Reintroducing the Philomathean

By The Philomathean Editorial Board

The Philomathean Monthly was founded in 1896 by Bridgewater College students in order to share and celebrate students ’ news articles, literary creations, local ads, and silly jokes. Later, the Philomathean became a printed collection of students ’ creative and academic work, published until 2018.

Now we bring you the first digital edition of the Philomathean. In this and future editions, we share and celebrate the creative works of members from all parts of the Bridgewater College community: students, faculty, alumni, friends, and family. We hope the Philomathean can contribute to Bridgewater’ s commitment to building connections for life and providing all its community members opportunities to flourish. The vision and plan for transitioning Philomathean online, thereby expanding its audience and extending its scope, is a result of the tireless work of Dr. Chad Trevitte, to whom this inaugural digital edition is dedicated.

We initiated work on all aspects of Philomathean production with the theme of “Dig a Little Deeper” in mind. While not entirely sure how to define it, we appreciated how “Dig a Little Deeper” invited a variety of themes and types of works. As we began receiving submissions, we gained a new understanding of what it means to Dig a Little Deeper.

As we reviewed submissions and pieced together the works chosen for this journal, we noticed two overarching themes: one, the timeline of life, from childhood to adolescence to adulthood, to nearing the end of life to death; the other, the process of uncovering, discovering, creating, and perhaps altering identity. These two themes are closely related—the journey of self-discovery and self-identification. Both are often intertwined with the journey of life, and major life events may prompt or result in a newfound understanding of identity.

The pieces in this collection loosely follow this universal journey, from the innocence of youth to the self-discovery of adolescence to the nostalgia we feel with age. However, this is only one way of interpreting the works and the theme of this journal.

We invite you, the reader, to Dig a Little Deeper yourselves; you may choose to read the works on their own, out of order, or according to the order presented in the Table of Contents. You may notice themes similar to what we found or identify themes and connections of your own. We believe reading this work should be a creative experience, continuing the tradition of creativity that went into curating this edition, composing the individual submissions, and founding a digital journal.

So, turn the page to Dig a Little Deeper into the journey of life and construction of identity as told by the creative minds of the Bridgewater College Community.

Alyssa Brady, Emma Clouse, Samantha Hince, Danielle Jenkins, & Sienna Sullivan serve as the 2022 Editorial Board.