Download - Mount Holyoke Alumnae Quarterly Summer 2009

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Sisters in Arms

10

Deep (andWide) Impact

18You Asked; She Answers

22

A Short History of Philosophical Ideas

About In!nity

24Salamanders Signal a

Global Warning

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!e Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College serves a worldwide network of diverse individuals, cultivates and celebrates vibrant connections among all alumnae, fosters lifelong learning in the liberal arts tradition, and facilitates opportunities for alumnae to advance the goals and values of the College.

Ideas expressed in the !uarterly are those of the authors and do not necessarily re"ect the o#cial position of either the Alumnae Association or the College.

General comments concerning the !uarterly should be sent to Emily Weir ([email protected] or Alumnae !uarterly, Alumnae Association, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 01075-1486). For class notes matters, contact Jill Parsons Stern ’84 (413- 538-3094, [email protected]). Contact Alumnae Information Services with contact information updates (same address; 413-538-2303; [email protected]). Phone 413-538-2300 with general questions regarding the Alumnae Association, or visit www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu.

"e Mount Holyoke Alumnae !uarterly (USPS 365-280) is published quarterly in the spring, summer, fall, and winter by the Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College, Inc., 50 College St., South Hadley, MA 01075-1486. Summer 2009, volume 93, number 2, was printed in the USA by Lane Press, Burlington VT. Periodicals postage paid at South Hadley, MA and additional mailing o#ces.

: Please send form 3579 to Alumnae Information Services, Mount Holyoke Alumnae Association, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 01075-1486.

MOUNT HOLYOKE $UARTERLYSummer 2009 Volume 93 Number 2

EMILY HARRISON WEIR

MIEKE H. BOMANN

JILL PARSONS STERN ’84

ALDRICH DESIGNDESIGN FARM (class notes)

HANNAH CLAY WAREHAM ’09

Marg Stark ’85 (chair), Emily Dietrich ’85, Jillian Dunham ’97, Charlotte M. Overby ’87, Hannah M. Wallace ’95, Victoria Anderson ’87 (Web consultant), Alison Bass (faculty rep.), Amanda Aultman ’10 (student rep.), Cynthia L. Reed ’80 (ex o#cio with vote)

Cynthia L. Reed ’80

Maureen McHale Hood ’87

Julianne Trabucchi Puckett ’91

Linda Ing Phelps ’86

Marg Stark ’85

Susan d’Olive Mozena ’67

Mari Ellen Reynolds Loijens ’91

Susan Swart Rice ’70

Jenna Lou Tonner ’62

Elizabeth A. Osder ’86

Joanna M. Jones ’67

Jill M. Brethauer ’70

Akua S. Soadwa ’03

Jane E. Zachary, ex o#cio without vote!e Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College, Inc., 50 College St., South Hadley, MA 01075-1486; 413-538-2300; www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu.

ON THE COVER:

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viewpoints

As a tattooed member of the class of 1957 (yes, ’57!), I’m delighted to learn thatI would !nd plenty of company on campus! A"er a trip to French Polynesia in 2004, I knew I wanted one; the question was, “where?” At my age, most of the favorite places (upper arms, belly, rump, thigh) are no longer “out there.” #en I remembered one of the natives with a tattooed wedding ring. Aha! A toe ring! And that’s what I have today.

Jan Laing Hetterly ’57 Fair!eld, Connecticut

[submitted to our online blogazine] For my eightieth birthday, I presented myself with a tattoo for no particular reason except that, as a recent denizen of hospitals, I wanted to be sure I was better identi!ed than with a plastic wristband.

It is on my le" wrist, easily hidden by a wide bracelet when my age group might be startled. It has two colors (the inks now are quite handsome): sky blue and coral; red for my Aries sun, blue for my Pisces moon sign.

#e shape is a $ower with seven petals in blue for my biofeedback number, and a seven-pointed center in red. Nothing was more fun than designing it myself with the help of an adorable young man.

Mary Hoyt Blum ’48Cushing, Maine

I absolutely loved Hannah Clay Wareham’s article, “Tattoos: Stories in Ink.” It captured so many di%erent and interesting stories, and I think it truly re$ected the evolution of tattooing from a sailor’s hobby to a legitimate form of self-expression for everyone from bikers to soccer moms.

My mother died one week before I started my junior year at Mount Holyoke, and on the two-year anniversary of her death, I got my !rst tattoo: a tribal sun with her initials in the middle. I chose a sun because while I was a kid who liked to lounge in the shade, my mother would always beg me to come sit in the sun with her, because she felt it could heal what ailed you. #e tattoo marked both my graduation from Mount Holyoke, which was her !nal wish for me, and my decision to begin healing.

It’s so refreshing to see other women marking important events in their lives with tattoos. I especially love that my classmate, Carrie Ruzicka, marked herself with a laurel chain to symbolize the strength that MHC gives to all of us.

Laura Draper ’99Philadelphia, Pennsyl"ania

Tempting as it is to initiate a sermon on the theme “Act in haste; repent at leisure,” I’ll limit my observation to the fact that anyone who can manage to wait a little longer may be able to obtain a programmable tattoo. See, for example, www.gizmowatch.com/entry/tattoos-driven-by-technology/ orwww.design.philips.com/probes/projects/tattoo/index.page.

Carl Wittho!, parent of an ’08 alumna Acton, Massachusetts

I was disappointed with the Alumnae !uarterly for publishing the article “Tattoos: Stories in Ink” (spring 2009). As a mother of three, I constantly am reminding my children not to draw on their skin with markers. As an internist, I have seen countless tattooed seniors, many of whom regret putting indelible pictures and words on their skin (a little more serious than a !ve year-old wielding a Sharpie). In fact, having a tattoo does more than permanently deface the body; it increases the risk of blood-borne diseases such as Hepatitis C and HIV.

I was planning on giving this issue of the Q to a prospective student, but a"er reading this article I changed my mind, not sure of the message that I would be sending to a rising senior in high school. We should be teaching our youth

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Pathfinders in Public Health Alumnae Break New Ground

Preventing Disease and Promoting Health

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Mount Holyoke Alumnae Quarterly S u m m e r 2 0 0 9 3

We continue to welcome letters for the printed Quarterly. Indeed, we crave them. What’s the use of singing our hearts out to an empty theater? We need your ideas, your opinions, your letters.

Of course, we will edit your letters for accuracy, length, and clarity. You can also post your comments on our “blogazine” online (www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu). We especially like hearing from you by e-mail. Send your thoughts, then, to [email protected].

to respect their body, not deface it. What next Q, the art of body piercing?

Katie Doty Romp, M.D. ’91Birmingham, Alabama

!is week started with a battle with my eighteen-year-old high school senior, who already has the Chinese characters for “One’s responsibility is heavy and the journey is long” tattooed on his side. !ursday brings his next tattoo against my wishes. !en again, he’s just earned a combination of academic and soccer scholarships that will pay for his entire tuition next year. His responsibility will be heavy.

Seeing young women at MHC explain their decisions made me feel a tad bit better.

Melissa R. Vance ’84Moorestown, New Jersey

James E. Hartley is right to caution against making Mary Lyon into who we want her to be rather than taking her “on her own terms,” but we make a mistake if

we impoverish Lyon’s “own terms,” as the spring 2009 issue [Closer Look, p. 30] of the Alumnae !uarterly does. Because it misunderstands the religious revival that gave Lyon her spiritual bearings, the piece makes Lyon into a quaint antique rather than someone who still matters.

To assert that Lyon would “be appalled” by Mount Holyoke today because of a lack of “intense religious feeling” is to miss the fact that for Lyon, “intense religious feeling” meant more than going to chapel. Mary Lyon’s religious views were shaped by the Second Great Awakening and its signature notion of perfectibility. Perfectibility was the idea that, since human beings are created in the image of a perfect God, they have the potential to become perfect by removing impediments between themselves and God, which is to say, sin.

In New England, perfectibility was a social as well as individual idea: by removing impediments to God, communities could realize the Kingdom of God on earth. While actually achieving perfection was unlikely, human beings

should strive for it in the lifelong process that Lyon was talking about when she wrote of women’s role “in the great work of renovating the world.”

By turning to three random pages in the issue of the !uarterly featuring Hartley’s book, I note mini-biographies of graduating seniors who plan to work for conservation and the rights of indigenous peoples, a pro"le of a professor distributing "lms of cultural reclamation to Senegalese schoolchildren, and a feature on alumnae who work in public health in the United States and Africa. Surely a woman with Mary Lyon’s religious devotion would recognize that the college remains involved in “the great work of renovating the world” that mattered so much to her.

Chandra Miller Manning ’93Associate Professor of History, Georgetown UniversityWashington, DC

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campuscurrents

It is no accident that the peace and reconciliation that eluded Ireland during its decades-long “troubles” !nally came to pass in a new era “where women’s talents are "ooding every aspect of life as never before,” said Ireland President Mary McAleese in her commencement address to the class of 2009, which was broadcast live via the Internet.

tried to "y on one wing, and it has not been a pretty sight as it struggled with the downstream consequences of wasting the

talent and potential of that other wing, the women of the world,” she emphasized to the 566 women receiving degrees on May 24.

#e challenges for women, of the developing world especially, remain daunting, McAleese went on, and all who were awarded MHC degrees—including thirty-

one master’s degree recipient, twenty-four international students earning certi!cates, and three post-baccalaureate degree students—should

“go and do good, humanly upli$ing things that will not be done unless you do them.”

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her degree this year at the age of eighty-two and is believed to be the oldest person to graduate from MHC. #e !rst African-American to be hired in the Spring!eld, Massachusetts, public school system, she received a standing ovation and roar of appreciation from the audience.

Also receiving honorary degrees at MHC’s 172nd commencement were Princess

founder of E%at University, the !rst private university for women in Saudi Arabia; and Clare Waterman ’89, chief of

Tissue Morphodynamics at the National Institutes of

commencement speeches and a photo gallery, go to www.mtholyoke.edu/news/channels/27/stories/5681394.

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http://www.mtholyoke.edu/news/channels/27/stories/5681394


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As anybody who’s taken an anthropology or gender studies class with her knows, gender studies professor Chaia Heller likes YouTube, the video Web site. +at’s why, on the ,rst day of the seminar, I wasn’t surprised that she showed a funny video clip examining the ways in which women are targeted by television ads for American yogurt.

Since then, we’ve seen everything from upsetting

malnourished infants to US television ads touting the bene,ts (or at least minimizing the risks) of high-fructose corn syrup.

Multimedia clips, like those from YouTube, are especially helpful in a course like “Gender,

Global Context,” a subject largely ignored in scholarly discourse. Situated at the intersection of gender studies and anthropology, the class entails thinking critically about what exactly nourishes our bodies and why we choose the foods we do.

As women living in America, we examined the “health and beauty” norms prevalent in mainstream media; we used international case studies and ethnographies to deconstruct gendered food

practices around the world. Despite the lack of academic attention to the subject, our class never seemed to run out of things to talk about.

We examined Michael Pollan’s bestseller, !e Omnivore’s Dilemma; farmers’ use of genetically modi,ed organisms; and the intimate relationships between meal partners and sexual partners around the world. We examined American ideals of whiteness and thinness (especially among women),

and Japanese mothers’ painstaking practice of making traditional obentos, the highly specialized lunchboxes for preschool-age children.

Presentations by groups of three or four students encouraged the class to

of patriarchal government structure one week, and international breastfeeding practices another. Heller’s lectures functioned as a jumping-o- point for lively

class discussions, and were always illustrated with YouTube clips.

We found that it is hard to separate ourselves from themes as pervasive in real life as food and gender, especially when they’re so inextricably linked. So we talked endlessly on, through our breaks, and a.er class. We sensed an opportunity to inspire change on both a personal and social level.—Hannah Clay Wareham ’09

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Last spring, Emma Angus ’11 researched how releasing a cheese factory’s e!uent into the La Cuecha River in Costa Rica a"ected worms and insects downstream. For a recycling project, Kelsey Russell ’10 made a “life-changing” trip to a Costa Rican land#ll, where people lived and collected recyclables for resale.

Both MHC students were participants in Global-Local

Challenges to Sustainability: $e Costa Rican Experience, a new #%een-week, study-abroad program focused on sustainability and environmental science. Based at the Monteverde Institute, which hugs the Monteverde Cloud Forest Reserve, a natural science and ecotourism hotspot, the program is cosponsored by MHC and Goucher College. To read more about their experiences, and see photos, go to alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/costarica.

Researchers know lizards that shed their tails to avoid predators risk infection, lose valuable energy reserves, and even sex appeal. Nevertheless, in the face of death a foreshortened back end may seem a small price, as tail regeneration is swi%.

But Gary Gillis, a biology professor at MHC, and his former student Lauren Bonvini ’07 wondered if there weren’t other hazards for the lizard awaiting a new tail. For example, what happens when the reptile in question tries to jump (a common transportation mode for animals living in trees)?

Turns out, distance and speed are not a"ected, but in-&ight stability is profoundly altered. Check the video at http://blog.wired.com/wiredscience/2009/02/leapinglizards.html to see a comparison between landings of a green anole with and without a tail. Heartbreaking—and completely fascinating.

Gillis and Bonvini published their #ndings in the Journal of Experimental Biology.

$e changing nature of interdisciplinary studies, and shi%ing faculty and student interests coalesced this spring into the decision to eliminate American studies as a major at MHC.

Conceived of by the Pulitzer Prize–winning historian William McFeely, who taught at MHC for sixteen years beginning in 1970, American studies became the place for English, history, politics, and religion scholars to indulge their interdisciplinary interests, said Don Weber, professor of English and current cochair of the program.

But over the years, cultural studies became routine within the traditional departments, and the need for “cross-fertilization” in a special place was no longer necessary. Too, Weber said, as scholars identi#ed with American studies became interested in other areas, such as gender and #lm studies, teaching those subjects within their own departments became the norm.

“$e disciplines are becoming more interdisciplinary,” he said. M

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campuscurrents

“!ere is almost no di"erence in courses that are housed in departments and those that are housed in American studies.”

Weber hopes that the program will eventually be reimagined by a younger group of faculty members, and that it might be called ethnic studies or transnational studies.

“American studies is not dead,” he added, “but on hold.”

Few current students are a"ected. !e three American studies majors in the class of 2009 and eight in the class of 2010 will have their majors honored. A#er that, interested students will create their own special major.—M.H.B.

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Students from diverse !elds in the arts, humanities, sciences, and social sciences shared their independent research projects in spring at the annual Senior Symposium.

One participant, Marissa Sicley ’09, investigated the di"erences in the growth, sense of self, and coping strategies between women who had experienced individual traumas and those who had experienced group-based traumas. Her results were surprising.

A psychology and theater double major from Turners Falls, Massachusetts, Sicley’s project, “Pathways to Collective Identities: A Mixed-Method Examination of Post-Traumatic Cognitions, Group Identity, and Sense of Self,” involved forty-two female participants recruited from local Hampshire County. Each had experienced either a man-made or

natural group disaster, or an interpersonal trauma such as abuse or rape. Participants completed a questionnaire they received in the mail; six of those women were randomly selected for a personal, in-depth interview.

Sicley’s expectation, based on previous research in the !eld, was that survivors of traumas like natural or man-made disasters would experience more connectedness, a heightened sense of belonging, and a higher collective self-esteem than survivors of traumas like rape or sexual abuse. What she found was decidedly di"erent.

“#ose who had experienced collective traumas believed that they engaged in behaviors that controlled what happened to them more than those who had not experienced collective traumas,” said Sicley. In addition, those who experienced natural or man-made disasters felt more self-blame than those whose trauma had been interpersonal.

Sicley says one possible explanation for her !ndings is that people who believe they have control over their situations naturally blame themselves when traumatic events happen to them, regardless of the nature of the event.

“#is attribution of responsibility may make the person feel more aware of how to prevent a situation in the future, even if the situation was actually beyond their control.”—M.H.B.

Mount Holyoke sophomore Emily Yates was the winner of the eighty-sixth annual Kathryn Irene Glascock ’22 Intercollegiate Poetry

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Competition in April. Chosen anonymously to compete by the faculty-student Glascock Committee, Yates read her work in front of a general audience and three poet-judges.

#e contest was started in 1923 with a gi0 from the parents of Kathryn Irene Glascock ’22 as a memorial to their daughter, who died soon a0er graduation. Glascock had been a promising poet. Part of the appeal of the competition is to experience, at least for a moment, the life of a poet among peers, and to soak up the spirit of many renowned poets who have participated in the contest in years past.

Yates, an English major from North Carolina, says she has been writing poetry for as long as she can remember. She and half a dozen undergraduate poets were given ten minutes to read their poetry aloud. In addition to MHC, poets represented American University, Bennington College, Smith College, University of Pittsburgh, and Yale University.

#e poet-judges were Erica Dawson, author of Big-Eyed A!aid; Rachel Hadas, author of River of Forgetfulness; and Baron Wormser, author of "e Road Washes Out in Spring. Judges in the past have included Robert Frost, James Merrill, William Meredith, Marianne Moore, Richard Wilbur, and Louise Bogan. Sylvia Plath submitted an entry in 1955, the year she graduated from Smith. To read poems by Yates, go to www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/yates.—M.H.B.

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http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/yates

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campuscurrents

Rower Sarah Gray ’09 wrote, “!ere is no greater terror or joy than to take the whole sum of who you are and express it in four minutes.” Writhing in pain and gasping … for oxygen, the experience “may not sound like fun. It isn’t fun. It is totally ful"lling.”

Gray was honored by the Alumnae Association with this year’s Scholar-Athlete Award. A neuroscience and behavior major, Gray’s rowing achievements are many.

In 2007, her boat placed fourth in the senior open 8 at the United States Rowing National Regatta. In 2008, she won a bronze medal in the lightweight intermediate

pair event at the National Regatta and stroked the winning varsity 8 at the Seven Sisters Championship. In 2009, she was selected to the NEWMAC All Conference Championship. She stroked the sixth-best Division III varsity 8 at the New England Championship Regatta.

Gray last year also received the Bernice MacLean Award for excellence in biology, and was a summer science research fellow; a member of Psi Chi (the national honor society for psychology); and a Rhodes Scholarship "nalist.

“Sarah is a born leader,” said Jeanne Friedman, MHC rowing coach. “She is driven to do whatever needs to be done to be the best she can be—and her ‘can do’ spirit spreads to those around her.”

MHC’s new outdoor track and "eld facility is getting noticed. !e college has been selected to host the 2009 NCAA Division III "eld hockey national championships November 21 and 22. “Our beautiful

new facility is living proof that ‘If you build it, they will come,’” said Laurie Priest, MHC director of athletics. In April, the college hosted the NEWMAC Men’s and Women’s Track and Field Championships for the "rst time in ten years. !e state-of-the-art outdoor facility was completed last year.

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ith dust storms swirling above, explosives dropping in the evenings, and the Army rolling

in, Air Force Major Kimberly Calcutt Mc!ueen ’99 sat atop Saddam Hussein’s former private terminal at the Baghdad airport in the summer of 2007, maintaining the communications network for Air Force personnel deployed there and preparing to set up communications services for a newly arrived Army battalion. In the next four months she would connect the Iraqi police force with U.S. forces and expand General Petraeus’s communications network.

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Despite the danger and pressure of the assignment, Mc!ueen rel-ished the opportunity to use her skills. “"e military places a high value on knowledge and advanced education,” says Mc!ueen, “but we spend so much time training that sometimes it’s nice to actually get out there and do the job.”

Despite the training, Mc!ueen admits that she never expected to #nd herself dodging mortars at the Baghdad Airport, or taking shelter from falling bombs in a bunker before continuing her communications networking tasks.

Mc!ueen confesses that it was the scholarship money o$ered in exchange for participating in the ROTC unit at UMass that initially drew her into the military. Her plan was to gain a few years of practical experience and retire to the private technology sector. Instead, she says, she found a community where her skills are highly valued, her professional development is encouraged, and she’s given the opportunity to lead.

A%er ten years in the military, Mc!ueen says it’s a thrill to put on her uniform every day. “I feel empowered. I feel a sense of pur-pose. Most of all I feel like I’m making a di$erence in the world, and I can’t imagine a life I’d want more.”

According to a recent Rasmussen Poll, nearly 80 percent of Americans now view the US military favorably. Despite the high level of support, if you ask most civilians what life is like in the military, they conjure images only of boot camp and Iraq.

"e advent of an all-volunteer service and the elimination of ROTC programs on many private college campuses following the Vietnam War created a gap between military personnel and the average citizen. For Mount Holyoke women in uniform, this gap can feel like a chasm. While their classmates enter civilian careers as lawyers, teachers, and investment bankers, at least three-dozen Mount Holyoke alumnae are currently pursuing professional opportunities in the military.

“If you told me while I was at MHC that I’d end up in the Army, I would have laughed and said you were crazy,” says Army Major Catherine Kimball-Eayrs ’93, who entered Mount Holyoke with dreams of becoming a doctor. A%er failing to land a spot at one of her top-choice medical schools, she considered her options.

“My dad was a member of the military medical corps, but I never connected the military with a professional career,” she recalls. “A%er looking into the Uniformed Medical School, I realized that the military could be the path to the career I wanted as a physician.”

At www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/militaryalumnae, you can sample Catherine Kimball-Eayrs’s life as a military physician by reading her blog posts, and #nd links to information on women in the US military from the Revolutionary War to oral histories of current servicewomen.

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http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/militaryalumnae


Kimball-Eayrs graduated in 1999 with an MD and an Army commission. She expected to complete her required seven years of service in return for her medi-cal degree, leave the military, and work as a civilian physician. Ten years later, she is still in the Army, and is a pediatrician and working mother. Having found increased professional opportunities in the Army, Kimball-Eayrs recently recommitted to another tour.

While popular culture associates military life almost solely with combat operations, most military careers happen away from the battle!eld. Teams of professionals, from engineers to accoun-tants, provide the infrastructure key to achieving the military’s mission. Others address the challenges of providing everything from health care to groceries for some 1.5 million active-duty personnel and their families.

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For example, in her role as director of base medical services at NATO Air Base Geilenkirchen, Germany, Air Force Lt. Colo-nel Melanie Carino ’92 coordinates the care of more than 4,000 U.S. military and government personnel and their dependents.

“I am e!ectively running a branch of a managed-care organiza-tion,” says Carino, noting that with a budget of over $37 billion in 2009, the military healthcare system is one of the largest in the US.

Increased career opportunities for women in traditionally male-dominated "elds is another bene"t of military life, alumnae say. A computer scientist and communications systems special-ist, Mc#ueen explains that, because evaluation methods are uniform and focused speci"cally on the quality of your work, the requirements for advancement are more objective in the military than in civilian jobs.

Says Mc#ueen, “You’re given a tremendous opportunity to shine when you know that your success is based on your perfor-mance. $at’s exactly the sort of meritocracy I learned to aspire to at Mount Holyoke.”

$e military’s current strategic plans focus its mission increas-ingly on humanitarian and peacekeeping missions. From combating yellow fever in Central America to providing relief to the victims of the 2004 South Asian tsunami to distributing food aid in Africa, according to the State Department, the U.S. military engages in humanitarian projects in over 100 countries in any given year. However, with two wars currently under way, combat operations are still a core element of military life.

Kimball-Eayrs experienced the front lines directly when she deployed to the infamous Iraqi “triangle of death” in September 2006 to provide medical support to an Army combat brigade. $e deployment was not only an opportunity for Kimball-Eayrs to sharpen her medical skills. As one of 150 women in a group of more than 5,000 and the most senior female, it also o!ered a chance to demonstrate her leadership abilities.

“You can’t back down in that sort of situation. People are relying on you for more than just your skills; you also need to set an example,” she says. “I drew on the con"dence and strength that I developed at Mount Holyoke not only to succeed as the lone female in the group, but also to serve as a leader.”

Day-to-day life in the military can be di%cult. Deployments are coming on shorter notice and lasting longer, budget cuts require personnel to do more with less, and duty stations are typically changed every two to three years, keeping many constantly on the move.

“It’s very hard to commit to staying in the military as a mom,” says Kimball-Eayrs. “You can’t escape the fact that you’re going to be sent away from home for extended periods of time.” In this instance, the equity in performance standards described by Mc#ueen can create an extra burden for soldiers with families. “If you want to get promoted, you need to do the same things as any other o%cer; that includes deployments,” says Kimball-Eayrs, whose fourteen-month deployment to Iraq in September 2006 came when her children were three years and thirteen months old.

For Major Shawna Doherty ’98 (USAFR), that lack of control over time at home was the primary reason she transferred to the

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reserves and a civilian job. “I expected to serve a full career in the active-duty military,” says Doherty, who was commissioned as an Air Force o!cer following her Mount Holyoke and ROTC graduation. Upon returning from a deployment to Afghanistan, Doherty married a civilian and realized that the stability she wanted to build a family wasn’t in the cards if she continued her military career.

Now a consultant, Doherty confesses that the most di!cult part of the transition from active-duty to civilian life relates to how she’s viewed as a woman in the workplace. As a military o!cer, Doherty was guaranteed the respect accorded her rank. As a civil-ian, she has struggled to achieve that same equality.

Doherty also misses the strong sense of community in the military, and what she describes as a culture focused on develop-ing individuals. “I always felt that I was surrounded by people who wanted me to succeed when I was at Mount Holyoke, and I found the same culture echoed in the military.”

Despite the increasing opportunities for women in the military described by alumnae, there are still chances to break barriers. Women account for just 15 percent of the force, and post-Vietnam-era female o!cers are only beginning to "ll the ranks of generals and admirals.

“Mount Holyoke women have a tremendous opportunity to contribute to shaping military culture, because we’re smart and ambitious,” says Doherty. However, o!cers must leave personal politics at the door to do their jobs e#ectively. “Members of the military don’t make policy; that’s up to civilian leaders,” notes Mc$ueen. “Our job is to support those decisions; we implement that policy.” %at’s di!cult at times for an overachieving Mount Holyoke woman, particularly since the college trains students to advocate for their opinions.

Even though the alumnae interviewed credit their Mount Holy-oke education for their military success, on the whole they agree that the MHC community’s support for their career choice is limited. %ey said professors had refused them recommendations

and some classmates and faculty had taunted them for choosing the military. One alumna said a classmate spat on her the day she wore her ROTC uniform to a history class.

Like many private colleges, Mount Holyoke does not maintain an ROTC unit on campus; students wishing to participate join the unit at UMass. Although military representatives do come to cam-pus, some may have been discouraged from recruiting by Mount Holyoke’s policy of asking all organizations recruiting on campus to complete an acknowledgment of nondiscrimination or to discuss with students why they can’t sign the statement. Doherty argues that the lack of support at MHC for military careers limits graduates’ opportunities for jobs and inhibits their understand-ing of the military. “Members of the military aren’t born in Petri dishes,” she says; “they re&ect the values of the communities they come from.”

Beyond the professional possibilities, alumnae say they serve in the military because they "nd a sense of honor and purpose in serving their country.

Describing how she was inspired by Mary Lyon’s call to public service, Carino says that she wanted to serve a cause greater than herself. She considered leaving the military several times to pursue a larger paycheck in the private sector, but realized that a higher salary would not equal the personal satisfaction of doing a job she describes as important.

“I realized that the culture and the values of the organization were as important to me as the work,” says Carino. Describing the mili-tary as a nonpro"t organization, she argues that service members give full e#ort to their jobs not to improve the bottom line, but because so many people rely on them. “In the Air Force we follow a set of core values: integrity "rst, service before self, excellence in all we do,” says Carino. “Our entire mission is to serve others.”

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A young alumna’s discovery in Yellowstone National Park is causing a stir far beyond its gates and has sobering implications for the future of the planet.

For nearly $ve years, Sarah McMenamin ’04 has been con-ducting research on a subspecies of tiger salamander, called Ambystoma tigrinum, as part of her doctoral thesis at Stanford University. %e salamanders are robust little creatures that have &ourished for thousands of years in vernal pools and kettle ponds formed by glaciers.

McMenamin was charged with comparing the salamander’s habitat and population to a survey conducted in 1992–93. Guided by wetland sensing data prepared by survey coauthor Christopher Wright, she looked at an area of Yellowstone 10 km in radius that contained forty-nine ponds. What she found was alarming. In 1992–93, twenty-six of the forty-nine ponds contained amphibians. Now only $'een did, a decline of nearly 50 percent. Moreover, the ponds themselves were disappearing.

“I remember standing there in the $eld, comparing the map of 1992–93 with the landscape in front of me and realizing the two were very di(erent,” she says. “It was exciting, because I knew the information we were getting was important, but at the same time, it was very disturbing, because of the implications for the environment.”

Because the ponds surveyed were not fed by streams or rivers and were re$lled only by snow melt, rainfall, and the local aquifer, the animals’ decline could not be explained by the usual factors—such as wells, irrigation, or dams—that can draw down water tables and change habitat in less isolated areas.

Check out the media cover-age Sarah McMenamin’s work prompted, and see the transpar-ent “crystal” salamanders she discovered, at www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/smcmenamin.

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“+e fact that we’re seeing this severe a decrease in an isolated area, in one of the best-protected areas in the country, which has minimal to no human development, implies that the e,ects of global warming are everywhere,” said McMenamin.

Amphibians are well-known indicators of climate change, accord-ing to J. Alan Pounds, resident scientist of the Tropical Science Center in Costa Rica. “We can expect mass extinction in amphib-ians and a wide range of other species, if global warming continues on its present course.”

McMenamin comes to her passion for science naturally. Father Mark is professor of geology and geography at MHC, and mother Dianna is a planetary geologist. +e Cambrian explosion and evolutionary history were frequent topics around the dinner table as Sarah grew up, and she loved tagging along on her dad’s -eld trips. She spent a lot of time outdoors, frequently bringing home snakes and turtles.

Being homeschooled taught her the value of hard work and enthusiasm, she says. “If something sparked my interest, I pursued it. I learned to answer my own questions, and spent a lot of time in Williston Library, reading.”

When McMenamin entered MHC, she recalls being certain “I did not want to go into science. +at was what my parents did, and I wanted to strike out on my own in some creative, artistic -eld like writing or painting,” she said. But an introductory course in biol-ogy soon drew her in.

“+e biology department was extremely stimulating for a budding researcher, and … I was able to pursue research at a very early stage in my career. I was a TA for my adviser Je, Knight and Craig Woodard for two semesters of their Genetics and Molecular Biol-ogy class, which was a fantastic experience,” she wrote in an e-mail. “I also spent two semesters doing independent research with [former faculty member] Diane Kelly.” Internships at the Howard Hughes undergraduate research training program at MHC in summer 2000 and at the NASA Ames Center in California in 2003 cemented her enthusiasm for research.

“+e camaraderie of working with other people on a common goal is a very powerful thing,” she said. “+ere’s a sense of teamwork and a feeling of satisfaction you get when you ask intelligent ques-tions and -nd out the answers. I was hooked.”

A.er graduating from MHC, she decided to explore developmen-tal biology at Stanford. “Transitional states fascinate me,” she said. “Amphibians live compellingly distinct lives in adulthood and childhood, in water and on land. +ey inhabit a particular eco-logical niche, marginal areas that push them to modify and adapt.”

Biologist Elizabeth Hadly, McMenamin’s thesis adviser at Stan-ford, says McMenamin has all the characteristics of a dynamic scientist. “What makes Sarah so amazing is that she is intensely

curious and totally focused on her subject, amphibians,” she said. “It can be a little touch-and-go when you put students in the -eld for the -rst time. Some are great researchers in the lab, and ask really good questions. But put them out in the -eld, where conditions can be i,y, and they fall apart. I think Sarah was terri-ed at -rst, but she absolutely fell in love with the work, started -nding stu,, and never looked back.”

Since October 2008, when McMenamin’s paper on amphibians in Yellowstone was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, she’s become a bit of a celebrity. Newspapers and Web sites picked up the story, and she has been interviewed by USA Today, the BBC, Disco!ery, Scienti"c American, and ABC, among others.

“It was exciting at -rst, but it certainly cut into my productiv-ity,” she said. She may have to get used to it. Just a few months ago, on a routine -eld survey, she discovered a completely new type of salamander living in two Yellowstone ponds. She’s

calling them “crystal salamanders” because they are completely transparent. “Sarah called me at home, she was so excited when she found them,” says Hadly. “Yellowstone has been studied up the wazoo, but here are these salamanders that nobody has ever known about. It makes the case for preserving this habitat even more compelling.”

Currently, McMenamin is collaborating with Pounds and Hadly on a chapter in an upcoming science publication and writing up her discovery of the “crystal” salamanders. And she successfully defended her doctoral thesis in May.

McMenamin says of her work, “Hopefully, as our and other research is publicized, and public awareness increases, we will become more sensitive to the needs of the populations we share our planet with. I think it will be very di/cult to dra. legisla-tion that will e,ect real change, let alone -nd a way to imple-ment it. I do know the solution has to be multifaceted, and come from a stronger sense of stewardship of the land and of the planet.”

16-23mtho_sum09.indd 17 7/20/09 8:29:10 AM


the Harriet L. and Paul M. Weissman Center for Leadership and the Liberal Arts celebrates

its tenth anniversary this year, its impact as a vibrant hive for teaching, learning, and social action at Mount Holyoke contin-ues to grow. Operating out of a few o!ces in Porter Hall, the center has insinuated itself into many aspects of academic life on campus, has established bonds with the surrounding commu-nity, and promises to be a source of new approaches to creative pedagogy in higher education nationally.

“Our idea was to get our tentacles into as many classrooms, as many faculty gatherings, as many student gatherings as possible, and to really encourage and shape campus conversations,” said Christopher Benfey in a recent interview. Benfey, a respected literary critic and author who is also Mellon Professor of Eng-lish, codirected the Weissman Center from 2000 to 2004.

Many colleges and universities contain institutions charged with performing some of the tasks that the Weissman Center does, such as bringing speakers to campus, helping students with their

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writing, and promoting community engagement by placing students in internships and service learning opportunities. But the magic of the Weissman Center is that it has also doggedly and energetically grappled with big-picture questions, such as: What role can a liberal arts education play in building leadership skills? How does one go about broadening students’ perspec-tives and instilling in them a drive for social relevance? How can educators everywhere prepare women to rise to the highest echelons of their chosen "elds by being agents of change? By combining the discrete tasks it performs into a coherent whole, the Weissman Center has become a force for integrative think-ing at Mount Holyoke.

Lois A. Brown, who steps down this summer as director a#er four and a half years, described some of the components of the Weissman Center and the strategies it uses to advance its overarching ideals. $e Speaking, Arguing, and Writing (SAW)

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And of course there are free, public events with speakers who are always fascinating and usually famous in their !elds. "e Weiss-man Center carefully calibrates these lectures and symposia to tie into the curriculum in as many classes as possible. Featured guests meet with students and faculty in small-group settings, o#en engaging directly with concerns relevant to what students are working on at the time. Semester and yearlong themes such as “Family Matters,” “Migrations,” and “Geographies of Color” give professors in any department the opportunity to design course o$erings or syllabi that relate to the work of the writers, activists, broadcasters, political !gures, and artists of many stripes who come to South Hadley in fairly rapid succession each term. "ese have included leading thinkers like veteran newswoman Charlayne Hunter-Gault, the late literary theorist and activist Susan Sontag, crusading author on public education Jonathan Kozol, writer and activist Barbara Ehrenreich, and architect Daniel Libeskind.

Before assuming the directorship, Brown, an associate professor of English, turned one of her introductory literature, culture, and critical theory courses into a writing-intensive course. “Peer learners and mentors make safe spaces for sometimes very nerve-racking moments,” explains Brown. Mika Weissbuch ’11

(AND WIDE) IMPACT

By Eric Goldscheider

program prepares a cadre of about forty peer mentors who fan out across campus to work with fellow students, o#en assisting professors in specially designed speaking- and writing-intensive courses. "ere is also the Community-Based Learning (CBL) program, which sends Mount Holyoke women o$ campus in ways that are structured to complement and buttress their course-work. At the end of each academic year, the Weissman Center hosts the Senior Symposium, at which members of the graduating class showcase intellectual passions, independent projects, and scholarly research.

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describes becoming a peer mentor as a time of enormous growth. “I learned to really step into my voice and become aware of what I was thinking and why I was thinking that way,” said Weissbuch. Beyond that, she said, “the Weissman Center has been an es-sential part of my education and informs the work I do in the community ... I have learned the importance of really under-standing what others believe before I pass judgment or conjure up suggestions.”

Speaking Up for WomenFrom its inception in 1999, a guiding principle of the center has been that honing basic oral and written communication abilities is crucial to e!ective leadership. Concomitant with this were the twin ideas that competent speaking and writing, no matter how elegantly deployed, can be vacuous without a strong foundation in knowledge; and that activism without artful presentation risks being soulless and ine!ective. "e Weissman Center was born of a marriage between two #edgling initiatives. "e SAW program was already experimenting with new ways of teaching written and oral communication, such as role playing, in-char-acter recreations of historical events, debates, and the greater use of oral exams. "e big idea linking it to what was then called the Center for Leadership and Public Interest Advocacy was that form and content were inextricably related.

“"ere was a concern, especially as a women’s college, that we had a particular obligation to teach women to be assertive, to be able to arrive at a position on the basis of knowledge and to argue for it with authority,” said Professor of Philosophy Lee Bowie. “"at was much of the motivation from the faculty for the creation of these two programs.” Bowie, whose $elds include the philosophy of the mind and of logic, was one of the found-ing co-directors, along with Eva Paus, an economics professor who now leads MHC’s McCulloch Center for Global Initia-tives.

When Benfey and his co-director, Profes-sor of German Studies Karen Remmler, took the reins in 2000, they set out to solidify the bonds between the SAW program and the public events mission of the center. “Our vision was to make

the programming an opportunity for people from di!erent walks of life, from di!erent disciplines and professions, to come together and have public conversations around an issue,” said Remmler. She and Benfey organized a yearlong theme, ending in the spring of 2005, called “Water Matters: Survival for the 21st Century.” Including exhibits, it had more than a dozen public events linked to courses with nine professors in $ve departments. Benfey describes as almost missionary zeal his and Remmler’s drive to have a lasting impact on the campus as a whole. “We wanted to be a force in the classroom, we wanted to be a force in the lives of faculty, we wanted to provoke,” he said.

"e SAW program is now headed by Laura Green$eld, who teaches a course each semester designed to educate new peer mentors about underlying theories they can draw on to become e!ective partners in the learning process. “We look for women who really understand the reciprocal nature of their work,” said Green$eld. A measure of the impact the program has on the college as a whole is that about two dozen faculty o!er speak-ing- and writing-intensive courses each semester that employ a SAW peer mentor. And in the last academic year, nearly 40 percent of Mount Holyoke women used the SAW Center, a drop-in resource located in the library, making more than 1,270 appointments. “"at is a phenomenally huge number compared to what I’ve seen at other institutions,” said Green$eld. She is bringing some of the ideas developed in the SAW program into a wider arena by encouraging her students to present papers at professional meetings. In November Mount Holyoke will host “the $rst and only conference speci$cally devoted to peer men-toring and writing,” said Green$eld. “We’ll have hundreds of people from across the country and perhaps the world coming to talk about our work.”

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Rebekka Lee ’04, who is pursuing a master’s degree at the Harvard School of Public Health, looks back at her mentoring experience as an important part of her education. One of the reasons the SAW program has such a great impact is its scale, according to Lee. “So many classes had a writing mentor [that] any student was probably going to have a mentor in at least one class, especially if she started in 2002 or later,” she said.

Reaching a Broader Community Alan Bloomgarden coordinates the Community-Based Learn-ing program, which predated the Weissman Center but is now under its umbrella. !is is another way in which the center’s reach extends deeply into the college as a whole. !ere are between twelve and "#een CBL courses each year, with a total of about 200 students, in which faculty speci"cally build some form of community engagement into their curriculum.

Also, the center employs community fellows who are paid to work with area organizations through initiatives such as the Ho-lyoke Corps, which works with students in the public schools of an economically stressed city; and Girls Inc., a national nonpro"t organization with local chapters that teach life skills to girls. “!e most sophisticated and productive conception of CBL is one that involves engaging students in citizenship development and leadership,” said Bloomgarden. “!e match between the CBL program and the leadership orientation of the Weissman Center is an excellent one because we want students to become change agents.”

Emma Fialka-Feldman ’11 describes herself as being “passionate about getting more people into leadership [and] a big fan of the Weissman Center... because it challenges students and faculty to think about leadership in holistic ways.” She attends all the public lectures and recently took Educational Psychology, a course with a CBL component through which she tutored chil-dren and helped out in enrichment programs at the Donahue Elementary School in Holyoke. !e experience “really gave me the opportunity to re$ect on what we learned in class about what it means to motivate students and what that looks like,” said Fialka-Feldman.

Linzy Brekke-Aloise ’98 graduated a year before the Weiss-man Center was formally launched. Today, a professor of early American history at Stonehill College, Brekke-Aloise o#en speaks with prospective students about MHC. !e Weissman Center, she said, is a big selling point. She participated in the discussions in the mid to late 1990s that led to the formation of the center. “!ere was a very strong [feeling] that one of the bene"ts of a women’s college was the creation of female leaders who are not afraid to speak up and to speak out, but that there needed to be a formal, structured way of promoting that,” said Brekke-Aloise. She got to know Harriet Levine Weissman ’58, who with her husband, Paul, made a $4 million founding gi#,

and still views her as a model of the kind of leader the college aspires to produce. “Harriet is a force in public life and an amaz-ing philanthropist,” said Brekke-Aloise. “One of the things I "nd most fascinating about her is that she is genuinely interested in all things Mount Holyoke, a remarkable quality in an alumna who has been graduated for several decades.”

Brekke-Aloise is struck by the relevance of the Weissman Center’s founding principles to issues facing higher education more generally. “Women are still struggling to feel comfortable and competent making public arguments,” she said. “Even in the classroom they want to quietly build consensus rather than say, ‘!is is what I think, this is the argument that I want to make.’ Women hang back quite a lot.” Now that enrollment trends show that women outnumber men in many coeducational insti-tutions, administrators are wrestling with how best to empower women’s voices. “Mount Holyoke and institutions like the

Weissman Center have a very strong leadership role to play in guiding other institutions of higher learning about how

best to educate women,” said Brekke-Aloise. “!ey know how to do it, and in many ways coeducational institutions do not.”

Looking back at an illustrious decade of programming and pioneering pedagogy during tenth anniversary celebrations this spring, Harriet Weissman said, “Paul and I are deeply privileged, proud, and honored to have our names attached to the center.”F

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Links to a decade of Weissman-Center-sponsored speakers—including writer Susan Sontag, EPA head Carol Browner, dancer/choreographer Trisha Brown, education “crusader” Jona-than Kozol, and international activist Naomi Tutu—and information about the center’s many programs are at www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/weissmanctr.

16-23mtho_sum09.indd 21 7/20/09 3:08:45 PM

http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/weissmanctr


I was a student on the committee of faculty, sta! and students you formed in 1996 to develop the Plan for 2003. We spent a lot of time working on the college mission that year. Knowing what you know now, how would that mission statement be di!erent? Eliza-beth O’Donoghue ’97

I’m proud that we were able to boil down the College’s mis-sion into a single sentence: it warms my heart as an English professor! "e key elements in that sentence—academic excellence, diverse residential community of women, liberal arts, and purposeful engage-ment in the world—are still the touchstones of Mount Holyoke today. I wouldn’t change a word.

What is the biggest chal-lenge facing the College today and what’s being done about it? Melinda A. Mann ’79

Without a doubt, the current economic environ-ment is providing the greatest challenge that colleges and universities have seen, prob-ably since the Great Depres-sion. We’re doing all we can to contain costs, but we know we can’t cut our way back to equilibrium without seriously hurting educational quality. So our challenge over the next few years will be to grow revenue to maintain Mount Holyoke’s academic excellence.

By any measure, the stu-dents at MHC today are every bit as strong as they were a generation ago, and we’ve been receiving more applications over the past few years than at any time in institutional history. Like you, most people in the MHC community are passionate about both aca-demic excellence and women’s education, and I wouldn’t want to compromise on either. We’ve yet to see any data that suggests that co-education would improve Mount Holy-oke’s academic quality, or its ranking.

What’s your take on the fu-ture of women’s colleges? Did your view change in any way during your tenure at MHC? Carol Sliwa ’80

I freely admit that I came to Mount Holyoke with some skepticism about single-sex education, but I will leave a convert. I think there will be a continuing place for women’s colleges in the United States for one simple reason: they work. One of the most inspiring parts of my Mount Holyoke career has been our involvement in Women’s Education Worldwide. While women’s colleges in the United States may be a countertrend, there are young Mary Lyons around the globe starting brand new women’s colleges in our image where they are most needed—places like Kenya, Sudan, Zimbabwe, Saudi Ara-bia, Dubai, Bahrain, Bangla-desh, and Pakistan. And they, too, will change the world for the better.

the professions and to career success. We need to make sure that we keep the cur-riculum relevant and that we help employers and students recognize its value. "is is one of the drivers behind our new Nexus program, which will connect the liberal arts classroom with experiences beyond the gates.

Why do you think we have fallen further in ranking than either Wellesley or Smith? And why have we fallen so far below Wellesley? Anonymous

US News rankings re#ect institutional wealth more than any other factor, includ-ing educational quality. Mount Holyoke will always be disadvantaged compared to wealthier peers. If their methodology looked at real measures of academic strength and educational outcomes, Mount Holyoke’s position would no doubt rise. But such things are not easily quanti$ed, and we must not forget that the real motivation behind these rankings is to sell magazines—I’ve long been a critic of the damage these bogus rankings have done to higher education.

Although I strongly be-lieve in single-sex education, I think it is outdated and ar-chaic, and has signi$cantly al-tered the quality of applicants and matriculating students at MHC. What does President Creighton think about MHC going co-ed, to maintain its competitive position, and to actually elevate its rankings relative to other small liberal arts colleges? Susan Sokalner Dickstein ’71

What new requirements are necessary for a successful MHC president, and if you were serving on the interview committee, what are the most important traits and skills you would wish to see? Katherine Gleeson Wallin ’59

"ere are many ways to be an e!ective college president. Fundamentally, though, to lead Mount Holyoke one must appreciate and privilege the College’s raison d’etre, its academic program and its outstanding faculty. At the same time, the president is the CEO of a complex organi-zation and must do all the things that good managers do: hire well, plan, execute those plans, and balance the budget.

How can a women’s col-lege stay viable in the weak economy, which threatens to push students toward “marketable degrees”? (yuck! "e term leaves a bad taste in my mouth!)—Dee Drummey Boling ’88

"e question is really less about being a women’s college, and more about the state of the liberal arts. With families under greater $nancial pres-sure, students have every reason to insist that their college education should help them $nd a job, as well as lead a productive, ful$lling life. "e liberal arts have histori-cally been the best route into

16-23mtho_sum09.indd 22 7/20/09 8:30:54 AM

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Of the new buildings, what’s her favorite and why? KC Maurer ’84

Mary Lyon said, “Stone and brick and mortar speak a language that vibrates in my very soul,” and I have to agree. I love all our new buildings, but the most satisfying for me has been the new residence hall, which is actually the only entirely new structure we’ve built during my presidency. I love the way it communicates with the both the landscape and the architectural heritage of campus. It’s state of the art, but it feels like it has always been there.

My classmates and I have always liked the fact that we were Joanne’s !rst !rsties, and are really happy that she’ll be with the College long enough to celebrate at our 10-year reunion with us! If I were having lunch with President Creighton, I think I’d like to ask her how her impressions of the students have changed over time, and what she’s learned about the kind of women who become Mount Holyoke alumnae. Katherine O’Brien ’00

While the faces have changed over the years, there has been a remarkable consis-tency in student values, ethos, and a"ect. I have learned a great deal from our students. I am deeply impressed by the incredible journeys so many of them have taken to get to the College—from inhospi-table settings such as a refugee camp in Algeria, or a village in Tibet, or a township in Zimbabwe—and the passion for learning and for making a positive di"erence in the world that so deeply infuses their lives.

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!e same logic can make movement itself seem impossible. To walk across a room, you must cross the "nal half of the room, but before that you must cross a quarter of it, and an eighth before that … But it is impossible to cross an in"nite number of "nite spaces. So you can’t move.

Nearly 400 years before Christ was born, Aristotle worried about this and other puzzles concerning in"nite divisibility. He was also worried about the in"nitely big. !e universe, he thought, couldn’t be in"nitely big. If it were, then half of it would also be in"nite. What makes the whole in"nite bigger than half of it? Apparently nothing; they’re both in"nite, so they must be the same size. But they can’t be the same size, since one is half of the other. Aristotle raises a number of other objec-tions, and concludes that the universe must be "nite. Looking at the stars above him, he concludes that space consists of a huge (but "nite) sphere with the earth at the center.

As soon as Aristotle suggested this, someone asked what was on the other side of the sphere. Still, the idea kept almost every-body happy for well over a thousand years, which is a pretty good run. In the third century BC, Archimedes calculated the number of grains of sand it would take to "ll Aristotle’s universe. In the Middle Ages, Saint !omas Aquinas endorsed Aristotle, and the view became the orthodoxy of the church.

!ings changed when Renaissance scientist Copernicus argued that the earth was not the center of the universe. People thought that maybe other things were wrong with Aristotle too, such as his ideas about a "nite universe. In the seventeenth century,

BY SAM MITCHELL

Almost the earliest pieces of writing we possess speculate and argue about the in"nite.Greek philosopher Zeno’s paradoxes are probably the earliest. One of them (written in the "#h century BC) concerns Achilles, $eetest of foot of all the Greeks, who is to run a race with a tortoise. He gives the tortoise a ten-meter start. He runs ten times as fast as the tortoise, but cannot ever overtake him. Why not?

By the time Achilles reaches the point where the tortoise began, the tortoise is ahead, by one meter.

By the time Achilles reaches the end of that one meter, the tortoise is still ahead, by ten centimeters.

By the time Achilles reaches the ten cen-timeters, the tortoise is still ahead, by one centimeter.

By the time Achilles reaches the one centime-ter, the tortoise is still ahead … And so on. !e series never reaches an end, and the tortoise is always ahead of Achilles. No matter how many races Achilles runs, the tortoise is still ahead by the time he’s reached the end. So Achilles can’t overtake the tortoise.

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Galileo was one of these dangerous thinkers, and he raised an independent puzzle about the in1nite. Roll a doughnut along its edge, which is about 30 cm long. At any time, only one point of the edge touches the table, and only one point of the circumfer-ence of the hole in the middle is above that point. So there are as many points along the edge as around the inner hole. But say the inner hole is 10 cm around. 2en there are as many points in 30 cm as there are in 10 cm. And if we have various freak dough-nuts with unusually small holes, there are as many points in 30 cm as there are in 1 cm, 1 mm, or the circumference of an atom.

Analogously, suppose you’re a desk clerk at the Hotel In1nity. All your in1nitely many rooms are full, but someone new turns up. Must you turn that person away? No. Move the occupant of room 1 to room 2; the occupant of room 2 to room 3, and so on. Room 1 is now vacant for your new person.

If in1nitely many new people show up, you can still be accom-modating. Room 1 goes to room 2, room 2 to room 4, room 3 to room 6 and so on. Since all the room numbers doubled, and thus became even numbers, you can now put the in1nitely many new people in the (now vacant) odd-numbered rooms. 2ere must be as many even numbers as there are numbers, since there are in1nite rooms, whether they are even- or odd-numbered. We can put all of the numbers, without residue, into just the “rooms” occupied by the even numbers.

Nineteenth-century mathematician Georg Cantor argued that this showed that there were numbers of numbers, and that this in1nite number of numbers was descriptive of many types of numbers. For example, the number of numbers was the same as the number of even numbers (and odd numbers, and primes, and multiples of a billion, etc.). It seems obvious, but it was not obvious to Aristotle, who was the word on this for a long time.

Cantor also proved that the number of fractions was equal to this in1nite number, which he called Aleph-null. Most remark-

ably, he proved (by what is called the diagonal argument, which is worth looking up) that there was more than one in1nite number. 2e number of points around the circumference of a doughnut is, in an important sense, greater than aleph-null, even though aleph-null is in1nitely big. He called this new number Aleph-one, and he conjectured, but could not prove, that there were no in1nite numbers in between Aleph-null and Aleph-one.

Cantor’s work met with considerable resistance, but eventually won the day, and is now almost universally accepted. Almost universally. 2ere remains a tiny minority of mathematicians called intuitionists, or constructivists, who don’t believe that we can really understand the idea of an in1nite totality. In the twentieth century, these were joined by philosophers, who questioned whether it is possible to understand Cantor’s view of in1nity.

I agree that we cannot completely understand the idea of the in1nite, but explaining why would take me, well not quite an in1nitely long time, but longer than this article allows.

Discuss in1nity (brie3y, or endlessly,) by posting comments at www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/in!nity. “Meet” Sam Mitchell at www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/misc/pro!le/smitchel.shtml.

24-29mtho_sum09.indd 25 7/20/09 3:12:42 PM

http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/misc/profile/smitchel.shtml


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By Kirstin Downey (Nan A. Talese)Before there was Hillary Clinton or Condoleezza Rice there was Frances Perkins (MHC 1902), secretary of labor under Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

-e .rst woman to hold a cabinet position, Perkins initiated sweeping changes to labor laws including the eight-hour workday, Social Security, and child-labor laws. In this biography, new light is shed on a largely forgotten .gure who was integral to the formation of the New Deal. Kirstin Downey is a Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist at the Washington Post.

By Kathy Emery, Linda Reid Gold, and Syl!ia Braselmann (Common Courage Press) In this book, Emery outlines the impact of the 1964 “freedom schools” in Mississippi that opened on back porches and in churches in 1964 to teach con.dence, voter literacy, and political organization to African American citizens long denied all three. It also serves as a case study illustrating the elements crucial to the success of a social movement that can inform present-day activists. Kathy Emery ’77 was a high school teacher for sixteen years, coauthored Why is Corporate America Bashing Our Schools, and is executive director of the San Francisco Freedom School.

Edited by Lynne Zacek Bassett (University Press of New England)-is treasury of Massachusetts’ historic quilts reveals both stitchers’ artistry and the times in which they lived. American history is revealed through quilting much earlier in Massachusetts than elsewhere, Bassett’s research

shows. Photographs of nearly 200 quilts are enhanced by stories putting their makers into political, social, and economic context. -e result combines extensive scholarship with celebration of ordinary people’s creativity. Among the quilts is one made to honor Emiline Cross’s 1854 graduation from MHC. (Read about it at alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/crossquilt.)Lynne Zacek Bassett ’83 is an independent scholar specializing in New England’s historic costume and textiles.

Edited by Heather Powers Albanesi and Carole Ann Camp (White River Press)Susan Daniels ’79 and Ivy Tillman ’83 are included in this collection of twenty-one personal essays regarding race relations and racism in the twenty-.rst century. In descriptions of events and memories, the authors provide personal accounts of their experiences with racism, and the realities that many Americans of color still face.

Susan Daniels ’79 is an executive recruiter for Deer"eld Associates, an executive search "rm in Wellesley, Massachusetts. Ivy Tillman FP’83 is a technical support and repair consultant at the MHC library.

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24-29mtho_sum09.indd 26 7/20/09 11:45:33 AM


By Amity Gaige (Random House) Social worker Charlie Shade is dogged by a sense of injustice and drawn into the lives of his mentally ill clients. Wife Alice, a soulful young woman, feels hemmed in by the demands of newborn daughters. Temptation and physical danger !gure into this poetic chronicle of complex personalities and the fragility of love and marriage. Amity Gaige is a visiting assistant professor of English at MHC. Her !rst no"el was Oh My Darling.

By Ayesha Harruna Attah (Per Ankh Publishers)"ree generations of African women struggle with family, matters of the heart, and life in an African nation rocked by political struggle and division. Among the characters are Lizzie-Achiaa, who runs away from home to !nd her missing lover; her !rst daughter, Akua Afriyie, who strikes out on her own as a single parent; and Sugri, Lizzie-Achiaa’s granddaughter, who goes to college in New York and learns about the real challenges of freedom. Ayesha Harruna Attah ’05 is a writer and journalist and has worked for the Accra Daily Mail, African Magazine, and Yachting Magazine.

By Sibella Giorello ("omas Nelson)"is novel about forensic geologist Raleigh Harmon !nds the special agent in Seattle during the dry season. Harmon must use her forensic skills to !nd a missing hiker, all the while trying to protect her own job. Sibella Connor Giorello ’85 is also the author of "e Stones Cry Out, which won a Christy Award. To read an excerpt #om "e Rivers Run Dry, go to www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/riversrun.

Cover Design: James W. Hall, JWH Graphic Arts

Original package design © 2008 Thomas Nelson, Inc.

Cover Photography: Getty & James W. Hall

When a routine case turns deadly, forensic geologist

Raleigh Harmon finds her career on the rocks . . .

and her life at stake.

Special Agent Raleigh Harmon is good at her job, but not as good at

bureau politics. As one of the few females on the team, she finds

herself in strange land when she’s transferred from Richmond to

drought-stricken Seattle. When a hiker suddenly goes missing and

a ransom note arrives, Raleigh realizes there’s no time for tran-

sitions. Vowing to find the missing college girl, she must rely

on her forensic geology skills to uncover the truth, leaving

no stone unturned.

Gritty and poetic, with an evocative sense of place,

a quirky cast of characters, a fast-twisting plot,

and a compelling, complicated heroine, this su-

perbly crafted mystery will keep you reading

compulsively as hope runs short, the clock

ticks down, and the rivers run dry.

SIBELLA GIORELLO

began her writing career as

a journalist. Her stories have won

awards, including two nominations for

the Pulitzer. Her novel, Stones Cry Out, won

a Christy award. She lives in Washington state

with her husband and family.

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By Marjory Heath Wentworth (Legacy Publications) When a group of little boys searches for buried treasure in their backyard on Sullivan’s Island, South Carolina, they stumble across a piece of history—a set of centuries-

old shackles used on the slaves who were held on the island. Based on a true story, the book is written in lyric prose and was released in time for Black History Month ’09. Marjory Heath Wentworth ’80 is the poet laureate of South Carolina and author of two collections of poetry, Noticing Eden and Despite Gravity.

24-29mtho_sum09.indd 27 7/20/09 8:50:00 AM


By Carole Shmurak (SterlingHouse Publisher)!is third novel in a series about "ctional professor/sleuth Susan Lombardi "nds the heroine searching for a missing high school teacher a#er his wife is found dead in the basement of their home. Carole Bernstein Shmurak ’65 is professor emeritus at Central Connecticut State University and coauthor of Ring Out Wild Bells.

By Caroline Sulzer (Plain View Press)Sulzer’s "rst novel approaches themes of violence, loss, and love in a candid way as it follows two women through what could be the most di$cult year of their lives. Reminiscent of her poetry, Sulzer’s novel includes the reader in a fascinating examination of the endurance of friendship in the face of great adversity.Caroline Sulzer ’81 has published poetry in Calyx, Delaware Valley Poets Anthology, and Puckerbrush Review.

For descriptions of these books, go to www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/morebooks_sum09.

By Gail A. Hornstein (MHC professor of psychology and education) (Rodale Books)

By Marcia Gagliardi Brennan ’88 (Rice University Press)

By Wendy Laura Belcher ’84 (Sage Publications)

Edited by Christina Mengert and Joshua Marie Wilkinson (University of Iowa Press)!is anthology includes work from twelve up-and-coming poets, including Jennifer K. Dick ’93. Using a format that facilitates conversation and collaboration among writers of di%erent generations, 12 x 12 provides a critical examination of the creation and value of poetry in the twenty-"rst century.Jennifer K. Dick ’93 has published poetry in six anthologies and is the author of Fluorescence. Visit her blog at http://jenniferkdick.blogspot.com.

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Sue Barry remembers the !rst time she saw the world in three dimensions.

She had just come out of her optometrist’s o"ce, which she visited weekly for therapy to correct her impaired vision from crossed eyes, and was in her car. But something had changed. #e steering wheel seemed to be $oating in air and there was a real volume of space between it and the dashboard.

An eye-opening experience, literally, she nevertheless paid it little heed. #e MHC neurobiologist thought her changed perception “was because of the fading daylight.” But Barry’s stereo vision was not a $uke and instead part of an extraordinary personal and scienti!c journey into the plasticity of the adult brain and the importance of considering the whole person in brain science and rehabilitation.

Barry was a college student before she realized that she lacked three-dimensional vision. Despite repeated surgeries as a child to help straighten her eyes, they were never fully aligned. As author and neurologist Oliver Sacks explains in the foreword to Barry’s recent book, Fixing My Gaze, by suppressing the image from one or the other eye in order to avoid double vision, she e%ectively nixed her brain’s ability to see in 3-D. Letters on the page jumped around; her eyes were easily fatigued, and driving was a nightmare.

Barry’s !rst-person chronicle of having her sight improved is not only a deeply poetic narrative but also a scienti!c history of her own and others’ vision problems. She points out that our educational system rarely makes a connection between children who have di"culty learning to read and vision problems. She was labeled a “slow learner” as a child and struggled for years to compensate for her incorrectly diagnosed disability.

When she did learn that her reading problems were physiologically related, it would take another twenty years until she discovered her brain was capable of being rewired to see the world in three dimensions. But it wasn’t going to be easy.

Referred to developmental optometrist Dr. #eresa Ruggiero, in Northampton, Barry at age forty-eight began

a year-and-a-half-long series of daily exercises and weekly vision therapy to learn how to aim her two eyes at the same place in space at the same time, fusing the images to be able to see in stereo.

“It’s humbling,” Barry says. “You have to begin at the beginning. I learned skills that most people learn during the !rst six months of life.”

But the bene!ts were astonishing. She now sees what she calls “the space between” objects—and not just in her car. For the !rst time, she has a sense of horizontal distance. And she !nally understands the modern artist’s use of negative space.

Barry’s view of science has also changed. Once a reductionist who looked at individual pieces of evidence and then constructed a whole, she now understands that “a person is more than their circuit of neurons.” She has also become interested in the whole concept of rehabilitation.

“You really have to understand the person in the context of their whole life,” she says. “I didn’t say I wanted stereo vision—I didn’t know what that was, necessarily. But I had day-to-day issues that could be improved.” Like reading road signs.—M.H.B.

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I have lived in North Carolina since 1975 and have been “at the wheel” for the drive to South Hadley every !ve years since 1979. My husband accompanied me sometimes, but for our !"ieth, sixtieth, and sixty-!"h reunions, I traveled alone.

For our !"ieth, I arrived on campus in a yellow 1964 Chevrolet Chevelle convertible. For our !"y-!"h, we drove a Jaguar; for the sixtieth, an Oldsmobile. #is summer, our sixty-!"h reunion, I will chau$eur another classmate from New York in a 2006 Buick. I use the reunion trips as an opportunity, at various times, to visit friends along the way.

Now I am almost eighty-six, and living in a retirement community. When I tell my fellow octogenarians my plans, most of them are surprised that I could even think of a 1,200-plus-mile trip. A"er I explain how exhilarating it can be—“Open Road USA”—a few o$er to accompany me, but not many.

I learned to drive at the New Jersey shore when I was twelve and have loved every minute of every automobile trip I have taken. In the past two years I have made trips to the Jersey shore for family vacations, and in the summer of ’08 I was the oldest returning camper at the 100th anniversary of the camp in the Pocono Mountains I attended from 1936 to 1942.

On May 25, I start my journey north to South Hadley.—Margie Metzler Siefert ’44

For this, our tenth reunion, three of my fellow Sphinxes and I (and our families) will be “bunking it” together, as we did when we lived in Prospect many moons ago.

A couple of months ago, we were all trying to decide if we could spare the expense of reunion. Our friend, April Stroud, who lives about thirty miles from campus, o$ered to !nd out if the other four of us (Sara Martin Haskins, Cindy Meeske, Laura Tribou, and I) and our families could stay in a vacant condo unit down the row from hers. For some reason, even though it’s empty, the owner keeps paying for water and electricity!

April asked the owner, and he had no problem with it whatsoever. It’s ours—for free! It will be quite a squeeze, since there will be eight adults and !ve kids, and two of us will be four months pregnant (due two days apart in October.) But we’ll make it work with AeroBeds, Pack ’N Plays, and de!nitely some earplugs!

A big shout-out to Paul (the owner) for helping four young ’99 families cut costs to be able to attend our ten-year MHC reunion!—Bonnie Yezukevich ’99

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“Nothing in my prior life could have fully prepared me for the trial by !re of being eighteen years old and entering the virtually all white, extremely elite world that was Mount Holyoke in 1965,” said Barbara Smith ’69 in her keynote address at Hortense Parker Day in spring.

"e event honored women of color at Mount Holyoke and recognized especially the !rst black woman to graduate from the college, Hortense Parker, class of 1883. Organized by Ahyoung An ’09 and Camila Curtis-Contreras ’09, the program focused on the mixed experiences of alumnae and current students of color. A student !lm, Experienced Diversity, re#ected the

experiences of students of color on campus today.

Smith, an elected Common Council member in Albany, New York, is a former publisher and noted contributor to black feminist thought. She outlined the e$ect that social and emotional isolation had on her academic work. “Every day was a battle on some level, a battle to be seen, to be respected, to be heard,” Smith said.

But the important thing, she added, was that she survived. “I always say I got what I came for, a stellar education.” Smith went on to cofound Kitchen Table: Women of Color Press, the !rst US publisher for women of color. She also edited the book Home Girls: A Black Feminist Anthology.

An and Curtis-Contreras also paid tribute to numerous other prominent alumnae of color, including Martha Rolston, class of 1898; honor student and social

psychologist Elizabeth Alice Stubbs ’26; Hattie Kawahara ’43, one of three Japanese-American students interned in camps during World War

Bien ’75, who was founder of the Asian student group; W. Rochelle Calhoun ’83, former executive director of the Alumnae Association; Sonali Gulati ’96, an assistant professor at Virginia Commonwealth University;

’97, who was a student chair

and performed !e Geisha Next Door on campus in 2005.

To read Barbara Smith’s speech in full, go to www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/smith_parker.

30-37mtho_sum09.indd 34 7/21/09 11:11:12 AM

http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/smith_parker


Five Mount Holyoke professors visited China to explore learning and internship opportunities in East Asia for MHC students. Interested particularly in international business and international relations

programs, the group met with university o!cials in Beijing and Shanghai. Faculty members also greeted alumnae and current and incoming MHC students and their families at receptions organized by the Alumnae Association and by the O!ce of Admission. MHC’s

standing as the oldest women’s college is well received by Chinese families of increasing means who are impressed with the rank and reputation of U.S. institutions. “"ere are plenty of people who are willing to spend the money to send their daughter to the U.S.,” said Eva Paus, professor

of economics and one of MHC’s delegation. Other faculty members were Kavita Khory, professor of politics; Calvin Chen, assistant professor of politics; Ying Wang, associate professor of Asian studies; and Jon Western, professor of international relations.

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30-37mtho_sum09.indd 35 7/20/09 2:29:58 PM

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Developing a historical understanding of the changing relations of power in American households during late eighteenth and nineteenth centuries is the focus of a yearlong project by Mary Beth Sievens ’86, this year’s Mary E. Woolley Fellowship winner.

!e $7,500 prize will allow Sievens to reside near the American Antiquarian Society in Worcester, Massachusetts, where she will examine the personal papers of husbands and wives in several families. How the internal dynamics of these households changed with the onset of a market- and consumer-oriented economy has not yet been well studied.

“Separate account books will allow me to determine what economic activities fell under husbands’ or wives’ purview, making it possible to analyze issues relating to authority, decision-making, and ownership of resources,” Sievens said.

Sievens, associate professor of history at SUNY–Fredonia, will use her sabbatical year to research and write a book on the topic.

Elizabeth Palmer ’76 was appointed for a "ve-year term as a college trustee beginning July 1. Palmer was a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of MHC and is senior vice president and managing director of global institutional product management and marketing at MFS Investment Management.

A search committee is busy working to identify the best candidate to replace college President Joanne V. Creighton, who has announced that she is stepping down e#ective June 2010.

!e sixteen members of the committee are Jeanne E. Amster ’77, chair of the Presidential Search Committee and trustee; Barbara McClearn Baumann ’77, vice chair of the Presidential Search Committee and trustee; Robin Blaetz, associate professor of "lm studies; Katherine Boyles ’12; Michael Buckley, superintendent of general services, facilities management; Mary Beth Topor Daniel ’82, trustee; Mary Graham Davis ’65, past president of the Alumnae Association; Katherine Duceman ’11; Frederick Kass, network and systems manager, LITS; Mindy McWilliams Lewis ’75, cochair of the “Legacy of Diversity” initiative

and trustee; Chau Ly ’97, cochair of the “Legacy of Diversity” initiative; Leslie Anne Miller ’73, chair of the Board of Trustees, ex o$cio; Karen Remmler, professor of German studies, critical social thought, and gender studies; Jay Sarles, trustee; Lucas Wilson, associate professor of African American studies and economics; and Margaret Wol# ’76, trustee.

Alumnae are encouraged to share their comments and nominate gi%ed leaders from across the globe at [email protected] or [email protected]. !e mailing address is Presidential Search, Mount Holyoke College, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 01075. To follow the progress of the search, go to www.mtholyoke.edu/o!ces/comm/pres/index.html.

So that the Alumnae Association may honor deserving alumnae, please share names to be considered for the recognitions listed below. Please include documentation on the strength of your candidate(s), and names, addresses, phone numbers, and e-mail addresses of references. Send nominations to the Alumnae Association of Mount Holyoke College, 50 College Street, South Hadley, MA 01075-1486; 413-538-2300; fax 413-538-2254; or [email protected]. You can

also use our online form at www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/awards to submit nominations.

Alumnae Honorary Degrees: Awarded to alumnae of genuine achievement and distinction who have contributed to learning in the arts and sciences or who have contributed to society in some service, career or otherwise, distinguished for both intellect and character.

Alumnae Medal of Honor: Awarded for eminent service in promoting the e#ectiveness of the Alumnae Association, for signal service in completing de"nite projects undertaken by the college, or for other noteworthy services that strengthen the position of Mount Holyoke College. Deadline is July 15, prior to the nominee’s reunion year.

Alumnae Trustee: Selected for willingness and ability to involve herself actively in the workings of the college, participate in the policy-making discussions of the Board of Trustees, and use her expertise in special areas to enrich those discussions. Deadline is January 15, annually.

Mary Lyon Award: For young alumnae who have been out of the college "%een years or fewer, who demonstrate promise or sustained achievement in their lives, professions, or communities consistent with the humane values that Mary Lyon exempli"ed in her life and inspired in others. R

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Loyalty Award: !e Loyalty Award honors an alumna who has demonstrated consistent e"ort and active involvement in one area of service over an extended period of time. Volunteer e"ort can be on behalf of a class, club, a#nity group, the association, or the college. Nominees should be from classes that will hold reunions in the following spring. Deadline for submission: December 15.

Young Alumna Loyalty Award: !e Young Alumna Loyalty Award honors an alumna who has demonstrated consistent e"ort and active involvement in one area of service over an extended period of time. Volunteer e"ort can be on behalf of a class, club, a#nity group, the association, or the college. Nominees may be from any class that has graduated ten years or fewer from the date of the upcoming reunion. Deadline for submission: December 15.

Achievement Award: For alumnae whose achievements and service to society exemplify the ideals of excellence of a liberal-arts education; who use their talents with professional distinction, sustained commitment, and creativity; and who re$ect the vision and pioneering spirit of Mary Lyon.

Elizabeth Topham Kennan Award: Given periodically to an outstanding alumna educator, honoring the service former President Elizabeth Topham Kennan ’60 has given to the college and to higher education in general.

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30-37mtho_sum09.indd 37 7/20/09 9:05:33 AM

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Come back to Mount Holyoke for a dynamic weekend of exploring our dreams and supporting one another in making a difference in our communities—and the world. Registration and more information will be available online by September 1 at www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/mhc.

“We have the power within ourselves to be whatever we want to be. Dream big.”Debra Martin Chase ’77, film producer, keynote speaker at Alumnae and Students of Color Conference 2007

Strength, courage, and wisdom: Capturing the entrepenurial spirit November 7-8

38mtho_sum09.indd 1 7/21/09 1:12:38 PM

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bulletinboard

Save the date for traditional Christmas Vespers in Boston on Friday, December 11, 2009, at the Old South Church. For information, contact Cerise Jalelian at 781-861-7446 or [email protected].

Mount Holyoke College is a member of the Independent 529 Plan, which allows alumnae and their families to prepay tuition at less than today’s price for use in the future. More than 275 private colleges have joined the consortium administered by TIAA-CREF that enables families to plan for the rising costs of private higher education. Family members of MHC alumnae are automatically eligible. !e Independent 529 plan operates on a simple principle: in return for prepaying college costs, member colleges carry the investment risk and protect you from future tuition increases. For more information, check out the Web site at www.independent529plan.org.

Lots of MHC-related class and club products are for sale. For details and photos of many items, please visit www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/shop/alumgi!s.php or phone the Alumnae Association at 413-538-2300 to request a printed copy of the information.

Mount Holyoke College is hosting the 2009 NCAA Field Hockey Championship, November 21 and 22. !ere are two games on Saturday (11 a.m. and 2 p.m.) and the championship game on Sunday (1 p.m.). For more information, [email protected].

travelopportunitieswhich harkens back to the golden age of rail travel. In St. Petersburg, we’ll stroll along the elegant fountain-lined canals and see one of the world’s greatest collections of art during an early-opening visit to the renowned Hermitage Museum, which boasts a magni"cent collection of nineteenth and twentieth-century French Impressionist and post-Impressionist works. We’ll tour Peter the Great’s glorious summer estate at Peterhof and visit the imperial compound of Tsarskoe Selo (Pushkin) and its Catherine Palace, an elaborate Baroque and Rococo residence built in 1752 for Czarina Elizabeth, Peter the Great’s daughter. Our stay in St. Petersburg includes the option of attending a music performance of the Russian composer Tchaikovsky’s works in the Great Hall of the Philharmonia.

!e cost of this trip starts at $3995. For more information, please call !omas P. Gohagan & Company at 800-922-3088.

Join us on an enlightening journey to Russia’s twin cultural capitals, Moscow and St. Petersburg, homes of some of the world’s richest architectural, artistic, and historic treasures. We will spend three days in Moscow, visiting the halls of the Kremlin, the fabled “citadel of the czars”; the Armory, Russia’s oldest museum, site of the diamond throne of Czar Alexis and the bejeweled Fabergé Easter eggs commissioned by the Romanov czars; and the city’s famed Red Square, where the sixteenth-century St. Basil’s Cathedral, built by Ivan the Terrible, still stands in all its imperial grandeur. Our time in Moscow, which includes the option of attending a ballet performance in the landmark Bolshoi !eatre, is followed by a rail journey to St. Petersburg aboard the Grand Express, Russia’s "nest passenger train,

78-81mtho_sum09.indd 78 7/20/09 11:38:16 AM

Mount Holyoke Alumnae Quarterly W i n t e r 2 0 0 9 79

Join Mount Holyoke, Bryn Mawr, Radcli!e, Smith, Vassar, and Wellesley alumnae for an unforgettable trip to Bangladesh and India. "is trip, exclusively for women, combines sightseeing with in-depth discussions with women in leadership positions in government, education, business, media, and the arts. Joining us on the trip is Dr. Nikky-Guninder Kaur Singh, Crawford Family Professor of Religious Studies at Colby College and expert in the #elds of Sikhism, poetics, and feminist thought.

Our #rst destination is Dhaka, Bangladesh, where we will meet with world-renowned fashion and textile designer Bibi Russell; lunch with women who have bene#ted from the Nari Jibon project, which helps educate women through skill development programs; and tour old Dhaka. We will stay at the beautiful Dhaka Westin Hotel, and also meet with Dr. Hoon Eng Khoo (Smith ’73) of the new Asian University for Women in Chittagong; former Prime Minister Khaleda Zia, and Muhammad Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank and winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2006.

From Dhaka we will $y to Kolkata, India (formerly Calcutta), one of the largest cities in the world. We will lunch with the Maharani of Burdwan, tour Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of

Charity home, and enjoy a hands-on cooking class in Indian cuisine. We next journey to Mumbai, Delhi, and Agra. In Mumbai, we will stay at the Taj Mahal Palace and Tower and visit the site of the Oscar-winning #lm Slumdog Millionaire in the company of journalist Kalpana Sharma. In Delhi, we will tour the old city, visiting the Red Fort and India’s largest mosque; meet Sonia Gandhi, leader of the Congress Parliamentary Party; and talk with Man Booker Prize–winning novelist Arundhati Roy, among others. We will conclude our two-week adventure at the UNESCO site of Fatehpur Sikri.

"e cost of this trip is $7,740. For complete details, please call Julie Scott at Distant Horizons at 1-800-333-1240.

A Seven Sisters TripSail aboard the all-suite, 114-guest Corinthian II in search of the history of antiquity’s most powerful women. Beginning in Athens with a visit to the Acropolis and an excursion to the Sanctuary of Artemis, we next cruise across the Aegean Sea to Bodrum, Turkey, where %ueen Artemisia commanded a naval vessel during the Battle of Salamis. "e cruise continues on to Rhodes, home of Kallipateira (the only woman to have attended the ancient Olympics) and then to Fethiye, Turkey; Tartus, Syria; and Alexandria, Egypt, as we visit ancient shrines dedicated to goddesses, magni#cent museums and churches, and archaeological sites that shed light on fascinating women of the ancient world. "e Mount Holyoke faculty lecturer is Bettina Bergmann, a specialist in Greek and Roman art and architecture.

"e cost of this trip is approximately $7,395 per person. Please call Travel Dynamics International at 1-800-257-5767 for more information.

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When the news !rst hit that Michelle Obama was starting an organic vegetable garden, I read everything about it. As a passionate locavore and organic foodie, I can’t begin to describe the thrill I felt. As a black woman, my !rst thought went to our slave ancestors who built the White House. I imagined their pride and joy in watching one of their daughters remind the world of their legacy in ways they could only dream about. I immediately wanted to know what Michelle Obama was planting, who was helping her, and whether this was her !rst garden. I wanted to know if, like me, Michelle loves collard greens and brussels sprouts. When I saw the New York Times’s picture of Michelle in the garden with DC children, I became emotional. At !rst, I had no idea why. "en it hit me: I spent my early childhood in a vegetable garden. "e experience never le# me even though I didn’t learn about it until several decades later.

My father was a Black Panther Party member, and he’s been in prison since I was two. Nothing can prepare a two-year-old for the trauma of losing a parent, especially one as loving and giving as my father. A#er his incarceration, I was sent to Southern Pines, North Carolina. I lived there for four years, in the home of my father’s sister and “Momma,” the doting mother-in-law whom I accompanied in the vegetable garden each day. I have no intellectual memory of any of this, but my body remembers. None of my adult habits made sense to me until stories of my life in Southern Pines were unearthed. As a kid, I remember feeling di$erent from other children, who slept in on weekends. I was always up at the crack of dawn, methodically planning my day. "is habit was surely fruit from buried memories of daybreak in the garden. Similarly, I never understood, until now, why I never met a vegetable I didn’t like or why I usually preferred vegetables to candy. Most important,

Momma’s garden helps explain why I always had a vision—it takes faith and vision to grow food. Although my aunt told me about this lost part of my childhood last year, she doesn’t have pictures of me in the sundress and sunhat I insisted on wearing nearly every day. So I ripped Michelle’s picture out of the Times and put it near my computer because it helps me tap into an experience that still sustains me. I now know that I was being taught, through Momma’s vegetable garden, to have faith in something I couldn’t see right away, and that sometimes hope is all we have. I was being taught that when people work together, everybody survives. I was learning to be %exible, and that asking for help is critical. I was being taught that if I was willing to work hard and have patience, I would be blessed beyond my expectations. I was learning at that tender age that health,

beauty, joy, and love were possible even in the midst of unbelievable pain, loss, and devastation. I know Momma’s North Carolina vegetable garden helped save my life in ways I have yet to discover.

I work hard to live in my blessings, not my problems, but when things feel tough, I try to remember that, at two years old, people taught me how to dig into my soul, have faith in the unknown, and grow whatever I want. In these precarious times, Michelle Obama’s garden also teaches us to sow a vision that feeds faith, love, and community instead of fear, despair, and loss.

lastlook

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http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/chayes

Mount Holyoke alumnae are the reason for our success.Especially now, during these challenging economic times,

thank you, thank you, thank you.—Joanne V. Creighton, President

T H E C A M P A I G N F O R M O U N T H O L Y O K E

c3mtho_sum09:AQ ad_winter 04 7/20/09 3:53 AM Page 1

!e laurel parade was an emotional transition into my new status of alumna, especially as I walked with the rest of the senior class and saw the other alumnae waiting for us. !e alums applauded us and we applauded them, and we all felt part of a network only other Mount Holyoke students and alums can understand. It brought tears to my eyes to see other alums clapping, crying, cheering, and smiling as though they were cheering for their own daughters. Although I will miss Mount Holyoke deeply, the laurel parade reinforced my belief that graduation is just the beginning of my new Mount Holyoke life, my entrance into the legacy. —A""#-L$%&# M$'$%($) ’09 (at far right in photo)

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Download - Mount Holyoke Alumnae Quarterly Summer 2009

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