University of Portland Magazine Winter 2021

Winter 2021

Tending To A nurse advocates for eastern Oregon’s public lands UP tackles legacy pollution along the Willamette River Jim Nuccio's camellias will bloom

EDITOR’S LETTER FEATURES

28 Light in a Pandemic

by Alicia Jo Rabins A poem.

30

2 ON THE BLUFF 3 Sports 5 The Experts 6 Dream Teams 8 En Route 10 Campus Briefs

40 CLASS NOTES 45 In Memoriam 49 For the Love of It

Oxtail on My Mind

by Armin Tolentino A reflection on the Filipino dishes of his youth.

12 Healer, Hunter, Mentor, Mom

by Tracy Ross School of Nursing alum Chelsea Cassens ’08 spends her off-hours promoting ethical hunting practices and advocating for public lands in eastern Oregon.

34 Winter Bloom

by Liz Ohanesian

20 The Cleanup

by Rachel Ramirez ’18 Before expanding its footprint along the Willamette River, University of Portland had to commit to a massive effort to clean up the legacy of industrial pollution on the land. Ten years in, UP has proven up to the task.

Got questions about your camellias?

Jim Nuccio ’72, co-owner of an 85-year-old family-run California nursery, has answers.

Winter 2021 Vol. 39, No. 2 President Rev. Mark L. Poorman, CSC Vice President Michael E. Lewellen Editor Jessica Murphy Moo Designer Darsey Landoe Associate Editor Marcus Covert ’93, ’97 Contributors Danielle Centoni, Roya GhorbaniElizeh ’11, Anna Lageson-Kerns ’83, ’14, Celeste Robertson, Amy Shelly ’95, ’01 Cover Stella Kalinina Portland is published three times a year by University of Portland.

Copyright © 2021 by the University of Portland.

All rights reserved.

Editorial Offices Waldschmidt Hall, 5000 N. Willamette Blvd., Portland, OR 97203-5798 Email jmurphymoo@up.edu Online up.edu/portlandmagazine Printed on 10% recycled and FSC-certified paper in Portland, OR. Third-class postage paid at Portland, OR 97203. Canada Post International Publications Mail Product—Sales Agreement No. 40037899. Canadian Mail Distribution Information—Express Messenger International: PO Box 25058, London, Ontario, Canada N6C 6A8.

Hello MY KINDERGARTENER IS just starting to read words.

It’s still a slow sound-it-out exercise for his young mind.

It’s work.

It is with immense admiration that I watch him doing this work. I aspire to his openness to learning and failing and learning (again).

“Hello to what we do not know,” writes poet and theologian Pádraig Ó Tuama in his spiritual memoir, In the Shelter: Finding a Home in the World. He says hello to many challenges and possibilities and spiritual questions in this book, but it is the “hello to what we do not know” that’s sticking with me because it seems a wise practice for life and for the moment, as we all live through a global pandemic about which so much is still unknown.

Working at a university offers opportunities for these hellos at every turn. I love working here. I don’t have an excuse to stick with what I already knew; I don’t have an excuse to tread water in my knowledge or understanding of the world. There is always a new subject worth examining before me.

Which leads me to you: Hello, to you, dear reader, an individual whom, even if I do know you, I also don’t.

My hope is that the magazines we send you hold subjects worthy of your examination. I hope they are a welcome hello-to-something-you-don’t-know.

I began working on this issue knowing next to nothing about the public lands in eastern Oregon or ethical hunting practices or the legacy of pollution along the Willamette River or the original caretakers of this land or the propagation of camellias or the Everlasting Light in every synagogue or the ingredients in Filipino oxtail stew or grace in a woodshop. Now I know a little bit more.

I am grateful to all who participated in the learning in this Winter 2021 issue—that includes all writers and subjects, and our readers too.

Thank you and hello.

Jessica Murphy Moo, Editor

Opinions expressed in Portland are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the University administration. Postmaster: Send address changes to Portland Magazine, University of Portland, 5000 N. Willamette Blvd., Portland, OR 97203-5798.

WINTER 2021

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ON THE BLUFF SPORTS

No Game for Granted FOR WEEKS, UNIVERSITY of Portland’s men’s and women’s basketball teams navigated online classes and roamed a lifeless campus, as they fought off fears their season would never happen. On Oct. 14, the NCAA permitted its Division I basketball programs to begin preseason practices with regular coronavirus testing and other safeguards, and gyms across the United States opened doors for full-contact, five-on-five workouts and scrimmages. But of the 350 Division I programs, two— UP and crosstown rival Portland State—were forced to keep their doors closed, thanks to a perplexing decision by Oregon Gov. Kate Brown to deny exemption requests by the schools to play through the Oregon Health Authority’s sports guidance.

At a critical point of the season, during which teams bond, players develop on-court chemistry, and coaches evaluate new personnel and experiment with new lineup combinations, the Pilots were left in the dark, unsure when—or even if—they would return to the court. “I could not believe what we were going through,” senior Ahmed Ali says. “I was so jealous of all the other teams.” This jealousy intensified each time Ali scrolled through his Instagram feed and discovered posts from players across the country, including in-state programs Oregon and Oregon State, boasting about returning to practice. As the players’ emotions seesawed, University administrators worked behind the scenes with health officials to cut through the red tape.

The 30 players on the men’s and women’s teams kept the faith, pressing forward with tedious individual basketball workouts and solo weight training sessions, which allowed them, at the very least, to stay in shape. But as each week

NEW SEASON, NEW FIELD

RYAN HOPPES/PICTURETHISPDX

UP’s Basketball Season in Session

passed without a resolution, opposing teams gained even more of an edge, and the status of the season became even more precarious. Finally, after more than five weeks, Brown relented and approved the Pilots’ exemption. Three days before their first game, on Nov. 22, the men’s and women’s players were able to hold full practices, and Ali’s jealousy morphed into bliss.

“Oh, man, when they told us we were finally getting to practice, I can’t even describe what that was like,” Ali says. “We were so happy, so grateful. There was a lot of rust those first few days, but you could just see how much the guys were enjoying the game and being back on the court together. I can tell you this: We don’t take the game for granted anymore.”

It’s safe to say the student athletes who outlast this unique basketball season on The Bluff won’t take college life for granted again, either. In every conceivable way, as with everything in life the last nine months, the concept of normal has dramatically been redefined at UP. As courses have

UP Pilots’ new Joe Etzel Field is ready and waiting for the baseball season to begin in February. For schedule and televised home games, visit:

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PORTLAND

BOB KERNS

PortlandPilots.com

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transitioned from classrooms to computers, the campus has been eerily empty and quiet, with only a trickle of athletes and ROTC students roaming around. The basketball players, who live at Tyson Hall, are required to undergo daily COVID-19 testing to practice and, even with that reassurance, continue to wear masks and practice social distancing. Last season, the women’s team often would meet at coach Michael Meek’s house for meals and bonding sessions. But off-campus excursions and large gatherings are off limits now, so instead, they gather outdoors on nice days for socially distanced lunches after practice and occasionally meet in small groups at each other’s apartments.

It helps that all but one of the women from last season’s team have returned this season, so they already are close. For the men, who feature nine new players hailing from Canada to Florida and everywhere in between, the safety measures and practice limitations made it tough to build early camaraderie. They improvised as best they could, including playing the video game Call of Duty together—separately—from their rooms spread around Tyson. One way they haven’t bonded is by taking team trips to weekend parties. “I tell some of the freshmen, ‘You guys are not enjoying the real college experience,’” Ali says, giggling. “It’s tough and I kind of feel bad for them. I’ve lived the college experience. I don’t like partying anymore. But everyone should experience it at some point.”

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ON THE BLUFF THE EXPERTS

The Bluff’s lack of students and buzz have forced the players to embrace a monotonous lifestyle that feels a lot like the film Groundhog Day. Days are filled with a familiar routine featuring online Zoom classes, a weight training session, practice, an individual shooting session, and homework. Rinse.

Repeat. Rinse. Repeat. Before Brown finally allowed them to practice, the quiet repetitiveness and isolation threatened to become unbearable for some.

“It brings you anxiety and stuff,” Ali says. “You have lots and lots of time to think, and I hate when my mind is free. I try to keep my mind busy to protect my thoughts when I’m alone.”

It’s no wonder men’s coach Terry Porter, women’s coach Meek, and their assistants have made it a point to check in on players more than normal to measure mental health.

But the players consider themselves lucky. There have been COVID-19 outbreaks on college campuses in every region of the country, and college basketball games and practices have been postponed left and right because of positive tests and contact-tracing protocols, including at WCC rival Gonzaga. As of this writing, the Pilots have not endured one positive test.

“It’s going to be really crazy looking back at all of this 10 years from now, watching TV and seeing everyone wearing masks and stuff like that,” senior Maddie Muhlheim says. “For us, we know that a lot of people are going through hard times. We just feel fortunate and grateful for the time we do get to spend together, and we’re just trying to enjoy each other’s presence as much as we can. This has, for sure, brought us closer.”

This once-in-a-lifetime season could conceivably end at any point, but they plan to enjoy the ride as long as it lasts.

“It’s like that cliché saying, ‘Play every game like it’s your last,’” Muhlheim says. “With this situation, it’s literally true that any game could be our last. So I’ve just tried to be mindful of that throughout everything and just take every game and every practice seriously and just enjoy the moment.”

JOE FREEMAN ’99 covers the Portland Trail Blazers and NBA for The Oregonian/OregonLive.

ANDREW LAFRENZ ’02 Associate Professor, School of Nursing

BOB KERNS

STEVE GIBBONS

ON THE BLUFF SPORTS

COVID Investigator, Columbia County UP’S RESIDENT EPIDEMIOLOGIST—Andrew Lafrenz ’02— has been working seven days a week since April. Not only is he directing the School of Nursing’s newest major in integrative health and wellness studies, but he has also been offering his expertise to local entities during the pandemic.

“I’ve been working on the COVID team in Columbia County, which includes my hometown of Scappoose, OR, since April,” he says. “Before I was hired, they only had one disease investigator for the entire county; it was clear they were going to get overwhelmed. I was working seven-day weeks on county COVID investigations until the UP fall semester started, so now I lead the weekends for the county.”

Because of privacy concerns Lafrenz can only share general observations about COVID outbreaks in Columbia County.

“Every week there’s a class-sized workplace outbreak,” he says.

“There’s almost always a construction site or a fast food place.

We see a lot of police and first responder outbreaks because the correctional department is just inundated. COVID goes through the prisons and the jails, affecting inmates, correctional officers, and transport.”

He has also brought his knowledge about COVID to his teaching and scholarship at UP. He recently presented “The Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic on College Students’ Mental Well-Being and Physical Activity Levels” at the Oregon Public Health Association annual conference, and he integrates his county work with his teaching. “It’s really interesting work that I can bring into the classes I teach at UP, and it’s helpful for the School of Nursing to have someone embedded in these outbreaks. As a researcher I’m doing the safest work you can with COVID. I don’t have risk exposure like nurses and doctors, so they’re doing the real work.”

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ON THE BLUFF DREAM TEAMS

The World Is the Classroom LAST SUMMER AS the entire country, right down to the UP community itself, grappled with the ramifications of racial injustice, as the COVID-19 death toll continued to rise, as communities in the North Atlantic braced for the most active hurricane season on record, just weeks before hundreds of fires across the West would turn the sky red, communication studies professor Vail Fletcher and biology professor Tara Prestholdt started rethinking their curriculum.

They’d been awarded an Ignite Grant to create an educational program centered on environmental stewardship, but focusing on that issue alone no longer felt quite right. “After COVID, it didn’t seem appropriate,” says Prestholdt, “but we wanted to keep the momentum going. Black Lives Matter, COVID, and climate change are interwoven concerns. How do we help students make sense of the chaos?”

Their answer: lean in to all of it with all the interdisciplinary brainpower a liberal arts university can offer.

Together with Ruth Dittrich, assistant professor of economics, and Laurie Dizney, assistant professor of biology, they created a brand-new class, Imagining Our Futures: Making Sense of COVID-19, Black Lives Matter, and Climate Change.

Launching in the fall semester, the class would harness the energy and expertise of almost two dozen University of Portland faculty members across four of the five schools and a multitude of disciplines to help students better understand the complex, interconnected nature of the three biggest challenges facing us today and for years to come. Asynchronous, massively interdisciplinary, and, of course, fully online, nothing like it had ever been done at UP before. By the time the 12 weeks were over, everyone, even the professors, learned more from each other than they ever thought they would.

“We saw this as a pivotal chance to have a class that’s responsive to the cultural moment and the fragility and vulnerability of the students, faculty, and staff,” says Fletcher. “We wanted to respond to the sense of uncertainty that we all have and need to talk about more. These are deeply entrenched, big, global— and local—problems that will affect us for the rest of our lives, and we need to start thinking about solving them regardless of what your major is or what your career is.”

The response from students was breathtaking, with more than 220 signing up for the class. “It was exactly what I wanted,” says Ryn Marcel ’22, who’s majoring in biology and theology. “As much as any of my other classes could pull in aspects of climate change, COVID, and Black Lives Matter, what I really wanted was a class, an academic setting, to bring all of that together. I didn’t want our current experience tangential to what I’m learning in school; I wanted school to center around what’s happening in our world today.”

Of course, untangling the complexities of these issues requires looking at them through many different lenses. How does racial injustice affect the economic resources of a community? How do economic resources impact how people feed themselves? How does their diet impact their environment?

How does their diet and environment impact their health? And how does all of that relate to their odds of contracting and surviving COVID-19?

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Faculty from the departments of psychology, biology, business, mathematics, engineering, economics, environmental studies, communication studies, international languages and cultures, theology, philosophy, and more—the collective brainpower of an entire university— came together to shed light on some of the most pressing problems facing our world so maybe students can find their way toward some answers. Isn’t that what education is all about?

“It was a challenge to do something that would appeal to students of different majors and different stages of their academic career,” says Louisa Brad Egan, assistant professor of psychological sciences. “But I loved the idea of a really broad interdisciplinary class that was focused on current events. As crazy as 2020 has been, it’s a gift to students and faculty to use our academics to address the issues. As professors, we can’t help but put our own fields into how we interpret things, so it’s been an outlet for us.”

Each week in the semester featured ELLEN RUTT recorded presentations and a list of required reading from two professors, and no two weeks were the same. When it was her turn, Kali Abel, adjunct professor of environmental studies, took the class on a virtual journey abroad to Bolivia, Colombia, Cuba, and Nicaragua—places where she had contacts through her environmental work. “I knew there were so many stories internationally that I had access to, and the best way to talk about these issues, in a way that brings hope and a different perspective, is to let those people tell their own stories,” she says. In some cases, it took three months to get the recorded interviews because there was no WiFi in the remote villages.

Some of the Cuban speakers were so fearful of government retribution they had to use a pseudonym and disguise their voices. But hearing about the issues, directly from young people living in places you usually only read about, brought the connections closer to home.

It’s exactly what Jack Clark ’22, an environmental studies major and biology minor, had hoped to get from the class— informed perspectives from different disciplines. “I already had a good understanding of the functionality of climate change, but the class gave me insight into how it affects people across the globe,” he says. “It’s given me more of the humanities side and the human-impact side of climate change. In the case of Dr. Abel’s session, hearing people from all over the Global South talk about how COVID and police brutality have affected them, seeing the actual people in these different places, has been really helpful for me. Seeing how COVID intersects with racial justice—it’s not something that my major has addressed.”

The students are learning from each other as well, mainly through forums where they have to post their thoughts on that week’s subject matter.

“I’ve taken a lot of sociology and communications classes, so a lot of the social science stuff makes sense to me,” says Sophie Downing ’22, who is majoring in organizational communication and English and minoring in social justice. “But I know almost nothing about environmental sciences. In the forums you’ll get students who will say, ‘I’ve taken three classes on this, and here’s what I’m thinking.’ Getting to use them for their knowledge is good for everyone.”

The students weren’t the only ones learning. Because the class was asynchronous, meaning the presentations were recorded and could be watched anytime, the professors were tuning in as well. “A lot of us were watching each other’s lectures, which is great, because you get to see different teaching styles and topics and hear their thoughts, and you don’t get to do that usually,” says Egan.

Abel says the class has sparked conversations among faculty about building out new courses or even collaborating in the future. “Some professors I never met, who watched my session and I watched theirs, have reached out and said, ‘Let’s teamteach a course.’ That’s so cool to me. It’s not just an opportunity for students, it was an opportunity for faculty to say, ‘OK, let’s reform how we educate and take part in this conversation.’”

Fletcher says that although the format of the class is a big departure from UP’s small, in-person instruction, it shows that

one size doesn’t fit all. The class couldn’t have worked this well any other way. “We wanted to teach this class, but we wanted this class to teach us too,” she says. “We wanted to learn from the students and the students to learn from each other, but then because of the format, it became a faculty development thing too. I learned more from my colleagues and the students than I ever have before.”

Still, gaining a better understanding of the issues plaguing the world today doesn’t make it any easier to live with them.

The most common question the professors received from students: What do I do now?

Fletcher says as much as the class needs a “Part 2: How to Be an Activist,” there’s no pat answer to that question. Instead, seeking the answer is an ongoing journey that will unfold over the rest of our lives. “It’s about helping the students understand the long road ahead and what to take with them,” she says.

“Everyone’s answer is different. For someone in nursing, this might eventually show up in interpersonal relations with their patients. Some sort of racial justice tension might arise, and they may think, ‘Oh this is my actionable moment. I can communicate to the doctor or my colleagues how we can do better.’”

Abel also saw the class as an opportunity. “We’re planting the seed to keep going, keep learning, keep being uncomfortable, and that’s the start of reimagining the future.”

The class was such a success that plans are in the works to offer it again next year. ­—Danielle Centoni

WINTER 2021

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ON THE BLUFF EN ROUTE

Ryan Jarvis and his invention, Dose One Pill +

Studying Abroad from Portland

Three Cambodian UP Students Reflect on Distance Learning MEY SROU’S FAMILY didn’t really want her to leave Cambodia to start her college education in the US during the pandemic. So far, COVID-19 has had minimal impact in Cambodia. The risks would be higher in the US, and she’d have to do distance learning in a dorm room in relative isolation.

But Srou was ready. “I still wanted to come,” she says.

She felt pretty lonely at first. This was neither a typical first semester abroad nor a typical first semester at UP. But now that classes have been moving forward and she has met some people, she has hit her stride. She has started to learn piano. She has made a habit of loading ketchup onto American food to give it an extra little kick. And she has enjoyed her learning, particularly professor Montana Hisel-Cochran’s business class, in which she and a group of students had to simulate running a café, determining how much overhead they had, how many staff they might have to lay off if the numbers didn’t add up. Srou is thinking she wants to become a business major.

Srou has also enjoyed the support of her mentor, economics major Rosie Ith, who is also from Cambodia. Ith, now a junior, has “been there,” as a first-year international student at UP. She understands the stresses, the cultural shifts, and she and Srou have talked through everything from how in the world to get all the work done on time to techniques for keeping an even keel (during a year that no one could characterize as “even”).

Since distance learning began, Ith has been taking her classes from Cambodia, 14 hours ahead of Portland’s time zone, which means she’s been getting up at 4 a.m. for some of her classes. Her pro-

fessors have tried to accommodate her by recording all the classes, so she can watch them at a more suitable time. But Ith realized she likes in-person best, so she’s been logging on in the wee hours.

Sahas Sok, who is a UP junior from Cambodia, has also opted to show up for in-person class, even if it means she has essentially become nocturnal. She has classes from 11 p.m. her time until 4 a.m.

“Attending live sessions allowed me to ask questions and helps me to learn better and manage my time better,” she says.

Still, of the schedule she says, “It’s crazy.”

In addition to the low COVID risks, there have been a few advantages to taking classes while in Cambodia. Ith was able to do her Moreau Center Justice Internship at Gender and Development for Cambodia (GADC), which is a womenled organization that aims for genderequality and training for women leaders in Cambodia. (Ith is aiming at a public policy graduate degree.)

Sok has enjoyed the opportunity to take part in the local STEM festival for Cambodian youth. A civil engineering major, she wrote a number of scripts for the festival; one of them involved an experiment to test whether a solution is an acid or base, using red cabbage. “We created simple, easy lessons for them, so even in rural areas, where they might not have modern equipment, they can still do the experiment,” she says.

They both admit they are grateful for the added time with family. Sok’s niece was born over the summer, so she’s enjoyed watching her grow.

All three Pilots look forward to getting back to in-person single-time-zone classes on The Bluff as soon as they can.

Photos from Mey Srou, Sahas Sok, and Rosie Ith, documenting their fall semester, from piano lessons in Portland, family time, work spaces, and the early morning window view as 4 a.m. classes begin.

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Student Wins for Safe Dosage Invention

AFTER HIS FIRST -place win in UP’s 2020 Pilots Venture Challenge invention track, accounting major and Entrepreneur Scholar Ryan Jarvis ’21 took second place in the 2020 Invent Oregon State Finals in the fall. His venture product, Dose One Pill +, is a device Jarvis invented to organize and safely dispense prescription medications. While such devices are available now, Jarvis wants to set Dose apart by engineering simplicity, integrative technology, and affordability into his design—all needs he first encountered when caring for his grandmother.

“My Nanna’s kidneys started failing; she’d gotten a transplant from my mom in 1999, but now she needed dialysis and lots of new medications,” he says. Jarvis used a monthly pill planner to keep them organized, but when doctors changed medications, it was difficult to take pills out, add them in, or even identify which were which. “We’d go back and forth to Kaiser trying to find out what happened, why is she sick this time? It was rough,” he says.

He also witnessed casual misuse of medications by some of his friends. To look at the big picture, 18 million people misuse medications in the US each year; 12 million of those abuse opioids; of those 12 million, 130 die each day. Jarvis points to unfettered ease of access driving those numbers: “Once you get your prescription, there’s no way to prevent a person from taking them all at once or selling or sharing them. It’s also driven by what’s in mom and dad’s or grandma’s medicine cabinet.”

Jarvis decided to come up with a solution. He first designed locking caps that fit prescription bottles and dispense a single pill at a time. “You insert those in a centralized device, which scans barcodes which generate a dosage schedule—an accurate schedule, which also tracks dosing instructions and interactions with other drugs,” he says. “I call it the ‘Keurig’ principle.

You can take the pill bottles out, but you can’t get the medication—or make coffee—without the machine.”

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ON THE BLUFF CAMPUS BRIEFS

Coming Up

HEAR THE WHOLE THING Join the discussion live at 5:15 p.m. on March 31: up.edu/readup

UP Nursing Faculty and Students Join Inoculation Effort AS OREGON WELCOMES long-awaited vaccines to combat the COVID-19 pandemic, the University of Portland School of Nursing (UPSON) is stepping up to assist with vaccination of priority recipients at Kaiser Permanente medical centers. Ten nursing school faculty members have been volunteering to administer COVID-19 vaccines to frontline health care workers at Kaiser Sunnyside Medical Center in Clackamas and Kaiser Westside Medical Center in Hillsboro.

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“This is a critical time in the course of the pandemic. Our health care providers are experiencing burnout and exhaustion, and this is one way we can support them in this time of need,” says Casey Shillam, dean of UPSON. When the spring term began on the UP campus in late January, 30 to 40 students from UPSON also joined the vaccination effort to increase the distribution of the vaccines locally. The students, juniors and seniors in the

nursing program, will receive additional training as part of their clinical curriculum to prepare them for the vaccination responsibilities.

“Our students will soon enter the nursing workforce, and they stand ready to take an active role in defeating this pandemic,” says Shillam. “They are the future of health care and will lead the way to health and wellness in postCOVID life.”

NASHCO PHOTO

THIS YEAR’S SCHOENFELDT Distinguished Visiting Writers Series will feature an online conversation with Dr. Ibram X. Kendi, author of How to Be an Antiracist, this year’s campus-wide ReadUP book.

How to Be an Antiracist is a New York Times #1 bestseller and was named one of the best books of the year by The New York Times Book Review, NPR, and The Washington Post, among many others. Kendi is the Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University and the founding director of Boston University’s Center for Antiracist Research. He won a National Book Award in 2016 for his nonfiction book Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America.

Schoenfeldt Distinguished Visiting Writers Series will offer a conversation with Kendi via live webinar on March 31, at 5:15 p.m. This online discussion is open to the community.

MLK Day ON

Students Walk with Students

Intersectional Hope & Healing Fund DISTANCE LEARNING, WHILE essential due to the pandemic, has presented new challenges for many University of Portland students. Aimee Morlatt, junior finance major and president of UP’s mental health advocacy group Active Minds, learned firsthand of students attending Zoom classes from their cars, missing lectures due to lack of internet service, and other inequities and hardships.

News that the Fall 2020 semester would take place online made many students’ situations worse, particularly for those who were relying on campus housing and employment. Morlatt and senior Addie Zhao took action by setting up a GoFundMe account in August to engage their friends and families to provide relief funding to UP students in need.

Now named the Intersectional Hope and Healing Fund, Morlatt and Zhao’s brainchild has transitioned to a University scholarship thanks to help from the UP development office. It’s raised $20,806 to date and has assisted 12 students with awards totaling $5,500.

The assistance offered by the fund doesn’t stop at direct awards. The student committee is also helping guide students to the resources they need, such as the Presidential Hope Fund.

What makes this an “intersectional” fund? “Our goal was to try to remove the bias that can exist in other forms of financial aid,” says Morlatt. “Those requirements aren’t bad—most scholarships are for specific majors, schools, class years, GPAs—but we want our relief fund to be for everybody.”

The Intersectional Hope & Healing Fund Committee intends to carry the fund forward from year to year—and not just to assist fellow Pilots affected by pandemic-related hardships.

To contribute or apply for aid, go to giving.up.edu/intersectional.

—Marcus Covert ’93, ’97

UP HOSTED ITS second annual MLK Day On program, a day for the community not just to take the day off, but to be “on,” to lean in and learn about Dr. King’s legacy and the ongoing struggle for civil rights and racial justice.

This year’s keynote was Taylor Stewart ’18, whose racial justice work to honor the life of Alonzo Tucker was featured in Portland’s Fall 2020 issue. Stewart spoke of his own personal journey and his growing awareness of the part he could play by telling the truth about Alonzo Tucker, who is Oregon’s only documented victim of mob lynching.

Stewart’s focus on the legacy and terror of lynching in the US is a soul-wrestlingly difficult truth about our country, but he believes the only way to achieve progress and reconciliation is by telling and acknowledging the truth and then acting. “We are burdened by our history of injustice,” Stewart says, “but more by our history of silence.”

He drew a pointed connection between lynching and the presentday death penalty in the United States, and he aims to work toward ending the death penalty in the state of Oregon.

MARGARET JACOBSEN

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Healer, Hunter, Mentor, Mom Chelsea Cassens ’08 wants her eastern Oregon community to stay healthy. She works toward that goal as a nurse and as an advocate for the protection of public lands.

BY T R ACY RO S S P H O T O S B Y M A X W H I T TA K E R

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ll these months into the pandemic, Chelsea Cassens, a nurse at Grande Ronde Hospital, has started to notice something new about her regular patients.

Their treatments are the same. The patients she works with on the oncology floor, for instance, still need to come in for their chemotherapy and antibiotic infusions, even when COVID-19 cases have surged, as they did back in December, in La Grande, Oregon (population 13,000), and her nearby hometown of Imbler (pop.

300). Of course these patients don’t want the increased risk of catching COVID, but they must go to Grande Ronde Hospital whether they want to or not, because it’s where they get these vital drugs.

Yet what she observes makes her all the more attentive. Her patients arrive with all of the side effects of isolation, she says; they’re lonely and sad. They tell her, “You’re lucky you get to come into work every day, to see people and interact.” Yes, Cassens enjoys this part of her occupation. But she also wants to help the patients who keep her connected with her community.

“Some don’t want to treat sadness with anti-depressants, so I encourage those that can to get outside and go for a walk. We have miles of local hiking and mountain biking trails right outside of town,” she says. And she has a visceral connection to all of the benefits—physical, mental, emotional—of immersion in nature.

In addition to being a nurse, Cassens is an outdoors-woman, a hunter. When she feels depressed—as she sometimes did after the birth of her first baby, Brynlee—she heads outdoors. When Brynlee was small, just sitting with her in the backyard grass was enough to calm her colicky cries and lift Cassens’ spirits. But the multiple wilderness areas Cassens could see from her perch—the Eagle Cap, the Elkhorn, and the WenahaTucannon—and the promise of adventure she has found there for three decades, reminded her of all that she is, and all that she has been, from the beginning of her life as the great-granddaughter, granddaughter, and daughter of five generations of hunters who have roamed on, hunted on, and harvested meat on this land.

It’s a 30-minute drive to the national forest lands Cassens hunts most often.

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When she gets linked-together days off, that’s where she heads. Making sure Brynlee and her son, Lane, are taken care of, she joins her husband, Tanner, in loading her truck, whistling for her German Wirehair Pointer, Flynn, and driving to the mountains, where she can hunt what’s in season.

For Cassens, parenting Brynlee, 7, and Lane, 5, comes first; then nursing; then hunting. But hunting threads through nursing and being a good mother. She grew up on annual hunts, weeks long, with her extended family.

She left Imbler once, to attend University of Portland’s School of Nursing. But her heritage and all that hunting gives her brought her back, and that’s when she became so much more than someone who hunts to feed her family.

When she returned to this region, she became a hunter who both takes from the land and works to preserve it through extensive conservation efforts.

In some ways, she returned to her home to save it for future generations.

“Where do we start?” she says when someone asks her about her childhood.

Usually the questions come from the “hunting curious,” like the reporter hiding the fact that he was a vegetarian who accompanied her on an elk hunt in September of 2018. Seeing as that story ran in The New York Times, she’s gained some notoriety. So she’s had to think back to her roots and what got her here.

All the generations of Hughes and Plass families who still live in Cassens’ majestic corner of wilderness-shot eastern Oregon were tied to the land in ways it’s sometimes hard to imagine these days.

Her great-grandparents rolled into the Grande Ronde Valley in the 1950s, built a home, and began raising kids. Her grandparents, Loren and Betty, grew up in a world filled with adventure: horse packing, camping, hunting, and fishing high mountain lakes. If resilience is something all parents are encouraged to give their kids nowadays, they gave it to their kids in spades. “My dad and his four brothers grew up as sportsmen in the Eagle Cap,” says Cassens. “They packed horse strings and mule strings back there and stayed for extended periods.”

(Horse and mule strings are animal trains that carry loads of supplies over

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roadless terrain.) “My grandpa worked at a jewelry store in town, though, so when my dad and his younger brother were like 10 and 11, they’d stay in the backcountry by themselves.”

All four of the Hughes boys grew up to raise families of hunters. And for as long as Cassens can remember, their years revolved around what they could legally hunt. One of her most potent childhood memories comes from a time when her dad, Ed, hoisted her, at age 8, and her brother, age 6, into his truck for a quick drive into the Umatilla National Forest to scope for a buck. The air was crisp—early evening—and along a dirt road Ed saw his deer between them and a stand of small spruce trees. He stopped the car and told the kids, “I have a favor to ask you. I’m gonna go up and over this hill on the other side of the trees, and I want you two to walk down this little old logging road, and hopefully you’ll bump this deer toward me.”

“As he’s talking, my dad is getting his pack and gun,” Cassens continues. “Then he leaves us outside of the car. I remember my brother and me walking down this road, brushed in with trees, and we

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can’t see in front of us. Then we hear gunshot, and I remember sucking in my stomach. But my dad starts whooping and hollering, yelling, ‘Come on up!’ And there he is grinning ear to ear with this great buck. My brother and I held its legs while my dad skinned it. Now, the little trees where we walked are so big you’d never spot a buck out there. But still to this day, I look up there every time we drive by.”

Cassens learned all of her first hunting techniques from her dad. Other family members completed her early wilderness education. For two weeks every spring, four generations of family, including greatgrandparents, grandparents, parents, and oodles of cousins, would take the horse strings into the Wallowa-Whitman, set up a big, multifamily camp, and take full advantage of turkey hunting season.

Often the little kids would stay with the great-grandparents while other adults hunted. Cassens’ great-grandmother Grace would hike her into the hills to

study wildflowers. “I can still remember her favorite flower—the yellow bell,” Cassens says. “That tells you the impact those trips had on me. How many people learned their great-grandma’s favorite wildflower from their great-grandma?”

Her grandfather would have just as strong an impact, only later, when she was older.

Cassens learned all of her first hunting techniques from her dad.

She still loved hunting in high school; still hunted with her dad, her brother, and cousins. She says she and her dad were, and still are, extremely close. “I’ve enjoyed the opportunities I’ve had to hunt with Chelsea, and can see how the various skills I taught her have stuck with her.

She was very easy to raise, both her and her brother. Now it’s fun to be the older person at camp and watch her take care of everybody,” says Ed, her first mentor.

Now, when she mentors other women hunters, she is paying it forward.

An equally influential force in her life was her granddad, Loren Hughes, who first taught her about conservation.

Being around him wasn’t all that fun at first—“He was so passionate and loud about what he believed, it could almost be embarrassing,” she says. But the man had chops: Jack Ward Thomas, head of the US Forest Service under President Clinton, wrote several books (including his latest, Hunting Around the World, in 2015), and he signed one to Hughes. It was no wonder: Hughes served on multiple conservation boards and traveled frequently to Washington, D.C., to lobby for the preservation of public lands. So many people have spoken and written admiringly about him that it’s hard to pinpoint the most affectionate missive.

But this remembrance from his friend Ric Bailey paints a vibrant picture: “The loss of every big tree, every roadless area left another wrinkle on that handsome mug. And Loren did whatever it took to stop it, and then some. In fact, during the early years of the Forest Service’s administrative appeals process, he became known as ‘Eight-Cent Hughes,’ because he stopped timber sale after timber sale with naught more than a postage stamp and a hand-written appeal. Loren was fighting for protection of our national forests…before we had NEPA (the National Environment Protection Act), the Wilderness Act, or any meaningful legal protections. He was an activist before most people even knew what an activist was.”

Though Cassens didn’t know it when she was a kid watching him dole out “iron handshakes” as he preached his religion of conservation, she would follow in his footsteps.

First, she graduated high school, got the Providence Scholarship, and left home for University of Portland. At UP, she chose nursing because she’s always loved caring for people. She says coming from a small town, UP was great because it had a cohesive feel. “The class I started with is who I graduated with. And that’s UP in general. It’s away from downtown Portland in its own small little world.

I would definitely say it was challenging, but I felt the instructors and advisors kept track of students through their classes. I always felt supported and given the challenge to succeed,” she says.

But once she started clinicals and 12-hour nursing shifts, she found she needed another outlet. So Chelsea Hughes got herself a job at a Sportsman’s Warehouse, and that’s where she met her future husband, Tanner Cassens.

He was a passionate hunter who grew up in eastern Oregon, too (Pendleton).

When they first met, they had so much in common she was slightly convinced they were related. So even though her dad had warned, “You’re never going to meet someone who hunts and fishes in Portland,” she had. They married in June of 2012 and found out they were pregnant that August.

Where’d they tell the family? At antelope hunting camp, naturally. Then they moved to Imbler, to be near the future grandparents.

Brynlee’s birth the following spring made them ecstatic. But even the strongest among us have no control over hormonal changes. As a new mom, Cassens found herself “a little blue.”

She longed for her old self—the one who was “active and outside and doing things and having my own life,” she says.

What’s more, Brynlee wasn’t a great sleeper or eater, and she cried a lot. The one place that could consistently calm her was the patch of grass in the backyard where Cassens still goes to get perspective on her life. But Brynlee’s fussing was about to bring Cassens a gift.

Around the time of Brynlee’s birth, national conversations about public lands protection were heating up. Simultaneously, the idea that the public owns public lands was taking root. That year, the organization Backcountry Hunters and Anglers (BHA) released its “I am a public land owner” campaign, showcasing the terminology of federal lands and emphasizing that they are for the people. Cassens had what might seem like a strange epiphany given her upbringing. She began to see that the idea of the public owning the land wasn’t just theoretical—in fact all Americans had a stake in it. They paid taxes to fund the agencies that managed it. And they had a say in what happened

to the ground itself and the animals roaming upon it.

BHA encouraged its constituents to post pictures of themselves enjoying the land, and soon thousands of hunters and anglers answered the call. Cassens saw herself in the photos of hunters in the draw between two mountains, waiting for a herd of elk to come their way; she could identify with snapshots of fishermen at the edge of a shimmering river casting a fly for the trout they knew lurked under the surface. These images showed Cassens viscerally what her Grandad Hughes had been fighting for before and during her youth. And once she “got” it, she started fighting for it too.

Next, she started educating herself about threats to public lands, such as what can happen when Bureau of Land Management (BLM) or US Forest Service lands are transferred to individual states.

“Once the state manages the land, what could happen to it is more up in the air than when the federal government owns it,” she says. “A state has to run on a balanced budget, and there’s a lot of history to show that states will sell their real estate to private industries or owners who have billions of dollars.” Those entities can then sell the land to whomever they want, and they often cash out to oildrilling or logging companies.

Then, in November of 2016, she and Tanner had an encounter that would dramatically deepen her involvement in conservation.

It involved a once-in-a-lifetime bighorn sheep tag Tanner had finally drawn within the John Day River canyon. (Tags are permits that allow a hunter to pursue certain animal types, typically big game such as deer, elk, bear, cougar, and antelope. One tag equals the right to harvest one animal, and they are limited based on supply of species in a given area. Some tags are so limited they are once-in-alifetime tags.)

Tanner determined that the best way to access the area he would hunt was by raft, on the water. It’s a true adventure, floating along while hunting the river canyon’s cliffs and rock faces. Public lands line both sides of the river, and its waters are public. But there were limited access points to launch a boat. Where Chelsea and Tanner wanted to launch, the access point was being leased by a hunting guide who wanted to charge them $2,000.

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Lead bullets (left) fragment on impact; Copper bullets (right)

What the guide failed to tell them was that his restrictions were limited: He could charge people to launch the day before the season started, the day it started, and the day after, but Chelsea and Tanner were launching days before that range. They discovered this foul by talking to local Fish and Game biologists and to representatives from the BLM and Western Rivers Conservancy, and they were able to launch without paying the outrageous fee. But they both now had firsthand experience with a private entity (the land lessee) attempting to restrict access to a public resource (the river), and it strengthened Cassens’ commitment to be a vocal advocate for conservation.

First, she became a member of BHA— “basically seven men sitting around a campfire advocating for public lands— which grew into a national movement,” she says. Then, she became a board member and life member for the Oregon chapter of BHA. In 2018, she joined BHA members from across the nation on a trip to Washington, D.C., where she lobbied her state representatives to pass the Land and Waters Conservation Fund (LWCF),

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essentially a renewable $900 million cash font from taxes on offshore drilling that funds everything from soccer fields to river access to cleaning restrooms in public places.

BHA’s executive director, Land Tawney, says, “When I first heard about Chelsea, the person telling me was glowing. Chelsea jumped right into BHA, flying to D.C. The LWCF’s success had many mothers and fathers, but Chelsea is one of the main mothers that got this thing funded.”

Cassens went not only for the land but for her family. In 2018, she joined an initiative to spread the word to hunters that lead ammunition will fragment upon impacting an animal, spreading small shards of the toxic material throughout. Those fragments can potentially poison the many scavengers that feed on entrails left by hunters after a kill. In the New York Times story that featured Cassens and her dad hunting elk in 2018, there’s an embedded video showing these animals. Among them: a black bear. Since Cassens feeds Tanner, Brynlee, and Lane game meat most nights of the week, she uses copper

bullets instead of lead ones to keep her family safe as well.

“We as hunters really want to put our best foot forward,” says Tawney. But the use of lead ammunition is a controversial topic. Some hunters swear by it and have been resistant to switching to copper.

However, “Chelsea has been instrumental about bringing the conversation about non-lead ammunition to the fore,” Tawney says. And as Cassens continues to spread the word, it shows her commitment to hunting safely, ethically, and in ways that preserve the animal populations on our lands.

Her activism, and her rootsy social media posts about her childhood, her children, the family’s outdoor adventures, and hunting started to bring her celebrity. In 2018, she also became the first ambassador for Artemis, an allwomen hunting conservation organization funded by the National Wildlife Federation.

Artemis’s co-founder Jess Johnson says that, as a mentor to women hunters, “Chelsea brings a lightness and ease to things that helps the student relax and feel like it is OK to ask questions (no

matter how little). Hunting can come off as an extremely serious thing (because it is...we are talking about life here) and can also be scary to approach as a newcomer. Lightening the mood, bringing an easy yet still ethical and incredibly well-informed teacher into the mix (like Chelsea) basically ensures that the student will keep with it. It’s all about experience: was it fun, was it comfortable, were reasonable expectations set?

Chelsea seems to be innate in this.”

Cassens shares her same warmth and ease with new graduate nurses doing their first year of clinicals, as Grande Ronde Hospital’s nurse residency educator, where she “basically helps them debrief their first year of nursing challenges,” she says. “Chelsea is a wonderful mentor to us new nurse residents,” says Justin Heikkila. “She also does a great job of advocating for us to be a part of new experiences we may not have been able to encounter during nursing school.”

In October, before the pandemic surged for a second time, Cassens got out on a chukar hunting trip with Tanner. They went to the Owyhee Mountains where

the terrain is exceptionally rugged.

Hiking over mountains of sharp rock without a trail can be grueling, and there’ve been times, since she had kids, that it was for Cassens.

But she has put a lot of focus on her health over the past two years, and she’s feeling physically and mentally solid. Her celebrity helps: you don’t get gorgeous shots of remote wilderness areas without hiking for them. Pictures of her hunting in fields glowing gold in the afternoon sun; of the entire family celebrating a successful pheasant hunt; ones of Brynlee rowing their raft and of Lane and Tanner picking berries populate her feed. Yet for me, two showcase the ethos with which she and Tanner are raising their kids. One of Brynlee gently cradling a wildflower in her hand, and one of Lane in a kids’ size T-shirt that says “Public Land Owner.” “I talk to my children about respecting the land and protecting the Earth. We talk about taking care of things that are special to us. I don’t know if they clearly understand ‘public land owner’ yet, but on a whole, they respect all landscapes we use for our activities,” Cassens says.

Right now, though, with the country in various stages of its second COVID lockdown, her patients in the oncology ward may need her more than her family.

It’s a good thing so many of them share Cassens’ love of hunting. “One of my patients is always carrying a fishing or hunting magazine, and I’ll bring in my BHA mag and trade it with him,” she says.

“This patient, he’s like 80, yet he’s out hunting and fishing and talking about his favorite elk hunt with his son. He shows me on his iPad the Facebook post his son made about him: This is my dad, newly diagnosed with colon cancer. And this is his elk. His son is so proud.”

It seems if Granddad Loren were around, he’d feel the same about her. But Cassens is too busy to ruminate about such things. She has kids to feed and patients to help and a corner of the country’s most beautiful public lands to defend.

TRACY ROSS is a writer, editor, mother, and outdoors-woman who has spent her life skiing, mountain biking, and rafting, but who has recently started learning to hunt, thanks in part to Chelsea Cassens.

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UP ARCHIVES

Franz River Campus

The second in a series on the past, present, and future of University of Portland’s expanding footprint.

The Cleanup

BY R AC H E L R A M I R E Z

BY PU RCHASI NG LAN D ALONG PORTLAN D HARBOR—KNOWN FOR ITS LEGACY OF I N DUSTRIAL POLLUTION—U N IVERSITY OF PORTLAN D COMMITTED TO A N EW LEVEL OF ENVI RONMENTAL STEWARDSH I P. TH E N EIGH BORHOOD IS TAKI NG NOTICE.

Before the University of Portland bought the 35-acre patch of land below Waud’s Bluff and called it Franz River Campus, the area had already acquired many names. It had been known as Pirate Town, Creosote Factory, SuperFun Site, and officially Triangle Park.

This parcel of land also came with a reputation, more recently for graffiti, abandoned factories, and illegal activities. But its longstanding reputation is still for the historically massive industrial and environmental pollution it contributed along Portland Harbor.

Since the 1900s, the North Portland property— along with the neighboring McCormick & Baxter site, still owned by the creosote company—has been redeveloped and tainted by nearly 50 industrial operations, including a lumber mill, concrete packing plant, metal working plant, dry docks, waste storage tanks, and a power plant.

In 2000, eight years prior to UP’s purchase, Portland Harbor was declared a Superfund site, a polluted area contaminated with hazardous substances that required a long-term cleanup.

McCormick & Baxter was also declared a Superfund site. Triangle Park (now Franz River Campus) received a different designation: it was declared an orphaned brownfield site—a contaminated land abandoned by a property owner who didn’t have the means to pay for a cleanup.

Buying the land meant that the University was also buying into an enormous responsibility.

If UP purchased the land, the University would need to take part in cleaning it up—both the property’s contaminated soil and groundwater as well as the riverbank—according to requirements stipulated by the City of Portland, the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the Oregon Department of State Lands, and tribal representatives.

Given the immense scale of the cleanup, was the University up to the task?

More than 10 years into the process, it turns out UP was up for the undertaking and may even be creating a blueprint for how other universities can work hand-in-hand with public entities to clean up contaminated land and make it usable for future generations.

UP campus and North Portland area, 1990.

The Franz River Campus—pictured here to the right of campus—was known as Triangle Park, and still had industrial buildings intact.

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Franz River Campus

A Toxic History For centuries, the Willamette River was home to many of Oregon’s tribal nations such as the native Multnomah, Wasco, Cowlitz, Kathlamet, Clackamas, Bands of Chinook, Tualatin, Kalapuya, and Molalla. The water, once clean and pure, served as their livelihood, fishing for salmon and smelt. In the early 1800s, British and American settlers arrived and traded with the thriving villages scattered along the Willamette and Columbia Rivers.

But their arrival also brought deadly epidemics like smallpox and measles that essentially wiped out Portland Harbor’s Indigenous people. The erasure of the native villages, coupled with a flood of white settlers, altered the ecological and environmental landscape along the river forever.

Industrialization brought pollution. Shipping vessels traveled up and down Portland Harbor and would often dock in Triangle Park’s low-lying ports. While these industrial ports were major hubs for economic activity (particularly postWorld War II), they were also major sources of contamination.

Ships that run on dangerous amounts of fossil fuel, the diesel-powered machinery and freight trucks transporting cargo, combined with dust and noise pollution, all elevate levels of greenhouse gas emissions released into the air, land, and water. The shipping industry’s workers, many of whom were Black folks who migrated north from the Deep South looking for jobs, were exposed to these toxic chemicals.

In the 1970s, the 35-acre site was owned by Riedel International, an industrial company that dredged rivers, constructed boats, and soon became involved in hazardous waste spill cleanups near the railroads. In 1984, Riedel International got a permit to build a hazardous waste storage building in the area, which sparked widespread opposition and protests from the North Portland neighborhood.

Although Riedel shuttered its operations in 1986, the environmental harms still linger in the site’s soil and groundwater.

According to an environmental assessment by the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ), the soil—which has since been excavated and disposed of off-site—was con-

taminated with toxic chemicals such as polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), arsenic, lead, copper, asbestos, chromium, and nickel. The groundwater, meanwhile, was tainted with diesel fuel oil, gas, lead, and more. Scientists say long-term exposure to these chemicals could lead to severe health conditions such as asthma, cancer, and other respiratory health illnesses.

Cleanup Efforts Begin After President Richard Nixon’s creation of the landmark Environmental Protection Agency in 1970, a slew of environmental protection policies and regulations followed. According to the 1972 Clean Water Act, it is against the law to discharge any pollutant from any point source such as pipes or man-made ditches into navigable waters, like the Willamette River, unless a permit was obtained.

The National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) was also formed to mitigate water pollution and set up pollution monitoring. The NPDES minimized pollution by industrial companies, factories, and even individuals, but it didn’t end the contamination altogether.

Since the early 2000s, a growing number of environmental cleanups have emerged. Today, cleanup of the Portland Harbor Superfund site— which stretches for 11 miles from the Broadway Bridge to Sauvie Island—is still ongoing.

University of Portland became one of the cleanup pioneers after purchasing property along the polluted harbor.

ACKROYD PHOTOGRAPHY, INC.

Local grassroots organizations are playing a role too. “[Because of] this legacy contamination, we know we can’t make the site and the river truly pristine again,” says Cassie Cohen, the executive director of Portland Harbor Community Coalition, an environmental justice group. “But the cleanups are so important for the health of future generations to be able to have access to healthy soil and water and air.”

Cohen’s organization aims to uplift the voices of those most impacted by pollution in the Portland Harbor Superfund site. “Grassroots efforts [at the height of the growing industrial business along the river] were…lacking for impacted communities like tribal groups, the Black community, immigrants and refugees, and houseless communities, to weigh in.… Most folks have no idea really the extent of the toxicity that still remains today.”

OREGON DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY

Above: Aerial view of the McCormick & Baxter site operations, 1973 Opposite: View from the west of Triangle Park and University of Portland, 1991

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Franz River Campus

UP ARCHIVES

Franz River Campus Cleanup

The University, led by the efforts of longtime UP leader and community liaison Jim Kuffner, took its first swing at buying part of the industrial land in 1997. (Funds for this bid and the later purchase came from private sources earmarked specifically for land development.) Although the attempt was unsuccessful due to the low price it offered, the University still managed to buy a small 7-acre parcel of the land behind Corrado Hall. Meanwhile, the rest of the property was purchased by industrial barge builder Jay Zidell through a company called Triangle Park, LLC. Zidell made an agreement with the DEQ to indemnify him from existing liabilities on the site, but failed to make an agreement at the federal level—which became a major obstacle once the EPA declared the Portland Harbor a Superfund site, and was searching for property owners that may have contributed to the harbor’s contamination.

Since Zidell was already facing challenges in terms of cleaning up the land, the University— still interested in the property—negotiated with Zidell, the DEQ, and the EPA to do whatever was necessary to clean up and revitalize the former industrial site through a process overseen by the EPA. Purchase negotiations between Zidell and the University dragged on for years and hit more than a few stumbling blocks.

In December 2008, the University successfully bought the 35-acre site for $6 million—$1.2 million of which (the same amount that the EPA fined Zidell) was added to the University’s standing $3 million contribution fund to clean up the site.

Even after the deal closed, Kuffner says the cleanup of what is now Franz River Campus did not begin in full swing until the summer of 2012.

As part of the purchase agreement with the Oregon DEQ and the EPA, the University spent the following years assessing the land with the help of environmental consulting agencies, taking hundreds of soil and groundwater samples, removing and excavating contaminated soil both on site and along the riverbank—which they later had to cover and revegetate, investing nearly a million dollars in environmental consulting studies and coming up with a redevelopment design plan of the land.

“It took that long. All of 2009, 2010, 2011 and half of 2012, as well, before we were able to reach a complete understanding and agreement on what the scope and the nature of the cleanup would be,” Kuffner says. “What got the University, too, was the level of cleanup. We did not have the resources to clean up the property to the level that would have provided for housing, so we ultimately ended up with a level of what’s called recreational and operational uses.”

The University met the EPA standards and completed the cleanup in 2014. As it stands, residence halls or dormitories cannot be built on River Campus due to restrictive zoning that limits the land use to only an occupational and recreational level. Perhaps in the far-off future, Kuffner says, that might change. But for now, the University

Above: The Franz River Campus, pictured here in 2005, is situated between UP’s main campus and the St. John’s Bridge Right: Jim Kuffner (left) in 2012, during the early phases of UP’s cleanup process that involved excavating and removing—and later covering and revegetating—soil along the riverbank

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plans to stick with recreational and occupational uses and continue working with the DEQ as it brings its vision to life: more athletic facilities, a new physical plant, a boathouse, and an environmental education center (plans for which have been pushed further into the future because of the impact of the global pandemic on the University’s finances).

“After completing cleanup work for EPA, the University began working with DEQ to ensure the development of the Franz River Campus maintains the environmental protections put into place during the cleanup,” says Lauren Wirtis, a spokesperson for the DEQ. “The University has been and continues to be proactive in informing and involving DEQ in site development activities, and works cooperatively with DEQ to conduct site work in an environmentally sound manner.”

UP also needed a comprehensive plan to rehabilitate the riverbank’s ecological damages. The University partnered with the Oregon Department of State Lands (DSL) to evaluate and design a shoreline restoration project in both UP-owned and DSL-owned properties. The project had to go through the Portland Harbor Natural Resources Trustee Council, which consisted of three government representatives and five tribal representatives, including the Confederated Tribes of Siletz Indians and Umatilla Indian Reservation.

UP is now working on its shoreline properties separately from the DSL and has pledged to continue its stewardship in managing and restoring the riverbank in concert with the development of the Franz River Campus.

Kuffner says he is proud of the work the University has done in cleaning up the land. In December 2019, he retired from the University after 35 long years, but he still lives a walking distance away from campus and continues to volunteer his time in the community.

“In my 35 years working there, I’ve walked the campus many, many times and just felt how blessed I am to be at a place like this that has a good mission working with young people, trying to develop the best that they can for the world and the future,” Kuffner says. “‘What a great day to be on campus,’ I always liked to say.”

ADAM GUGGENHEIM

UP Gets Involved

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Franz River Campus

Neighborhood Impact Michael Pouncil, 50, moved to Portland the same year the University bought Triangle Park. When Pouncil bought his North Portland house, just a few blocks away from campus, his real estate agent didn’t tell him he would be living in close proximity to Superfund sites. It wasn’t until he became involved in the movement to restore and protect urban rivers that he found out about the vast swath of contaminated properties along the Willamette River.

“If I had known that I’d be purchasing a home near a Superfund, I probably would have looked somewhere else,” he says. “But then I wouldn’t have learned about the history of the place and [gotten] to know my community. Despite these horrible disparities in the community when it comes to environmental injustice and pollution here, I still love my community. It has its own rough-edge beauty to it. It’s actually been a bizarre blessing in a way.”

Pouncil applauds the University for understanding the industrial history and trying to repair the damages done by legacy pollution in Triangle Park, but he still finds it shocking whenever he encounters residents of North Portland who have no idea about the history of pollution along Portland Harbor. As the chair of the Portland Harbor Community Advisory Group, he’s been trying to spread awareness of the river and shoreline cleanups by putting up flyers at grocery stores, hosting events, facilitating forums or meetings, and even going door to door in the neighborhood.

“Five years of doing this work, and it still surprises me that people are surprised to hear about the river’s history,” Pouncil says. “It shows you how strong the message is that Portland dubs itself as a green and renewable city, when we actually have one of the top largest Superfund sites in the country.”

In the middle of a pandemic, Pouncil and Cohen have been fighting a different cleanup battle at another contaminated site next to McCormick & Baxter. The site, called Willamette Cove, is being cleaned up by Portland’s Metro Council. However, community members say that the council is only committed to doing the bare

BOTH PHOTOS: BRUCE FORSTER

minimum with no equitable development plan.

Jim Ravelli, University of Portland’s vice president of operations, who’s also been a key part of the Triangle Park venture, recently sent a letter to Metro Council urging them to take caution and listen to community members’ concerns.

As for Triangle Park, people have been receptive to the changes. “Folks have really liked the transition from what it was to what it is now,” Ravelli says. “It was a very congested, very industrial place. But to turn it into a park-like setting and restore it to something that is not only going to be enjoyed by our students, but also the community—they’re really liking the transition. And I think it just speaks to UP’s stewardship.”

Trang Lam, who took over Kuffner’s reins to oversee the redevelopment of the 35-acre property, is also part of the North Portland community.

Just like Kuffner, Lam has been key in putting together the last pieces of the development puzzle, such as getting permits and passing additional Greenway reviews, which are the city’s requirements to allow public access, flood protection, and other potential impacts to the environment. Before her recent departure to a director position with Parks and Recreation in Camas, WA, she had been engaging with community organizations like the Portland Harbor Community Coalition.

“We have very transparent conversations with the community, and especially with a large construction like this, we want to make sure that we’re being safe,” Lam says. “The University, in the context of redeveloping the Triangle property into Franz River Campus, is really a trailblazer for not just North Portland, but for the city, in general, as far as cleaning up the shoreline.”

Walking around Franz River Campus today, one never would have thought that a large smokestack and industrial plant used to occupy the space. The University has successfully installed parking lots and soccer fields for athletes to practice. Ravelli said a new physical plant facility is still one of their top priorities, as are the proposed dock and boathouse, a track, and an environmental studies learning center, which Lam said she’s most ecstatic about since it marries the community benefits of recreation with environmental and ecological scholarship. A new tennis center is another facility they’re looking into installing in the future. In response, community advocates say the University has been doing a laudable job so far.

“I believe it’s going to be an amazing feather in the cap for the University to have a campus that’s waterfront property right next to it,” says Pouncil. “I’d say kudos to UP, and if anything, they are a catalyst to getting these heavy industrialized and polluted sites cleaned up. It’s good to see someone in the private sphere take an ecological

approach to cleaning up the mess that historical polluters have left behind.”

While Franz River Campus is just a small patch of land compared to the rest of the contaminated properties along Portland Harbor, Kuffner hopes that University of Portland could be a model for other properties along the river. Portland, like many other major cities across the country, still faces legacies of injustice in its communities. For now, environmental justice advocates like Pouncil and Cohen vow to continue the fight for clean air, land, and water so that Portland can fully live up to its image of a green city.

“For 100 years or more, the University of Portland has identified itself as this beautiful campus, on The Bluff, overlooking the Willamette River. With the acquisition of the property down there, we now get our feet wet,” Kuffner says.

“In that context, we embraced what we could do to restore and return that property to the best kind of beneficial reuse, which serves not only the University and generations to come, but [also] serves the memory of the people who were there before.”

RACHEL RAMIREZ ’18 is an environmental justice reporter based in New York City. You can find her work at various publications including Vox, HuffPost, The Guardian, Rolling Stone, Grist, and more.

Above: A heat wave during the summer of 2013 meant a lot of the vegetation had to be replanted.

Opposite: UP’s Franz River Campus practice fields, 2019

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Light in a Pandemic

BY A L IC I A JO R A B I N S I L L U S T R AT I O N B Y L E I A K A P R O V

The mask feels at home on my face Like a worn key in a front door’s lock I make cinnamon rolls without a recipe And it works, like a miracle We wipe the counters twenty times a day Pour the children glasses of milk over and over When we open the refrigerator To grab the jug’s thick plastic handle A brightness inside stands sentry Holding us in its light for a moment I used to imagine the refrigerator bulb Stayed on all the time Like the Everlasting Light That hangs before the Holy Ark In every synagogue But now that I am older and have seen How everything can be lost in a moment I understand two things: One, the refrigerator is dark When closed And two, in every synagogue, Someone changes that lightbulb Some custodian or rabbi Or teacher or congregant or volunteer— And though this sounds like the start Of a joke, it is the opposite.

In the face of all that would extinguish us We pour milk, we bake, we take turns, wear Masks, we keep the light burning, We keep each other alive.

ALICIA JO RABINS is an award-winning writer, musician, and Jewish educator. She is the author of two poetry books, Divinity School and Fruit Geode, and has released three albums (and accompanying study guides) with Girls in Trouble, her indie-folk song cycle about Biblical women.

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BY A R M I N TOL E N T I NO P HOTO BY C E L E ST E NO C H E

oxtail on my mind What the writer remembers about the Filipino food of his youth, what he forgets

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I

haven’t tried to forget about Filipino food, but it’s slowly happening.

Forgetting isn’t new for me. It’s effortless. There are great swaths of my past I don’t recall easily. I can remember the Duncan Hines jingle from the ’80s, but not the details of my day-to-day life as a kid. It’s easier for me to picture Lucy Ricardo cooking in her sitcom kitchen than my own mother making me dinner in the house where I grew up. I haven’t buried my memories intentionally, just misplaced them after years of disuse. But the pandemic and The Lockdown Life have made me reflect: how quickly I have assimilated to this new normal. I have to actively remind myself about “before,” when I wore clothes with zippers, rode trains sitting inches from strangers, hugged friends and shared popcorn from the same bowl. And as I dig further back, I unearth memories long forgotten in the archives. Like oxtail stew, a dish I haven’t tasted in a couple decades. And the more I remember, the more I miss it.

Aside from a well-worn hoodie and Electric Light Orchestra’s album Out of the Blue, few things are scientifically proven to bring humans comfort as effectively as food does. Based on how much my credit card statements have thinned since The Lockdown Life began, I clearly relied on eating out as a frequent source of comfort. Now everything I eat, I cook myself. I’m home all the time after all, and my wife, a pharmacist, can’t telework (you can’t Zoom a flu shot).

It makes sense for me to cook for us both, and I enjoy it. I’m competent in the kitchen. Michelin isn’t fitting my spatula for stars, but I also won’t make the average taster retch.

Since my wife is vegan, my meat consumption in The Lockdown Life has dropped to near nil. While she is strict in her own dietary choices, she isn’t overly proselytizing.

She even bought me a chest freezer to theoretically store all the fish I would catch if I were any good at catching fish.

But at the same time, she wouldn’t be thrilled to find blood stains on the counter leaking from the flank of something you’d feed at a petting zoo.

After nine months of eating vegan classics like cauliflower steak, it was my stomach that started me on this recent binge of nostalgia. Before falling asleep, I’d picture a slab of ribeye searing on cast iron or a rack of smoked ribs glistening with juice. And, as each dish for which I pined made me rediscover another, I dug deeper into the past, summoning memories of foods I hadn’t eaten since well before the pandemic started. Like kare-kare, oxtail stew, a particularly inconvenient craving because making it vegan would be sacrilegious and, sadly, I don’t even know how to cook Filipino food in the first place.

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It’s not just the food though. There are aspects of being Filipino I’ve either forgotten or just never knew. I have little blood family on this continent and then chose to move far away from the few I had. I moved to the whitest major metropolis in the nation and Filipino restaurants and markets are uncommon here. I married a white woman. I never learned to speak Tagalog (my parents discouraged it, fearing my accent would be another barrier to making it in America). You don’t have to know the language to eat the food, and yet I don’t even have the vocabulary for so many things I’ve lost from my diet.

Maybe I would make Filipino dishes if I’d learned cooking from my mother, but as a child I never cared to learn from her, and, as an overworked/underappreciated parent and an unenthusiastic cook, she didn’t try much to teach me. Growing up, Mama would claim I was picky, that I didn’t like leftovers. That’s not true now, nor was it likely true then. I just didn’t like her cooking in general.

And if you start with something bad, giving it twelve hours to congeal in the fridge doesn’t usually improve it.

But no one could question her effort, whether I appreciated it or not as her son. She didn’t have to be an expert cook to keep us nourished.

As I’ve remembered these foods from the past, I unearthed a memory that seemed so preposterous at first I had to re-examine it: In elementary school I’d wake up around 7:30 in the morning, and Mama would have already left for work. But there’d be a hot breakfast waiting on the stove for my sister and me. No cereal or Pop-Tarts for us, even if that’s what I wanted because that’s what white kids ate. Every morning a new batch of kanin and ulam. Rice and stuff that goes on rice. That stuff could be beef and broccoli or picadillo or a mung bean and pork soup called monggo that I especially didn’t like (she’d leave tomato skins in which would gross me out). I have no idea how she selected the menu or how long it would take to prepare. But every day, without fail, she made breakfast and was out the door before I was even awake. For comparison, in The Lockdown Life, I’m sometimes late for my 8:30 a.m. work start, and my commute is from my bed to my computer, a distance of maybe 30 feet.

Since she also cooked dinner for me every evening, the math would show Mama prepared the vast majority of the Filipino food I’ve consumed in my life. But, because I didn’t like her cooking, as I reminisce over meals I miss, it’s not actually hers I’m thinking of. I’m remembering dishes cooked by aunties from celebrations gone by.

These are very un-vegan fantasies.

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As I drift off to sleep, I picture birthdays and holidays with cousins, grazing over the table, piling food on a Styrofoam plate.

Cracking the ear off lechón and dipping it into sweet and salty liver sauce. Ladling a bowl of dinuguan, a stew of pig’s blood, vinegar, and organs I couldn’t name, but each having their own necessary role in the balance of textures between chewy and squishy. Eating unripe mangoes like chips and guacamole, dipping the sour, green slices in a shrimp paste called bagoong, bright pink, the tiny black eyes of the crushed crustaceans still visible, looking back.

I picture these dishes of my youth steaming on an endless table.

And in the middle, a giant pot of kare-kare. Hunks of oxtail simmering in a peanut broth with strips of tripe added for texture, bagoong dotting the greasy concoction, balancing the richness with a bright tang of salt and sea. All over a mound of white rice.

A dish for celebration.

Yes, there are vegan recipes for kare-kare online, but I’m not buying it. It’s impossible to veganize connective tissue and meat off the bone. Nothing in the plant kingdom really approximates the spongy goodness of tripe. If food brings us comfort, it’s not simply because of the ingredients, but the memories a dish conjures. The flavor is layered with the familiar. Strip a cuisine of its tradition and you’re also skimming off that comfort.

Even if I looked up a “traditional” kare-kare recipe and made a pot just for myself, it wouldn’t be the recipe I remember. There’s something depressing about learning on YouTube what you should have learned from your own family. I’d rather stick with cauliflower steak and garbanzo beans twelve ways than fake something I’ve already lost.

In New Jersey, my mother struggles through her own version of The Lockdown Life. But if you look at the past couple decades, her present state seems more the inevitable conclusion after an accumulation of misfortunes, sorrows, and bad luck. COVID is just one more thing that’s strangled the circumference of her freedom.

First, in January 2000, my father declared the end of their marriage by disappearing one day while she was at work. Mama, already a timid driver on New Jersey highways, who’d grown distant from friends over the years and had few relatives nearby, now lost the one person who was most likely to drive her anywhere. Asian groceries where you could buy things like tocino or tuyo were beyond her driving range. I was away—my freshman year of college—already forgetting what it was like to be a son. I could have helped more, or even a little, but I didn’t.

Years later, some dental situation, nothing very serious from what I gather, led to the dentist pulling a few of her teeth. No malpractice; she requested this option rather than whatever else was offered because she feared the alternative would be more painful. It had the consequence, though, of relegating her to softer foods. No more bistek or chicharon. I don’t know when

this all happened. I might have moved to Baltimore or Boston by then.

I was deep into my forgetting.

Then, when I’d moved for the last time, settling down in Portland and ready to visit Mama for the first time in a year, she warned me as I waited to board my flight, “Anak, I don’t want you to worry but…I’m using a cane now.” The uneasy truce she had with arthritis had devolved to disability. The woman whose daily commute used to include three miles of walking through midtown Manhattan couldn’t manage a flight of stairs. A hip surgery became inevitable. My sister and I were excited for her though.

“I have a coworker who just got that exact surgery!” I said. “It’s only been six weeks and he’s already playing basketball. He’s not much younger than you but says he feels like he’s thirty again.” And she allowed herself to feel some of that hope, a risk she rarely dared. The surgery technically worked, but she swore one leg was shorter than the other and she couldn’t hide the bitterness that ate at her knowing this surgery worked for so many other people, but not her. The pain was lessened some, but by no means cured, and a cold fear crept in that she may never regain her ability to walk effortlessly again. She hasn’t and realistically never will. If COVID never befell us, she would still have to spend most of the day inside, lying down to manage the pain.

Next time I get to see my mother, maybe I’ll ask her to tell me if she has a recipe for kare-kare. See what she remembers.

See what I can learn.

Like me, she now eats very differently from the foods she knew all her life, though for very different reasons: fear of causing a fire if she forgets she left the stove on, weak or missing teeth, foods forbidden by the Arthritis Foundation as likely inflammatories (hint: if it’s delicious, it causes inflammation), debilitating leg pain if she stands more than five minutes.

Unlike me, though, she doesn’t need a pandemic to remember, over and over, the past. She might forget specific words or dates, but never forgets pain and hurt. On those events that stabbed her most severely, her memory is flawless. She rues and ruminates and regrets deeply.

At her most despondent, she says to me in quiet shock, “Bakit ako pinaparusahan?” Why am I being punished?

“I don’t know, Ma.” I don’t. I could say all these tragedies and misfortunes are unrelated. I could say it happens to others too. I could say it’s not so bad. I’ve learned to say nothing because it’s worse to tell someone it’s not so bad when they know it is. So I just listen. I say I’m sorry, but never explain what for.

Last we talked she was in a decent mood, if still in her usual pain, the Jersey winter beginning to seep into her joints. “Your sister brought over nilaga she made.” It took me a second to translate in my head; it had been so long since I’d thought of this dish. Also starring oxtail, with cabbage and potatoes, and, at least the way Mama used to make it, whole peppercorns floating in the broth like spicy naval mines you’d accidentally crunch.

“I forgot how good oxtail is,” she says. It’s soft.

She can chew it. I’m sure it’s on the list of forbidden foods, but she knows it’s worth cheating now and again.

When Mama cooks now, it’s only for her or her cat. I’ve likely eaten the last meal my mother will ever cook for me. I can’t remember what it was.

That last meal I do remember was Filipino fried rice, sinangag, a breakfast staple. Just yesterday’s hardened rice resuscitated with sizzling oil and a generous dash of garlic powder. Fried eggs, the yolks on the firmer side. Johnsonville breakfast sausage because she couldn’t drive to Asian markets that sold the more traditional longganisa.

I was likely between moves, flaming out in one city and landing back home for a spell to regroup and figure out where to rebuild next. She had everything cooked before I was awake. I remember it all being absolutely delicious. Maybe because it had been so long, it was like eating Filipino food for the first time.

Back in May, I bought my annual ticket to Jersey for Christmas. Plane tickets were so cheap, and December was so far away. There was time for the world to stabilize, heal. It could all return to what we remembered. Then 2020 became the first year in which I didn’t see my mother.

I’ll hold out hope for 2021. That we all hold on long enough to make the pandemic a memory we can choose to keep or bury forever. Next time I get to see my mother, maybe I’ll ask her to tell me if she has a recipe for kare-kare. See what she remembers. See what I can learn.

ARMIN TOLENTINO is a poet and the author of the collection We Meant to Bring It Home Alive.

He once started a grease fire trying to season a wok.

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How Jim Nuccio ’72 Maintains an 85-Year-Old Family Flower Legacy

BY L I Z OH A N E S I A N P HOTO S BY ST E L L A K A L I N I NA

On a Sunday morning in early November, the Yuletides bloom inside Nuccio’s Nursery, their bright pink-orange petals open to reveal large, yellow stamens. The eyecatching camellia, now a fairly common variety, was developed here in the foothills of Southern California’s San Gabriel Mountains back in 1963.

Elsewhere amidst a sea of green leaves, a purple azalea called Nuccio’s Happy Days enjoys a fall bloom that comes with warmer weather. A large, pink flower known as Joe Nuccio’s Camellia and a camellia with layers of pristine white petals called Junior Prom, both of which are fairly uncommon varieties, have appeared ahead of schedule. These are amongst several hundred varieties of camellias and azaleas that have been developed by the family-run nursery. The biggest seller, though, isn’t one they introduced. It’s not a flower with vivid colors or a particularly striking shape. It’s the camellia sinensis, colloquially known as a tea plant.

“When you’re drinking tea, you’re drinking this,” says Jim Nuccio ’72, co-owner of the 85-year-old nursery.

It’s a remarkably plain plant with small white flowers, but it’s also highly in demand. The nursery sells hundreds at a time. Nuccio himself delivered 90 to a winery in Santa Rosa. A customer in Redding ordered 150.

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Another customer in Bakersfield purchased 200.

Shoppers drop into the nursery and walk out with three or four tea plants at a time.

Nuccio’s Nursery began with Jim Nuccio’s father, Julius, and his uncle Joe in 1935 out of a backyard in the Los Angeles suburb of Alhambra. A little more than a decade later, they moved the nursery to Altadena, a small, unincorporated community less than 15 miles from downtown L.A. Nuccio grew up in Altadena, not too far away from the nursery where he spent high school and college summers working. As a high school student, he played football and basketball and ran track. It was running, though, that garnered him a partial scholarship at University of Portland, where he studied history. After college, Nuccio was drafted and stationed in San Francisco. He stayed there for a few more years until he and his wife, Judy O’Connor Nuccio, who also attended University of Portland, moved to Southern California, and Jim entered the family business.

Today, Jim runs the day-to-day with his brother, Tom. (Their cousin, who handled operations with them, died earlier in 2020.) Nuccio’s is an award-winning nursery renowned for an ample selection of camellias and azaleas.

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Nuccio’s Pearl

Nuccio’s Bella Rosa

Nuccio’s Carousel

Silver Waves

Buttermint

Joe Nuccio

Katherine Nuccio

Candy Cane

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St. Francis of Assisi surrounded by azaleas

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Even after cutting back on their stock, the nursery’s catalog hosts about 500 different varieties of camellias and a little under 400 different types of azaleas.

As for Nuccio’s own favorites, he’s partial to Nuccio’s Pearl, with its layers of pink-tipped white petals, and the deep red Julius Nuccio’s Camellia. He’s also a fan of High Fragrance, which was developed by a hybridizer in New Zealand and is one of the few scented camellias.

Maintaining a successful nursery is a fine balance between catering to the tastes of flower enthusiasts and the more standard needs of landscapers. “You have to grow the unusual varieties for people to drive up here,” says Nuccio. The same can be said for mail order, which makes up about 10 percent of their business. “We have to grow unusual things for mail order, but the generic varieties, the ones that you can buy at any nursery, are the ones that we sell the most of here.”

About 150 varieties of camellias, and an equal amount of azalea varieties, have been developed by Nuccio’s Nursery. These include a handful of varieties, like Nuccio’s Gem, that have become popular in the flower world. They also hold patents for two varieties, Nuccio’s Bella Rosa and Julius Nuccio’s Camellia.

Developing new varieties, or cultivars, of flowers is an inexact science. “Two and two doesn’t equal four,” says Nuccio. You can have an idea of what you want, but whether or not you get it is dependent on other factors, like what the bees feel like cross-pollinating.

In fact, the parentage of some of the hybrids at Nuccio’s Nursery is murky for that reason. It’s also a lengthy process, taking about ten years to the point where a cultivar can be registered.

Since 1945, American Camellia Society has been registering cultivars of the flower. They aren’t the only organization that does this, but they were the first and have amassed listings for thousands of different camellias. In order to register a cultivar, a grower would have to show that it’s unique. “They have to either find a mutation that they can propagate or start one from seed that ends up being significantly different,” says William Khoury, superintendent of gardens for American Camellia Society, by phone from Fort Valley, Georgia.

But, the grower also has to show that this unique variation of the camellia can be repeated. To do that, it has to bloom for at least four years. Then, a grower can apply to register it.

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Landscapers tend to go for the most common varieties, Nuccio says. Customers shopping for their own homes might pick out a more unusual flower if they see it in bloom while they’re browsing in person. Part of a variety’s popularity is based on when it blooms.

Since the nursery tends to get the most drop-in customers in the spring, varieties that bloom in that window of time attract the most eyes. Even a gorgeous flower might not catch as much attention if it blooms outside of that season.

Business has been good lately. A rainy spring meant slower sales in what’s usually the nursery’s busiest season. In a normal year, that’s not something they would have been able to make up during summer.

However, 2020 was not a normal year and, like so much of the gardening and home improvement industry, Nuccio’s Nursery benefited from the glut of people working on their yards during the summer of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Their customers are varied. They’ve provided the flowers for a Japanese garden in Portland and an azalea festival in Southern California. Mail-order customers come from across the US, but they see the most business from people in the Carolinas, Georgia, and Florida. They have customers who stop in while visiting Los Angeles, and Nuccio regularly drives up to Northern California to make deliveries.

Every day at around 5 a.m., Nuccio arrives at the nursery. Once it’s light, he’ll check to see which plants need to be watered. He might do some pruning or replanting, various tasks to make space in a nursery that sells a lot of plants.

If it’s still dark, though, there won’t be that much for him to do, save for drinking a cup of coffee while catching up on paperwork. They don’t use computers at the nursery.

“Some people come in, and they almost find it refreshing that we’re kind of old-fashioned, but it hasn’t hurt us. We’re old-fashioned, but things still work,” Nuccio says when we follow up by phone a couple weeks later. “You can still produce a product, despite a lack of technology.” In fact, he adds, a lot of the work isn’t reliant on technology. “There’s no app on your phone to transplant an azalea.”

While the nursery does have a website, you’ll have to call or drop by during business hours to buy something. “I think it’s nice to talk to people,” says Nuccio, adding that he can explain what a customer is ordering and how shipping charges will work. They only accept payment by cash or check, and Nuccio and his brother still take care of the books by hand.

It’s a lot of work, but Nuccio enjoys the independence that comes with the business and the physical, outdoor labor. He says, “There’s never been a dull moment because there’s always work to do.”

LIZ OHANESIAN is a Los Angeles-based freelance journalist. Her work has appeared in Los Angeles Magazine, Shondaland, and a number of other outlets.

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50s 1957

Pilot’s Pilot Airline captain Anderson Johnson III ’90 has seen it all from the cockpit of his 747. From meteor showers and space shuttle launches, to watching the sun chase down the horizon near the North Pole. These days, Johnson is now focused on what he is carrying in the cargo of his UPS plane—the COVID-19 vaccine.

“It’s really gratifying to know how important these trips are for everyone,” Anderson says. “There is no glory in flying cargo, but it’s awesome to be a part of such a critical piece.”

The biggest change for Johnson’s flights is keeping the vaccines at the proper temperature while also keeping the pilots and crew safe. “There are limits to how much dry ice you can have on board,” Anderson says. And there are procedures to ensure proper ventilation.

Since March, Anderson and the entire UPS cargo fleet have been distributing PPE, masks, and medical devices around the world to help combat the COVID-19 pandemic. “The biggest

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thing for us, especially through the summer, was getting medical supplies from here to overseas and vice versa,” he says.

“You name it, we carried it.”

Growing up in Southern California between two Air Force bases, Anderson and his family would go to Riverside Airport at dusk to watch the planes take off and land. His love of planes continued when he came to UP as a basketball player. His teammates would find him talking to the pilots in the cockpit while traveling for away games.

“When I started college, I knew I wanted to either play in the NBA, become an ESPN sportscaster, or become a Navy pilot,” he says. “I figured that if I could do one of these three dream jobs, I will have become a success.”

After graduating from UP with a communication degree, Anderson served in the Navy for 10 years flying P-3 Orions. He joined the UPS fleet in 2000 and became airline captain in 2005.

“When you do something you love, it doesn’t feel like work.”

—Roya Ghorbani-Elizeh ’11

Here’s a wonderful letter from Carlo Pedron ’57: “John Archer ’56’s alumni news article in the Fall 2020 Portland magazine pulled some heartstrings and fond memories. Yes, there are a few of us UP grads left from the ’50s. We graduated in the Class of ’57, I with a BS in general engineering.

Prior to my senior year at the University, I married my high school coach’s daughter, my sweetheart, Evelyn Coghlan. Evelyn worked at Pac Bell as a phone operator.

I say ‘We graduated’ because UP student body president, Robert Goggin ’57, awarded Evelyn a special diploma, noting thereon: ‘Evelyn has so well merited, by her devotion and sacrifice during her husband’s education at this institution, to be awarded the degree PHT…or…Put Husband Through.’ One month after graduation Ev presented a special graduation gift, our loving daughter no. 1, child no. 1, Cynthia Marie. Graduating from AFROTC, awarded a regular commission, we were inducted into the US Air Force as a young family and after entering flight training, I gained my wings.

Ev soon gave us loving son no. 1, child no. 2, Joseph

Carlo. As a flight officer flying B-47 six-engine jet bombers with the Strategic Air Command at the height of the Cold War, I flew between Little Rock, AR, and North Africa or Zaragosa, Spain, in six-week cycles.

Ev gave us loving daughter no. 2, child no. 3, Catherine Ann. I continued the flying rotation between Arkansas and Spain. Ev soon again gave us loving son no. 2, child no. 4, Paul Francis.

After five-and-a-half years of military duty, we returned to civilian life in San Jose, CA, in 1963. I was working for IBM and continuing with family life, when Ev gave us loving daughter no. 3, child no. 5, Carla Sue. Well…a few years hence, Ev gave us loving daughter no. 4, child no. 6 (twinkle in my eye) Constance Louise.

We continue to live in San Jose, retired from our family business, Pedron Enterprises. Our love together endures for 64 years!” A lovely account of a life well-lived and wellloved, Carlo; sounds like you hit the soulmate jackpot.

Thanks so much for writing.

00s 2001

Adam Ritenour ’01 has joined Portland-based electrical engineering

SEND US YOUR NEWS Share the latest on your family, career, or accomplishments. We’re also interested to hear about any side gigs you’ve started during the pandemic.

Send updates to mcovert@up.edu

ADAM GUGGENHEIM

CLASS NOTES

On Curiosity and Chemistry

On a crab processor boat, in 1988, in the middle of a storm off the coast of Alaska, Kara Breuer ’95, MAT ’06 made a promise that if she survived, she’d go to college. It took the crew about 17 hours to make it home.

On that boat, that night, she says, “I made my peace with God,” and she eventually made good on her promise.

A native of Ketchikan, Alaska, Kara grew up in the logging and fishing industries. In the crab industry, she operated the onboard hydraulic lift to drop a 200-pound cage of packed crab legs into boiling water. Next the meat would need to be frozen in a super-saturated salt solution and Freon gas. If she got the salinity and Freon balance wrong, it could cost the company $2 million. As time went on, she wanted to understand how the chemistry of that Freon actually worked. And so the crabbing industry led Kara to chemistry and to UP. She had some prerequisites to catch up on ahead of time—she’d stopped school in seventh grade to go to work—but she relished being a student at a liberal arts school. “It changed my whole life,” she says. With the mentorship of chemistry professor Ray Bard, and her advisor, Sr. Sandra Lincoln, Kara decided to become a teacher.

Kara now teaches organic chemistry labs at UP and assists with UP’s archeological and scientific research in Mallorca. She also teaches AP chemistry and biomedical sciences at Ridgefield High School. She finds remote learning to be a challenge, mainly because it’s hard to build relationships, but, she says, “I try to make it entertaining.”

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CLASS NOTES

2002

The Portland Business Journal Forty Under 40 class for 2020 has been published and—no surprise here— DJ Widmer ’02 of ICD High Performance Coatings was chosen out of a pool of 300 Portland-area entrepreneurs, innovators, and rising stars in the business community. DJ is currently global sales manager for ICD, a manufacturer of water-based coatings for glass, metal, and plastic applications for architecture, auto, appliance and solar industries. Congratulations DJ, once again you’ve been recognized as one of our best and brightest!

2003

Structural engineer Aaron Wegner ’03 has been named an associate in the Portland office of KPFF Engineering. Since joining the firm in 2008, he has worked on high-rise buildings, data centers, schools, hospitals, and seismic upgrades. Wegner earned a master’s degree in structural engineering from Cornell University and is a licensed professional engineer in Oregon, Washington, and New York.

Congratulations are in order for Casey White Zollman ’03, who writes:

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“I wanted to provide you with the following update: I’m excited to announce that I started a new job in October 2020 as the communications director for the Oregon Community College Association. While the OCCA is based in Salem, OR, I can work remotely from Pendleton, where my husband and I live with our four-year-old son (and future Pilot? He’s got quite the engineer’s brain) Ryder.

We’ve lived in Pendleton for more than 17 years, and my husband owns a successful construction business here, so we’re thankful I am able to take advantage of this great job opportunity and continue to live in our beautiful community.”

Thanks for writing, Casey; we’ll hold a spot for Ryder!

2006

Sara Gerontis Wyffels ’06, a Spanish teacher at Arizona’s Chandler High School and UP School of Education alumna, is the Arizona Educational Foundation’s 2021 Arizona Teacher of the Year. The award was announced during the Foundation’s virtual awards ceremony on Friday, October 23. Sara has been teaching for 14 years and earned her bachelor of arts from Western Washington University and her master of arts in teaching from UP. Sara will engage in a “year of recognition” as an ambassador for the teaching profession, delivering more than a hundred speeches and making public appearances throughout the state and the nation, and she now becomes a candidate for National Teacher of the Year. Depending on COVID conditions, Sara will travel to the White House to meet the president and will

Hawai'i Chapter Raises Funds for Students

University of Portland Chapters The Pilot alumni network is strong and growing!

Consider connecting with fellow alums in the following regions or through the following affinity groups.

Some good news to start off 2021. Our Hawai'i Chapter recently organized a fundraising project selling face masks designed with Pilot purple and their chapter logo. Through a generous donation, 100% of the proceeds will go towards supporting UP students who need assistance.

Mahalo to the Chan ohana (family) for supporting the University of Portland and the UP Hawai'i Alumni Chapter. Sporting the aloha print facemasks are Casidy (sister), current UP student Caroline (’23), Carolyn (mom), Carol (grandma), and Cathy Lynne (aunty). GO PILOTS!

If you’d like to join a chapter group, email alumni@up.edu.

Regional

Bay Area Boise Chicago Colorado Hawai'i Los Angeles Minnesota New York City Orange County Sacramento San Diego Seattle South Bend Tacoma Washington, D.C.

ADAM GUGGENHEIM

company Reyes Engineering as a senior electrical engineer. He has experience designing power distribution, fire alarm, life safety, and control systems for labs, clean rooms, commercial buildings, industrial spaces, and municipal facilities.

Ritenour previously worked for Glumac and earned his bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University’s Shiley School of Engineering.

Affinity Chapters Air Force ROTC BIPOC Engineering Nursing Nonprofit MBA

Introducing: BIPOC Affinity Chapter The Office of Alumni & Parent Relations has been adding more chapters at a steady pace and is thrilled to announce the new BIPOC affinity chapter.

If the BIPOC Affinity Chapter sparks an interest, please consider taking the following survey, as the group considers priorities: up.edu/alumni/diversity-alumni-letter Our thanks to Irene (Niedo) Campbell ’12, Yuri Osorio Hernández ’15, Marija Hobbs ’98, Katie Scally ’11, Amanda Perez ’18, Yaneira Romero ’12, Alyssa Schmidt-Carr ’10, Marshawna Williams ’12, and Gilbert Resendez ’14, for their hard work and dedication in creating this new chapter.

With Thanks

About five years ago I found myself walking through Chelsea Market with Craig Swinyard ’98. At the time he was UP’s recently minted alumni director, and I was a relatively new resident in New York City. We grabbed coffee and reminisced (I knew him way back when he captained the practice team for UP women’s basketball), and he updated me on news from The Bluff, where he was also a much-loved math professor.

He quietly but confidently shared his vision for our alumni community, including, of all things, an alumni chapter right there in New York.

I thought he was crazy—surely there weren’t that many of us who had settled so far East. But there were. And before too long, Craig’s vision came to be. Our chapter is now about 130 people strong and growing.

Slowly, deliberately, these UP alumni and affinity groups have grown across the country. Craig’s dedication elevated the alumni office from a team that produced great but occasional events to one that offers a dynamic and supportive community of alumni, parents, and families.

This semester, Craig Swinyard will return to full-time teaching (and mentoring and advising and encouraging) students on The Bluff.

And we would be remiss to start 2021 without noting the immeasurable impact he has had on our alumni community. We want current students and soon-to-be-alums to know that as you leave UP and enter the world prepared to apply your Holy Cross education to being a person of powerful, positive impact on the world, there is a thriving Pilot network waiting to greet you. Thank you, to Craig and your fine team, for all you have done for us.

—Jennifer (Swinton) Williams ’00, National Alumni Board President

Above: Samantha Dela Cruz ’22, Kawika Jacang ’21, Deneen McNicoll ’86

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spend a week at International Space Camp in Huntsville, AL, among other appearances.

Congratulations, Sara!

2008

Congratulations to Rachael Rapinoe ’08, who has been named to the 2020 class of the Portland Business Journal’s Forty Under 40 list.

Rachael was chosen out of a pool of 300 Portland-area entrepreneurs, innovators, and rising stars in the business community. Rachael’s sports-centered CBD company, Mendi, offers a wide range of products to help amateur and professional athletes heal from the inevitable injuries sustained from playing rough-and-tumble sports like soccer. They know their business, too—Rachael and her twin sister Megan (who also lends her talents to Mendi) helped lead the Pilots to their 2005 NCAA Division 1 championship.

We heard from Danielle (Bruno) Matteson ’09, who writes: “As a note for the Portland magazine alumni section, I wanted to share some exciting news about my husband, Maj. Donovan Matteson USAF ’08. Donovan (known as “Abe” while at UP) recently graduated with his second master’s degree from the Air Force Institute of Technology (AFIT). Of note, he won the Dr. James T. Moore Research Award, which is given to one student annually. The prestigious award was in recognition of his thesis, which demonstrated how the Air Force can save $84 million annually by implementing next-generation tanker planning tools.

Following his graduation, Donovan has been selected to serve at the United States Strategic Command (STRATCOM) J5 unit in

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Omaha, NE, where he will help plan the air piece of America’s nuclear triad.”

Thanks for the note, Danielle, and thank you both for your service to our country.

10s 2010

We received the following note from Ethan Niedermeyer ’10, who writes: “I’ve always loved the UP magazine, even when I was still in school. I know we all miss Brian Doyle and his writings, but I am so excited about what Jessica Murphy Moo has done with the magazine. I’ve never written in to provide a class update before, so I figure it’s about time. I am currently an assistant district attorney at the San Francisco DA’s office, where I have completed 23 jury trials and am currently assigned to the serious and violent felony trial team.

I’m also the proud uncle to two beautiful nieces, Bridget (2 yrs.) and Maeve (1 week!

As of October 19).” Thank you, Ethan; it sounds like the legal profession and unclehood suit you well.

2012

Kari Kuboyama ’12 has been promoted to associate

by WDY Inc., a Portlandbased structural and civil engineering firm founded in 1985. She has seven years of civil engineering experience, including a broad range in project management and permitting services, and specializes in site development for private and public improvements. She is a graduate of the Shiley School of Engineering.

2012, 2014

Wonderful news to share from Rose (Harber) Judge ’14: “I just wanted to share that my husband, Bryant Judge ’12 and I recently welcomed our first son, Nolan Kingsley Judge, on August 16, 2020. A future Pilot indeed!” Congratulations, Rose and Bryant, and we’ll save Nolan a place in (gulp!) 2038!

2017

An alumni update from Grace McConnochie ’17, who writes: “After graduating from UP I earned a master’s in mechanical engineering at Boise State University with a focus in computational biomechanics. I also competed on their track and cross country team with my remaining eligibility. I returned home to New Zealand and then went traveling around Europe with a good friend from UP in 2019, where we visited many of our Pilots track and cross country teammates.

I also spent some time running and volunteering in Ethiopia. I came back to New Zealand in September and worked in a bike shop whilst applying for jobs in my field. I finally got my dream job in February 2020 in Adelaide, Australia, working as an engineer in a gait laboratory at the Biomechanics Lab. COVID hit right before I was due to move, however, so after six months of applying for an exemption to travel I finally am here in Australia and loving it so far. Running-wise, I am still competing and have joined a training group here too.”

Thanks for the note, Grace, and please keep us updated on your adventures down under.

2019

Spencer Nelson ’19 was hired as an electrical designer by Reyes Engineering in its Portland office. He recently received a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from the University’s Shiley School of Engineering, where he participated in the MECOP program as an intern and explored software engineering and industrial engineering for plant machinery and product development. Reyes Engineering is an electrical engineering firm based in Portland, OR. Nelson currently is working in the firm’s low voltage studio learning integrated transportation systems.

FACULTY, STAFF, FRI EN DS Rev. Michael DeLaney, CSC, became rector of St. Joseph’s Oratory in Montreal, Canada’s biggest Catholic shrine, on November 22, 2020. Those who lived in Shipstad Hall, went to Salzburg, or took theology or history courses between 1988 to 2002, will no doubt remember Fr. Mike, who served at UP in various roles during those years. Holy Cross brother Saint André Bessette, CSC, began a place of devotion at St. Joseph’s in 1904, and its status as a place of miraculous healing draws large numbers of visitors and pilgrims each year. One of Fr. Mike’s first priorities on moving to Montreal earlier this year: undertaking intensive lessons in French. “I am very grateful and honored for this opportunity to continue the work of St. Brother André so that his important mission reflects the values of our Congregation of Holy Cross,” said the new rector. Congratulations on this latest honor, Fr. Mike; we haven’t forgotten you here on The Bluff.

Our heartfelt prayers and condolences go out to the families of the following individuals. Requiescat in pace.

Geraldine (“Gerry”) Eileen Harrington ’46 passed away at the age of 96, on August 17, 2020. She graduated from the St. Vincent Hospital/ UP nursing program. Following graduation Gerry taught at several nursing schools and then served in the US Army Reserves from 1950 to 1954 as an RN with the rank of first lieutenant. In October 1952 she married Alva Harrington, and they settled on what would become Huntington Farm near Sherwood, OR, where they raised their three children, Keith, Anne, and Lee, and grew cherries, pears, prunes, and filberts.

She taught in the Clackamas Community College nursing program from 1968 until her retirement in 1987.

Gerry was preceded in death by her husband, and she is survived by her children and her grandchildren.

William Bradner Campbell ’52 passed peacefully at his home in the early morning of October 10, 2020, three days short of his 92nd birthday.

His niece Marcia McLemore and cousin Karen Arlen were with him. After earning his degree in business, he moved to San Francisco and was employed as an accountant, working for a Cadillac dealership, Double Indemnity Insurance, and Blue Shield of California, where he retired after 25 years. Bill was an avid reader and had an extensive library of classic literature, historic and architectural books. “Bill was a kind and generous man, loved and revered by family, friends, and acquaintances,” according to his family.

Anthony Sarsfield ’55 died on August 29, 2020. He transferred from University of Oregon to UP after his freshman year and played basketball for the Pilots while majoring in accounting. He met his wife, Marilyn Winslow ’56, when they were in the same English class, and the couple wed on August 11, 1956. They lived on their family farm and were married for 56 years until Marilyn’s death in 2012. They raised beef cattle and grew alfalfa and winter wheat until Anthony retired at age 82.

Survivors include his daughter, Christine; his son, George; and three grandchildren.

He met the love of his life, Sandra Eileen (Casey) Murphy, while serving in Newfoundland, and they married in 1960. Dean and Sandra raised six children as a military family, and he retired from the service in 1979. “Dean was blessed with a beautiful tenor voice, which he enjoyed sharing with his family, friends, and church,” according to his family. “Everyone enjoyed his beautiful renditions of Danny Boy and Ave Maria.

Our hearts are broken and ache to hear him sing again.” Survivors include Sandra and their children and loving family.

James Robert Lucia ’56 CP passed away on July 28, 2020, surrounded by family.

Jim served in the US Army from 1956 to 1958 and worked as a union steamfitter. One of his great passions was restoring vintage cars, and it didn’t take him long to settle on the Corvette as his car of choice. James also worked tirelessly to help those experiencing homelessness.

Survivors include his wife of 60 years, Marlene; daughter, Katherine Lucia Hutchinson ’83; sons, Jeffrey and Christopher; two siblings; 12 grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren.

John Kennedy White ’58 passed away on October 20, 2020. He spent three decades as an elementary teacher at Highland, Boise, Vernon, and other Portland schools, and he taught military employees’ children on Okinawa and in Germany and Italy. He was a member of the Milwaukie Elks, the Laurelhurst Dance Club, and St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, and he volunteered with Meals on Wheels, St. Vincent de Paul, and Portland Community College. He is survived by his brother, Bernie, and extended family.

Dean M. Murphy ’56, ’71 died on March 10, 2020, at the Methodist Hospital Stone Oak, San Antonio, TX, surrounded by his beloved family. He was born in Vernonia, OR, and after graduation was commissioned in the US Air Force.

We learned recently of the passing of Forrest Van Riper ’60, ’62. He earned undergraduate and master’s degrees in music education at UP and went on to a long career as a music professor at Sacramento Community College in Sacramento, CA. He was a member of the

Hooyboer Society and his estate has bequeathed a gift to the UP music department to assist with scholarships for music students.

Mary Lou Yager ’61 died in her home in Coogee Beach, Australia, on August 27, 2020. After graduating from UP with a degree in literature in 1961, she and a girlfriend flew off to New York City to start their careers and enjoy the vibrant city life. In 1976, she moved to Australia with her then-partner Andrew, and her son, Jed, was born there in 1977. Mary Lou ran a catering business for 25 years and was more than happy to prepare and host her own 80th birthday party.

“Mary lived a happy life with a peaceful, warm, and generous spirit,” according to her family. “She was adored by her grandchildren, Andrew’s daughters, Kaya and Kim, and everyone who knew her. May she rest peacefully in the sunlight of the Spirit.”

Mary J. Nicholas ’62, of Bloomington, IL, died peacefully on August 24, 2020. She earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees in music education at UP and a doctorate from University of Kansas. She worked with developmentally disabled patients at Lakemary Center in Paola, KS. In 1968, at the invitation of the Juilliard Repertory Project (JRP), she presented a concert with elementary school children for music teachers in attendance at the Music Educators National Conference. She was former editor

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of the Journal of Music Therapy and joined the faculty at Illinois State University in 1980, after seven years as director of music therapy at the College of Saint Teresa in Winona, MN. Survivors include her sister, Kay, and brothers, Neil and Joseph.

November 13, 1931– September 15, 2020 Let’s take a moment to remember Barbara Lefebvre (Arnold) Pope ’65, who died on September 15, 2020, at Rose Linn Care Center in West Linn, OR. A native of Vineland, NJ, Barbara held her own growing up with brothers Lewis, Eugene, and Larry. Finding her calling early in life, she completed Army basic training in 1951 and served in administrative roles in Heidelberg, Germany, during the Korean War. There she proceeded to sign up for every training she could as both student and teacher, and she traveled widely and independently, leaving a wake of lifelong friends and admirers wherever she went.

“We still receive condolences from friends and students she met then,” according to her brother Lewis. “Barbara just loved people and culture and never passed up an opportunity to travel, socialize, attend symphonies and plays, or visit museums. She made connections all over the world.”

Barbara and her former husband, Carl Pope, moved to Oregon in 1962, and she earned her master’s degree in education at UP. Her long civilian career included teaching English and English as a Second Language at Sandy High School, Clackamas Community College, and Portland State University. “She was an avid reader, accomplished painter, licensed pilot, and devoted friend,” according to her family.

“Her beloved dog, Theo, was faithful to the end and passed in July of this year. She will be fondly remembered by all who knew her.” Survivors include brothers Lewis and Eugene, two nieces, and three nephews. Our prayers and condolences to those whose lives she touched.

Barbara Pope

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Anne Elizabeth (Garnett) Atkins ’64, ’66, age 77, passed away in Durham, NC, on October 8, 2020. Anne worked as a librarian in Klamath Falls, OR, and later in the City of Commerce, CA. Anne met her husband, Bob Atkins, in Ontario, CA, and raised her children there.

Anne lived for many years in Chehalis and Centralia, WA, where she had many friends. She is survived by her daughter, Amy, and was predeceased by her son, Michael, in 2013. She is also survived by her siblings and four grandchildren.

Donald Edward Gorger ’67 of Portland died September 11, 2020, with his wife, Sandra Gorger, by his side.

He enrolled in the School of Business at UP in 1955 but joined the US Air Force before finishing his degree.

He became a Russian language specialist, and while stationed in Darmstadt, Germany, he traveled extensively throughout Europe. He returned to The Bluff after his service, switched his major to engineering, and met Sandra Tumlinson ’67.

Together they raised eight children. During his years with the Bonneville Power Administration, he designed power flow control systems that are still used today to provide electricity throughout the nation. “A man centered on God and family, Donald was cheerful,

confident, brave, and gregarious,” according to his family. “He was still making everyone laugh even as he lay in a hospital bed fighting for his life.” Survivors include Sandra; their children, including Eric ’95; grandchildren; and two siblings.

We heard the following from David Allstot ’69, who writes to celebrate his good friend Richard “Dick” Organ ’69 and an era that still holds many happy, enduring memories of UP: “Vickie and I are still thinking about our friend Richard Organ, who passed away [last year]. I had gone fishing with him in Alaska for the last 30 years, and he was my best friend for many years before that. I have a picture that shows the joy that we all shared back then.

Richard on the left, me (second from the right) and Jim Zimmerman on the right.

We apparently stopped by Tim Hein’s house to rouse him out of bed to join us for a few (more?) beers. I think we succeeded. Richard Organ was beloved by all of us; he had a unique personality and was always part of the action. The broader point is one I always try to convey to my students. There are a lot of smart people out there, and not just those from ‘top schools.’ Those who work hard and play hard and develop a passion for what they do always succeed in the long run. Mr. Organ exemplified all of those wonderful qualities, and we miss him dearly.”

John Henry Leahy Sr. ’69 passed away peacefully on November 11, 2020, with family by his side. Born and raised in Portland, John was a lifelong Catholic. He attended Madeleine Grade School and Grant High

School, then received his BS from Washington State and MBA from University of Portland. He was a veteran of the US Navy. John met his wife and lifelong partner, Maryanne, at Washington State, and they raised six children in Portland. He was involved with the Mortgage Bankers Association, Kiwanis Club, and was an avid supporter of the Rose Festival. John loved seeing the delight on his grandchildren’s faces when Grandfather’s cuckoo clock clanged to life with dancers and chimes each hour. He is lovingly remembered by his six children, 16 grandchildren, and eight great-grandchildren.

Due to COVID, a Celebration of Life will be held at a later date. In lieu of flowers, donations can be made to La Salle Catholic College Prep in Milwaukie, OR, or the University of Portland.

Joel Francis Hermsen ’70 passed away at the age of 74 on September 28, 2020.

He met and married Jane Hermsen (Carlson) in 1970, and they were happily married for 49 years. Joel worked for The Oregonian and Oregon Journal for 38 years, retiring as a senior account executive. Survivors include Jane; their two daughters, Jill and Janelle; and three grandsons.

William J. “Bill” Houston ’71 died on September 11, 2020, at his home in Petaluma, CA. He was surrounded by his loving family. Bill served in the Air Force as a missile launch officer in South Dakota in the early ’70s, then returned to Sonoma and soon started a career at Sebastiani Vineyards, retiring after 32 years as plant manager. Bill will be remembered by his class-

mates as a gifted musician.

His late-night campus hootenannies with professor Jim Covert on guitar, Bill on banjo, and Patty Glynn Berkshire ’70 on piano are the stuff of legend. “He truly found his musical home in the final decade of his life,” according to his family, “playing with other local musicians in his adopted town of Garberville, CA. There he played weekly for the local hospital, the Farmer’s Market, and many other community functions.”

Bill is survived by his loving wife of 32 years, Sally; five children; and six grandchildren. He will be greatly missed by his three siblings, Mary E. Narlock, Susan Stone, and John (Amber) Houston.

Nancy Stark ’72 died on September 23, 2020; her spirit released from her body at home after living with multiple sclerosis for 24 years. She leaves behind a loving family, endearing friends and acquaintances, and a legacy of love for humanity, artistic sensibilities, a quiet intellect, and a gentle nature. She worked as a teacher and English as Second Language (ESL) instructor at Roswell Elementary School in Portland and at the Anacortes Middle School.

According to her family, “Nancy was a multi-layered person with many talents, interests, and insights.

Her passion for the arts was reflected in her own art, in owning and operating Paper Stones Gallery in Anacortes in the 1980s, and in being deeply involved in the Washington State Arts Commission for five years.” Survivors include her daughter, Callianne Blau; sons, Ben and Max; and four grandchildren.

January 10, 1943– June 14, 2020 Parviz Ghavami ’79 passed away this summer, after a one-year battle with cancer. We received this beautiful tribute from his son, Reza Ghavami: “I would like to share the remarkable story of a proud UP alumnus, my father, Parviz Ghavami, who took his last breath on Sunday, June 14. He is probably the prime example of the American dream, emigrating from Iran with my mother in the late 1970s, and finding his new home in Portland, where he would earn his master of science in mechanical engineering in 1979. I was born in Portland in 1978, so I must express my gratitude to the University for the opportunity given to my father to pursue his dreams and provide for his family. Before his passing, Dr. Ghavami ran his own civil engineering consulting company. Before that, he taught math and science at a technical college in Harlingen, TX, where he spent most of his life. His professional engineering degree is what made it possible to start his own consulting work, and he always told me he owed the University a lot of gratitude for giving him the education and skills to realize his goals in life. My dad was my best friend in life and an inspirational hero that I owe all of my success to. Thank you for accepting him back then and giving him a gateway into this country and a better life.”

In November 2020, Reza drove to Portland from Dallas, TX, to inter his father’s ashes at Mt. Calvary Cemetery.

Parviz Ghavami

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James R. Mattecheck ’80 died on September 27, 2020.

He worked for more than 40 years in the software sales industry, mentoring and building strong relationships. He was active in the recovery community and believed in the importance of supporting others in recovery. His Sunday night dinners will always be treasured by his kids as an opportunity for good food and a time to catch up and connect. In the words of a dear friend, “Depression was a formidable foe; he couldn’t find his way to light in the darkness.” Survivors include four siblings; his wife, Kristina; their two children; first wife, Mary; and their four daughters. In lieu of flowers, please consider donating to the National Alliance on Mental Illness or Deschutes Land Trust.

Scott Martin Niedermeyer ’84, loving husband and father of four children, died at the age of 58 on September 15, 2020. He was the youngest of Linus and Beverly

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(Briles) Niedermeyer’s five children. He summited Mount Hood more than a dozen times, as well as other mountains in the Cascades, hiked the Pacific Crest trail at 12, and was happiest in the mountains and near the water, particularly when he shared those adventures with his wife, Stacy; their children; and family and friends. “As Scott departs on his next adventure, hiking his way to heaven, he no doubt packed a lunch and will arrive with an excellent story of the journey,” according to his family.

Survivors include Stacy and their children; his father, Linus; and four siblings.

Carmen Frances Carroll ’86 of Portland, died Sunday, August 16, 2020, due to complications from Alzheimer’s and COVID-19. She was a member of the Three Affiliated Tribes in North Dakota and, according to her obituary, always knew she wanted to be a nurse.

Carmen and her late husband, Bill, had two daughters, Amber Lee and Kelly Jo; Bill and Kelly predeceased her. She was a devoted Sunday School teacher, volunteer, Girl Scout leader, Bible Study Fellowship leader, and missionary on the Burns Indian Reservation and in Oaxaca, Mexico. “Carmen was fully immersed in the lives of her grandchildren and loved them deeply,” according to her family.

“She was a very engaged grandparent, attending their many school and sporting events, taking them to local attractions, and sacrificing her bonus room for Barbie parties, playing store, arts and crafts, and the occasional dental floss spider web.” Survivors include her daughter, Amber; three grandchildren; and one great-grandson.

Lucas Robert Adams ’16 passed away suddenly due to cardiac arrest on May 31, 2020. He joined the US Air Force in September 2000 and completed training to be a pararescue jumper in 2006. During his career, Luke was deployed around the world, completing rescue missions on land and in water, bringing to life the Pararescue Jumper motto, “That others may live.” Luke is survived by his loving wife, Shea; their precious children, Sawyer and Asher; and his parents and siblings. Donations in Luke’s honor can be made to Lucas Adams Memorial Fund at Four Corners Community Bank in Farmington, NM, or to That Others May Live Foundation.

FACULTY, STAFF, FRIENDS Claudia Antoinette (Robins) Harrington passed away on July 5, 2020. The field of medicine ran in the family, according to her obituary.

She spent most of her career caring for children in intensive care in Portland and taught in the University of Portland’s School of Nursing from August 1993 until July 2004. In retirement she worked in the local wine industry and self-published a book, The Bicycling Wine Tourist: Hidden Gems in Oregon Wine Country. A second book on the Walla Walla wine industry was interrupted by a brain tumor, and Claudia spent the last eighteen months of her life in Seattle with her daughter, Andrea “Andie” Long. She is survived

by Andie and all five of her siblings, Lanny, Bodie, Roque, Eddie, and Nancy.

Louella M. Webb died on August 17, 2020. She and

her husband, Norman Webb ’75, shared an interest in higher education, establishing the Norman and Louella Webb Endowed Scholarship in 2006 to benefit undergraduate students majoring in engineering at UP. She lived with steadily worsening impairment from multiple sclerosis for more than 50 years. According to her family, “Through it all, Lou never lost her ability to engage others in conversation about their interests, to manage her household, keep up with her growing family, and contribute to the community. Her focus was always on others, never on the difficulties that took more and more of her energy.” Lou is survived by her devoted husband, Norm; two children; four grandchildren; eight great-grandchildren; and one greatgreat-grandchild. Lou and Norm’s son David predeceased her. Contributions in Lou’s memory may be made to the National Multiple Sclerosis Society.

Dale Alan Boyd, age 55, passed away on August 9, 2020. He was a shy, quiet, and hard-working man.

He loved music, especially his favorite band, KISS. He was a collector and loved to work in his garden tending roses. Dale worked at the University of Portland for 20 years as a janitor.

He is survived by his wife of 24 years, Carla Denise (Orne) Boyd; three brothers; nephews; and two greatnieces who all adored their Uncle Dale. “Until we meet again, Dale: uncle, best friend to many, son, brother, kind and loving soul. If so inclined, please make a donation to the American Diabetes Association in Dale’s name.”

BOB KERNS

Christine Mary Katica ’78 died on September 10, 2020, in Vancouver, WA. After earning her MBA on The Bluff, she began her career as marketing services manager at Columbia Sportswear Company. As part of her career Christine traveled extensively and gained a great love and respect for other cultures of the world. She retired from Columbia in 2008. “Christine was beautiful, graceful, artistic, sassy, smart, and a lot of fun,” according to her family. “She will be sorely missed by her family and her many friends.” Christine is survived by her two sons, John and Daniel Harrison, and five siblings.

FOR THE LOVE OF IT

Grace and the Woodshop THE WOODSHOP AT the Holy Cross Court has become a place of refuge, especially during these days of endless video conferences. The stacks of maple, red oak, and cherry and our saws, planes, and chisels beckon us to imagine and create.

Along with my fellow CSCs, I’ve turned salvaged dorm room furniture and fallen campus trees into cutting boards, altars, cabinets, and even an icon of St. Joseph the Worker, patron saint of the Holy Cross Brothers.

As priests and brothers we gather daily around Christ’s altar of sacrifice to turn humble bread and wine into the body and blood of Jesus, for the salvation of the world. In this most important act of faith we participate in the transformation of simple matter into sublime and sacred realities.

It is not so different in the woodshop. We trade our stoles and chasubles for aprons and safety glasses as we stand before

the workbench, once again calling on the Holy Spirit to help us transform the ordinary into something extraordinary: the presence of God, now in the guise of western redcedar and American chestnut, figured with birdseyes, fiddlebacks, and spaltings. We marry chocolatey black walnut to silvery Oregon white oak. We shape and sand rough boards into elegant pieces that shimmer under the cloak of a teak oil finish. Our bench then becomes another altar and our shop another chapel, where we offer the sacrifice of our creativity and God’s grace again enters the world.

FR. DAN PARRISH, CSC, ’96 teaches business management for UP’s Pamplin School of Business. His icon of St. Joseph the Worker is portrayed on the back cover of this issue.

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5000 North Willamette Blvd.

Portland, OR 97203-5798 Change Service Requested

Non-Profit Organization U.S. Postage PA I D Portland, Oregon Permit No. 188

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BOB KERNS

Since 2015 the staff of Campus Ministry have been installing icons of patron saints in each of the chapels on campus. For the woodshop at Holy Cross Court, Fr. Dan Parrish, CSC, made an icon of St. Joseph the Worker, the patron saint of the Holy Cross brothers.