IN MEMORIAM

arrived to teach at Haverford in the fall of 1975,” recalled Terry Newirth, professor emeritus of chemistry, “Claude immediately took me under his wing.

“Although that year I taught ‘Superlab’ in the fall and advanced courses in the spring, he invited me to sit in on his organic classes, which I did, and took copious notes. Thus, right from the beginning, I learned in the fields of science, technology, and mathematics, as well as expenses associated with graduate school entrance exams and applications.

“Claude Wintner’s zest for life was almost unstoppable,” said Haverford president Wendy Raymond, who lives on campus with her husband, Dave Backus ’82. “Shortly after Dave and I arrived on campus, Claude knocked on our door to welcome back his former student from intro chem 40 years earlier! Claude’s love and care for Haverford, especially for his colleagues and former students, never ended.

“I could always count on Claude for a lively conversation about campus happenings, research and teaching, racial equity, former students we knew in common, or colleagues new and enduring,” Raymond said. “These last years of his life were a special blessing for me.” how to teach organic chemistry—which I also loved—from the master,” said Newirth. “There is no doubt Claude’s passion for organic chemistry was contagious to our students, and his mentorship of young faculty was without peer.”

Ted Love ‘81, M.D., who has gone on to build a distinguished career in biotechnology, agreed. “Claude was the quintessential professor. He taught, challenged, and inspired me, and changed my life’s trajectory!”

Wintner’s dedication to his students inspired Love to establish the Wintner/ Love Fellows Endowed Fund, which will support annual stipends to students underrepresented in the sciences by providing living expenses and summer earnings for students’ summer research

Students and faculty colleagues remember Wintner for his ability to explain complex ideas in understandable terms. He attributed this to his being “not a genius,” as he would put it, but one who had to work hard himself to understand difficult concepts. He considered it a vocation to search for new and better ways to transmit them.

A well-known anecdote among his former students involves two graduate students who were discussing the merits of their respective undergraduate organic chemistry professors—one from Haverford, the other from Harvard—with each insisting that his was the best. As it turned out, they were arguing about the same person: Claude Wintner.

Writing on Twitter, Adam Cifu ’89, now a physician-researcher at the University of Chicago, credits Wintner for delivering the most important lecture he ever attended. “About half my class failed our first organic chemistry class freshman year of college. Our professor, Claude Wintner, responded with an hour-long lecture on time