) presents the history of the world from creation until 1493 using both text and illustration. The book features more than 1,800 illustrations of cityscapes (32 of which were drawn from life), Biblical events, historical figures, and more. It is one of the most heavily illustrated and technologically advanced incunabula. n

Special thanks to Christian Goodwillie, director and curator of Special Collections, for providing information on each of the pieces included in this feature.

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Makayla Alston ’25, Katie Novak ’22, and Emily Jiang ’25 look through albums outside Dawn Marie’s Treasures during Fall Fest, a day when Clinton businesses offer Hamilton students special discounts and treats. Students return the favor by hosting crafts and games for local children, and a cappella groups perform on the Village Green.

Hamilton’s Town-Gown Fund Surpasses $1 Million in Grants

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By

Maureen A. Nolan and Mike Debraggio

n the town-gown equation, Fran Alteri is town — the third generation of his family to operate Alteri’s Restaurant in the heart of the village of Clinton. As a high school kid, he was a regular at Hamilton hockey and football games. Now he loves to chat with alumni who stop by the restaurant to share memories of his late parents and the old days.

When Alteri was asked a few years ago to serve on the Hamilton College Town-Gown Committee, he was eager to accept. “It’s so important to help out, right? Anything we can do to give back and help our community and help our college, whatever we can do, we should be doing. To the next generation, it’s important,” he says.

PHOTOS BY NANCY L. FORD

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President David Wippman speaking at a reception for Town-Gown grant recipients and committee members.

The histories of the village, the town, and the College are closely linked, and our successes are mutually dependent.

The committee’s primary charge is to oversee and distribute the Town-Gown Fund, established in 2001 by two anonymous donors to foster goodwill and communication among the College, the town, and the village. The committee works to ensure that the endowment prospers to provide ongoing — and increasing — community support.

The fund reached a milestone in 2021 — $1 million in gifts and grants to aid the work of nonprofits and public-service agencies in a town that has been entwined with the College pretty much from their beginnings.

Some 230 years ago, Moses Foote, who founded the village of Clinton, joined dozens of local residents in pledging land, materials, labor, and money to establish the HamiltonOneida Academy. The school, conceived by the Rev. Samuel Kirkland, for whom the town is named, had the support of President George Washington and Treasury Secretary Alexander Hamilton. Nineteen years later, in 1812, the academy was rechartered as Hamilton College.

“The histories of the village, the town, and the College are closely linked, and our successes are mutually dependent,” says Hamilton President David Wippman. “Today, Hamilton has become one of the most highly regarded liberal arts colleges in the country, and Clinton has become one of America’s most charming and desirable small towns, with an outstanding school district, an active business community, and an attractive quality of life.”

In addition to the Town-Gown Fund, Hamilton contributes hundreds of thousands of dollars annually to support village and town services through a municipal contributions agreement, which was initiated in 2006 and extended over the years. Through 2021, the College’s contributions via the agreement will total $7.4 million divided among the village, town, Clinton school district, and Oneida County. The school district receives roughly 60 percent of the money.

The town and the College have one another’s backs, observes Kirkland Town Supervisor Bob Meelan. “Hamilton needs the town; the town needs the College. I love having Hamilton here. I love having the kids in town. There’s nothing to be gained from being like the Hatfields and McCoys,” Meelan says.

Students from Hamilton volunteer in local nonprofit organizations, shop in local stores, and dine in local restaurants, as do their visiting families and alumni. In dollars and cents, the impact of the College ripples across the region. A 2019 economic impact study estimated the local and “spillover” impact of visitors to Hamilton at $20.5 million. Hamilton’s total regional and statewide economic impact was $325.5 million, according to a study by the Center for Governmental Research for the Commission on Independent Colleges & Universities in New York. That same study estimated the College’s overall employment, direct and spillover, at 1,790 jobs.

Clockwise from upper left: A.J. Zuckerman ’23 (center) enjoys lunch outside The Compound with cross country teammates James Gallagher ’24, Luke Cohen-Abeles ’23, Nick Lyon ’22, and Brogan Deem-Ranzetta ’24, and his parents. Brenda Torres ’22, Lea Barros ’22, Joel Adade ’22, and Adam Valencia ’22 walk along West Park Row. The village of Clinton nestled among the trees. Four-year-old Chase Meyers admires his face painting created by Alex Kropaneva ’25.

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FOCUSED IMPACT

ZACK STANEK

Top: Shannon Cicero ’25 and Eliza Behrke ’25 leave Lucianna’s Boutique on Clinton’s West Park Row. Bottom: Ziyi Zhou ’25 volunteers alongside another Hamilton student at Clinton’s Boynton Pool.

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The Hamilton Town-Gown Committee typically focuses its grants on education, for instance awarding money to the local school district and public library, but its members heed the community’s other needs, too. In 2021, when the continuing pandemic created hardship for local families, the committee responded with two grants totaling $10,000 for the food pantry, money that was sorely needed, Alteri says.

The volunteer Clinton Fire Department, which serves the village and town, received a $20,000 grant in May 2021 for critical new emergency communications equipment. The department was forced to obtain the costly new equipment when Oneida County upgraded its communications system, Fire Chief Brad Dunda explains. “The generosity of the Town-Gown Fund has made it possible for us to purchase equipment that normally we wouldn’t be able to afford through our regular budget. We would have had to cut back in other areas to get certain pieces of equipment. So yeah, this has been great — a wonderful thing for us,” says Dunda, who works part-time at Hamilton as a campus security officer.

Also included in the most recent round of grants — $20,000 for the Kirkland Arts Center’s capital campaign, which is the first major campaign in the history of the organization, says Jennifer Potter Hayes K’73, who chairs the effort. The $300,000 campaign is ambitious for the small organization, she says.

“We suggested that if the Town-Gown Fund could make this bigger grant to us — the $20,000 — that we would then use that

to leverage our board to match it. And they did,” she says. “That was also a huge leap for our board. People really stretched, so it just shows how much a gift like that, what a difference that can make, what a big impact we can have.”

A Clinton native, Potter Hayes is a blend of town and gown with a bias that tends toward gown, she admits. Besides attending Kirkland, she previously worked at Hamilton in the Registrar’s Office and Alumni Office, and her father, the late Donald Potter, was a highly regarded professor of geology. Over the years, Potter Hayes says, she’s seen the relationship evolve and improve between the community and Hamilton, starting during the tenure of President Eugene Tobin, who served in that role from 1993 to 2003.

She’s also seen community appreciation grow for the College on the Hill. “I think there’s a better understanding now about where Hamilton stands in the academic world, as an institution of excellence, and so now I think there’s pride. I think there hadn’t maybe been an understanding of how incredible Hamilton is, and now I think there is a tremendous sense of pride of having that institution in this town,” she says.

Alteri anticipates more good things to happen in the community thanks to the growing Town-Gown Fund support for organizations that help the town thrive. “The people on the board are phenomenal,” he said. “They have an interest in Hamilton and an interest in the town, which is what you want. I think it’s going to be great going forward. It’s going to be even better.” n

10 THINGS NOT TO MISS IN

CLINTON N o matter if it’s been five years or five decades since you last made your way back to Hamilton College and Clinton, N.Y., you’re sure to find some old favorites and new places to explore the next time you visit.

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ARTISANS’ CORNER Jewelry, paintings, cutting boards, soap, scarves, leather goods — the list goes on. Browse the work of 40 local artists at this fabulous co-op.

ALTERI’S

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Since 1953, Alteri’s restaurant has be enticing customers with its pizza, pasta, and sandwiches. Or simply find a stool at the bar and enjoy a craft beer with a friend.

CLINTON CIDER MILL Enjoy a fresh cider donut and apple squeeze while relaxing on the porch.

Visitors can also check out the hydraulic cider press that’s been in use at the mill since 1927. Open Labor Day through Thanksgiving.

CLINTON POTTERY

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UTICA COFFEE Stop by the local coffee shop for a hot or cold beverage ranging from a gingerbread chai in the winter to a dreamsicle frappe in summer.

There’s also regular brew for the average Joe.

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Beautiful and practical describe the stoneware of Clinton Pottery.

Popular among Hamiltonians are mugs personalized with graduation dates stamped on the bottom.

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NOLA’S

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Featuring American and vegetarian cuisine, with many ingredients locally sourced, Nola’s offers cozy fine dining and creative cocktails.

BRIMFIELD FARM WINERY Brimfield Farm Winery partners with an estate winery in the Finger Lakes region to create red and white wines ranging from sweet to dry. Enjoy a tasting in their historic barn hayloft.

THE CREMERIA Have a hankering for authentic gelato? How about sorbetto?

Look no further than the made-from-scratch creations at Clinton’s Cremeria.

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DON’S ROK It’s that place where everybody knows your name.

4 KIRKLAND ART CENTER

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Artists from all over are drawn to this intimate regional venue. Check kacny.org for upcoming concerts and gallery exhibits.

FOR MORE INFORMATION, such as addresses and hours of operation, and a listing of other shops and eateries in Clinton, visit clintonnychamber.org.

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HE FIRST SEMESTER for Hamilton’s Class of 2025 has come to a close, bringing a true intertwining of Hamilton and home for each new student.

It’s been a chance for them to grow and change, while still keeping some ties to their previous lives.

But how can we truly encapsulate the experience of a first-year student?

To answer that, we surveyed eight new

By Alyssa Samuels ’25

students on both the most important item they brought with them to Hamilton and how their perception of college has already changed as they readied themselves for their first semester break.

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IN 2019, EDWIN MENSAH-BOATENG was gifted a bright yellow hat by his sister when she came home for the holidays. He laughs about how this item had little significance to him at first. “It was just a cool yellow hat that my sister just happened to give me,” he says, admitting that he even found it a bit “tacky.” However, as with many family gifts, it came with him when he moved to Hamilton. If nothing else, it reminded him of home.

As the semester progressed, Mensah-Boateng started incorporating the hat

into his outfits, albeit with the bottom rolled up to hide the “NJ” stitched on the front.

“The hat still reminds me of my home state of New Jersey,” he says, “but I consider [it] to look a lot better without the big blue initials.”

Now the hat has become part of his style, part of his identity around campus. “It’s what people associate with me; the guy in the yellow hat.”

The shaping of his hat into something that fit his identity represents his broader experience. Mensah-Boateng says being in a college environment has helped him become more aware of who he is, and he’s sure he’ll mature even more at Hamilton. It has encouraged him to explore his interest in the outdoors through the Raquette River Canoe orientation trip and has challenged him to pursue a biology major. Although he doesn’t wear his hat every day, it reminds him of the bigger identity he is constructing at college and of the connection to the boy from New Jersey who received a yellow hat for Christmas.

Eva Millay Evans ’25 NEW MILFORD, CONN.

FIVE YEARS AGO, EVA MILLAY EVANS named her guitar Hope, and the two have been making music ever since. “Where I go, my guitar goes,” she says. Whether it’s a good day that leads to rock ballads or a stressful one that brings about slow, sad chords, the instrument has lived up to its name. “College is an era full of change and challenge,” she says, “but music is something that brings people together.”

Once on campus, Evans wasted no time exercising her passion for songwriting. She played several original songs at Open Mic night, expecting just a performance but finding something more meaningful. “The students who came up to me after are still the students I do homework with in KJ,” she says.

When playing a concert for some friends in the stairwell of Dunham Residence Hall, she unexpectedly piqued the interest of passersby. “People would keep coming down the stairs, no matter who they were,” she recalls.

“A violinist, a French major, a choir kid, a lacrosse player, a math major, a theatre kid.”

True to the College’s ethos, Evans had created a space where students of different backgrounds and experiences could simply sit and share the joy of music.

Evans and Hope have become a staple of Hamilton’s music scene. From the Thursday night stairwell concerts to her radio show on WHCL titled “The Eva the Diva Show,” Evans has created an identity on campus. As she strolls the pathways with her guitar case covered in hand-drawn lyrics and song titles, she knows that Hope has brought her recognition, but more importantly, connection.

Edwin Mensah-Boateng ’25

NEWARK, N.J.

PHOTOS BY NANCY L. FORD

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Eve Rudin ’25 NEW YORK, N.Y.

JOHN CARBONE HAS HAD his stuffed dog named Buddy longer than he can remember. Gifted to him as an infant, Buddy has accompanied Carbone to places like the Caribbean, Ireland, Spain, and various states across the U.S. So, of course, when it came time to start college, Buddy was ready for another journey.

Buddy has not always been a source of fun and remembrance. When Carbone arrived at Hamilton, he was unsure how to navigate the transition to college life.

“I didn’t really know anyone,” he recalls.

“I was going to be on my own in just a few hours, and, of course, it was raining.”

However, when his mother propped Buddy up on the edge of his bed, Carbone felt a spark of courage.

Carbone describes his first semester as “all that [I] ever could have hoped for and more.” He prospered in friend groups, classes, and even helped Hamilton’s Ultimate Frisbee team qualify for the next round of a tournament. Carbone’s relationship with Buddy exemplifies a hallmark of the Hamilton experience. Through his connection to his stuffed pal, he’s found a path

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to “know thyself” as he makes use of all the College has to offer.

Carbone plans to study abroad during his junior year, and although he doesn’t know exactly where he will go, he does know that Buddy will be right there with him. The bond between these two world travelers has only strengthened in their first semester at Hamilton. “With all of this squeezed into just a few months,” Carbone says, “I can’t wait to see what the next seven semesters have in store!”

WHEN EVE RUDIN EMBARKED on a longawaited 20-day canoe trip to Canada, she was presented with a special gift. Every member of her Northwaters wilderness group received a wooden canoe paddle; this was a rite of passage. Even so, the experience stood out on a personal level. “Each of our paddles had a different pattern in the wood and was made perfectly for our height,” she says. “It felt really special.”

With the now well-worn paddle packed safely into the car, Rudin arrived on campus last fall carrying both the rewarding and challenging aspects of her canoe trip with her. The paddle had come to symbolize the close connections she formed on the trip. One specific memory it conjures actually began with frustration. After repeatedly failing to cook the next day’s breakfast, Rudin’s group was weary and past ready to give up and sleep. “A few close friends stayed up with us until 2 a.m. to finish cooking,” she recalls with a smile. “Then we sat around the fire and stargazed.” Going into the wholly new environment of college, Rudin says her paddle reminds her of perseverance and how others can help push you along in times of struggle.

At Hamilton, Rudin has been putting her paddling skills to good use. From leading canoe trips to joining the College’s rowing team, she has built upon the memories of time in the water. Thanks to the constant comfort and power of her trusty paddle, Rudin has created an environment in which she can once again thrive.

“It definitely feels like home,” she said.

John Carbone ’25

MARSHFIELD, MASS.

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GROWING UP, DOMINIC TANELLI was an avid Cartoon Network fan. He and his best friend would get together every Friday to watch any episodes the network aired, even if they were reruns. However, their passion did not stop there. Tanelli remembers how they would sit and draw their favorite characters for hours on those Friday nights.

His friend even offered to design a pair of Converse shoes inspired by some of their favorite characters.

When Tanelli stepped on campus in the fall, he did so with a “symbol of friendship,” as he puts it. His black Converse were designed with images of Gumball and Darwin,

two characters from Cartoon Network’s The Amazing World of Gumball adorning the front. Tanelli describes them as a reminder, something tangible that ties him back to the joy and happiness of his childhood, when he’s cramming for a math test, finishing up an econ PSet, or even thinking about his future.

To him, the shoes are a comfort that he is never too far from home.

During his first semester, Tanelli’s shoes became a treasured “design piece” within his residence hall, something he would only wear out on nice days to protect them from the elements. Even though they have not accompanied him everywhere, they remain an inspiration. Tanelli says although he has only ever drawn the characters on paper, he would someday love to design his own pair of shoes.

“I definitely [would] want to make them very personal to me,” he said, “and not worry about what other people may think of them.”

Dominic Tanelli ’25

WEST CALDWELL, N.J.

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Abby Lowder ’25 PUTNAM VALLEY, N.Y.

WALK PAST KEEHN RESIDENCE HALL and you’re likely to be taken aback, or even startled, by an object looking out at you from Abby Lowder’s window. The 6-foot-tall cardboard cutout of Pennywise the Dancing Clown from the horror film It has become a landmark on the campus’ Dark Side. “Many people immediately recognize it,” she laughs, “and that has only made me more fond of it.”

However, Lowder’s true reason for treasuring her cutout goes deeper than simple hilarity or fun. “I was gifted it by a dear friend who shares my love for the It movies,” she says, “and it reminds me of family as well.” To Lowder, horror and Pennywise represent traditions: Her father took her to see It for the first time, her mother always helps with her cosplays of the titular character, and all three of them share an intense love for Stephen King. As she “figures out exactly what [her] little niche is” at Hamilton, her cutout serves to make her new surroundings truly feel like home.

When reflecting on her first college semester, Lowder describes it as “wonderful.” She plans to pursue a neuroscience major and possibly a theatre minor. For now, however, she is content being known as “the person who owns the giant Pennywise.” At Hamilton, she can be the horror-loving member of her family but can also branch out and make wholly new connections. “The cutout has always been special to me, but now I have even more fun memories attached to it,” she says.

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WHEN IT BECAME APPARENT that Ilsaa Siddiqui would be going to a different college than her best friend, Isabel, the two decided to set up a trade fueled by remembrance and themed on comfort. “I gave her a Gon and Killua best friends pillowcase,” Siddiqui says with a smile, “and she gave me my squishmallow Caeli because I like to cuddle with things when I’m sleeping.”

When she arrived at Hamilton, Caeli reminded her of home each day when she returned to her dorm. Ii wasn’t long before Siddiqui found herself growing more comfortable on campus as she experienced everything from an orientation trip to clubs like the Muslim Student Association and the Hamilton Debate Society.

However, when her roommate left early for Thanksgiving break, Siddiqui suddenly found herself in a “dark and lonely” room and more in need of cuddles with Caeli. “I grew up having always shared my bedroom with siblings,” she says. Having her stuffed friend made Siddiqui feel close to Isabel emotionally, even though they were hundreds of miles apart physically. At this point, the squishmallow became more than a memory turned object. It became a source of warmth, a presence that not only reminded her of home, but the feelings associated with it as well.

As the semester concluded, Siddiqui reflected on how “strong” she finished. With Caeli at her side, Siddiqui managed to not only conquer the freshman fear of loneliness, but also made new friends. She plans to study abroad in her junior year, and of course Caeli will be there by her side.

Ilsaa Siddiqui ’25

SELDEN, N.Y.

Like the students she wrote about for this story, Alyssa Samuels ’25 is a first-year student. She is already active on campus as a writer in the College’s Communications Office and as a member of the College Choir, and will serve as vocal director for the Theatre Department’s upcoming mainstage production. “Music and acting have always been my passions,” she says. “Before I could even talk, I sang, stringing together stories from syllables that were unintelligible to those around me. Now I compose my own pieces with vocals and piano accompaniment.” It’s no surprise that the most-cherished item she brought with her to Hamilton is a keyboard. She knew her performative passion would accompany her, and we’re delighted that she’s also sharing her writing talents with Hamilton magazine.

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Timothy Colledge ’25 MILTON, MASS.

TIMOTHY COLLEDGE STILL TREASURES the tie he wore to his first high school debate tournament. “It’s my lucky tie,” he says, “I’ve worn it to quite a few tournaments, and I have a pretty good win ratio.” However, his connection to the piece of formal neckwear goes much deeper than simple luck. It represents both nostalgia and a path to new opportunity.

Colledge’s tie has accompanied him to other important life events. The tie was a gift from his father when he remarried and has always served as a reminder that even though his father lived in a different city, he was “still with [me] whenever [I] was wearing the tie.”

At Hamilton, Colledge’s tie evokes much of that same feeling of connection — this time to his previous experience in debate.

“Some of my closest friends to this day also did debate, and because of that I have a sense of nostalgia I didn’t before,” he says.

In his first semester, Colledge joined Hamilton’s Debate Society. Although he plans to take it a bit less seriously than before, even forgoing a tie at some tournaments, he still smiles when thinking about the “great community of people” he’s met on campus through the club.

“It’s definitely not the same as high school, but it’s got the same sort of academic spark to it,” he says.

As Colledge embarks on his college journey, he will keep his lucky tie with him. Whether tucked into his collar or away in his closet while he pursues other interests, the tie represents joy, connection, and the luck needed to continue those feelings into the future. n

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Bookshelf Isabel Weinger Nielsen K’76 (editor)*

Lost Orchard II: Nonfiction from the Kirkland College Community (Washington, D.C.: National League of American Pen Women, 2021)

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his collection of 45 essays by Kirkland College alumnae, faculty, and administrators addresses subjects as wide-ranging as aging, loss, parenting, feminism, and places.

Kirkland, which merged with Hamilton in 1978, fostered independent learning and creativity, with disciplines such as American studies, visual arts, dance, and history of science. Kirkland also offered one of the first undergraduate creative writing majors at a four-year college. Lost Orchard II captures the reflections and talents of those who knew it best.

“This collection of writing is a window into the minds and souls of the women Kirkland students became,” Christie Bell Vilsack K’72 notes. “What we did in the years we spent together is reflected in the words collected here. I read every word with the growing awareness that what we created together — founders, teachers, students, administrators — in rural upstate New York during the 12 years Kirkland existed, changed the trajectory of our lives and the many we’ve touched.”

All proceeds from the sale of Lost Orchard II support the Samuel & Natalie Babbitt Kirkland Scholarship Fund. This book follows Lost Orchard: Prose and Poetry from the Kirkland College Community (SUNY Press, 2014). n pecial thanks to associate editors Nancy S Avery Dafoe K’74, P’04, Liz Horwitt K’73, and Jo Pitkin K’78. Cover illustration by Linda Branch Dunn K’77.

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The Wind |

by Rachel Dickinson K’78

The following essay appears in Lost Orchard II. Republished with permission.

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HE WIND IS BLOWING SO HARD THIS AFTERNOON that curled brown leaves stuck deep within the winter grass are pulled from their resting place and held aloft for just a moment before being pulled away into the hedgerow. I know that tonight the whoosh of the wind will cover the howls of the coyote that live in the gully just beyond the trees. Their howls, like the leaves, will lift up, then catch a ride on the wind and move far away from my waiting ears.

Medium-sized trees with straight, iron-gray trunks stand in the hedgerow. Their up-curved branches feather into light gray wisps tinged with hues of scarlet. They sway back and forth and back and forth as the wind pushes then lets up, pushes then lets up. The blowing of the wind seems pulsingly rhythmic, but that can’t be right. Wind does not obey the kind of rhythmic regularity found at a dance party.

I like the wind and its uncontrollable nature. It is, of course, most noticeable when you’re in a boat on water. Many people hate it. I suppose the wind-haters are mostly those who need to be in control of everything around them. The wind knows no master and will not pay heed to cries for help or bargains offered.

A year after my son Jack died, on what would have been his 19th birthday, I was struck with vestibular neuritis. You don’t have to know what that is, only that it involves the most extreme fall-on-the-floor-and-can’t-move kind of vertigo that lasts for weeks. Months of physical therapy followed, enabling me to walk fairly straight with some certainty by using a walking stick. I refused to call it a cane.

I saw hills and valleys in the pavement of the sidewalk and in patterned carpet. I had to train myself to override the impulses in my brain that said they were real and trust that my foot would recognize the trueness of the surface when it landed. I also drifted to the left if I didn’t concentrate on my walking or if I somehow got moving too fast. Sometimes I wished I had a video of the way I walked as a way to confirm my cockeyed movement. Every time I left the house, I had to decide whether or not I would need the walking stick based on how far I might decide to go. Walking to the post office, about a hundred yards from my house, became a monumental task partly because I had to cross a street. What if I fell in the road or misjudged where the curb was? I began to be frightened of crossing roads and for a while I didn’t want to leave the house because navigating through the world was just too hard.

I felt sorry for myself. Why me, why me, why me? The line of questioning began with why did my son die and ended with why did I come down with this stupid condition? I could feel a kind of bitterness welling up within me. I was trapped in a loop of senseless questioning that had the effect of trapping me in the green chair within the Pink House. I was out of my mind when Jack died, but this, I knew, was what despair felt like. I binge-watched television shows while knitting scarves that were so pathetic-looking because of odd color choices and uneven stitches that they became the perfect manifestations of how I felt.

But the wind, the wind; back to the wind. What does this have to do with the wind that blows leaves and twigs and hard pellets of rain across the lawn in front of me? I can no more control the wind than I could control my movements a couple of years ago. But like the sailor who had to learn to read the wind accurately to expertly catch it in the unfurled sails, I had to understand and work with my new perception of space. My desire, as always, was to leave the realm of the Pink House and to travel. To accomplish that meant, once again, becoming adept at moving through the world.

CYNTHIA “TOOTIE” LOFFREDO ANDERSON ’95. Ride of a

Lifetime (self-published, 2021).

NADYA BAIR, ASSISTANT PROFESSOR OF ART HISTORY. The Decisive Network: Magnum Photos and the Postwar Image Market (Oakland, Calif.: University of California Press, 2020).

MARTY BLAKE ’77. Drawn to Type: Lettering for

Illustrators (London: Bloomsbury, 2021).

TERRY BROOKS ’66. Child of Light (New York: Del Rey/Random House, 2021).

PETER CAMERON ’82. What Happens at Night (New York: Catapult Press, 2020).

ROGER D’APRIX ’55. Bosses: True Stories of the

Good, the Bad and the Ugly (Seattle: ChangeStart Press, 2020).

STEPHEN M. FELDMAN ’77. Pack the Court! A Defense of Supreme Court Expansion (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 2021).

BARBARA GOLD, the Edward North Chair of Greek and Greek Literature and professor of classics emerita, and Genevieve Liveley. A Guide to Latin Lyric and Elegy (Hoboken, N.J.: Wiley Blackwell, 2021).

BILL HARLEY ’76. Now You Say Yes (Atlanta: Peachtree Publishing, 2021).

JAN HERRMAN ’74. The Last Cowboy (Dublin, Ohio: Telemachus Press, 2021).

ALLIE KERPER ’15. Pale Hairs Reach Between Us

(Edinburgh, Scotland: Blue Diode Publishing, 2021).

JAIME KUCINSKAS, associate professor of sociology (co-editor). Situating Spirituality: Context, Practice, and Power (New York: Oxford University Press, 2021).

SARAH J. MAAS ’08. A Court of Silver Flames (New York: Bloomsbury, 2021).

SARAH J. MAAS ’08. House of Sky and Breath (New York: Bloomsbury, 2022).

Martine Kalaw ’03

The ABCs of Diversity: A Manager’s Guide to Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion in the New Workplace (Middletown, Del.: BestSellingBook.com, 2021)

O

ften people realize that a lack of diversity is a problem in their companies, but they don’t have the vocabulary, or tools, to address it effectively. An organizational development expert and consultant, the author explains how middle managers are key to achieving more inclusive, welcoming, and productive workplace environments. “[Managers] hire new employees, push for their promotions, liaise with senior executives, and affect who decides to stay and leave,” Kalaw writes. “Unlike the executive suite, they’re interacting with employees at various levels and can directly take part in bringing in more diverse employees or carrying out a company’s DEI vision.”

Written in a straightforward, conversational tone, the book includes best practices, helpful exercises, and strategies that managers can put into place immediately to mitigate implicit bias and encourage a culture of active allyship. n

SCOTT MACDONALD, professor of film and art history

(co-editor). William Greaves: Filmmaking as Mission (University of California Press, 2021).

JENNIFER K. MANN ’85. The Camping Trip

(Somerville, Mass.: Candlewick Press, 2020).

BRUCE MARKUSEN ’87. Hosted Horror on

Television: The Films and Faces of Shock Theater, Creature Features, and Chiller Theater (Jefferson, N.C.: McFarland, 2021).

DANIEL MAUNZ ’00. Questions of Perspective

(Castroville, Texas: Black Rose Writing, 2020).

CELESTE DAY MOORE, assistant professor of history.

Soundscapes of Liberation: African American Music in Postwar France (Duke University Press, 2021).

DAVID BROWN MORRIS ’64. Wanderers: Literature, Culture and the Open Road (New York: Routledge, 2021).

JOSEPH MWANTUALI, professor of French (editor).

Werewere-Liking: Le Ki-Yi Mbock et la Renaissance Africaine (Yaoundé, Cameroon: Editions Ifrikiya, 2021).

ADAM SILLS ’91. Against the Map: The Politics of

Geography in Eighteenth-Century Britain (Charlottesville, Va.: University of Virginia Press, 2021).

RANDOLPH SPLITTER ’68. The Third Man

(Kirksville, Mo.: Golden Antelope Press, 2022).

CHARLIE WARZEL ’10 and Anne Helen Petersen. Out of Office: The Big Problem and Bigger Promise of Working from Home (New York: Knopf/ Random House, 2021).

STEWART G. YOUNG ’72. Mona’s Dreams

(Bloomington, Ind.: Westbow Press, 2020).

For descriptions of the books listed, and links to where you might purchase them, visit hamilton.edu/alumni/books.

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FINAL THOUGHTS Forever friends Tom Macy ’65 (left) and Henry Little ’65 at Tom’s wedding in 1982.

LOOKING for HENRY

by Sydney Shafroth Macy

H

OW MUCH FUEL do we have left, Cap”?

Cap and Mace had just finished a bombing run south of Da Nang and were headed back to the base at Chu Lai, flying along the east coast of South Vietnam. It was a brilliant, clear day, and Vietnam looked like a tropical paradise from the air. Peaceful deserted beaches and verdant forests with the turquoise sea lapping the coast. There was no sign of the death and destruction just inland from this tranquility.

Tom Macy was the RIO (Radio Intercept Officer) in the back seat of the F-4 Phantom jet. Cap Nickel was the pilot.

Members of an elite Marine squadron — the Black Knights — they had flown over 100 missions together. Their plan today was to follow protocol and dump the jet’s excess fuel over the ocean, lightening their load to ensure a safe landing.

“

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H A M I LTO N

“Mace, is this about Henry?” Cap asked with a knowing chuckle. “Where is he this time?”

They had tried to find Henry several times after completing bombing missions based on descriptions in letters between Tom and Henry. “ January 6, 1968. Dear Henry. Today my pilot and I bombed a target about 25 miles southwest of your camp. We had extra fuel so we decided to try to buzz you.

We made two passes on a small circular type camp flying an ARVN flag slightly NW of highway 1 near the big bend in the river. What we thought was your camp was a small camp somewhere between those 2 X’s on the enclosed map. I lost your letter with the coordinates so I had to guess which one. Please plot your exact position on this map so we can buzz you again. Good luck, Tom.”

This is a story of a lifelong friendship.

Tom Macy ’65 and Henry Little ’65 met at Hamilton, survived harrowing tours of duty in Vietnam, and eventually landed in California, where they worked together to preserve some of America’s most spectacular and cherished wild lands. Their story is told by Macy’s wife, Sydney, who was hired

by Little and later introduced to Macy.

Having heard the war stories many times, she was inspired to write this essay several years ago for a memoir writing retreat.

Tom was studying Henry’s map secured to a clipboard on his leg. “Just south of the Hoi An River, Cap. Just off our route. We might find him this time.”

Cap shook his head and banked the jet into a hard right turn inland. “Okay, Mace.

Let’s go look for Henry.”

T

OM MET HENRY LITTLE in 1961, their freshman year at Hamilton.

Tom remembers Henry in French class and recalls that he had a certain warm and friendly character. Henry has no recollection of the French class but remembers looking out the upper windows of their freshman dorm after an early fall snowstorm and watching Tom and others practicing their hockey slap shots on thin snow barely covering the grass. Eventually they roomed together and played on the varsity hockey team, forming a lifelong friendship.

FINAL THOUGHTS

Tom was born and bred with a passion for fishing. His father was an avid fly fisherman, often taking Tom to various places near their home in northern New Jersey.

They fished the ponds and lakes for bass and pickerel, and the rivers and streams for trout.

Tom remembers taking Henry to Oriskany Creek, near Hamilton, where Henry threw a disastrous cast that landed with a splash, and a large brown trout grabbed his fly. Tom was more excited than Henry, and neither one of them can remember if Henry even landed the fish. But that day cemented their friendship, and fishing would continue to bring them together.

Henry and Tom graduated from Hamilton in June 1965, and within weeks received their draft notices. The United States had sent the first Marines into Da Nang three months earlier, and American involvement was growing. In 1964, there were fewer than 25,000 troops in Vietnam. The count for 1965 was 185,000, and that number more than doubled in 1966. The country was committed to the war in Southeast Asia, and college graduates in the mid-’60s didn’t have a choice. It was before the anti-war protests that spread across the country. The war was new. Young men served. There were no questions. It was what you did.

Tom enlisted in the Marines and as a college graduate signed up for Officers Candidate School. Henry had returned to his hometown of Rochester, N.Y., and at his father’s urging joined the Army Reserves. They spent the summer building roads in the Adirondacks with their other Hamilton roommate, Norm Smith, who planned to become an officer in the Navy.

They traveled to Albany together to enlist and complete their physicals. Henry had flat feet and failed. He was in the Reserves and could have safely stayed there, but went through a second physical in

Rochester, passed, and joined the Army.

He still doesn’t understand why. “ My father was a colonel in World War II and my uncle was a major general in the Air Force and a famous pilot. My father was against the war and my mother was devastated when I volunteered to go to Vietnam. Things were going on in Vietnam and I felt like I was sitting on the bench of a hockey game and I couldn’t stand the idea of not getting involved. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

Tom reported for duty on Christmas Day 1965 and Henry in early 1966. Their training was grueling and dropout rates to become an officer were high. Endurance was key, and Tom’s athleticism served him well. They both got through it and after nearly two years of training were deployed as officers to Vietnam in November of 1967 — Tom to Chu Lai and Henry to Da Nang.

By the end of 1967, troop numbers had swelled another 100,000, and the war continued to escalate.

T Top, Tom Macy ’65 receiving his bronze star for valor in combat, 1968. Above, Henry Little ’65 in South Vietnam, 1968.

OM KNEW FROM THE DAY he enlisted that he wanted to fly. The excitement. The open skies. The speed and acceleration. He couldn’t imagine being confined on the ground in the steamy jungles of Vietnam.

Flight training was grueling — the pace was fast and the pressure extreme.

Ten weeks of aerial combat training. Six hours each day, half in the air and half in a trainer. There was little study involved.

Just the constant honing of reflexes, feel, and agility. “ Late June, 1967. Dear Dad, Thanks for the birthday present. The day I called I had just finished a most spectacular flight down the Grand Canyon. A typical day at Yuma: 0445 Takeoff. When airborne – low level intercepts over the

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FINAL THOUGHTS

Map showing Henry Little’s location in Vietnam.

pitch black mountain-studded desert for an hour, then bombs, rocket and napalm delivery for one hour. Land and debrief. 1015 Takeoff. When airborne – 2 hours of navigation and instrument flying, followed by hairy ride 200 feet over Colorado River at 500 knots in the Grand Canyon. I enjoy the flying more and more as I become proficient at my duties in the F4. Love, Tom.” In September Tom reported for duty in Iwakuni, Japan, joining the Black Knights and pairing up with Cap before their November deployment to Vietnam.

H

ENRY SPENT THANKSGIVING of 1967 having dinner on the roof of a hotel in Saigon. Several days later, he flew to Da Nang and was assigned to a small South Vietnamese regiment about 10 miles to the south. In the war, the U.S. Army was always attached to a corresponding unit of the South Vietnamese Army. Within a week, the captain of Henry’s battalion was transferred to Hong Kong, leaving First Lieutenant Little in charge. They lived in a military compound in the middle of a primitive village surrounded by rice paddies.

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Several weeks later, they were transferred further south to Hoi An, a charming village with a strong French influence.

On January 3, they were awakened to the sound of aircraft overhead and artillery firing and were loaded into armored personnel carriers and transported to Tra Kieu village. The Hon Bon hill towered over Tra Kieu. The night before, the Viet Cong had tried to take the hill and the village, and a bloody battle erupted. Henry’s battalion secured the hill and remained there for a month. The assault on the Tra Kieu hill was a prelude to the Tet Offensive and an early attempt by the Viet Cong to establish themselves in the strategic area close to Da Nang.

F

LYING DOWN THE COAST of the South China Sea, Tom and Cap owned the skies. They had just completed another successful bombing run over Khe Sanh and were returning to their base with extra fuel to burn. Young Marines in the hottest jet fighter in the free world. It should be easy to find Henry.

Cap makes the turn inland, and his wingman is right there with him. Glued to the lead plane, their wings are practically

touching. Tom looks over at the other plane as it compresses the 100-degree tropical air with streamers of pure white moisture curling off the wingtips. A long, red sword is emblazoned along the length of the plane above the wings. Painted below the sword is a black knight in armor with a red plume feathering off the top of his helmet. VMFA-314, the Black Knights, U.S. Marines.

Cap descends to avoid anti-aircraft fire and accelerates as he pulls a 90-degree turn. The force of the turn increases the gravitational pull, causing their G suits to squeeze their calves, quads, and stomachs to prevent blood from pooling in their legs.

Below them is a quilted landscape of rice paddies in a palette of lush, tropical greens. They are flying above a valley over a thin ribbon of water when they spot a fort at the base of a hill in the distance.

“Let’s give him a show, Cap.” Flying just below the speed of sound, at 550 knots and 300 feet off the ground, they blast toward the fort. As the jets thunder overhead, they perform a series of aileron rolls followed by an afterburner climb up to 10,000 feet, flipping over and coming down as though on a bombing run.

Two phantom jets diving on the fort together, then pulling out at the last minute. And just as they are pulling out, Tom sees green smoke grenades go off. Frantic smoke, waving in the air. Billowing green smoke everywhere.

“Holy shit, Cap, that’s Henry. We found him!”

After a few more acrobatics, the planes turn south and head back to Chu Lai.

H

ENRY REMEMBERS IT EXACTLY. January 25, 1968, at 1400. He and his troops were in bunkers after being mortared, peeking out like terrified ferrets, when the phantom jets came roaring over them. When the planes

FINAL THOUGHTS

turned and came back over, Henry’s Vietnamese battalion commander dove into the bunkers screaming an expletive that translates to “We’re all dead chickens.” Everyone thought they were about to get bombed. But when the planes flew around again, upside down, Henry knew it was Tom. He ran outside, alone, with the smoke grenades and watched the show.

That day his stock with his Vietnamese troops went way up. They thought he had supernatural powers and had the Marines at his beck and call.

Five days later, on January 30, the Tet Offensive was launched. In a series of coordinated attacks, Viet Cong forces invaded 100 cities and outposts in South Vietnam, changing the course of the war.

Four days after Tet, Henry and his troops were rescued off their hill in advance of the Viet Cong infiltration of the area. They were airlifted to a small schoolhouse in the middle of a rice paddy, in a grove of trees, just south of Da Nang. They were dirty and their uniforms rotting.

The makeshift camp around the schoolhouse was not secure. There was little protection in the event of enemy fire.

No foxholes had been dug, and there were only a few, shallow irrigation ditches that might provide some cover. At 2200 on the night of February 5, Henry learned that two of the protective mortars outside the schoolhouse had been sabotaged. That night he slept on a table, fully dressed with his boots on, using his helmet as a pillow.

His radios and gun were on his belt.

Four hours later there was a huge explosion, and everyone ran out of the building. Henry and another lieutenant jumped in an irrigation ditch together.

Moments later a rocket hit the schoolhouse and blew it up. Henry called in artillery support, which gave them some protection.

And then he was shot, in the shoulder, and the lieutenant next to him was shot in the face. By daybreak, the enemy was in

retreat. A Vietnamese soldier found them and called in a chopper. Henry was airlifted to Da Nang and operated on. The bullet had shattered his left shoulder. From Da Nang he was flown to Japan, and within a week of getting hit, he was in the military hospital at Valley Forge, Pa.

T

WO MONTHS LATER, Tom wrote his father to let him know he had volunteered to join the troops on the ground. He had flown 250 combat missions and his odds of being shot down went up with each flight. Nearly 450 Phantoms were lost in Vietnam. But Tom didn’t think much about his odds. He wanted to experience another part of the war. He volunteered to be a FAC (Forward Air Controller), one of the most dangerous assignments in the Marine Corps. “ Dear Dad – Last month I elected to volunteer for a change of scenery … I have had a very good tour with VMFA-314, but I’m anxious to see the rest of the war. The war on the ground – a much less impersonal war. I worked hard and did well with 314 and will miss the people, but I have a keen desire and always have had, to get into the nitty gritty of the war in the swamps and trenches. I will write a bit if it fulfills my possibly naïve expectations. Please write Henry a letter; he got wounded badly in the shoulder. Love, TT.”

By April 22, Tom was on Hai Van Pass in the mountains north of Da Nang. He stayed on the ground until he rejoined 314 in early August. Two months later he was on his way home. “ August 16, 1968. Dear Mom and Dad. Back in Chulai – alive, a captain now, flying with VMFA 314 again. My commanding officer with the grunts asked me to extend my tour. I said no thanks – Hawaii beckons; I’ve laid my ass on

the line enough and am very happy and lucky to be alive. My four months tour with the 3rd Battalion, 5th Marines was the most challenging, terrifying and illuminating experience of my life. It was very powerful. The War is a waste, the experience is exhilarating…How much will you sell the VW back to me for? Is it still in good shape? If not, I’ll have to buy a new one. Love, Tom”

C

LOISTERED IN A girls boarding school north of New York City, I turned 16 the day after Tom found Henry. What little I knew about Vietnam, and something called Tet, I learned from watching the war on the evening news. By April, I was glued to Cronkite’s reports of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s assassination and the race riots that followed. Anti-war demonstrations were spreading across the country, Bobby Kennedy was shot in June, and protests prevailed at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. When I started my junior year of high school, America had changed. Opposition to the war exploded as our troops in Vietnam ballooned to over 500,000 and casualties peaked.

I dreamed of going to college in California, and by the time I arrived at Stanford in 1970, the campus had erupted.

There were anti-war demonstrations every day. My best friend joined a radical group called Venceremos and was busy preparing for the revolution, going to the rifle range to practice shooting and training with the Black Panthers. It was daunting and terrifying — and exhilarating.

T

HE R.L. WINSTON ROD CO., founded in San Francisco in 1929, made premier bamboo fly rods. By the 1950s, distance casting records were being set with Winston rods at the Golden Gate Angling and Casting Club. The club,

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FINAL THOUGHTS

dating back to 1894, was hidden away in a corner of Golden Gate Park. From the beginning, the Winston Rod Co. had a strong affiliation with the club. It is where improvements to the rods were imagined and created, and where world distance casting records were shattered.

In the Spring of 1970, Tom drove his VW bug to San Francisco and entered a training program at a small brokerage firm.

By early the next year he was pounding the pavement looking for clients, and one afternoon he stumbled on the Winston Rod Co. A tinkly bell attached to the door alerted the owner in the back that he had a visitor — a clean-cut young man dressed in a suit. Tom poked his head into a room filled with racks of split bamboo. Soft, creamy shades of toffee and cedar warmed the space, and bright lamps illuminated two men hunched over tables making the rods. The air was dappled with flakes of dust from the coating of sawdust on the old wood floor. A strong, chemical scent of glue and varnish permeated everything.

Strips of bamboo were being glued together in pentagonal shapes, then lightly brushed with clear varnish and wrapped with colored thread to attach the line guides. Handles made of flawless cork attached to polished wood were lined up on a counter waiting to be attached to each rod. Works of art created in this humble shop.

A

YEAR LATER, Tom called Henry in New York to tell him that the Winston Rod Co. was for sale. After that first day in the shop, Tom would often grab a sandwich and join the owners for lunch while they built the rods. Fishing stories were shared, and there were tales of new casting records set with Winstons.

One day, the owners announced that they would like to sell the business and offered it to Tom.

54

H A M I LTO N

Henry was working on Wall Street in the fall of 1971. He and Tom were both itchy. Investment banking and stock brokerage weren’t right for either of them.

When Henry got the call, he quit and moved west. Henry carefully reviewed the financial health of the company and learned the craft of rod making, while Tom met Winston customers and assessed the larger market beyond San Francisco.

On the weekends they went fishing.

In the end, they passed on the purchase. Tom had read an article in the Wall Street Journal about The Nature Conservancy protecting the Seven Sacred Pools on Maui. He called the Conservancy’s western director, Huey Johnson, and was hired to help run the Southern California effort for a statewide issue campaign that the Conservancy was backing. Tom needed help and hired Henry. After the measure passed, they both landed permanent jobs. Tom helped Huey start the Trust for Public Land, and Henry went to work for the Conservancy and was quickly put in charge of the West.

Tom and Henry continued to work together for over 40 years. They traveled across the West, usually armed with a fly rod and reel, and preserved some of our country’s most emblematic properties and stunning landscapes, including famous trout water — the McCloud River in California, Silver Creek in Idaho, and Phantom Canyon in Colorado.

Top, Henry Little ’65 with his longtime friend Sydney Macy in Pt. Reyes, Calif., circa 2015. Above, Henry Little ’65, Norm Smith ’65, and Tom Macy ’65 at Tom’s 65th birthday in 2007.

I

FOUND HENRY IN 1975, fresh out of college and looking for environmental work in San Francisco. A friend introduced us, and Henry agreed to meet me.

There were no jobs at the Conservancy, but he encouraged me to meet with his good friend Tom, and he gave me a few other names. I met Tom and the others, and later that year Henry hired me. It was a dream job, and I also had the joy of working to preserve special places across the West.

FINAL THOUGHTS Henry Little ’65 (front left) with disabled veterans at a Project Healing Waters event last summer.

After working for Henry for a year, I remember being greeted one afternoon by smoke wafting out of his office and the stench of Cuban cigars. Champagne corks were popping, and Henry was holding forth and in fine form. His first son, William, had been born, and the whole office was celebrating. Tom had come to join the revelry since he was the baby’s godfather.

Two years later, in the summer of 1978, Tom and I finally found each other and discovered our mutual love of the outdoors and wilderness adventure. For a month, we ventured down the west coast of British Columbia’s Haida Gwaii in a handmade ocean kayak, living off the land and surviving persistent winds and an angry ocean. A year after that epic journey, we bought a house north of San Francisco, moved in together, and continued our work to preserve natural lands.

When we were married in 1982, Henry was an usher in our wedding, and 5-yearold William was our ring bearer. He followed my sister up the aisle in his navy blue shorts and short-sleeved white shirt, carrying a satin pillow with my wedding ring poised on top. He walked just in front of our two flower girls, and stood still and serious until the ceremony was over. Then Henry picked him up, hugged him close, and carried him down the aisle.

D

IRECTIONS TO THE Golden Gate Casting Club involve finding the buffalo paddock in the western part of the park, not far from the ocean. In the cool dawn, the air is full of steam from the bisons’ breath, set against the backdrop of what author Tom McGuane calls “the primordial hills of Golden Gate Park.”

Just before reaching these beasts, there is a spot to veer off the path, duck under dense trees and bushes, and emerge onto the club property.

On a crisp fall morning, Tom and I have pushed our way through the overgrowth and are walking up the steps to the clubhouse. The building resembles an old log cabin and has the feel of a remote fishing lodge. We enter the 80-year-old structure, which is tidy and tight, with dark wood walls and a few windows to let in a bit of light. There is fishing memorabilia displayed on the walls, stored in glass cases and on shelves around the room: the last cane rod built by the Winston Rod Co. before they moved to Montana; the rod that set the world casting record in 1960; classic books on fishing; relic fishing flies and other paraphernalia. At one end of the room is a stone fireplace with a popping fire trying to warm the drafty space.

The room has started to fill with mostly older men — Vietnam vets — along with some younger vets who served in the Gulf War, Iraq, and Afghanistan. They are part of a group called Project Healing Waters, which Henry helped launch in San Francisco in 2016. Almost two dozen vets gather at the Casting Club twice a month to learn about fly fishing. They are joined by five to 10 volunteers, mostly vets themselves, who help with lectures, classes, and instruction. Throughout the year, the vets and volunteers go on fishing outings — surf casting off Ocean Beach, striper fishing in the bay, and longer trips to the Sierras or Mount Shasta to fish for trout.

Most of the vets are dealing with mental health issues. Very few have physical injuries, and most never saw combat. But they are healing. Henry sums up it best. “ It’s not about the casting and the fishing; it’s about the camaraderie. And the spirit of the place, and people feeling welcomed and not feeling embarrassed if they can’t cast. And having a chance to catch up, you know, on their latest conquest or their latest activity … the outings are really important because things come out around the campfire. Talking and shooting the bull, and the vets really look forward to it.”

The day we join the group, the class is devoted to fly tying. Tables have been organized in a horseshoe shape, with vices attached to them and bright lamps illuminating each spot. Materials for the flies — feathers, fur, thread, and hooks — are scattered everywhere. The class is being taught by Henry’s son, William, who shows a video and then offers tips on tying.

He and other volunteers move around the table to share their knowledge with each vet. After a couple of hours and a simple lunch on the front terrace with lots of conversation, the vets string up their rods and wander down to the casting pools. Tom gives a demonstration of a double haul, producing a graceful long cast. Then he and Henry walk around the pools helping each vet perfect his own cast. n

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BIG PICTURE

Colorful Couper STANDING IN STARK CONTRAST TO THE WINTER LANDSCAPE, Couper Hall welcomes students in from the cold. The building, originally known as Silliman Hall, dates back to 1888. It was the first college building in New York State to be erected for the sole purpose of serving as a YMCA. Now the home to the Classics and Women’s & Gender Studies departments, the building was rededicated as Couper Hall in 1992.

PHOTO BY NANCY L. FORD

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BIG PICTURE

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A photo, a lucky shirt, a hot pot? What was the one thing you brought with you from home when you arrived on campus for your first semester at Hamilton that you couldn’t imagine living without? We asked that question to some members of the Class of 2025. You can find their responses on page 40.

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