Congratulations, Class of 2010! - Columbia College - Columbia ...

Chris Kimball ‘73 

Cooks Up Recipes 

That Work 

page 20 

Jonathan Cole ‘64 

Says Universities 

Fuel Innovation 

page 26 

Special Insert: 

Alumni Reunion 

Weekend 2010 

Columbia College 

July/August 2010 

today 

Congratulations, Class of 2010!

I 

’ll 

meet you for a 

drink at the club...” 

Meet. Dine. Play. Take a seat at the 

newly renovated bar & grill or fine dining room. 

See how membership in the Columbia Club 

could fit into your life. 

For more information or to apply, 

visit www.columbiaclub.org 

or call (212) 719-0380. 

The Columbia University Club of New York 

15 West 43 St. New York, N Y 10036 

Columbia’s SocialIntellectualCulturalRecreationalProfessional Resource in Midtown.

Columbia College Today 

Contents 

24 

16 

34 

53 

Cover Story 

16 

Features 

20 

24 

26 

72 La s t i n g Im a g e 

C l a s s o f 2010 Jo i n s t h e 

R a n k s o f Al u m n i 

Class Day and Commencement marked a rite of 

passage for the Class of 2010. 

By Ethan Rouen ’04J and Alex Sachare ’71 

Photos by Char Smullyan and Eileen Barroso 

Co o k i n g 101 

Chris Kimball ’73, head of the America’s Test Kitchen 

empire, showcases recipes that work. 

By Claire Lui ’00 

Yo u n g Li o n s i n Wa s h i n g t o n 

Three young alumni are making their mark in 

D.C. politics. 

By Lydia DePillis ’09 

Co l u m b i a Fo r u m 

Jonathan Cole ’64, ’69 GSAS explains how universities 

fuel innovation in this excerpt from The Great American 

University: Its Rise to Preeminence, Its Indispensable 

National Role, Why It Must Be Protected. 

8 

Alumni News 

Spe c i a l In s e rt: 

Alu m n i Re u n i o n 

Wee k e n d 2010 

Eight pages of photos, 

including class photos, from 

the June celebration. 

33 B o o k s h e l f 

Featured: Apostolos Doxiadis 

’72’s graphic novel Logicomix: 

An Epic Search for Truth, and 

its hero, Bertrand Russell. 

35 O b i t u a r i e s 

35 Arthur S. Weinstock ’41 

37 C l a s s No t e s 

A l u m n i Up d at e s 

53 Thomas Kline ’68 

65 Michael Goldwasser ’93 

20 

Departments 

2 Let t e r s to th e 

Edi t o r 

3 Wit h i n th e Fa m i l y 

4 Aro u n d th e Qu a d s 

4 Senior Dinner 

5 Van Doren, Trilling 

Awards 

6 Academic Awards 

and Prizes 

7 Smith To Coach 

Men’s Basketball 

8 “99 Columbians” 

10 5 Minutes with … 

Susan Boynton 

11 Alumni in the News 

12 Student Spotlight: 

Sun ’11 

13 Campus News 

14 Roar Lion Roar 

15 Transitions 

Web Exclusives at www.college.columbia.edu/cct 

Coo k i n g wi t h Ki m b a l l 

View highlights of Chris Kimball ’73 on America’s Test Kitchen. 

Jea l o u s a t Cl a s s Da y 

Hear Benjamin Jealous ’94’s inspirational speech. 

The Ma k i n g of Log i c o m i x 

See how Apostolos Doxiadis ’72 made his graphic novel. 

Fiv e Mo r e Mi n u t e s 

Listen to more from Professor Susan Boynton. 

Dro p th e Be a t 

Listen to one of Michael Goldwasser ’93’s reggae songs. 

Cla s s of ’60 Ce l e b r at i o n 

Enjoy Nathan Gross ’60’s singing and piano performance. 

FRONT cover: Char Smullyan; BACK COVER: EILEEN BARROSO

columbia college today 

Letters to the Editor 

Volume 37 Number 6 

July/August 2010 

Editor and publisher 

Alex Sachare ’71 

Managing Editor 

Lisa Palladino 

associate editor 

Ethan Rouen ’04J 

Associate Director, Advertising 

Taren Cowan 

forum editor 

Rose Kernochan ’82 Barnard 

Contributing writer 

Shira Boss-Bicak ’93, ’97J, ’98 SIPA 

Editorial Assistants 

Grace Laidlaw ’11 

Jesse Thiessen ’11 Arts 

Design Consultant 

Jean-Claude Suarès 

art director 

Gates Sisters Studio 

webmaster 

Thomas MacLean 

Contributing Photographers 

Eileen Barroso 

Tina Gao ’10 Barnard 

Char Smullyan 

Published six times a year by the 

Columbia College Office of 

Alumni Affairs and Development. 

dean of alumni affairs 

and development 

Derek A. Wittner ’65 

For alumni, students, faculty, parents and 

friends of Columbia College, founded in 1754, 

the undergraduate liberal arts college of 

Columbia University in the City of New York. 

Address all correspondence to: 


Columbia Alumni Center 

622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 

New York, NY 10025 

212-851-7852 

E-mail (editorial): cct@columbia.edu; 

(advertising): cctadvertising@columbia.edu 

www.college.columbia.edu/cct 

ISSN 0572-7820 

Opinions expressed are those of the 

authors and do not reflect official 

positions of Columbia College 

or Columbia University. 

© 2010 Columbia College Today 

All rights reserved. 

CCT welcomes letters from readers about 

articles in the magazine, but cannot 

print or personally respond to all letters 

received. Letters express the views of 

the writers and not CCT, the College or 

the University. Please keep letters to 250 

words or fewer. All letters are subject to 

editing for space and clarity. Please direct 

letters for publication “t o t h e e d i t o r .” 

Freefall 

University Professor Joseph Stiglitz’s arti 

cle in the May/June CCT [Columbia Forum] 

is right on the money, and I look 

forward to reading his book. However, he 

leaves out (at least in your excerpt) another 

important factor in the ongoing decline 

and fall of our economy, one that has a seriously 

inflating effect on the GDP. 

For decades, the late Columbia professor 

Seymour Melman ’49 GSAS criticized 

the effects of Pentagon capitalism and the 

military/war economy on the nation’s 

overall economic situation. Military production 

and the maintenance of the war 

economy contribute significantly to GDP 

numbers but they provide nothing to either 

the general well-being of the population 

or to the real productivity of the 

economy. 

Since the end of WWII, the Pentagon 

has monopolized an ever-greater portion 

of an ever-growing federal budget (total 

yearly defense-related expenditures, 

including servicing the military fraction 

of the national debt, is now around a trillion 

dollars), which has made it the single 

greatest economic entity in the American 

economy. Professor Melman pointed out 

that as military production dominated 

an ever-greater proportion of industrial 

research and development and precision 

manufacturing, the United States lost the 

ability to compete in essential areas of civilian 

manufacturing to overseas competitors. 

When New York City modernizes its 

subway system or California begins building 

a high-speed rail system, the only bids 

for equipment or technical expertise come 

from foreign corporations. When half of 

the Oakland-San Francisco Bay Bridge is 

replaced, the fabricated steel components 

are shipped across the Pacific from China. 

But we can take solace in making the best 

(and most expensive) damn rockets, tanks 

and warplanes in the world — and it sure 

helps the GDP look good. 

Dave Ritchie ’73 

Berkeley, Ca l i f. 

Socrates, Not Sophocles 

With great interest I read of this year’s 

John Jay Awards Dinner in the May/June 

CCT, where Julia Stiles ’05 was quoted as 

quoting this famous paradoxical phrase 

from Greek antiquity: “All I know is I 

know nothing.” Regrettably, this golden 

line was attributed to Sophocles, where 

actually it was Socrates who made this famous 

utterance in the Apology of Plato, a 

Contemporary Civilization mainstay. 

Brian Overland ’04 

Sa n Fr a n c i s c o 

[Editor’s note: The error was made not by Stiles 

but by the editor, who heard it incorrectly and 

did not catch the mistake in print.] 

Harriss Remembered 

I am a three-degree Columbian, starting 

with the College. As a student, I was fortunate 

to take several courses with C. Lowell 

Harriss ’40 GSAS, and as a professor and 

dean, to have worked with him on curricula 

and other academic projects. 

What a truly fine man! A scholar, he 

cared more for what you learned than 

how learned you found him to be. 

After completing a Ph.D., I joined the 

faculty of the Graduate School of Business 

and had the opportunity to work with 

Lowell on a number of University committees. 

When the Business School dean 

resigned in a dispute with the Provost 

over a tenure case, it was Lowell who convinced 

me to accept the job of acting dean. 

“I know that you would rather teach than 

dean,” he said, “and you can return to 

teaching when the President’s Committee 

finds a new dean. Right now, the school 

needs you to hold things together and provide 

a sense of calm and continuity. It may 

not be fun, Kirby, but it is necessary!” 

Lowell always put the “necessary” first. 

I admired him greatly. 

E.K. (Kirby) Warren ’56, ’57 Business, 

’61 GSAS 

Tu x e d o, N.Y. 

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july/august 2010 

2


W i t h i n t h e F a m i l y 

One Tradition Grows, Another Goes 

The Alumni Parade of Classes, 

which has been a part of Class 

Day for seven years, is one of 

Columbia’s younger, lowerkey 

traditions. It lacks the historical 

gravitas of the Varsity Show or the “students 

being students” nature of Orgo 

Night or Primal Scream (if unfamiliar, 

look them up at wikicu.com). It’s also 

one of my favorite days of the year. 

For those who have yet to participate 

(and it’s your loss), each year 

alumni are invited to return to campus 

and join in the Class Day processional 

by carrying their class banner. 

The Alumni Office provides a 

nice breakfast at which attendees 

can catch up with classmates 

or mingle with other 

alumni. This year’s breakfast 

was held in John Jay Dining 

Hall, a room that certainly 

brought back memories for 

those in attendance. 

Alumni are given Class Day 

pins to mark their participation; 

this year’s pin depicted 

Butler Library, which is now 

in its 75th year. Then alumni 

head outside, where they line 

up with their banners and 

await their cue to take their 

place in the processional (after 

the seniors and before the faculty), and 

march over the hexagonal pavers from 

Butler to the Sundial. The walk takes 

only a couple of minutes, then participants 

may leave or stay to watch the 

rest of the Class Day program from a 

reserved seating area. 

What makes this event so special is 

the reaction alumni receive as they pass 

the graduating students. Once the first 

banner-carrier — this year it was Arnold 

Saltzman ’36 — comes into view, 

the students stand and cheer and keep 

it up until each class has reached the 

front of the seating area. Take it from 

one who has done it several times: It’s 

remarkably uplifting to carry your class 

banner, hear the cheers and feel the 

connection with the graduating seniors 

on this, their special day. 

Do yourself a favor: Keep an eye 

out next spring for the Alumni Office’s 

invitation to participate in the Alumni 

Parade of Classes, come back to campus 

and show your support for the next crop 

of Columbia alumni. 

Alas, one other Columbia tradition 

seems to have quietly gone by the wayside: 

sledding down the snow-covered 

Low Steps on trays purloined from 

John Jay. That’s because the dining hall 

recently completed its first year of trayless 

dining, and it looks like there’s no 

going back. 

Alex Sachare ’71 (left) and Eddie Eitches ’71 prepare to march 

with their class banner in this year’s Alumni Parade of Classes. 

photo: ethan rouen ’04J 

The folks who keep track of such 

things found that by removing trays, 

diners make more careful decisions 

about their food choices, and there also 

are fewer service items to be cleaned. In 

the last year, Dining Services estimates 

it has saved approximately 3,000 gallons 

of water once used daily to wash 

the trays, and at least 50 pounds of food 

leftovers per mealtime. Sanitary, unused 

food is donated to City Harvest, 

a nonprofit whose mission is to rescue 

and deliver food to the hungry in New 

York City. 

If tray sledding had to go, at least it 

went for a good reason. 

One of the best parts of my job is 

meeting some of the remarkable 

people who are Columbia 

College alumni, especially those older 

than I who have led full and fulfilling 

lives. Some have maintained their 

relationship with the College across a 

half-century or more and continue to 

contribute their time, money or expertise 

to support the College. 

One such man was Arthur S. Weinstock 

’41, who died in April (see Obituaries). 

I looked forward to seeing Arthur 

at College events such as Homecoming 

and awards dinners because he always 

had a smile on his face and kind words 

on his lips. He was active in his class’ affairs 

and was a staunch supporter 

of this magazine, often calling 

with thoughts and suggestions 

and even filling in with Class 

of ’41 Class Notes columns in 

a pinch. Ray Robinson ’41, another 

prince, called Arthur “the 

sweetest man I’ve ever met,” 

and I heartily second that emotion. 

He already is missed. 

Speaking of Class Notes, I 

call your attention to the Class 

of ’87 column and a submission 

from Annie Fils-Aime Joseph ’87 

in which she describes, as correspondent 

Sarah Kass ’87 put 

it, “her experience as a doctor, a 

Haitian and a human” in trying 

to help some of those impacted 

by the earthquake in her homeland. 

Please take five minutes to read her story. 

Finally, to end on a happier note, 

filmmaker Marty Huberman ’91 is 

developing a documentary to be called 

The Streak Starts Now, about the players 

on the Lions football team that 

beat Princeton 16–13 on October 8, 

1988, to end the record 44-game losing 

streak (or, to be entirely accurate, 

non-winning streak, since there were 

two ties) and the success so many of 

the players went on to achieve. He is 

looking for film, pictures — and stories. 

To learn more about the project, watch 

a trailer or contact Marty, go to www. 

TheStreakStartsNow.com. 


3


Around 

the 

Quads 

Class of 2010 Parties at Senior Dinner 

A massive tent on South Field was the site of the annual Senior Dinner, where nearly 1,000 soon-to-be graduates celebrated after their final day of 

classes. Dean Michele Moody-Adams channeled her inner Billy Crystal and told the seniors, “You look mah-velous!” 

Photos: Carlos Aloya 

Nearly 1,000 members of the 

Class of 2010 marked their 

last day of classes by getting 

dressed up and partying in a 

huge tent on South Field at the Senior 

Dinner on May 3, renewing what has 

become one of the most joyous traditions 

of graduation month. Dean Michele 

Moody-Adams, who experienced the 

raucous dinner for the first time, drew 

laughs and cheers by reminding attendees, 

“Columbia College Class of 2010, I 

have two words for you: swim test.” 

As the seniors whooped and hollered, 

Adam Bulkley ’10, chair of the Columbia 

College Senior Fund, proudly announced 

that the Class of 2010 had set a record not 

just for Columbia but for all Ivy League 

liberal arts colleges with a participation 

rate of 92.5 percent, a figure that climbed 

to 92.7 percent by Class Day. By surpassing 

its goal of 91 percent, the Class of 

2010 earned a matching gift of $50,000 

from Board of Visitors member Charles 

Santoro ’82. 

Class President Cliff Massey ’10 welcomed 

the seniors to the dinner, which 

was co-chaired by Ruqayyah Abdul- 

Karim ’10 and Robyn Burgess ’10. Student 

Council President Sue Yang ’10 introduced 

the dean, and Brian C. Krisberg 

’81, chair of the CC Alumni Association, 

added brief remarks. 

Community Impact Honors Wittens 

Columbia’s Community Impact and its students presented the eighth annual 

“Making a Difference” Service Award to University Trustees Vice-Chair 

Richard Witten ’75 and his wife, Elizabeth ’97 TC, at its 18th annual Spring 

Benefit Auction, which was held on May 10 at JP Morgan Chase in midtown. 

Witten is senior managing director of The Orienta Group, an investment and 

advisory firm. His wife is an Executive Committee member of the Hunter College 

Foundation and a director of the Fresh Air Fund. CI honored the Wittens 

for their “steadfast support of CI and their efforts to support education, public 

health and social services in the Columbia community.” Said Witten at the ceremony, 

“Community Impact is a core part of a Columbia education and a core 

part of Columbia’s responsibility to our neighbors. It’s not just altruism; it’s life 

experience.” 

Through CI, 900 Columbia and Barnard students are directly improving the 

lives of more than 8,000 low-income residents of Harlem, Washington Heights 

and Morningside Heights. All proceeds from the event benefited Community 

Impact’s programs. To learn more, visit www.columbia.edu/cu/ci. 

Left to right, President Lee C. Bollinger; Sonia Reese, executive 

director, Community Impact; Richard Witten ’75; 

Elizabeth Witten ’97 TC; and University Trustee Emeritus 

George Van Amson ’74, CI board member and master of 

ceremonies. 

PHOTO: MICHAEL DAMES 


4


around the quads 

Students Honor Davidson, Volk with Van Doren, Trilling Awards 

Jenny Davidson, associate professor 

of English and comparative 

literature, received the 49th annual 

Mark Van Doren Award, 

and Katharina Volk, associate professor 

of classics, received the 35th 

annual Lionel Trilling Award, on 

May 5 in the Faculty Room of Low 

Library. The winners were chosen 

by the Columbia College Academic 

Awards Committee, composed of 

students representing a cross-section 

of majors within the College. 

The Van Doren Award honors a 

Columbia professor for his/her 

commitment to undergraduate 

instruction, as well as for “humanity, 

devotion to truth and inspiring 

leadership,” and is named for Mark 

Van Doren, a Pulitzer Prize-winning 

poet, novelist and literary critic. The 

Trilling Award honors a book from 

the past year by a Columbia author 

that best exhibits the standards of intellect 

and scholarship found in the 

work of Lionel Trilling ’25, the noted 

literary critic and author. Van Doren and 

Trilling were longtime members of the 

Columbia faculty. 

Katharina Volk (seated, left) received the Lionel Trilling 

Award and Jenny Davidson received the Mark Van Doren 

Award in Low Library on May 5. Joining them were (from 

left) Emelie Kogut ’10, Nirvikal Jassal ’10, Dean Michele 

Moody-Adams and Anna Malkan ’11. Kogut, Jassal and 

Malkan were co-chairs of the Columbia College Academic 

Awards Committee, which selected the winners. 

Photo: Tina Gao ’10 Barnard 

Members of the Academic Awards 

Committee audited the classes of Van 

Doren Award nominees during the academic 

year to observe the quality of their 

instruction and read books under consideration 

for the Trilling Award. The 

committee met weekly to confer on 

the selection process and to evaluate 

nominated professors and titles before 

announcing the winners in April. 

Davidson, who earned a Ph.D. 

from Yale in 1999, specializes in 18thcentury 

literature, though she also is 

an expert on British cultural and intellectual 

history and English literature. 

She was cited by the committee 

for “her innovative assignments, her 

ability to facilitate student participation 

— even in lecture classes — and 

her genuine care for her students’ 

educational experience.” 

Volk, who was honored for her 

2009 book, Manilius and his Intellectual 

Background, earned a Ph.D. from 

Princeton in 1999 and has been teaching 

at Columbia since 2002. Manilius 

is the first English-language monograph 

on Marcus Manilius, a Roman 

poet of the first century A.D., and 

committee members found it “engaging 

and accessible, which is a testament to 

Volk’s ability to demonstrate the intellectual 

and cultural milieu of Manilius.”



2010 Academic Awards and Prizes 

The Academic Awards and Prizes Ceremony, at which 

students are recognized for their academic achievements, 

is a highlight of graduation week. Dean of 

the College Michele Moody-Adams and Dean of Academic 

Affairs Kathryn B. Yatrakis were on hand to congratulate 

the students at the ceremony, held on May 17 at Faculty 

House. Yatrakis, along with several noted faculty members, 

presented the awards. Following are the 2010 recipients. 

Special Achievements 

To Be Noted 

Presented by Kathryn B. Yatrakis, dean 

of academic affairs 

Harry J. Carman Fellowship 

Am a n d a Be n av i d e s ’10 

Jarvis and Constance Doctorow 

Fellowship 

Ni s h a n t Bat s h a ’10 

Henry Evans Travelling Fellowship 

Ge o r g e Ba i s o n ’10 

Dav i d Ve g a-Ba r a c h o w i t z ’10 

Solomon and Seymour Fisher Civil 

Liberties Fellowship 

Ju a n Ga s c o n ’11 

Br i t t n e y Na g l e ’12 

Albert Asher Green Memorial Prize 

Ar i a n n e Ri c h a r d ’10 

Euretta J. Kellett Fellowships 

Ch a r l e s Cl av e y ’10 

Am a n d a Pa r s o n s ’10 

Richard Lewis Kohn Traveling 

Fellowship 

Si m a s Gl i n s k i s ’12 

Arthur Rose Teaching 

Assistantship 

Sc o t t Ma x f i e l d ’11 

David B. Truman Alumni Award 

Sa r a h We i s s ’10 

Salutatorian 

Je f f r e y Sp e a r ’10 

Valedictorian 


Prizes in the Core Curriculum 

Presented by Professor James J. 

Valentini, Department of Chemistry 

Joshua A. Feigenbaum Prize in 

Literature Humanities 

Su s a n Ph a n ’11 

Wallace A. Gray Prize in 

Literature Humanities 

Ni n a Ba c u l i n a o ’11 

Dean Hawkes Memorial Prize 

Al l i s o n Ca p l a n ’11 

Ju d d Li n d e n f e l d ’11 

Em m a McGl e n n e n ’11 

Jonathan Throne Kopit Prize in 

Logic and Rhetoric 

Ha d i El z ay n ’12 

James P. Shenton Prize in 

Contemporary Civilization 

Ja m e s Daw s o n ’10 

Prizes in Science and 

Mathematics 

Presented by Professor James J. 

Valentini, Department of Chemistry 

Richard Bersohn Prize 


Computer Science Department 

Award 

Al e x Ba m b e r g e r ’11 

Ga b r i e l Sc h u b i n e r ’10 

Dean Michele Moody-Adams joined valedictorian Arianne Richard ’10 

and salutatorian Jeffrey Spear ’10 at the annual Academic Awards 

and Prizes Ceremony. 

PHOTO: TINA GAO ’10 BARNARD 

Alfred Moritz Michaelis Prize 

Io n Mi h a i l e s c u ’10 

Professor Van Amringe 

Mathematical Prize 

Fi r s t-Ye a r: Su n g Pa r k ’13 

So p h o m o r e: Sh e n j u n Xu ’12 

Ju n i o r : Sa m u e l Be c k ’11 

John Dash Van Buren Jr. Prize in 

Mathematics 

Ata n a s Ata n a s o v ’10 

Prizes in the Social Sciences 

Presented by Professor Priscilla 

Ferguson, Department of Sociology 

Charles A. Beard Prize 

Jo n at h a n Ba c k e r ’10 

Carl B. Boyer Memorial Prize 

Ro n Ge j m a n ’10 

Chanler Historical Prize 

Kat e Re d b u r n ’10 

Albert Marion Elsberg Prize 

An n a Wo o d ’10 

Lily Prize in History 

Mi c h a e l Pa r a n a c ’10 

Garrett Mattingly Prize 

Ti m o t h y Tz e n g ’10 

Sanford S. Parker Prize 

Da n i e l Vi l l a r ’10 

Edwin Robbins Academic Research 

and Public Service Fellowship 

Jo n at h a n De n t l e r ’10 

Ye s o l Ha n ’11 

Sa r a h Kh a n ’11 

Ky l e Sh y b u n k o ’10 

The Romine Prize 

Ho n o r s Th e s i s: Je h a n Spa r k s ’10 

Se m i n a r Pa p e r: Er i c a 

Ke s t e n b a u m ’10 

The Phyllis Stevens Sharp 

Fellowship in American Politics 

Ja m e s Daw s o n ’11 

Caroline Phelps Stokes Prize 

Ni c h o l a s Se r p e ’10 

Taraknath Das Foundation Award 

Ni s h a n t Bat s h a ’10 

Alan J. Willen Memorial Prize 

Jo r d a n Hi r s c h ’10 

Prizes in the Humanities 

Presented by Associate Professor Jenny 

Davidson, Department of English and 

Comparative Literature 

Senior Thesis Prize in Art History 

and Archaeology 

Ja m e s DeWi l l e ’10 

Charles Paterno Barratt-Brown 

Memorial Prize 

Hi l l a ry Bu s i s ’10 

Ju a n La m ata ’10 

Ro s a l i n d Pa r r y ’10 

Dino Bigongiari Prize 

Ad r i e n n e Re i ta n o ’10 

Bunner Prize 

Rya n Al b e rt s ’10 

Douglas Gardner Caverly Prize 

Abhijit Na g a r a j ’10 

Earle Prize in Classics 

Wi l l i a m St e w a r t ’12 

John Vincent Hickey Award 

Ja m e s Lo w d e r ’10 

Adam Leroy Jones Prize in Logic 

Ro n Ge j m a n ’10 

Helen and Howard R. Marraro 

Prize 

Tay l o r Na p o l i ta n o ’10 

Peter M. Riccio Prize 

Ca s h e l Ro s i e r ’10 

Benjamin F. Romaine Prize 

Co r e y Br e g m a n ’10 

Ernest Stadler Prize For 

Excellence in the Study of 

Classical Antiquity 

An d r e w Wa r d ’11 

Deutscher Verein Prize in 

German 

Bu c k El l i s o n ’10 

Susan Huntington Vernon Prize 

Ke n Ki t ay a m a ’10 

Richmond B. Williams Travelling 

Fellowship 

Ay o Al s t o n-Mo o r e ’11 

An n a Fe u e r ’11 

Se o Im ’11 

Ta r a Me n o n ’11 

Prizes in the Creative and 

Performing Arts 

Presented by Patricia E. Grieve, the 

Nancy and Jeffrey Marcus Professor of 

the Humanities, Department of Spanish 

and Portuguese 

Academy of American Poets 

Poetry Prize 

Ni c h o l a s Wo n g ’11 

Karen Osney Brownstein Writing 

Prize 

Yitian Fu ’10 

Arthur E. Ford Poetry Prize 

Mo r g a n Pa r k e r ’10 

Philolexian Prize 

Za c h a ry Go m e s ’10 

Re b e c c a Ku t z e r-Ri c e ’12 

Austin E. Quigley Prize 

Pa i g e Jo h n s o n ’10 Ba r n a r d 

Richard and Brooke Kamin 

Rapaport Summer Music 

Performance Fellowship 

Brigid Ba b b i s h ’12 

Hi l a r y Ba b o u k i s ’11 

Su z a n n e Dav i e s ’11 

Th e o Di Ca s t r i ’11 

Ho l ly Dr u c k m a n ’12 

Au g u s t d u Po n t ’10 

Re b e c c a Fu l l e r ’10 

El l i o t t Hu a n g ’10 

Ku r t Ka n a z awa ’11 

Sa r a h Mi-Eu n Kim ’11 

Vi c t o r i a Le w i s ’13 

Ed w a r d Po l l ’10 

Er i c Si l b e r g e r ’11 

Ma r k Ya n-We i Sim ’12 

Ma d h ava n So m a n at h a n ’13 

Tav i Un g e r l e i d e r ’11 

Louis Sudler Prize in the Arts 

Ur s u l a Kw o n g-Br o w n ’10 

The Mariana Griswold Van 

Rensselaer Prize 

May a Po pa ’10 Ba r n a r d 


6



Smith Named Head Men’s Basketball Coach 

B y Al e x Sa c h a r e ’71 

Can Kyle Smith pick up where Joe 

Jones left off 

Smith, who spent 18 years as an 

assistant coach, the last nine at St. Mary’s 

(Calif.), was introduced on May 5 as the 

22nd head coach in the 110-year history of 

Columbia men’s basketball. He succeeds 

Jones, who resigned after seven seasons 

to become an assistant to former Cornell 

coach Steve Donahue at Boston College. 

A 1992 graduate of Hamilton College, 

Smith spent eight years as an assistant 

coach at the University of San Diego and 

one year at the Air Force Academy before 

moving to St. Mary’s in 2001. He rose to 

become associate head coach for the Gaels, 

who compiled a 28–6 record last season 

and reached the Sweet 16 of the NCAA 

Division I Men’s Basketball Championships. 

Smith’s primary duties included 

coordinating recruiting, overseeing player 

development and focusing on the team’s 

offensive game plan. 

Jones had only mixed success during 

his tenure on Morningside Heights. A 

popular presence on campus, he inherited 

a team that went 2–25 and was winless in 

its 14 Ivy games and achieved three 7–7 

Ivy seasons before sliding to 5–9 in Ivy 

play last year and 11–17 overall. Although 

Jones posted only one winning record 

in seven seasons (16–12 in 2007) and an 

overall mark of 86–108, Athletics Director 

M. Dianne Murphy said he “reengaged 

our men’s basketball community and 

revitalized our men’s basketball program. 

For that, we are all very grateful.” 

Murphy said she reviewed more than 

150 applications before deciding on Smith, 

citing his “strong leadership skills, excellent 

basketball knowledge and successful 

recruiting experience. He’s exactly what 

we’re looking for as our head basketball 

coach.” 

Randy Bennett, head coach at St. Mary’s, 

predicted that Smith “will be very successful” 

in his first stint as a head coach. “He 

has been a huge part of what we’ve done. 

It’s been he and I together — it’s been like 

having a co-coach.” 

Smith said he was “very excited” to 

take on the challenge of taking the Columbia 

program to the next level. “Let’s 

try to get a winning season,” he said, 

when asked about goals. “Let’s try to get 

there — that would be a huge confidence 

boost — and see what happens from there. 

Eventually we want to be a team that can 

compete for Ivy League championships.” 

Smith sees parallels between St. Mary’s 

and Columbia. “When I got there we were 

2–27,” he said, “so I saw it grow from 9 

(wins) to 15 to 19 to 25, and then the last 

three years we averaged 27. It can be done.” 

Although Smith said, “At St. Mary’s 

we fancy ourselves as being Ivy League 

West,” one big difference is that his 

former school was able to offer athletic 

scholarships. “It’ll obviously be different, 

with a different student-athlete,” he said, 

“but Cornell proved it can be done in the 

Ivy League. What I’m taking from that is 

the belief we have in ourselves. It doesn’t 

matter what resources you have — you 

have a chance if you’re working hard and 

you get good players who are committed. 

You have a chance to compete with 

anybody. 

“What’s going on in the Ivy League is 

exciting,” he added. “Cornell reached the 

Sweet 16, Harvard and Princeton were 

very good and are expected to be good 

again next year. I don’t see any reason Columbia 

can’t be, too.”



“99 Columbians” Depicts Student Diversity 

B y Da n i e l l a Za l c m a n ’09 

When Angela Radulescu ’11 stumbled 

across Bennett Hong ’11’s 

Facebook photo albums of 

friends and classmates, she was impressed. 

Radulescu, then photo editor of Spectator, 

had always wanted to create a unique, 

Columbia-centric photography project, and 

Hong, whose portraits she found remarkably 

intimate and crisp, seemed like the 

perfect partner. So she approached him 

with an idea halfway through the 2009 

fall semester: photograph 99 students in 

their dorm rooms to create a 

portrait of Columbia’s diverse 

student body. 

Hong quickly agreed, and 

the two created a Facebook 

group to gauge student interest. 

Within three days, the 

pair had 100 students volunteering 

to be subjects. 

And so the “99 Columbians” 

project was born. Radulescu, 

a neuroscience and 

behavior major with a concentration 

in economics, and 

Hong, a pre-med East Asian languages 

and cultures major with a concentration 

in economics, didn’t often have much 

time to spare. But the duo used every 

moment they could for the rest of the semester 

to run from dorm to dorm, spending 

as much as four hours with each 

subject. They discussed everything from 

one student’s summers spent teaching at 

clown camp to another’s move from Afghanistan 

to the United States as part of a 

conflict resolution program. 

“There are so many unusual 

stories that emerge 

when you take the time to 

interact with someone on 

this level,” says Hong. At the 

busiest point of the project, 

he scheduled up to four 

shoots in a single day, making 

it a rule to spend roughly 

two hours talking and two 

hours photographing. 

Ryan Bubinksi ’11 devoted 

his winter break to creating an 

interactive online gallery of the 

Bennett Hong ‘11 and Angela Radulescu ‘11 

sought to chronicle the diversity of the Columbia 

student body. 

Photo: Daniella Zalcman ‘09 

exhibit at 99columbians.com. Robyn Burgess 

’10 volunteered to manage the public 

relations. On April 9, Radulescu and Hong 

held an exhibit in Lerner Hall to showcase 

their work and contributed art to several 

other campus events organized by CUArts 

and CCSC. 

“We wanted to photograph Columbians 

with their own ways of being,” Radulescu 

says. “These are students with a diverse 

range of interests who are artists and scientists 

and athletes at the same time. Discovering 

that range of talents in this community 

was an amazing experience.” 

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Susan Boynton is an associate 

professor of music and 

chair of Music Humanities. 

Her research focuses on 

liturgical music in medieval 

Western monasticism, monastic 

education and the 

role of women in medieval 

song. The recipient of two 

Fulbrights, a Rome Prize, an 

American Council of Learned 

Societies Fellowship and a 

membership at the Institute 

for Advanced Study, she has 

been teaching at Columbia 

since 2000. Boynton earned 

her bachelor’s from Yale and 

her Ph.D. from Brandeis. 

Where did you grow up 

New York City. 

What did you want to be 

growing up 

When I was in high school, I 

was interested in being a pianist, 

but I liked writing about 

music, so in college, I thought 

I’d be interested in being a 

music historian, a classicist or 

something like that. 

Do you still play piano 

Yes. I have a grand piano at 

home. I do some informal 

performances. I’ve done little 

concerts here and at home. 

What kind of music did you 

listen to growing up 

I listened to classical music. 

My father sang in a lot of 

choirs and was a very good 

piano player. My grandmother 

was a voice teacher and a singer. 

I heard a lot of early music 

and choral music growing up, 

so I grew interested in that. 

How did you come to 

Columbia 

I used to teach at the University 

of Oregon. That 

was my first job after I 

got my doctorate. I was 

invited to apply for a 

job here in 2000, and 

that was it. I was very 

glad to come home to 

New York. The West 

Coast seemed very far 

away. My whole family lives 

in New York. 

What classes will you teach 

in the fall 

Music Hum and a new pedagogy 

class that’s for music 

department graduate students. 

It’s combined with a 

professional development 

program including classes on 

C.V. writing, grant writing, 

the job market, publications 

and so forth. 

Where do you see Music 

Hum fitting into a rounded 

liberal arts education 

Music is very much part of a 

liberal education. When people 

learn to analyze a painting 

in Art Hum, the object is visual; 

in Music Hum, it’s a sonic 

object. Music is the text. As in 

Lit Hum, where people learn 

to read texts closely and take 

apart a text, they learn that 

with music in Music Hum. 

Texts are not limited to verbal 

texts. Texts also are visual and 

musical. 

What are you working on 

I recently finished a book on 

a Jesuit in the 18th century 

who was studying medieval 

manuscripts of music in Toledo 

Cathedral from 1750–55 

and working with a calligrapher 

who made incredible 

facsimiles of the manuscripts. 

The Jesuit was involved in 

many different things, and I 

was just focusing on that one 

aspect of his work. His work 

started as a political project, 

a Spanish government commission 

to transcribe archival 

documents that they would 

use in negotiations with 

the Vatican regarding the 

crown’s claims on ecclesiastical 

property both in Spain 

Five Minutes with … Susan Boynton 

and in the new world. As 

a larger historical project, 

it concerned the history of 

Spanish patrimony and cultural 

legacy. 

Where do you live 

Broadway and 111th Street. 

Are you married Do you 

have kids 

I am married to Jens Ulff- 

Moller, who also teaches at 

Columbia. We have a 2-yearold 

daughter. 

Did you and your husband 

meet at Columbia 

We met at a medieval conference 

in Kalamazoo, Mich. 

It’s this huge conference 

every year in May when the 

dorms at Western Michigan 

are available. It now has 

about 4,000 people a year. 

People from Europe, the Pacific 

Rim, all over the world 

come to Kalamazoo. 

To non-medievalists, 

it’s probably weird, 

but to any medievalist, 

it’s a 

household name. 

I actually know 

a number of 

people who met 

their spouses 

in Kalamazoo. 

What is something your 

students would never guess 

about you 

I used to dance ballet. 

How do you recharge 

I do yoga. 

If you could be anywhere 

in the world, where would 

you be 

It’s a tie between Rome and 

Madrid. I spent a lot of time 

at the Academy in Rome. My 

second book is on this Jesuit 

in Toledo, and because the 

materials are preserved mostly 

in Madrid, I spent a lot of 

time there too. 

What’s your favorite 

place in New York City 

The promenade by the 

Hudson near West 100th Street 

in Riverside Park. 

What’s your favorite food 

Indian. 

What on your resume are 

you most proud of 

The Rome Prize, a fellowship 

to go to The American Academy 

in Rome for a year. 

What music are you listening 

to 

Lately, a lot of children’s 

music! We also watch a lot 

of DVDs of ballet and opera. 

Right now, my favorite is an 

amazing DVD of The Rite 

of Spring and The Firebird of 

Stravinsky with wonderful 

reconstructions of the original 

choreography and a fantastic 

orchestra performance. 

Can you recommend a musical 

event in New York 

The concert series of early 

music at The Cloisters in a 

beautiful chapel, and a series 

at Corpus Christi Catholic 

Church on West 121st Street. 

Interview and photo: 


To watch Boynton discuss how 

students benefit from New York’s 

rich cultural offerings, go to 

www.college.columbia.edu/cct. 


10



alumni in the News 

as a Diplomat-in-Residence at the 

City College of New York. 

college.columbia.edu/cct_archive/ 

sep_oct06/cover.php. 

Karthik Ramanathan ’94 

Photo: Alex Kingsbury ’04J 

n Karthik Ramanathan ’94 has 

left his post at the Treasury Department, 

where he had overseen the 

issuance of more than $8 billion of 

debt, to work in the private sector. 

Ramanathan, who joined Treasury 

in 2005 from Goldman Sachs, was 

entrusted with the responsibility 

of ensuring the efficiency of the 

government’s debt auctions, a task 

that has only grown in importance 

in light of the financial crisis and 

the increase in the deficit. Ramanathan 

“has made terrific contributions” 

to Treasury’s seasoned debt 

management team,” U.S. Treasury 

Secretary Timothy Geithner told 

The Wall Street Journal. 

n Mark C. Minton ’67 has been 

elected president of The Korea 

Society, an American organization 

“dedicated to the promotion of 

greater awareness, understanding 

and cooperation between the 

people of the United States and 

Korea.” According to the society’s 

website (www.koreasociety.org), he 

has served for 32 years as a senior 

Foreign Service officer, playing a 

prominent role in interactions 

between the U.S. and Asia. Minton 

served as U.S. Ambassador to Mongolia 

from September 2006–September 

2009 and also served as deputy 

chief of mission at the U.S. Embassy 

in Seoul as well as in various other 

diplomatic posts. He also has taught 

n Michael F. Mundaca ’86 has been 

appointed by President Barack 

Obama ’83 as assistant secretary for 

tax policy at the Treasury Department. 

He previously was senior adviser 

for policy at Treasury’s Office 

of Tax Policy and was the acting assistant 

secretary for tax policy. Mundaca 

was appointed to Treasury in 

2007 as deputy assistant secretary 

for international tax affairs. In the 

private sector, Mundaca was a partner 

in the International Tax Services 

group of Ernst & Young’s National 

Tax Department and has been an 

adjunct professor at Georgetown 

University Law Center. He also 

served in the Treasury during the 

Clinton administration. 

Newt J. “N.J.” Burkett ’84 

photo: WABC-TV 

n Award-winning newsman Newt 

J. “N.J.” Burkett ’84, ’85 SIPA has 

earned another trophy for his shelf 

and another fascinating tale to 

share with his New York audience 

through WABC television. Burkett 

and his team received the Radio 

Television Digital News Association’s 

2010 Regional Edward 

R. Murrow Award in the video 

continuing coverage category for 

large television markets. He won 

for his coverage from Gaza in 

January 2009. CCT profiled Burkett 

in September/October 2006: www. 

n James Shapiro ’77, the Larry 

Miller Professor of English, has 

garnered headlines for his latest 

book, Contested Will: Who Wrote 

Shakespeare. Continuing this 

theme, he authored an extensive 

piece in the March 26 Financial 

Times (www.ft.com) questioning 

the reluctance of Shakespeare 

scholars to accept collaboration as 

a significant component of Shakespeare’s 

work. “Many scholars, 

including some of those most 

responsible for the transformations 

in Shakespeare studies, have had 

a hard time letting go of otherwise 

unsupported biographical claims 

that Shakespeare wrote Hamlet to 

commemorate the death of his son, 

or that The Tempest marks his leavetaking 

from the stage and retirement 

to Stratford — conveniently 

overlooking three subsequent 

collaborations with John Fletcher,” 

Shapiro wrote. The author of 

multiple volumes on Shakespeare, 

Shapiro is working on The Year of 

Lear: Shakespeare in 1606. 

n Tony Kushner ’78’s latest play, 

The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to 

Capitalism and Socialism With a Key to 

the Scriptures, will premiere in New 

York next spring in a co-production 

by the Public Theater and the Signature 

Theater Company, according 

to The New York Times. The play, first 

produced in Minneapolis last year 

under a commission from the Guthrie 

Theater, will open on March 

22, 2011, in the Public’s Newman 

Theater. Kushner has continued 

reshaping the play after the Guthrie 

production, citing his recent work 

editing Arthur Miller plays as influencing 

his revisions of the script. 

He is noted for his Pulitzer Prizewinning 

play Angels In America: A 

Gay Fantasia on National Themes. 


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11



student spotlight 

Thomas Sun ’11 Strives To Eliminate Health Inequalities 

B y Na t h a l i e Al o n s o ’08 

The two months Thomas 

Sun ’11 spent as a 

volunteer at a primary 

care clinic in sub- 

Saharan Africa strengthened his 

interest in global health issues 

and influenced his subsequent 

goals. 

During summer 2009, Sun 

interned at the Shifa-al-Asqam 

(Healers of the Sick) Socio Medical 

Center in Medina Baye, 

Senegal, which focuses on all 

aspects of maternal and child 

health services in addition to 

general emergency care. Sun 

spent his time there assisting 

the staff in day-to-day tasks 

such as dressing wounds. 

“Many kids came in with 

scratches and infections because 

they don’t have shoes. 

They play barefoot in the sand 

and get caught on metal. We 

saw many injuries like those,” 

says Sun, who was deeply troubled 

by the clinic’s lack of medical 

supplies and poor hygiene. 

In addition to assisting with 

medical needs, Sun collaborated 

with two volunteers to 

create new forms and digitize 

the clinic’s medical records 

with the hope that these can 

eventually be used to produce 

data for statistical analysis. 

“The expertise that we were 

able to offer was mostly technological,” 

he notes. 

The Senegal internship was 

an initiative of the One World 

Foundation, a New York Citybased 

nonprofit that matches 

young people with domestic and 

international projects that promote 

social justice. The United 

States Agency for International 

Development’s Global Health 

Fellows Program provided the 

funding. A desire to visit Africa 

to inform his understanding of 

global health issues motivated 

Sun to apply, a process that required 

a written application and 

a phone interview. 

Sun was born in China and 

was 10 when his family emigrated 

to Vancouver. “Having 

witnessed how the Canadian 

and American health systems 

work, I wanted a more global 

perspective on health care,” he 

explains. 

While in Senegal, Sun and 

the other volunteers stayed in 

a private, two-level building in 

Medina Baye. The desert heat 

was intense, he recalls, and 

power outages were frequent. 

At the clinic, Sun relied on Evelyn 

Kamgang, a fellow volunteer 

who spoke French, to serve as 

an interpreter for him with the 

doctors and nurses, who spoke 

French and Wolof, the local 

language. 

Thomas Sun ’11, shown here in his 

bedroom in Senegal wearing a traditional 

Senegalese outfit, has been connecting 

Harlem families with essential 

resources through Project HEALTH 

since his first year at the College. 

PHOTO: Trell Malveo 

“He always had his notebook 

out in which he would take copious 

notes of French phrases 

and their phonetic sounds, 

along with Wolof phrases and 

translations,” recalls Kamgang 

of Sun. “He did not let the lack 

of French or Wolof speaking 

skills stop him from communicating 

with our Senegalese 

counterparts or participating in 

clinic activities.” 

Though the language barrier 

was frustrating, Sun gained a 

new goal from it. “I realized if 

I was going to be more effective 

on the global health scene 

I would need to be more proficient 

in at least another language,” 

explains Sun, who is 

studying French and already is 

fluent in Cantonese and Mandarin 

Chinese. 

Sun also considers his stay in 

Senegal his first real exposure 

to Islam, the country’s predominant 

religion. He found the 

experience culturally enriching 

and was particularly struck by 

the role local religious leaders, 

known as sheikhs, played 

in promoting healthcare 

initiatives. 

“They were the ones 

who spoke on the radio 

to get people to have 

their children vaccinated,” 

he says. 

Sun traveled to Senegal 

with the goal of expanding 

his knowledge of global 

health issues and succeeded; 

a similar resolve 

to broaden his horizons 

steered him toward the 

College two years earlier. 

“Columbia drew me 

because it’s in New York 

City and that comes with 

many cosmopolitan and 

international opportunities,” 

says Sun, who 

completed the elite International 

Baccalaureate 

Degree Program, a rigorous 

two-year curriculum 

for high school students 

that yields a diploma 

recognized by universities 

worldwide. “I also was drawn 

by the well-roundedness of the 

Core, which is something the 

IB program also stresses and I 

found I enjoy.” 

Sun is majoring in philosophy 

and completing a pre-medical 

curriculum. He became interested 

in public health issues as 

a first-year at the College when 

he joined the Columbia chapter 

of Project HEALTH, a volunteer 

organization that recruits college 

students to provide public 

health interventions at local 

medical institutions. 

“Part of why I am interested 

in health inequalities is because 

I was an immigrant, and I did 

not understand English when 

I moved to Vancouver. I felt a 

lot of the time I was neglected 

or ignored because of the 

language barrier,” he says. “I 

find that I can identify with underprivileged 

patients who feel 

that they are ignored in some 

sense as well.” 

Through Project HEALTH, Sun 

has mentored children with 

sickle cell disease and staffed 

help desks at the Harlem Hospital 

Center and NewYork-Presbyterian 

Hospital emergency 

rooms that connect underprivileged 

families with resources 

relating to food, education, employment 

and housing. 

“We [the students] are the 

ones who are directly servicing 

them,” says Sun, who assumed 

a more administrative role 

as a campus coordinator for 

Project HEALTH in April. “With 

the recent economic crisis we 

have seen an increase in the 

number of cases.” 

In 2009, Sun was awarded 

the Goldman Sachs Global Leaders 

scholarship, which recognized 

16 students nationwide 

who excelled academically and 

demonstrated leadership potential. 

He envisions himself pursuing 

an M.D./M.P.H., and though 

he is pondering different career 

paths, the value of his experiences 

thus far is not lost on him. 

“I will be more aware of the 

socioeconomic factors that impact 

health,” says Sun. “A doctor 

can only treat part of the health 

problem.” 

Nathalie Alonso ’08, from 

Queens, is a freelance journalist 

and an editorial producer of 

LasMayores.com, Major League 

Baseball’s official Spanish language 

website. 


12



CAMPUS News 

n LEED GOLD: The recently renovated 

Faculty House (www.facultyhouse.com) 

has been awarded the prestigious Leadership 

in Energy and Environmental 

Design Gold Certification by the United 

States Green Building Council, making it 

the first LEED Gold Certified building on 

the Morningside campus. Faculty House 

is the only building of its kind in New 

York City and the first McKim, Mead & 

White building in the country to be 

given this designation. The United States 

Green Building Council describes the 

LEED system as “the nationally accepted 

benchmark for design, construction and 

operation of high-performance green 

buildings.” 

Some of the features of the Faculty 

House restoration included integrated 

energy-efficient and water-conserving utilities, 

appliances, fixtures and insulation; 

installation of a new HVAC system; recycled, 

low-emission furnishings, materials 

and finishes as well as locally made materials; 

restored original details; and repurposed 

materials. During renovation, used 

equipment was donated and construction 

waste was recycled. Faculty House was 

awarded 44 out of 44 total points attempted 

in the certification process. 

 

enters new era 

Wm. Theodore de Bary ’41, ’53 GSAS was 

awarded the Philolexian Award for Distinguished 

Literary Achievement at the 

Philolexian Society’s annual dinner, held 

at the Union Theological Seminary on 

April 17. De Bary, the John Mitchell Mason 

Professor Emeritus and Provost Emeritus 

of the University, was cited as “a distinguished 

member of the Philolexian Society 

and a giant in the field of literary endeavor 

who is the quintessential great teacher, 

the quintessential great scholar and the 

quintessential great Columbian.” Tao Tan 

’07, ’11 Business, a former student of de 

Bary’s, presented the award. 

PHOTO: RAZA PANJWANI ’07 

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Roar Lion Roar 

n TENNIS REPEAT: Columbia’s 

men’s tennis team, co-captained by 

Jon Wong ’10 and Mihai Nichifor 

’10E, won its second consecutive 

Ivy League Championship and its 

third in the last four years by beating 

Princeton 6–1 on April 18. The 

Lions finished the regular season 

with a 16–4 overall record and 6–1 

in the Ivy League to capture their 

fifth Ivy title since 2000 and eighth 

under coach Bid Goswami, who 

took over the program in 1982. 

Wong is the first Columbia tennis 

player to become a three-time 

Ivy champion, and Nichifor, a 

transfer from Manhattan, completed 

his two years at Columbia 

with a 14–0 record. They were All- 

Ivy first-team selections in both 

singles and doubles, and Haig 

Schneiderman ’12, who was 7–0 in 

singles play at the No. 3 spot, was 

named to the All-Ivy second team. 

n GOLF THREE-PEAT: Clark Granum 

’11E shot a three-under-par 

67 in the final round at Baltusrol 

in Springfield, N.J., on April 25 to 

lead Columbia’s men’s golf team 

to its third consecutive Ivy League 

Championship. The Lions compiled 

a three-round score of 890 to 

beat Yale by three strokes for the 

team title, with Penn third at 898. 

Granum tied Penn’s Scotty Williams 

for the best individual score 

at 214 but lost a one-hole playoff 

for medalist honors. 

Brendan Doyle ’12 and Michael 

Yiu ’13 tied for seventh individually 

at 225, Justin Lee ’11 tied for 16th 

at 228 and Ford Fischer ’13 tied for 

23rd at 233. The team score comprises 

the top four scores each day. 

Granum was named to the All- 

Ivy first team for the third straight 

season, while Doyle and Yiu earned 

second team honors. 

n STRAIGHT SHOOTERS: The 

Columbia archery recurve team 

won silver for the second consecutive 

year at the U.S. Intercollegiate 

Archery Champions at College Station, 

Texas, on May 13–16. Columbia, 

represented by Sara Goshorn 

’10, Sarah Chai ’12 and Alexandra 

Garyn ’11 Barnard, defeated Connecticut 

and James Madison before 

losing to the host school, Texas 

A&M, by one point. 

Goshorn won the silver medal 

individually in the recurve division, 

winning four matches before 

bowing to Jennifer Nichols of Texas 

A&M 106–94 in the final. Goshorn 

earned All-America honors for 

the third year in a row. Chai and 

Sydney Shaefer ’12 (compound) 

were named All-America for the 

second consecutive year and Lauren 

Marion ’11 (recurve) achieved 

All-America for the first time. 

n GEHRIG TITLISTS: Columbia’s 

baseball team won its second 

Lou Gehrig [’23] Division title in 

three years before bowing to Red 

Rolfe Division champion Dartmouth, 

two games to one, in the 

playoff for the Ivy League Championship. 

Columbia had won the Ivy 

crown in 2008, Dartmouth in 2009. 

Columbia compiled a 26–21 record, 

including 14–6 in Ivy play, for 

its first winning record in 23 years. 

The 26 wins were the Lions’ most 

against Division I opponents in 

school history. Pat Lowery ’12 was 

named Ivy Pitcher of the Year after 

going 3–1 in Ivy (5–3 overall) and 

holding opposing league batters to 

a meager .172 average. Outfielder 

Dario Pizzano ’13, who hit seven 

of his 12 home runs in Ivy play 

and batted .388 against league foes, 

shared Rookie of the Year honors 

with Chris O’Dowd of Dartmouth. 

Columbia’s men’s golf team celebrates winning its third consecutive Ivy 

League Championship at the historic Baltusrol Golf Club in Springfield, N.J. 

Photo: Dan Laukatis 

In addition to Lowery and Pizzano, 

catcher Dean Forthun ’10 and 

designated hitter Alex Aurrichio ’12 

were named to the All-Ivy first team. 

Pitcher Don Bracey ’11 was named 

to the second team and infielder Jon 

Eisen ’12, first baseman Jason Banos 

’11, shortstop Alex Ferrera ’11 and 

outfielder Billy Rumpke ’12 received 

honorable mention. 

n HEPS: Columbians won seven 

individual titles and two relay 

crowns at the Ivy League Heptagonal 

Championships in Princeton 

on May 9. 

Kyra Caldwell ’12 was named 

the meet’s Most Outstanding Female 

Performer. She won the 100m 

hurdles and 400m hurdles and set 

an Ivy record with a time of 58.24 

seconds in the latter event. Caldwell 

then teamed with Yamira Bell ’13, 

Uju Ofoche ’13 and Sharay Hale ’12 

to win the 4x400m relay in an Ivyrecord 

time of 3:35.69. Hale won the 

200m dash, Jacqueline Drouin ’11 

won the 1500m run and Monique 

Roberts ’12 Barnard took the high 

jump. 

The men’s team made its mark 

as well. Kyle Merber ’12 won the 

1,500m run and Jeff Moriarty ’11 

captured the 800m run, and the 

two teamed with Mike Mark ’10 

and Matthew Stewart ’11 to win 

the 4x800m relay. 

By virtue of their wins, all 

received All-Ivy first team recognition. 

In addition, because they 

finished second in the events listed, 

the following were selected for the 

second team: Hale (100m dash), 

Bell (400m dash), Drouin (3,000m 

run) and Ofoshe (long jump). 

n ROWING: Columbia’s varsity 

heavyweight eight scored a surprising 

win in its heat at the Eastern 

Sprints, beating highly regarded 

crews from Yale and Wisconsin, 

among others. The freshman eight 

also surprised the experts by finishing 

second in its heat behind topranked 

Harvard. Both crews, however, 

finished sixth in their Grand 

Finals. Columbia’s JV finished 

third in its opening heat and fifth 

in the Petite Final. The varsity lightweights 

finished second in their 

Petite Final, the JV finished third 

and the freshmen came in fourth. 

n ALL-IVIES: In addition to those 

mentioned in previous items, four 

other Columbians earned All-Ivy 

honors in spring sports. In softball, 

catcher Kayla Lechler ’12, who set 

school records for batting (.368), 

runs (37) and total bases (79), was 

named to the first team, and utility 

player Dani Pineda ’10, who 

played both first base and center 

field and led the team with six 

home runs, and designated player 

Maggie Johnson ’11, who pitched 

and played first base and set a 

school record with 12 career home 

runs, made the second team. Golfer 

Lynda Kwon ’12, who finished 

seventh in the Ivy championships, 

also made the second team. 

Soccer star Sophie Reiser ’10 and 

All-American fencer Jeff Spear ’10 

were this year’s winners of the 

Connie S. Maniatty Outstanding 

Senior Student-Athlete Awards at 

the annual Varsity ‘C’ ‘Celebration. 

Photo: Gene Boyars 

n VARSITY ‘C’: Sophie Reiser ’10 

(soccer) and Jeff Spear ’10 (fencing) 

were presented the Connie S. 

Maniatty [’43] Outstanding Senior 

Student-Athlete Awards at the 89th 

Varsity ‘C’ Celebration at Levien 

Gymnasium on May 4. 

Reiser, Columbia’s all-time leader 

in assists, was the Ivy League Player 

of the Year in 2009 and three times 

earned All-Ivy first team recognition. 

Spear, class salutatorian, was 

the 2008 NCAA sabre champion 

and a second-team All-American 

in 2009 and 2010. He received the 

NCAA’s Elite 88 Award at the 2010 

NCAA Championships and ESPN 

The Magazine/CoSIDA’s Academic 

All-America of the Year Award, the 

first Columbian to be honored. 

Phil Satow ’63 (baseball) and 

Lisa Landau Carnoy ’89 (track and 

field) were presented with the Athletics 

Alumni Awards. 

n STEINMAN: Sports historian 

and former sports information 

director Bill Steinman was one of 

seven people presented with Lifetime 

Achievement Awards by the 

College Sports Information Directors 

of America in San Francisco 

on July 5. Steinman publicized 

Columbia sports for 38 years, joining 

the Athletics Office in 1970 and 

retiring in 2008. He continues to 

serve as a valued resource because 

of his encyclopedic knowledge of 

Columbia sports history. 

Alex Sachare ’71 


14



Transitions 

n ALUMNI OFFICE: Taruna 

Sadhoo joined the Alumni Office 

on March 15 as assistant director 

for student-alumni programs. She 

works with the Division of Student 

Affairs and the Center for Career 

Education to create opportunities 

for alumni involvement that will 

support the undergraduate experience. 

Before coming to Columbia, 

Sadhoo spent 2½ years at Queens 

College as coordinator of specialty 

advising/programs and academic 

adviser. 

Ron Joe joined the Alumni Office 

on April 21 as associate director, 

data analysis and reporting. Joe 

most recently worked at Columbia 

IN LUMINE TUO 

Technology Ventures, where he 

spent the past 1½ years as associate 

director, business processes and 

data management. Prior to working 

at CTV, Joe worked for more 

than a decade as an independent 

technology consultant with firms 

such as Credit Suisse, Morgan 

Stanley and The City of New York. 

He works with the Alumni Office 

to provide ad hoc reports and 

data analyses for individual units 

as well as develop models and 

reports to support short- and longterm 

planning. 

Three Columbia College Fund 

staff members have been promoted. 

Eleanor L. Coufos ’03, ’06 TC has 

n AAAS: Ruth DeFries, the Denning Professor of Sustainable Development 

and professor of ecology, evolution and environmental biology, 

and professor of philosophy Christopher Peacocke were among 

four Columbia faculty members elected this year to the American 

Academy of Arts and Sciences, one of the nation’s most prestigious 

and oldest honorary societies. They were joined by Nicholas Lemann, 

dean of the Journalism School, and Peter Strauss, the Betts 

Professor of Law. They will be inducted on Saturday, October 9, at 

the academy’s headquarters in Cambridge, Mass. 

been appointed director of annual 

giving programs, effective May 1. 

Coufos joined the Alumni Office in 

April 2007 from the Center for Career 

Education, starting as associate 

director of donor relations and then 

becoming director of the Young 

Alumni Fund in July 2008. As director 

of annual giving programs, she 

will focus on bringing the College 

Fund’s direct mail, telemarketing 

and online giving programs to even 

higher levels as well as increasing 

outreach and providing leadership 

to the fund in managing trend analysis 

and segmentation strategies. 

Amanda Kessler has been promoted 

to associate director of the 

Young Alumni Fund, effective May 

24. Kessler has been with the YA 

Fund for almost two years, notably 

working as staff adviser to the 

Senior Fund. In the past two years, 

the Senior Fund’s participation 

rates of 90.5 percent and 92.7 percent 

showed increases of 5 percent 

and 2.2 percent from the previous 

years, respectively. In partnership 

with the Alumni Affairs department, 

Kessler has co-led the Young 

Alumni Spring Benefit for the past 

two years. In her new role, Kessler 

will continue to handle these areas 

as well as take on greater responsibility 

for the YA Fund. 

Matt Winkler P’11, editor-inchief 

of Bloomberg and a member 

of the College’s Board of 

Visitors, shares a moment with 

President Barack Obama ’83 

at the White House Correspondents 

Dinner at the Washington 

Hilton Hotel on May 1. 

Photo: Patti Harris 

Zachary Howell, who for the 

past three years was a member of 

the College’s Fund staff, first as a 

development officer working with 

older alumni and then as assistant 

director of the Parents Fund, has 

been promoted to associate director 

of the SEAS Annual Fund, effective 

July 12.


Class of 2010 Joins 

Ranks of Alumni 

B y Et h a n Ro u e n ’04J a n d Al e x Sa c h a r e ’71 

P h o t o s b y Ch a r Sm u l l y a n a n d Ei l e e n Ba r r o s o 

As the Class of 2010 celebrated Class Day on May 17, 

the College’s newest alumni were treated not just 

to mild temperatures and sunny skies but also to 

a rousing call to arms from keynote speaker Benjamin 

Jealous ’94, NAACP president. 

“These are days when we each are called on to be clear about 

what we want not just for ourselves, but for the world,” Jealous 

told the seniors gathered on South Field. “Now is the time for 

you to decide that you will move this country always forward 

and never backward. Now is the time for all of us who believe in 

hope, not hate, to speak up and be heard, because change happens 

every day, not just during elections.” 

Jealous, a campus activist who was suspended from Columbia 

before being reinstated and going on to become a Rhodes Scholar, 

spoke about his time as a civil rights activist in the South and 

warned of the need to always be questioning who are your enemies 

and who are your friends. 

Presiding over her first Class Day, Dean Michele Moody- 

Adams received an enthusiastic ovation as she addressed the 

graduating class. “You dove into this big pond that we call Columbia 

College and you did what was required of you not only 

to stay afloat, but to swim with assurance and power, and to do 

so in more than one sense,” she said, drawing a laugh with her 

reference to Columbia’s famous swim test. 

Smiling faces were everywhere at Class Day and Commencement. 

NAACP President Benjamin 

Jealous ’94 exhorted graduating 

seniors to “speak up and be 

heard.”

columbia college today class day and commencement 2010 

Moody-Adams quoted from John Dewey, who said, “Education 

is not preparation for life, education is life itself,” and urged 

the graduates to remain lifelong learners. She also referred to 

John Stuart Mill, who wrote that truly happy people always have 

their minds fixed on some object other than their own happiness. 

“That object might be the happiness of others, it might be the improvement 

of mankind, it might be some other art or pursuit, as 

Mill says, ‘followed not as a means but as itself an ideal end,’ ” 

she said. “Aiming at something else, Mill concludes, we will thus 

find happiness by the way. 

“But now it’s your turn. You must find something in life that 

takes you outside of yourself, something that provides a goal far 

richer and more compelling than the fleeting pleasure of the moment. 

Your Columbia College education has taught you just how 

to find such a goal, and its value in this regard may mean more to 

you in the future than it already means today.” 

For the seventh year, the procession featured the Alumni Parade 

of Classes, with 115 alumni from as far back as the Class of 

1936 marching with their class banners. The alumni were greeted 

by a standing ovation from the members of the graduating class 

as they passed alongside with their banners and symbolically 

welcomed the seniors into the alumni community. 

Dean of Student Affairs Kevin Shollenberger welcomed the 

students, parents and guests and also presented a number of student 

life and service awards, Dean of Academic Affairs Kathryn 

B. Yatrakis presented academic awards and prizes and Geoffrey 

J. Colvin ’74, president of the Columbia College Alumni Association, 

presented alumni awards and prizes. 

Jeffrey Spear ’10 delivered the salutatory address, and Clifford 

Massey ’10, senior class president, addressed the crowd prior to 

the presentation of class pins, at which several deans were assisted 

by members of the 50th anniversary Class of 1960. 

Adam Bulkley ’10, Senior Fund chair and recipient of the 2010 

Alumni Association Achievement Award, announced that a re- 

Trustee Emeritus George L. Van Amson ’74 (left) presents 

an Alumni Medal to Kyra Tirana Barry ’87, a v.p. of the CC 

Alumni Association. Gedale B. Horowitz ’53, ’55L (center) 

and his wife, Barbara Silver Horowitz ’55 Barnard, also 

received Alumni Medals. 

Two graduating seniors found much 

to smile about at Class Day. 

Dean Michele Moody-Adams presided 

over her first Class Day and urged 

the graduating seniors to remain 

lifelong learners.

class day and commencement 2010 


cord 92.7 percent of seniors had donated $18,628 this year, and 

that surpassing the participation goal of 91 percent triggered a 

gift of $50,000 from Board of Visitors member Charles Santoro 

’82. Bulkley, accompanied by the nine Senior Fund vice-chairs, 

presented Moody-Adams with a scroll bearing the names of the 

945 seniors who contributed. 

While the weather was perfect for Class Day, it rained the following 

day at University Commencement and the sea of light 

blue in the center of campus was somewhat obscured by umbrellas. 

President Lee C. Bollinger, who had cut short his Class 

Day remarks because he was to speak at Commencement, said 

he was invoking his executive authority to shorten sections of the 

outdoor event, which was met with approving cheers from the 

grateful, wet crowd. In his sharply abridged remarks, he shared 

an old piece of academic “folk wisdom” that “if it rains on your 

Commencement, you are guaranteed to have a fabulous life.” 

During the Commencement ceremony, the University conferred 

eight honorary degrees and two Medals for Excellence. Among the 

honorary degree recipients were NYC schools chancellor Joel I. 

Klein ’67, playwright Tony Kushner ’78 and the late professor C. 

Lowell Harriss ’40 GSAS. The Medals for Excellence, awarded annually 

to outstanding alumni under the age of 45, were presented 

to Ron Gonen ’04 Business and Dana Schutz ’02 Arts. 

Ten Alumni Medals were presented, with the recipients including 

Kyra Tirana Barry ’87 and Gedale B. Horowitz ’53, ’55L. 

Presidential Awards for Excellence in Teaching were presented 

to Sharon Akabas, associate clinical professor, Department of 

Pediatrics; Michelle S. Ballan, assistant professor, School of Social 

Work; Linda F. Cushman, associate clinical professor, Department 

of Population and Family Health; Frederik B.S. Paerels, associate 

professor, Department of Astronomy; and Michael S. Sparer, professor, 

Department of Health Policy and Management. 

Later, from dusk until after midnight, the lights of the Empire 

State Building were aglow in blue and white in honor of Columbia’s 

graduates. 

Moody-Adams 

received a scroll 

bearing the names 

of the record 945 

senior donors from 

Senior Fund chair 

Adam Bulkley ’10 

(sixth from right) 

and the nine vicechairs. 

Students stood 

and cheered as 

members of the 

Class of 1980 

passed by with 

their class banner 

during the Alumni 

Parade of Classes. 


18

columbia college today class day and commencement 2010 

Rain dampened 

those in attendance 

at Commencement 

but 

not their spirits. 

President Lee 

C. Bollinger invoked 

his executive 

privilege 

to cut short 

the ceremony, 

including his 

remarks, which 

can be read in 

full online at 

www.columbia. 

edu/cu/presi 

dent/docs/com 

munications/ 

2009-2010/ 

100518Com 

mencement 

Address.html. 

Two happy 

graduating 

seniors join 

the ranks of 

College alumni.


Chris Kimball ’73 brings recipes that work from 

America’s Test Kitchen to your kitchen 

Cooking 101 

B y Cl a i r e Lu i ’00 

The titles of Chris Kimball ’73’s published 

books, The New Best Recipe and More Best 

Recipes, quite literally reflect his convictions 

about cooking. Kimball believes 

that there is an absolute best way to cook 

anything and everything — and furthermore, 

that with the right recipes, anyone 

can be a great cook. 

Kimball’s passion for well-made food 

(and his zeal for didactic details in recipes) 

is reflected in the magazines, television shows and books 

that he oversees as the head of the America’s Test Kitchen empire 

(www.americastestkitchentv.com), based in Boston. His official 

title is founder of Boston Common Press, the company that owns 

the various media that come out of America’s Test Kitchen. In 

reality, Kimball is much more than just the founder, serving as 

hands-on leader and cooking guru/taskmaster to more than three 

dozen employees who create hundreds of recipes each year. 

And to the public, Kimball, sporting a natty bow tie and his 

signature red apron, is instantly recognizable as the face and 

voice of the America’s Test Kitchen brand. 

The brand began with a small, unassuming food magazine, Cook’s 

Illustrated (www.cooksillustrated.com), which in terms of circulation 

is now one of the biggest cooking magazines in the country and 

is edited by Kimball. It has grown to include a spin-off magazine, 

Cook’s Country (www.cookscountry.com); two shows on PBS, America’s 

Test Kitchen and Cook’s Country (www.cookscountrytv.com), both 

hosted by Kimball; a new radio show debuting this fall, also hosted 

by Kimball; a bevy of cookbooks each year; and four successful websites. 

The company is privately held and revenues are not publicly 

disclosed, but the Boston Globe has estimated the gross revenue for 

print and web subscriptions alone at more than $40 million a year — 

and that’s not counting television, radio or book revenues. 

Fusing science, analytical testing and commonsense tasting, 

Kimball and his team have developed an approach to cooking 

that is quite different from the celebrity chef phenomenon. 

Though Kimball is featured as the face of America’s Test Kitchen 

and Cook’s Illustrated, he and his team try to shift the emphasis to 

where they think it belongs: the food. 

Kimball is involved in every television and radio episode, sits in 

on meetings for all the books and magazines, and tastes everything 

in Cook’s Illustrated. His workday starts at 6:30 a.m., and the editorial 

director at Cook’s Illustrated, Jack Bishop, says with a laugh, 

“When Chris arrives on his motorcycle, wearing his bow tie, it is a 

sight to be seen.” Kimball’s contrast of practical neckwear (chosen 

for his ability to keep it out of the food he cooks) and daring transport 

might seem unusual, but above all, Kimball’s approach to life 

is about how to find the best, most enjoyable way to live it. 

It’s a philosophy that’s reflected in Kimball’s fondness for simple, 

unpretentious food, as well as in his personal passions, which 

include driving fast, gorgeous cars (“Driving with Chris in his 

Maserati in Boston is a death wish,” says Bishop, who says that 

once was enough for him) and the Grateful Dead (Kimball plays in 

a Grateful Dead cover band). 

This combination of practicality and luxury might have had its 

roots in Kimball’s childhood. Though he grew up in Westchester 

County, N.Y., Vermont always has been at the heart of Kimball’s 

self-identity. His parents owned a farm in Vermont, where the family 

spent weekends and summers, and Kimball has written extensively 

about Vermont in his Cook’s Illustrated editor’s letters and his 

cookbooks. The original family farm was sold, but Kimball bought 

a new farm in 1986 in southwest Vermont, which now includes 

livestock, bees, an apple orchard and a maple syrup operation. 

Kimball and his wife, Adrienne, and children, Whitney, Caroline, 

Charles and Emily, divide their time between Boston and Vermont. 

When speaking about his influences, it’s clear that the state is a sort 

of talisman for Kimball. He reminisces about a local cook from 

his childhood as the primary inspiration for his philosophy about 

what to cook and how to eat: “The thing about Marie Briggs was 

that her farmhouse was the center of town. So when people were 

driving around, they would often stop by and get something to eat 

and whoever was around would get dinner at noon. Food was the 

center of that community and she was 

the center of that community because she 

was the cook. The food was simple, but 

it was really good. I really liked that, and 

that’s how I got started.” 

Kimball’s upbringing reflected the 

time (the ’60s) and place (the suburbs) of 

his youth, where his love of fast cars and 

Deadhead tendencies may have originated. 

He attended Phillips Exeter Academy 

before matriculating at Columbia in 1969, 

in the middle of the anti-war activities and 

protests that consumed the University and 

the nation at the time. “There was a lot going 

on,” he says. “We were always marching 

and we had strikes every May Day. I 

don’t think I took finals more than half the 

time, because the school was on strike. The 

College was under siege for that time, and 

it was a really tough time.” 

Chris Kimball ’73 

is familiar to 

millions as the 

host of America’s 

Test Kitchen. He 

lets the kitchen 

staff do most of 

the cooking and 

acts as a stand-in 

for the viewer, 

asking questions 

about ingredients 

and technique. 

Photos: Daniel 

Van Ackere 


20

columbia college today chris kimball ’73 


21

chris kimball ’73 


Majoring in primitive art, Kimball recalls having excellent art 

history professors and cites Professor Albert Goldman’s classes as 

being particularly memorable, but he acknowledges that he probably 

learned as much outside the classroom as inside. During his 

undergraduate years, Kimball drove a cab on weekends and remembers 

sitting on the roof of the student center during a protest, 

talking a fellow protester out of throwing a Molotov cocktail. 

After a couple of jobs in publishing and marketing, Kimball, 

who had always had an interest in cooking, began taking cooking 

classes. Frustrated with the lack of answers about why some recipes 

worked and others failed, Kimball decided to start his own 

cooking magazine in 1980 and raised $100,000 from friends and 

family to get it going. 

“The other food magazines weren’t really about food,” he says. 

“They were about restaurants and lifestyle.” This first magazine, titled 

Cook’s, already bore Kimball’s soon-to-be signature emphasis on cooking. 

Eventually, the magazine was sold and operated by different media 

companies before being closed down by Condé Nast in 1990. 

In 1993, Kimball decided to try again, and this time, after buying 

back the name Cook’s, he ditched the advertisers as well as 

any lifestyle and travel articles requested by said advertisers. The 

result was Cook’s Illustrated, an advertising-free publication that is 

a cross between Consumer Reports and a high-end neighborhood 

recipe pamphlet. The magazine only has color on the cover; inside, 

unfussy black-and-white photos are augmented with precise 

line drawings. 

In 2000, Kimball started America’s Test Kitchen, now airing its 10th 

season on PBS. “It’s no secret that in the food world, you need to be 

on TV,” says Kimball. “If you’re not, it’s very difficult.” Unlike traditional 

cooking shows, which are built around the personality of the 

chef-host (think Julia Child), America’s Test Kitchen is much closer to 

a classroom. Kimball rarely, if ever, cooks on the show, leaving that 

to the test kitchen staff. He acts in his host role as a stand-in for the 

viewer, asking the reasoning behind each ingredient and technique. 

His friend and fellow PBS cooking show host, Lidia Bastianich, 

host of Lidia’s Italy, is respectful of Kimball and his team’s zeal for 

details. “I think they are very practical, and they take the maybes out 

of the recipes. It’s a clean, intelligent approach,” she says. Bastianich 

says that her show emphasizes “the freedom of cooking” and a belief 

that “cooking is not a science,” taking a more relaxed approach 

that is the opposite of Kimball’s philosophy; for him, cooking is a 

science. Nonetheless, Bastianich suggests that perhaps her show has 

gently changed Kimball’s approach to television, saying, “We have 

influenced each other. He hasn’t admitted to my influence, but perhaps 

now he brings a little more passion to the show.” 

The recipes for Kimball’s magazines and the television shows all 

go through a rigorous testing process. First, readers are surveyed 

about which recipes they want to see. Next, the test kitchen tries out 

multiple versions of each recipe, with a working recipe being tested 

as many as 50 or 100 times. Then the recipe is sent to a few thousand 

volunteer testers, with a few hundred of them trying it within a week 

and answering a questionnaire. “Unless 80 percent of the people say 

that they will make it again, we go back and fix it,” Kimball says. 

“We have to go back and make it simpler, make it tastier.” 

The featured recipes are rarely fancy; the emphasis is always 

on simple, easy-to-find ingredients transformed into tasty, approachable 

food. Kimball believes that everyone can agree on the 

best version of a dish. “This whole idea of taste being relative 

— when it comes to basic American cooking — is just not true. I 

mean, there are good mashed potatoes and bad mashed potatoes, 

and it’s not that hard to tell the difference,” he says. 

The resulting recipes are impressive. Cook’s Illustrated’s recipe 

for pie dough, which uses vodka to create a flaky crust, is hailed 

by Kimball as one of the magazine’s best discoveries and immediately 

became a classic among bakers. 

Of course, with access to so many test kitchens and sample 

recipes, the question becomes whether Kimball cooks at home. 

The short answer, at least during the week, is no. That task falls to 

his wife, whom Kimball met when she was working at a summer 

job at a marketing seminar company, where Kimball also worked. 

Adrienne laughs when recalling how Kimball, who used to have 

to walk by her cubicle when leaving, would never say goodbye 

until one evening when she yelled out “Good night, Chris!” Adrienne, 

who has been married to Kimball since 1987, worked on the 

business side of Cook’s before leaving to take care of the family’s 

farm in Vermont, their children and their daily lives in Boston. 

Adrienne, as the person in charge of Kimball family 

meals, did have a wandering eye, recipe-wise, 

for a while. “For years, Adrienne cooked out of 

Bon Appétit, and I used to get really mad,” says 

Kimball. “She used to just ignore me, and then I 

shut up for about three years, and slowly I realized 

she finally had migrated to our stuff, because, I hope, she 

found our stuff more reliable.” Adrienne, who now cooks exclusively 

from her husband’s magazines and books, agrees, saying, 

“The bottom is line is that the Cook’s Illustrated recipes work. The 

other ones, while they may have looked good on paper, were not 

consistently working. Ours just ended up being better.” 

Compared to the other cooking magazines, which are supported 

by advertising, a subscription to Cook’s Illustrated is expensive, 

$24.95 for six issues. After Kimball placed a notice in The New 

York Times announcing Cook’s Illustrated’s return, 1,500 subscribers, 

many of them former Cook’s readers, immediately signed up, 

and today, almost two decades later, the magazine has a million 

subscribers, a number on par with glossies such as Bon Appétit 

and significantly higher than competitor Saveur, which has about 

270,000 paid subscribers. Cooksillustrated.com is unusual in that 

none of its content is free, even with a subscription to the magazine. 

A year’s subscription to the website costs $34.95. 

In a media world that is rapidly changing and during a recession 

where many publications’ advertising revenue has shrunk dramatically, 

Kimball also stands out because his magazines and website all 

are free of advertising, supported only by subscription fees. “Considering 

what a traditional niche Chris is in, he’s been a real innovator, 

and his models have implications that go beyond his amazing 

franchise,” says David Carr, media critic for The New York Times. 

Kimball is adamant about the need for consumers to pay for 

content and to pay for the expertise of well-trained editors and 

test cooks who develop recipes for the show and magazine. “In 

terms of recipe selection, having a lot of recipes is not helpful; 

having recipes that work is,” he says. “You want someone to 

stand in between the raw data and the consumer and give the 

consumer something that’s helpful.” 

And with his gimlet eye, finicky palate and multimedia reach, 

Kimball wants his recipes to be the ultimate stand-in between the 

ingredients and the home cook. America’s Test Kitchen may be a 

democracy of recipe testers, but one very determined ruler stands 

above it all. 

To watch highlights of Chris Kimball ’73 on America’s Test Kitchen, 

go to www.college.columbia.edu/cct. 

Claire Lui ’00 is a freelance writer and editor. Her articles have appeared 

in Print, American Heritage and other magazines and websites. 


22

columbia college today chris kimball ’73 

R e c i p e 

Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookies 

From Cook’s Illustrated 

Makes 16 cookies 

Avoid using a nonstick skillet to brown the butter; the dark color 

of the nonstick coating makes it difficult to gauge when the butter 

is browned. Use fresh, moist brown sugar instead of hardened 

brown sugar, which will make the cookies dry. This recipe works 

with light brown sugar, but the cookies will be less full-flavored. 

1¾ cups unbleached all-purpose flour (8 ¾ ounces) 

½ teaspoon baking soda 

14 tablespoons unsalted butter (1¾ sticks) 

½ cup granulated sugar (3 ½ ounces) 

¾ cups packed dark brown sugar (5 ¼ ounces) 

1 teaspoon table salt 

2 teaspoons vanilla extract 

1 large egg 

1 large egg yolk 

1¼ cups semisweet chocolate chips or chunks 

¾ cup chopped pecans or walnuts, toasted (optional) 

Instructions 

1. Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 375 degrees. 

Line 2 large (18- by 12-inch) baking sheets with parchment paper. 

Whisk flour and baking soda together in medium bowl; set aside. 

2. Heat 10 tablespoons butter in 10-inch skillet over mediumhigh 

heat until melted, about 2 minutes. Continue cooking, 

swirling pan constantly until butter is dark golden brown 

and has nutty aroma, 1 to 3 minutes. Remove skillet from 

heat and, using heatproof spatula, transfer browned butter to 

large heatproof bowl. Stir remaining 4 tablespoons butter into 

hot butter until completely melted. 

3. Add both sugars, salt and vanilla to bowl with butter and 

whisk until fully incorporated. Add egg and yolk and whisk 

until mixture is smooth with no sugar lumps remaining, about 

30 seconds. Let mixture stand 3 minutes, then whisk for 30 

seconds. Repeat process of resting and whisking 2 more times 

until mixture is thick, smooth, and shiny. Using rubber spatula 

or wooden spoon, stir in flour mixture until just combined, 

about 1 minute. Stir in chocolate chips and nuts (if using), giving 

dough final stir to ensure no flour pockets remain. 

4. Divide dough into 16 portions, each about 3 tablespoons (or 

use #24 cookie scoop). Arrange 2 inches apart on prepared 

baking sheets, 8 dough balls per sheet. (Smaller baking sheets 

can be used, but will require 3 batches.) 

5. Bake cookies 1 tray at a time until cookies are golden brown 

and still puffy, and edges have begun to set but centers are 

still soft, 10 to 14 minutes, rotating baking sheet halfway 

through baking. Transfer baking sheet to wire rack; cool cookies 

completely before serving. 

Five Tips for Cooking Success 

Chris Kimball ’73 offers guidelines to help you become a better home cook. 

1. 

Use more salt. People 

don’t use enough salt, 

which is ridiculous. The 

amount of salt you consume 

when you cook is 

a small fraction of your 

daily total salt intake, 

because it’s all in the 

processed foods. 

2. 

Use more heat. People 

don’t use enough heat. 

People are scared of heat, 

but heat creates flavor. 

When they sauté, they 

crowd the pan and they 

don’t preheat it properly, 

and they end up steaming 

the food. When you 

go to professional kitchens, 

you see a lot of heat, 

a lot of smoke. 

3. 

Taste before serving. 

People don’t taste the 

food before they serve 

it, so they don’t adjust 

the seasonings, and they 

end up with something 

that would be improved 

by a little more salt, a 

little more fresh herbs, 

a little more of this or a 

little more of that. That 

last-minute adjustment 

of the dish, assuming 

it’s something you can 

adjust, is something that 

makes a huge difference. 

4. 

Use sharp knives. People 

don’t have a sharp 

knife. (Sharpening 

steels don’t sharpen; 

they tune up the knife. 

To sharpen, you have 

to regrind the blade.) 

So people have incredibly 

dull knives, which 

means they’re likely 

to cut themselves. It’s 

incredibly hard to cook 

with dull knives. 

5. 

Check your oven temperature. 

Buy a $13 

oven thermometer, heat 

the oven for 20 minutes, 

put in the thermometer 

and check it. Often, the 

oven is off by at least 

25 degrees. We calibrate 

our ovens every 

30 days. That’s what 

people at home don’t 

realize. They set their 

oven to 350, and they 

don’t realize it could be 

375 or 400. It could be 

anything. That’s why 

cooking times are never 

to be trusted. No one’s 

ever cooking under the 

same conditions. 


23


Young Lions 

in Washington 

Several recent alumni are making their presence felt in the Obama administration 

B y Ly d i a DePil l i s ’09 

For Lukas McGowan ’07, going 

to the office every day 

means something rather special 

— walking through the 

doors of the White House. 

That’s where he works as a 

correspondent for Vice President 

Joe Biden, drafting letters on behalf of 

his boss to anyone he might need to communicate 

with: the Dalai Lama, perhaps, or 

the prime minister of Spain. 

One day, it was a newly naturalized 

Amer ican, whose letter required some serious 

contemplation. “I hadn’t given much 

thought to what it meant to be an American 

citizen,” McGowan says. “It was an 

exercise not only in writing, but it also was 

a philosophical exercise.” 

McGowan had never set his sights on government, 

but politics uprooted his life at an 

early age. When he was in middle school, during 

Bill Clinton’s second term, his father, Gerald 

McGowan, was appointed ambassador to 

Portugal. So, the seven-child McGowan family 

decamped to Lisbon, going from eating 

spaghetti most nights in Northern Virginia to 

having a staff of eight at a palatial residence in a European capital. 

At his international school, McGowan sometimes took heat for 

his country. “By being the ambassador’s kid, if America was doing 

something, I became the kid who had to stand up for it,” McGowan 

remembers of his four years in the Portuguese capital. “At times, I 

would have to walk through a group of protesters. They were yelling, 

‘Americans are murderers,’ and I would see the guard on the 

other side of the gate and he would let me in real quick.” 

McGowan, who has a ready smile and easygoing manner, 

didn’t consider himself an activist when he got back to the States. 

A political science major, he loved the Core Curriculum, played 

intramural soccer and immersed himself in the delights of the 

city rather than College Democrats meetings. When graduation 

rolled around, he signed on with an investment bank in New 

York. Politics, however, got in the way again; though McGowan 

had been supporting fellow Virginian Mark Warner for President, 

things changed when Obama jumped into the race. 

“Obama declared, and I knew I had to work for him,” says 

McGowan, who had been a fan of the Illinois senator since watching 

him deliver the keynote address at the Democratic National Convention 

in 2004. That choice landed McGowan in Dallas County, Iowa, 

where he was charged with spreading the Obama gospel as one 

By now, you’ve probably heard 

of the Columbia alumni who hold top spots 

in the current administration, including 

Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. ’73, 

’76L; Federal Communications Commission 

chairman Julius Genachowski ’85; 

and of course President Barack Obama ’83. 

But there was a lower-level surge toward 

Washington, D.C., as well, a migration of 

recent graduates wanting to help implement 

the agenda that Obama had laid out 

in his campaign and learn how government 

works from the inside. In addition to 

Josh Lipsky ’08, who works in the White 

House visitors office and was the subject 

of CCT’s January/February “Alumni 

Corner” (www.college.columbia.edu/cct/ 

jan_feb10), here are three more young 

College alumni who are serving on the 

front lines in the administration. 

of the campaign’s earliest paid staffers. At 

that stage, the job meant doing whatever he 

could to get attention for Obama, from running 

road races to entering eating contests in 

his candidate’s name. Wearing a sandwich 

board during a parade one day — as far as he 

could get from his original investment banking 

career plan — McGowan says he thought 

to himself, “I just graduated from Columbia. 

I didn’t picture myself doing this!” 

Obama won Iowa, and the victory made 

him a real contender. But that was only the 

beginning for McGowan, who in the next 

several months sped through California, 

Ohio, Wyoming, North Carolina and Puerto 

Rico, leaving to help organize the next area as 

soon as the last one’s primary was over. For 

the general election, he settled into Virginia, 

and his work contributed to the first Democratic 

presidential win there since 1964. 

Soon after Obama’s victory, McGowan 

went to Washington, working on the transition 

team until he was offered a spot on 

the Vice President’s staff. Though the hours 

aren’t as crazy as his field organizing days 

(he’s usually off in time for dinner), there’s 

a different kind of pressure — his boss, after all, is one of the men 

running the country. “In the campaign, we understood that losing 

wouldn’t be the end of the world,” McGowan explains. “Now 

that we’re governing, we don’t have that choice. The stakes are 

so much higher now.” And now, McGowan is not only drafting 

Biden’s letters but also his speeches: He wrote the first draft of the 

Vice President’s remarks on Earth Day and jumped at the chance to 

write for an appearance in McGowan’s old turf, Iowa. 

On a day-to-day basis, though, there are considerable perks 

to McGowan’s job: directing the vice presidential motorcade 

through New York City, for example, or playing basketball with 

White House staff and elected officials. Sometimes, even senior adviser 

David Axelrod stops by to shoot a few hoops. “He’s good!” 

McGowan says. 

McGowan isn’t sure what his next career move might be — right 

now, he says, there’s just too much going on to think about it. 

As assistant to the head of the Small Business Administration, 

Subash Iyer ’07 is smack in the middle of the 

federal government’s attempt to salvage the U.S. economy, 

and he got there almost entirely by accident. 

At Columbia, Iyer, an economics-political science major, devoted 


24


young lions in washington 

his extracurricular time to activities that skirt the edges of politics and 

policymaking. He traveled and competed with the mock trial team, 

practicing legal reasoning and rhetoric. His speech still is speckled 

with debater-ish phrases such as, “At the end of the day … ”. 

As a volunteer tutor for the college prep program Let’s Get Ready, 

Iyer engaged directly with the kind of social need that he hadn’t 

experienced growing up in suburban New Jersey. He also oversaw 

law and justice as the chair of the Student Council’s elections board, 

arbitrating disputes that arose in hard-fought races between student 

politicians. “The act of politics has always appealed to me,” Iyer 

says, “although I never actually wanted to partake in the act.” 

So Iyer jumped into the intense life of an entry-level 

consultant, putting in 14-hour days at McKinsey & Co., 

helping to unravel the management problems of large 

corporations. He asked for, and received, a broad range 

of assignments, from health care to financial services. 

The case he most enjoyed was the only one he did 

for a public entity: a study on Maine, recommending 

ways in which the state could close a budget gap without 

cutting services. In December 2008, Iyer received 

a call from Karen Mills, who had headed the Maine 

economic council that had brought in McKinsey. President 

Obama had just appointed her to head the Small 

Business Administration, and she had been impressed 

enough with Iyer’s work on the Maine assignment that 

she wanted him to come along. 

Iyer didn’t need to be asked twice. He packed up 

his life in Manhattan and moved to Washington, D.C., 

soon after the inauguration, settling into an office in 

the maze of federal buildings south of the Mall. 

When he arrived, the Small Business Administration 

itself was in need of some McKinsey magic: Its budget 

had been cut significantly during the Bush administration, 

and morale was low. But the SBA had become a key 

element of Obama’s strategy to kick-start the economy; 

legislators allocated $730 million in stimulus funding 

to distribute to small businesses across the country and 

looked to the agency to guarantee loans when banks 

weren’t lending. 

“Small businesses are something that everyone can 

rally around,” Iyer explains. “People realize that we’re 

a powerful engine because we’re connected on the 

ground to people and we can have a tangible impact, 

and so everyone has been coming to us wanting to partner with 

us, from healthcare to ‘green’ jobs.” 

Unlike many positions in federal bureaucracies, Iyer’s job isn’t 

confined to the Washington bubble. He has traveled around the 

country to meet with small businesses, helping the SBA maintain 

a strong local presence. Recently, he transitioned from advising 

Mills on policy matters to working directly with agencies to help 

them award contracts to small businesses — especially those 

owned by women and minorities — as Recovery Act money 

flows through the federal pipeline. 

Iyer grows animated as he talks about the problems his agency 

has been helping to solve. “It’s fascinating,” he says, describing how 

nearly a quarter of all government contracts go to small businesses, 

or how the SBA guarantees more than $80 billion in loans. 

Nonetheless, his Washington detour will not turn into a reroute. 

Iyer will enter NYU Law this fall. He’s not sure what he’ll 

be studying, or where he might want to go after that. But he’ll 

definitely have something to say when classmates ask, “So, what 

have you done since graduation” 

Lukas McGowan ’07 

Subash Iyer ’07 

George Krebs ’09 

Washington, D.C., would seem like a natural postcollege 

destination for George Krebs ’09, whom 

his classmates know as the ebullient social butterfly 

they elected to two terms as class president 

and then president of the Student Council during his senior year. 

After all, it would make sense for him to follow the man upon 

whom he had modeled his own administration. 

Krebs first saw Obama at a campaign rally in July 2007, and the 

next summer he passed up more lucrative internship opportunities 

to volunteer with the campaign’s new media operation. In helping 

to run the blogs and social networks of my.barackobama.com, Krebs 

became part of the team that knit together thousands of 

Obama supporters in the most successful online outreach 

effort politics ever had seen — exactly what Krebs had 

worked to achieve in his own political career. 

“At Columbia,” Krebs says, “it was about having 

a student government that interacts with the people 

it’s representing, one that doesn’t only come to your 

doorstep when you’re pandering for votes but instead 

keeps relationships with you for the entire time you’re 

in office and really cares about your concerns.” 

Krebs’ successful campaigns featured high fives 

and bear hugs rather than advanced web applications, 

and promised the ability to use flex points off-campus 

rather than comprehensive healthcare reform. But the 

idea of constant interactivity carried through to his 

work for Obama. 

“I found a man who believes in that very principle 

who just happens to be the President of the United 

States,” he says. “So it worked out.” 

Along with the luckiest of Obama’s volunteers, 

Krebs found his way into the administration after graduation. 

He’s still doing new media, but this time for the 

FCC under Julius Genachowski ’85. The FCC has been 

making headlines by pushing forward with “Internet 

neutrality,” or keeping the web free of restrictions on 

content and types of access. Krebs also is supporting 

a lower-profile but no less important project: expanding 

broadband Internet across the country, using funds 

from the stimulus package passed last year. 

Like Obama’s web campaign operation, the FCC also 

is leading the federal government’s charge into the world 

of Web 2.0. As such, Krebs has done the federal government’s 

first official live-blog and also manages the FCC’s Twitter 

feed, which has garnered more than 341,000 followers since it started 

in mid-August. Krebs speaks with glee of its rapid early growth. 

“In 80 tweets, I’d grown larger than the EPA! State department, you 

have 9,000 [tweets], I’m coming after you!” he crows. 

Krebs doesn’t plan to stay in D.C. forever — he misses the 

boundlessness of New York City and plans to leave for graduate 

school at some point. In the meantime, he says he has been pleasantly 

surprised by the atmosphere in a large federal bureaucracy 

such as the FCC. 

“I thought that everyone in government would just be going 

through the motions,” Krebs says. “Instead, they are very interesting 

people who live very full lives outside government. I have 

little desire at this point to be a career employee, but being here 

while the Obama administration is in town is really exciting.” 

Lydia DePillis ’09 majored in history and lives in Washington, D.C., 

where she covers real estate and development for Washington City Paper. 


25


[ Columbia Forum] 

The Great 

American University 

PHOTO: CHESTER 

HIGGINS JR. © THE 

NEW YORK TIMES 

Jonathan R. Cole ’64, ’69 

GSAS has spent nearly 

50 years of his life at Columbia 

— arriving as a 

freshman in 1960 then 

quickly progressing to 

Ph.D. student (in sociology), 

professor, and eventually 

Provost and Dean 

of Faculties. He currently is the John Mitchell 

Mason Professor of the University. “Some 

say I bleed Columbia blue,” he writes in the 

preface to his newest book. 

So The Great American University: Its 

Rise to Preeminence, Its Indispensable 

Role, Why It Must Be Protected (Public- 

Affairs, 2010) represents, in its way, a 

departure. Here Cole turns his gaze away 

from the “mother university” to reflect on 

the difficulties facing all of America’s great 

research universities today. A review in The 

Economist said: “His book is really three, 

each a magisterial work. First, he sets out 

an admirably comprehensive history of how 

America’s great universities came into being. 

Then, he trawls for examples 

of the enriching 

inventiveness of these 

institutions, listing the 

extraordinary range of 

innovations in technology 

and in thinking that 

have sprung from their 

research. Finally, he outlines the forces that 

threaten America’s research universities.” 

In the excerpt that follows, Cole explains 

why our research institutions are essential 

and how they have shaped our daily lives. 

Rose Kernochan ’82 Barnard 

I do not know what I may appear to the world; 

but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy 

playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in 

now and then finding a smoother pebble or a 

prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great 

ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me. 

Isa a c Ne w t o n 

Americans 

have always 

been fascinated with inventions and scientific 

discovery, and we pride ourselves on 

our ability to find solutions to formidable 

problems. Yet most people do not know the 

origin of the most important discoveries of 

our time. Is it any wonder, given that the bestselling 

twentieth-century American history 

high-school textbooks devote more space to 

Madonna than to Watson and Crick, that our 


26

Finding A 

Smoother Pebble: 

A National System 

of Innovation

the great american university 


top university professors and researchers typically miss out on 

even their fifteen minutes of fame Nevertheless, we use products 

derived from ideas generated at our great research universities 

countless times a day — whether we realize it or not. 

For example, in the morning you may brush your teeth with 

an electric toothbrush, then stagger into the kitchen, open the 

refrigerator, and take out some orange juice. The toothbrush 

can vibrate thousands of times a minute, creating fluid dynamics 

that can dislodge bacteria and plaque much more efficiently 

than an old-fashioned toothbrush; the refrigerator has 

a compressed gas circulating through its coils; and the orange 

juice has been preserved while being shipped from a distant 

location. All three are based on discoveries made in university 

research departments. Contemplating that night’s dinner, you 

take some steaks out of the freezer and make sure you have 

the ingredients for a salad. Most likely, you are not thinking 

about the fact that the meat’s fine quality is a result of artificial 

insemination and scientific breeding techniques, both the 

result of university work, or that the special tomatoes on your 

counter have been genetically modified. You put a nice bottle 

of California wine into the fridge to chill, with nary a thought 

of the heartier vines made possible by research conducted by 

university enologists, then turn on your favorite FM radio station, 

made possible through university inventions over in engineering, 

for a little background news. 

The station gives you a weather update, based on knowledge 

originating in the meteorological wings of universities. 

Then there are news stories about an earthquake that 

measured 7.5 on the Richter scale, the number of hurricanes 

predicted for this year, and the latest public opinion poll on 

the upcoming election, all of which are based on information 

learned through university research. You swallow the antibiotic 

your doctor prescribed for you, and then, as your conscience 

gets the better of you, decide to go out jogging. You 

bring along some Gatorade (another university invention) so 

you won’t get dehydrated. As you begin, you notice that your 

muscles are sore from your last run, and that reminds you to 

order some flowers for your elderly mother — her hip replacement 

surgery is tomorrow. On your way home you stop at 

the closest ATM for some cash, which, of course, uses another 

university discovery, and later, when you’re driving to work, 

you flip on the GPS to navigate a construction detour. A few 

minutes later, back on route, you use your E-ZPass to glide 

through the bridge toll booth — which uses laser technology, 

not to mention computers — paying a premium for driving 

into the city during peak hours (congestion pricing is also a 

university invention). 

Whatever your job, you are very likely to continue using 

methods and devices that are the fruits of university research 

once you reach the office. As the manager of a hedge fund, for 

example, you would be using sophisticated mathematical programs 

to help make investment decisions, and the mathematics 

and investment algorithms, of course, would be based on advances 

made in universities. When you entered the office, you 

would turn on the computer to find out how the foreign markets 

were doing. In fact, all day long you would be using the 

computer and the Internet, which also began with university 

discoveries. If your advertising agency was using focus groups, 

it would be basing its work on university research, and when 

you took your lunch break, and the clerk at the local deli swiped 

your sandwich and soda over the bar-code scanner, you would 

again be encountering a university discovery. Enough. The list 

could go on and on, but the point is clear. As we march through 

our daily lives, all of us are continually enjoying the benefits of 

discoveries made at our great universities. 

The universities play a huge role in bringing all of these inventions 

and discoveries into our daily lives, but they do not do it 

alone. The research conducted at our great universities is part of a 

larger national system of innovation. That system is essentially a 

social system for producing and applying new knowledge. It is a 

complex network of affiliations, collaborations, associations, and 

formal relationships that includes our universities, government 

agencies and laboratories, and the private sector, including the 

nonprofit research sector. Each plays a critical role in enhancing 

the overall stockpile of knowledge that we possess and in bringing 

it piece by piece into our lives through the practical applications 

that make up our world. 

A Productive Partnership: 

The Impact of Universities on 

Industries and Local Economies 

Industry and research universities are interrelated 

in many ways — not only through 

licensing agreements (explored in Chapter 

5), but also through production of the highly 

trained, talented individuals who work in industrial 

laboratories and through the founding 

of companies by university faculty or former 

students. As of 2003, over 70 percent of all science 

and engineering graduates were working 

in private industry. Forty-four percent of all 

the science and engineering students who had 

earned Ph.D.s were working in industry; 43 

percent were working at institutions of higher learning; and 13 

percent were doing other things. It is clear that research universities 

represent the main pipeline to our nation’s industrial research 

laboratories. And the 100 or so greatest research universities produce 

the majority of Ph.D.s in science and engineering. The great 

industrial laboratories could not function without these universities 

feeding them new, talented individuals on a consistent basis. 

Although the universities supply the talent — people with 

the aptitude, the skills, and the training to contribute to industry 

— as well as many of the ideas that industry uses, however, the 

credit for creating and developing products and services based 

on discoveries in science and engineering cannot go solely to the 

universities. Industry picks up where the universities leave off, 

playing an equal role in the innovation process. In that sense, 

there is a very productive partnership between the universities 

and industry. And the knowledge produced at universities and 

then developed by industry has huge societal payoffs with an 

enormous impact on local, national, and international communities. 

The national system of innovation in America has many 

components, as mentioned above. Here we will take a closer look 

at the relationship between two of those components — the universities 

and industry — with an emphasis on how the universities 

have an impact on the economies of their local communities. 

Stanford and Boston area universities, particularly MIT, have 

attempted to measure the economic and social impacts they have 

had on their local communities, and the data they have generated 

can help us estimate the impact of universities on local communities 

in general. Stanford University reported, for example, that 


28



since the founding of Hewlett-Packard in 1939, 2,325 members 

of the Stanford University community founded more than 2,454 

companies. These companies included such giants as Cisco Systems, 

Google, Hewlett-Packard, Sun Microsystems, and Yahoo!, 

and their commercial prosperity led to the phenomenal success 

of nearby Silicon Valley. These companies have consistently 

made it into the “Silicon Valley 150” — the list of the largest 

Silicon Valley firms, published annually in the San Jose Mercury- 

News. In fact, they have not only made the list, they have consistently 

been in the top ten or fifteen in terms of rank by sales. In 

2008, Hewlett-Packard topped the list, Cisco was number two, 

Google and Sun were numbers six and seven, respectively, and 

eBay was number nine, with Yahoo! twelfth. These companies 

generated $261.2 billion, or 55 percent of the total revenues of 

the 150 companies, in 2008. The total market capitalization of the 

Stanford-founded companies on this select list totaled $415 billion, 

or about 50 percent of the total market capitalization of the 

150 companies. Silicon Valley is in a class of its own, but other 

cities have also benefited from their proximity to major research 

universities. A 1997 study by BankBoston concluded that the local 

economic impact of eight Boston-area universities was “more 

significant than at any other time in modern economic history.” 

MIT alone has a huge impact on the local economy. The 

BankBoston report found that “if the companies founded by 

MIT graduates and faculty formed an independent nation, the 

revenues produced by the companies would make that nation 

the 24th largest economy in the world. The 4,000 MIT-related 

companies employ 1.1 million people and have annual world 

sales of $232 billion. … That is roughly equal to a gross domestic 

product of $116 billion, which is a little less than the GDP of 

South Africa and more than the GDP of Thailand.” Perhaps as 

important as the overall effects of MIT research and training is 

the type of companies that are being formed on the basis of discoveries 

and training at the university. Noting that the MIT companies 

tended to be “knowledge-based companies in software, 

manufacturing (electronics, biotech, instruments, machinery) 

or consulting (architects, business consultants, engineers),” the 

report said: “As you would expect from the most distinguished 

engineering school in the nation, about 50% of the firms had 

founders who majored in engineering and another 24% in physical 

science. But fully 25% of the founders of MIT-related firms 

majored in ‘social studies,’ and a significant number of firms 

generated by them were related to ideas produced in the social 

and behavioral sciences. The knowledge based companies have 

A 2003 study of the economic effects of Boston’s eight research 

universities showed that in the year 2000, these universities 

provided a $7.4 billion boost to the regional economy. 

The study concluded: “As jobs become more knowledge-driven, 

the universities produce not only the research that can lead 

to the creation of new companies and industries in the Greater 

Boston area, but the ability to deliver a workforce educated in 

emerging technologies.” It further noted that the universities 

had “served as a magnet to a number of national and international 

companies that have located or are developing major 

research operations in the Boston area,” listing Amgen, Cisco, 

Merck, Novartis, Pfizer, and Sun Microsystems as examples. 

A 2003 study of the economic effects of Boston’s eight research 

universities showed that in the year 2000, these universities 

provided a $7.4 billion boost to the regional economy. The 

universities employed almost 51,000 people directly in 2002 and 

provided employment indirectly for about 37,000 other workers 

in the region. (This does not include people employed by 

university-affiliated hospitals or research institutes.) A talent 

pool of roughly 32,000 graduates, many of whom remained in 

Boston, came out of the universities every year. Innovative research 

at these universities had led to 264 patents, 280 commercial 

licenses for technology, and 41 start-up companies as well 

as opportunities for more than 25,000 continuing education students, 

many cultural and community events, and general improvements 

in the housing, streets, and environment of Boston. 

The universities received about $1.5 billion a year in research 

contracts and grants, mostly from the federal government. The 

report noted that faculty members had founded major local 

companies such as Akamai Technologies, Biogen, Delphi Communications 

Systems, and Genome Therapeutics. They had also 

spawned hundreds of new start-up companies. In fact, 25 out of 

the 50 Boston-area start-ups that had attracted the most financing 

had been companies associated with these universities. 

a disproportionate importance for their local economies because 

they usually sell to out-of-state and world markets and because 

they so often represent advanced technologies.” 

The universities and the firms based on their research also 

were found to have a “multiplier effect” on the total number of 

jobs created in the local area because, for example, for every local 

job created by a pharmaceutical firm working on university-based 

discoveries, there tended to be three to five additional jobs created 

by the needs of that firm for suppliers of equipment and services. 

These data are now a decade old, but since 1997 MIT’s research and 

development activity and its role in the establishment of new startup 

companies has expanded dramatically. The 1997 data vastly underestimate 

the impact of MIT’s faculty and students today on the 

formation of national and international companies and the value 

of their discoveries and innovations to our economic well-being. 

The fact that the universities have so strongly boosted the 

growth of technologically oriented firms is significant. The 

independent Milliken Institute in Santa Monica, California, 

found that it was the high-technology sectors of the economy 

that determined the success or failure of a metropolitan area. 

High-technology activity explained 65 percent of the difference 

in economic growth among metropolitan regions in the United 

States in the 1990s, and research centers and institutions were 

undisputedly the most important factor in incubating high-tech 

industries. Proximity to a research university has been a critical 

factor in determining where high- technology industries locate 

their offices and laboratories, both because the brains located 

at the university represent a greater asset than ever before, 

and because of the increased interest among universities to be 

involved in the early stages of company formation and the 

licensing of their ideas to established businesses. 


29



Social, Cultural and Ethical 

Impacts of Universities 

For many generations, we Americans 

have thought of education as a public as 

well as a private good. An investment in 

the education of our young people was 

an investment in the nation. We created 

land-grant colleges after the 1862 Morrill 

Act in an effort to train young people 

for more skilled jobs and to improve the 

quality of our agriculture and related 

industries through organized research. 

We knew that a better-educated citizen 

had greater life chances and could potentially 

contribute more to the general social welfare. In recent 

decades, we have moved away from this rationale for higher 

education toward one that focuses on individual payoffs rather 

than on larger societal returns. That is a mistake. Our personal 

and taxpayer investments in the American research university 

should be seen by each of us as an investment in the public 

good — in the larger welfare of the nation that will improve the 

lives of all citizens. That commitment to the general good is a 

fundamental part of the mission of great universities. 

and can potentially fall into the wrong hands, what should our 

attitude toward the advance of knowledge be When we can 

use our knowledge for the welfare of others, what choices are 

we faced with How and whether we decide to use our knowledge 

depends on our values, and sometimes it involves making 

complicated choices where both options have advantages and 

disadvantages. These are issues that are usually the province 

of the humanities, not the sciences, and yet they are questions 

that scientists are now facing every day. This is why I insist that 

the great centers of higher learning must include an emphasis 

on the humanities and social sciences. Great universities cannot 

ignore the contributions of any of these sources of ideas. 

When we think about the contributions of the universities 

to industry we naturally focus on the influence they have had 

on the growth of industrial innovation and the scientific and 

engineering feats involved in taking ideas and translating 

them into useful products. But another kind of contribution 

to the social and cultural life of the nation is derived from the 

ideas, inventions, and discoveries made by scholars working 

in the social and behavioral sciences and the humanities. As 

with the contributions of science and technology to industry, 

the contributions in the social and behavioral sciences and the 

humanities are made through the influence of ideas, concepts, 

and methods as well as through the people who establish and 

staff organizations and businesses that depend on the training 

The number of consulting firms that depend on advanced 

university training, either in the form of Ph.D. or advanced professional 

degrees, and that work for industry to solve marketresearch 

problems, is staggering. The very idea of systematic 

marketing research comes, as we shall see, from our universities. 

I don’t want to dismiss the other side of the story. The great 

transformation that university research has created in our lives 

and society, sometimes beyond what we could have imagined 

even a decade or two ago, also has produced a host of complex 

new scientific, moral, and ethical problems for us to address 

and solve. Our successes have spawned new dilemmas 

of choice. When modern biological science allows us to create 

new and potentially lethal viruses; when nanoscientists, piecing 

together individual atoms, can create biological structures 

that can learn from their own actions; when nuclear physics 

produces the possibility of Armageddon, and creates problems 

of nuclear waste disposal even when its discoveries are used 

peacefully to generate power; when computer-science technology 

allows us to spy on our own citizens and abridge their 

privacy; when automobiles and other manufactured goods 

contribute to global warming; and when we have the capacity 

to clone animals and potentially human beings, we are faced 

with a set of vexing and challenging problems of our own 

making that are sometimes urgent and often controversial. 

New social and economic costs are thus sometimes associated 

with discovery. A number of questions arise that we all 

must consider as the social and ethical impacts of universityrelated 

research affect our world in ever more surprising ways. 

When science and technology have the potential to be misused 

that is provided in these fields by our best universities. 

Consider in blueprint form five domains where our universities 

have had an enormous impact on the direction the society 

has taken over the past fifty years: (1) independent “think 

tanks” that translate empirical knowledge into policy advice; 

(2) consulting firms that are used by businesses and government 

to solve organizational problems; (3) nongovernment 

organizations around the world and other private nonprofit 

foundations; (4) cultural institutions; and (5) individual social 

and political advisers who work for the government. There are 

hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of jobs created as well 

as thousands of businesses spawned as a result of the training 

and expertise gained at our universities in these fields. 

There are hundreds of private think tanks, and they work 

on every imaginable subject, from military preparedness to 

health-care reform. Some are liberal (the Brookings Institution), 

and some are highly conservative (the Heritage Foundation), 

but the entire spectrum of political perspectives is represented 

in the range of think tanks that exist. Though most are 

independent, some are associated with universities (such as 

Stanford’s Hoover Institution, the University of Chicago’s National 

Opinion Research Center [NORC], and the University 

of Michigan’s Institute for Social Research [ISR]). Some are extremely 

large, such as the Rand Corporation, while others are 


30



boutique-sized, specializing in just a few areas of knowledge. 

What almost all have in common is that they recruit highly 

knowledgeable and well-trained graduates of our major research 

universities, most of them with advanced degrees from 

Ph.D. programs or law schools. Many of the larger think tanks 

have endowments, but their revenues come principally from 

work on government contracts that require specific answers 

to questions posed by the funding agency or from private 

businesses. They exert increasing 

amounts of influence 

in the policymaking 

world, independent of 

universities. The quality of 

their work is often mixed, 

but they depend largely 

on our great universities 

for their talent. 

The number of consulting 

firms that depend 

on advanced university 

training, either in the form 

of Ph.D. or advanced professional 

degrees, and that 

work for industry to solve 

market-research problems, 

is staggering. The very idea 

of systematic marketing research 

comes, as we shall 

see, from our universities. 

Polling and public-opinion 

firms alone hire thousands of 

people to staff their efforts to 

put their finger on the pulse 

of the nation. Hundreds of 

thousands of jobs have been 

created from the ideas and 

methodologies developed 

at research universities that 

have created advanced techniques 

to explore questions 

about peoples’ preferences 

and purchasing behavior, 

and about their attitudes 

and opinions, and to place 

these views in some form of 

theoretical context. 

Nonprofit organizations 

are largely staffed by those 

with advanced training at 

our great institutions of 

higher learning. Nongovernment organizations (NGOs), which 

now number in the thousands around the world, and which set 

out to achieve a host of objectives, ranging from empowering 

women in less developed countries to preventing disease, find 

their talent most often at the distinguished research universities. 

These graduates of our universities are contributing on 

the homefront as well as epidemiologists working for the Centers 

for Disease Control; they might become medical sleuths 

trying to uncover the genetic makeup of a bacteria or to piece 

together the history of a flu that is developing into a pandemic. 

As social workers with Ph.D.s or lawyers who work for organizations 

such as the Urban Justice Center, they may advocate 

The Graduate School of Journalism, which has educated many of the 

world’s best journalists, is reflected in the windows of Alfred Lerner Hall, 

the undergraduate student center. 

for the poor. Brilliantly trained lawyers and Ph.D.s are working 

for organizations that are trying to limit the number of wrongful 

convictions in felony cases through the use and analysis of 

DNA evidence. In today’s world, NGOs are having as much 

impact in many domains as governments are. And large, private 

foundations that support the arts, sciences, and humanities, 

as well as ongoing projects on themes designed to address 

major social, political, and economic problems, also depend 

increasingly on the skills 

and knowledge of Ph.D. 

and professional school 

graduates from our finest 

universities. Foundation 

leaders and program officers, 

who choose how and 

where to invest scarce resources, 

have been trained 

and often had teaching 

or research experience at 

these universities. 

Finally, we should not 

omit the contributions of 

these universities to the 

cultural institutions of our 

cities and nation. Universities 

produce more doctorates 

than are needed 

on university faculties. 

Increasingly, these highly 

trained professionals, particularly 

in the humanities, 

are working at museums, 

libraries, media companies, 

and arts and cultural centers. 

The quality of curatorial 

work at museums, and 

the art and science of the 

restoration and preservation 

of valuable artifacts, 

depends on highly technical 

knowledge that can only be 

gained with advanced education. 

Work at museums 

on virtual learning centers 

and on documentary films 

exploring historical and 

cultural subjects depends 

on the talents emerging 

from the advanced university 

programs…. 

As we depend increasingly on knowledge as the source 

of social and economic advance, we require an increasing 

proportion of our young people to be trained, even beyond 

their undergraduate education. The universities are not only 

critically important to our economic and technical welfare; 

they are also, both directly and indirectly, essential in creating 

the richness of the social fabric of the nation. 

Excerpted with permission from The Great American University: Its Rise 

to Preeminence, Its Indispensable National Role, Why It Must Be 

Protected by Jonathan R. Cole (PublicAffairs, 2010). 


31


Alumni 

News 

33 Bookshelf 

35 Obituaries 

37 Class Notes 

72 Lasting Image 

Photo: Eileen Barroso 


32


Bookshelf 

So Lovely a Country Will Never 

Perish: Wartime Diaries of Japan ese 

Writers by Donald Keene ’42, the 

Shincho Professor of Japanese Literature 

and University Professor Emeritus. 

This set of journal entries written 

by WWII-era Japanese liter ary 

figures is interwoven with Keene’s 

commentary and reminiscences 

about the writers (Columbia University 

Press, $24.95). 

But I Never Made a Loan: My 

Career in Banking — The Early 

Years by Carter C. Golembe ’45. 

Golembe, an economist and former 

FDIC employee, comments on the 

relationship between banking and 

public policy (iUniverse, $25.95). 

Lyndon B. Johnson by Charles Peters 

’49. This biography of America’s 

36th president is part of a larger 

series co-edited by Sean Wilentz ’72 

(Henry Holt and Co., $23). 

American Indians and the Fight 

for Equal Voting Rights by Laughlin 

McDonald ’60. McDonald examines 

the struggles that Native American 

citizens have faced in gaining and 

exercising the right to vote (University 

of Oklahoma Press, $55). 

Writing for the Web: 4th Edition 

by Crawford Kilian ’62. Focusing 

on issues of content as well as 

presentation, Kilian outlines the 

strategies that make for effective 

Internet writing (Self-Counsel 

Press, $18.95). 

The Logic of Alice: Clear Thinking 

in Wonderland by Bernard M. 

Patten ’62. Patten examines the 

role of logic in Lewis Carroll’s classic 

children’s book (Prometheus 

Books, $21.98). 

St. James’ Church in the City of 

New York 1810–2010 by Francis J. 

Sypher Jr. ’63. A bicentennial history 

of St. James’ Church, an Episcopal 

parish on New York’s Upper West 

Side (St. James’ Church, $35). 

The Grave Gourmet by Alexander 

Campion. This mystery novel, written 

under a pseudonym by Milton 

Sa Pereira ’68, centers around a 

French detective and her food critic 

husband (Kensington Books, $22). 

William P. Homans Jr.: A Life 

in Court by Mark S. Brodin ’69. 

Brodin chronicles the life of the 

Boston lawyer and antiwar activist 

(Vandeplas Publishing, $29.95). 

Edward Said: The Charisma of 

Criticism by H. Aram Veeser ’72. 

Veeser, a student of Columbiabased 

cultural theorist and late 

University Professor Said, offers 

his thoughts on his teacher’s philosophy 

and contributions to the 

field of academic criticism (Routledge, 

$39.95). 

In Search of the Blues: A Journey 

to the Soul of Black Texas by Bill 

Minutaglio ’76. A longtime reporter 

and professor of journalism, 

Minutaglio has written a series of 

essays about the African-American 

community in Texas (University 

of Texas Press, $24.95). 

The Culture of Japanese Fascism 

edited by Alan Tansman ’81. Tansman 

argues that fascism in WWIIera 

Japan was as much a cultural 

as a political phenomenon (Duke 

University Press, $27.95). 

Walking Thunder: In the Footsteps 

of the African Elephant by 

Cyril Christo ’82 and Marie Wilkinson. 

This book introduces readers 

to the elephants of the savannah 

through black-and-white photographs, 

essays and stories from 

African folklore (Merrill, $60). 

The Conscience of a Libertarian: 

Empowering the Citizen Revolution 

with God, Guns, Gambling 

& Tax Cuts by Wayne Allyn Root 

’83. Root, a candidate for the 2012 

Libertarian Party presidential nomination, 

advocates income tax cuts 

and reductions in the size of the 

government bureaucracy as ways 

to improve America’s political and 

economic situation (John Wiley & 

Sons, $24.95). 

Have You Seen My Dinosaur by 

Jon Surgal ’85. A friendly game of 

hide-and-seek between a young 

boy and his dinosaur gets a little 

out of hand (Beginner Books, 

$8.99). 

Raven Stole the Moon: A Novel by 

Garth Stein ’87. Stein’s protagonist 

is a mother grieving the death of 

her young son (Harper Paperbacks, 

$14.99). 

Rules of the Game by Neil Strauss 

’91. The author offers tips for meeting 

and impressing women, along 

with his lessons learned (It Books, 

$16.99). 

Black Hearts: One Platoon’s 

Descent into Madness in Iraq’s 

Triangle of Death by Jim Frederick 

’93. Frederick details the events 

that preceded the 2006 rape and 

murder of an Iraqi girl by American 

soldiers and explains how the 

psychological consequences of 

modern warfare contributed to the 

crime (Harmony, $26). 

Great Negotiations: Agreements 

that Shaped the Modern World 

by Fredrik Stanton ’96. The author 

describes eight key discussions 

that have shaped the course of 

international diplomacy during 

the last three centuries (Westholme 

Publishing, $26). 

Bitch is the New Black: A Memoir 

by Helena Andrews ’02. In a series of 

essays based on her own experiences, 

Andrews explores the personal 

challenges faced by professionally 

successful African-American 

women today (Harper, $24.99). 

Water the Moon by Fiona Sze-Lorrain 

’03. A compilation of Sze-Lorrain’s 

original poetry (Marick Press, $14.95). 

John Kluge: Stories by John W. 

Kluge Jr. ’05. Written by the son of 

John W. Kluge ’37, this collection 

of anecdotes and stories, as told 

by his father, offers a new perspective 

on the life and philosophy of 

the famous philanthropist (Columbia 

University Press, $39.95). 

The Publisher: Henry Luce and 

His American Century by Alan 

Brinkley, the Allan Nevins Professor 

of American History and Pro- 


33

ookshelf 


Turning Geeks into Superheroes 

Apostolos Doxiadis ’72 merges math and comic books 

Faster than a graphing calculator. Tougher 

than a complex proof. Able to turn a 

nerdy subject into a compelling story in 

fewer than 350 pages. It’s Mathman! 

Actually, it’s Apostolos Doxiadis ’72, who may 

be the first alumnus to fall into the same category 

as Batman and Superman. Doxiadis is the co-author 

and on-page guide of the best-selling graphic novel 

Logicomix: An Epic Search for Truth (Bloomsbury, 

$22.95), the story of Bertrand Russell and the 

search to establish a logical foundation for all of 

mathematics. 

While the graphic novel may not seem the 

ideal genre to attack the greatest paradoxes 

of the 20th century, Russell as narrator adds 

enough POWs, ZAPs and KA-BLAMs to deserve 

a space alongside the best of superheroes. 

“Russell had advantages that made him a 

dream narrator. He was known for his fluency 

and his dry, ironic sense of humor as well 

as his unconventional ideas and behavior,” 

Doxiadis says. “He was more of a Huck Finn, 

i.e., star and teller of his own adventure, than 

an Ishmael in Moby Dick. Russell is undeniably 

one of the great heroes of the quest.” 

After a brief introduction by Doxiadis, his co-author, UC Berk e- 

ley theoretical computer scientist Christos H. Papadimitriou, and 

artists Alecos Papadatos and Annie Di Donna, the reader meets 

Russell pushing his way through a crowd of anti-war protestors at 

the beginning of WWII. 

The protestors appeal to his pacifism and ask him to join them 

instead of going into an American university to give a speech. 

Instead, Russell invites them in and proceeds on a tale that begins 

with his childhood and takes readers through an enthralling 

narrative of his tumultuous relationships, his fear of madness and 

his consuming journey into “The Crisis of Foundation,” the search 

for unifying truths. 

“Russell had a tragic childhood, and his falling in love with the 

‘cold beauty’ (his words) of mathematics was partly an escape 

from horrible internal insecurities and dilemmas,” Doxiadis says. 

“This personal stance seemed to us to be a perfect metaphor 

for the role that the quest for Foundations played in the troubled 

times in which it took place: an almost maniacal search for complete 

certainty in an increasingly uncertain and dangerous world.” 

The reader also is introduced to mathematicians A.N. Whitehead, 

Georg Cantor and Kurt Gödel, as well as their contributions 

to the quest. 

Even without the gene-mutating exposure to a nuclear reactor, 

Russell is able to tackle the problems of his times in a compelling 

story that Doxiadis made seem effortless. 

He has had practice, though. Doxiadis has made his living in 

the arts for three decades as a film and theater director, playwright 

and novelist. Uncle Petros and Goldbach’s 

Conjecture: A Novel of Mathematical Obsession 

(1992) was an unexpected bestseller and was 

translated into more than 30 languages. The book 

merges math and narrative, focusing on a young 

man and his uncle, who is obsessed with trying to 

solve a famous mathematical problem. 

“When I wrote Uncle Petros, which really 

marked my entry into this overlap, I wasn’t thinking 

I was doing anything out of the way,” he says. 

“Like all writers, I like to write about things I know 

and care about.” 

Doxiadis came to Columbia at 15, a self-described 

math nerd who “tended to view all required, nonmathematical 

courses as a nuisance.” Moving into 

John Jay just after the protests of Spring 1968 and 

witnessing the toll of the Vietnam War and a junta 

in his native Greece, he got swept up in the political 

upheaval of the moment — he can even be spotted 

in protest footage that was used in Forrest Gump. 

Through Contemporary Civilization and Introduction to 

World Literature, he also discovered Plato and Kant and the 

joy of analyzing Crime and Punishment. 

Doxiadis did graduate work in applied mathematics at 

images: 

Alecos 

Papadatos 

the École Pratique des Hautes Études in Paris before returning 

to Greece to work in theater and film, winning the prize of the 

International Center for Artistic Cinema at the 1988 Berlin International 

Film Festival for his second film, Terirem. 

Since the mid-1980s, he has largely devoted himself to fiction, 

which he says has many similarities to math, especially 

when he is “in problem-solving mode” during the planning and 

editing phases. 

The departure to the graphic novel came about by luck when 

two artist friends were looking for an idea for a book, and Doxiadis 

proposed his math story. He found the process frustrating, the 

writing being much more technical and exacting that what he was 

used to as a novelist. Still, he says he would like to try again. 

For now, Doxiadis is completing three scholarly papers based 

on a cognitive study he recently finished on “how logical and 

mathematical thinking were born in the agonistic context of 

classical Athenian democracy, through influences both from 

judicial practice but also storytelling and poetry.” 

After that, he plans to leave math alone for a while. 

“With these projects, I feel I’m pretty much done with it for 

a while and would like to go back to the usual subjects for a 

writer,” he says. What might those be “Oh, you know, sex and 

violence and passions and ideas and their interrelations — and 

suchlike!” 


To view a video about the making of Logicomix, go to www. 

college.columbia.edu/cct. 

vost Emeritus. Brinkley’s profile 

of Luce — the founder of Time, Life 

and Fortune magazines — criticizes 

many of the media mogul’s professional 

choices while applauding 

his contributions to American journalism 

(Alfred A. Knopf, $35). 

Storms of My Grandchildren: The 

Truth about the Coming Climate 

Catastrophe and Our Last Chance 

to Save Humanity by James Hansen, 

adjunct professor of earth and 

environmental sciences. Hansen’s 

discussion of climate changes incorporates 

political and historical 

as well as scientific perspectives 

(Bloomsbury USA, $25). 

The Bridge: The Life and Rise 

of Barack Obama by David Remnick. 

Remnick, the Pulitzer Prizewinning 

editor of The New Yorker, 

analyzes the social implications of 

Barack Obama ’83’s presidential 

campaign (Alfred A. Knopf, $29.95). 

Grace Laidlaw ’11 


34


Obituaries 

1937 

Robert M. Paul, retired teacher, 

Portland, Ore., on January 3, 2010. 

Paul was born in 1915 in New 

York City. He was active in Boy 

Scouts, especially the Sea Scouts, 

and attained Eagle Scout rank. 

Later, he worked in commerce for 

an importing firm and for R.H. 

Macy. Paul’s first teaching assignment 

was at Wasatch Academy in 

Mount Pleasant, Utah. In 1942, he 

volunteered for the Navy and was 

a commanding officer of an LCI 

participating in the invasions of 

North Africa, Italy and Normandy. 

He remained active in the Naval 

Reserve and retired as lieutenant 

commander. Following WWII, 

Paul earned a master’s in teaching 

of mathematics from Columbia. He 

taught on Long Island before moving 

to McMinnville, Ore., where he 

taught math and became dean of 

boys at McMinnville H.S., retiring 

in 1977 after 32 years. Paul began 

his 53-year seasonal career with the 

National Park Service in 1947; he 

earned a Superior Service Award. 

Survivors include his wife of 66 

years, Mary (née Benbow); daughters, 

Janet Bones and her husband, 

Stan, and Nancy Trembath and her 

husband, Rick; and four grandchildren. 

Memorial contributions may 

be made to The Salvation Army or 

a charity of the donor’s choice. 

1941 

Stanley H. Gotliffe, pediatric psychiatrist, 

Pawleys Island, S.C., on 

January 30, 2010. Gotliffe was born 

in New York City and was a Navy 

veteran of WWII and Korea. He 

earned a degree in 1944 from P&S 

and was a pediatric psychiatrist 

for 30 years at the Bureau of Child 

Guidance in the New York City 

School System and for 10 years at 

Bergen Pines Regional Medical 

Center Children’s Unit. Gotliffe 

was his class’ CCT Class Notes correspondent 

from 1994–2008. Survivors 

include his wife, Ruth; sons, 

Edward and his wife, Ginger, and 

Alan and his wife, Cathy; daughter, 

Nancy Von Eilbergh and her husband, 

Otto; and seven grandchildren. 


be made to Columbia University 

Gift Systems, Columbia Alumni 

Center, 622 W. 113th St., MC 4520, 

New York, NY 10025. 

John M. Mullins, education executive, 

Holyoke, Mass., on July 

11, 2009. Born on May 2, 1919, in 

New York City, Mullins served in 

the Navy during WWII, obtaining 

Arthur S. Weinstock ’41, Loyal and Generous Alumnus 

Arthur S. Weinstock ’41 of 

White Plains, N.Y., a devoted 

and generous Columbian, died 

on April 17, 2010, after a brief 

illness. Weinstock worked for 

Exquisite Form and was the 

general manager of manufacturing 

in Puerto Rico prior to 

retirement. 

A longtime contributor to the 

College as well as an involved 

alumnus, Weinstock, along with 

his late wife, Marian E. (Betty), 

to whom he was married for 

52 years, endowed the Arthur 

S. and Marian E. Weinstock 

Scholarship for College students 

in financial need as well as the 

Arthur S. Weinstock Recognition 

Award for participation in 

intercollegiate athletics. He 

served as president of the 

Society of Columbia Graduates, 

treasurer of the Columbia Club 

of Westchester, was on the 

Board of Columbia/Barnard 

Hillel and was a 1991 Alumni 

Medalist. 

Weinstock was the “one 

most responsible” for class 

reunions at Arden House for 

about 45 years, noted CCT class 

correspondent Robert Zucker 

’41 in this issue’s Class Notes. 

Weinstock himself at times 

wrote the ’41 column, stepping 

in occasionally for Stanley H. 

Gotliffe ’41. Weinstock also 

contributed regularly to Class 

the rank of lieutenant commander. 

He and his family relocated to New 

York City after the war, and Mullins 

began his career at Columbia. Mullins 

and his family then moved to Demarest, 

N.J., where he held, among 

other positions, a nine-year term on 

the Northern Valley Regional School 

Board of Education. In 1961, Mullins 

took a position with the College 

Entrance Examination Board, where 

he worked for the remainder of his 

career. Mullins was a trustee of the 

American University in Paris for 35 

years and remained interested in 

the educational issues of the day. He 

enjoyed following professional tennis 

on TV and attending the theater. 

Mullins is survived by his wife of 

Notes with classmate news. 

A member of Zeta Beta 

Tau, Weinstock served on its 

Supreme Council in addition 

to being an honorary director 

on the Foundation Board 

of Directors. Active in the 

congregation at Temple Israel 

Center in White Plains, he 

dedicated a classroom in its 

Hebrew School. Weinstock also 

was a donor to the Holocaust 

and Human Rights Education 

Center, the New York ALS 

Association and the Grace 

Church Community Center in 

White Plains. 

Weinstock played baseball 

and basketball while at the 

College, managing the latter 

team. 

“Arthur and I met in 1937, 

our freshman year, at Zeta 

Beta Tau,” said Ray Robinson 

’41, “and we remained friendly 

the rest of our lives. He loved 

Columbia, the New York Yankees 

and Temple Israel in equal proportions. 

Rain or shine, Arthur 

attended Columbia football and 

baseball games and never lost 

hope for our teams. 

“To me, he was indisputably 

the sweetest person I’ve ever 

met.” 

Dr. Melvin Hershkowitz ’42, 

also a longtime friend of Weinstock’s, 

noted, “Arthur was one 

of the kindest, most generous 

67 years, Alice Newton Drury; sons, 

John and his wife, Donna, Ross and 

his wife, Maria, and David and his 

wife, Betsy; seven grandchildren; 

and four great-grandchildren. Memorial 

contributions may be made 

to the Loomis Village Fellowship 

Fund, 20 Bayon Dr., South Hadley, 

MA 01075. 

1948 

Carter H. Hills, retired diplomat, 

Arabist, Washington, D.C., on December 

8, 2009. Hills graduated from 

the College with honors and earned 

an M.A. from Princeton in 1950. 

He received an Aramco fellowship 

to study Arabic and Middle East 

Studies at the American University 

and most considerate friends 

I had at Columbia. These 

traits were part of his intrinsic 

character, and they persisted 

throughout his life. I mourn 

his loss and will never forget 

his extraordinary qualities and 

his loyalty and devotion to our 

beloved alma mater.” 

Weinstock is survived by his 

nieces, Margaret (Peggy) Kerner 

and her husband, Jonathan, and 

Carol Landsman Hannett and 

her husband, Steve. 


be sent to the Arthur S. and 

Marian E. Weinstock Scholarship 

c/o the Columbia College 

Fund, Columbia Alumni Center, 

622 W. 113th St., MC 4530, 

3rd Fl., New York, NY 10025 or 

Temple Israel Center, 280 Old 

Mamaroneck Rd., White Plains, 

NY 10605. 

Lisa Palladino and Jesse 

Thiessen ’11 Arts 

Carter H. Hills ’48 

of Cairo and was a fellow at the 

Johns Hopkins School for Advanced 

International Studies. Hills, a Navy 

WWII veteran, was appointed under 

the Eisenhower Commission 


35

obituaries 


to the United Nations Reliefs and 

Works Agency, where he worked in 

Lebanon, Jordan and Egypt in the 

1950s. He subsequently worked in 

the Department of State’s Bureau 

of International Organizational 

Affairs. During his tenure at the 

Department of State, Hills worked 

in Washington, D.C., Paris (with the 

Organization of Economic Cooperation 

and Development) and Rome. 

In Rome, he was deputy and acting 

U.S. permanent representative to the 

UN Food and Agriculture Organization 

before permanently joining 

FAO. For the remainder of his career, 

Hills was responsible for negotiating 

agreements and overseeing FAO’s 

programs in the Middle and Near 

East, including Afghanistan, Iran, 

Other Deaths Reported 

Columbia College Today also has learned of the deaths of the following alumni. Complete obituaries 

will be published in an upcoming issue, pending receipt of information and space considerations. 

1940 Theodore S. Hecht, magazine correspondent, Forest Hills, N.Y., on January 1, 2010. 

1942 Waldemar R. Hertwig, retired chemical engineer, San Diego, on April 1, 2010. Hertwig entered with 

the Class of 1942 but instead earned a B.S. in 1942 and a Ph.D. in 1943 from the Engineering School. 

1943 Philip J. Bliss, advertising v.p. and personnel director, Portsmouth, N.H., on April 22, 2010. 

Warren W. Eason, professor and musician, Columbus, Ohio, on March 22, 2010. Eason earned an 

economics certificate and Ph.D. in 1951 and 1959 from SIPA and GSAS, respectively. 

William R. Loweth, Tequesta, Fla., on May 5, 2010. 

William M. Webb, retired engineer, Louisville, Ky., on April 16, 2010. Webb earned a B.S. and an 

M.S. in mechanical engineering in 1943 and 1949, respectively, from the Engineering School. 

1944 William V. Beshlian, physician, Glen Rock, N.J., on April 24, 2010. 

Kenneth G. Englar, retired engineer, Newport Beach, Calif., on March 2, 2010. Englar entered with 

the Class of 1944 but instead earned a B.S. in 1943 from the Engineering School. 

Harold W. Polton, paper recycling firm partner, real estate development and management executive, 

Pompton Plains, N.J., on April 2, 2010. 

1945 Howard H. Bess Jr., surgeon, Denver, on May 2, 2010. Bess earned a degree in 1948 from P&S. 

Donald W. Johnson, radiologist, Bloomfield, Conn., on May 7, 2010. Johnson earned a degree in 

1948 from P&S. 

1946 Raleigh Estrada, salesman, Chicago Heights, Ill., on May 12, 2010. 

1948 Henry H. McDonald, retired ophthalmologist, Pasadena, Calif., on April 9, 2010. 

Salvatore S. Stivala, chemist and retired professor, Englewood Cliffs, N.J., on March 26, 2010. 

1949 Kenneth F. Hadermann, retired teacher and school administrator, Lake Wylie, S.C., on April 25, 2010. 

Theodore O. Prounis, attorney and management consultant, New York City, on May 22, 2010. 

Prounis entered with the Class of 1949 but instead earned a degree in 1950 from the Business School. 

1950 Desmond J. Nunan Sr., retired educational system administrator, Ocean City, N.J., on May 5, 2010. 

1951 Ernest J. Petrulio, pediatrician, Trabuco Cyn, Calif., on October 20, 2008. 

1952 Marvin L. Yates, chemist, Port Angeles, Wash., on March 4, 2010. 

1954 Murray Hilibrand, Dallas, on May, 9 2010. Hilibrand earned a B.S. in electrical engineering in 1955 

from the Engineering School. 

George C. Muscillo Jr., physician, Scarsdale, N.Y., on May 10, 2010. 

Max R. Pirner Sr., retired engineer, Humble, Texas, on May 9, 2010. Pirner earned a B.S. in industrial 

engineering in 1955 from the Engineering School. 

1956 Paul I. “Ivy” Bartholet, controller, Westerly, R.I., on May 20, 2010. 

1958 James R. Meyers, retired librarian, Ithaca, N.Y., on April 15, 2010. 

Robert R. Ott, Mt. Lebanon, Wash., on March 27, 2010. 

1960 T. Irving Chang, Honolulu, on April 1, 2010. 

Norman H. Nordlund, pilot, Brookfield, Conn., on April 28, 2010. 

1965 George W. “Bud” Goth, Berkeley, Calif., on November 28, 2009. 

1975 Joseph F. Slade III, physician, professor of orthopedics and rehabilitation, Guilford, Conn., on May 

21, 2010. 

1980 Joseph V. DiGiuseppe, deputy city solicitor, Philadelphia, on May 24, 2010. 

1994 Mildred E. Niss, poet and web artist, North Tonawanda, N.Y., on November 29, 2009. 

Iraq, Jordan, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, 

Kuwait and other Gulf states. Hills 

spoke six languages. He is survived 

by his wife, Joan; daughters, Sarah, 

Jennifer and Alison ’96; and four 

grandchildren. 

1949 

Louis H. Schmid, microminiature 

electronics expert, Oceanside, Calif., 

on November 29, 2009. Born on 

October 1, 1927, in Brooklyn, N.Y., 

Schmid graduated from Brooklyn 

Tech H.S., and after serving in the 

Army at the end of WWII, finished 

his studies at Columbia, graduating 

with a double major in physics and 

chemistry. Schmid was a pioneer in 

the military microminiature electronics 

industry with a career spanning 

more than 45 years. His first job was 

at Sperry Gyroscope, and he subsequently 

helped establish the microminiature 

connector divisions at ITT 

Cannon, Microdot and Cinch before 

founding Min-E-Con and UltiMate, 

both of which continue to thrive. 

Schmid married Verda Lee Schmid 

in 1975; she survives him, as do his 

children, Marilyn, Linda, Jon and 

Rob; stepchildren, Ron, Judy, Victor 

and Ken; six grandchildren; and six 

step-grandchildren. 

1952 

Warren R. “Pete” Sanchez, retired 

computer analyst, systems designer, 

banker and entrepreneur, Beaufort, 

N.C., on December 2, 2009. Sanchez 

was born January 11, 1932, in New 

York City and grew up in Mineola, 

N.Y. He served in the Army 

and while stationed in Frankfurt 

in 1955 met his first wife, Sonja 

Trautner. Sanchez earned a degree 

from the Business School in 1957 

and the same year received his CPA 

certification and began his business 

career at Ernst & Ernst in Manhattan. 

He continued his software and 

technology career with a number 

of companies, including several he 

founded. In 1997, Sanchez retired. 

Several years later, he started volunteering 

full time at the Museum 

Boat Shop. He chaired the Board 

of Sister Cities of Beaufort, volunteered 

with the Friends of NC Maritime 

Museum and belonged to the 

Morehead City-Beaufort Boating 

Club. Sailing dominated his life, but 

he also loved model trains, riding 

funiculars and travel. Sanchez is 

survived by his second wife, Gerda; 

mother, Pearl; sons, Francis and his 

wife, Colleen, and Michael and his 

wife, Nancy; stepson, Paul Hohensee; 

stepdaughters, Joanne Luce and 

Louise Valdov; five grandchildren; 

nine step-grandchildren; and five 

nieces and nephews. 

1954 

Ralph S. Mattson, mining engineer, 

Green Valley, Ariz., on October 17, 

2009. Mattson was a Henry Krumb 

Scholar at Columbia. He earned a 

B.S. in mining engineering in 1955 

from the Engineering School and 

became a mining engineer, running 

gold and copper operations in the 

Orient, South America and elsewhere. 

Mattson is survived by his 

wife of 27 years, Prabha (Anneke); 

two brothers; several nephews, 

nieces and cousins; and extended 

family members in Finland, Thailand 

and the Netherlands. 

Lisa Palladino 

Obituary Submission 

Guidelines 


welcomes obituaries for 

College alumni. Please include 

the deceased’s full name, 

date of death with year, class 

year, profession, and city 

and state of residence at 

time of death. Biographical 

information, survivors’ names, 

address(es) for charitable 

donations and high-quality 

photos (print, or 300 dpi jpg) 

also may be included. Word 

limit is 200; text may be 

edited for length, clarity and 

style at editors’ discretion. 

Send materials to cct@ 

columbia.edu or to Obituaries 

Editor, Columbia College 

Today, Columbia Alumni 

Center, 622 W. 113th St., MC 

4530, New York, NY 10025. 


36


class notes 

Class Notes 

25 

40 



622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 


cct@columbia.edu 

Dr. B.F. “Billy” Levene ’38, ’41 

Dental writes, “I went on to dental 

school and practiced for 69 years, 

until this January. My father began 

the practice in 1905 and my son, 

Kenneth, ’66, ’72 Dental, is continuing 

it. I captained the Columbia 

chess team and have been devoted 

to the game all my life. I play, teach 

and collect: 750 books and 400 sets. 

We hope to attend the meeting of 

Chess Collectors International in 

Cambridge, England, this July (over 

my cardiologist’s dead body, to coin 

a phrase).” 

Paul Angiolillo ’38 shares, 

“Glory be. I never thought I would 

hear from or about the Columbia 

Glee Club. [Editor’s note: Alumni 

Reunion Weekend 2010, held in 

June, featured a Glee Club alumni 

gathering and performance.] It 

seems a distant, shadowy, vague 

event. When I entered the College 

in September 1934, Fred Meisel ’38, 

a classmate at Great Neck High, 

persuaded me to join the club with 

him. I was grateful to him for the 

suggestion, for I profited greatly for 

all four years I belonged. My closest 

friends also were in the Glee Cub 

those four years, and we enjoyed 

doing concerts on campus, off campus 

(Atlantic City, for example), on 

the radio and one Christmas film 

short we made in Queens, with 

second-tier beauties, each swooning 

before us with glistening eyes as we 

sang. (A widower at 92 with weak 

memory, how does it happen that 

I remember this now after some 75 

years) There were venues all over 

the NYC area where we sang during 

those four years, annually. We 

were always rehearsing for a concert 

and felt sometimes like professional 

singers once on a stage. The 

dear Rev. Frederic Meisel passed on 

in 2004. 

“Finally, however great my 

desire to join the reunion in June, 

I had to forego the pleasure, for I 

am pretty much homebound. Roar, 

Lion, Roar.” 

Seymour Jacobson ’39 writes: “It 

has been more than 70 years since 

graduation, and I am amazed that 

so much time has elapsed. My occasional 

visits to the campus through 

the years were associated with feelings 

of nostalgia and wonderment, 

feelings that also could be applied 

to my life. To those who shared 

those enjoyable and occasionally 

painful years at Columbia, I send 

greetings and best wishes. 

“I retired from the practice of psychiatry 

in New York a dozen years 

ago and subsequently moved to a retirement 

community in Westchester 

County, close to my family. 

“Family, of course, is important 

to all of us and especially at this 

period of life. I take great satisfaction 

in the accomplishments of my 

daughter and grandson, who have 

achieved success in academia, as 

well as in my accomplishment at 

reaching great-grandfatherhood.” 

Stanley M. Daugert ’40, ’49 GSAS 

writes: “Seventy years have passed 

since our graduation, so I suspect 

there aren’t many of us left to share 

our classmates’ stories. For those left 

and others, here is mine, briefly: 

“I took the M.A. in philosophy 

in 1942 under Irwin Edman ’17 

(thesis on ‘Plato’s Philosophy of 

Art’). I was drafted in 1942 and 

spent much combat time in the 

South Pacific and Luzon. I ended 

the war in northern Luzon, then 

shipped out to South Korea in 

command of a HQ Co., helping 

Sixth Infantry Division personnel 

to oversee the repatriation of Japanese 

citizen-invaders back to their 

home islands. 

“I married an American Red 

Cross worker mid-war in Brisbane 

in 1944, and we returned to Bucks 

County, Pa., — she from Manila, I 

from Inchon — early in 1947. I reenrolled 

in Columbia, completed 

my coursework, published my dissertation 

(The Philosophy of Thorstein 

Veblen) and was awarded the Ph.D. 

in philosophy in 1949, signed by 

Dwight D. Eisenhower, Columbia’s 

then-new president. 

“Accepting a post at Oglethorpe 

University in Atlanta, I taught small 

classes consisting mainly of Georgia 

students in various subjects from 

speech and writing to introduction 

to philosophy and ethics for several 

years under a unique and exciting 

plan. It involved teaching and aiming 

at human understanding, character, 

citizenship and community 

service. Recently, I was invited to 

Oglethorpe to give a talk to students 

from the ’50s and ’60s. I spoke on 

‘The Good Life, 2009.’ 

“In 1962, I accepted the post of 

chairman of the philosophy department 

at Western Washington 

University in Bellingham, Wash., 

and spent the next 23 years teaching, 

writing and administering 

a department of six professors. I 

established an annual Colloquium 

in Philosophy, to which we invited 

some of this country’s most noted 

scholars in the discipline; I believe 

it is still running. Philosophers 

from the entire Northwest, including 

Canada, are usual attendees. 

“Meanwhile and betimes I have 

enjoyed playing piano, particularly 

with different partners in the twopiano 

format, for which a body of 

significant music has been composed. 

We have given concerts for 

about 15 years running. I regret saying 

I haven’t found a substitute for 

my last partner, who passed away. 

My first wife, daughter of Delaware 

Valley artist Rae Sloan Bredin, 

passed away in 1978. I remarried in 

2000 at 82 to a brave but loyal and 

loving woman of 63, Alice Vivian 

Daugert. We have been a happy 

and devoted retired couple, travel 

fairly extensively, read widely, and 

commune with friends and family 

for talk, music and humor. 

“We are moderately active politically, 

rejoiced to see Obama elected, 

but wish we could be more sanguine 

about our country’s future. We leave 

it to the good students of Columbia, 

including Obama, to help steer the 

ship in the right direction.” 

Jim Frost ’40, ’49 GSAS writes: 

“Recently, there was a notice concerning 

an alumni reunion this 

June. Not having been to the campus 

in years, it seemed like something 

I might do. The occasion 

was dedicated to the graduates at 

five-year intervals [whose class 

years ended in 0 or 5]. There was 

an entry for the Class of 1945 but 

none for the Class of 1940. Never 

have I written concerning my life 

after college, but it seems like now 

or never. I turned 92 in May. 

“I knew Harry Carman, who 

was on my doctoral committee, 

and was his coauthor for a book. 

My wife and I visited him at his 

farm. Another professor at Columbia, 

though he did not stay there 

very long, was Harold Syrett ’38 

GSAS, ’44 GSAS, the great authority 

on Alexander Hamilton (Class 

of 1778). Harold and I became close 

friends. Erling Hunt ’30 GSAS 

guided my college schedule and 

chaired my doctoral committee. I 

owe him a ton. 

“As an undergraduate, I was a 

waiter at Johnson Hall and a clothes 

handler at Macy’s, among other 

odd jobs. I was a member of the 

wrestling team and represented 

Columbia at my weight in every 

single meet. Receiving my letter, 

I became a member of the Varsity 

‘C’ Club. The most important event 

was meeting Elsie Lorenz, who was 

to become my wife. My story must 

include this beautiful and extremely 

able person, who graduated from 

Richmond Hill H.S. in Brooklyn a 

month past her 15th birthday and 

was at the top of her class. She graduated 

from college a month past 

her 19th birthday. Hunt described 

Elsie as ‘an unusually attractive and 

able lady.’ 

“I completed my master’s in 

1941. The plan was that I would 

get a teaching job, and Elsie and 

I would be married. It was not to 

be. I was a Canadian citizen and 

drafted as a private. My classmates 

were all officers, usually in the 

Navy. When I told Elsie that I was 

drafted, she said it was time we 

were engaged. I had no money, but 

Elsie had been teaching for two 

years, and she bought the ring. 

“On July 14, 1941, I entered the 

Army as a private and found it was 

not an easy life, working on the 

line, checking planes and preparing 

them for flight. An order sent me to 

the base commander’s office, where 

I was informed that I, a private, was 

the NCO in charge of personnel. 

This assignment came because I 

had the highest score on the Army 

General Classification Test. 

“My citizenship came through. In 

those days, it took at least a couple 

of years. I was sent to the Officer 

Candidate School in Miami and 

the School of Business at Harvard, 

where I was the only cadet to pass 

one examination. Graduation made 

me a commissioned officer. I had 

a specialty number and a title bestowed 

by Headquarters Army Air 

Force and could be assigned duty 

only by Army Air Force Headquarters. 

Elsie and I were married in 

her church on September 14, 1942. 

Elsie used to quip that it was a short 

courtship, only six years. I did well 

and rose to the rank of major. 

“The war ended, and it was 

back to Columbia to work on the 

doctorate, which I received in 

February 1949. My doctoral di- 

Class Notes are submitted by 

alumni and edited by volunteer 

class correspondents and the 

staff of CCT prior to publication. 

Opinions expressed are those of 

individual alumni and do not 

reflect the opinions of CCT, its 

class correspondents, the College 

or the University. 


37

class notes 


ploma from the Graduate Faculty 

of Political Science, Philosophy 

and Pure Science was signed by 

Dwight D. Eisenhower. Meanwhile 

I taught history for a year at Nutley 

H.S. in New Jersey and then at the 

New York State Teachers College at 

Oneonta, where I was an instructor 

or the lowest academic rank. 

At the end of the year, the college 

president called me in and said 

he wanted me to be dean, which 

ranked next to the president. I said 

I would talk to Elsie. She said it 

must be a mistake; nobody went 

from instructor to dean. I agreed 

with her, but the president meant 

it, and I became dean. My chief 

task as dean was to begin conversion 

from a teachers college to a 

multipurpose institution. 

“Elsie was very active in Oneonta 

but never said much about it. 

It would be tedious to mention all 

of her good works. One day I saw 

her picture in the paper with three 

noted businessmen. I learned that 

she was on the board of the community 

chest. Elsie was unhappy 

with the one-room schools on the 

outskirts of Oneonta. She got herself 

elected school district trustee and 

led a campaign to have the children 

bussed to Oneonta, where there 

were very good schools. She was 

out night after night after night, 

escorted by a gentleman from the 

Board of Regents to a meeting with 

parents. It was a tough business 

because the people did not want 

to give up control of schools used 

by their families for years. There 

were even fist fights. The vote came, 

and Elsie and her helpers won. For 

many decades, the children have 

been bussed to better schools. I 

never did anything so noble. 

“During the academic year 1959– 

60, I had sabbatical leave and 

accepted a Smith-Mundt grant to 

serve for a year as the professor of 

American history at the University 

of Sri Lanka. The Rockefeller Foundation 

gave me a grant to visit the 

American studies centers in Japanese 

universities. Harry Carman 

wrote a letter endorsing me for the 

grant. The funds available made it 

possible to take Elsie and our two 

daughters with me. It was a wonderful 

year. We went around the 

area, visiting 17 countries. 

“My next assignment was in the 

central administration of SUNY, 

where I was the vice chancellor for 

the Colleges of Arts and Science. 

Syrett was there as vice chancellor 

for University Centers. My work 

in Albany was to make the colleges 

multipurpose institutions far 

removed from the exclusive role 

of preparing teachers. I did well 

in Albany. Chancellor Gould kept 

raising my salary and assigning me 

special tasks. While in New York, 

I was twice offered the position of 

State Historian but did not accept. 

“There were many difficult 

situations. I will describe one here. 

The black students demanded that 

I provide a state car they could 

use to bring groups together for 

discussions. I refused. Phone calls 

threatened me and mentioned that 

a Molotov cocktail might set my 

house on fire. Attending a conference 

in Saratoga, I found myself 

surrounded by three large men. 

One said, ‘You are Dr. Frost.’ The 

second said, ‘You have two very 

pretty daughters.’ The third said, 

‘Too bad.’ Nothing happened, but 

Elsie and I were very concerned 

and kept careful watch over our 

daughters. 

“Next it was on to Connecticut, 

where I thought my job was to 

press for new programs in the state 

colleges to increase their role as 

multipurpose institutions offering 

broader opportunities for students. 

Every personnel change in my 

office had to be approved by the 

Commission for Higher Education. 

Work in the legislature, defiance of 

a commissioner and, as a newspaper 

reported, defiance of the governor 

resulted in the trustees taking 

control, and their policies governed 

the system of four campuses. There 

were legislative threats to eliminate 

the trustees. Elsie always said to 

me that we did not have to stay in 

Connecticut and that perhaps it 

was time for me to retire and write 

books. She would also say, quoting 

from the Book of Ruth, ‘Whither 

thou goest, I will go.’ On March 

1, 1983, the legislature created the 

Connecticut State University, and I 

became its president. The trustees 

were in control, and now the effort 

would be focused almost solely on 

expanding the curricula. 

“On July 1, 1985, I retired. About 

this time, it was discovered that my 

highly intelligent Elsie had Alzheimer’s. 

She knew it but never complained. 

She liked to travel, and that 

is what we did: Antarctica, South 

Pacific, Alaska and many other 

places. Gradually things worsened, 

and this active lady who had gotten 

me into golf and snorkeling was in 

a wheelchair. I was told I could not 

handle it, but they were wrong. Only 

during the last four or five weeks 

did I have professional help. Elsie 

died on July 8, 2003, in our bedroom. 

Since that time, I have lived in our 

10-room house by myself. 

“My children are Roger, who 

passed away; Janet, a chemistry 

professor; and Elsie, a lawyer handling 

large cases for the IRS. 

“I’ve written seven books: Life on 

the Upper Susquehanna, 1783–1860 

(1951); A History of New York State 

(1957), with David M. Ellis, Syrett 

and Carman; New York: The Empire 

State (1961), again with Ellis and 

also with William B. Fink; A History 

of the United States: The Evolution 

of a Free People (1968), with Ralph 

Adams Brown, Ellis and Fink; The 

Establishment of Connecticut State 

University 1965–1985: Notes and 

Reminiscences (1991); The Country 

Club of Farmington, 1892–1995 

(1996); and Life with Elsie (2005). 

“For the last book, the publisher 

refused to charge me for publication 

and wanted me to put the 

book on the market, but I refused. I 

have given it to friends and placed 

it in libraries, where it has been 

much used.” 

41 

Robert Zucker 

29 The Birches 

Roslyn, NY 11576 

rzucker@optonline.net 

We note with sorrow the passing of 

four classmates. 

Edward Amontree died in 

Sarasota, Fla., on February 4 after a 

lifetime of practicing dentistry. 

James Cronenberg of Midland, 

Texas, started with our class and 

graduated from the Engineering 

School in 1942. He worked for the 

El Paso Gas Co. His life ended on 

January 1. 

T. Hall Keyes III entered with 

our class. He owned and operated 

a pet resort and training center in 

Ridge, N.C., and died on January 6. 

Arthur Weinstock left us on 

April 17 after several weeks of intensive 

care at a White Plains, N.Y., 

hospital. Art lived in White Plains 

and was the one most responsible 

for our annual reunions at Arden 

House for approximately 45 years. 

In college, he was president of ZBT, 

manager of the basketball team and 

took part in many other activities. 

He served as president of the Society 

of Columbia Graduates, as treasurer 

of the Columbia Club of Westchester 

and as class president; was 

on the board of Columbia/Barnard 

Hillel; and on the Supreme Council 

of ZBT. Art and his late wife, Betty, 

endowed a scholarship for needy 

students at Columbia College and 

the Arthur S. Weinstock Recognition 

Award for participation in intercollegiate 

athletics. 

Among those at Art’s funeral 

were Phyllis and Ray Robinson; 

Suzanne and Bob Dettmer; Charlie 

Plotz; Irene Leiwant, widow 

of Erwin Leiwant; Bob Zucker; 

Arthur Graham ’42 and Paul de 

Bary ’68. A group of his Columbia 

friends, at Art’s invitation and in 

his memory, attended the Hillel 

dinner at Low Library on April 27. 

[Editor’s note: See Obituaries.] 

At a recent luncheon in New 

York, a group of us discussed 

the advent, next year, of our 70th 

anniversary of graduation. Any 

thoughts of activities in which we 

could indulge would be appreciated. 

From Thursday, June 2–Sunday, 

June 5, 2011, the College will 

sponsor Alumni Reunion Weekend 

for class years that end in 1 or 6. 

Stay tuned. 

42 

Melvin Hershkowitz 

3 Regency Plaza, Apt. 1001-E 

Providence, RI 02903 

DRMEL23@cox.net 

On March 10, I received a brief e- 

mail message from Valerie Straw, 

reporting that her father, Sam Pisicchio, 

died in Sonoma, Calif., at 89. 

At my request, Valerie subsequently 

sent a detailed (and affectionate) 

review of Sam’s life and career after 

he left Columbia to serve in the 

Coast Guard during WWII. Sam 

stayed in the Coast Guard after the 

war, serving as a meteorologist, a 

public information/press officer 

and executive officer on a training 

cutter, until he retired in 1965. He 

had assignments in Boston, where 

he was known as “Sam the Weather 

Man” for his radio reports; York, 

Maine; Washington, D.C.; Virginia; 

Cape May, N.J.; Cleveland; and 

southern California before his retirement 

to a rural area in Napa, Calif. 

In Napa, Sam was an employment 

consultant for the Napa County 

Welfare Department (NCWD), 

at which many of his clients spoke 

only Spanish, so Sam enrolled at 

UC Davis to learn Spanish. He 

quickly passed the GED exam to 

confirm his fluency and was proud 

of that accomplishment. He worked 

for the NCWD until 1980, when he 

finally retired and devoted himself 

to repairing his property, vacations 

with his wife to South America 

and going to the theater in San 

Francisco. 

Valerie told me that Sam loved 

Columbia, jazz and the New York 

baseball Giants. He often made negative 

comments about the “Dirty 

Dodgers” and the “Damn Yankees.” 

He always wore his Columbia ring 

and often spoke of his affection for 

alma mater. 

At Columbia, Sam earned intramural 

medals, was on the freshman 

wrestling team and worked on 

Spectator. He was a member of Il 

Circolo Italiano, Le Cercle Lafayette, 

the Newman Club, the Pre-Law 

Society, the Squash Club and the 

Dormitory Council. He had close 

friendships with Don Mankiewicz 

and me. I regret that our paths diverged 

after graduation, and I never 

saw Sam again after 1942. 

I thank Valerie for her informative 

communication about Sam. I send 

my personal condolences to her and 

from our Great Class of 1942. 

My Horace Mann (Class of 1938) 

classmate and Livingston Hall 

sophomore year roommate, Robert 

Kaufman, is the patriarch of an 


38


class notes 

extraordinary family. Bob, at 89, is 

a contender for the record of eldest 

grandpa with the youngest grandchild 

in our class. As I write this in 

April, Bob’s granddaughter, Ruby 

Lee, is just 20 months old! Ruby 

Lee’s sister, Maddie Kate (9), is a 

future Columbia cheerleader. Bob 

lives in Scarsdale, N.Y., and keeps 

a close eye on all Columbia sports, 

with special attention to crew. Bob 

was the intrepid coxswain on our 

great Columbia crew in 1940 and 

1941. Splish splash! Row Lions! 

On April 19, our Alumni Office 

notified me of the deaths of David 

Harrison and George Laboda. 

Dave died in Madison, Wis., on 

February 3, and George died in 

Lake Worth, Fla., on February 26. I 

knew both Dave and George during 

our college years. Dave worked 

on Spectator and was a member of 

the Debate Council, Blue Book editor, 

Columbia Community Fund 

chairman, and a member of the 

Earl Hall Society and the University 

Christian Society. George was 

manager of the Student Laundry 

Agency, chairman of the Fall 

Formal, president of the Columbia 

Student Agencies Council, and a 

member of the University Christian 

Association and Nacoms. 

Dave was born in Liverpool, 

England, in 1922. He was brought 

to the United States in 1933 and 

naturalized in 1945. In 1949, Dave 

earned an M.A. in economics from 

Columbia and began a career as an 

economist, statistician and market 

research analyst. He worked for 

several prominent firms, including 

RCA International, the Textile Economics 

Bureau, Courtaulds North 

America, Chemstrand, Monsanto, 

and Kurt and Salmon Associates. 

Dave retired to Madison and 

lived there for several years until 

his death. He was assistant editor of 

our Great Class of 1942 newsletter, 

working with our late, great editors, 

Victor Zaro and Dr. Herbert Mark, 

and later with myself after Vic and 

Herb died. Dave was a fine writer, 

with a laconic wit and penetrating 

analytic comments about the absurdities 

of modern life. After he moved 

to Madison from Bayside, N.Y., he 

sent me his wry comments about the 

Wisconsin Badger football mania at 

Camp Randall Stadium, contrasting 

that scene with his memories of the 

old days at Baker Field and Wien 

Stadium. Dave was preceded at Columbia 

by his brother, John Francis 

Harrison ’38, who also earned M.A. 

and Ph.D. degrees at Columbia and 

became chairman of the English 

department at Transylvania College. 

We send our condolences to 

Dave’s family and friends. A 

detailed obituary will appear in a 

future issue of CCT. 

George was well known on campus 

as manager of the Student Laundry 

Agency. He had many friends 

who appreciated his energy, gregarious 

personality and management 

skills. After Columbia, George rose 

to a prominent position as advertising 

manager and media consultant 

at Colgate-Palmolive Corp. According 

to our 1978 Columbia College 

Directory, George had already retired 

by that date. 

At the time of this writing, no 

further information is available 

about George or his family. We 

send our condolences to them and 

to his friends. A detailed obituary 

will be published in a future issue 

of CCT. 

Don Mankiewicz in Monrovia, 

Calif., and Arthur “Wizzer” Wellington 

in Elmira, N.Y., had been 

in touch with me via e-mail and 

telephone to discuss and handicap 

the Kentucky Derby on May 1. (By 

the time you read this, that race 

will be history.) Don, Arthur and I 

are the surviving members of the 

Columbia chapter of the Certified 

Degenerate Horseplayers Club, 

founded on the campus in 1938 by 

ourselves and our now-deceased 

friends Charles F. “Chic” Hoelzer 

Jr. and Don Dickinson. Over the 

intervening 72 years, members 

have kept in touch to discuss and 

handicap the Triple Crown races 

(Derby, Preakness, Belmont Stakes) 

and the Breeders Cup Championships. 

Despite our collective expertise 

in equine genetics, handicapping, 

jockeys and post-time odds, 

our success has been erratic. As we 

approach our collective nonagenarian 

status (Art celebrated his 90th 

birthday on May 17), we retain our 

optimism and continue to believe 

in what Frank Sinatra said in one 

of his best songs, “Here’s To The 

Winners!” 

I welcome news from all classmates 

via e-mail, regular mail or 

telephone calls. Kind regards and 

best wishes to all. Hail Columbia! 

43 

G.J. D’Angio 

Department of Radiation 

Oncology 

Hospital of the University of 

Pennsylvania, Donner 2 

3400 Spruce St. 

Philadelphia, PA 19104 

dangio@xrt.upenn.edu 

I remember fondly several members 

of the Columbia faculty and 

coaching staff. An outstanding personality 

among them was Jimmy 

Murray, the fencing coach, who was 

a legendary figure in fencing circles. 

Jimmy was a small man, then in his 

late 60s, and could beat any of us. 

After doing so, he would chuckle 

and cry out, “It’s the Irish oatmeal 

that does it!” He had trained in 

Paris with a great master, Alphonse 

Kirchhoffer, whose name he would 

invoke during a brisk bout. (I am 

indebted to George Kolombatovich, 

the current coach, for newspaper 

clippings and other data concerning 

Jimmy Murray.) 

Another favorite of mine was Professor 

Frohock of the French department. 

He later headed Romance languages 

at Harvard. When he died, I 

sent condolences to his widow, and 

she replied with the comment, “He 

always said his Columbia students 

were the best.” 

Do you have a teacher or other 

staff Columbian you particularly 

remember If so, write to me at 

dangio@xrt.upenn.edu so it can be 

shared with our classmates. 

My wife and I journeyed to beautiful 

Banff in the Canadian Rockies 

in March to attend the seventh in a 

biennial series of seminars on childhood 

kidney cancers I started years 

ago. In June, we were in Stockholm 

to participate in the umpteenth of 

a series of neuroblastoma research 

congresses she started three or more 

decades ago. We detoured to the 

Shetland Islands on our return just 

for fun. 

John J. Zullo writes, recalling 

his days as a “brown bagger” before 

graduating from the School of 

Engineering. There followed a stint 

in the South Pacific with the Navy 

during WWII. John then worked in 

industry, primarily in production 

and marketing. A source of pride is 

his granddaughter, Dana Morgan 

Zullo ’03, who graduated 60 years 

after her grandfather. 

Robert (Bob) Greene provides a 

moving tribute to Carl Viggiani, who 

died on January 16. They were close 

friends since college days when both 

played touch football. Bob notes that 

Carl landed in Normandy on D-Day 

+ 6, went across Europe and was one 

of the liberators of Dachau. A searing 

memory for anyone, Bob says, 

certainly so for someone like Carl, 

“with the soul of an Italian artist.” 

Carl majored in Romance languages 

and became a professor at Wesleyan 

in Connecticut, where he remained 

on the faculty for 40 years. He was 

an expert on the French existentialists, 

especially Albert Camus, whom 

he met in Paris after WWII. 

Bob was a writer of documentary 

pieces for CBS and ABC, and 

went to Washington with the legendary 

E.R. Murrow at the time of 

the Kennedy administration. Then 

piano, a longtime hobby, “took 

over.” He toured the world playing 

The World of Jelly Roll Morton, a 

musical documentary. His group 

included “heroes from whom I 

had learned on the old 78 RPM 

records,” to use his words. I looked 

into this, Bob being modest, and 

found that their 1964 record, St. Peter 

Street Strutters, was a landmark 

album. According to reviews, it 

captured the true essence of New 

Orleans jazz. It sounded that way 

to me, when listening to excerpts 

available through the Internet. 

Tune in. Bob was on his way to 

Copenhagen for a concert when he 

wrote, ending his note by saying, 

“Life can become a poem sometimes, 

in spite of the downs.” 

44 

Henry Rolf Hecht 

11 Evergreen Pl. 

Demarest, NJ 07627 

hrh15@columbia.edu 

We mourn the passing of Henry 

Griesman, who spent most of his 

life in the fashion industry as a supplier 

of high-quality fabrics from 

Europe and Asia. His proudest 

achievement was as an intelligence 

sergeant who shortly after VE Day 

ran across Wernher von Braun and 

started the rocket pioneer on his 

way to Huntsville, Ala. Henry’s 

ashes will be interred in Arlington. 

45 



622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 



John Golembe ’62, ’65 TC wrote to 

inform the class of his brother’s 

doings: “Carter H. Golembe, who 

is retired with his wife, Patricia, in 

Delray Beach, Fla., recently published 

But I Never Made a Loan: My 

Career in Banking — The Early Years, 

a book about his distinguished 

career, which spanned the second 

half of the 20th century. 

“After beginning with the FDIC 

in the early 1950s, Carter moved to 

the American Banker’s Association, 

founded a leading bank consulting 

firm and then established one of 

the most respected and widely read 

newsletters in the banking industry, 

The Golembe Reports. Financial writer 

Martin Mayer called Carter ‘one of 

the most interesting and informative 

sources on the banking scene,’ 

and a Federal Reserve Board governor 

lamented his 2002 retirement by 

saying, ‘Not getting the benefit of 

his 50-plus years of experience and 

his ability to analyze is a tremendous 

loss.’ 

“As with many of his classmates, 

Carter’s College years were interrupted 

by WWII service in Europe. 

After recovering from wounds suffered 

in the Battle of the Bulge and 

returning to Morningside Heights, 

Carter finished his baccalaureate and 

went on to earn a Ph.D. in economics 

in 1952 at GSAS. Subsequently, he 

earned a law degree at The George 

Washington University. Carter’s 

long-standing support of Columbia 

College was honored in 1995 by 

the establishment of the Carter H. 

Golembe Scholarship Fund.” 


39

Joseph P. Rumage, our class eye 

physician and surgeon, wrote to us 

from Gretna, La., his home base: 

“I had hoped to visit with you and 

perhaps catch the Columbia crew 

after my Class of 1950 NYU Medical 

School reunion breakfast on April 10. 

“However, they race now at 10 

a.m. somewhere on Long Island. In 

the old days, it was at 2 p.m. on the 

Harlem River across from the old 

Polo Grounds. 

“Anyway, enjoy your news 

items , and I’ll try again soon. Keep 

up your good work!” 

In early February, my wife, 

Shirley, and I flew to Hawaii for 

our oldest grandson’s wedding. He 

had requested I act as officiate. He 

lives in a lovely home on Maui, one 

of Hawaii’s principal islands. The 

wedding took place on the lawn. 

Of course, in my brief address to 

the couple I urged them to stand 

together forever to withstand “the 

slings and arrows of outrageous fortune” 

as well as enjoying the “Joy 

of the World.” Flying 11 hours each 

way was made even more onerous 

on our return trip by an all-night 

layover in Los Angeles requiring a 

fresh hobble through security. The 

wedding and attendant parties had 

already proved exhausting enough. 

But such age-related complaints 

are really asides. The weather was 

perfect. The 6-foot-4 groom was 

incredibly handsome, the bride, 

Hollywood beautiful. So what more 

can you ask 

Since returning at the end of 

February and continuing until 

now, physical problems have been 

huge time guzzlers. I know that 

other classmates have struggled 

with as much and more. They have 

told me it would be impossible to 

find space in their minds or the 

time to compose a note, however 

simple. 

In my case, the next months promise 

renewed energies, and I look 

forward to hearing from classmates. 

While we are still around — 

though sadly in dwindling numclass 

notes 


Members of the Class of ’46 and their wives gathered for lunch in Manhattan 

in May, followed by a guided tour of the High Line public park by 

Kevin Baker ’80. Taking in the beautiful surroundings were (seated, left 

to right) Helen Aronson, Marvin Aronson ’46, Don Summa ’46, George 

Levinson ’46, Mike Pincus ’46 and Aihud Pevsner ’46; and (standing, left 

to right) Irwin Nydick ’46, Baker, Marge Sunshine, Josephine Hendin and 

Herb Hendin ’46. 

PHOTO: Bernie Sunshine ’46 

Albert Rothman chimed in 

be fore reunion: “I hope many of us 

’45ers are still above the ground, 

and maybe I simply can’t find 

them. How I would love to hear 

from others who linger here and 

remember me, whether positively 

or the reverse. Hal Samelson, Ron 

Graham and Johnny O’Connor 

are gone. I miss them deeply, as 

well as others [whose names] don’t 

come to my aging mind. 

“In many ways, it is the happiest 

time in my life. Am I nuts No. I 

feel fully alive and active, grateful 

for surviving heart bypass, cancer, 

hip replacement and so on, and 

especially clinical depression a few 

years ago. Oh, and I’m four inches 

shorter with severe spine issues 

that hardly bother me and go into 

abeyance when I hike. 

“No longer interested in my former 

studies and career in chemical 

engineering and chemistry. B.S. 

Ch.E. at Columbia, Ph.D. in chem- 

Ch.E. at UC Berkeley and both 

industrial and university positions. 

After retiring in 1986, I became 

a published and prize-winning 

writer, poet and author: A Brooklyn 

Odyssey: Travails and Joys of a Boy’s 

Early Life. Working on two more 

books, including Travels Without 

Charley, about a 10-week trip in my 

truck, hiking all the National Parks 

in the West. 

“Writing is much more to my 

liking than anything before it. 

Another passion is regular hiking 

(I am a trails patrol volunteer in the 

various parks in the SF Bay Area). 

And, of course, my loving children: 

entrepreneur Denise, teacher Lynn 

and son Joel, professor and head 

of the Department of Molecular 

Biology at UC Santa Barbara. Also, 

four grandchildren and two greatgrandchildren 

of various ethnicities, 

which delight me: Mexican, 

Japanese, Caucasian (what an odd 

name to avoid ‘white’!). 

“But I must add: My first two 

years at Columbia, thanks to a 

Pulitzer Scholarship, mean more 

to me than all the subsequent studies, 

including engineering at the 

College, which I didn’t care for. I 

wish I had been able to study more 

humanities. But to an offspring of 

poor immigrants, a good job was 

the primary need. My family considered 

themselves deprived, but 

the word ‘poor’ was never their 

identification. And the draft board 

had me in its sight at the elbow of 

WWII.” 

The Class of ’45 is still looking 

for a class correspondent to write 

a bimonthly column for Columbia 

College Today. If you want an open 

platform and a chance to reconnect 

with classmates, please contact 

Associate Editor Ethan Rouen at 

ecr2102@columbia.edu. Until then, 

please send notes about your life, 

thoughts, travel, family and experiences 

at Columbia to the postal 

or e-mail address at the top of the 

column. 

46 

Bernard Sunshine 

20 W. 86th St. 


bsuns1@gmail.com 

Our class luncheon in New York 

on May 6 brought us together for 

an enjoyable afternoon of good 

fellowship, reminiscences and personal 

anecdotes. Wives were invited, 

and four brave women added 

beauty and grace to the event. 

Present were Helen and Marvin 

Aronson, Josephine and Herb 

Hendin, George Levinger, Irwin 

Nydick, Aihud Pevsner, Mike 

Pincus, Paula and Mal Ruderman, 

Don Summa, Marge and Bernie 

Sunshine, and special guest Kevin 

Baker ’80. [See photo.] 

We lunched at Moran’s Restaurant, 

a 19th-century throwback, 

which boasts a large collection of 

sparkling Waterford crystal acquired 

by the proprietor across many years. 

It is adjacent to the High Line public 

park, which opened less than a year 

ago to rave reviews and already is a 

featured New York attraction. After 

lunch, we had the very special treat 

of a guided High Line tour by Kevin, 

a widely acclaimed writer, many of 

whose novels focus on life in New 

York, set in historic context. His insights 

and information, delivered in 

delightful fashion, added immeasurably 

to the experience. 

George Levinger, professor of 

psychology (retired) at the University 

of Massachusetts in Amherst, 

traveled the furthest. He is writing 

a memoir that includes a recounting 

of the Frosh-Soph Rush. George 

reported that as v.p. of the sophomores, 

at the last minute he was 

thrust into the leadership of the class 

at the rush when it was discovered 

that freshmen had kidnapped the 

president the night before. 

John McConnell responded 

from Idaho to the class luncheon 

announcement, saying Idaho was 

a bit of a distance from midtown 

Manhattan, and he would not be 

with us. John writes: “We are in 

a house on the Rathdrum Prairie, 

sandwiched between Coeur 

d’Alene, Post Falls and Hayden, 

a 45-minute drive from Spokane, 

Wash. Weather here is beautiful. 

Last year at this time, we had six 

feet of snow. This year, we have 

had a total of less than five inches, 

leaving concerns about water 

levels throughout the region. Skiing 

is still great at elevations above 

4,000–5,000 feet.” 

John, from this and previous correspondence 

about your surroundings, 

you probably could write 

Paradise Found. 

My wife and I recently moved 

house (back to New York City, after 

55 years in New Rochelle), and 

some things that turn up catch the 

eye. Like a note from Mike Pincus. 

Some years back, he wrote in part: 

“A good deal of my openness of 

mind and attitude derived from 

those wonderful men at Columbia 

who inculcated, in most of us I 

think, the sense that what is true is 

what you have examined closely 

with an open mind. But, it may not 

be true forever. In a sense, truth 

changes as we grow older and 

experience the world and other 

people’s truths.” 

Send me your thoughts about 

Mike’s statement. It can bring an 

interesting exchange of views. 

I also came across the first CC 

’46 Newsletter (December 1954). 

I had been elected class president 

and reported: “I am frankly sorry 

that one of the first official acts of 

our group (the officers) has to be a 

request for class dues, but as you 

can understand, it is not possible for 

one or two individuals to continue 

to finance class mailings and other 

functions. I hope you will respond 

to this one request for dues and 

will do so immediately. I realize the 

expenses of Christmas and other 

holidays, and income taxes cloud 

the horizon at this time of year, 

but the $2 you give to the class 

now may well mean the success or 

failure of our attempts to put 1946 

back on its feet.” 

Fifty-six years later, CC ’46 is going 

strong, so I suppose the appeal 

was successful. 

47 

Bert Sussman 

155 W. 68th St., Apt. 27D 


shirbrt@nyc.rr.com 


40


class notes 

bers — I believe we should speak 

up. We are those special people 

with genuine memories of the 

Depression, WWII, Roosevelt and 

Hitler, and Chang Kai-Shek and his 

madame. We were just students — 

most still in our teens — walking 

on Van Am or going into Hamilton 

when the news of Pearl Harbor hit 

us. We have, of course, since then 

shared the memories of the string 

of unbelievable assassinations and 

Vietnam and the Moon Shot with 

the rest of the world. 

But only those of us who were 

there in mid-century can truly 

measure the validity of the comparisons 

made so often between 

then and now. 

Recently, we lost Peter Brescia, 

like us Class of ’47, but also a 

graduate of Columbia’s School of 

International and Public Affairs. 

Peter spent his entire career working 

nobly in the Foreign Service in 

places such as Afghanistan. We owe 

him and the thousands of anonymous 

public servants who spend 

their lives working for us and their 

country more than a moment of 

respect. [See May/June Obituaries.] 

Peter is gone. But we are still 

here. If we hadn’t learned the essentials 

before we got to 116th Street, 

we then were nourished on the 

Core Curriculum and a long list of 

brilliant teachers. (My favorite was 

Gilbert Highet.) We know up is not 

down and right from wrong. 

Our responsibility is to use our 

ability to think and to distinguish 

appeals to reason from “you betcha.” 

I look forward to hearing from 

you. 

48 



622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 



George Woolfe writes: “CCT came 

this week, and despite all the disruption 

in our house, I took the time to 

read Durham Caldwell’s ’48 Class 

Notes. Add Elaine and me to the list 

of those who are joining Durham in 

the great state of Massachusetts. 

“We moved to Mayflower Place, 

a continuing care retirement community 

on Cape Cod in West Yarmouth, 

in April. It is only about 20 

miles from Durham’s hometown in 

Falmouth and my house there. 

“This is my second sojourn in a 

retirement place, and I can recommend 

such a move to our fellow 

classmates. Not only is caregiving 

lifted from the shoulders of your 

spouse or offspring should a debilitating 

illness occur, but your wife 

no longer has to cook dinner every 

night, nor clean up afterward! 

“As a fellow resident once said 

to me, ‘Moving here is my gift to 

my children.’ This is basically why 

we decided to move to Mayflower 

instead of to my place in Falmouth. 

It will be readily available to us 

should we feel the need to escape 

institutional living, and it will provide 

a place to stay when my son 

and his family visit. 

“Arthur Bradley was my neighbor 

to the north in Hartley. He 

mentioned in the March/April CCT 

that in 1945, he’d been stationed at 

a ‘port near Tokyo,’ which was, in 

fact Yokosuka. When Arthur came 

to visit me in the ’60s at Ste-Adèle, in 

the Laurentians, we played golf. The 

player we were paired with turned 

out to be an American who had also 

been stationed in Yokosuka.” 

Larry Spelman writes: “My 

wife, Dorothy, and I are still happily 

retired in Sarasota, Fla. In pursuit 

of activities, I have become an avid 

tenor banjo player (1920s songs, 

none of that bluegrass stuff). I am 

now a member of two bands, the 

Gulf Coast Banjo Society, which has 

its weekly gigs from October–May 

on Thursdays at Snook Haven in 

Venice, Fla., during the day, and 

the Sunshine Mummers String 

Band, which has its weekly gigs on 

Wednesdays, also in Venice. Dick 

Hyman lives in Venice, and he has 

visited our banjo performances. 

He has intimated that one of these 

days, he will bring along his electric 

keyboard and join our playing, but 

so far we have not had that pleasure. 

If any classmate likes happy 

banjo music and comes to any of 

our gigs and introduces himself to 

me as a classmate, the hot dogs or 

cheeseburgers are on me.” 

CCT is looking for a new Class 

Notes correspondent for the Class 

of ’48. If you’d like to volunteer a 

few hours a month to keep in touch 

with classmates and write about 

what they are doing, please contact 

Ethan Rouen, associate editor: 

Columbia College Today, Columbia 

Alumni Center, 622 W. 113th St., 

MC 4530, New York, NY 10025. Or 

e-mail him at ecr2102@columbia. 

edu, or call him at 212-851-7485. 

Until a correspondent is found, 

please send news to the address at 

the top of the column. 

49 

John Weaver 

2639 E. 11th St. 

Brooklyn, NY 11235 

wudchpr@gmail.com 

I feel thrice blessed! After a lack 

of word from any of you, I was 

pleased to find my inbox had not 

one but three notes, putting an end 

to the fear that the Class of ’49 had 

disappeared into a black hole from 

which the screams of “Help” could 

not be heard. 

I did poorly in Professor Farwell’s 

basic physics course but popular 

articles appear from time to time describing 

black holes as a place from 

which nothing can escape. Well, at 

least three ’49ers have done just that! 

Chet Nedwidek popped up on 

my computer screen with another 

one of his fantastic wood turnings, 

a blue-ribbon effort in a wood 

turning competition. The extraordinary 

skill required for even the 

most basic of wood turnings is a 

wonder. To infuse the high order 

of aesthetic as expressed in this 

artwork by Chet continues to be a 

source of wonder and admiration. 

And congratulations are in order 

again for the illustrious Charlie 

Peters! His book on Lyndon Johnson, 

with a June publication date, 

is available to all reading this. 

Charlie’s insights and analysis have 

enlivened and enlightened political 

discourse for a great many years. 

Third, and I save the best for last, 

is the word I received from Basil 

Shanahan, of Bangor, Pa. Basil wrote 

in response to my plea for word 

from all of you. It is appreciated for 

that to begin with. But there was 

a sad note to the content of Basil’s 

letter. Basil is under the impression 

that, having failed to achieve public 

acclaim or some appropriate form 

of celebrity, he represents some 

“underclass” of Columbia College 

graduates. The class celebrities, be 

they public figures whose wealth or 

awards of recognition are respected 

achievements, are a minor percentage 

of College graduates. Most of us 

were, and are, ordinary guys who 

have led simple lives of no special 

note except that the conduct of those 

lives was inspired by our Columbia 

years. 

I hope that Basil will accept his 

membership in our class as having 

significance. And, as one who would 

remain in obscurity but for the 

priv ilege of writing this column, I 

say, welcome back. And thank you 

for responding to my plea. Basil did 

express a desire to be in touch with 

classmates, and his e-mail address is 

basilshan@yahoo.com. 

That’s it for July. Enjoy your 

summer. At this writing, my tomatoes 

are in the ground, and hope 

springs eternal for a fruitful harvest! 

50 

Mario Palmieri 

33 Lakeview Ave. W. 

Cortlandt Manor, NY 10567 

mapal@bestweb.net 

Dick Brunstetter, after graduating 

from P&S in 1955, entered the field 

of psychiatry and child psychiatry. 

He practiced and taught in several 

U.S. cities but for more than 20 

years has remained settled in the 

Winston-Salem. N.C., area. Among 

his posts have been professorships 

at the medical schools of Tulane 

and Wake Forest and a four-year 

stint with the National Institute of 

Mental Health in Washington, D.C. 

Dick retired from academic life 

in the late ’90s but took on a new 

career in public mental health. 

For his many years of service on 

mental health boards, local and 

state, and as a child psychiatrist 

for various community agencies 

helping kids, he was honored as 

the recipient of the 2010 Lifetime 

Career Leadership Award from 

the North Carolina Council of 

Community Programs, a statelevel 

organization of mental health 

agencies. Dick has published articles 

in professional journals and is 

the author of the book Adolescents 

In Psychiatric Hospitals: A Psychodynamic 

Approach to Evaluation and 

Treatment. He sends greetings to all 

classmates and to members of the 

tennis team. 

Sad to report, Alfred Arees of 

Croton-on-Hudson, N.Y., died in 

March 2009. 

Our class reunion took place in 

June, but due to lead-time requirements 

for Class Notes, we shall 

have to wait for the next issue to 

report on attendees and activities. 

In the May/June issue, we reported 

the publication of Roland 

Glenn’s book, The Hawk and The 

Dove, but neglected to include the 

publisher’s information. The publisher 

is Smith/Kerr Associates, 

43 Seapoint Rd., Kittery Point, ME 

03905; phone/fax, 207-439-2921; 

e-mail: bizbks@aol.com; www. 

SmithKerr.com. 

51 

George Koplinka 

75 Chelsea Rd. 

White Plains, NY 10603 

desiah@verizon.net 

So, what about Len and Fred If 

we roll back the clock more than 60 

years, Len Stoehr and Fred Kinsey 

are roommates during their junior 

year at Columbia College. They 

share a double room on the third 

floor of the now defunct Phi Kappa 

Psi fraternity chapter on West 113th 

Street. After graduation, they go 

their separate ways and do not 

reconnect until some 40 years later. 

Len was enrolled in Columbia’s 

NROTC program, and upon 

graduation he was commissioned 

an ensign in the Navy with a threeyear 

obligation. After a few years 

of Navy life and while stationed in 

Hawaii, he had an epiphany and 

decided that naval service was not 

such a bad deal. Len “re-upped” 

and served for 22 years as a naval 

officer. Prominent years were spent 

commanding a submarine on 

patrolling missions in the Pacific 

Ocean. He retired in 1973 as a captain. 

Following his discharge, Len 

held a variety of engineering and 

management positions, and today 


41

class notes 


he works part-time doing patent 

searches for a law firm. He has been 

married to Jan for 27 years. They 

live in Arlington, Va., and own a 

retreat house on a lake near the Blue 

Ridge Mountains of Virginia. Len’s 

interests include tennis, grandkids, 

the lake house, reading and connecting 

with old friends. 

Fred’s career took a different 

trajectory. He married after graduation 

and returned to Columbia for 

graduate work in anthropology. 

After completing an M.A. in 1953, 

Fred was drafted into the Army. 

Upon completion of his military 

obligation, Fred was employed 

as an archeologist and curator at 

the Pennsylvania State Museum. 

After eight years, he accepted a 

dual position as director of Franklin 

and Marshall College’s North 

Museum and as a member of the 

college’s anthropology department 

in Lancaster, Pa. Fred retired from 

F&M after 27 years and founded 

an archeological consulting business. 

Now fully retired, Fred and 

his wife, Carol, live in Manheim, 

Pa., where they enjoy traveling, 

landscaping, reading and volunteer 

work. 

Happy ending Yes! About 20 

years ago, Len and Fred reconnected 

after ’51’s 40th reunion. They began 

exchanging visits several times a 

year, with and without spouses. A 

big event last year was when they 

attended each other’s 80th birthday 

bash. Recently, the classmates enjoyed 

a boys’ weekend at the lake 

house. As Len said, it was comical; 

“Two old deaf guys shouting at each 

other.” Both would enjoy hearing 

from any of the old gang. Len can be 

reached at lenstoehr@msn.com and 

Fred at wfkinsey@gmail.com. 

Fortieth reunion, good; 50th 

reunion, better; but the 60th will 

be the best! Planning is under way, 

and the Alumni Office has assigned 

Jennifer Freely, assistant director of 

alumni affairs, to help our nascent 

committee with the planning for 

Thursday, June 2–Sunday, June 5, 

2011. Information will be forthcoming 

via e-mail, phone calls, literature 

and this column. Your ideas and 

suggestions are most welcome. Jennifer 

can be reached at 212-851-7438 

or jf2261@columbia.edu. 

John Handley reports all is well 

with his family, and he and his wife, 

Mary, still live in Santa Barbara, 

Calif. Spring skiing has been good 

at Mammoth Mountain, with 11–14 

feet of snow in the high peaks. Like 

so many of us octogenarians, John 

and Mary devote considerable time 

to grandparenting and graduation 

ceremonies. It recently was cap 

and gown time for granddaughter 

Maria, who hopes to be accepted at 

Brown in the fall. Her Dad, Mark, 

will get a second star as a rear admiral 

in the Navy, adding a little icing 

to the Handley cake! 

How about this sports item 

from [the Myrtle Beach] Sun News: 

Dave Zinman finished first in the 

65-and-over mile run at Coastal 

Carolina University this spring. 

No real surprise, because Dave got 

his varsity letter in track 59 years 

ago at Columbia. As Dave said at 

the finish line, “These weary legs 

are still a-truckin’, despite some 

heavy huffing and puffing along 

the way.” Stan Schachter, our roving 

reporter in Florida, sent news 

about Marvin Berkman, who at 

the time of our graduation was 

captain of the varsity track team. 

Despite Marvin’s mentoring, 

Stan’s own track career was shortlived. 

Marvin, and the late Mark 

Winfield, went on to accumulate 

numerous victories for the Lions. 

Marv’s career led to a Harvard 

M.B.A., retail experience with 

Bloomingdale’s, a marriage in 1963 

and resettlement in the Midwest. 

In 1975, he moved to Los Angeles, 

acquired a carwash business, built 

an empire and turned it over to his 

son. Now he can come and go as 

he pleases, has time to enjoy with 

three grandchildren and a daughter 

who is an attorney in San Jose 

and who recently appeared before 

the California Supreme Court and 

won her case. 

No doubt about it. The Core 

Curriculum has created great diversity 

in our classmates’ careers. 

Consider Peter T. Suzuki, who 

earned a master’s in 1952 from 

GSAS’ anthropology department, 

studying with such luminaries as 

Alfred Kroeber, Joseph Greenberg, 

Margaret Mead ’28 GSAS and 

Harry Shapiro, to name a few. 

After studying at Yale and Leiden 

University in Holland and acquiring 

a Ph.D. in anthropology, Peter 

had a long tenure in the academic 

world with institutions in Turkey, 

the University of Maryland, in 

Europe and finally retiring from 

his professorial appointment at 

the University of Nebraska. Most 

recently, he has published an 

article in Indigenous Policy Journal 

(September 2009), “Margaret 

Mead’s Unpublished Field Notes 

on the Omaha Tribe: Three Unpublished 

Ceremonies.” The material 

is based upon Mead’s documents 

stored in the Library of Congress 

since summer 1930. Peter’s paper 

goes over numerous Omaha Tribe 

ceremonies, which he discovered 

were not included in Mead’s book, 

The Changing Culture of an Indian 

Tribe. In addition to anthropological 

research, Peter has been going 

to Perth, Australia, twice each year 

since 2006. There, he keeps his widowed 

sister company and has time 

to ponder his next publication. 

A few final notes: Martin L. 

Katz and his wife, Olga, recently 

completed their 45th winter in 

Puerto Rico and are back in New 

Jersey for the summer. Marty got 

tied up with a “little heart problem” 

as he called it, but all is well. 

Best of all, he learned to say “Hello” 

in Tagalog, Korean and Hindi 

from the multicultural nurses 

in the hospital. His e-mail is torero1465@aol.com. 

Ralph Lowenstein 

co-authored a book with John 

C. Merrill that came out in January: 

Viva Journalism: The Triumph of Print 

in the Media Revolution. (Available 

from Amazon and other Internet 

bookstores for those with grandchildren 

who can help with a computer 

order.) Sam Haines, class 

v.p., is in a nursing home in Bergen 

County, N.J. Fraternity brothers 

and close friends should keep in 

touch with Sam. The New York 

Times reported the death of Allison 

Stacey Cowles, who died on April 

24. Allison was the wife of Arthur 

Ochs Sulzberger. Columbia’s 

Alumni Office reported the death 

of John W. Garrett, of Asheville, 

N.C., on January 10. Frank Lewis 

had a serious automobile accident 

last August. His car was totaled 

when another vehicle turned into 

him. Frank is pleased with his excellent 

overall recovery, feels fine 

and is hoping he can make the 60th 

reunion despite a couple of lingering 

problems. Keep in touch with 

Frank at franklewis@aol.com. 

Something to think about: The 

online-only Columbia College Fund 

57th Annual Report (http://fund. 

college.columbia.edu/annual 

report) noted that $14.6 million was 

donated in Fiscal Year 2008–09. Our 

class, consisting of 295 members, 

had 98 donors who contributed 

$52,431. Next year is a reunion year. 

Can we double our giving and 

make a big splash Yes we can! 

52 

Sidney Prager 

20 Como Ct. 

Manchester, NJ 08759 

sidmax9@aol.com 

Here we are in the midst of summer. 

July: hot, hazy and humid. But 

also, it’s time for the beach, picnics 

and ballgames with hot dogs, hamburgers, 

beer and soda. The lazy 

days of summer that remind us of 

when we were kids, playing in the 

park, running under the cold water 

of the open fire hydrants or if you 

were lucky, going to camp. What 

freedom we had, away from the 

house all day, just having to be back 

in time for dinner. Remember waiting 

for the bells to announce Good 

Humor or Bungalow Bar and holding 

on tightly to that nickel or dime 

that you needed for that special 

summer day treat. Many of us were 

so poor that we were inches away 

from welfare, but we didn’t even 

know it. The Police Athletic League 

provided free tickets to Yankee 

Stadium where I saw Joe DiMaggio, 

Bob Feller, Hank Greenberg and 

Ted Williams. 

Also, there was always a handball 

game in the playground 10 

blocks away. Some days I would 

spend the entire day playing handball. 

If you could win, you could 

stay on the court. And then there 

were the ongoing softball games in 

the empty lot on the corner. 

Of course, June was the time of 

graduations. Speaking of which, my 

wife and I happily attended three 

of our grandchildren’s high school 

graduations. One of our granddaughters 

will be attending Washington 

University in St. Louis, one 

of our grandsons will be attending 

Dartmouth in Hanover, N.H. (having 

been valedictorian of his high 

school class), and another grandson 

will attend Cornell in Ithaca, N.Y. 

I couldn’t talk them into going to 

Columbia. 

Peter G. Lee writes: “I began 

my career working for defense 

and defense-related companies. 

DuPont (smokeless gun powder), 

G.D.-E.B. Division (nuclear submarine) 

and Secondary Lead Smelters 

(ballasts and bullets). Anyway, it 

is not a distinguished career, but it 

kept me out of military service. 

“I have four children, three sons 

and a daughter. They are all engineers. 

I have a most wonderful wife 

who is a chemist. We met at a scientific 

conference. She thought I was 

a salesman, so I sold myself to her. 

We have been making beautiful 

chemistry. 

“After coming to the United 

States in 1940, I finally had the 

opportunity to visit my birthplace, 

a small village in southern China. 

My wife saw her home in Shanghai. 

However, everything has changed. 

My house was torn down, and my 

wife’s home is now housing five 

families. 

“My wife and I like outdoor 

activities such as hiking, sightseeing 

and gardening. We bought a small 

camp with three acres of land in upstate 

New York. It became our place 

of refuge, where we can unwind 

and relax. Since we like the place, we 

thought we could we retire there. 

In 1987, we replaced the one room 

shack with a Lincoln log cabin. We 

purchased the cabin kit and friends 

helped put it together. After it was 

finished and comfortably livable, we 

realized it was not good for an old 

couple to live there year-round. This 

place is too remote. It has no public 

transportation, limited medical 

facilities, and only mom-and-pop 

shopping. The winter is too harsh, 

with temperatures 20 degrees below 

zero and 300 inches of snowfall each 

season. That situation, we cannot 

handle. But, it is still an attractive 


42


class notes 

place to spend summer and fall. We 

are now a ‘snowbird couple.’ ” 

James D. Kelly writes: “I was 

supposed to graduate with the 

Class of 1953, so few in the Class of 

1952 are apt to know me. I went on 

to Columbia’s graduate school for 

economics and ended up working 

as an economist at IBM’s Armonk 

HQ for 27 years. I have a message 

for all of you out there: Despite 

appearances, the earth is not flat, 

and the sun does not revolve around 

the earth. As with physical science, 

assumptions using common sense 

alone frequently lead to the wrong 

conclusions. I knew from my studies 

of the history of economics that 

there were, indeed, bubbles in both 

the worldwide real estate market 

and in most stock markets, despite 

assertions from Fed officials that 

it was impossible to know that a 

bubble exists until it bursts. Some of 

us knew that huge bubbles existed. 

I acted on that knowledge and got 

out of the stock market long before 

it crashed. Finally, it is essential that 

the federal government continue to 

run large budgetary deficits until it is 

clear that the economic recovery will 

not abort and send us reeling into 

another Great Depression. Common 

sense says that big federal deficits 

must be reined in. Wise economic 

policy says, ‘not so fast.’ Before we 

curb the deficits, let’s be sure that the 

crisis is really behind us.” 

Sorry to report the passing of 

Donald J. Engel, a retired comptroller 

from Hopewell, N.J., on 

September 11, 2009. 

Good wishes and good luck to 

all. I left Florida in May and will 

be in my New Jersey home until 

December. Please feel free to send 

me any information or updates. 

53 

Lew Robins 

1221 Stratfield Rd. 

Fairfield, CT 06825 

lewrobins@aol.com 

In 2008, Bob Wallace received the 

Mayo Clinic Distinguished Alumni 

Award. At the time, Dr. Eugene 

Braunwald of Harvard Medical 

School and Brigham and Women’s 

Hospital in Boston called our distinguished 

classmate “a giant in 

cardiovascular surgery.” Among his 

many medical achievements, Bob 

was the first surgeon in the nation 

to perform the Rastelli operation 

to correct transposition of the great 

arteries with ventricular septal defect 

and pulmonary stenosis. After 

serving as the chair of Mayo’s department 

of surgery from 1968–79, 

Bob went to the Georgetown University 

School of Medicine, where 

he became the chief of the Division 

of Cardiothoracic Surgery. 

In 1999, Bob was v.p., president 

and chair of the Scientific Advisory 

Committee of the LeDucq Foundation. 

Dr. Andrew Wechsler has written, 

“Bob Wallace set the direction 

for what will probably turn out to be 

the largest private foundation supporting 

cardiovascular research. Individuals 

supported by the LeDucq 

Foundation represent the highest 

level of cardiologic investigation on 

both sides of the Atlantic.” 

Bob has written more than 250 

articles or book chapters. He was a 

resident on Dr. Michael DeBakey’s 

service in Houston and later worked 

with Dr. Denton Cooley. Amazingly, 

Bob claims that it is quite likely he 

would never have pursued a career 

in medicine if it had not been for 

football coach Lou Little, who took 

a great deal of interest in the young 

men who played for him. He’s sure 

that Little had a great deal to do with 

his acceptance at P&S. 

Bob and Betty have been happily 

married for 55 years. They have 

three children and six grandchildren. 

Talking to Bob on the phone, I 

learned that since his retirement, he 

has been involved in a program to 

provide tutoring and mentoring to 

inner-city children in Washington, 

D.C. In addition, he has become 

addicted to playing golf and carving 

two decorative decoys a year, which 

he gives away to friends and family. 

What a great classmate! Here’s 

to many more years of productive 

activity! 

Sad to say, Jay Levine passed 

away on February 22. Jay earned 

his M.A. in English and comparative 

literature in 1954 from GSAS 

and became a professor in Chicago. 

The American Physical Society, 

in recognition of scientists who 

have worked to uphold human 

rights, awarded Herman Winick 

its Andrei Sakharov Prize on February 

14. The award is named for a 

Russian physicist and Nobel laureate 

who campaigned extensively 

against nuclear proliferation in 

the former Soviet Union. Herman 

suspects that he was nominated for 

his work to pressure the Iranian 

government to release Iranian 

physicist Mohammad Hadi Hadizadeh 

Yazdi, who had been one of 

his colleagues in a physics project 

Herman started in 1997. In 2001, 

Herman organized a letter-writing 

campaign on Hadizadeh’s behalf, 

recruiting 32 Nobel Prize laureates 

in the effort. Later, he was able to 

help Hadizadeh secure research 

positions at Ohio and Harvard. “I 

got very upset that a guy like him, 

whom I respected so much, should 

be in prison for views so similar to 

mine,” Herman writes. 

In 1957, Herman earned his doctorate 

in high-energy physics from 

Columbia and has held positions 

at the University of Rochester and 

Harvard. He was one of the primary 

actors at Stanford in the creation of 

SSRL and Linac Coherent Light 

Source. 

Herman has written more than 

100 scientific articles and is a fellow 

at the APS and the American Association 

for the Advance of Science. 

He is working on a collaborative 

effort with a group of physics 

experts he organized from nine 

Middle Eastern countries, including 

Jordan, Iran, Israel and Egypt. 

If their work is successful, Herman 

believes it will dramatically help 

all countries in the Middle East. 

Renee and Herman have been 

married 57 years. Their wedding 

took place the day after our graduation 

in 1953. They have three 

children and seven grandchildren 

and live on the Stanford campus. 

Keep up your innovative, dedicated, 

enthusiastic work! 

54 

Howard Falberg 

13710 Paseo Bonita 

Poway, CA 92064 

westmontgr@aol.com 

I’m feeling great, since a good 

number of classmates have responded 

to my “agonized call for 

help” regarding information. Many 

of our classmates are involved in 

activities, regardless of retirement, 

and concentrate on business or 

community, family or sports, hobbies 

or travel, or just plain leisure. 

Peter Ehrenhaft is serving as an 

arbitrator in an international commercial 

dispute. Peter and his wife, 

Charlotte ’57 SW (whom he met in 

his last year at Columbia), recently 

spent two weeks in China to see 

the terra cotta warriors in their 

pit and cruise down the Yangtze 

Larry Kobrin ’54 is senior counsel at Cahill Gordon 

& Reindel, practicing real estate and corporate law. 

River. Peter also serves as national 

treasurer of Compassion & Choices, 

which seeks to allow Medicare 

to reimburse doctors who provide 

end-of-life counseling. 

Alan Fendrick and his wife, Bev, 

are well and were planning to leave 

Sarasota in late May for their home 

in the Berkshires. Among their family 

sources of pride is their grandson, 

Jonah, who has been playing the 

cello since he was 5 and will be part 

of an interscholastic student high 

school orchestra giving a concert at 

Alice Tully Hall. 

Saul Turteltaub and his wife, 

Shirley, will celebrate their 50th anniversary 

on August 1. Here’s to a 

happy 50 more years together. They 

have two sons and four grandsons 

(in the words of our classmate, 

“Boys are us.”). Saul is considering 

moving back from Beverly Hills 

to New York so that he can “hang 

around Hamilton Hall” to see if he 

can assist grandsons Max and Ross 

with their admission to Columbia 

College. He was talking to Stan 

Swersky, who lives in Weston, Fla. 

Stan has successfully recovered 

from serious surgery and is well 

enough to play golf again. 

It’s always good hearing from 

fellow members of “The Class 

of Destiny,” and it’s even better 

when someone contacts me whom 

we haven’t heard from for a long 

time. Demetrios “Jim” Caraley is a 

wonderful case in point. Jim’s career 

involved academia at Columbia and 

Barnard, where among other honors 

accorded full professors, Barnard 

honored him with a special chair, 

the Janet Robb Professorship of the 

Social Sciences. Jim held full professorships 

at Columbia and Barnard. 

He is a prolific author and has been 

editor of several scholarly journals 

such as Political Science Quarterly, 

and since 1992 has been president 

of the Academy of Political Science. 

One of Jim’s comments to me was 

“Columbia College, especially the 

humanities Core, really shaped my 

life, and I advise anyone who I think 

has a chance of getting in to apply to 

the College as the best undergraduate 

institution in the country.” 

I couldn’t have said it better. 

Peter Kenen refuses to retire. 

Although he ascended to emeritus 

status at Princeton some years 

ago, he continues to teach, write 

and travel. Peter is a prolific writer 

and has three new papers, all 

forthcoming, on the reform of the 

international monetary system. His 

areas of interest involve him in a 

great deal of international travel. 

Peter and his wife, Reggie, have 

four children and four grandchildren, 

one of whom is a freshman at 

Columbia in a joint program with 

the Jewish Theological Seminary. 

Peter is another example of how 

one can be retired, involved and 

having fun. He is happily involved 

in deep sea fishing and enjoyed 

the sailfish he caught on a deep 

sea trip. 

Arnie Tolkin is not only fascinated 

by genealogy but he also does 

something about it. He has uncovered 

relatives all over the world, 

and shortly, Arnie and his bride 

will be off to Africa to visit with 

relatives he found in Johannesburg 

and Capetown. Arnie maintains a 

strong Columbia connection, since 

his grandson, Aaron ’08, is engaged 

to Dena ’09 Barnard. “We are now 

three generations of Columbia grad- 


43

class notes 


uates with a great deal of loyalty to 

the College and the University,” 

Arnie said. 

Bret Charipper is living happily 

in Manhattan and would be interested 

in getting together with classmates 

for coffee or lunch. His e-mail 

address is regentplace@rcn.com. 

Larry Kobrin is now senior 

counsel at Cahill Gordon & Reindel, 

practicing real estate and corporate 

law. I’ve known through the years 

that Larry has always had a “full 

plate.” Like many of us, he is exploring 

new areas of involvement. 

He noted he and his wife, Ruth, and 

their children hold eight Columbia 

degrees. 

I am pleased to have heard from 

so many of our classmates. Many 

of us share similar activities and 

concerns, so that between reunions 

we have an opportunity to send 

info for our Class Notes for sharing 

and for mutual interest. 

55 

Gerald Sherwin 

181 E. 73rd St., Apt. 6A 


gs481@juno.com 

One of the significant initiatives 

being put forth by the University is 

the establishment of Global Centers 

around the world. The most recent 

ones are in Mumbai and Paris. This 

is being done to enhance Columbia’s 

global perspective in teaching 

and research. President Lee C. Bollinger 

has led the charge in opening 

these facilities. Added to this are 

the alumni travel programs, which 

continue to play a role in getting 

alumni closer to the University and 

faculty. In October, an exciting tour 

will be conducted exploring the 

mysteries of the Ottoman Empire — 

“Empires of the Sea.” Pop quizzes 

may be given at each port. 

Before the World Cup reached 

its peak of excitement, in the spring 

Columbia alumni in Johannesburg 

attended an exciting opening of the 

Johannesburg alumni chapter. The 

turnout was beyond expectations 

— considering that there are more 

than 150 alumni in this part of the 

world. Back on campus, Columbia 

once again hosted the World Leaders 

Forum. Chairman of the Joint Chiefs 

of Staff Admiral Mike Mullen spoke 

about U.S. military strategy. The 

school also featured a visit by French 

President Nicolas Sarkozy, who addressed 

an enraptured audience in 

Low Library. Columbia continues to 

get high-profile people. 

The Café series at PicNic Market 

& Cafe continues to sell out every 

Monday evening. Recently, Professor 

Ira Katznelson ’66, as part of 

Café Social Science, discussed 

how fear shaped policy during the 

Roosevelt and Truman years. In a 

Café Humanities chat, musicology 

Professor Elaine Sisman revealed 

the secret narratives in the problematic 

opera Don Giovanni. You 

get to see and know the professors 

“up close and in person” (per 

Howard Cosell). 

Dean Michele Moody-Adams 

recently gave a stirring talk at the 

Columbia University Club to a 

throng of alumni and friends. She 

certainly makes the rounds, not 

only with alums but also with 

students. We can’t wait to see what 

classes she will teach, once she finds 

the time in her busy schedule. 

The party’s over — it’s time to 

call it a day. And so went the 55th 

reunion for the Class of ’55, who 

will be described by many as the 

most memorable class in Columbia 

history — record-breaking attendance 

participating in wonderful 

events. Thanks go to the Reunion 

Committee from all over, specifically 

Herb Cohen, Jim Berick, Bob 

Brown, Don McDonough, Lew 

Mendelson, Bob Pearlman, Al 

Martz, Roland Plottel, Jay Joseph, 

Arnie Schwartz, Mort Rennert, 

Stanley Lubman, Dick Kuhn, 

Stu Kaback, Larry Balfus, Jeff 

Broido, Bill Epstein, Elliot Gross, 

Berish Strauch, Ferdie Setaro, Jack 

Stuppin, Alan Sloate, Bob Schiff, 

Chuck Garrison, Jack Freeman, 

Alfred Gollomp, Allen Hyman, 

Don Laufer, Ezra Levin, Steve 

Rabin and your roving reporter. 

Sid Sheinberg gave a speech on 

Saturday morning amidst the 

meeting and greeting and eating 

and toasting. Who else did we espy 

around campus From near and far: 

Marty Dubner, Abe Ashkenasi, 

Ross Grumet, Aaron Hamburger, 

Abbie Leban, Bernie Kirtman, 

Bob Kushner, Harold Kushner, 

Bob Loring, Ron McPhee, Gerry 

Meyerhoff, Beryl Nusbaum, Gerry 

Pomper, Chuck Solomon, Ben 

Kaplan, Ron Spitz, Lew Sternfels 

and Ralph Tanner (other attendees 

will be named in the next issue). 

Unfortunately, we missed Bill 

Langston, Igou Allbray, Bob 

Dillingham, Bill Epstein, Alfred 

Gollomp, Roland Plottel, Mike 

Liptzin and Dick Carr, among others, 

who all sent regrets. We’ll get 

them at the next reunion. 

How did the class make out with 

regard to the Columbia College 

Fund The results will be covered in 

detail in a separate note to the class 

after the books are closed for the 

fiscal year on June 30. A preliminary 

look shows positive results. 

Sad notes to report: Condolences 

go to the families and friends of 

Jim Gherardi, Jerry Rosenthal and 

Bede Sullivan, who passed away 

over the past several months. 

My fellow classmates, there is 

little to say after such a glorious 

weekend. It was wonderful spending 

those days with you. However, 

get ready, be prepared, rejuvenate 

yourselves. Before you know it, the 

60th will be upon us. 

Love to all, everywhere! 

56 

Alan N. Miller 

257 Central Park West, 

Apt. 9D 


oldocal@aol.com 

The weather is nuts this year. Temps 

can vary by 50 degrees within one 

week in the Northeast. I heard from 

Lou Hemmerdinger that Florida 

was not so great either. 

We had a well-attended monthly 

lunch in late April — 10 guys made 

it. We tried out the new third-floor 

dining area at the Columbia University 

Club, which got excellent 

reviews. 

Alan Broadwin brought photos 

of his two new grands, very cute. 

Buz Paaswell still is acting 

president of CCNY, but the school 

found a permanent replacement to 

start in August, and this is making 

Buz’s wife, Roz, happy for the end 

of his temporary position. 

Alan Press still is wandering the 

out-of-the-way parts of the earth 

(places I would never go), and after 

lunch, we went to his office and he 

showed me photos of indigenous 

people seen on his travels. 

Dan Link is back from Florida, 

and we greeted him with 40 degrees 

and wind. He arranged lunch 

at his Westchester club for May 20, 

which included tennis (I tried not to 

fall this time). 

Jerry Fine is back from vacation 

in the Far East. He and his wife, 

Barbara, used Odysseys Unlimited 

again, and they raved about this 

travel group when we had dinner. 

It was fortuitous, as Helene and 

I were considering this outfit for 

a trip to northern Italy the end of 

September, and we signed up. 

Peter Klein, Al Franco ’56E and 

Bob Siroty came from New Jersey 

for the lunch. Bob agrees with me 

that Dean’s Day combined with 

Alumni Reunion Weekend is a 

mistake, as I have heard from many 

others. And we both miss the full 

day in April with three sessions 

of about six choices each. Now 

we have two sessions with a total 

of eight choices. It also distracts 

from the purpose of class-specific 

reunions with a whole University 

event and eliminates one event a 

year for alumni to get together. 

Lenny Wolfe was a last-minute 

attendee at the lunch and a pleasure 

to see after a long absence. 

Maybe we will use his Yale Club 

again in the fall. 

Missing due to various problems 

good and bad at the last minute 

were Maurice Klein with a cold, 

Ron Kapon suffering drinking 

champagne in France, and Ralph 

Kaslick and Mark Novick, who 

went by mistake to Faculty House, 

where we usually go. 

The next event was Class Day 

on May 17, where Steve Easton 

and I carried the class banner. May 

18 was Commencement, also a 

great occasion, despite rain all day. 

Then, as I said, another class lunch 

and Dean’s Day. 

By the end of April, we were getting 

close to our $100,000 requirement 

to fund our 10 annual class 

scholarships, which we started at 

our great 50th reunion, and I fully 

expect to meet this. The student recipients 

I and others meet are interesting, 

intelligent and unexpectedly 

accomplished. Keep your money 

coming to the Columbia College 

Fund (www.college.columbia.edu/ 

giveonline), as it serves a great 

purpose. 

Next, as usual, my plug for 

taking courses at Columbia taught 

by super professors. Next fall, I am 

taking two great ones, one with the 

Parr Professor Emeritus of English 

and Comparative Literature Jim 

Mirollo and another with retired 

professor Peter Pazzaglini. Jim 

gave a marvelous talk at our 50th 

reunion lunch. In the spring, we 

have at the Heyman Center for the 

Humanities Professor Emeritus 

of Slavic Languages and director 

in University Seminars Robert 

Belknap on Russian short stories 

(my fourth course with him; he 

is superb). Anyone interested in 

courses at Columbia, which I am 

enthusiastic about, can contact me. 

I got a 10-year economic and 

international forecast from our 

class economist in Palo Alto, Tracy 

Herrick. If this is correct, it has 

some frightening prospects, and I 

hope it is partly wrong. 

So guys and dolls, our 55th 

reunion is scheduled for Thursday, 

June 2–Sunday, June 5, 2011. We 

have had two small meetings, 

combined with lunch, so far and 

plan to have the first major one in 

September. Please let me know of 

any ideas and if you want to join 

the Reunion Committee. When in 

my apartment, an inducement is 

sandwiches from the Second Avenue 

Deli, probably more important 

than my sparkling personality. 

As usual, we wish you all health, 

happiness, a little wealth and longevity. 

We expect only concerned 

children and extraordinary grandchildren. 

Love to all. 

57 

Herman Levy 

7322 Rockford Dr. 

Falls Church, VA 22043 

hdlleditor@aol.com 

Marty Fisher: “One bit of good 

news to balance the bad: Sam Lip- 


44


class notes 

syte, Robert Lipsyte’s son, a professor 

of creative writing at Columbia, 

practices what he preaches. His new 

book, The Ask: A Novel, is reviewed 

by Slate: 

“ ‘The outer borough Socrates 

of Lipsyte’s new novel, The Ask, is 

Milo Burke. As a reviewer, I will 

describe him as a development 

officer at a university in New York 

that aspires to be more prestigious. 

In Lipsyte-speak, Milo is “one of 

those mistakes you sometimes find 

in an office,” hired to “grovel for 

more money” for an institution 

where “people paid vast sums of 

money so their progeny could take 

hard drugs in suitable company.” 

Milo has a “good [expletive] job.” ’ 

“[Sam’s] book of short stories 

is called Venus Drive: Stories. It (as 

well as his two intervening books) 

is available on Amazon and at 

your local bookseller. 

“The Ask seems to be a big hit, so 

congratulations, Bob. 

“And now we turn to the bad 

news. 

“George Dickstein died on 

February 3. It is coincidental that 

he joins his good friend and fellow 

Jamaica H.S. 1953 graduate, Joel 

Schwartz, in the hereafter. They 

are the first members of our little 

1957 luncheon group to pass on. 

“If you want to contact George’s 

widow, who lives in Riverdale, 

drop me a line.” 

Marty then provided us with 

some personal recollections of 

George: “We lost another friend and 

companion on February 3 when 

George ‘slip’d the surly bonds’ of 

mortality to join his forefathers on 

the inevitable journey we all must 

take. George was a good friend: 

quiet, subtle, intelligent and rocksolid. 

He was not the hail-fellow, 

well-met person one might imagine 

being the center of attention at a 

fraternity house party. He was not 

a cynosure but rather existed on 

the fringes of the main event. If one 

were lucky enough to encounter 

George there, one could have 

been impressed by the breadth of 

his intellect and the depth of his 

passion. The specific passion with 

which I happened to connect was 

George’s simple and complex love 

of the Brooklyn Dodgers baseball 

club, circa 1947–57. We could have 

talked for hours about the exploits 

of Jackie, Duke, Peewee, Gil, Roy 

... yes and predecessors and role 

players such as Pistol Pete Reiser, the 

unfortunate center fielder who kept 

bumping into short outfield walls at 

Ebbets Field, and Whitlow Wyatt. 

This is not to mention Andy Pafko, 

whose acquisition from the Cubs 

was a godsend, and Ralph Branca, 

son-in-law of a part-owner of the 

Dodgers. He served up the now 

seriously disputed pitch that Bobby 

Thomson hit in 1951. And there is 

Dale Mitchell, the excellent singles 

batter and consistent .300 hitter who 

is now remembered as the final out 

(on a called strike) in Don Larsen’s 

1956 World Series perfect game. 

“This recollection could have 

been improved because I had only 

one good opportunity to listen to 

George privately after one of our 

recent ’57 luncheons. I arranged a 

one-on-one get-together with him 

at an upper Broadway diner 15 

blocks from Baker Field. I knew I 

wanted to repeat the experience 

even while I was enjoying it, but 

the exigencies of time and location 

to meet intervened. I never saw 

George again. 

“The lesson to be learned: Seize 

the life experiences you know you 

want to repeat and cut through 

the protocol and procrastination, 

which prevent you from enjoying 

them, now. You will not regret 

them, as I regret never having 

spoken again with George, a fine, 

generous, unassuming, truly modest 

man. 

“Diana Olick, daughter of Phil 

Olick, has been mentioned prominently 

on NBC’s Nightly News. Although 

I have not seen her on screen, 

Brian Williams gave her a generous 

credit early in April for her reporting 

on the continuing foreclosure crisis.” 

Marty then reported on the 

May 26 class luncheon, held at the 

University Club in NYC: 

“Attendees were Neil McLellan, 

George Lutz, Alan Brown, Ed 

Wein stein, Sal Franchino, Joe 

Feldschuh, Mark Stanton, Bob 

Klipstein, Martin Fisher, Art 

Meyerson, Paul Zola, Jerry Finkel 

and Martin Brothers. By my count, 

there were six doctors, four lawyers, 

two educators and one CPA 

in the group. This was our first gettogether 

since early December, and 

we were all able to take up where 

we left off in 2009 without skipping 

a beat. We may be able to squeeze 

in one more 1957 luncheon prior to 

the summer hiatus. Otherwise we 

will get together in the fall. 

“These luncheons form a helpful 

bridge between reunion years. 

We have about two more years 

until our 55th; it is gratifying to 

see so many classmates brought 

together under one roof with good 

fellowship as the only item on the 

agenda.” 

Alan Frommer: “Seen recently 

at Jimmy’s Café in Wellesley Hills, 

Mass., were Al (aka Robert) Raab 

(Bethesda, Md.) and myself with 

our wives of 50 years, Fran ’61 

Cornell and Judy ’59 Cornell. It 

has been 19 years since Robert and 

Fran moved from the Bay State, 

and a lot of ‘catching up’ was 

done in a too short period of time. 

Robert and I both have our team 

jackets (wrestling and crew) that 

continued to get use over time by 

my children (Michele ’86 and Ben 

’91). We pledged to pick up the 

conversation at our 55th reunion.” 

Elliott Schwartz: “Two CDs of 

my music have been released this 

past year. One contains all six of my 

chamber concertos, performed by 

the Boston Modern Orchestra Project 

on the orchestra’s BMOP-Sound 

label. The other disk, on the Innova 

Recordings label, includes a piece 

for saxophone quartet and piano 

(I’m the piano in the recording), a 

work for large wind ensemble and 

recorded bird sounds (performed 

by the Harvard Band) and a trio for 

the unlikely combination of violin, 

contrabassoon and piano. I’ve been 

traveling a bit lately as well, with 

visiting residences at festivals and 

conservatories in Birmingham 

(United Kingdom), LePoet-Laval 

(Provence) and the Hong Kong Institute 

of Education/MUSICARA- 

MA Festival. In May, I received 

an honorary doctorate from the 

University of Southern Maine, and 

in the fall, my wife, Deedee, and I 

will head for England to take up 

a fall term fellowship at Robinson 

College, University of Cambridge.” 

John Taussig: “Class of ’57 

graduates in Southern California 

recently held our third lunch gathering 

in the past 1½ years. This one 

was to recognize and celebrate our 

53rd year post-graduation and to 

continue our sharing of memories 

from those formative years. Attendees 

were John Ahouse, Ken 

Bodenstein, Mike Gold, Jonathan 

Lubin, Ken Silvers, John Taussig 

and Gene Wagner. 

“We met on May 1 at Parker’s 

Lighthouse at the foot of the Long 

Beach Marina. The background 

views of the close-by Queen Mary 

in the marina, along with the 

many boats [crossing] the harbor, 

provided an ideal backdrop for our 

conversations, which flowed as 

freely as the Pacific waters. 

“We plan to meet again in the 

early fall.” 

58 

Barry Dickman 

25 Main St. 

Court Plaza North, Ste 104 

Hackensack, NJ 07601 

bdickmanesq@gmail.com 

We were sorry to learn of the death 

of Dr. William G. “Buz” Covey 

on May 28, 2009. After graduating 

from P&S, Buz had a long career 

as a hematologist in Connecticut 

and eventually became medical 

director of the Jewish Home for the 

Elderly in Fairfield. He is survived 

by his wife, Bonnie; children, Anne 

’94 P&S, David ’00 Business, Aaron, 

Michael and Laura; and seven 

grandchildren. Classmates may remember 

Buz as the bass in the Blue 

Notes, along with Bob Hanning, 

Steve Paul and Howard Winell. To 

see a loving, eloquent and touching 

eulogy by his son David, you 

can check out the following link: 

thecoveys.net/Buz_Covey.html. 

Amy and Joel Levine continue 

their gastronomic travels, most 

recently to France, London, New 

England and New York; their 

reviews appear on their blog, 

http://aswelikeit.vox.com. Joel 

has moved from ophthalmology 

to being a foodie to a third career 

as a financial maven, assisting at 

his daughter’s hedge fund, and 

he offers this advice: “As far as 

investing is concerned, a long-ago 

teaching has paid off for us: ‘An 

investment is something that gives 

you a safe, measurable, consistent 

return.’ Anything else is speculation 

with risk capital, and the past 

few years have accentuated the 

risk part of that equation. Class of 

’58 alumni should remember to 

hedge their risks and enjoy their 

‘Golden Years.’ ” 

Sounds easy ... 

Stu Huntington reports, “My 

wife, Paula, and I went to a party on 

March 7 at Harriet and Irv Micklin’s 

lovely horse ranch, which sits on 

the Santa Rosa Plateau, above the 

Temecula Valley in southwest 

Riverside County, Calif. Other CC 

’58 alums and their spouses attending 

were Marcia and Rick Brous, 

Jane and Ira Carlin, and Helen and 

Harold Wittner. Arthur Freeman 

was there, but his wife, Carol, was 

at their East Coast home. Jack 

McGroarty was accompanied by 

his friend Patti Kelly. We enjoyed 

a look around the ranch, a visit to 

the stables, tasty hors d’oeuvres 

and a fantastic dinner, but most of 

all an afternoon with some of the 

nicest people in the world! And we 

roared, Lion, roared, just loudly 

enough to wake the echoes of the 

Temecula Valley!” 

Chuck Golden observes, “Have 

you noticed that the 1958 column 

is getting ominously closer to the 

beginning of the Class Notes than 

the end” 

Thanks for the reminder, Chuck! 

Having left a Wall Street firm, 

first to become associate house 

counsel to a commercial real estate 

developer in White Plains and then 

to open his own office on Long 

Island, Chuck has been a country 

lawyer for 40-plus years. When 

the real estate downturn began, 

he closed his office and moved his 

practice to his home. Even though 

his wife, Sheila, works in a shop in 

Huntington four days a week, leaving 

Chuck as a “househusband” 

by default, he still has more time to 

devote to his five grandchildren (all 

of whom live on Long Island), HO 

scale model railroading, tennis and 

to a timeshare in Aruba every winter. 

A fencer as an undergraduate, 


45

class notes 


Chuck continues to follow the team 

“as a way of reliving the past and 

trying to stay and think young.” A 

little genetic boost doesn’t hurt: His 

dad lived to 101. 

The class lunch is held on the 

second Wednesday of every month 

in the Grill Room of the Princeton/ 

Columbia Club, 15 W. 43rd St. ($31 

per person). E-mail Art Radin if 

you plan to attend, up to the day 

before: aradin@radinglass.com. 

59 

Norman Gelfand 

c/o CCT 


622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 


nmgc59@gmail.com 

Steve Kallis Jr. writes, “So much 

has happened in half a century. 

When I graduated, after serving 

my obligatory time, I went after 

my dreams, formed years before. 

I had the space bug, and in time 

was hired by the Chrysler Space 

Division, ending up in Huntsville, 

Ala., where I worked on the Saturn 

I/IB program as part of the Apollo 

Project. The Huntsville years were 

great, and although my contributions 

to the overall effort were tiny, 

they did help. To this day, I mourn 

the emasculation of the manned 

space effort, viewing the shuttle 

program as a step back from greatness. 

As the prospect of meaningful 

manned space exploration 

waned, I found myself working 

in a whole new area — interactive 

computers. I spent the majority of 

my professional career with Digital 

Equipment Corp., where I found 

a home publicizing new and innovative 

ways to apply computer 

technology. Through the years, I’d 

developed an interest in motion 

picture production and its technology, 

eventually to the point of 

developing a computer system to 

generate control tapes for the optical 

printers found in motion-picture 

film processing laboratories. 

“Long before PCs, I had acquired 

a PDP-8/e minicomputer, which I 

installed in my home and which I 

used to develop software avocationally. 

I’d acquired some professional 

16mm cameras and made a number 

of industrial films to publicize 

the company products. I’ve kept 

my finger on the pulse of several 

technical specialties and probably 

will continue to do so until my last 

breath. I’ve also been a writer, selling 

my first article and short story 

within 1½ years after graduating. 

I’ve sold stories, articles and guest 

editorials ever since. An old-time 

radio show, Captain Midnight, was 

something I aspired to develop 

a book on, and in gathering data 

for the work, I learned how to fly, 

eventually acquiring an airplane 

(a PA28-151, which led me into the 

joys of aviating). 

“My Captain Midnight book 

finally appeared, and I flew from 

Massachusetts to Washington, D.C., 

to get some of the illustrations. 

“I’m quasi-retired (no writer who 

can still write is ever really retired), 

living in Florida with my wife and, 

at this time, a very affectionate cat.” 

From David Smith, “I had such 

a wonderful time at our 50th reunion 

I’m writing to share some of 

our retirement life with my classmates. 

My wife, Helen, who also is 

retired, and I have continued our 

world travels, but on a more expanded 

scale. Last year, we spent 

three months in Paris and traveled 

in Turkey and Syria. In the fall, 

we went to Scotland for a month, 

followed by two months in Italy, 

mostly in Ferrara and Venice with 

side trips to Bologna and Ravenna. 

We recently left for two months 

in Turkey. We’ll spend a few days 

in Istanbul, a week in Cappadocia 

and return for a month to the same 

house where we spent April last 

year, in Yalikavak on the Bodrum 

Peninsula. Bodrum is the home 

of Herodotus and the Mausoleum, 

one of the seven wonders 

of the ancient world. We’ll finish 

our sojourn in Edirne, ancient 

Hadrianopolis and site of Sinan’s 

finest mosque. After a month back 

in Washington, we’ll return to 

Orkney and to Lewis in the Outer 

Hebrides for July and August. September 

will find us again, as every 

year, in Venice for a month. 

“Helen is a wonderful photographer 

and a member of the Society 

of Woman Geographers. She 

documents our adventures with 

her insightful photographs. I write 

about the wonders of what we are 

seeing and experiencing.” 

From Eugene Appel ’60E: “Most 

of you know of my participation 

in Columbia football; what you 

probably don’t know was the driving 

incentive. As a first-generation 

American from Hungarian/Jewish 

(Levite) immigrants, Appel-Lobl- 

Almasy, first to attend college (Columbia), 

football and engineering 

presented me with a determined 

objective where failure was not an 

option! 

“My 39 years of engineering 

included a master’s, ’73 UNC- 

Chapel Hill, in environmental engineering; 

registration P.E. licenses 

in New Jersey, California, Oregon 

and Florida; and disciplines of 

mechanical, civil, environmental, 

system controls, structural, 

water, waste water and construction 

management. The results 

of my work exist in New Jersey, 

Wisconsin, Washington, California 

and Oregon. I’m especially pleased 

to say construction management 

plans set forth more than 20 years 

ago for Medford, Salem, Portland 

and Gresham, Ore., are still in use. 

A major factor in my success was 

Columbia’s emphasis to look at the 

big picture, the inclusive potentials, 

not limiting the problem to just the 

immediate needs! 

“But Norm Gelfand asked, ‘What 

are we doing and thinking now’ 

“Doing: Trying to stay healthy, 

active and productive. 

“Healthy: routine exercise (three 

miles on treadmill three times per 

week, 15 miles on bike two days per 

week); watch what I eat (keep my 

eyes on the food); use my mind (play 

a lot of bridge and love Sudoku). 

“Active: volunteer coach since 

retirement in 1999 in football and 

wrestling in the Portland area (2004 

State Championship 3A); volunteer 

help at local community center (developing 

bridge and biking groups 

and educational arts classes). 

“Stepping forward: Any time I 

see something I don’t like but feel 

I can effect a change, I do. (I’ve 

stepped into an argument at a bus 

stop between a teenager and an 

old bag lady, stepped into the path 

of an escaping thief who the cops 

then picked up off the ground, 

pushed and cussed at an unruly 

crowd in San Diego that separated 

my son and grandchild from me). 

“I’m not afraid to speak or vote 

the less popular position because 

my values are not negotiable. As 

my wife, Linda, says, ‘I may not be 

right but I’m sure!’ ” 

“Thinking: I’m concerned there 

is not enough time left in my life to 

accomplish my cares and responsibilities. 

First, I feel it is now my 

responsibility as the last living 

member of my immediate family to 

leave the memories and stories for 

my grandchildren. What these individuals 

felt and taught us through 

their examples and values represent 

their souls. Therefore, I plan in the 

next few years to retrace my path 

and record on videotape places, 

people and stories of our family and 

friends. 

“Also, before I die I want to 

leave my eulogy on videotape to 

be played at my funeral. I’d like to 

share in the last laughs and the last 

tears. As an example, in case some 

of you can’t make it, a couple of 

years ago I had a urinary infection 

and my testicles enlarged about 

10 times. The only thing I could 

think about if I die from this, at 

least my friends could say, ‘Appel 

had balls!’ 

“On a more serious note, I want 

to close on what my dad taught me. 

The two most simple and important 

values he left for me were, ‘Be the 

best you can be’ and ‘Make the 

world a better place.’ I hope we all 

have time to do that! My definition 

of success lies in Ralph Waldo 

Emerson’s Success.” 

More contributions like this would 

be welcome in our Class Notes. 

Joe Calarco writes that, “Things 

are a bit crazy right now, but here’s 

a brief summary: We recently closed 

my production of A Midsummer 

Night’s Dream after a five-month 

run in our repertory. My son, Joey, 

got married in Los Angeles. We 

recently added a pair of stunning 

B&W speakers to our surroundsound 

system. I am getting back 

into weight training after recent 

knee surgery and plan to add water 

aerobics. My wife, Sue, continues to 

teach special education.” 

Stan Feld reports, “The Class 

of 1959 had a great 50th reunion. 

Many wonderful comments have 

appeared in our class’ CCT column. 

“I hope my comments stimulate 

all of us to keep communicating so 

we have a fabulous 55th reunion. 

“I started a social network called 

Columbia College CC’59 nine 

months prior to our reunion. We 

had 200 valid e-mail addresses out 

of our class of 660. One hundred 

thirty classmates signed up for the 

social network. 

“I realize I might have been a 

pest and apologize. I have been 

told by many of you that joining 

the social network amplified the 

reunion experience and so I accomplished 

my goal. 

“The social network facilitated 

reconnection of past friendships 

and stimulated new friendships. 

As we get older, social networking 

will be important for our health. 

The Columbia College CC’ 59 

network should be used to increase 

our fond memories at Columbia 

College. 

“The network is private and 

available only by my invitation. If 

you are interest in joining, please 

e-mail me: stanfeld@feld.com. 

“I am trying to keep CC ’59 alive 

and active. I wrote that my wife of 

47 years, Cecelia, and I were going 

to New York City. I asked for some 

hot suggestions. Michael Marks 

wrote a note with wonderful suggestions. 

Jack Kahn offered to take 

me around the College. 

“The Columbia communications 

department is putting ‘Names in 

the News’ and ‘What Is Doing at 

Columbia’ on the network once a 

week to keep us informed. 

“As a stimulant for communications, 

I have asked members of the 

network to talk about their travel 

and travel plans. Cecelia and I 

always have been active travelers. 

We recently went to Turkey. We 

plan to go to Vietnam, Cambodia 

and Thailand in January. This summer, 

we are spending a month in 

Colorado. In the fall, we are going 

to take a car trip around the Finger 

Lakes in upper New York State. 

“I would love you to share your 

travel experiences with all of us 


46


class notes 

either through the social network 

or our CCT column. Here is a taste 

of our Turkey trip. 

“Turkey: Beyond Istanbul. In 

September 2009, I spent almost 

three weeks traveling in Turkey. 

It is a country of varied terrain, 

bustling cities, quiet villages and 

friendly people everywhere. One’s 

experiences in Turkey can be as full 

of contrasts as the country itself. A 

modern shopping mall filled with 

young people and families; Mc- 

Donald’s and KFC next to Turkish 

fast food in the food court; ancient 

ruins (Ephesus, Perge, Aspendos); 

magnificent, mysterious tufa structures 

(Cappadocia); mountains and 

lush valleys growing everything 

from olives to pomegranates; and 

towns overlooking the really turquoise 

Mediterranean are a few of 

the delights awaiting the traveler. 

See Istanbul, the city that straddles 

two continents. Go to Ephesus 

(preferably late in the afternoon 

when the crush of cruise ship tourists 

has left). Spend a few days on 

a Turkish sailing boat called a gulet 

dipping in and out of coves along 

the Mediterranean and Aegean 

coasts, hiking in the hills while at 

anchor. And take a hot air balloon 

ride over the fairy chimneys of 

Cappadocia (you’ll be sorry if you 

don’t).” 

Steve Trachtenberg has been 

traveling, too. He writes, “Just 

back from Tangiers, Morocco. 

Went to attend board meeting of 

Museum Morocco TALIM. While 

walking around, found a small 

schul on a side street. Nice but out 

of business.” 

From Allen Rosenshine, “I have 

done something I never thought 

I would do: a blog. I’m doing this 

in spite of my antipathy towards 

most blogs and bloggers, largely a 

result of 1) being a poster boy (or 

old man) for the new-media challenged 

and 2) the torrent of inanity, 

insanity, irresponsibility, downright 

lies and pure claptrap that 

typifies much of the blogosphere. 

Rather, I’m doing it because (no 

surprise to those who know me) 

I enjoy now and again expressing 

an opinion. But I find no pleasure 

in expressing them to myself, since 

that rarely results in any meaningful 

response or discussion. That is 

in fact what I hope my blog will 

encourage. So if you are interested, 

or whenever you have absolutely 

nothing else to do, you can find my 

blog at allenrosenshine.com. It’s 

called My Two Cents (and Worth 

Every Penny). Feel free to 1) ignore 

it, 2) respond to postings on it, 3) 

pass it on to others and/or 4) write 

it off as just more claptrap.” 

I have gone there, and as you 

might expect it is worth reading. 

Frank Wilson has provided an 

update on his progress in learning 

Farsi: “I recently started the third 

and final quarter of the first year. 

I am holding my own and now 

imagining that I will proceed with 

year two in the fall. At the end of 

that year, I’d plan to go to Iran (if 

that’s possible), try to spend time 

with some Iranian docs and see if 

I can get an up-close feel for why 

we can’t seem to do anything about 

this mess. One thing I’ve recently 

learned: the European system for 

training physicians that so many 

of our classmates know about 

originated in pre-Islamic Persia (at 

the Academy of Gundishapur) and 

was exported to the Italian medical 

schools in the 13th century.” 

J. Peter Rosenfeld and his lovely 

wife, Carmen, along with Norman 

Gelfand and alumni from other 

classes, attended an interesting 

lecture by Professor David Helfand 

of Columbia’s Department of 

Astronomy. 

60 

Robert A. Machleder 

69-37 Fleet St. 

Forest Hills, NY 11375 

rmachleder@aol.com 

Gremlins were afoot. Those evanescent 

creatures whose meddlesome 

antics are responsible for 

sabotaging the work-product of 

those who pride themselves on 

exerting no less than the most demanding, 

exacting and punctilious 

attention to their efforts. The Reunion 

Committee drafted, scoured, 

edited, caught errors, re-examined 

and proofread innumerable lists 

and letters, documents and schedules, 

and yet ... how else other than 

the mischievous work of gremlins 

to explain that in scrutinizing the 

draft necrology of deceased classmates 

— two score eyes plus eight 

— only Bob Morgan was sharp 

enough to notice that the list contained 

a name preceded by “Mrs.” 

who, to be sure, never was nor ever 

could have been a member of the 

class (and, it now seems, was the 

wife of a former faculty member) 

Gremlins. Or perhaps we were so 

caught up individually in searching 

for names of those we knew 

and reflecting on the memories 

of those we knew well, that our 

eyes were misty and our minds 

distracted. And how else to explain 

that on the list of committee members 

at the foot of the letter placed 

in each Reunion Mug, the name 

of Lee Rosner had been omitted, 

and not caught in time Gremlins 

pried his name loose No excuses. 

An unpardonable error on our part 

to have omitted Lee of all people, 

whose vision conceived a class 

website and whose dedication 

and labors saw it to fruition. The 

website, a modern marvel, is and 

shall remain a sterling example 

of how a group of men still struggling 

to emerge from their history 

of Remington typewriters, carbon 

paper, mimeograph machines, 

Kodachrome and videotape were 

through the efforts of Lee induced 

to overcome their hardwired technological 

limitations and register 

on an instantaneous, interactive 

communications vehicle. 

And if you have not visited and 

registered on this website, please be 

sure to do so: http://CC1960.ning. 

com. This site is private and available 

only to members who have 

signed up. If you haven’t joined 

already, e-mail Lee at jlrathome@ 

juno.com and he’ll enroll you. 

In the March/April issue of 

CCT, we included some comments 

regarding the class survey. Among 

them, a submission by one of our 

classmates of several suggested 

additions to the questionnaire, 

one such addition being a play on 

the falakros, or Bald Man Paradox, 

propounded by the classical Greek 

philosopher Eubulides of Miletus 

(forgive me for bringing him up 

again). As framed by our classmate, 

it read as follows: “Since graduating 

from Columbia, I still have all my 

hair; I have lost some of my hair; I 

have lost most of my hair; I am not 

bald, I just have a very wide part.” 

All responses to the survey having 

been submitted in anonymity, the 

clever wag’s identity was unknown. 

Now Sidney Hart has revealed 

himself to be the author, and to 

establish the bona fides of his claim, 

has submitted the several other proposed 

questions as well. The door 

to survey questions having long 

been sealed, the responses received 

and tabulated, and the results 

distributed, Sidney’s proposals will 

have to rest in quietude until when 

next a questionnaire is assembled 

for a subsequent reunion we can 

petition their inclusion. Or, perhaps, 

we can explore with Lee Rosner the 

feasibility of a rolling survey on the 

class website, to include Sidney’s 

questions and others, as well as 

topical matters of interest as they 

arise, keeping the class engaged in 

making its views known on current 

events concerning the world at 

large and alma mater in particular. 

Meanwhile, Sidney remains occupied 

in his practice of psychiatry, 

is working on his third novel “and 

from time to time bombards friends 

and family with my sardonic or 

blistering satires.” 

Juris Mednis sends greetings 

and well-wishes to all from Latvia. 

Regrets that he could not make the 

50th reunion but promises to make 

a later anniversary and hopes that 

we all stay mentally and physically 

fit till then. 

Juris’ life, which began in Latvia, 

has come full circle. He came to the 

United States, attended The High 

School of Music and Art as an art 

student (M&A, as we referred to 

it fondly, sent 11 of us to the Class 

of ’60), and “purposefully rejected 

opportunities for a life in the arts.” 

He pursued a career in banking, 

initially several years at the Bank 

of New York, thereafter as the 

president and CEO of two banks 

in New Jersey. Putting the banking 

career aside, a new life started: “I 

became an inventor, then started a 

plastics manufacturing company. 

In 2000, with my wife of now 40 

years, we moved to Latvia, hoping 

and expecting to be able to make 

some minor difference toward this 

society’s recovery from the debilitations 

wrought by more than 

50 years of foreign occupations: 

first the Soviet Union’s, then Nazi 

Germany’s and again, for the long 

pull, by the Communist Soviet 

Union. It will take at least another 

generation for a meaningful recovery. 

So we are here and here to stay. 

I have not been back to the States 

now for four years, although our 

kids and grandchildren live on the 

East Coast. My wife occasionally 

gets back in the context of her work 

within the Methodist Church.” 

And, despite his decision to 

pursue careers other than in the 

arts, Juris “wound up being stuck 

in a museum anyway.” Collected 

and displayed in the Department 

of Architecture and Design of the 

Museum of Modern Art are everyday 

objects that merit recognition 

as masterpieces of design, balancing 

function and form. MoMA 

has designated them “Humble 

Masterpieces.” There enshrined 

is a design version of one of Juris’ 

inventions. The work named “Bottles” 

can be viewed on the MoMA 

website, http://search.moma. 

org/q=bottles+juris+mednis. 

Don Patterson writes that as a 

commuter from New Jersey and 

member of the varsity tennis team, 

80 percent of his extra time and social 

life revolved around members 

of the team. “My best friends were 

brothers Les ’62 and Lloyd Moglen. 

They became California doctors. 

Unfortunately, my old doubles 

partner, Lloyd, died in July 2002. 

In the ’70s and ’80s, my business 

took me to San Francisco, where I 

spent my weekends with Dr. Les 

playing tennis; he also taught me to 

ski at Squaw Valley.” Don wonders 

whether anyone has been in touch 

with Paul Standel and Reynolds 

Acker, two other members of the 

tennis team. He would like to make 

contact with them. 

The undergraduate friendship 

between Irving Chang and Bill 

Tanenbaum became stronger 

when their daughters, Kimberly 

Chang ’95 and Betty Tanenbaum 

’96, became friends. It grew deeper 

and more poignant when Bill’s 


47

An obituary for Conrad M. Sherman, 

whose death Frank Grady 

reported here several issues ago, 

appeared in the May/June issue. 

Harry Green recently completed 

40 years as a faculty member at the 

University of California (combined 

Davis and Riverside campuses). 

Thanks to the university’s vision 

of long ago, he writes, “UC has a 

defined-benefit retirement program 

that reaches 100 percent at 40 

years service. As a consequence, I 

have retired to help with the financial 

calamity that has befallen the 

university.” Nevertheless, Harry 

maintains his high-pressure laboratory 

and pursues his research 

into the physical mechanisms of 

earthquakes at depths greater than 

50 kilometers, where frictional 

processes are quenched by pressure, 

and identification of rocks 

that have surfaced from hundreds 

of kilometers depth during continental 

collisions. Although Harry 

has curtailed his teaching, he has 

enhanced his external service. On 

July 1, he will become the presiclass 

notes 


Bob Rennick ’61 (right) and his wife, Lisa, celebrated their 40th wedding 

anniversary last year with Jon Liebowitz ’61 and his wife, Ruth, at 

Longfellow’s Wayside Inn in Sudbury, Mass. 

PHOTO: Courtesy of Bob Rennick ’61 

wife, Reina, died six years ago, and 

Irving immediately reached out 

with his support, friendship and 

encouragement. Irving’s empathetic 

words helped immeasurably 

to raise Bill’s spirits. An e-mail conversation 

ensued that blossomed in 

a continuous, frequent and lengthy 

dialogue that touched on the wide 

range of interests and concerns 

of each, sprinkled with Irving’s 

excellent, politically incorrect sense 

of humor. With the approach of 

the 50th reunion, Irving inquired 

whether Bill planned to attend. 

Bill was undecided. Irving was 

not. Though his health had been 

compromised by both an invasion 

of cancer that had passed and 

quintuple heart bypass surgery, 

and though the journey to New 

York from Honolulu, place of his 

birth and always his home, was 

certainly no stroll in the park, the 

prospect of the 50th filled him with 

enthusiasm. It was an enthusiasm 

so contagious that Bill was 

instantly persuaded that the two 

meet at alma mater this June. 

With the dawning of the new 

year, Irving had news to impart. He 

sent an e-mail to Bill. Their relationship, 

he said, was such that he would 

not want Bill to first learn the news 

by reading obituaries in Columbia 

College Today. He again had been 

invaded by cancers; his body was 

riddled with it; his doctors had given 

him about six months to live. “Damn 

it,” he wrote. “I was so looking 

forward to the reunion.” 

Bill, crestfallen, having just 

returned from a visit to England 

and France and having opened the 

e-mail, informed me of Irving’s condition 

on January 14. We felt that 

to mention this in the Class Notes 

would be inappropriate and an 

affront to Irving’s pride and privacy, 

but we agreed the news could be 

shared with classmates who had 

common bonds with Irving. Armed 

with the class e-mail address list 

(neither complete nor always current), 

I sent the news and included 

Irving’s e-mail and home addresses 

to, among others, fraternity brothers 

and fellow members of the 

lightweight football team. Several of 

those I was able to reach, Claudio 

Marzollo, Neil Markee and Victor 

Chang, soon let me know that they 

had corresponded or spoken with 

Irving. 

On Friday, January 15, I wrote 

to Irving as class correspondent to 

“extend [on behalf of all the class] 

a figurative hug, a spark of light 

when there appears only darkness, 

warmth in the most chilling of 

moments, and a spiritual blanket 

of affection to see you through that 

which awaits.” 

Irving replied immediately and 

thus began an exchange of correspondence, 

lengthy, discoursive, 

filled with our respective memories 

of Columbia, views on society and 

politics, reflections on family, and, 

of course, progress reports on his 

condition. “I loved my time at Columbia 

and I loved New York,” he 

wrote, and he relished recalling his 

days on the lightweight football 

squad and relating the colorful details 

of those games. He spoke of the 

punishing emotions that plagued 

him following his diagnosis, emotions 

compounded by the fact that 

his wife Jocelyn’s only, younger 

sister had been diagnosed on Saturday, 

January 16, with cancer and 

had been given a life expectancy 

even shorter than his own. He 

despaired that Jocelyn would suffer 

two such losses within a brief span 

of time and that he was helpless to 

counsel or console her. 

As his condition deteriorated, and 

the nature of the cancers had still to 

be established, Irving explored the 

availability of alternative treatments 

and experimental treatment trials. 

Richard Friedlander contacted 

oncologist Ira Jaffrey. Ira graciously 

offered to be of assistance, and I 

provided Irving with Ira’s phone 

numbers. Irving’s deterioration advanced 

rapidly; too rapidly for him 

to seek Ira’s help and advice. 

Irving received his law degree 

from the University of Michigan. 

He clerked for the Hawaii Supreme 

Court, was a deputy prosecuting 

attorney and established a 

highly successful private practice 

from which he retired in 2004. He 

chaired the boards of the Hawaii 

Youth Symphony and the United 

Cerebral Palsy of Hawaii, and 

remained active in leadership positions 

in Hawaii with regard to Columbia 

affairs. Each of his children, 

sons Timothy and Jonathan ’98, 

and daughters Allison ’94 and Dr. 

Kimberly ’95, attended Columbia. 

Irving was passionate about food 

and cooking. He had been writing 

a cookbook. He tended beehives 

and made honey (Bill Tanenbaum 

has a sealed bottle of honey that he 

received from Irving; he will open 

it this Rosh Hashanah in bittersweet 

remembrance). 

T. Irving Chang died on April 1. 

As I write this, one month and 

a fistful of days before reunion, I 

think, “Damn, how sad he’ll not 

be there; how sad there’ll be no 

opportunity for us to sit and talk 

and continue to spin out the many 

interesting threads of conversation 

we had started four months 

earlier.” 

Reaching out to classmates to encourage 

them to return to reunion 

resulted in wonderful responses 

and warm phone conversations. It 

also brought news that some had 

died. We learned from Nicholas 

Bassiliou’s son that Nick had died, 

as we learned from William Molloy’s 

son that Bill had died. Bill’s 

son, Bill Jr., wrote that his father 

“was a wonderful man/dad/ 

teacher, and I miss him every day. 

He died on July 25, 2007.” 

Please send us your remembrances 

of Irving, Nick and Bill. To 

the families of each, we send our 

heartfelt condolences. 

Next issue: news of the reunion. 

Please send me your impressions. 

[Editor’s note: Go to www.college. 

columbia.edu/cct to listen to Nathan 

Gross’ singing and piano performance 

at the reunion.] 

61 

Michael Hausig 

19418 Encino Summit 

San Antonio, TX 78259 

mhausig@yahoo.com 

This is the third reminder for our 

50th reunion, which will take place 

Wednesday, June 2–Sunday, June 5, 

2011. A committee has been formed 

to plan the event with the help of 

the Alumni Office. Anyone interested 

in helping should contact Tony 

Adler (awadler@spartacom 

mercial.com) or Burtt Ehrlich 

(burtt@ bloomberg.com) with their 

ideas. 

Joe Rosenstein’s new prayer 

book for Rosh Hashanah and Yom 

Kippur, Machzor Eit Ratzon, will 

be published this summer. This is 

a follow-up to Siddur Eit Ratzon, a 

prayer book for Sabbath, festival 

and weekdays that he published 

a few years ago. Information 

about both can be seen at www. 

newsiddur.org. A pair of volumes 

on mathematics education he 

co-authored, Navigating Through 

Discrete Mathematics in Grades K-12, 

were published in 2008 and 2009 

by the National Council of Teachers 

of Mathematics. 

Mich Araten was honored by 

Westchester Jewish Community 

Services, the largest not-for-profit, 

nonsectarian human services agency 

in Westchester, for his 20 years 

of leadership on the board and for 

his guidance in the last three years 

as president of the board. WJCS 

programs span generations with 

an emphasis on mental health 

issues, reaching 18,000 individuals. 

Programs include services for 

young children with early signs of 

autism, adults dealing with end of 

life and bereavement issues, and 

victims of abuse and trauma. WJCS 

provides counseling in schools and 

in homes for children of all ages, 

home health aides for seniors and 

has 12 group homes for developmentally 

disabled adults. In the 

past year, it has set up a program 

to provide financial, legal and emotional 

counseling to those affected 

by the recent financial crisis. 

62 

John Freidin 

1020 Town Line Rd. 

Charlotte, VT 05445 

jf@bicyclevt.com 


48


class notes 

dent of the Tectonophysics Section 

of the American Geophysical 

Union. Harry’s wife is a professor 

of cell biology, and their family 

is growing by leaps and bounds; 

grandchild No. 8 is due in August. 

Congratulations! 

Phil Eggers reports the sad news 

that his wife of 26 years, Jane Jaffe 

Young, died a year ago of mesothelioma. 

They were colleagues in the 

English Department at the Borough 

of Manhattan Community College 

since 1965. Phil chaired the department 

for 18 years, and Jane chaired 

the faculty union, the Professional 

Staff Congress, for eight years. 

Her daughter, Phil’s stepdaughter, 

Victoria Young Salganik, is a senior 

social worker at Johns Hopkins hospital. 

She and her husband, Jonas 

Salganik, have a daughter, Natasha 

(6), Phil’s first grandchild. 

In 2008, Penguin Academics 

published Phil’s two-volume writing 

textbook, Steps for Writers. Phil 

is retired from his full-time position 

but continues to teach world 

literature at BMCC/CUNY. His 

son, David, earned his bachelor’s 

at Harvard and doctorate in cello 

performance at Juilliard. David’s 

new CD, Kingston Morning, a combination 

of reggae, bluegrass and 

other musical modes, is about to be 

released. Phil’s daughter, Wendy, 

earned her B.M. and M.M. at 

Westminster Choir College/Rider 

University. She sings, composes 

and teaches voice in Connecticut. 

Bill Campbell e-mailed news 

that he, Russ Warren, Lee Black, 

Ed Little, Richard Hassan, Tom 

Vasell and Buzz Congram, as well 

as teammates Tom O’Connor ’63, 

Mike Hassan ’63, Al Butts ’64 and 

Len DiFiore, attended the Annual 

Columbia Football Golf Outing in 

May at a course in New Jersey. The 

night before, they met at Smith & 

Wollensky Steakhouse in the city. 

“We use this occasion as one annual 

team reunion,” Bill writes. “The 

other happens at Homecoming. It 

is a great get-together for all.” 

Russ Abbott was scheduled to 

give a keynote address to the EmergeNET 

workshop on engineering 

emergence in York, United Kingdom, 

but the volcano in Iceland 

prevented him from flying across 

the Atlantic. You can contact Russ 

at russ.abbott@gmail.com. 

Andy Jampoler lives in Loudoun 

County, Virginia’s “Lost Corner.” 

He and his wife, Suzy, a geographer, 

have been married 45 years. 

They have children and grandchildren 

in Pennsylvania and Iowa. 

After nearly 25 years as a naval 

aviator, including command of a 

land-based maritime aircraft squadron 

and a naval air station, Andy 

retired from the Navy as a captain. 

During his career, he served in 

Vietnam, worked at the Pentagon 

and flew Lockheed P-3 airplanes 

in search of Soviet submarines. By 

his own account, he passed the next 

10 years in the aerospace industry 

learning how to be a capitalist. 

Andy has spent the last decade 

in retirement researching and 

writing full-time. He has published 

three books: The Last Lincoln 

Conspirator: John Surratt’s Flight from 

the Gallows; Sailors in the Holy Land: 

The 1848 American Expedition to the 

Dead Sea and the Search for Sodom and 

Gomorrah; and Adak: The Rescue of 

Alfa Foxtrot 586, which the U.S. Naval 

Institute Press selected as “Book 

of the Year” in 2003. His fourth 

nonfiction book, Horrible Shipwreck: 

A Full, True and Particular Account, 

the story of the wreck of the British 

female convict transport Amphitrite 

in 1833 off the French coast — all 

but three aboard drowned in sight 

of hundreds ashore — will be 

published in December. From his 

photograph online, Andy looks just 

as he did in 1962. His e-mail address 

is jampoler@earthlink.net. 

In 2008, SUNY Stony Brook made 

Stephen Cole a Distinguished Professor 

in recognition of his scholarship 

— 10 books and some 50 

articles in professional journals 

— and his many contributions to 

that university, where he has been 

a professor for 42 years. This designation 

is a high honor, one that 

only about 25 of more than 1,000 

faculty members have received. 

Stephen continues to teach and 

pursue research. His main interests 

are the sociology of medicine and 

education. In his words, “I have 

broad themes that I stress in both 

of these courses. For medicine, I 

think we are over-‘medicalized.’ 

There are too many operations 

performed, too many pills and 

too many tests performed, all of 

which do not make us healthier. I 

discuss the reasons why this is so. 

For education, I stress my belief 

that we can’t solve our problems 

by changing the schools. Instead, 

we have to look at the society in 

which the schools are embedded. 

That society is anti-intellectual and 

does not value book learning. Also, 

there is no payoff in our society for 

learning a lot. Look at the recent 

frightening decline in college attendance 

by males.” 

Stephen has two sons, one a 

professional photographer and 

cabinetmaker and the other a 

market researcher. The former 

lives in Hampton (upstate New 

York) and the other in Norwalk. 

Conn. Stephen’s granddaughter, 

Miriam, is, he writes “very cute, as 

all babies are.” Stephen’s wife of 22 

years, Maria, teaches sociology at 

Stony Brook and also has a professorship 

at a university in Warsaw, 

Poland, her hometown. Stephen 

and Maria recently bought a beautiful 

new apartment in Warsaw 

and go there twice a year. “With 

Warsaw as our base, we take vacations 

all over Europe. We shipped 

a car there because it is much more 

expensive to buy cars there (VAT) 

than here, and we had one car 

more than we needed anyway. For 

the first time in my life, in 2007, I 

became politically active. I am an 

enthusiastic supporter of Barack 

Obama ’83, believing him to be the 

best president we have had since 

FDR. I am sure this will stir up a lot 

of disagreement. Classmates who 

are interested in discussing these 

issues should e-mail me at scole@ 

notes.cc.sunysb.edu.” 

David Brothers lives in Fairfield, 

Conn., and has been practicing 

ophthalmology for nearly 40 years. 

“Now,” he says, “I practice less 

and ride my bicycle more. Sound 

familiar I used to ride the hills in 

Peter Krulewitch ’62 has been working on a book 

of oral histories of New Yorkers over 90, the oldest 

being Jacques Barzun ’27. 

Vermont, a legitimate escape. My 

wife, also a physician, and I have 

cycled out west and in Europe and 

have deferred cycling on our next 

trip through South America next 

month. I try to return to Columbia 

and Manhattan, still the center of 

the world, periodically. V&T Pizzeria 

and Mondel Chocolates still generate 

vibrant gustatory memories. 

My pre-med niece recently took me 

to a luncheonette in the East Village 

that brought back vivid memories 

of ‘The Japs,’ the counter luncheonette 

that offered dinner for $1.50. 

I also remembered the incredible 

intellectual exchanges in CC and 

Humanities, where a full professor 

leading the class was loudly 

addressed as ‘a snob.’ I must have 

been dreaming!” David has three 

children and four grandchildren. 

He can be reached at bros180@ 

optonline.net. 

Peter Krulewitch has been 

working on a book of oral histories 

of New Yorkers over 90, the oldest 

being Jacques Barzun ’27, who last 

year gave Peter a five-hour interview 

in San Antonio, where Barzun 

is retired but continues to read and 

write. He was 102 last November. 

The book is already more than 400 

pages and includes both famous 

and not-so-famous people. Their 

memories start with the return of 

the doughboys from WWI, include 

the 1920s (remembering Harding’s 

death), the Depression (one 

woman was paid $7.50 a week as 

a seamstress), WWII (two were in 

the V-12 program) as well as more 

recent history. Writes Peter: “It’s 

been a grand adventure, probably 

more for me than the interviewees.” 

Peter’s e-mail address is epetek1@ 

gmail.com. 

Allen Young sends a brief note 

that underscores some of the progress 

made at Columbia since our 

times: “I am proud of track and field 

athlete Cory Benton ’10 and happy 

to know that his coming out as a gay 

man (a black gay man) was a good 

experience for him. Our college has 

had a pretty good overall record as a 

progressive place.” 

Benton said that coming out to his 

coaches and teammates was a better 

experience than he expected. You 

may read more at the prominent 

GLBT website www.advocate.com, 

where Allen learned this news. 

Crawford Kilian writes that he 

“experienced life as a retread this 

spring. I took a job at a Vancouverarea 

community college, subbing 

for an instructor who’d fallen ill in 

the first week of the semester. It 

went well, but today’s students’ 

addiction to their cell phones is 

starting to look like a public health 

problem. They couldn’t seem to 

go more than 15 minutes without 

texting someone! I finally laid down 

the law, and we got back on task. 

Now I’m back to retirement … at 

least for a while.” 

Crawford is working on the third 

edition of his Writing Science Fiction 

and Fantasy, which should be out 

late this summer. He says, “Amazing 

that the book has carried on 

since 1998.” The Tyee (http://the 

tyee.ca) continues to publish his 

book reviews and articles, and he 

keeps blogging away on topics 

ranging from swine flu to English 

usage. 

63 

Paul Neshamkin 

1015 Washington St., 

Apt. 50 

Hoboken, NJ 07030 

pauln@helpauthors.com 

I recently reached out to all of you 

by e-mail (if you didn’t hear from 

me, it means I don’t have a good 

e-mail address for you — please 

send me one) and asked for news, 

especially from those of you who 

have never sent in a note, and received 

the following: 

Richard Weisman writes, 

“This will be my first update 

since I graduated. I’ve maintained 

contact with my dear friend Paul 

Lehrer over all these years. I’ve lost 


49

class notes 


contact with a few other classmates. 

I have been teaching at York 

University in Toronto since 1969 

— recently received acknowledgement 

as a 40-year veteran. I am a 

professor in the Law and Society 

program and for the past two years 

have been director of the Graduate 

Program in Socio-Legal Studies, 

a program I helped found. I have 

been a dual citizen of the United 

States and Canada since 1997 and 

still vote in U.S. elections. I married 

a wonderful woman, Maureen, in 

1981. She had the misfortune to 

get breast cancer, from which she 

passed away in 1995. I have since 

2001 been sharing my life with 

another great lady, April. Maureen 

and I had two sons, Daniel (26) and 

Steve (22). I consider it the greatest 

and most rewarding learning 

experience of my life to have raised 

them more or less singlehandedly 

after their mother died. I have no 

plans to retire soon. I enjoy the 

freedom and opportunities that 

an academic career affords, and 

besides, I have unfinished business 

— another book to complete. 

I got a Ph.D. in sociology from UC 

Berkeley but switched to interdisciplinary 

work after completing 

an LL.B. in 1985. I remember an 

absolutely extraordinary seminar I 

took with Professor Daniel Bell at 

Columbia in 1962–63. I think just 

about all eight of us in that seminar 

became academics. If I were to demand 

of my students today what 

was expected of us in that seminar 

on a weekly basis — completion 

of a major work in classical social 

theory and readiness to discuss it 

in detail — my students, graduate 

as well as undergraduate, would 

think I was either joking or had 

taken leave of my senses.” 

Victor Margolin writes, “I am 

an emeritus professor of design 

history at the University of Illinois 

Chicago. I am working on a large 

world history of design, which I 

plan to finish in about two years. 

Recently, I have given lectures 

in Poland, Spain and China, and 

spoke in May at a conference of 

Turkish design historians in Izmir. 

Travel plans for work include 

Santiago, Chile, and Montreal, 

Canada. So, life as a retired professor 

is not bad. I have been nominated 

for the third time for the 

Design Mind award, which is part 

of the National Design Awards 

at the Cooper-Hewitt National 

Design Museum.” 

Mike Bowler writes, “I taught 

high school; worked nearly 40 years 

in the newspaper business, the last 

35 at the Baltimore Sun (the last 10 

of those as education editor); three 

years at the Institute of Education 

Sciences (research and statistical 

arm of the Department of Education). 

Our son, daughter-in-law and 

grandson live two blocks away, and 

I volunteer at our grandson’s public 

school (as well as doing a volunteer 

research project on H.L. Mencken 

at a local university). Through early 

July, I’ll be a part-time enumerator 

for the census. I put this job roughly 

at the difficulty level (high) of brewing 

the coffee (and thus determining 

the mood of Columbia on any 

given day) at John Jay first thing 

in the morning in 1960–61. Being 

married to a Barnard girl (Margaret, 

for 47 years), I sided with her when 

Columbia went coed and did not 

enamor myself to the Columbia p.r. 

machine. Will try to make the 50th 

reunion.” 

When I asked Mike if there were 

any classmates he’d like to be put 

in touch with, he replied, “No, 

not really. There were three of us 

from Montana (I from Helena) in 

the class. I’m in touch with John 

Barovich ’64, from Billings. I’m long 

out of touch with Roland Trenouth, 

from Missoula. I’ve been close 

friends with the only Barnardian 

that fall from Montana, Carol Miles, 

from Livingston. We celebrated 50 

years of friendship last fall. We met 

on an Undergraduate Christian 

Association hayride in fall 1959. My 

wife and I married in the Columbia 

chapel the week of my graduation. 

The next day, I took her to a Mets 

doubleheader. She had a year left at 

Barnard, so we repaired (by train) 

to Montana, where we took a whole 

year’s worth of education courses 

and returned to New York, where 

I got a job after the start of the academic 

year replacing a woman at 

Oceanside (Long Island) H.S. who 

had made the mistake of showing 

her pregnancy. I taught that year 

and then did the master’s program 

at Columbia’s J-school while my 

wife paid the bills as a teacher in 

Hicksville. The rest, including a 

turbulent time covering desegregation 

as education editor of the 

Atlanta Constitution, getting fired 

for rabble-rousing, being saved by 

arbitrator Hugo Black Jr. (yes, the 

son) is history.” 

Walter Guarino writes, “Things 

have been exciting recently. I have 

been interviewed a lot by national 

and local media (CBS TV, BBC TV, 

USA Today, WOR TV, FOX TV, New 

York Times, et al.). It is a result of 

the fact that I have become a media 

expert on things such as Super Bowl 

advertising, ad trends, social media 

and most recently, Tiger Woods as 

a brand. I run a branding firm in 

New Jersey called Insight|SQW, 

and I am in my 12th year of teaching 

grad students in a master’s in communications 

program at Seton Hall 

University. I guess one of the biggest 

honors I have been given was to 

receive the highest award a New 

Jersey resident can get. It’s called the 

Governor’s Gold Medal, and it was 

given to me in recognition for a statewide 

pro-bono campaign I created to 

promote multiculturalism. I married 

my lovely wife, Maureen, 34 years 

ago, and we live in Fort Lee, N.J. I 

often see my college roommate, Dr. 

Evan Silvy, and we talk about our 

‘school days’ on many occasions.” 

Walter promises to try to make 

one of the class lunches soon and 

catch up on things. 

Aaron Malakoff writes, “I live 

in New Braunfels, Texas, and work 

part-time as a hospice and palliative 

care consultant. I spent most 

of my professional career as a solo 

practice urologist in San Antonio, 

but in 1998 I sold my cystoscope 

and was the first to do a fellowship 

in palliative care at the University 

of Texas Health Science Center in 

San Antonio. After that, I was the 

medical director at the hospice in 

New Braunfels until I quit working 

full-time so that I could travel for 

longer periods. My convivant, 

Judy, and I like to involve ourselves 

with the local populace on 

Bob Contiguglia ’63 recently was honored with the 

Werner Fricker Builder Award by U.S. Soccer at its 

annual meeting. 

our travels, and we have had some 

interesting visits to the rainforest in 

Ecuador and in helping start a palliative 

care program in Guatemala 

City. I hope to return to Vietnam 

and see it with different eyes before 

I get too old and can still see. 

“My son, Jamie, lives in NYC, 

and I visit him around Labor Day. 

We have a long-standing tradition 

of attending the U.S. Open each 

year. Unfortunately, the U.S. Open 

is never close to a second Thursday. 

I spend quite a bit of time on 

the tennis court even though most 

of my friends have switched to 

golf. Still, I like playing singles, so 

it is usually with younger people 

and keeps me humble. I also attend 

a ski seminar in Colorado that is 

led by an aikido master. It is a most 

rewarding way to begin the year. 

“I know there must be many of 

our class here in Texas, and I would 

like to get in touch with them. I attended 

an alumni get-together last 

year in Austin, which is a 45-minute 

drive from here, but at that particular 

function, there were very few of 

our generation present.” 

Aaron, I don’t know how often 

you get to Fort Worth, but you 

might try getting together with 

Arnie Barkman, Mike Bumagin, 

Bruce Miller or Bob Whelan, who 

gather for bagels fairly regularly. 

Harley Frankel’s nonprofit, College 

Match, had a spectacular college 

admissions year even though this 

was a very competitive year in the 

admissions world. He reports, “Forty-six 

percent of College Match’s 

low-income students of color from 

inner-city public schools were admitted 

into Ivy League universities or 

Ivy equivalents like Wellesley, MIT 

and Stanford. This included three 

at Yale, three at Stanford, eight at 

Dartmouth, nine at Wellesley, two 

each at Harvard, MIT and Amherst, 

and four at Brown. Unfortunately, 

no College Match students were 

admitted into Columbia.” 

Sorry, Harley. I’ve got my fingers 

crossed for a big Columbia year for 

your group soon. 

Alexis Levitin teaches at 

SUNY-Plattsburgh, near the 

Canadian border. Recent travels to 

Brazil and Ecuador have resulted 

in three books in the last year: a 

co-translation of Tapestry of the Sun: 

An Anthology of Ecuadorian Poetry, 

the English version of a multilingual 

book of 22 sonnets called 

Consecrating the Alphabet and Brazil: 

A Traveler’s Literary Companion, for 

which he was the editor. He is now 

finishing work on a children’s book 

called Invitation to Rio. Sandwiched 

between work was a month living 

in the Galapagos Islands as well as 

a week on Isla Grande in Brazil. 

Bob Contiguglia recently was 

honored with the prestigious Werner 

Fricker Builder Award by U.S. 

Soccer at its annual meeting. The 

honor is bestowed annually to an 

individual who has worked tirelessly 

in furthering the interest of 

soccer, without regard to personal 

recognition or advancement. 

Bob is the former president of 

the U.S. Soccer Federation, which 

culminated a three-decade career in 

which he excelled as a player, coach 

and administrator at nearly every 

level of the game. During his tenure 

as U.S. Soccer president, several 

milestones were achieved, including 

a U.S. Women’s National Team 

victory in the spectacularly successful 

1999 FIFA Women’s World 

Cup, the largest women’s sporting 

event in history; the tremendous 

run to the quarterfinals by the U.S. 

Men’s National Team in the 2002 

Korea/Japan FIFA World Cup; and 

an Olympic gold medal won by the 

U.S. Women’s National Team at the 

2004 Athens Olympics. 

Michael Nolan writes, “I recently 

found a photo of me and Harvey 

Milk, a friend and political adviser 

of mine, from early 1978. It got quite 

a response when I posted it on 


50


class notes 

Facebook. Quality ain’t great but lots 

of meaning.” 

For those using Facebook, I recommend 

searching for classmates 

like Mike (or me) and becoming our 

“friends.” There are a lot of us out 

there, and you might be interested 

to see what we’re up to. Maybe we 

should start a Class of 1963 page. 

Phil Satow recently was honored 

at the annual Varsity ‘C’ Celebration 

for his many contributions to 

Columbia athletics and in recognition 

of his leadership gift to provide 

major improvements to the baseball 

facility at Baker Athletics Complex. 

Congratulations, Phil, and thank 

you from all of us. 

If you are back in NYC, I hope 

that you will try to make the next 

Class of ’63 lunch, scheduled for 

Thursday, July 8 (and then again in 

the fall starting on Thursday, September 

9 — it’s always the second 

Thursday). Check our website at 

www.cc63ers.com for details and 

to review pictures of gatherings to 

see if you can spot an old friend. 

In the meantime, let us know 

what you are up to, how you’re 

doing and what’s next. 

64 

Norman Olch 

233 Broadway 


norman@nolch.com 

My freshman CC instructor was the 

then–27-year-old historian Robert 

Dallek ’64 GSAS, who has gone on 

to write highly regarded books on 

American presidents and American 

foreign policy. At their class lunch 

in April, our Washington, D.C., 

classmates invited Professor Dallek 

as their special guest. Dan Press 

writes: “The informal and stimulating 

lunch conversation with Professor 

Dallek was like a typical CC 

class, unstructured and covering 

a great deal of territory, including 

the good old days at Columbia, an 

assessment of the Obama presidency 

(largely favorable), the war in 

Afghanistan (largely unfavorable), 

thoughts on prior administrations 

and Kant’s categorical imperative 

(largely un-understandable). Class 

members in attendance were Barry 

Shapiro, David Levine, Gene Meyer, 

Jack Ventura, Sheldon Hochberg, 

Peter Trooboff, Ed Levy and 

his wife, and me. Everyone in attendance 

received an A, and Professor 

Dallek even offered to convert my 

50-year-old C to an A.” 

If you live in the Washington, 

D.C., area, or are just passing 

through the capital, you can reach 

Dan at 202-298-1882. 

Allen Goldberg writes from the 

Midwest that he has retired as professor 

of pediatrics at Loyola University 

and now is working with 

former U.S. Surgeon General C. 

Everett Koop on the Communication 

in Health Care Project, which 

seeks to encourage the effective 

communication of information that 

individuals and families can understand 

and use to maintain good 

health and prevent disease. Allen’s 

son Sanford is professor and chair 

of the Department of Philosophy 

at Northwestern. His son Matthew 

moved with his family to Melbourne, 

Australia, to become CEO 

of Lonely Planet, the travel guide 

publisher. 

“My daughter Rachel and her 

husband, Duane, are expecting their 

first child,” Allen adds, “and Matthew 

and Liz are expecting their 

first daughter. That will make seven 

grandchildren. What blessings!” 

Steve Henick writes, “After 

retiring in 2004 from a career in 

international business and wanting 

a purpose rather than leisure, 

I looked for a second career, something 

I would simply enjoy doing. I 

initially trained to become a mediator. 

I still mediate as a volunteer, 

but I was given the opportunity 

to teach and that has become my 

main interest. I split my time 

between Anne Arundel Community 

College near Annapolis, Md., 

where I live, and the University of 

Maryland University College.” 

At Anne Arundel, Steve created 

and teaches courses on the impact 

of globalization, and at the University 

of Maryland, he teaches management 

courses. “I also am director 

of Anne Arundel’s Institute for the 

Future, so I work full-time. I truly 

enjoy it and the course design. The 

constant work aimed at improving 

online education and the institute 

help keep me up-to-date.” 

Peter Trooboff received the 

Leonard J. Theberge Award for 

Private International Law from the 

American Bar Association’s Section 

of International Law. The award was 

given for Peter’s “distinguished, 

long-standing contributions to the 

development of private international 

law.” Peter has been practicing law 

with Covington & Burling in Washington, 

D.C., for 35 years. 

After 25 years, Steve Singer is 

retiring as director of college counseling 

at the Horace Mann School 

in New York. Steve estimates that 

he has counseled more than 4,000 

students. “It has been a great job 

and a wonderful experience,” Steve 

said. As many of you know, Steve 

is one of the premier and most 

famous college counselors in the 

United States. The headline in the 

Horace Mann Record reads, “Singer, 

College Counseling Legend, to 

Retire in August.” The tributes have 

been pouring in. Peter V. Johnson, 

director of admissions at Columbia, 

told the Record that when he attends 

college admissions conferences, 

“Whenever I peruse the conference 

program, rather than looking at 

the titles of the panels, I look to see 

which panels Steve is on. I always 

attend those, and I get to them early 

because admissions and college 

counseling professionals across the 

country and around the world hold 

him in such high regard. I have yet 

to sit in on one of Peter’s panels 

where the room was not standing 

room only.” 

William R. Fitzsimmons, dean 

of admissions and financial aid 

at Harvard, said: “Steve’s retirement 

marks the end of an era. He 

made enormous contributions to 

the college admissions profession 

and to the students he served. No 

one cared more about students 

or worked harder to do the right 

thing for them. His candor, his 

concern for the highest ethical standards 

and his wisdom were the 

stuff of legend … Like his beloved 

Yankees, he’s at the top of his game 

— and he’s a sure bet for the Hall 

of Fame.” 

Steve will celebrate in August 

with a month in France, and after 

a one-year break will teach a 

course in Tolstoy and Dostoevsky 

at Horace Mann. Unfortunately 

Steve’s final hurrah was marked 

by a mishap. While boarding an 

Amtrak train bound for Washington, 

D.C., to visit the admissions 

office at Georgetown, he fell, broke 

his leg and had to undergo surgery. 

Ivan Weissman and David Schiller, 

head of the Upper Division at 

Horace Mann, went to his Manhattan 

apartment to cheer him up, and 

my wife, Jacqueline, son, Alexander, 

and I held a Passover Seder 

at his home. The class wishes him 

well in retirement. 

65 

Leonard B. Pack 

924 West End Ave. 


packlb@aol.com 

This issue of CCT immediately 

follows our 45th reunion. Unfortunately, 

submission and publication 

schedules do not permit reunion 

news here, since the deadline was 

late April. Our next column, to be 

guest-written by classmates who 

attended the reunion, will provide 

full coverage of that eventful 

weekend. 

I mentioned in my last column 

that Mike Cook, a partner in the 

Business Reorganization Group 

of Schulte Roth & Zabel, was to 

receive the Professor Lawrence P. 

King Award at the 2010 luncheon 

of the Bankruptcy and Reorganization 

Group of the UJA — Federation 

of New York’s Lawyers 

Division, on May 3. Thanks to the 

organizational efforts of Allen 

Brill, the event turned into a mini 

class reunion of “friends of Cook.” 

In addition to Mike the Honoree, 

his wife, Roberta, and their sons, 

Jonathan and Alexander, we had a 

“Class of 1965 table” populated by 

Allen Brill, Ira Gomberg, Stephen 

Hoffman, Bob Kronley (who came 

from Atlanta to attend), Leonard 

Pack, A.G. Rosen and Michael 

Schlanger. Mike’s star power drew 

1,150 attendees, a record for this 

prestigious annual event. A highlight 

was the presentation to Mike 

of a “Mensch” T-shirt by Jonathan 

and Alexander. 

I ran into Ira on April 17 at a 

performance of the Broadway play 

Red, a fascinating piece about the 

artist Mark Rothko. Ira and I are 

now Rothko experts. 

Our class China expert, Ken 

Dewoskin, has been appointed 

an independent director of Agria 

Corp., a China-based agricultural 

solutions company. Agria’s March 

10 press release announced “the 

appointment of a preeminent China 

strategist, Kenneth J. Dewoskin, 

Ph.D., as an independent director of 

the company. A former partner of 

strategy and business development 

at a big four accounting firm, Dr. 

Dewoskin is a well-regarded and 

regular presenter on China business 

issues throughout the U.S., Europe 

and Asia, including at the World 

Economic Forum. He has lived and 

worked extensively in both China 

and Japan over the past 45 years.” 

Ken is a senior adviser to Deloitte 

China and a director of Deloitte’s 

China Research and Insight Center. 

He also is a senior adviser to The 

Conference Board, where he oversees 

a range of leadership activities 

spanning workforce, financial and 

strategic areas. Ken is a former 

professor of international business 

and the chairman and professor 

of Asian cultures at Michigan. He 

also has taught executive education 

programs for Michigan, Singapore 

Management University and 

Wharton. He has presented on 

China business issues across the 

United States and throughout Asia 

and Europe, in the World Economic 

Forum, Chamber of Commerce, 

Economist Intelligence Unit, Eurasia 

Group, the Conference Board, U.S.- 

China Business Council, China- 

Britain Business Council and World 

Transportation Forum. Ken has 

authored numerous articles during 

his career, including a regular column 

for the China Economic Review, 

and previously wrote regularly for 

The Far Eastern Economic Review. His 

influential views have made him 

sought after by some of the world’s 

most prestigious media outlets, 

including The New York Times, Financial 

Times, Economist, South China 

Morning Post, People’s Daily, CNBC, 

Business Week, Fortune, Asian Wall 

Street Journal, The Washington Post, 

Red Herring, BBC World Services 


51

class notes 


and major newswire services. 

Ken earned a Ph.D. from Columbia 

in 1974. A fluent speaker of Man - 

darin Chinese and Japanese, he has 

also studied at National Taiwan 

University and Kyoto University. 

[Editor’s note: CCT profiled Dewoskin 

in November/December 

2007: www.college.columbia.edu/ 

cct_archive/nov_dec07/updates2. 

php.] 

Dr. Gerald Kruglik, like your 

class correspondent, had a conflicting 

obligation that required him 

to miss our reunion. “I am sorry to 

have missed the reunion, to which 

I had been looking forward. But 

my class at the University of Santa 

Monica, where my wife, Barbara 

Bottner, and I are in the master’s 

program in spiritual psychology, 

meets that weekend. Students are 

not allowed to miss a class, which 

meets only one weekend a month. 

So in the spirit of reunion, and this 

column, so diligently shepherded 

by Leonard, I shall report Class 

Notesy items: My wife, a writer 

(she’s published more than 40 

books for children), and I have 

written four kids books together: 

Wallace’s Lists and the Pish and Posh 

series are published by Random 

House. I live in Los Angeles, not 

far from USC; am semi-retired 

from the practice of radiology; occasionally 

am in contact with Bob 

Szarnicki, even more occasionally 

with Ron Chevako and Jim 

Carifio; and welcomed my first 

grandchild on May 12, Miranda 

Nicole Kruglik, all 6 lbs. and 10 oz. 

of heart-stopping beauty. I do an 

occasional interview for the ARC 

and watch the continued travails of 

the football and basketball teams 

with unabated sadness.” 

Gerald has a wonderful e-mail 

address: dr.xray@sbcglobal.net. 

Feel free to write to him and let him 

know what he missed at reunion. 

Professor Leon Rosenstein ’72 

GSAS notes that his book, Antiques: 

The History of an Idea, is doing well, 

having been reviewed with praise 

in international journals, and so is 

his antiques business, given this 

sluggish economy. Having retired 

from full-time teaching two years 

ago, Leon still finds opportunities 

to give lectures on various subjects, 

from philosophy to art history to 

religion. He recently, for example, 

gave the annual member’s lecture to 

the Mingei International Museum 

(in San Diego, where he lives) on 

“The Ten Criteria of Antiques Collecting 

and Connoisseurship.” He 

finds that the only part of university 

life he really misses is the interaction 

in the classroom with students. 

(Leon does somewhat guiltily also 

admit missing the lengthy battles 

he used to have with the university 

administration, which he was 

able to survive not only because of 

academic tenure but also because, 

he claims, he was able to view 

these contests as a sports matches, 

ones that he could only rarely win, 

but where one could sometimes 

checkmate the opponent.) Leon 

also spends much time traveling to 

various parts of the globe and will 

be guiding an exclusive, luxury tour 

of the Greek Islands and Istanbul 

(Tuesday, September 21–Wednesday, 

October 6, all of which, as 

former president of the Classical Alliance 

of the Western States, he has 

done many times before. He also is 

in the process of turning his lengthy 

published article, “Heidegger’s Aesthetics,” 

into a book. Leon can be 

reached at rosenst1@mail.sdsu.edu. 

Finally, on a more somber note, 

please turn to the Obituaries in the 

May/June issue for notice of the 

death of Roger Wetherington in 

July 2009. 

66 

Stuart Berkman 

Rua Mello Franco, 580 

Teresópolis, Rio de Janeiro 

25960-531 Brasil 

smb102@columbia.edu 

Byron Michael Noone was remembered 

at the Vietnam “Operation 

Babylift” 35th Anniversary 

Program, held at the New Jersey 

Vietnam Era Educational Center 

on April 24. Byron’s widow, Lana, 

and daughter, Jennifer Nguyen 

Noone ’99 SW, spoke at the event, 

and Lana celebrated Byron’s work 

and life during her remarks. Please 

contact lananoone@yahoo.com for 

further information. 

We recently learned about two 

events in Massachusetts featuring 

Alan Feldman reading for National 

Poetry Month. Both were held in 

April, at the Dover Town Library 

and at the Framingham Public 

Library. 

Nothing further to report at this 

time. Have a pleasant summer 

(and greetings from our part of the 

Southern Hemisphere, where July 

is the most temperate and pleasant 

month of the year). 

67 

Albert Zonana 

425 Arundel Rd. 

Goleta, CA 93117 

az164@columbia.edu 

Rabbi Mark Golub, who was general 

manager of WKCR while at 

Columbia, is president and founder 

of Jewish Education in Media, a 

nonprofit that produces Shalom TV 

and L’Chayim on cable television. 

Shalom TV was launched in 2008 

as a mainstream, free, video-ondemand 

network and now is available 

in more than 37 million homes 

across the United States, including 

1.5 million Jewish homes, on virtually 

every cable network. Newsweek 

named Mark one of America’s 50 

most influential rabbis. He was 

ordained a reform rabbi by the 

Hebrew Union College-Jewish 

Institute of Religion in New York 

City. He has been the rabbi of two 

congregations in Connecticut for 

more than 38 years. 

68 

Arthur Spector 

271 Central Park West 


abszzzz@aol.com 

Greetings and salutations. Summer 

seems to have arrived quickly 

in New York City. I hope to get to 

Saratoga soon for some fresh air. Or 

maybe Sitka, Alaska, from where 

some amazing pictures arrive regularly, 

compliments of Bob Carlson. 

I ran into Ira McCown at the gym, 

and he forwarded a note that I will 

summarize. He claims I look great 

(thanks) and suggests that I could 

run another NYC Marathon — 

wrong guy. Maybe Buzz Zucker. 

Ira looks trim and in good spirits. 

His daughter is at law school, and 

his son is a paralegal. I learned a 

bit about his dad, who had been a 

surgeon and was in both WWI and 

WWII. Amazing. 

I received a brief “hello” note 

from Bill Joseph. As usual, a spurof-the-moment 

idea turns into a 

“Next time, pal” — he was in for 

his daughter’s graduation to be a 

rabbi. So as Bill wrote, “Being married 

to a cantor and now having a 

rabbi for a daughter, I find myself 

at Stephen Wise in your neighborhood, 

but that’s as close as I’ll get.” 

Congratulations, Bill. You may 

be the only one who can hold a 

service at home — or on the road 

if you can find your daughter for 

a visit. 

I received a wonderful note from 

Ira Goldberg. His daughter, Shoshana, 

will be off to the University 

of North Carolina in public health, 

where my daughter, Hannah ’06, 

finished her first year. Shoshana 

and Hannah know each other from 

Columbia and before. So Professor 

Jon Kotch will be educating our 

daughters. Thanks, Jon. Hannah is 

enjoying Chapel Hill. 

Mas Taketomo sent a note on 

a Glee Club Reunion, held during 

Alumni Reunion Weekend/Dean’s 

Day on June 4–5. Sounds like a 

large crowd was expected. I hoped 

to go. They may have let me sing. 

Mas said I could play the piano 

with them. 

I enjoy hearing from Paul Brosnan. 

I appreciate the political humor, 

but I am restraining my enthusiasm 

for sharing — but two Arlington 

fellows might agree on things. 

Paul, I am sure you noticed that 

the baseball team won the Gehrig 

Division and had the best record in 

the league, but lost the Ivy League 

title to Rolfe Division winner 

Dartmouth two games to one. I 

was impressed with our comefrom-behind 

win in Cambridge for 

the second game of a doubleheader 

and the first game, the hapless 

Harvard team scored one run to 

Columbia’s 24 runs. Isn’t there 

some mercy in baseball, especially 

if there is a second game and the 

first game is seven innings 

To the men’s tennis and golf 

teams, both Ivy champs, congratulations! 

I received a video shot and edited 

by Bob Brandt’s son, Austin, 

showing Austin and Ryan (his 

other son) doing skiing tricks and 

flips and summersaults on the skis. 

Bob, they seem like daring fellows 

readying themselves for the 

Olympics. I enjoyed the video. I 

would have included the YouTube 

link here, but I wonder what the 

appropriateness of that is. I bet you 

can still downhill ski with them if 

they slow down a bit. 

Mike Olneck sent a note that I 

should forward to Bob and others. 

He wrote, “I was perusing the 

recent CCT Class Notes, and had 

an idea for the Class of 1968. People 

of our era frequently mention their 

grandchildren. How about sending 

out a call for notes from those of us 

who are, in the title words of Martin 

Carnoy’s book, ‘fathers of a certain 

age,’ i.e., fathers with high-school or 

younger kids still living at home 

For some, these will be folks in 

‘second’ families; for others, like me, 

they will be ‘late bloomers.’ You 

might get some interesting themes.” 

Mike is professor emeritus of 

educational policy studies and 

sociology at the University of 

Wisconsin. 

It is a fascinating thought, Mike. 

I am sure Pete Janovsky, with his 

wonderful twin daughters (who 

must be fifth-graders now) would 

agree. 

I received a nice note from 

Doug Freundlich sending me 

condolences for my mom’s passing 

away. (Thanks, Doug.) He also had 

been a little under the weather and 

is, I hope, feeling much better now. 

Doug’s Venere Lute Quartet has a 

third CD on the way, and he will 

let us know when it is out. 

Doug, maybe you can perform 

with the Quartet at our next reunion. 

That would be grand. 

I received this note from Roger 

Wyatt with news that should lift 

one’s spirits; tragedy followed by 

good things sounds good to me. 

Roger wrote me: “My current news 

packet is personal. After living in 

Kansas for many years, I moved 

to Saratoga Springs, N.Y., in 1998. 

Last year was a rollercoaster of 

a year for me. In October, Hilary 


52


class notes 

Thomas Kline ’68, ’75L Helps Return Stolen Art 

In the movies, Indiana 

Jones acts alone in taking 

back pilfered artifacts. In 

reality, he surely would 

benefit from the help of Thomas 

Kline ’68, ’75L. 

Kline, a New York native 

and father of three who now 

resides in Washington, D.C., has 

been a pioneer in the field of art 

restitution law during the last 

two decades and has been involved 

in cases that twist from 

The Netherlands to Indiana, 

from Berlin to Connecticut. 

“I started off representing 

the Greek Orthodox Church in 

Cyprus,” Kline recounts of his 

first restitution case, in 1989. 

An art dealer from Carmel, Ind., 

had purchased four famous 

mosaics in The Netherlands, 

not knowing they had been 

stolen from the church in the 

aftermath of the Turkish invasion 

of Cyprus in 1974. 

The church asked Kline’s law 

firm, Manatt, Phelps, & Evans, 

to represent it in recovering the 

mosaics. “U.S. Customs would 

not seize them, so the only 

option we had was to litigate,” 

Kline says. 

Kline ended up with a highwire 

act. “[The Carmel dealer] 

agreed to a temporary order 

against selling the mosaics, on 

condition that we go to trial in 

60 days.” Kline’s team packed 

25 depositions into that time 

and proceeded with a trial that 

became politically contentious. 

“There’s an entity called the 

Turkish Republic of Northern 

Cyprus that’s only recognized 

by Turkey, and lawyers for that 

country showed up claiming to 

be plaintiffs,” Kline says. “There 

was an argument over unrecognized 

governments, whether 

we should recognize their actions 

… there was a multitude 

of issues I hadn’t anticipated.” 

Nevertheless, five months after 

the temporary order, Kline’s 

firm won the case and the mosaics 

were returned to Cyprus. 

Gary Vikan, director of the 

Walters Art Museum in Baltimore, 

befriended Kline while 

serving as a witness on that 

case. “Tom emerged as a leader 

in the area,” Vikan says. “The 

case was precedent-setting in 

due diligence with trafficking in 

antiquities.” 

Kline’s tone is generally calm, 

but discussing the aftermath of 

the Cyprus case brings out exhilaration: 

“Oh man, the issues 

were incredible!” he says. “I was 

learning about the art market, 

international trade … it was 

fascinating!” 

Less than a year after the 

Cyprus case, Kline — then with 

the firm Andrews Kurth — took 

on restitution once again. “I did 

a case for a German church 

from Quedlinburg, which was 

the royal capital, involving 

recovering medieval religious 

objects stolen by an American 

lieutenant,” he says. Kline has 

been in the restitution field, and 

with Andrews Kurth, ever since. 

“I just found it a fascinating 

area, particularly with my mother 

being an artist and having a 

pretty good background in art 

and art history from Columbia,” 

he notes. 

Kline grew up on the Upper 

West Side, moving with his 

family to Scarsdale, N.Y., when 

he was 9. After high school, he 

came back down the Hudson 

to major in government at the 

College. “It’s kind of a family 

tradition,” he says of Columbia, 

referring to his father, Eugene 

’33, ’35L, and his late brother, 

Robert ’66, ’70L. 

Before attending the Law 

Thomas Kline ’68, ’75L holding the Augsburg Book of Nobles, a 16thcentury 

book of German prints and drawings that turned up stolen 

in New York. Kline represented the German state of Baden-Wurttenburg 

and prevailed in getting the book returned. 

PHOTO: TOBIAS EVERKE 

School, Kline taught social 

studies at a public high school 

in Manhattan, a four-year period 

that “really rounded me 

out,” he says. He still teaches, 

having taught a course on 

cultural property for 10 years 

in The George Washington 

University’s Museum Studies 

Program. 

“Teaching forces you to 

think more broadly about 

things, keep up on all aspects 

of the law,” he says. “When you 

do litigation, you learn a lot 

about a little, about one issue.” 

Sometimes, Kline says, the 

solutions to his cases get innovative. 

Ten years ago, he represented 

a Czech Jew named Eric 

Weinmann who was looking 

for some artwork his mother 

had abandoned in Berlin during 

WWII. “He was in his 30s [during 

the war] and he remembered 

this painting,” a Courbet. 

Weinmann had discussed 

his search with a friend, who 

then discovered the painting 

by chance, hanging in the 

Yale University Art Gallery. “He 

found it when he went back 

for an alumni reunion!” Kline 

says. “That was very strange. 

So we made a claim.” To return 

the painting, Kline’s team had 

to prove that its then-owner 

had purchased the work after 

Weinmann’s mother had fled 

Germany, and that she had not 

sold the painting voluntarily. 

“The case was not exceptionally 

long in settling, but 

it felt that way at the time,” 

Kline says. “We had to do an 

incredible amount of research 

to show Weinmann’s story was 

more likely to be right.” 

When they won the case, 

Weinmann just wanted to get 

the painting back, Kline says. 

“He didn’t want a financial settlement, 

he didn’t care about 

that. So he arranged with Yale 

for a 10-year loan, and he hung 

the painting in his dining room.” 

“Tom’s an idealist,” Vikan 

says about his friend. “The 

cases he takes are for the 

underdog.” His speech slows 

slightly. “He’s a just, good person. 

He brings his values into 

the courtroom.” 


McLellan, my wife and companion 

for 21 years, died. She lived her 

life on her own terms while she 

battled cancer for 31 months. In 

July, in Hawaii, my son, Owen, 

married the lovely Maggie. They 

are in Boston, studying to be 

psychotherapists at Massachusetts 

School of Professional Psychology. 

This year started out with a 

bang. In February, I met the lovely 

Letitia, and we clicked deeply. 

We are exploring and deepening 

our relationship. In late April, I 

started my sixth residency at the 

Experimental Television Center. In 

May, I vacationed in Vienna and 

Salzburg. Whatever the rest of the 

year brings, I will engage it with 

resilience, resourcefulness and 

imagination that are the hallmarks 

of a Columbia education.” 

Roger, when you get back I 

hope we can rendezvous at some 

fine restaurant in Saratoga. We are 

so overdue. All the best. 

I had lunch with Paul de Bary as 

part of our once-in-a-while lunch 

event, and he reported he will be 

off to Argentina in the fall, and yes 

— I think I have this right — there 

are more than 700 de Barys in Ar- 


53

class notes 


Crooners Larry Teitelbaum ’71, Lawrence Masket ’71, Rob Mayer ’71, 

Elliot Cahn ’70 and Alan Mayer ’72 broke into a full multi-part harmony 

rendition of “Roar, Lion, Roar” at a wedding in Sonoma, Calif., in May. 

PHOTO: CAROL BLACKWELL 

gentina. I also received a note that 

Dan Carr, chief medical officer and 

president of Javelin Pharmaceuticals, 

will be honored at a Chabad 

event in New York. Good deeds 

are good for sure. Greg Winn 

called to tell of some good news 

that I am sure he will share with 

us when the time is ripe. He is in 

grand humor, enjoying retirement 

of sorts, teaching and traveling. 

I still work on municipal financing, 

now 35 years later or so. Still 

enjoying working with the clients; 

the travel; and the opportunity to 

help government entities with their 

financing needs. My girlfriend and 

I recently went to Miami Beach, and 

I must admit I like palm trees and 

sunny days and swimming pools. 

Neil Anderson, I understand, 

enjoys Naples, Fla. 

I hope the Glee Club reunion 

turns out to be a good time. Mas 

will report on it for sure. I hope all 

is well with classmates, and do send 

in notes when you can. 

69 

Michael Oberman 

Kramer Levin Naftalis & 

Frankel 

1177 Avenue of the 

Americas 


moberman@ 

kramerlevin.com 

As happens too often and too consistently, 

I did not receive any news 

from classmates for this issue. However, 

I came close: Mike Tracy ’68 

was kind enough to let me know 

that Mark Brodin’s latest book is 

William P. Homans Jr.: A Life in Court 

(released in paperback in January). 

Looking at the product description 

on Amazon, I was pleased to note 

that it states Mark is a graduate of 

the College and gives our class year 

— but, of course, that fact I knew. 

The description says that the book 

is about a Boston lawyer who spent 

his 50-year career working for “the 

poor and downtrodden, the protection 

of our most basic civil liberties, 

and the abolition of the death 

penalty.” 

It’s been several years since an 

item about Mark appeared in this 

column, so, I went to his webpage 

to get his current bio. Mark is professor 

of law and former associate 

dean for academic affairs at 

Boston College Law School. He has 

published extensively in the areas 

of employment discrimination, 

constitutional criminal procedure, 

evidence and litigation. Mark was 

named BC Law’s 2002–03 Faculty 

Member of the Year by the Law 

Students Association. The Black 

Law Students Association awarded 

him the Ruth Arlene Howe Award 

in 2005 and 2006 and the Anthony 

P. Farley Excellence in Training 

Award in 2008–09. 

The Internet (especially university 

websites) is a helpful way to 

learn about classmates who do not 

send in news, and I found information 

about several classmates whom 

I do not believe have appeared in 

CCT. Arnold Barnett is the George 

Eastman Professor of Management 

Science and Professor of Statistics at 

MIT’s Sloan School of Management. 

His research specialty is applied 

mathematical modeling with a 

focus on problems of health and 

safety. He has received the President’s 

Award and the Expository 

Writing Award from The Institute 

for Operations Research and the 

Management Sciences, a professional 

society in the field of operations 

research, management science and 

business analytics, in 1996 and 2001, 

and is an INFORMS fellow. Arnold 

is an expert on aviation safety and 

has been quoted in a variety of recent 

articles on airline safety issues, 

including airport security issues. In 

2008, Arnold chaired a conference 

at Sloan called “To Keep or Not 

Keep the Electoral College.” He has 

written op-ed pieces for The New 

York Times, The Wall Street Journal, 

The Boston Globe and USA Today. 

Arnold has been honored on 10 

occasions by students at MIT Sloan 

for outstanding teaching. 

Scott Nordlicht is a physician 

specializing in cardiology and 

internal medicine at The Washington 

University Heart Care Institute 

School of Medicine in St. Louis. 

His webpage links to a YouTube 

interview, in which Scott describes 

his role as a patient advocate: “I 

particularly enjoy becoming a patient’s 

advocate, helping individuals 

navigate their way to sustained 

wellness,” he says. Scott is listed in 

Best Doctors in America. He enjoys 

swimming, weight lifting, movies 

and reading. 

Henry Reichman is a professor 

in the Department of History, 

California State University, East 

Bay, in Hayward. He specializes 

in the history of Russia/U.S.S.R. 

and European history since 1789. 

As an avid baseball fan, Hank also 

teaches a course on the history of 

baseball. He has been chair of the 

Academic Senate and a Statewide 

Academic Senator. He received 

the CSUEB Outstanding Professor 

Award in 1999 and is listed 

in Who’s Who Among America’s 

Teachers. Hank’s book, Railwaymen 

and Revolution: Russia, 1905, was 

published in 1987. He is associate 

editor of the American Library Association’s 

Newsletter on Intellectual 

Freedom and author of Censorship 

and Selection: Issues and Answers for 

Schools, the third edition of which 

was published in 2001. 

David Bradley is an associate 

professor and tenured reader in the 

linguistics department of La Trobe 

University in Bundoora Victoria, 

Australia. He has conducted extensive 

research on endangered languages, 

sociolinguistics, historical 

linguistics, geolinguistics, language 

policy and phonetics/phonology 

in Southeast, East and South Asia 

across many years, especially on 

Tibeto-Burman languages. David’s 

teaching areas include language 

across time, language in Asia and 

language in society. He has had 

extensive contacts with Asian 

universities for more than 25 years; 

has participated in establishing, 

obtaining funding for and running 

exchange links in China, Thailand, 

Japan, Indonesia and India; and 

has had many years of fieldwork 

experience in China and Southeast 

and South Asia. David is a fellow 

of the Academy of the Social Sciences 

in Australia. 

Elliot Rosen is associate professor 

in medical and molecular 

genetics at Indiana University 

School of Medicine in Indianapolis. 

He received his Ph.D. from the 

University of Iowa and was a postdoctoral 

fellow at UC San Diego. 

The research in Elliot’s lab focuses 

on studying the physiologic roles of 

coagulation and hemostatic factors 

using genetically modified mice. 

Richard Sherr is a professor in 

the Department of Music at Smith 

College. He has written extensively 

about Papal music and musicians 

as well as the music of the Renaissance. 

Richard has been chair of 

the Department of Music (1983–88, 

1991–93, 2002–05) and secretary of 

the Faculty (1987–90). 

I know there is news out there 

about our classmates, but it would 

be really great if the news out there 

would simply show up in my e-mail 

inbox. Let me hear about your personal 

and professional news and/or 

your reflections on how the College 

years have impacted your life, 

looking back now on 41 years since 

graduation and just about 45 years 

since our freshman week orientation. 

Postscript: Five members of our 

class participated in the Alumni 

Parade of Classes at Class Day 

on May 17: Neil Flomenbaum, 

me, Manny Organek, Richard 

Rapaport and Eric Saltzman. 

The Class of 2010 also reflected 

participation by members of our 

class with four legacies: Adam 

Flomenbaum ’10, Abby Oberman 

’10, Billy Organek ’10 and Gabriel 

Saltzman ’10. Eric had even more 

reason to be grateful that day: his 

father, Arnold Saltzman ’36, led the 

parade, commemorating three generations 

of College graduates in the 

Saltzman family. As Neil, Manny, 

Richard and I carried the Class of 

1969 banner (which, as always, 

attracted cheers from the graduating 

seniors), Eric moved back and 

forth along the line photographing 

the occasion. For sure, at our own 

Class Day, I did not foresee a day 

41 years in the future when a Dean 

Michele Moody-Adams would 

recognize a daughter of mine as a 

graduate of the College, but I do 

confess experiencing during this 

Class Day a misty-eyed moment 

as I realized that the ’10 after my 

daughter’s name and the ’69, P’10 

after mine will constantly confirm 

our shared membership in the 

Columbia community. And, if that 

wasn’t enough, the event produced 

copy for the class column! 

70 

Leo G. Kailas 

Reitler Kailas & 

Rosenblatt 

885 Third Ave, 20th Fl. 


lkailas@reitlerlaw.com 

Our 40th Alumni Reunion Weekend 

took place in June, and I agreed 

to act as reporter. Because of this 

column’s deadlines, a full report of 

the festivities will be included in the 

September/October issue of CCT. 

Stay tuned! 

Also, please try to open your 

wallets — even in these difficult 

economic times — to the institution 

that played such a key role in 


54


class notes 

our development and in assisting 

us on the path of life. You can give 

via www.college.columbia.edu/ 

giveonline or mail a check to the 

Columbia College Fund, Columbia 

Alumni Center, 622. W. 113th St., 

MC 4530, 3rd Fl., New York, NY 

10025. 

One news item from Richard 

Howard: “If you come across the 

print edition of The Chronicle Review, 

it features three photographs that I 

took for Spectator way back when. I 

do quite a bit of work for the Chronicle 

and the editor knew I had been at 

Columbia in 1968, so she requested 

the photographs. The stock photo 

usage fees would have paid for a 

semester’s tuition in 1968! For me, a 

parent with two kids in college right 

now, that is quite a revelation, inflation 

calculator notwithstanding.” 

Also some sad news on the 

passing of two classmates: Robert 

W. Butterfield, sexton, Bethlehem, 

Pa., on January 5; and Stephen 

G. Plummer, chairman and CEO, 

Crumpler, N.C., on October 20. 

71 

Jim Shaw 

139 North 22nd St. 


jes200@columbia.edu 

Contributors to this column make 

several references to an eatery you 

may remember. That may be in response 

to an e-mail I sent to the class, 

mentioning a number of experiences 

we may have in common. 

By the time you read this, I will 

have sent a Class eNewsletter, which 

I am restarting. If you have not received 

it, I may not have your correct 

e-mail address. Send it to me at the 

e-mail address above. 

Vincent Rigdon: “I am pastor of 

Our Lady of the Presentation Parish 

in Poolesville, Md. It is a very 

happy assignment.” 

Pete Hamlin: “Yes indeed, 40 

years has passed by in a blink. So 

much has happened to all of us 

that I won’t even begin to start 

individual news this time, but I do 

want to say for our school, not just 

our class, that we have a President, 

Barack Obama ’83; a governor of 

New York, David Paterson ’77; U.S. 

Attorney General, Eric H. Holder 

Jr. ’73, ’76L; and international news 

reporter, commentator, interviewer 

and formulator of policies, George 

Stephanopoulos ’82 . We can be 

proud of what CC (Columbia College, 

Contemporary Civilization or 

both) has done for all our minds.” 

John Dubberstein sent a link to 

a colorful poster for a performance 

by the Clear Light Ensemble at the 

“School of Jellyfish for the Advancement 

of sustainable living 

and renewable energy through: architecture, 

design, permaculture, 

performing arts and chocolate” 

in Beacon, N.Y., on May 8. “Come 

and listen to the exhilarating mix 

of tabla, viola and sitar!” 

The poster notes that “John Dubberstein 

has played sitar for 35 

years. A student of Harihar Rao, 

Punita Gupta and Manilal Nag, 

he in recent years has taken a 

tack away from a strictly classical 

presentation of Indian music. The 

current music will be featured in 

support of holographic laser dome 

projection works. John also (when 

not windsurfing the Hudson) performs 

on vocals and guitar with the 

Bad Boys Blues Band.” 

Ken Cowan: “I have been at 

SciClone Pharmaceuticals International 

for 13-plus years. I spent a 

number of years in Singapore but 

now am at the corporate HQ in 

San Mateo, Calif. We continue to be 

busy despite the economy. I go to 

New York several times a year, but 

the visits are never long enough. I 

miss Mama Joy’s roast beef heroes 

with Russian dressing, lettuce and 

Swiss cheese. In the spring, the best 

place to eat a sandwich was on 

the steps in front of Low Library, 

washing it down with a quart of 

Miller High Life. Those were the 

days! Things were simpler then, or 

at least more immediate.” 

Ed Wallace writes about rights to 

public expression, balanced with 

rights not to experience it, in a New 

York Times op-ed piece published 

April 16. He describes his experi - 

ence as a New York City councilman 

getting a six-word legislative 

amendment passed and his chagrin 

at the results. www.nytimes.com/ 

2010/04/17/opinion/17wallace. 

htmlscp=1&sq=edward%20 

wallace&st=cse. 

Eddie Eitches: “Son Etan graduated 

from Columbia P&S in May. He 

will be an ER resident at Beth Israel 

in NYC. He is excited at moving 

from Washington Heights to First 

Avenue and East 16th Street. Daughter 

Eliana ’13 finished her first year 

at the College. Only freshman to take 

(at Dad’s urging) Eric Foner ’63’s 

1820–60 American history course. 

Hoping both will follow Dad’s lefty 

(president of largest federal worker 

local in D.C.) footsteps.” 

David Lindley: “My wife, Jane 

’71 Barnard, and I are grandparents. 

Our older daughter, Camilla 

Lynch, and her husband, Brian, 

had a son, Jack. Looks like both 

parents and all four grandparents; 

strange, this gene thing. 

“Jack and I share a middle name, 

Morrison, my mother and his greatgrandmother’s 

maiden name. I 

have threatened to get us matching 

kilts.” 

Michael Straus: “By the time 

you read this, I will have completed, 

d.v., a master of philosophy 

degree studying ancient Greek at 

Cambridge, a university which, 

The Feinberg family now has three generations of College graduates. 

Rebecca Feinberg ’09 (center) graduated magna cum laude. Her father, 

Jack Feinberg ’72, is on the left, and her grandfather, Judge Wilfred 

Feinberg ’40, ’43L, is on the right. 

though it may lack Columbia’s 

culinary equivalents, such as 

Mama Joy’s, more than makes up 

for it in the quality of its pubs and 

of course its architecture. My thesis 

concerns Aristophanes’ play The 

Clouds, which may have been on 

our reading lists as freshmen, but 

repays a visit. And to be sure, as 

I discussed at more length in my 

Class Notes submission last year, 

www.college.columbia.edu/cct/ 

jul_aug09/class_notes#cy197, 

reading classics beats reading depositions, 

an avocation from which 

I retired in 2003.” 

Rob Mayer: “The photo near 

these Notes shows Larry Teitelbaum, 

Lawrence Masket, me, Elliot 

Cahn ’70 and my brother, Alan ’72, 

at a spring 2010 wedding, as we 

were about to break into a round 

of ‘Roar, Lion, Roar.’ Elliot was an 

original member of Sha Na Na, and 

I was a four-year member of the 

Columbia Glee Club. ‘T’ (Larry), 

‘Spider’ (Lawrence) and Alan all 

can sing pretty well, so our rendition 

of ‘Roar, Lion, Roar’ was in full 

multi-part harmony. 

“Larry and his wife, Barbara 

Felsinger, have a son, Ben Teitelbaum 

’08, and a daughter, Sophie 

Teitelbaum, who attends UC Berkeley. 

Barbara’s older brother, Stan 

Felsinger ’66, was a basketball star 

at Columbia immediately before 

our era (when a 6-foot Jewish guy 

could still excel in the Ivy League). 

He was All-Ivy in 1966 along with 

Dave Newmark ’69. And just to 

complete the circle, the guy whose 

daughter was getting married in 

May is Dave Newmark’s dentist!” 

Hang out with your friends, 

too! Alumni Reunion Weekend is 

Thursday, June 2–Sunday, June 5, 

2011. Mark your calendars now. 

The campus is beautiful (especially 

in June), and it surprises how 

much some things have changed 

and how some things have remained 

the same. (Same with classmates!) 

Some have done both. For 

example, Ferris Booth Hall is gone, 

replaced with a sleek and modern 

Alfred Lerner Hall. But downstairs, 

in Roone Arledge Auditorium, 

you will see that it is really our old 

Wollman Auditorium. Remember 

classmates performing there in Sha 

Na Na and other bands 

I attend reunion, and I always 

have a great time. It’s wonderful 

to be with old friends and to make 

new ones. We all experienced so 

much together. Forty years will 

have gone by in a blink. Keep your 

eyes open for this. See ya there! 

72 

Paul S. Appelbaum 

39 Claremont Ave., #24 


pappel1@aol.com 

There’s a definite California flavor 

to this column. Peter Levitan, in 

Los Angeles, “get[s] such a kick 

out of reading items from Armen 

Donelian, who was a neighbor 

on the legendary () fourth floor 

of Furnald in our day, and following 

his jazz career. The latest turn 

in my legal career (my seventh 

career since graduation — in turn, 

children’s theater manager, restaurant 

reviewer, freelance journalist, 

nonprofit arts administrator, script 

reader and literary/theater scout) 

follows stints at New York and 

L.A. law firms, and subsequent 

positions as a senior lawyer and 

executive at Fox and indie Intermedia 

Films. I started a solo practice 

in 2002 and also began teaching as 

an adjunct at Loyola Law School 

(a course I created covering film, 

television, music, theatre and new 

media financing — the first such 

law school course in the country, I 

believe).” 


55

class notes 


Peter recently organized and 

moderated a symposium for the 

Beverly Hills Bar Association on 

new developments in entertainment 

financing. Reflecting on the 

differences between broad-based 

television programming when 

there were only three networks 

and today’s more fragmented cable 

world, Peter notes how common 

censorship was for the edgier acts. 

“For their 1967 appearance on 

The Ed Sullivan Show, The Rolling 

Stones complied with CBS network 

censors’ instructions to change 

the line ‘Let’s spend the night 

together’ to ‘Let’s spend some 

time together,’ but Mick Jagger 

exaggeratedly rolled his eyes every 

time he sang the line. By contrast, 

later that year The Doors agreed 

to the censors’ demand that lead 

singer Jim Morrison change the 

lyrics to their hit single ‘Light My 

Fire’ by altering the line, ‘Girl, we 

couldn’t get much higher’ to ‘Girl, 

we couldn’t get much better.’ The 

band agreed to the change, but had 

no intention of honoring the agreement. 

Morrison sang the original 

line, on live television and with no 

delay. CBS was powerless to stop 

it, and a furious Sullivan refused to 

shake the band members’ hands.” 

Also in L.A., Jack Feinberg 

received his Ph.D. in physics from 

UC Berkeley in 1977 and has been 

a professor of physics, astronomy 

and electrical engineering at USC 

since then. His research focuses on 

lasers and nonlinear optics. Jack’s 

daughter, Rebecca ’09, graduated 

magna cum laude, the third 

generation of Feinbergs to do so. 

Jack’s father, Judge Wilfred Feinberg 

’40,’43L, is a senior judge on 

the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 

Second Circuit. [See photo.] 

Back on this coast, Peter V. Darrow 

has joined DLA Piper’s corporate 

finance practice as a partner 

in the New York office. Peter was 

previously at the law firm Mayer 

Brown, where he was a partner 

in the firm’s banking and finance 

group for 25 years. He regularly 

represents issuers, underwriters 

and placement agents in crossborder 

securities offerings, as well 

as structured finance transactions 

in emerging markets. In addition, 

Peter represents institutional 

lenders in secured and unsecured 

financings, including acquisition 

and leveraged financings. He also 

advises SEC-registered companies 

in complying with their disclosure 

obligations and counsels U.S. 

hedge funds in their private equity 

investments and joint ventures. 

Among his other accomplishments, 

Peter is chairman of The 

Cambodia Trust, the leading 

provider of relief and rehabilitation 

support for landmine victims 

in Cambodia. He also is an officer 

and board member of the Trinity 

College, Oxford Society, as well as 

a board member of Everyone Wins, 

a nonprofit literacy and mentoring 

organization. After Columbia, 

Peter earned a B.Phil. from Trinity 

College, Oxford, and a J.D. from 

the University of Michigan Law 

School. 

73 

Barry Etra 

1256 Edmund Park Dr. NE 

Atlanta, GA 30306 

betra1@bellsouth.net 

There is a great piece about Phil 

Schaap in the spring Columbia magazine, 

for thems of you that never 

read it (or even look at it). Unfortunately, 

the timing is such that by the 

time this is published, you may not 

still have the magazine … 

In order of appearance: Jose Sanchez 

recently completed another 

book (with three co-editors), The 

Iraq Papers, which “does what few 

books did to explain the Vietnam 

War for many of us back then.” 

What he is proudest of are his 

daughters. Desi is a TV show host, 

hosting LatinNation on Sunday 

afternoon on New York’s channel 9, 

a show on the Music Choice cable 

network interviewing celebrities 

and a show on MTV2. Hannah is 

starting her own assisted-living 

facility and says there won’t be any 

“early admission” for Jose and his 

wife, although he says, “I have my 

doubts.” The youngest, Leina, is 

an art major at Pratt, not far from 

where Jose teaches poli sci and urban 

studies at LIU Brooklyn. “Life,” 

he says, “could not be better.” 

Continuing in academia (and 

publishing), Joel Pfister is the Kenan 

Professor of the Humanities and 

chair of the Department of English 

at Wesleyan. His fifth book, The 

Yale Indian: The Education of Henry 

Roe Cloud, was published last year. 

Recent “lecture gigs” have taken him 

to China, Japan, England, France, 

Germany, Denmark, Norway and 

Israel. Joel notes the passing (mournfully) 

of two of his favorite professors, 

Robert Egan (drama) and James 

Shenton ’49 (history) a number of 

years back. 

Kirk Moritz is tennis director 

(along with Joe Perez ’79) of the 

CityView Racquet Club in Long 

Island City (www.cityviewracquet. 

com), which was built on top of 

the Swingline Staple building and 

has helped overcome the dearth 

of indoor facilities in NYC. Kirk 

and Joe ran the East River Tennis 

Club for 25 years previously; they 

are happy to see the Columbia 

tennis teams continuing to win Ivy 

League championships (Kirk was 

part of the first two). Kirk and his 

wife, Julie, have lived in Manhattan 

for 30 years. 

Steven Niles performed a thesis 

production for an M.F.A. in new 

media and performance at the 

Kumble Theater at LIU Brooklyn 

(there it is again!) in April. The 

work, a multimedia piece including 

multichannel video and compositions 

that Steven played on the 

piano and sang, is about a bipolar 

movie director who has problems 

with his medication and seeks 

alternate forms of healing. Wow. 

Steven Messner begins his term 

as president of the American Society 

of Criminology in November; 

he muses that “having lived on 

120th between Amsterdam and 

Morningside in the early ’70s, how 

could I not have developed an interest 

in crime” How not, indeed. 

Until we note again … 

74 

Fred Bremer 

532 W. 111th St. 


fbremer@pclient.ml.com 

Morningside Heights is being transformed 

at a remarkable pace, yet 

this transformation seems to have 

achieved “stealth mode” for many. 

The implications for Columbia and 

the community are significant. 

While we were on campus 

in the early ’70s, crossing 110th 

Street was an act of bravery. Few 

of us traveled much further north 

than Plimpton on Amsterdam 

or Riverside Church. Nobody 

crossed to the forbidden zone east 

of Morningside Drive. All of this 

appears to either have changed or 

will soon do so. 

The advent of the Manhattanville 

campus (roughly West 

125th Street to West 134th Street, 

Broadway to the Hudson River) 

will change nearly a mile north of 

the Morningside campus. A string 

of luxury high-rises and high-end 

retail space along 100th Street from 

Broadway to Columbus should 

bring in upper-income households 

to Manhattan Valley (the one-mile 

area south of campus). Across the 

past five years, there already has 

been a great migration of upperincome 

professionals into Harlem, 

especially the 20–30 blocks north of 

Central Park, to the east of campus. 

While Columbia once was an 

island of academia and middle class 

surrounded by areas of poverty, we 

soon will be an institution cozy in 

our nest surrounded by upperincome 

neighbors, fancy restaurants 

and high-priced shops. This sounds 

more like the physical setting of 

Harvard, Princeton and Stanford — 

all wonderful institutions, but with 

very different environments. “The 

times they are a’ changin’ ” — but 

for better or worse 

It has been “many a moon” since 

we heard from Marcos Delgado 

(known as Tony while on campus). 

He recently sent in word that he still 

owns Barton-Sharpe (the high-end 

furniture concern) in NYC and 

is surviving the challenges of the 

economic downturn. Marcos keeps 

in touch with crew teammate John 

Pototsky ’74E, even though John 

lives in France most of the time. Yet, 

he adds that “I have not spoken 

with Jonathan Oberman (who lives 

in NYC) in more than 25 years. 

How odd is that” 

By the way, Jon is a law professor 

at the Benjamin N. Cardozo 

School of Law in New York. 

When President Barack Obama 

’83 needed advice on ways to 

strengthen black colleges, he called 

upon Ronald Mason. Ron is the 

president of Jackson State University 

in Jackson, Miss., and has joined the 

advisory board of the White House 

Initiative on Historically Black 

Colleges and Universities. One of 

its central tasks is to recommend 

ways to increase college attendance 

among racial minorities. 

As the children of many classmates 

move from college to their 

own careers, I will try to pass on 

the occasional insight into what 

they are up to. While I don’t have 

many details (yet), I have learned 

that Steve Dworkin’s son, Adam, 

wrote a play that was staged at 

a theater in the East Village last 

April. Adam is attending NYU 

in the graduate dramatic arts 

program. Steve is doing municipal 

finance at J.P. Morgan in Los Angeles, 

but work conveniently brings 

him to New York on a frequent 

basis. 

In the current environment, do 

you think Adam in theater or Steve 

in finance has the more stable career 

It started with a short e-mail from 

Larry Silverman (a partner with 

Covington Burling, the New York 

law firm) asking if I knew anything 

about Simon Taylor (a long-lost 

friend from College days). Hitting 

a few directories and the Internet 

reunited the two — and unearthed 

another missing classmate. 

Ends up, Simon and I share a lot 

of geography — except in exactly 

the reverse order. I was born in 

Sausalito, Calif., grew up in Oregon, 

came to New York to go to the College 

and spent part of my junior year 

in London at the London School 

of Economics. Simon was born in 

London, briefly moved to Oregon 

with his family, also came to New 

York for college and recently started 

a securities firm in Sausalito. (OK, so 

maybe it won’t make it into the next 

volume of Ripley’s Believe It or Not!.) 

Simon attended Harvard Law. 

Being the 1970s, he went to Florida 

to be a poverty and civil rights 

lawyer. In the 1980s, he returned to 

NYC to various law firms and eventually 

became a partner at Snow, 


56


class notes 

Becker, Krauss. In 2004, Simon 

started his own law firm while also 

being CEO of the NASDAQ brokerdealer 

investment bank ACN 

Securities (with offices in Palo Alto, 

West Palm Beach, New York and 

London). The firm does a mix of 

investment banking, consulting and 

intellectual property law for clients 

in life sciences, alternative energy 

and agribusiness. 

Welcome back, Simon! 

There you have it. Lost classmates 

reappearing, a presidential appointment 

and another example of the 

achievements of our progeny. As 

you can tell, the virtual mailbag was 

not as full as it usually is. Please take 

a moment to dash off a quick note 

about yourself, classmates or your 

kids. And if you have been wondering 

about a buddy from 40 years 

ago, let me see if I can locate him. 

75 

Randy Nichols 

734 S. Linwood Ave. 

Baltimore, MD 21224 

rcn16@columbia.edu 

I’m writing this in late April, in 

the run-up to our 35th reunion. 

Throughout the year, many of us 

have dug up memorabilia. Those 

of you who have visited the CC ’75 

network at www.columbiacc75. 

ning.com have seen some of mine. 

Recently, I received an e-mail invitation 

to rehearse and perform 

with other Glee Club alums during 

Dean’s Day/Alumni Reunion 

Weekend. We were asked to send 

Glee Club stories, and I responded 

with the following: “I remember, 

as a tender frosh from the sticks, 

going with my fellow Glee Clubbers 

to buy tuxes before our first 

concert. It was a hoot. We went to 

some shop downtown on the second 

floor and had an elderly man 

assist us. Imagine maybe a dozen 

guys tossing tuxes around, trying 

to find ones that fit. Of course, 

there was no discussion of style — 

they were all basic tuxes, the only 

kind available in those days.” 

I am pretty sure that Mukund 

Marathe and Bruce Grivetti were 

tossing the tuxes that night with 

me, and probably others of you as 

well. And Jim Dolan’s reporting 

on his discovery of a decaying 

audio tape, reported in his recent 

e-mail, is another gem. How many 

classmates were being cheered 

while they were streaking through 

campus What do you remember 

about those days 

With degrees in art history from 

Columbia and Brown, and training 

in museology from the Metropolitan 

Museum of Art and the Whitney 

Museum of American Art, Horace 

Brockington has held curator, 

historian, educator and art adviser 

roles with numerous museums, 

organizations and artists. In May, 

he was interviewed by artist Sandra 

Payne as part of the Hatch-Billops 

Collection’s Artist and Influence 

Series. He cofounded the public art 

organization, Art Across the Park, 

which was instrumental in creating 

some of the early contemporary sitespecific 

art works/projects in public 

parks throughout New York City. 

While updating my profile on 

LinkedIn, I came across Stanley 

Fertig, s.v.p. at HBO International. 

After taking a couple years break 

from his studies at Columbia 

(majoring in French), Stan went to 

Harvard for a Ph.D. in Romance 

languages and then to Yale School 

of Management, where he earned 

an M.B.A. Prior to moving to 

Executive Row for HBO, he was 

s.v.p. for Warner Music Group and 

Columbia Music Entertainment 

(Japan). 

Marc Kozinn practices cardiology 

in Buffalo, is on the faculty 

of SUNY-Buffalo and attending 

cardiologist at Erie County Medical 

Center, and does clinical research. 

He directs an echocardiography 

and non-invasive imaging lab, 

speaks and consults nationally for 

the pharmaceutical industry, and 

publishes in the field. Marc has 

been married to Betsy for 30 years. 

Their first granddaughter arrived 

in March. Wedding bells and additional 

baby showers are in store 

for the summer. 

At their 18th Annual Spring 

Benefit Auction, Columbia’s Community 

Impact (CI) presented its 

Eighth Annual “Making a Difference” 

Service Award to Elizabeth 

(Lisa) and Richard Witten. Richard 

is vice-chair of Columbia’s Board 

of Trustees and the senior managing 

director of The Orienta Group, 

an investment and advisory firm. 

Lisa is an executive committee 

member of the Hunter College 

Foundation and a director of the 

Fresh Air Fund. Richard and Elizabeth 

(Lisa) were recognized for 

their steadfast support of CI and 

their efforts to support education, 

public health and social services 

in the Columbia community. [See 

“Around the Quads.”] 

Next issue, I’ll be reporting on 

our 35th reunion. Go Lions! 

76 

Clyde Moneyhun 

Program in Writing and 

Rhetoric 

Serra Mall 450, Bldg. 460, 

Room 223 

Stanford University 

Stanford, CA 94305 

cam131@columbia.edu 

No notes this issue, friends. Send 

family and professional news to 

the address above, and I’ll make 

sure it gets into a future issue. 

77 

David Gorman 

111 Regal Dr. 

DeKalb, IL 60115 

dgorman@niu.edu 

Brief notes first. Rev. Thomas 

Worcester S.J. has been promoted 

from associate professor to professor 

of history at the College of the 

Holy Cross. Ron Fried was named 

as one of seven Norman Mailer 

Fellows and is spending a month 

in Provincetown, Mass., at the 

Norman Mailer Writers Colony 

working on a new novel, his third, 

I believe. Ron also mentions plans 

to take Damien Bona out to dinner 

for his birthday. 

The township of Edison, N.J., 

has a new business administrator 

— none other than Dennis 

Gonzalez. Dennis, who picked 

up a degree from Michigan Law, 

previously was the acting business 

administrator for Trenton, where 

he lives. He worked for Trenton in 

various capacities since 2000. 

Meanwhile, in April, Jim 

Shapiro, the Larry Miller Professor 

of English and Comparative 

Literature at Columbia, published 

a widely discussed and enthusiastically 

reviewed book, Contested Will: 

Who Wrote Shakespeare. This is Jim’s 

third book on Shakespeare, completely 

rethinking what many of us 

who teach English dismissed as a 

nutty sidetrack in literary studies, 

the debate over whether Shakespeare 

was indeed the author of 

the writings attributed to him. Not 

that there is any good reason for 

doubting that, but the motives and 

rationales of the deniers turn out to 

have multiple kinds of interest and 

significance. 

Best wishes to all! 

78 

Matthew Nemerson 

35 Huntington St. 

New Haven, CT 06511 

mnemerson@snet.net 

At the time of the last column, I 

was just going into a cast to repair 

my Achilles tendon, and now, a 

few months later, I am walking 

again and even visited New York 

recently without worry about how 

to use crutches to get around. So 

yes, time heals all. 

Some of our high-profile classmates 

have new roles. Jeffrey A. 

Moerdler, the New York practice 

leader of Mintz Levin’s Real Estate 

and Communications practices, 

has been appointed by New York 

State Governor David Paterson 

’77 and confirmed by the New 

York State Senate to serve as commissioner 

of the Port Authority of 

New York and New Jersey. Jeff will 

serve a five-year term. 

Jeff has been a general commercial 

real estate attorney for almost 

30 years, having represented large 

national companies, particularly in 

the high-tech, telecommunications, 

financial services, healthcare, supermarket, 

and oil and gas sectors. 

He has developed a practice in the 

intersection of real estate and communications 

issues. 

Given how challenging the next 

few years will be in and around 

New York government with major 

budget and political issues, Jeff will 

continue to be in a fascinating frontrow 

seat to how we manage to deal 

with some vexing problems. He has 

served in numerous governmental 

positions, including as the representative 

of the president pro tem 

of the New York State Senate on the 

New York State Financial Control 

Board, which provides review and 

oversight with respect to the financial 

management of the New York 

City government and related public 

authorities, and as a member of the 

New York State Banking Board. 

Jeff earned his J.D. at NYU and 

from 1981–82 served as a law clerk 

to the Honorable Charles L. Brieant 

’44, ’49L, United States district 

judge and later chief judge for the 

Southern District of New York. 

Another New York mover and 

shaker is Martin J. Cicco, and with 

the acquisition of his firm MJC 

Associates, a commercial real estate 

advisory boutique, Marty now is 

senior managing director and head 

of Evercore’s Real Estate Advisory 

practice. Marty, who will be based 

in New York, founded MJC Associates 

in January 2007. You may 

remember that prior to MJC Associates, 

Marty spent 29 years at 

Merrill Lynch, ultimately as vicechairman 

of Global Commercial 

Real Estate and global head of Real 

Estate Investment Banking. 

Marty has served on the advisory 

boards of the Business School’s Paul 

Milstein Center for Real Estate, the 

University of Wisconsin’s James A. 

Graaskamp Center for Real Estate 

and the Wharton School’s Samuel 

Zell and Robert Lurie Real Estate 

Center. In addition, he is an active 

member of the National Association 

of Real Estate Investment Trusts 

and The Real Estate Roundtable. 

Marty is a former trustee of both 

the Urban Land Institute and The 

International Council of Shopping 

Centers. In 2006, he received a John 

Jay Award for distinguished professional 

achievement from the College 

and in 2008 he was presented 

the Industry Achievement Award 

by NAREIT. 

Keeping with our New York 

theme, Tony Kushner’s latest play, 

The Intelligent Homosexual’s Guide to 

Capitalism and Socialism With a Key to 

the Scriptures, his first epic-size work 

about American life since his Pulitzer 

Prize-winning Angels in America: A 

Gay Fantasia on National Themes, in 


57

class notes 


the early 1990s, will have its New 

York premiere next spring in a coproduction 

by the Public Theater 

and the Signature Theater Company. 

The play, which explores politics, 

marriage, sex, radicalism and the 

labor movement under the roof of 

a retired longshoreman’s Brooklyn 

brownstone, was first produced 

under a commission from the Guthrie 

Theater in Minneapolis as part of 

a festival of Kushner plays last year. 

Michael Greif (Rent, Next to Normal) 

directed the Guthrie production, as 

he will the new one, which will run 

in the Public’s Newman Theater. 

The production is expected to cost 

slightly less than $1 million, with 

the Public and the Signature, both 

not-for-profit companies, sharing 

the cost. 

Tony said that the scope and 

themes of the play and its 11 characters 

remain intact from the Guthrie 

production, but that the script has 

also been influenced by his recent 

work editing volumes of plays by 

Arthur Miller. “If it feels at some 

point like a Broadway run is what 

should happen after this co-production, 

great,” he said. 

Now let’s move to Hollywood, 

where The Walt Disney Co. recently 

announced that James “Jay” Rasulo 

will become senior e.v.p. and CFO. 

Jay has been chairman of Disney 

Parks and Resorts and is a 23-year 

Disney veteran. In his new role, he 

will oversee the company’s worldwide 

finance organization, corporate 

strategy and development, brand 

management, corporate alliances, 

investor relations, treasury and risk 

management activities, controller 

functions, information systems, 

corporate responsibility, real estate 

and taxes. 

“Jay is a versatile executive who 

has done a great job over the last 

several years and has helped me to 

shape Disney’s strategic direction,” 

Disney President and CEO Robert 

A. Iger said. As part of this growth 

strategy, Jay has overseen a major 

expansion of Disney’s California 

Adventure at Disneyland Resort, 

which culminates with the opening 

of Cars Land in 2012, and of Hong 

Kong Disneyland, where work is 

under way on the creation of three 

original new lands. He also has led 

negotiations with the Chinese government 

to begin development of a 

new theme park in Shanghai. 

In addition to park expansion, 

Jay has been the principal architect 

of the growth of the award-winning 

Disney Cruise Line, which is adding 

two new ships, Disney Vacation 

Club and Adventures by Disney. Prior 

to becoming head of Disney Parks 

and Resorts in 2002, Jay greatly improved 

the operating performance 

of Disneyland Paris, now the No. 1 

tourist destination in Europe. 

Jay has been an advocate for the 

tourism industry, acting as chairman 

of the Travel Industry Association 

of America in 2006 and 2007. 

He was inducted into the Travel 

Industry Hall of Leaders in 2008. 

Jay joined Disney in 1986 as director, 

strategic planning and development, 

advancing to more senior 

positions there, and later became 

s.v.p., corporate alliances. He then 

led Disney Regional Entertainment 

before moving to Paris as president, 

Euro Disney, before becoming its 

chairman and CEO in 2000. A native 

New Yorker, Jay has an M.A. in 

economics and an M.B.A. from the 

University of Chicago. Before joining 

Disney, he held positions with 

Chase Manhattan Bank and the 

Marriott Corp. 

Finally, a real view from inside 

Hollywood through a recent blog 

of Peter McAlevey, president of 

Thunderbird Pictures. 

“I don’t think a lot of our classmates 

follow my blog, www.the 

wrap.com. I’d never pretend to 

be a book reviewer. On the other 

hand, it’s been years since I’ve read 

a book like Mark Harris’ Pictures 

at a Revolution: Five Movies and the 

Birth of the New Hollywood, now 

in paperback. Now, you have to 

understand, there’s a lot of jealousy 

here. For one thing, it seems like 

virtually everyone I know has won 

a Pulitzer Prize: My college roommate 

Tim Page (for criticism for The 

Washington Post), Ric Burns (for his 

documentary, The Civil War), playwright 

Tony Kushner (for Angels in 

America) and so on. 

“And now it’s Kushner’s companion 

Mark Harris’ turn for the 

kudos. But that’s not really what 

makes me jealous. Rather, it’s that I 

thought I had a lock on that old ‘anniversary 

year’ business … maybe 

my one great contribution to journalism. 

(Many would say my ‘only’ 

contribution.) You have to understand, 

until I came up with it over 

a couple of drinks with Mike Ruby 

(then foreign editor of Newsweek) 

and Mimi Sheils (business editor) 

and Lynn Langway (arts editor) at 

a steakhouse in Manhattan in 1983, 

no big magazine had ever run one 

of those now ubiquitous ‘that was 

the year that was’-style stories. 

“Even though I left Newsweek 

for Disney shortly after, Newsweek 

continued working on a piece built 

around 1968 and how it changed 

history, only to be beaten to the 

punch by Time magazine’s ‘Annus 

Mirabilus’ cover in 1988, looking 

back to 1968 from the Martin Luther 

King assignation to the riots in Chicago 

to Nixon’s election. Of course, 

today everyone’s doing it, from U.S. 

News & World Report’s recent ‘1957: 

The Year that Changed America’ 

to Newsweek’s finally running my 

‘1968’ issue last year, 40 years later! 

“Actually, I can’t take too much 

credit. When I was busy pitching 

the idea to my bosses at Newsweek 

over martinis, none of them realized 

I was just recycling a headline 

I’d found in the subway one day 

in ’78. In a leftist magazine titled 

Seven Days dropped on the subway, 

I read the headline: ‘1968, End of 

the Postwar World,’ written by that 

notorious German radical Danny 

the Red. 

“All I did was add 10 years to 

the concept! But the truth was, 

Danny was right: There are those 

‘moments in time,’ as someone 

once put it, when all the lines in 

history cross: In the case of 1968, 

it was not just assassinations and 

riots from Chicago and to Columbia 

itself … it was also the year of 

the Prague Spring (and the Russian 

crackdown), student riots that 

convulsed France, the Tet Offensive 

that led to the end of the Vietnam 

War and more. And in movies, as 

Harris points out, it was the year in 

which the Academy Awards almost 

equally split the difference between 

the ‘old’ Hollywood of big-budget 

musicals like The Sound of Music 

and historical epics like Cleopatra 

and Dr. Zhivago, and the ‘new’ Hollywood 

of The Graduate and Bonnie 

and Clyde that would lead, the next 

year, to Easy Rider (the movie that 

changed everything) and an era of 

unprecedented cinematic upheaval. 

(Go to the blog for a lot more 

fun copy.) 

“So, like I say, I’m jealous of all 

of them, from my friends with the 

Pulitzers to a writer like Harris 

who can manage such material 

to the filmmakers and producers, 

famous or not, who were there. 

“And now, thanks to this book, 

you can be jealous, too!” 

My daughter, Elana (20), and I 

visited New York in mid-May and 

decided to exercise my un-casted 

foot by touring the Columbia campus. 

Unbeknownst to us, it was 

Class Day and Commencement. 

The day was spectacular and, to 

conclude our Hollywood theme, 

the place looked like a movie set. 

Everything was first-class and 

the tents, seats, temporary stands 

and fences looked so much more 

upscale — may I say professional 

— than in our day that it was like 

watching Avatar and the original 

Star Trek back to back. We had 

real soul in our days, but wow, 

they sure do things in style today. 

Anyway, kudos to alma mater, the 

place seems to be doing just fine. 

79 

Robert Klapper 

8737 Beverly Blvd., Ste 303 

Los Angeles, CA 90048 

rklappermd@aol.com 

Congratulations to Frank Aquila, 

who recently was elected a member 

of the Council on Foreign Relations 

and received the 2010 Atlas Award 

as “Global M&A Lawyer of the 

Year.” In June, he received the 2010 

Burton Award for Legal Achievement 

and became chairman of the 

board of The NALP Foundation for 

Law Career Research and Education. 

Richard Milford updates us with 

news since Columbia. “I graduated 

from Mount Sinai School of Medicine 

in 1983. Completed orthopedic 

residency at Albert Einstein in 1988. 

Hand surgery fellowship in 1989. 

Practicing in Maryland since then, 

living in Hagerstown with my wife, 

Susan, and kids, Chris and Kate. 

“Recently got back from a week 

in Haiti. Our team went in week 

three post-earthquake. We had 

many of our supplies flown in with 

us — orthopedic implants, x-ray 

machine and anesthesia supplies 

— which significantly aided our 

productivity. Got to reacquaint 

myself with general orthopedic 

trauma and even a little low-level 

plastics (in my real life I’m a hand 

surgeon). We would scour the 

general medical clinics and tent cities 

of Port au Prince and Cité Soleil 

in our ‘ambulance’ (an appliance 

delivery truck with four mattresses 

thrown into the back) and bring the 

orthopedic cases that they couldn’t 

handle back to our hospital in Pierre 

Payen for surgery. One of the docs 

in our group did a direct human-tohuman 

transfusion of his blood (O 

negative) into one of our patients 

when there was no other source 

available. An immeasurable and 

overwhelming experience; I had 

half-heartedly wanted to do something 

overseas for some time, and 

the immediacy of the earthquake 

got me off the chair and into action. 

“Regards to various members 

of the Class of 1979 who have been 

with me at virtually all stages of 

my education: John Pagano and 

Tom Whelan (Saint Mel’s grammar 

school in Flushing); Joe Ferullo, 

Ray Dorado, Tim Murphy ’79E, Jim 

Hagan and Marc Libidois (Fordham 

Prep in the Bronx); Neville Alleyne, 

Jack Garden and Rob Haber 

(Mount Sinai School of Medicine); 

and Rob Riederman (Albert Einstein 

orthopedics). Now I don’t have 

to go to all those other reunions!” 

Rolando T. Acosta recently was 

appointed by the chief judge to the 

New York State Commission on 

Judicial Conduct. Rolando was 

elected to the New York City civil 

court in 1997. In 2001, he was named 

the acting Supreme Court justice to 

preside over, and spearhead the 

creation of, the Harlem Justice Center, 

a multi-jurisdictional problemsolving 

court. The following year, 

he was elected to the Supreme 

Court, and in 2008, he was appointed 

an associate justice of the 

Appellate Division, First Depart- 


58


class notes 

ment. Prior to becoming a judge, 

Rolando held various positions 

within the Legal Aid Society, including 

attorney in charge of the Civil 

Division in the Brooklyn Neighborhood 

Office and director of community 

relations. He also served as 

deputy commissioner for law enforcement 

and, subsequently, first 

deputy commissioner of the Commission 

on Human Rights. Rolando 

is the immediate past president of 

the Association of Judges of Hispanic 

Heritage, sits on the Board of 

Advisers of the Louis Stein Center 

for Law and Ethics at Fordham Law 

School and is a fellow of the New 

York Bar Foundation. 

Jeff Tolkin and his wife, Laurie, 

celebrate their 32nd anniversary 

this year. “We continue to live on 

Long Island in the town next to 

the one where we both grew up 

and are still happily in love after 

all these years. All three of our 

children are gainfully employed, 

which in this economy is something 

for which we are grateful 

(Michelle ’09 Business works at 

American Express). Remarkably, 

my travel business (World Travel 

Holdings) is going strong. We 

distribute cruises and villas. These 

two verticals are the best values in 

travel these days, and that is a key 

element to our success. For anyone 

interested, go to CruisesOnly.com 

for cruises and VillasofDistinction. 

com for villas. The villa business, 

while much smaller in scale than 

the cruise business, is a really cool 

business and is exploding. While 

most of our business is either families 

or groups of friends wanting to 

travel together, this year alone, we 

have booked a singing star, a number 

of NFL stars, numerous other 

celebrities and a king. We called 

the king’s assistant to ask how they 

got to us, and she said Google. 

Thomas Friedman has it right: The 

world is flat, and the power of the 

Internet and information is king!” 

Robert C. Klapper: Although 

it has been three decades since we 

were tortured by this institution (I 

mean that in a loving way, Peter 

Pouncey), I have a daily reminder 

in my bedroom of those hallowed 

days. My wife has allowed me to 

keep at home the simple oak stool 

where I sit and put my shoes and 

socks on every morning. This oak 

stool, which was recently repaired 

by my next door neighbor (the Bob 

Vila of Ventura, Calif.) is the same 

stool that Jack Garden and I used 

to audition acts for the Furnald Folk 

Fest during our senior year. We 

produced this show, as some of you 

may remember, and I will never 

forget the highlight of the auditions 

where a young Barnard student sat 

on that stool and with her very first 

words, Jack looked at me with eyes 

wide open listening to this incredible 

voice (the previous singer had 

sounded like a dying raccoon). This 

American Idol find of ours was none 

other than Suzanne Vega. What a 

memory! Let me know if you have 

a special Columbia memory (and I 

don’t mean herpes). 

80 

Michael C. Brown 

London Terrace Towers 

410 W. 24th St., Apt. 18F 


mcbcu80@yahoo.com 

Thank you to all who attended 

Alumni Reunion Weekend in June 

and to all who contributed to our 

reunion Class Gift. The Reunion 

Committee did a fantastic job putting 

together a wonderful weekend, 

and it was great to reconnect 

with classmates after 30 years 

away from alma mater. 

[Editor’s note: Because of CCT’s 

publishing schedule, reports from 

reunion will be published in the 

September/October issue.] 

Dion Kekatos was back on campus; 

he is a partner at Seeger Weiss 

in New York City. He has significant 

experience in civil litigation 

and has handled many complex 

cases on both the federal and state 

level. A lifelong New Yorker, Dion 

has served in various roles for 

the U.S. Attorney in the Southern 

District. 

Phil Adkins checked in from 

London, where he runs Cadenza 

International, which provides 

investment banking and corporate 

finance advice specialized to companies 

in the Far East. 

I urge you all to make it to Baker 

Field this fall to watch the football 

team play. Coach Norries Wilson 

and his staff have done a fine job 

with player development, and we 

are excited about the prospect for 

this season. 

Please feel free to drop me a line 

at mcbcu80@yahoo.com. 

81 

Jeff Pundyk 

20 E. 35th St., Apt. 8D 


jpundyk@yahoo.com 

It’s a sad state of affairs. A sad, sad 

state of affairs, indeed. How sad 

I’ve been writing this column for 

some years now and for all those 

years, Ed Klees has been pestering 

me to mention him. He’s tried 

exaggerating things; he’s tried 

outright making things up; he’s 

begged; he’s cried; he’s sworn any 

number of blood oaths. And for 

all of those years I’ve managed to 

fend him off. How Because I’ve 

had so much other material that 

there simply wasn’t enough room 

without encroaching on territory 

already ceded to the Class of ’82. 

Well this time out, you leave me no 

choice. Submissions are few and 

uncharacteristically economical. 

I’m forced to include an item from 

Ed, if only to hold off the Class of 

’80 from inching into our beloved 

space. Take this as a warning. This 

time out you’ll hear from Ed; next 

time I may be forced to recount any 

number of Pundyk family dinner 

conversations. 

So, what’s up with Ed He 

recently was appointed chair of 

the regulatory subcommittee of 

the American Bar Association’s 

Committee on Institutional Investors. 

Ed is general counsel at the 

University of Virginia Investment 

Management Co. Or so he claims. 

Vladimir Berezansky Jr. became 

the head of compliance for VTB 

Capital in Moscow. Vlad is returning 

to Moscow from Geneva, where he 

headed compliance for the Russia/ 

CIS region at a major Swiss bank. 

You can follow Vlad at his (stubbornly 

English-language) blog: 

www.nashagazeta.ch. 

Marc B. Mazur, chair of Elsworthy 

Capital Management, has been 

appointed director of Fibrocell Science, 

a biotechnology company. 

Kevin Fay reports that two of 

his daughters had graduations this 

year: Courtney from UVA and Emily 

from Episcopal H.S. Courtney 

is going to stay in school, as she 

has been accepted to the Curry 

School of Education at UVA. Emily 

is going to start in the fall at James 

Madison University. 

Daniel Gordis reports from 

Israel: “My Saving Israel: How the 

Jewish People Can Win a War that 

May Never End recently won the 

2009 National Jewish Book Award.” 

So, all, you’ve been amply 

warned. This issue you heard from 

Ed. Send copious and verbose 

updates to jpundyk@yahoo.com 

or who knows what I may publish 

next … 

82 

Andrew Weisman 

710 Lawrence Ave. 

Westfield, NJ 07090 

weisman@comcast.net 

Greetings, gentlemen. As I put digit 

to keyboard, the spring is turning to 

summer, the SEC is turning Goldman, 

Tiger Woods is turning to golf 

(failing to qualify for a tournament 

for the first time since 2005; his grip 

doesn’t appear as steady, insert 

your inappropriate comment here 

…), BP is turning the Gulf Coast 

into an unprecedented ecological 

disaster area and a young man’s 

mind turns to thoughts of love; 

it’s my anniversary today, 24 years 

married to my beautiful wife, Jody 

(née Abramowitz) ’84 Barnard. 

Seems like just a moment. 

Checking in this period, the 

ever-dangerous Dr. Donald F. Ferguson. 

Donald is a Kenpo Karate 

black belt and four-year student 

of Krav Maga, a particularly lethal 

martial art also known as Israeli 

jujitsu. For those of you who are 

new to blood sports, Krav Maga 

is used by the IDF Special Forces 

units, and several closely related 

variations have been developed 

and adopted by law enforcement 

and intelligence organizations 

including the Mossad, Shin Bet, the 

FBI, SWAT units of the NYPD and 

United States special operations 

forces. Rumor has it that this martial 

art was developed in response 

to a group of soldiers being fed 

kasha varnishkes, which was so 

lacking in flavor that several of 

them became enraged and struck 

out viciously at the barrack’s cook. 

When pressed on the martial 

arts issue by yours truly, Donald 

responded: “I am hoping the UFC 

starts a division for overweight 

people 50 or older. I am really 

looking forward to using everything 

I learned in Contemporary 

Civilization. I would first engage 

my 50-plus-year-old, overweight 

opponent in a Socratic Dialogue 

and then pounce when he least 

expects it. Just like a CC professor.” 

In between workouts, Donald 

recently managed to become CTO, 

distinguished engineer and e.v.p. 

of CA (formerly known as Computer 

Associates). 

A big congratulations on this is 

clearly in order! I did a little background 

checking and also discovered 

that Donald earned a Ph.D. in 

computer science from Columbia in 

1989, was appointed an IBM Fellow 

in 2001, chief architect for IBM’s 

Software Group and was named by 

ChannelWeb one of “25 Technology 

Thought Leaders For 2010.” 

Pretty impressive. I’m guessing 

the clock on his microwave doesn’t 

constantly blink 12:00. 

Keep those e-mails coming. 

Cheers! 

83 

Roy Pomerantz 

Babyking/Petking 

182-20 Liberty Ave. 

Jamaica, NY 11412 

bkroy@msn.com 

If the nomination of Elena Kagan 

(HLS ’86) to the Supreme Court is 

confirmed, I will have a law school 

classmate on the Supreme Court. 

President Barack Obama and 

Kagan both were members of the 

University of Chicago law school 

faculty. Elena’s mother, Gloria 

Kagan, taught my wife at Hunter 

elementary school/high school 

in Manhattan, a feeder school for 

Columbia and Kagan’s secondary 

school alma mater. While it is 

humbling to have classmates like 


59

class notes 


Kagan and Obama, it is also intellectually 

bonding to have shared in 

their academic experience. 

I spent most of April in China 

conducting business. Thomas 

Friedman, The New York Times columnist, 

is right: The world is flat. 

After years of searching for several 

day-old U.S. newspapers, I was 

now able to instantly download 

(for 99 cents) the Times and Wall 

Street Journal on my Kindle. My 

BlackBerry provided immediate 

access to e-mail. The new, five-star 

Ritz Carlton in Guangzhou (15 

minutes from the biannual Canton 

Fair) rivals any New York hotel. 

I used to survive on soup and 

noodles at the Canton Fair. Dining 

options now include Papa John’s, 

McDonald’s and even a kosher 

food court. Skype gave me a free 

and instant audio and visual connection 

to my family. The factory I 

visited in Guangzhou had wireless 

Internet access. And the nonstop, 

15-hour flight from Newark to 

Hong Kong is a dream come true 

after decades of having to endure a 

several-hour stopover in Tokyo. 

I hired a driver to take me from 

Guangzhou, China, to Hong Kong. 

The level of development in even 

the most remote towns in southern 

China is daunting. Some U.S. reporters 

claim China’s economy is a 

bubble that will soon burst. I have 

spent the last 20 years building 

partnerships with Chinese business 

people and am awed by their 

work ethic, technological sophistication, 

entrepreneurial spirit and 

talent. Despite a highly flawed 

government, China thrives based 

on privatization, risk-taking, profit 

incentive and industry. If we are to 

compete, we need to examine the 

underlying basis for their success. 

There continues, however, to be 

an unfortunate disconnect between 

the economic growth in Asia and 

political reform. This was most 

evident by the unrest in Bangkok, 

forcing me to cancel my trip there 

at the last minute. 

Wayne Allyn Root: “This is the 

story that the teachers’ unions wish 

had never happened. This is the 

story that proves all their hysterical 

demands for more money are nothing 

but a sham. This is the personal 

story of my daughter, Dakota Root. 

In each of the books I’ve written, I’ve 

taken great care to acknowledge my 

beautiful and brilliant little girl. 

“Dakota has been home-schooled 

since birth. While other kids spent 

their school days being indoctrinated 

to believe competition and winning 

are unimportant, and that others 

are to blame for their shortcomings 

and failures, Dakota was learning 

the value of work ethic, discipline, 

sacrifice and personal responsibility. 

While other kids were becoming 

experts at partying, Dakota and 

her dad debated current events at 

the dinner table. While other kids 

shopped and gossiped, Dakota was 

devouring books on science, math, 

history, literature, politics and business. 

I often traveled to business 

events and political speeches with 

my home-schooled daughter in 

tow. While other kids came home 

to empty homes, Dakota’s mom, 

dad or both were there every day 

to share meals and a bedtime kiss 

and prayer. While others were out 

learning to drive so they could attend 

more parties or experimenting 

with alcohol and drugs, Dakota 

was practicing the sport she loves, 

fencing, with dedication, intensity 

and passion. The result She became 

one of the elite junior fencers in 

America, winning the Pacific Coast 

Championship and representing the 

United States at World Cup events in 

Germany and Austria. 

“Was all the discipline and sacrifice 

worth it Recently, Dakota 

achieved her lifelong dream. She 

was accepted at both Harvard and 

Stanford. She also was accepted 

at Columbia, Penn, Brown, Duke, 

Chicago, UC Berkeley, USC and 

several more of the elite schools 

in America, an unheard-of record 

for a home-school kid. At a time of 

educational freefall, it is a remarkable 

story. With America’s public 

school system ranked at or near the 

bottom of the industrialized world 

(and Nevada near the bottom of 

that), with record dropout rates, 

grade inflation, violence, gangs, 

drugs, teen pregnancies, and the 

scandal of graduating high school 

seniors requiring remedial math 

and reading before starting college, 

Dakota’s story offers hope. Dakota 

proves the American Dream is 

alive, if only we’d stop depending 

on government to save us. 

“The sad reality is that teachers’ 

unions and government aren’t the 

solution. They are the problem. Our 

public schools get worse every year, 

yet teachers’ unions demand more 

money. Dakota proves it doesn’t 

take a state-certified teacher, or a 

teachers’ union or a village to raise 

a child. It only takes two loving 

parents who give a damn. One 

home-schooled girl has driven a 

stake through the heart of the public 

school education sham. ‘Home 

school to Harvard’ is a powerful 

story that every parent should be 

allowed to offer their children.” 

Steve Greenfield: “I have posted 

my music survey for 2009 (and just 

four months and a bit after the year 

ended!) on my blog, Permanent 

Transience, http://permanentran 

sience.blogspot.com. Although it is 

exceedingly long (a new personal 

high of 66 CDs were reviewed this 

year), I hope you will click on the 

link and take a look. I will probably 

soon add my top 100 pop albums 

of the decade, which will be a much 

shorter entry. 

“I am an editor and writer who 

has contributed freelance to the 

website Culture Catch, to CD NOW 

(back when it was independent and 

had its own content) and to several 

music publications you likely have 

never heard of. 

“A year overshadowed by the 

bizarre, pathetic and avoidable 

death of Michael Jackson on June 25 

also will be remembered for Kanye 

West’s gauche antics, interrupting 

the MTV Video Music Awards 

presentation to Taylor Swift for best 

female video to argue that Beyoncé 

deserved it more, and for the annoying 

ubiquity of the Jonas Brothers 

and Miley Cyrus, not to mention 

certain moody vampire/werewolf 

types on the silver screen. Bob 

Dylan released a Christmas album, 

and WFMU listeners had numerous 

suggestions for song titles (‘Harsh, 

the Hard Old Angel Stings,’ ‘O 

Little Ton of Deathlyphlegm,’ ‘I’ll Be 

Hoarse for Christmas’). Ken Freedman, 

WFMU’s station manager, 

threatened to keep playing tracks 

from the Dylan record until listeners 

donated a threshold amount to 

the broadcaster. A sure sign of the 

apocalypse came toward the end 

of the year, with the emergence of a 

self-possessed, 15-year-old muskrat 

with blow-dried hair named Justin 

Bieber as the new teen heartthrob. 

In more considered news from 2009, 

blues/roots guitarist Elijah Wald 

wrote a book, How the Beatles Destroyed 

Rock ’n’ Roll: An Alternative 

History of American Popular Music. I 

looked just at the eyebrow-raising 

title chapter and thought it was 

ridiculous. Whatever Wald’s merits 

as a writer and musician, grotesque 

overgeneralizations like ‘black 

popular music is superior to white 

popular music’ (I am paraphrasing) 

ought not to stand unchallenged. 

Wald’s argument is that black musicians 

typically had to scratch out a 

living in the industry and therefore 

learned craftsmanship in songwriting. 

White musicians, by contrast, 

were given more resources through 

fatter recording contracts, enabling 

them (from the Beatles onward) the 

luxury of noodling around in the 

studio, with detrimental effects on 

the music by moving it away from 

its essence. Since I am not any kind 

of a rock ’n’ roll fundamentalist, I 

do not buy this line of reasoning. 

“For the second year running, 

I will list my top 10 pop/rock records 

(original releases only) here 

in order of preference. For 2009, 

I thought about eliminating the 

Latin and ‘world’ (miscellaneous) 

categories and grouping under the 

rubric of pop anything not jazz 

or classical. In the end, I decided 

that there is still some usefulness 

in maintaining separate classifications, 

though I moved much of the 

Latin material (and one African 

record) that had aspirations toward 

mainstream pop into the primary 

section, making these CDs eligible 

for Album of the Year. The year in 

music was not an outstanding one, 

but neither was it the weakest I 

have witnessed this decade. Some 

interesting pairings can be made 

from the records in the survey, 

starting with the euphonious coincidence 

that albums titled Ay Ay Ay 

and Hu Hu Hu both made the top- 

10 list. The survey contains two 

records from Philadelphia bands 

(Espers and A Sunny Day in Glasgow) 

and two from 6-foot female 

singers from the United Kingdom, 

one backed by a band (Florence 

Welch of Florence + the Machine) 

and the other not (Imogen Heap). 

There were two epic-scale productions 

(Oneida’s triple-disc Rated 

O and the Decemberists’ rockoperatic 

The Hazards of Love). Also, 

two bands with Japanese names 

(Asobi Seksu and Nisennenmondai), 

two albums with national 

capitals (from opposite ends of 

Eurasia) in their titles (Goodnight 

Oslo and Destination Tokyo), two 

from electronica-geek specialists 

(Étienne Jaumet and Thomas 

Watkiss), and one CD from a wan 

Air imitator (Au Revoir Simone) to 

pair with the real thing (Air’s not 

very good Love 2). Several worthwhile 

acts narrowly missed the top 

10 list, notably Regina Spektor’s 

Far, Espers’s III and Nisennenmondai’s 

Destination Tokyo. At the other 

end of the scale, particularly disappointing 

were Forro in the Dark’s 

Light a Candle, Asobi Seksu’s Citrus, 

Passion Pit’s Manners, and Peter 

Bjorn and John’s Living Thing. In 

the realm of retrospectives, the 

compilation of the music of Ethiopia’s 

Mulatu Astatke, New York- 

Addis-London: The Story of Ethio Jazz 

1965-1975, will be a revelation to 

those (myself included) who had 

never been exposed to his work, 

and the special expanded edition 

of Radiohead’s OK Computer with 

alternate takes and bonus tracks 

is well worth a hearing. In jazz, 

new recordings by the Steve Lehman 

Octet, the Vijay Iyer Trio and 

Medeski Martin & Wood stood 

out. The year in classical music saw 

noteworthy releases from the collective 

Alarm Will Sound and from 

Chen Yi, as well as a reconstruction 

of the Ninth Symphony of the late 

Alfred Schnittke by Alexander 

Raskatov. Album of the Year honors 

go to Animal Collective for 

Merriweather Post Pavilion. Over the 

course of the decade, this band has 

been growing in confidence while 

avoiding the pitfalls of hubris and 

pretension. It has also managed 

to stay out of a creative rut, even 

as it continues to make music the 


60


class notes 

same way it has all along — childlike, 

volatile, hard to pin down, yet 

streaked with brilliance. The list of 

the top 10 follows: 

“1. Animal Collective, Merriweather 

Post Pavilion 

“2. Broadcast and the Focus 

Group, Broadcast and the Focus Group 

Investigate Witch Cults of the Radio Age 

“3. Zero 7, Yeah Ghost 

“4. Black Moth Super Rainbow, 

Eating Us 

“5. Flight of the Conchords, I 

Told You I Was Freaky 

“6. The Fiery Furnaces, I’m Going 

Away 

“7. Matías Aguayo, Ay Ay Ay 

“8. Metric, Fantasies 

“9. Natalia Lafourcade, Hu Hu Hu 

“10. Robyn Hitchcock & the 

Venus 3, Goodnight Oslo” 

Michael Marzec, publisher and 

COO of Smart Business Network, 

attended the Journalism School and 

recently participated in his 25th 

J-School reunion. Michael encourages 

all classmates to check out his 

website, www.sbonline.com. In 

the past several years, SmartBusiness 

has expanded from four to 19 

publications. It specializes in local 

business-to-business management 

publications offering management 

strategies to build a successful 

corporate culture. The company is 

in most major markets including 

Chicago, Los Angeles, Atlanta, Dallas 

and Philadelphia and has both a 

print and online presence catering 

largely to mid-level executives. It 

has published feature stories on 

Wayne Huizenga (Blockbuster), Ted 

Turner (CNN) and John Paul Dejoria 

(Paul Mitchell). 

Michael has been married to 

Paula Huber, an accountant, for 

more than 21 years. Their daughter 

Julie is a sophomore at the University 

of Cincinnati. Their daughter 

Megan is a junior in high school 

and interested in design. 

Looking forward to seeing you 

at some Columbia football games 

this fall! 

84 

Dennis Klainberg 

Berklay Cargo Worldwide 

JFK Intl. Airport 

Box 300665 

Jamaica, NY 11430 

dennis@berklay.com 

When Professor Karl-Ludwig Selig 

calls — and he is gracious enough 

to do so quite often, especially to 

wish this writer a hearty “Good 

Shabbos” each Friday afternoon — 

my staff is instructed never to place 

him on hold and to ensure that I 

drop everything, for, I can say with 

absolute certainty, that whatever the 

topic, he will share a lesson in life 

that will prove both remarkable and 

au courant, as if he were once again 

teaching us with his passion for the 

“text” and his guilty pleasure Interview 

magazine. As our incarnation 

of Don Quixote, he warns of the 

dangers and pitfalls of growing old 

in America and pities us all with “la 

lucha de la vida.” But despite the 

physical pain and daily suffering he 

endures since his stroke, his mind 

is as active as ever, and he is no less 

anxious to discuss current events 

and the books he is reading. Overall, 

Professor Selig wishes to stay 

connected to Columbia and reach 

out to his beloved students. 

One such student, a Londonbased 

managing director at 

Morgan Stanley, recently surprised 

him. “On a recent weekend visit 

to NYC, John Travis reconnected 

with former adviser and professor 

Karl-Ludwig Selig over coffee on 

the Upper West Side. Swathed in a 

paisley silk scarf, the professor, true 

to form, traversed a wide range 

of topics including Don Quixote, 

literary perspectives on border 

crossings, the importance of the 

book in a digital age, memories of 

Kristallnacht, Barcelona, Bologna, 

London hotels and bookshops, 

Richard Wagner, Arturo Toscanini, 

President Barack Obama ’83, The 

New York Review of Books, Columbia 

bureaucracy and esteemed former 

colleagues, including professors 

Joseph Bauke, Wallace Gray and 

Peter Pouncey. 

John, in turn, shared some highlights 

of the years since graduation: 

yielding to the charms of GSAS 

dropout Gabriela Herzog, swearing 

allegiance to The Queen and siring 

two children, Maximilian ’11 and 

Cosima ’13. John moved from NYC 

to London in 1993 after practicing 

law at Sullivan & Cromwell and 

now is at Morgan Stanley, focusing 

on raising equity for clients in Europe, 

Africa and the Middle East. 

Elsewhere on the Upper West 

Side, John caught up with his 

boarding school roommate Barak 

Zimmerman over smoked fish at the 

renowned “Sturgeon King,” Barney 

Greengrass. They walked off lunch 

with a reminiscent, 45-block stroll 

down Broadway. Barak, who moved 

back to the Upper West Side four 

years ago from Los Angeles, is a web 

consultant with clients in entertainment, 

toys and healthcare. (Yes, he 

likes to play doctor.) He was looking 

forward to summer, when he bikes 

the city and canoes the Hudson. He 

says the water isn’t as toxic as it used 

to be. 

Mazel tov, Jay Lefkowitz and 

Julius Genachowski ’85, on being 

awarded the 2010 Seixas Award 

by Columbia/Barnard Hillel and 

The Kraft Family Center for Jewish 

Student Life. 

Jay is a senior litigation partner 

in the NYC office of Kirkland and 

Ellis and a member of the firm’s 

Worldwide Management Committee. 

During the administration 

of President George W. Bush, he 

served first as deputy assistant 

for domestic policy, then general 

counsel in the Office of Management 

and Budget, and finally, as 

special envoy on human rights in 

North Korea. 

Years earlier, Jay served as director 

of cabinet affairs and deputy 

executive secretary to the Domestic 

Policy Council for President 

George H.W. Bush. 

Jay was active in the Soviet Jewry 

movement and has represented the 

United States at the U.N. Human 

Rights Commission in Geneva, as 

well as at the International Conference 

on Anti-Semitism sponsored 

by the Organization for Security 

and Cooperation in Europe, in 

Berlin. He lives in New York with 

his wife, Elena Neuman, and their 

three children. 

Gideon Rosen is delighted to 

report that his daughter, Grace, 

will be joining the Class of 2014. 

Gideon teaches philosophy at 

Princeton, where he lives with 

his wife, Lisa; Grace; son, Simon, 

(Class of 2021); and a fox terrier 

named Harvey Rosen, who is 

definitely not college material. 

Greg Deligdisch, v.p. of marketing, 

Patina Restaurant Group, is 

thrilled to have moved back to the 

Upper West Side at the beginning of 

April. After 17-plus years in Chelsea, 

it feels good to be “back home,” 

or close to it, on beautiful Riverside 

Drive in the low 90s. Now, V&T is 

but a brisk 15 minute walk — not a 

subway ride — away! 

After 15 years in a business 

partnership, Richard Manion 

“left to start my own Los Angeles 

architectural firm, Richard Manion 

Architecture. I continue to specialize 

in luxury private residences, largely 

on the West Coast, but also work in 

New York and overseas. I have two 

apartments at 15 Central Park West 

among my New York projects and 

10 houses in Shanghai, in addition 

to eight residences in California. It 

has been exciting to design apartments 

at 15 CPW, a building conceived 

by a former mentor, Robert 

A.M. Stern ’60, for whom I worked 

in the mid-1980s. A monograph of 

my work will be published in 2011 

by Images Publishing, as part of its 

New Classicist series in architecture, 

and any interested classmates can 

view some of my projects at www. 

richardmanion.com.” 

Madhu Alagiri checks in for the 

first time! “I went to medical school 

and then onto a urology residency 

in Philadelphia. After that, I took 

a pediatric surgical fellowship in 

San Diego and stayed on at UC San 

Diego as an associate professor of 

surgery. I am married with girl-boy 

twins (11) and a daughter (7). We 

have become used to the Southern 

California lifestyle but still miss 

New York. I plan to come to the 

30th reunion.” 

David Adler produced the 

NOVA documentary Mind Over 

Money (about behavioral economics), 

which aired on PBS on April 27. 

The president of WGBH is Jonathan 

Abbott, who also is a neighbor of 

Ben Pushner, who recently joined 

a Providence-based law firm, Rob 

Levine & Associates, which handles 

primarily plaintiffs personal injury 

and residential real estate in Rhode 

Island, Massachusetts and Connecticut. 

“I am admitted in all three 

states. Counsel referrals encouraged. 

Commuting regularly to Providence 

but still happy to be living in Newton, 

Mass., with my wife and fifthand 

seventh-grade daughters, and 

2-year-old black lab mix we adopted 

from a shelter when he was a puppy. 

Also happy to hear at any time from 

classmates who are passing through 

Providence or Boston.” 

Reggie Henderson, Phi Ep 

member and former school recordholder 

in the pole vault, caught up 

with us. His post-Columbia path 

led back to Rochester to get an 

M.S. in computer science from RIT. 

Reggie then returned to NYC and 

worked for a commodity trading 

firm, Mint Investment. Next it was 

off to Tokyo, where he worked for 

Mitsui, Citibank and finally financial 

risk management software and 

advisory firm The Kamakura Corp. 

(www.kamakuraco.com), where he 

is now a v.p. But not in Japan anymore. 

Since starting with Kamakura 

in 1995 (in the seaside area around 

Kamakura, Japan), Reggie has 

returned to his beloved Rochester 

from where he telecommutes to the 

new Kamakura Headquarters in 

Waikiki. Reggie is still pole vaulting 

(including a recent jump of 12 

feet, 2 inches), and his son, Shawn, 

also is a pole vaulter, leading the 

high school pack in Rochester and 

hoping to attend Syracuse in 2011. 

Reggie’s also finding a lot of fellow 

alumni on Facebook. 

“N.J. Burkett, Channel 7, Eyewitness 

News” ... or as we know him, 

Newton J. Burkett, was able to take 

a moment from his extraordinarily 

busy and successful life to check 

in. “I am still processing all that I 

witnessed in Haiti, where I spent a 

week on assignment after the earthquake. 

The scope of the destruction 

and human suffering was impossible 

to convey on television. Apart 

from 9-11, it may be the greatest 

catastrophe I’ve ever seen.” 

In addition to receiving Emmy 

Award nominations this year 

(already a three-time winner in his 

career), N.J.’s station, WABC-TV, 

was honored with the coveted 

Edward R. Murrow Award from 

the Radio Television Digital News 

Association for Newton’s coverage 


61

class notes 


of Israel’s war with Hamas in Gaza 

in January 2009. 

N.J. lives in Long Island with 

his wife, Margy, and children, Jay 

and Amanda. [Editor’s note: CCT 

profiled Burkett in September/October 

2006: www.college.columbia. 

edu/cct_archive/sep_oct06/cover. 

php.] 

And this “just in” from Bill Reggio: 

“My son, Billy, is a sophomore 

at the Engineering School and is 

having the time of his life. And, my 

daughter, Katie, was just accepted 

to Columbia College! A true-blue 

Columbia family.” 

85 

Jon White 

16 South Ct. 

Port Washington, NY 

11050 

jw@whitecoffee.com 

Although I am writing this column 

before our 25th Alumni Reunion 

Weekend, you will be reading it 

after … so please be patient, as the 

next column will be chock-full of 

reunion updates. 

In the meantime, Judah Cohen 

lives in Newton, Mass., outside of 

Boston, with his wife, Sherri Cohen 

(née Rabinovitz) ’91 Barnard; their 

daughter, Gabriella (14); and twin 

sons, Jordan and Jonathon (12). 

Judah works for AER doing climaterelated 

research, consulting and 

seasonal forecasts. He also holds a 

research affiliate appointment in the 

civil and environmental engineering 

department at MIT. “One of the accomplishments 

of which I am most 

proud is that I have received funding 

from both the U.S. and Russian 

governments for my new ideas and 

approach to seasonal forecasting. 

Something hard to imagine back 

when we were students at Columbia 

and Russia was the ‘evil empire.’ 

I am in touch with David Avigan, 

Barry Kanner, Martin Moskovitz, 

David Reich and Barry Schwartz,” 

Judah said. 

On the home front, I was privileged 

to attend Admitted Students 

Day. Our son, Isaac ’14, went to 

an activities fair (where he signed 

up for half a dozen activities on all 

ends of the spectrum, from College 

Democrats and the Science Magazine, 

to the Marching Band and 

Glee Club), ate in Jay (we walked 

around on Jay 14 and Carman 7 — 

looked amazingly like it did nearly 

30 years ago), was entertained by a 

series of a cappella groups, took a 

coach bus tour around Manhattan, 

returned for a midnight run to the 

Spectator offices and Koronet Pizza, 

slept with two other students in a 

room on Jay 6 and texted us at 3:20 

a.m. He came home the next day, 

having heard David Helfand and 

several other presentations, commenting 

that he was missing being 

at Columbia already. It is a truly 

wild experience to participate as a 

parent in this process. 

86 

Everett Weinberger 

50 W. 70th St., Apt. 3B 


everett6@gmail.com 

By the time you read this, we’ll 

know how John Chachas did in 

the Nevada Republican U.S. Senate 

primary in June. In late April, 

I heard John speak at a fundraiser 

in Sam Katz’s beautiful apartment, 

joined by Michael Lustig. John is 

facing a competitive race for the 

Republican nomination in Nevada, 

especially from Sue Lowden, a former 

Nevada state senator and Miss 

New Jersey. Whatever the outcome 

John, we’re proud of you! 

Ellen Bossert, a Columbia 

basketball star and inductee in the 

Columbia University Athletics Hall 

of Fame, recently met with Governor 

Arnold Schwarzenegger in Sacramento 

as part of the Green California 

Summit. She leads the marketing 

area for Philips Color Kinetics in 

Burlington, Mass. The company 

works with large-scale color “solidstate 

lighting” displays and fixtures. 

Ellen has an M.B.A. from Harvard. 

Congratulations to Michael 

Mundaca for being appointed by 

President Barack Obama ’83 as 

assistant secretary for tax policy at 

the Treasury Department. Michael 

also served under Presidents Bill 

Clinton and George W. Bush in the 

Treasury from 1995–2002, handling 

international tax and electronic 

commerce matters. In between Treasury 

stints, he was a partner with 

Ernst & Young in Washington, D.C. 

He collected three post-Columbia 

degrees: a master’s in philosophy 

from Chicago, a law degree from 

UC Berkeley and master’s in law 

from the University of Miami. 

Readers of New York magazine 

in March may have seen David 

Rakoff’s essay in the “My First 

New York” issue. Next to a photo 

of David as a freshman in John Jay 

was his essay about the dangerous 

but thrilling Columbia neighborhood 

of the early 1980s. I will leave 

you with an excerpt: 

“New York in 1982 was only 

beginning to shake off the traces of 

its Ford to City: Drop Dead near 

bankruptcy. Infrastructure was still 

crumbling, the subways were still 

covered in graffiti. The term yuppie 

would not be commonplace for another 

few years (and it would be at 

least that amount of time before the 

city opened its first Banana Republic 

or Cajun restaurant to clothe and 

feed them). Coffee still meant a paper 

cupful from Chock Full O’Nuts. 

There was a remaining franchise at 

116th Street and Broadway, probably 

unchanged since 1961, still boasting 

its undulating lunch counter in 

butter cream Formica, while one 

block down, a warning shot across 

the caffeinated bow of the neighborhood, 

was a doomed black-lacquer 

establishment with the almost 

parodically striving name Crêpes 

and Cappuccino. The owners had 

wrapped the sickly tree out front 

in bright blue fairy lights, which 

illuminated the empty interior in a 

dejected glow. It lasted less than a 

year. The colossus towering over this 

particular moment shuddering between 

decadence and recovery was 

not Bartholdi’s Lady Liberty but the 

first of Calvin Klein’s bronzed gods, 

high above Times Square. Leaning 

back, eyes closed, in his blinding 

white underpants against a sinuous 

form in similarly white Aegean 

plaster, his gargantuan, sleeping, 

groinful beauty was simultaneously 

Olympian and intimate, awesome 

and comforting. Here was the city 

in briefs: uncaring, cruelly beautiful 

and out of reach.” 

Read the full piece here: http:// 

nymag.com/news/features/64944/ 

index1.html. 

87 

Sarah A. Kass 

PO Box 300808 


sarahkassUK@gmail.com 

As promised in the last issue, Annie 

Fils-Aime Joseph has graciously 

offered to share her reflections on 

bringing her experience as a doctor, 

a Haitian and a human to help 

some of the many affected by the 

earthquake. This is her story. 

“I was so busy when the news 

hit. Evening clinic was in full swing. 

An earthquake seemed almost 

ridiculous to me. My first thought 

was ‘Why Haiti’ The last thing Haiti 

needed was another disaster — of 

any kind. No one had any idea how 

bad things were till later that night. 

“The next few sleepless nights 

were spent in collective shock, glued 

to CNN. No word from family, 

friends — only silence greeted our 

persistent and futile cell phone 

attempts. Once the extent of the 

catastrophe became clear, there was 

no question — I had to go. The details 

of when and how were quickly 

decided. Gaskov Clergé Foundation, 

a nonprofit organization that I have 

worked with for years, would put 

together a disaster mission, with rotating 

groups of medical professionals, 

one week each. Local lodging 

and transportation were secured. 

Having participated in previous missions 

to Haiti’s southern province, I 

felt I would be prepared for what lay 

ahead. I was comfortable with working 

under less-than-pristine conditions. 

Nothing could have prepared 

me for the devastation. 

“I have never been to war, but the 

streets of Port-au-Prince resemble 

sets for a bad war film. Rubble and 

dust are everywhere. Two-story 

homes and businesses flattened. 

Others are severely damaged, 

leaning precariously into the streets 

or over the adjacent properties. Impromptu, 

disorganized ‘tent’ cities 

— little more than lean-to’s covered 

with sheets, plastic bags or pieces of 

tarp — are strewn everywhere any 

public square or roadside clearing 

once existed. Large piles of refuse 

cover many corners. The stench 

assaults you quickly, making your 

eyes and nostrils burn. Most heartbreaking 

of all are the dazed facial 

expressions. People look confused, 

as though they had expected to have 

already awoken from what must 

surely be just a bad dream. Many 

survivors report feeling as though 

the world was coming to an end. I 

cannot imagine the end of the world 

looking much worse. 

“Work for the medical team 

started immediately. Baby Ebenezer 

and his father, who had been waiting 

since morning for the doctors, 

met us at base. He was 1 month old, 

severely dehydrated from diarrhea. 

His mother died three days postpartum, 

in the ‘evenment,’ or ‘event,’ 

as the earthquake is called. We 

took turns caring for him: gently, 

slowly, giving him anti-emetics 

and formula, even as we settled our 

belongings. His father, a widower 

at 24 with five other small children, 

looked almost as helpless. 

“Over the next six days, there 

was more of the same: children with 

malaria and scabies, hunger and dehydration; 

pregnant women without 

prenatal care whose hospitals had 

been damaged or destroyed, whose 

doctors were dead or off dealing 

with their own losses. We treated 

elderly diabetic and hypertensive 

patients who had not taken meds in 

a month. The surgical team cleaned 

wounds and changed dressings that 

had not been tended to for weeks. 

“During the week, we saw an average 

of 300 patients a day, all with 

multiple and varying complaints. 

The complaints we never heard, 

however, were of anxiety or depression. 

Instead, patients reported 

palpitations, chest pains, anorexia, 

insomnia or vague abdominal discomforts 

(all signs of Post-Traumatic 

Stress Disorder). In Haiti, it is not 

acceptable to have anxiety or depression. 

It is perceived as weakness, and 

one cannot afford weakness in the 

face of all the devastation and death. 

“Our mobile clinic traveled to various 

areas in Port-au-Prince, seeking 

out tent cities and communities that 

were off-radar to the global media. 

This is the work that GCF has been 

doing in Haiti, on a yearly basis, 

for the last 11 years. Our clinic was 

usually a makeshift tent, or church, 


62


class notes 

or school. Every neighborhood in 

Port-au-Prince is affected. Everyone 

knows someone who has died. All 

essentials are in short supply. Relief 

is still only trickling in. Some areas 

have been wholly ignored. Our 

teams did the best we could, saw as 

many as could make it to the clinics, 

working till near dusk. 

“It has taken me a while to transition 

back to life as a busy ob/ 

gyn. All the usual politics of the 

day seem banal. Minor complaints 

seem selfish. I keep imagining 

how the people in the tents are 

coping each time it rains, how 

many have become ill from pneumonia, 

tuberculosis or worse. 

“The story of Haiti and the earthquake 

is one of overwhelming 

destruction and crippling losses. It 

also is the story of people who are 

resilient and brave, having been 

dealt blow after blow, by man and 

by nature. People are homeless 

and afraid, but they wake up every 

morning and look for reasons to 

push forward and try to improve 

their lives. I feel very privileged to 

be Haitian and to have been able to 

serve those that deserved it most. I 

hope to return soon, to continue the 

work that is so desperately needed.” 

88 

Abha Jain Sinha 

9633 Eagle Ridge Dr. 

Bethesda, MD 20817 

abhasinha@comcast.net 

Summer is here, and the Columbia 

campus looks beautiful! On a recent 

visit, my kids were amazed at the 

flurry of activity and vibrant energy 

surrounding the Steps. I was delighted 

to hear from many of you this time. 

Salma Hasan Ali is a freelance 

writer based in Washington, D.C. 

She recently went to Pakistan with 

Greg Mortenson, co-author of Three 

Cups of Tea, and humanitarian Todd 

Shea, and has written about their 

work. Salma writes about crosscultural 

issues, U.S.-Muslim world 

relations and people making a difference. 

Her personal essay, “Pakistan 

on the Potomac,” appeared 

in Washingtonian magazine (www. 

washingtonian.com/articles/ 

people/10466.html), and her articles 

have been published in newspapers 

and magazines around the world. 

Laurence Davis writes, “Following 

my graduation from Columbia 

College, I spent two years working 

on the legislative staff of U.S. Senator 

John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.). 

I then moved to England, where I 

completed my doctoral degree at 

Oxford with a thesis on the political 

thought of the English poet, artist 

and craftsman, and revolutionary 

socialist William Morris. I have since 

taught politics and sociology at Oxford, 

Ruskin College, University College 

Dublin and National University 

of Ireland, Galway, and the National 

University of Ireland, Maynooth, 

where I am a visiting scholar. My recent 

publications include Anarchism 

and Utopianism (co-edited with Ruth 

Kinna), The New Utopian Politics of 

Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Dispossessed 

(co-edited with Peter Stillman) and 

numerous articles and book chapters 

on anarchist and utopian political 

thought, ecological and post-capitalist 

politics, and the politics of art, 

work and love. I live in Dublin.” 

Nikos Anreadis sent the following 

update: “I graduated from 

Boston University Law School, 

then spent three years as a pension 

consultant at Deloitte & Touche. I’ve 

been running my family’s private 

mortgage and real estate business 

since 1995. I married Yvonne Knapp 

’90 in 1996, and we have a daughter, 

Sophia (10), and a son, Georgie (8).” 

James Friedman keeps connected 

with alma mater. After graduating, 

he worked for a few years and then 

returned to campus to attend the 

Business School, graduating in 1995. 

Since then, he has been on Wall 

Street, first at Goldman Sachs and 

for the last five years at SIG (known 

for options trading). James lives on 

the East Side of Manhattan with 

his wife, Alison, and sons, William 

and Jack. They regularly attend CC 

cultural and sports events, such as 

Spring Kids Reading at Alma Mater 

and an occasional football game or 

Homecoming. He mentioned that he 

is always interested in reconnecting 

with folks! 

Alex Wallace Creed is really 

enjoying her involvement with the 

College’s Board of Visitors. She 

says, “There are a lot of interesting 

things going on at the school, and 

I am constantly reminded what a 

special place it is.” 

Craig Blackmon’s wife, Tiffany 

McDermott ’87 Barnard, wrote in 

that “Craig has created a novel business 

model for Washington State, 

a lawyer handling your real estate 

transaction. He named the business 

Walawreality. Super-busy when 

the man you work for is the man in 

the mirror. In Seattle, we don’t get 

to see many Columbia grads, but 

we have a cool ski house at Mount 

Ranier and would love visitors.” 

Patrick Crawford updated us as 

follows: “I got an M.A. in philosophy 

(studying with Richard Rorty) and 

a J.D. at the University of Virginia. I 

then practiced tax law with Shearman 

& Sterling in San Francisco 

before joining the faculty/staff at 

Stanford Law School as a Law and 

Business Fellow. I then became an 

assistant professor at American University 

School of Law. Since moving 

back to California — Los Angeles — 

I have taught and am now in private 

practice with a boutique firm, The 

Brager Tax Law Group, doing tax 

controversy work.” 

Batia Mishan Wiesenfeld also 

wrote in: “I married Howard Wiesenfeld 

’87L and went on a fivemonth 

honeymoon. When we 

returned, I went back to Columbia 

to get my Ph.D. in management 

from the B-School and then moved 

downtown to join the faculty of the 

Stern School of Business at NYU. I 

was promoted to tenured associate 

professor in 2002 and then full 

professor in 2008 and was blessed 

with four terrific kids along the 

way. One of the best things about 

being at Stern is the time I get to 

spend with Ellen Pluta, who teaches 

there along with me and is much 

beloved by our students, and Sharon 

Koren, who is only one block 

away at Hebrew Union College. 

This fall is going to be a double 

Columbia homecoming for me: 

My oldest daughter, Yael, will be 

joining the Class of 2014, and I will 

be back on campus at the Business 

School for a one-year sabbatical. 

“Ellen: Now that I have ratted 

you out, you have to send your 

own updates to CCT! Sharon: 

Congratulations. I can’t wait to buy 

your book! Fellow CC ’88ers: Over 

the next year or so, if it is a nice 

sunny day, and you find yourself 

in Morningside Heights, come and 

join me on the Steps, and don’t 

forget your sunglasses!” 

Enjoy summer days ahead, fellow 

CC’ers. 

89 

Emily Miles Terry 

45 Clarence St. 

Brookline, MA 02446 

eterry32@comcast.net 

Fortunately for this column, I have 

a CCT scoop because I heard from 

Ethan Nosowsky, whose career in 

book publishing I have followed 

for years. Ethan was a longtime 

editor at Farrar Straus and Giroux, 

one of the country’s most prestigious 

publishing houses. He’s now 

editor-at-large at Graywolf Press, an 

independent literary publisher, as 

well as a consultant for the Creative 

Capital Foundation, where he runs 

their Innovative Literature grant 

program. Of the Literature grant 

program, Ethan writes, “Creative 

Capital Foundation mixes venture 

capital concepts and applies them to 

the creative field, traditional grant 

making and artist services — grants 

average around $35,000. They’ve 

been around for 10 years and 

are best known in the visual and 

performing arts world.” But after 

18 years in New York City, Ethan is 

returning to San Francisco where 

he grew up, along with his wife, 

Cristina Mueller (also in publishing 

and a former editor for Lucky 

magazine). He’ll continue working 

for Graywolf and Creative Capital 

from there. As for what exactly 

prompted the move, Ethan says 

simply, “I think it was just time. My 

wife is from Berkeley as well, and 

the fact that my employer turned 

out to be flexible, enabling me to 

stay in publishing, made everything 

possible.” 

I also caught up with Amy 

Weinreich Rinzler, who is also 

vacating New York City along 

with her husband, Brad, daughter, 

Sophie, and son, Brody, to nearby 

Chappaqua, N.Y. 

I apologize for such a short 

column this issue, but many of you 

have been a bit … um … elusive 

You know who you are. 

90 

Rachel Cowan Jacobs 

313 Lexington Dr. 

Silver Spring, MD 20901 

cowan@jhu.edu 

In the world of Class Notes, it’s 

wedding season. Congratulations 

and best wishes go out to two 

classmates. Margaret Flynn and 

Dave Robinson were married in 

July 2009 at the beach in Bay Head, 

N.J. Their son, Carson (2), played 

ring bearer. Many Columbians 

were in attendance, including Liz 

Sieczka and Jim Felakos ’92, Gabriel 

Kra, Steve and Jenny Thompson 

Harvey, Karena O’Riordan, 

Michael Behringer ’89, Lisa Dabney 

and Craig Nobert, Sean Ryan, 

Brian Kennedy, Kirsten Mellor, 

and Steven and Laura Schiele 

Robinson. [See photo.] 

Joel Tranter and Mia Houtermans 

were married in December 

in Mendocino, Calif., and in March 

hosted a party in Berkeley to celebrate. 

Joel and Mia live in Berkeley, 

where they grew up. At their party, 

I caught up with Brian Timoney, 

Dan Sackrowitz, Judy Shampanier 

and Chihiro (Adam) Wimbush. 

After graduation, Chihiro spent 

more than a decade producing 

and performing music as a D.J. 

and musician in the Bay Area, then 

moved into radio as host of the 

world electronic music program, 

Your Blue Room. More recently, Chihiro 

transitioned to film, helping 

produce films by Asian-American 

directors including Wayne Wang 

and directing his own short narrative 

film, Double Features, which 

has played to festival audiences in 

Austin, Vancouver, Los Angeles, 

San Francisco and Oregon. 

Chihiro is focused on producing 

a diverse range of documentary 

films. He has shot art installations 

in gallery spaces and traveled to a 

remote field of dreams in Cambodia 

to video its first national baseball 

team. For the past two years, Chihiro 

has been working on a project 

called Redemption, documenting 

homeless shopping cart recyclers in 

West Oakland, their lives and the 


63

class notes 


Margaret (Flynn) Robinson ’90 and Dave Robinson were married in 

July 2009 at the beach in Bay Head, N.J. Their son, Carson (2), was ring 

bearer. Many Columbians were in attendance, including (front row, left 

to right) Jim Felakos ’92, Liz Siecska, Jenny Thompson Harvey ’90, the 

bride, the groom, Kirsten Mellor ’90 and Laura Schiele Robinson ’90; 

and (back row, left to right) Steve Harvery, Gabriel Kra ’90, Rosemary 

Hugh, Karena O’Riordan ’90, Michael Behringer ’89, Lisa Dabney ’90, 

Sean Ryan ’90, Brian Kennedy ’90 and Steven Robinson. 

neighborhood battle to shut down 

the recycling center they use as a 

lifeline. The filming is nearly completed, 

and the production team 

is fundraising for postproduction. 

To find out more or to support this 

project, e-mail chihiro_wimbush@ 

yahoo.com. To watch a sample from 

Redemption and other projects, check 

out http://kpacific.wordpress.com. 

Chihiro lives in San Francisco 

and misses New York City from 

time to time. 

I hope everyone enjoyed their 

time at reunion. It was a whole lot 

of fun to see so many people. More 

about the weekend in the next column. 

Until then, happy summer. 

91 

Margie Kim 

c/o CCT 


622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 


margiekimkim@ 

hotmail.com 

Hello to all! I wasn’t sure if I’d have 

anything for this column, but I 

received some great updates at the 

last minute. 

Chad Sweet wrote: “After leaving 

the government as chief of staff 

of the Department of Homeland 

Security, I co-founded the Chertoff 

Group (www.chertoffgroup.com) 

with former secretary Michael 

Chertoff. We’ve grown from two 

people and one office to 28 people 

(including the former director of 

the NSA and CIA, a former U.K. 

defense minister and a former head 

of Britian’s MI-6) with offices in 

Washington, D.C., New York and 

London. Also, I’m really proud 

of my wife, Julie Spellman Sweet 

’92L, who left Cravath as partner 

to become the general counsel and 

third-highest corporate officer of 

Accenture, a Global Fortune 500 

company. Julie and I live in NYC 

near Columbia on the Upper West 

Side with our daughters, Abby and 

Chloe.” 

After a long two years of planning 

and construction, Christopher 

(Glover) Mehta, her husband, Salil 

Mehta, and their three children 

moved into their new apartment 

on Riverside Drive. They say it’s 

nice to be so close to Columbia 

again. Christopher and her older 

children, Anjali and Rohan, traveled 

to Kenya in December 2009 

to attend Eme Essien’s wedding. 

It was an amazing trip that started 

with seeing many animals on safari 

and culminated in the beautiful 

wedding ceremony. Alethia Jones 

also attended and joined the Mehta 

crew for part of the safari in the 

Masai Mara. Christopher also has 

been busy volunteering at her kids’ 

schools, Brearley and Mandell, but 

is looking forward to her next big 

project (TBD). 

Alexander Rivkin went to Yale 

medical school and did his residency 

at UC San Diego. He runs an aesthetic 

medicine practice in Los Angeles 

and has been living there for seven 

years, enjoying the sunshine. He 

misses the energy of New York and 

visits several times a year. Alexander 

hopes to make his practice 

bi-coastal, with offices in Manhattan 

and Los Angeles. He keeps in touch 

with Julia Rosen (now Swift), Tina 

Wolfson and Josh Saltman as well 

as a surprising number of Columbia 

alums in L.A., thanks to the alumni 

network. 

Marty Huberman has an exciting 

new project in the works. For 

all of us who remember when “The 

Streak” was broken (and for those 

who don’t), you will be interested 

to know that Marty, an awardwinning 

filmmaker, is producing a 

feature documentary on the ’88 CU 

football team. It’s titled The Streak 

Starts Now, and is in the planning 

stages. Marty is looking for photos 

and/or film from the game and 

the celebration after the game to 

supplement the great footage he 

already has. He also is looking for 

backers. Check out www.The 

StreakStartsNow.com and http:// 

roarlions.blogspot.com. 

That’s all for now. Summertime 

is here. Hope you enjoy it! Until 

next time … cheers! 

92 

Jeremy Feinberg 

315 E. 65th St. #3F 


jeremy.feinberg@ 

verizon.net 

The streak of full mailbags continues. 

Thank you all so much for 

writing in! Oddly enough, all of the 

updates, except for my own, came 

from the West Coast. Let’s get to it. 

I received the good news that 

Sean Rodgers found his name on 

the Investor’s Daily Digest’s “Forty 

Under Forty” list this year. Sean, a 

corporate partner at Simpson Thacher, 

has been with the law firm 

since December 1995, after attending 

law school at UC Berkeley. 

First-time correspondent Bonnie 

(Carlson) Solmssen wrote to 

tell of her first Columbia alumni 

event: a “clean the beach” event in 

Venice Beach, Calif. Bonnie is taking 

a break from her career as an 

architect to raise her twins (4), who 

pitched in at the alumni event. 

Staying with West Coast developments, 

I heard from Robert Haga 

’92E. Robert and his wife, Apryl 

von Arlt, are the proud parents of 

son Dashiell Beckett, born on February 

19 in San Francisco. Dashiell 

was welcomed home by sister Ava 

Olivia (3). Congratulations! 

Finally, my own news. I am excited 

to report that I will be returning 

to the Columbia campus this 

fall as a professor. I’ve been asked 

by the Law School to join its adjunct 

faculty and teach an ethics and 

professional responsibility course 

to second- and third-year law 

students. My father was a professor 

(of physics) at Columbia for many 

years, so it feels especially good to 

have a “Professor Feinberg” back 

on campus. I’ll keep you posted on 

how it goes. 

93 

Betsy Gomperz 

41 Day St. 

Newton, MA 02466 

Betsy.Gomperz@gmail.com 

I know my last column was a short 

one, so thank you to everyone who 

wrote in and provided me with 

updates this time! 

Jennifer Friedman is director of 

the Public Interest Law Center at 

Pace Law School in White Plains, 

N.Y., where she is the first person to 

hold the position and is responsible 

for creating new pro bono 

programs, including assistance to 

Haitian immigrants in Westchester 

County and counseling for students 

interested in public interest careers. 

Jennifer and her husband, Andy, 

live in Irvington, N.Y., with their 

children, Sophie (6) and Lucas (4). 

Jennifer is in touch with Alyson 

Berliner, Adam Conner-Sax and 

Scott Levine, all of whom live in the 

New York area and whom she tries 

to see as often as she can. Jennifer 

also is in touch with Seth Pinsky, 

who was appointed president of the 

NYC Economic Development Corp. 

in February 2008. Seth stepped into 

this new role just seven months 

before the collapse of Lehman 

Brothers ushered in the ensuing 

economic downturn. Since then, 

he has worked to reevaluate the 

agency’s strategy for expanding the 

city’s economy and redouble existing 

efforts to position the city as the 

international center for innovation. 

Lots of “congratulations” are 

due to our classmates. On the baby 

news front, Jennifer told me that 

Nina Abraham recently had a baby, 

and I heard from Thad Sheely 

that he and his wife, Gabby, had a 

second son, Nicholas, on April 15, 

to keep brother Ben company. Thad 

has an exciting year ahead of him, 

as the New York Jets will be playing 

in their new stadium this fall. 

On the wedding front, Rohit 

“Rit” Aggarwala married Elizabeth 

Robilotti ’99 on April 10 at St. Patrick’s 

Cathedral in Manhattan. Rit 

was the director of long-term planning 

and sustainability in the Office 

of Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, 

overseeing plans for the city’s 

infrastructure and environment. 

He also was Bloomberg’s chief 

adviser on environmental policy. 

Rit stepped down from the position 

in June to move to California with 

Elizabeth, who began a fellowship 

in infectious diseases at Stanford 

University Medical Center in Palo 

Alto, Calif., in June. Though Rit and 

Elizabeth spent many years on the 

Columbia campus, they did not 

meet until 2002, when they were 

both on the Board of Directors of 

the Columbia College Alumni Association. 

Seth Rockman is an associate 

professor of history at Brown, 

where he is a specialist in revolutionary 

and early republic U.S. 

history, with a focus on the relationship 

of slavery and capitalism 

in American economic and social 

development. In April, Seth was 

selected by the Organization of 

American Historians to receive the 

2010 Merle Curti Award, which is 

given annually for the best book 

published in American social or 

intellectual history, for his book, 

Scraping By: Wage Labor, Slavery, 

and Survival in Early Baltimore. Seth 

will spend the 2010–11 academic 


64


class notes 

Michael Goldwasser ’93 Drops the Beat 

B y Jo n a t h a n Le m i r e ’01 

A 

rabbi’s son walks into 

a recording studio 

and makes a reggae 

version of a Beatles 

album. 

No, that’s not the set-up to a 

joke. That’s the life of Michael 

Goldwasser ’93, one of reggae’s 

most successful — and perhaps 

least likely — producers. 

Goldwasser, the driving force 

behind Easy Star Records (www. 

easystar.com), has received wild 

acclaim for releasing reggaeflavored 

song-by-song covers 

of three classic rock albums. 

Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the 

Moon turned into Dub Side of 

the Moon. Radiohead’s OK Computer 

morphed into an album 

named Radiodread. And last 

year Goldwasser produced his 

most ambitious project yet: The 

Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely 

Hearts Club Band became Easy 

Star’s Lonely Hearts Dub Band. 

“I wasn’t intimidated by The 

Beatles, and their fans knew I’d 

treat their music with respect,” 

Goldwasser says. “We just, 

shall I say, have a slightly different 

interpretation.” 

Goldwasser was born in 

West Virginia, but his parents 

— including his father, the 

rabbi — moved the family to 

New York when Michael was 

7. Immediately, music became 

a major part of Goldwasser’s 

life, and his jazz-loving parents 

claim he began writing songs 

soon after he learned to talk. 

“Music was always there, 

and by the time I was 15, I 

started performing at clubs in 

New York City,” Goldwasser 

says. “My parents were very 

supportive. They knew I was a 

good kid, and they knew that 

even if I was playing at a bar, I 

wasn’t going to get in trouble. 

“Actually, my father drove me 

to most of my shows,” he says 

with a laugh, “because I couldn’t 

take my guitar on the subway.” 

Columbia’s location in the 

city, just a few subway stops 

away from Greenwich Village’s 

thriving music scene, made 

Goldwasser’s college choice a 

simple one. 

“Being at Columbia was 

great for me as a musician, not 

just because of the academic 

side, though I did take quite a 

few music classes, but also because 

it kept my career alive,” 

says Goldwasser, an urban 

studies major who formed the 

R&B band Special Request after 

arriving on Morningside Heights. 

Goldwasser, who spent two 

years hosting shows on WKCR, 

performed relentlessly in clubs. 

He vividly remembers playing 

at the now-defunct Wetlands in 

1994 and asking for the score 

of that night’s New York Knicks- 

Houston Rockets NBA Finals 

game, only to be informed of the 

O.J. Simpson police chase that 

had just captivated the nation. 

Reggae producer Michael Goldwasser ’93 

with David Hinds of Steel Pulse. 

PHOTO: Courtesy of Michael Goldwasser ’93 

But Goldwasser’s heart 

thumped to a reggae beat, and 

he soon quit a clerical job at 

Metropolitan Hospital to pool 

resources with a few friends 

— each donating $1,000 — to 

start a new label, which took 

the name Easy Star. 

“It was not my life’s dream 

to sit in an office and wear a 

tie,” he said. “We complained 

about the dearth of quality reggae 

at the time, and we decided 

to do something about it.” 

The friends started amassing 

tracks that had never received 

a proper release and produced 

compilations albums. They’d 

carry the boxes of CDs to small 

record stores in Brooklyn and 

the Bronx and slowly began 

to make inroads in the reggae 

world, even though their leader 

didn’t exactly look the part. 

“I don’t think the fact that 

I’m Jewish and not Jamaican 

held me back,” Goldwasser 

says. “I was already somewhat 

known as ‘Mikey the White 

Guitarist’ in music circles so I 

had that credibility already. And 

reggae stars are down-to-earth, 

humble people, people who 

were not getting rich quick, and 

they weren’t judging me.” 

“What has been astonishing 

about Michael’s reggae career 

is the speed with which he was 

welcomed and taken 

seriously by many 

of reggae’s greatest 

artists,” says Michael 

Cooper ’93, who was 

in Goldwasser’s first 

band, The Feds. “Any 

man-bites-dog sense 

about Michael playing 

reggae seems to fade 

when people hear his 

music and realize that 

he is the real deal.” 

Easy Star’s big 

break came in 1999, 

when Goldwasser was 

convinced to try a 

reggae version of Pink 

Floyd’s iconic album, 

Dark Side of the Moon. 

“We were making 

great traditional 

Jamaican reggae but 

selling, at best, a few thousand 

copies,” Goldwasser says. “We 

had to try something different. 

“At first, I was skeptical [and] 

I knew the album only incidentally. 

But I came up with a few 

basic arrangements, listened 

and thought ‘This might work.’ ” 

Using the stage name Michael 

G, Goldwasser took years 

to slowly craft the album, using 

traditional Jamaican instruments 

and rhythms yet faithfully 

maintaining the songs’ structure 

and spirit. It was released 

by Easy Star in 2003. 

“We expected a negative 

response from rock or Floyd 

fans, but even those Floyd fans 

who told us they wanted to 

hate it, couldn’t,” he says. 

“I’m not suggesting that the 

Easy Star versions are likely to 

eclipse the originals, but I can’t 

stress enough how ingenious 

they are in and of themselves,” 

says Cooper, now a national 

correspondent for The New 

York Times. “Dub Side of the 

Moon is an amazing, painstakingly 

thought out concept 

album that I think would stand 

on its own for a listener who 

had never heard Pink Floyd.” 

The album sold an impressive 

160,000 copies worldwide. 

Easy Star found similar success 

in 2006 with Radiodread, 

which Rolling Stone praised for 

its “innovative arrangements 

and attention to detail.” 

Snagging a cult following, 

Easy Star launched a touring 

band and acquired a famous fan: 

New York City Mayor Michael 

Bloomberg’s daughter Emma, 

who asked the group to play at 

her wedding. 

Goldwasser, who has also 

written original compositions 

for TV shows such as CSI: 

Crime Scene Investigation and 

movies such as Woody Allen’s 

Cassandra’s Dream, tackled 

history’s biggest band for his 

third tribute album, which was 

released last year. 

“Radiohead has said very 

nice things about our work, 

which is very satisfying,” says 

Goldwasser, who lives on a kibbutz 

an hour north of Tel Aviv, 

Israel, with his wife, Ami, and 

2-year-old daughter, Tali, and 

runs his business remotely. 

“I haven’t heard from anyone 

in the Beatles camp yet,” 

he says, chuckling, “but I would 

love to get a phone call from 

Paul McCartney.” 

To hear Easy Star cover The 

Beatles, go to www.college. 

columbia.edu/cct. 

Jonathan Lemire ’01 is a staff 

writer for the New York Daily 

News. 


65

class notes 


year at the Huntington Library to 

write a new book for University of 

Chicago Press about shoes, shovels, 

hats and hoes manufactured 

in the North for use on Southern 

slave plantations. 

Finally, congratulations to Brian 

Yorkey and Tom Kitt ’96, who won 

the Pulitzer Prize in the drama category 

for their play, Next to Normal, 

which was found to be a “distinguished 

play by an American author, 

preferably original in its source 

and dealing with American life.” 

94 

Leyla Kokmen 

440 Thomas Ave. S. 

Minneapolis, MN 55405 

leylak@earthlink.net 

Some of our classmates have been 

in the news lately: 

Karthik Ramanathan, who has 

been overseeing the Treasury Department’s 

office of debt management, 

announced that he is stepping 

down from this post in order to 

return to the private sector. Karthik 

joined the Treasury Department in 

July 2005. Before that, he worked for 

Goldman Sachs. 

Amanda Peet welcomed her second 

child on April 19 in New York. 

Molly June joins sister Frances. 

On the more personal news front, 

I caught up with Ayanna (Parish) 

Thompson and her family on a 

recent trip to Arizona. Ayanna is 

doing well and continues her work 

as a professor of English at Arizona 

State University. 

That’s it for this time. Please 

send news! 

95 

Janet Lorin 

127 W. 96th St., #2GH 


jrf10@columbia.edu 

We all appreciated the Core Curriculum 

when we were students. 

Roosevelt Montás holds the title of 

Director of the Core, a job he’s had 

since summer 2008. 

Roosevelt teaches CC these days 

and did a stint teaching Lit Hum 

while completing his Ph.D. in the 

English department; he graduated 

from GSAS in 2004. 

“I am one of those people who 

never left,” said Roosevelt, who 

grew up in the Dominican Republic 

until age 12, then in Queens. 

Roosevelt often is called upon to 

give talks about the Core at various 

events, including Alumni Reunion 

Weekend. We hoped to see him 

in June. 

Congratulations to Michael 

Schaffer, who returns to his hometown 

of Washington, D.C., as editor 

of Washington City Paper. 

Mike began his career at City 

Paper, first as a staff writer and then 

as the second-in-command. He then 

spent two years at U.S. News and 

World Report, where he reported 

from Pakistan after 9-11 and from a 

dozen U.S. states, covering the 2000 

Florida recount, poverty issues and 

scandals in the Catholic Church. He 

then headed to the Philadelphia Inquirer, 

where he covered City Hall. 

Last year, Mike’s first book, One 

Nation Under Dog: Adventures in the 

New World of Prozac-Popping Puppies, 

Dog-Park Politics, and Organic Pet 

Food, a critically acclaimed examination 

of America’s mania for 

pets, was published. He spent 

two years on the project. [Editor’s 

note: CCT featured this book in 

September/October 2009: www. 

college.columbia.edu/cct/sep_ 

oct09/bookshelf2.] His freelance 

work has appeared in Slate, The 

New Republic, The Daily Beast, The 

Washington Monthly, The Washington 

Post, The Boston Globe, New York 

Press, Obituary Magazine, Philadelphia 

and Men’s Journal. 

Mike and his wife, Keltie Hawkins, 

have a daughter, Eleanor, who 

will be 3 in August. 

“I’m looking forward to reconnecting 

with Columbia cronies in 

D.C.,” Michael writes. 

96 

Ana S. Salper 

24 Monroe Pl., Apt. MA 


asalper@yahoo.com 

Not even baby news That’s hard 

to believe. Please write so we can 

fill this column. 

97 

Sarah Katz 

1935 Parrish St. 


srk12@columbia.edu 

CC ’97, where’s the love Not one of 

you sent an update. I know you’re 

up to great things. Please tell us all 

about it! 

98 

Sandie Angulo Chen 

10209 Day Ave. 

Silver Spring, MD 20910 

sandie.chen@gmail.com 

Let’s start off with more baby 

news. Daniel Pianko and Melissa 

(Epstein) Pianko are the proud 

parents of Noah David, born January 

20. Sister Bella is 3. The Piankos 

live in Manhattan and recently had 

a mini-reunion with Brooks Herman 

and Joanna (Erman) Herman, 

who were visiting New York from 

California. Brooks e-mailed me an 

adorable photo of his kids, Jacob 

and Sophie, with Bella Pianko, 

Samuel Kornfeind (son of Ben 

Kornfeind and Jeannette Jakus) 

and Rohan Jain (son of Nirad Jain 

’98E and Aimee Shaw ’99). I wish 

I could share the photo with you, 

but CCT only prints photos with 

alumni in them, and future alums 

don’t count. 

On April 2, Jacie (Buitenkant) 

Jacobowitz and her husband, Sander, 

became the proud parents of twin 

boys. Max Devin weighed 8 lbs., 

5 oz., and Tyler Eric weighed 7 lbs., 

3 oz. Everyone is doing well. Jacie 

works in compliance at Moody’s 

Investors Service and lives in New 

Jersey with her family. 

In professional news, Adrian Sas 

is the creator, producer and director 

of It’s My Park, a weekly documentary 

series about New York City’s 

parks, museums and recreational 

facilities, showing on NYC TV 

Channel 25. The series, now in its 

sixth season, highlights the city’s 

parks system; segments also stream 

on the Parks Department’s website 

which Adrian helped design: www. 

nyc.gov/parks/video. 

Congratulations are in order for 

Marissa Greenberg, who updated 

us for the first time to say she has 

received a National Endowment 

for the Humanities Faculty Grant 

to work on her book, Metropolitan 

Tragedy, 1567–1667. An assistant 

English professor at the University 

of New Mexico, Marissa’s book 

will focus on how dramatic tragedy 

from Shakespeare to Milton 

grappled with changes in London. 

She says: “My interest in Renaissance 

English drama was nurtured 

at Columbia, especially by Jean 

Howard, who supervised my 

undergraduate thesis.” Marissa, 

her husband, Adam Lyons ’96, ’98 

GSAS, a litigation attorney, and 

their son, Leam (3), have lived in 

Albuquerque, N.M., for four years. 

In personal news, I was chatting 

with a fellow mom at our 

children’s gymnastics class, and it 

turned out to be not only a fellow 

Columbia alumna but the CCT 

class correspondent for 1990, Rachel 

Cowan Jacobs ’90. It’s a small 

world for Columbia graduates! 

Have a great summer, and don’t 

forget to write in with your updates 

— they don’t have to be milestones! 

99 

Lauren Becker 

19 Devalan St., Apt. 3N 


laurenbecker@gmail.com 

Hello there. I’m happy to report 

that Rachel Jackson has written in 

again: “Here is another update regarding 

my film 3 Things. Our East 

Coast premiere was at the Charleston 

International Film Festival, and 

I won the award for Best Actress 

in that festival. We are hoping this 

is the first of many awards for the 

film.” 

I am hoping this is the second of 

many updates. And I am hoping to 

see Rachel’s award-winning performance 

someday. 

Here’s another update from Shazi 

Visram: “My husband, Joe, and I 

had our first human happy baby 

on January 31. His name is Zane 

Amirali Visram Kulak. And the little 

feller is so sweet and happy. We live 

in Jersey City with our other son, 

with fur, Willy, and are loving how 

different life is with a baby.” 

More great news: Jenn Kaufman 

and her husband, William Haft, 

recently celebrated the arrival of 

Aaron Kaufman-Haft. Aaron was 

born on April 21, weighing 7 lbs., 7 

oz.; measuring 20 inches; and sporting 

an adorable coif. Jenn, William 

and their dog, Anderson, moved 

to Chicago in fall 2008 and settled 

into a cute house in Lincoln Park a 

month before Aaron’s arrival. 

And there’s still more great 

news, but not really baby-related. 

Recently, I checked in with the 

hardest working international rock 

star in our class, Scott Hoffman, 

aka Babydaddy, whose band, Scissor 

Sisters, is about to release its 

third full-length album. Here’s 

what Scott had to say: “Been in 

the studio for most of the 2½ years 

since we got off the road from the 

last one. We got our buddy Stuart 

Price to co-produce this one (he 

had just done Madonna’s Confessions 

on a dance floor and the Killers’ 

last one). The album’s called Night 

Work and it came out on June 29 

in the United States and June 28 

everywhere else. We started a 

world tour in June beginning in the 

United Kingdom.” 

Scott will surely be in a city near 

you soon (the tour starts with the 

U.K., followed by Europe, Japan, 

Australia and more), so definitely 

check scissorsisters.com for a sneak 

preview and the complete schedule. 

I received this tidbit from the 

CCT crew, via Business Wire: 

“Stephen M. Gracey has joined 

the litigation department at the 

law offices of Ulmer & Berne. As 

an attorney with Ulmer & Berne, 

Steve’s practice focuses on product 

liability and life sciences litigation. 

He is well versed in prescription 

and drug product liability matters, 

consumer product liability matters, 

toxic tort and exposure matters. He 

also represents clients in commercial 

litigation including breach of 

contract, fraud and other business 

disputes. Prior to joining Ulmer & 

Berne, Steve was an attorney with 

Frost Brown Todd. He received his 

J.D. from the University of Cincinnati 

College of Law.” 

And this happy news was spotted 

in April 11’s New York Times: 

“Dr. Elizabeth Victoria Robilotti 

and Rohit Thomas Aggarwala 

[’93] were married [April 10] at St. 

Patrick’s Cathedral in Manhattan. 


66


class notes 

The Rev. David P. Dwyer, a Roman 

Catholic priest, performed the 

ceremony. Dr. Robilotti, 32, is keeping 

her name. She is a third-year 

resident in internal medicine at St. 

Vincent’s Hospital Manhattan, and 

is to begin a fellowship in infectious 

diseases at Stanford University 

Medical Center in Palo Alto, Calif., 

in June. She graduated cum laude 

from Columbia, from which she also 

received master’s degrees in history 

and public health. She received a 

medical degree at New York Medical 

College. [...] Mr. Aggarwala, 38, 

known as Rit, is the director of longterm 

planning and sustainability 

in the office of Mayor Michael R. 

Bloomberg. He oversees plans for 

the city’s infrastructure and environment. 

He is also Mr. Bloomberg’s 

chief adviser on environmental 

policy. He recently announced plans 

to step down from those positions 

in June, and will join Dr. Robilotti in 

California. [...] Though the couple 

spent many years on the Columbia 

campus, they did not meet until 

2002, when they were both on the 

board of the Columbia College 

Alumni Association.” 

Yay! Elizabeth has promised to 

write soon with details and will be 

sending an alumni-filled photo, so 

watch out. 

I saw a ton of Columbia people 

at Jen Song’s wedding in May, 

and here’s a brief, alumni-filled 

summary. Before the ceremony, on 

a barge in the East River, I chatted 

with the nation’s newest naval 

intelligence officer, James Boyle, 

who bragged that he’s able to arrest 

anyone claiming to be a pirate. Jay 

Cosel, an avid swimmer, giggled 

nervously in the background. Then 

Jen married Josh Oberwetter, an 

all-around super-awesome guy, and 

everyone was very happy. Back on 

dry land, I milled around with Konrad 

Fiedler, recently in from Los 

Angeles, and Eli Sanders, mainstay 

of Seattle’s The Stranger. Eli is a terrific 

writer and also does a weekly 

local news roundup on Seattle’s 

NPR station, and was recently 

asked on-air what it means to be an 

associate editor at The Stranger. He 

replied: “It means I free associate all 

day long.” 

Angela Garbes ’99 Barnard, Patty 

Wortham ’99 Barnard and Avi 

Ziv ’99 Barnard led the charge as 

everyone paraded to the reception, 

followed closely by Chris Hardin, 

in a pastel shirt, and the radiant 

Emily Ford, in a fetching rosyplum 

dress. Toward the middle of 

the pack were Jenn Alzona, her 

dance-floor alter ego Jenn Ruby, 

and her husband, Jarrod Ruby. I 

straggled along at the back with 

the Chicago-loving Ethan Fischer, 

Brooklyn’s own Matt Poindexter 

’01, and Ben Hall ’99E and Catie 

Zeidler ’99 Barnard, who came all 

the way from Copenhagen for the 

festivities. 

Sitting across from me at dinner, 

Dr. Emmy Pointer and Dave 

Burkoff, who live on the Upper 

West Side with their dog, Walter, 

and cats, Dr. Furr and James, 

shared a plate of vegetarian selections 

from the truly astonishing 

buffet of Korean delicacies. The 

estimable Mike Erman and his 

fiancée, Sinead Carew (yay!), were 

close at hand, keeping tabs on Konrad’s 

kim chi intake. I had to give 

a toast and was too nervous to eat 

even half the things I wanted. Esther 

Chak, who sat next to me, was 

supportive, and distracted me with 

news about Aaron Kaufman-Haft, 

and soon everyone was back on 

the dance floor celebrating with Jen 

and Josh and Total Soul (the band). 

It was way too much fun. 

That’s all for now. Please write 

with your news, complaints, updates, 

questions and so on. Thank 

you! 

00 

Prisca Bae 

344 W. 17th St., Apt. 3B 


pb134@columbia.edu 

On March 26, Kelly Alderson welcomed 

into the world a son, Andrés 

Radics Alderson (Andy), in Lima, 

Peru. Kelly and her husband, Axel 

Radics, enjoy living and working 

in Peru, where they have been for 

three years. 

01 

Jonathan Gordin 

3030 N. Beachwood Dr. 

Los Angeles, CA 90068 

jrg53@columbia.edu 

Hi everyone. Hope your summer 

is off to a great start! 

Rich Luthmann recently joined 

the boutique estate planning and 

probate litigation firm Borteck, 

Sanders & Torzewski, with offices 

in New York City and Livingston, 

N.J. 

Rich reports, “The CU Rugby 

Football Club Annual Alumni 

match took place on May 1 at 

Baker Field (alumni versus current 

players). I’ll let you know as to 

how it goes but invited to attend 

and expected were Stu Dearnley, 

Dan Wetmore, Mike Mahoney, 

Matt Hughes, Chris Miller, Billy 

“Jesus” Traux (hopefully with his 

wife, April Traux), Eddie Torres 

’02, Joe Viola ’02E, Paul Sheridan 

’00 and Ike Ibe ’01E.” 

Emily Landsburg has launched 

her second start-up, BlackGold 

Biofuels, a clean-energy company 

with four employees. After years 

of research in a north Philadelphia 

industrial plant, the company has 

developed the technology to remove 

Reshan Richards ’00 married Jennifer Butler in Wilton, Conn., in June 

2009. Celebrating with them were (left to right) Marina Chan ’00, Nelson 

Chan ’00, Ommeed Sathe ’00, the bride, the groom, Greig Bennett 

’01, David Torres ’00E, Rushika Conroy ’97, Tejpaul Bhatia ’00E, Homin 

Lee ’00, Andrew Warshawer ’00 and Yasanthi Alahendra ’94. 

PHOTO: Patricia Kantzos Photography 

grease from municipal water systems 

and turn it into biodiesel fuel. 

BlackGold is now at work on 

its first large-scale demonstration 

project, for the San Francisco Public 

Utilities Commission, which will 

use the rehabilitated sewer scum to 

power vehicles in the water department’s 

fleet. Emily also is in talks 

with other municipal water authorities, 

including Philadelphia’s. Her 

company’s annual revenues last 

year were $1.4 million, and she expects 

the firm to turn its first profit 

next year. Emily and her husband 

have an infant son, Max. 

Lots of exciting baby news this 

month … 

Corinna Schultz (née Russell) 

and her husband, Matthew Schultz, 

are excited to announce the birth 

of their first child, Oliver Ansel, 

on March 27. The couple lives in 

Providence, R.I., where Corinna is 

finishing her pediatric residency 

and looking forward to a “normal” 

schedule this coming year as chief 

resident. Matthew still is working in 

Cambridge but for a new company, 

Forrester. They are adjusting to life 

with a newborn and loving all of it! 

Emily Huters announced that 

she and her husband, Trey Hatch 

’01L, “welcomed our son, Henry 

Charles, on February 25. As you 

can imagine, we are still pretty 

sleep-deprived at this point, but 

we are so in love with our little guy 

and love being parents. 

“In somewhat alumni-related 

news, Henry shares a birthday 

with my old roommate Cheyenne 

Picardo ’02, and one of his first 

visitors in the hospital was Kelly 

McCreary ’03 Barnard.” 

Alex Eule and Michelle Eule ’01 

Barnard were delighted to welcome 

their daughter, Madeline Cayla, on 

April 22. Mom, Dad and baby are 

doing great. 

Congrats to all the new Columbia 

parents. Please keep in touch! 

02 

Sonia Dandona 

Hirdaramani 

2 Rolling Dr. 

Old Westbury, NY 11568 

soniah57@gmail.com 

Ben Letzler has joined the Office 

of the Attorney General in Boston 

as an assistant attorney general 

with the Insurance and Financial 

Services Division. Recently, he also 

welcomed two cats into his world, 

Abelard and Héloïse. 

James P. Houtsma and his wife, 

Erin, welcomed their first baby on 

August 14, 2009: Connor Kerr, Lion 

in training. 

Dr. Jacqueline Corona is a 

research fellow in the Department 

of Pediatric Orthopaedic Surgery 

at Morgan Stanley Children’s 

Hospital of NewYork Presbyterian- 

Columbia University Medical 

Center. 

Jon Fischer lives in London and 

is having an amazing time. He often 

sees Fabian Chrobog, who, according 

to Jon, apparently knows everyone 

in the city! Barclays Capital 

moved him there a few months ago 

for work, and he is using the opportunity 

to travel a lot within Europe. 

Will Hunter visited during Easter 

weekend, and they had a ton of fun. 

03 

Michael Novielli 

World City Apartments 

Attention Michael J. 

Novielli, A608 

Block 10, No 6. Jinhui 

Road, Chaoyang District 

Beijing, 100020, People’s 

Republic of China 

mjn29@columbia.edu 

I hope that you’re able to take some 

time away from the excitement of 

summer barbecues, picnics and 

beach outings to celebrate the successes 

and exciting events of our 

classmates. 


67

faculty of the Prison University 

Project’s College Program at San 

Quentin State Penitentiary. The only 

operation of its kind in California, 

the College Program offers hundreds 

of men the opportunity to start 

their college careers and earn associate 

degrees. As part of a faculty 

composed largely of professors and 

doctoral candidates from UC Berkeley, 

Claire teaches developmental 

math and is working to restructure 

the pre-college math program, and 

Ramsey teaches English courses 

including “Critical Thinking” and 

“Modern World Literature,” the 

Prison University Project’s answers 

to Logic and Rhetoric and Lit Hum. 

If you want to learn more about the 

Prison University Project, please 

e-mail Claire and Ramsey at claire 

andramsey@gmail.com. 

David Mills writes: “My service 

as a small enterprise development 

Peace Corps volunteer in Cameroon 

ends in July. Then, I’ll be 

heading back to the States to eat as 

much pizza as my body can handle 

and get settled in Philadelphia as 

I prepare to start the J.D./M.B.A. 

program at Penn this fall.” 

Shaanan Meyerstein writes: 

“Following graduation, Ariel 

Daube and I traveled the world 

for medical work and tourism. We 

then moved to Israel and for the 

last four years have attended the 

Ben Gurion University of the Negev/Columbia 

Medical School for 

International Health in Beersheva 

(the southern region of Israel). In 

addition to the regular American 

medical curriculum, our school 

focuses on training healthcare 

professionals who will work in 

underserved, poor areas around 

the globe. We have been exposed 

to a diverse patient population of 

Bedouins, Ethiopians, Russian and 

South American immigrants, African 

refugees and so on as well as 

diverse medical pathologies. One 

of the most impactful experiences 

we had was working in a hospital 

that came under rocket fire during 

the Gaza War in 2009. 

“Upon graduating in May, Ariel 

planned to begin a three-year residency 

in pediatrics at National 

Children’s Hospital in Washington, 

D.C., and Shaanan a three-year 

pediatric residency at Schneiders 

Children Hospital/Long Island 

Jewish Medical Center in Queens.” 

Monica Pasternak writes: “I am 

finishing my third year of medical 

school at the University of Miami 

Miller School of Medicine and have 

decided to pursue an M.D./M.B.A. 

I will be completing my M.B.A. 

during the 2010–11 school year 

and will graduate from medical 

school in May 2012. I am dedicating 

spare time to research in high-risk 

obstetrics (maternal fetal medicine) 

and volunteering with the mediclass 

notes 


Maureen Falcone ’03 (née Powers) married Tony Falcone in May 2009 in 

her hometown of Allentown, Pa. Elizabeth Martin ’03E (front row, left) 

and Diana Pietri ’03 (back row, left) were bridesmaids, and Kate Sawyer 

’03E, Rachel Przytula Woods ’03E and Jeremy Woods ’05 attended. 

PHOTO: Wesley Works., Inc. 

Mike Jones writes, “I went to 

Albert Einstein for medical school, 

finishing in 2007. I matched in 

emergency medicine at Jacobi 

Medical Center in the Bronx and 

was recently selected as chief 

resident. During that time, I also 

have continued to work as a medic 

in NYC and am the director of a 

small nonprofit ambulance squad, 

the Central Park Medical Unit 

(www.cpmu.com). I have also 

made it my passion to travel the 

world, having hiked the Scottish 

Highlands, backpacked across 

Italy a few times, hiked the Inca 

Trail to Machu Picchu and recently 

returned from Tanzania, where I 

summited Mount Kilimanjaro.” 

Joseph Lyons, who works in 

Houston as a v.p. in derivative 

sales in the global commodities 

division of Citigroup, married 

Kristen Elizabeth Olson in Austin 

on March 27. 

Fiona Sze-Lorrain’s first book 

of poetry, Water the Moon, was 

released in February. Her website 

is www.fionasze.com. 

Raj Patel writes, “I recently left 

private practice to become in-house 

corporate counsel for United Airlines 

in Chicago. I’ve saved several 

complimentary flight passes for Columbia 

friends who’d like to visit!” 

Matt McMillan, a political consultant 

living in Washington, D.C., 

won his 12th Pollie Award from 

the American Association of Political 

Consultants and was named 

to the prestigious “Democratic 

Campaign Dream Team” by Aristotle 

International. He has advised 

several high-profile foreign and 

domestic leaders, parties and advocacy 

organizations on communications 

and new media strategy. 

Sarah Secules Smee writes, 

“Ryan Smee and I are proud to 

announce Beatrix Eleanor, born 

December 8.” 

Adam Libove writes, “I moved 

from the Upper East Side to Greenwich 

Village. After nearly 10 years 

of living uptown, it is a welcome 

change. In addition, I took the 

opportunity to make another big 

move: I proposed to my girlfriend 

of five-plus years, Barbara Luxenberg 

’05 Duke, and we are starting 

to plan a wedding for next spring.” 

This summer, Alan Lue is working 

on the Research & Investment 

Management Team at Research 

Affiliates, an investment manager 

in Newport Beach, Calif., before 

returning to UCLA Anderson to 

finish his master’s in financial engineering. 

Also in California, Victoria 

Sharon is entering her final year of 

her dermatology residency. 

Katori Hall is the author of the 

play The Mountaintop, which was 

awarded England’s 2010 Olivier 

Award for Best New Play. It is 

scheduled to be performed on 

Broadway next fall. Referencing 

The Mountaintop, The Wall Street 

Journal writes, “The two-person 

production is set in a hotel room 

on April 3, 1968, the night before 

King was murdered. A hotel maid, 

Camae, brings King coffee, and the 

two start a conversation. It turns 

out that Camae is not who she initially 

seems. The play depicts King 

in private moments: taking off his 

shoes, talking to himself and, later, 

smoking and flirting with Camae.” 

04 

Angela Georgopoulos 

200 Water St., Apt. 1711 


aeg90@columbia.edu 

Greetings, fellow alumni! I hope 

you’re all doing well and getting 

the chance to enjoy summer. On to 

the news: 

Mike Ren is v.p. of a U.S. private 

equity firm in Shanghai, focusing 

on private, pre-IPO and crossborder 

investments in tier two and 

tier three Chinese cities. In May, 

Mahriana Rofheart earned a Ph.D. 

in comparative literature from 

Rutgers with a dissertation examining 

emigration in contemporary 

Senegalese novels and music. 

Tarek Adam ’04E and Robert 

Reyes ’05 have been in touch 

recently despite the distance 

between them. Tarek is finishing 

a biomedical research fellowship 

in Heidelberg, Germany, while 

Robert completes the last semester 

of his pre-med post baccalaureate 

program in Carbondale, Ill. Robert 

and Tarek met up in January when 

Tarek made the transatlantic flight 

to St. Louis for a medical school 

interview. Both are excited about 

beginning medical school in the 

fall! Tarek and Robert will attend 

The Saint Louis University School 

of Medicine and The University 

of Texas Medical Branch Medical 

School at Galveston, respectively. 

Vishal Arya writes, “I am finishing 

my first year at University of 

Chicago Booth School of Business. 

I am spending the summer as a 

product manager intern at Apple 

and plan to see if California living 

is all everyone says it is (I am 

pretty sure it is). Before starting at 

Apple, I was in South Africa for 

10 days attending four World Cup 

matches.” 

Congratulations to my good 

friend Miklos Vasarhelyi, who will 

be returning to Columbia’s campus 

this fall to attend the Business 

School. Congratulations also go 

out to Alex Hardiman and Brian 

Platzer, who were married in June, 

and Logan Schmid and Christina 

Tobajas, who were married in 

Manhattan on July 18, 2009. Logan 

divulged: “We met at a party in 

Wien our sophomore year. The 

party was broken up by campus 

security, but we’ve stayed together 

all these years!” 

On April 17, the Young Alumni 

Fund held its annual Spring Benefit 

in Manhattan. Our class had a 

strong showing, including Vignesh 

Aier, Etel Bugescu, Avram Drori, 

Julianna Dudas, Daniel Goldman, 

Adam Kaufman, Igor Margulyan, 

Hamesh Mehta, Denaka Perry, 

Eric Requenez, Yekaterina (Kat) 

Reznik, Julia de Roulet, Richard 

Tosi, Miklos Vasarhelyi and Ashley 

Vereschagin. 

As usual, please don’t forget to 

send me any and all updates! 

05 

Peter Kang 

205 15th St., Apt. 5 


peter.kang@gmail.com 

Summer is upon us! Hope you’re 

all doing well. 

Claire McDonnell and Ramsey 

McGlazer live in San Francisco’s ’Ro 

neighborhood. The highlight of their 

year has been joining the volunteer 


68


class notes 

cally underserved via our school’s 

Department of Community Service. 

As I write this, I am in Key West for 

a month doing my family medicine 

rotation, and spend my mornings 

kayaking before work; living the 

dream!” 

In May, Jessica Fjeld graduated 

from UMass, Amherst, with an 

M.F.A. in poetry. She is planning 

to return to Columbia in the fall for 

law school and is excited to be back 

in the city. Anna Brian Lee also 

graduated recently, with an M.B.A. 

from UC Berkeley Haas School of 

Business. And Steph Katsigiannis 

graduated from Fordham Law. She 

will join Kasowitz Benson Torres & 

Friedman in New York in the fall. 

Jeanelle Folkes writes: “I 

graduated in May from Teachers 

College with an M.A. in higher 

and postsecondary education. I 

recently purchased my first home, 

so I’m incredibly excited about 

that. I marched in the Alumni 

Parade of Classes on May 17 at 

this year’s Class Day, representing 

our class (and then running over 

to my own ceremony, lol).” 

Loren Crowe, who joined the 

Army on the day of his last final 

in May 2005, writes: “After being 

commissioned as an infantry officer 

and graduating from the U.S. Army 

Ranger School, I spent two years as 

a rifle platoon leader with the First 

Infantry Division at Fort Hood, 

Texas. After being promoted to captain, 

I returned from a deployment 

to Afghanistan last year, where I 

was stationed with my guys along 

a volatile stretch of the Pakistan 

border in eastern Afghanistan. I’m 

getting ready to head to Georgia for 

continued training, and I hope to 

deploy to Afghanistan again in the 

near future.” 

Thanks for the updates, and hope 

to hear from the rest of you soon! 

06 

Michelle Oh 

17 John St., Apt. 2D 


mo2057@columbia.edu 

As always, there are exciting updates 

from our classmates on academic, 

professional and personal 

fronts. Hope you enjoy the column! 

Have a great rest of the summer, 

and I look forward to updates from 

you for a future column. 

Emily Bean has been living in 

a 15-person cooperative house 

in Berkeley, Calif., for the last 1½ 

years. She works in Oakland as 

a bilingual kindergarten teacher 

and plans to stay, pushing the 

system and educating the future 

world-changers for at least another 

few years. Emily eagerly looked 

forward to her (well-deserved) 

two-month summer vacation in 

Argentina and Brazil, where she 

planned to continue her intense 

study of aerial acrobatics and 

hopefully learn some Portuguese. 

Jeremy Kotin co-produced and 

co-edited the hit of the Tribeca 

Film Festival, Monogamy, directed 

by academy-award nominee Dana 

Adam Shapiro and starring Chris 

Messina and Rashida Jones. On his 

producing team were Jeff Mandel 

’96 and Tom Heller ’05 Business. 

The film will be traveling the film 

festival circuit for the rest of 2010 

and will hopefully have a wide 

release shortly thereafter. Sean 

Wilkes is done with his tour at the 

Pentagon and is in Cambridge for 

the summer to study biology at 

Harvard. 

After two years of working 

at Scholastic Publishing on its 

website, Carly Miller has moved 

on to FoxNews.com as a strategic 

analyst to improve the website 

in its entirety. Marc Pimentel 

recently returned from a month 

of learning acupuncture in China, 

where he climbed the Great Wall 

and saw the Terra Cotta Army. He 

graduated from P&S in May and is 

at Brigham and Women’s Hospital 

for an anesthesiology residency. 

Emily Ross has had an exciting 

couple of months. After applying 

to graduate schools during the 

winter, she has accepted an offer 

to return to Columbia in the fall 

and will study for a master’s in 

public policy at SIPA. While leaving 

Washington, D.C., after almost 

four years will be hard, Emily is 

looking forward to going back to 

NYC. Stephen Kunen is a legal intern 

this summer in Las Vegas for 

the in-house counsel of Zuffa, the 

parent company of the Ultimate 

Fighting Championship. 

Elizabeth Berkowitz married 

Marc Tobak ’05 in October 2009 in 

New York City. Several members 

of the Classes of 2005 and 2006 

attended and were in the wedding 

party. Marc graduated from 

Harvard Law in 2008, clerked for 

Federal Judge Miriam Goldman 

Cedarbaum (who witnessed the 

civil license at the wedding) and 

is an associate at Davis Polk & 

Wardwell in NYC. Elizabeth has 

interned or worked at the Peggy 

Guggenheim Collection in Venice, 

the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston 

and the JFK Library and Museum, 

and is interning with the 20th 

Century Drawings & Prints department 

at the Morgan Library. She 

completed a graduate certificate in 

museum studies at Tufts in 2008 

and completed an M.A. in modern 

art: critical studies at GSAS in May. 

Elizabeth will begin a Ph.D. in art 

history at the Graduate Center at 

CUNY in the fall. 

Samuel Schon became engaged 

to Katie Wray, a cousin of Robert 

Wray, this past spring. They are 

planning a fall wedding in South 

Carolina. Tova Katz recently gave 

birth to a boy, Amiel David. She, 

her husband and son will be moving 

in July to Boston, where Tova 

will pursue an M.B.A. 

07 

David D. Chait 

1255 New Hampshire Ave. 

N.W., Apt. 815 

Washington, DC 20036 

ddc2106@columbia.edu 

CC ’07, hardly missing a beat. You 

are all up to amazing things. Here 

are some exciting updates: 

On April 17, many of our classmates 

attended the annual Young 

Alumni Fund Spring Benefit, held 

at the New York Tennis and Racquet 

Club. Attendees included Arvind 

Kadaba, Geoffrey Karapetyan, Jessica 

Zen, Todd Abrams, Benjamin 

Baker, Gerard Barrett, Matthew 

Barsamian, Aaron Bruker, Christian 

Capasso, David Chait, Luciana 

Colapinto, Tamsin Davies, Caitlin 

Shure, Charlotte Cowles, Adrian 

Demko, Samantha Feingold, Emily 

Hoffman, Daria Leonyuk, Jessica 

Wong Zen, Jacob Olson and Andrew 

Ward, among others. 

Erik Lindman participated in a 

four-artist show held at London’s 

Hannah Barry Gallery. Titled New 

Work, New York, the show highlighted 

contemporary abstract painting 

from New York City and ran from 

April 30–May 27. Erik writes, “This 

is my first major show outside of 

the States!” 

Kasia Nikhamina’s debut play, 

Redbeard & Domicella, a bold retrospective 

of her young marriage 

told in “he said/she said” fashion, 

was performed at the Too Soon 

Festival at The Brick Theater in 

Williamsburg, Brooklyn, in June. 

Please e-mail themayorshotel@ 

gmail.com if you’d like to join the 

mailing list. 

Xavier Vanegas writes, “An 

animated kids show I’m developing 

with Cathleen Cimino ’08, The 

Fink Forest Friends, won the Fred 

Rogers Memorial Scholarship from 

the Television Academy of Arts 

and Sciences Foundation in March! 

The award was presented by Mrs. 

Rogers (she is a pistol) at the Fred 

Forward Conference in Pittsburgh, 

a convention of child developmental 

psychologists and children’s TV 

programming executives. Other 

than that, I am still directing music 

videos and commercials as steps 

toward directing feature films.” 

Elizabeth Epstein shares, “On 

May 27, I graduated from the Harvard 

Graduate School of Education 

with an Ed.M. specializing in education 

policy and management.” 

Eric Bondarsky, Nina Cohen 

’08 Barnard, Lindsay Sohacheski 

’08 and Lena Hourwitz visited 

Sara Pollack ’07 Barnard, Reina 

Potaznik ’07 Barnard and Isaac 

Greenbaum ’06E in Washington 

Heights for an enjoyable Sabbath 

experience replete with excellent 

food, plenty to drink and Kattan 

to Settle. The occasion was the 

visiting of a few Ukrainian friends, 

who were in town briefly for business 

and pleasure. 

Edward Fox writes, “I’m off to 

pursue a Ph.D. in economics at 

Michigan in the fall. My plan is to 

also pursue a concurrent J.D. at 

Harvard or Yale. It’s a long program, 

but on the plus side, by the 

time I’m finished with it, everyone 

will have flying cars.” 

Phillipa Ainsley shares some 

exciting news. “Johan Warodell ’09 

GS, ’10 GSAS, and I got engaged 

on April 10 in the Brooklyn Botanic 

Garden! We’re moving to Berlin 

and then to Stockholm, as I will be 

doing my master’s at the Stockholm 

School of Economics starting 

this autumn. The wedding will 

probably be in 2012 and horribly 

inconvenient to travel to.” 

Mimi Arbeit writes, “I’m finishing 

my third year of teaching in 

Boston-area public schools. I will 

be starting an M.A./Ph.D. program 

in child development at Tufts in 

September. Additionally, I recently 

Erik Lindman ’07 participated in a four-artist show 

held at London’s Hannah Barry Gallery. 

got engaged to Matthew Lowe ’05 

GS, ’05 JTS, and we’re planning a 

July 2011 wedding in Boston.” 

Among those in NYC, Zak Kostro 

writes, “I’m bartending at Son 

Cubano, a restaurant and nightclub 

in the Meatpacking District. I work 

Tuesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday. 

Great food, live music and 

a D.J. on Friday and Saturday 

spinning the hottest house, Latin 

and pop. Best of all, no cover. Great 

happy hour Monday–Friday, 4:30– 

6:30 p.m. Would love to see some 

fellow Columbians at my bar!” 

Riddhi Dasgupta writes, “Christian 

Capasso and I backpacked 

around Morocco and Spain. It was 

a rewarding, sobering and fun 

experience. We received excellent 

tips from Julian Himes and 

Nishant Dixit, who had waded the 

same waters a little while ago. The 

Djemaa el Fna (Assembly of the 

Dead) in Marrakech was a fave. On 

a separate note, some Kiwi friends 

and I recently ran the Chris Hoy 


69

class notes 


Half Marathon in Edinburgh. It’s 

my second demi-marathon, and I 

hope to graduate to a full one soon. 

Sore muscles, soaring spirits.” 

Riddhi adds, “In late April, we 

held a Columbia College young 

alumni punting and pimms event 

in Cambridge, England. It was 

very nice to share this place with 

old friends and new.” 

Francesca Butnick graduated 

from Harvard Law in May. Beginning 

in September, she will be 

clerking at the Supreme Court of 

Israel for Justice Neal Hendel. 

Karen Ensslen graduated from 

law student to student-at-law, and 

thinks that “Toronto is the new 

Brooklyn.” 

Thank you again for all of the 

submissions! Have a great summer! 

08 

Neda Navab 

53 Saratoga Dr. 

Jericho, NY 11753 

nn2126@columbia.edu 

Elizabeth Carmel Grefrath is 

engaged to Joshua Kahlil Sessions. 

Elizabeth studied history and 

English and has worked at the 

Columbia University Oral History 

Research Office in various roles 

since 2004 and now directs the 

Rule of Law Oral History Project, 

which focuses on civil and human 

rights abuses in the post–9-11 

United States and the history of 

the Guantanamo Bay Detention 

Center. Joshua is the author, under 

his pen name, Joshua Furst, of 

the acclaimed novel The Sabotage 

Café and the story collection Short 

People. He teaches fiction writing 

at Columbia and The New School 

for Social Research. The couple will 

wed in October in New York City. 

Lauren Abbott is working at 

UBS on the Latin American Emerging 

Markets trading desk. “In 

order to get to work, Lauren wakes 

up at 4 every morning!” says disgruntled 

roommate Neda Navab. 

This summer, Lauren is traveling 

to South Africa for the World Cup 

to watch France play Uruguay and 

Italy play Paraguay, “and to swim 

with the sharks.” 

Chris Sauer is finishing up 

his first year at the Yale School of 

Medicine. He recently was elected 

to serve as the Medical Student 

Council president. 

Irina Ikonsky can be found at 

Harvard pursuing graduate work 

in Slavic literature. She travels to 

New York as much as possible to 

spend time with Lauren La Torre, 

who is going to be an educator 

and plans to write children’s books 

on the side. “They will be phenomenal,” 

predicts Irina. Amber 

Lee Nicole Moorer is working 

at Columbia’s Double Discovery 

Center. “Come visit!” she says. 

Matthew Birkhold occasionally 

goes to Princeton to pursue graduate 

study in German literature. “Secretly,” 

jokes Irina, “he just wants 

to study Russian and will travel to 

the Nevsky Institute of Language 

and Culture in St. Petersburg this 

summer to fulfill his lifelong goal 

of reading Anna Karenina in the 

original. And I will be there, too.” 

Abigail Rosebrock is pursuing 

a Ph.D. in English literature at Columbia. 

Fascinated by bestiaries, she 

plans to be a medievalist and write 

sketch comedies for smallGRAND 

on the side. Dianna Ng ’07 is finishing 

up medical school at NYU, but 

will devote her life to literature a 

la François Rabelais. The sensational 

six are working on opening 

the Book Museum for Fairy Tales 

with Alternate Endings. It will be 

designed by Dan Taeyoung Lee ’09, 

who plans to attend the Graduate 

School of Architecture, Planning 

and Preservation next fall. “The 

Book Museum is neither a library 

nor a college, but is what the author 

wished and was able to express in 

the form in which it is expressed,” 

explains Irina. If anyone knows or 

lives a fairy tale with (preferably) 

an alternate ending, please contact 

Irina. 

09 

Alidad Damooei 

c/o CCT 


622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 


damooei@gmail.com 

The Class of 2009 continues to amaze 

with its travels, studies and work 

across the world. Our updates for 

this issue come from Boston, India 

and points in between. 

Ernest Herrera is studying law 

at the University of New Mexico 

in Albuquerque. He has spent 

the first year trudging through 

mandatory courses, but he is looking 

forward to next year, when 

he will study immigration and 

criminal law. Ernest bought his 

first snowboard and is enjoying the 

slopes. This summer, he is taking 

law classes in Guanajuato, Mexico, 

through a program run through 

UNM. He also will be an extern for 

a Mexican lawyer in Mexico. 

After graduation, Akash Gupta 

spent a few weeks in California 

with Ariel Zucker, and they went 

backpacking at King’s Canyon. In 

March, Akash went to India, where 

he spent several months working 

at various public health NGOs all 

around the country. At the end of 

June, Akash started working in a 

tuberculosis/plague lab at Weill 

Cornell Medical College in New 

York City. His project screened 

some new antibacterial compounds 

to see if they could inhibit plague 

growth. He now is preparing for 

medical school, which begins in 

August. 

Robert Kohen is enjoying life as 

a graduate student. As of May, he 

completed his first year of study 

at Harvard, where he is pursuing 

a Ph.D. in comparative literature. 

Robert is focusing his studies on 

20th-century critical theory and 

cinema. He presented his first 

paper in April, discussing films by 

Pasolini at an academic conference 

at the University of Wisconsin. 

Robert is spending the summer 

researching in Paris. 

Last summer, Tiffany Dockery 

traveled to Tanzania to work for 

CARE International. There, she 

wrote human interests stories for the 

Women and Girls Empowerment 

Program, designed promotional 

materials and trained staff. Upon 

returning to the States, she joined 

Google as a member of the inaugural 

START program, spending four 

months in Mountain View, Calif., in 

an intensive training program before 

moving to her permanent role on the 

Google Affiliate Network team in 

Chicago. She is an account coordinator. 

She is loving Google, Chicago 

and her new puppy, Jake. 

10 

Julia Feldberg 


622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 


juliafeldberg@gmail.com 

Amidst the flurry of final papers 

and exams, class dinners and ceremonies, 

it is hard to imagine life 

beyond school. Alas, by the time 

you are reading this column, we 

will finally be Columbia College 

alumni. Whether you’re excited or 

panicked about your new life in 

the “real world,” take a moment to 

check out what some of our classmates 

are doing this summer and 

in the year ahead. 

Some are revving up for school 

mode once again. Alana Sivin 

deferred admission to a J.D./M.A. 

program in cultural studies of comparative 

law and education policy 

at Loyola Chicago in order to teach 

first grade for a year at Harlem 

Success Academy in East Harlem. 

Devora Aharon is traveling this 

summer and then will attend 

Mount Sinai School of Medicine in 

the fall. Alise Green is spending the 

summer working in New York City 

before moving to England to receive 

her master’s in sociology from the 

London School of Economics. 

Kevin Bulger and Patrick Foley 

are going on a cross-country road 

trip starting in New York. They plan 

to visit Ohio, Madison, St. Paul, the 

Dakotas, Wyoming, Idaho, Oregon, 

California, Arizona, Texas, New 

Orleans, Tennessee, St. Louis and 

finally Chicago. If anyone wants to 

house this road-tripping duo along 

the way, please let them know. Following 

their adventure, Kevin will 

be doing a post-graduate year at 

Durham University in England. He 

will be getting a master’s in modern 

history while playing basketball for 

the university. 

Isabel Broer moved in early 

June to Colorado, where she will 

teach secondary math for two 

years with Teach for America. Isabel 

hasn’t had enough of Columbia 

yet, though; she will be back on 

campus for law school in fall 2012. 

Jael Hernandez-Vasquez also 

will join the ranks of TFA in Phoenix, 

where he will teach eighthgrade 

special education. Jael writes, 

“The recent institutionally racist 

bill will not hinder this Latino from 

pursuing his goals!” 

If you need friends to visit in 

other parts of the country, look no 

further. Ruqayyah Abdul-Karim 

will be moving to Washington, 

D.C., for a two-year fellowship in 

bioethics research at the National 

Institutes of Health Clinical Center. 

Gabe Saltzman looks forward to 

seeing friends while he works in 

New York until November. He 

then plans to move out west to ski 

for the year. Those hoping to be 

invited — and maybe even get free 

lessons — should take the chance 

to talk him up this summer. Esha 

Gupta returned home to Oklahoma 

and stopped by New York for a 

wedding before she moved to Los 

Angeles in June. There, she lives in 

Santa Monica on Ocean Avenue. 

Esha plans to study for the GMAT 

and find a job in the entertainment 

industry while she’s there. If any 

Columbians are in the L.A. area, 

Esha would love to hang out! 

Last but not least, some of us 

will be returning to New York City. 

Jeff Schwartz will be producing 

“The Unsilent Film Series” at Le 

Poisson Rouge. The series will 

feature acclaimed live musicians 

playing over classic films. Jeff also 

is looking for a full-time job in 

the entertainment industry. Laura 

Taylor likely will travel to Singapore 

and/or Brazil this summer. 

Next year, she plans to dance with 

Alvin Ailey Dance Theater, work at 

Steps Dance, most likely teaching 

babies, and audition for Broadway 

shows. Adam Bulkley, having 

retired from his duties as head of 

the 2010 Senior Fund, went home 

to Baltimore for a few weeks and 

then returned to New York City 

to start at Barclays during the first 

week of July. 

As always, please don’t hesitate 

to reach out to me with your news. 

I hope you are all enjoying the 

summer! 


70

Classified 

Advertising 

services 

Date Smart/Party Smart. Join the introduction network exclusively for 

graduates students and faculty of the Ivies, MIT, Stanford and other great 

schools. The Right Stuff, www.rightstuffdating.com, 800-988-5288. 

Vintage Posters: NYC dealer offering quality selection of American/ 

European posters. Visit www.mjwfineposters.com. 

PROMOTE YOUR BOOK on tv-radio talkshows, print. Columbia alum offers 

free consultation. Frank Promotion, (914) 238-4604, frankpromo@aol.com. 

HEARTSTONE Senior Living for Engaged Graduates Santa Fe Luxury 

Affordable Heartstonecommunity.com. 

WAR BRIEF ALPHA: Understanding & Fighting World War IV at melos.us. 

rentals 

Naples, Florida: Luxury condominium overlooking Gulf, two-month 

minimum, 802-524-2108 James L. Levy CC ’65, LAW ’68. 

Northeast Florida: Luxury Condominium. Beach, golf, tennis, much more. 

Details & photos: vrbo.com/205110. John Grundman ‘60C (212) 769-4523. 

Englewood, FL: Brand New Luxury 2 BR/2 BA Waterfront Condo w/ pvt. 

boat slip. Walk to the Gulf, pool, floor to ceiling glass, awesome water views, 

Lanai, elevator. Professionally decorated. Contact Evan Morgan, CC ’85 at (330) 

655-5766 for details. 

St Croix, VI: Luxury Beach Villa. 5 bedroom house, East End (949) 475-4175; 

richard.waterfield@waterfield.com CC ’94. 

High Mountain Vermont Log Home: Unprecedented National Forest 

Serenity. www.TomPerera.com/home CC ’60, GF ’68. 

Jupiter Island Condo, 3 br, 2.5 bths., pool, splendid ocean, intracoastal. 

Sunset views from wraparound balcony; boat slips available. Sale or Seasonal 

Rental, min. 2 months. (772) 321-2370; Edward Kalaidjian, ’42C, 47L, eckalai@ 

aol.com. 

1850 farmhouse, upstate NY: 8 acres, apple trees, pond, views. Stunning 

details. 90 minutes GWB. Weekly/weekend. www.givonehome.com, “blue 

farmhouse.” CC ’91 

Brittany, NW France, bright and spacious 2007 villa, ocean views, www. 

brittanycoasthome.com, (603) 455-2010. 

real estate sales 

classified ad information 

REGULAR CLASSIFIED RATES: $3 per word for one issue, 

discounts for six consecutive issues. Ten-word minimum. 

Phone (including area code) and PO boxes count as one word. 

Words divided by slashes, hyphens or plus signs are counted 

individually. E-mail and Web addresses are priced based on 

length. No charge for Columbia College class years or 

ampersands (&). We boldface the first four words at no charge. 

Additional boldface words are $1 per word. 

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PAYMENT: Prepayment required on all issues at time of order. 

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staff, students and parents 

Mail, fax or e-mail orders to: 



622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 


Telephone: 212-851-7967 

Fax: 212-851-1950 

E-mail: cctadvertising@columbia.edu 

www.college.columbia.edu/cct 

Deadline for September/October issue: 

Tuesday, July 27, 2010 

Maine luxury lakefront town homes for sale on pristine Kezar Lake. 

www.kezarlakecondos.com or (713) 988-2382. 

2-BEDROOM Co-op Apartment, newly renovated, immaculate, steps from 

Columbia. Asking $785,000. www.545west111th.com, 917-687-6876 Mackenzie. 

Litchfield Cty. Connecticut — Contemporary Townhouse 3 Br/2 BA gated 

community. Fishing, indoor/outdoor pools & tennis, camp, horseback riding & 

skiing. Paid $134,000 — all reasonable offers considered. sing2bill@aol.com, 

Bill Wood CC ’65, GSAS 67. 


71

Photo: Eileen Barroso 

Lasting Image

Alumni Reunion Weekend 

COLUMBIA COLLEGE FUND 

1945 

1950 

1955 

1960 

1965 

1970 

1975 

1980 

1985 

1990 

1995 

2000 

2005 

Many thanks to the Columbia College alumni, parents and 

friends who supported the College this year. 

On behalf of the students you serve, 

Come Celebrate thank Alumni you! Reunion Weekend 2010 

— the reunion that everyone is looking forward to! 

Enjoy your summer. 

In addition to class-specific events throughout the weekend, you can join all Columbians 

celebrating their reunions on Friday at the “Back on Campus” sessions, including Core 

Curriculum mini-courses, COLUMBIAengineering COLLEGElectures, FUND tours of the Morningside campus and its 

libraries 

Office 

and 

of 

more. 

Alumni 

There 

Affairs 

even will 

and 

be unique 

Development 

opportunities to engage deeply with the 

city’s arts community with theater, ballet, music and gallery options. 

Columbians will be dispersed throughout the Heights and greater Gotham all weekend 

long, but Saturday is everyone’s day on campus. This year’s Saturday programming 

will invite all alumni back to celebrate and learn together from some of Columbia’s 

best-known friends who faculty supported in a series of the public College lectures, this at the year. Decades BBQs and affinity 

receptions. The night wraps up with the reunion classes’ tri-college wine tasting on 

Low Plaza, followed by our biggest line-up of class dinners ever and a final tri-college 

gathering for champagne, dancing and good times on Low Plaza. 

Many thanks to the Columbia College alumni, parents and 

On behalf of the students you support, thank you! 

Enjoy your summer. 

Co l u m b i a Co l l e g e Fu n d 

Dates and Registration Information 

Office Thursday, of Alumni June 3–Sunday, Affairs and June Development 6, 2010 

REGISTER TODAY! For more information or to register online, 

please visit http://reunion.college.columbia.edu. 

If you register before Monday, May 3, you’ll receive a 10% discount on all events, 

excluding South Pacific, West Side Story, Next to Normal, American Ballet Theatre 

and New York Philharmonic tickets.


Columbia University 

622 W. 113th St., MC 4530 


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