English Retirees Newsletter
20th Edition, September 2010
Chair’s Message
Dear Friends,
I’m writing this year to you all—friends from all sectors—with hopes that you can share with us, or that we can share with you, something good about these times from somewhere. (Actually, I just re-read this after a lunch break, and now want to say that I’ll be back in just a bit to talk about something really quite good.) But for now, I need to say that in my 32 years in the Department, I’ve never seen anything quite like the anxiety that has beset us. Practically everyone in the departments, the College, and the University has had to face the realities of ever-shrinking state support. And if we are to plan for additional cuts, beyond the mid-term cuts the Governor has already ordered, of up to 10% from the next biennial (2011-2013) budget, we will have realized, since 2008, a university-wide reduction in state funding of about 36%! Little wonder that the president and provost of the University have asked us to rethink—almost completely—the way we conduct ourselves and our programs. They have asked us to help them define what is being called the “new normal.”
When I wrote last fall and then again in the spring, I suggested that the days of across the board cuts are over, and by extension, primarily vertical cuts will take over. That is, in fact, what we saw in the College of Liberal Arts, which decided (after much public discussion) to give up Theatre and Dance and the major in German, among other things. But these days less is being said about vertical cuts. The possibility of horizontal cuts has returned, but knowing how debilitating that kind of cutting can be, we’ll more than likely see a combination of the two approaches. So it will again be up to us to present our best case for protecting our BA degrees in English and Digital Technology and Culture and our MA and PhD degrees in literature and rhetoric and composition.
In the past, the large service obligations the University has placed on us in the teaching of English 101, Introductory Writing, and English 402, Technical and Professional Writing have made it more possible to keep full time faculty teaching within the major and graduate programs. But with what will be inevitable cuts and reductions in temporary instructional faculty to follow, we will see many of our tenure track faculty teaching in lower-division courses, at 100—and 200—levels and a necessary trimming of our major and graduate offerings.
To some, this is not such a bad idea—rather like returning us to our roots—but for others, who’ve never known the ins and outs of lower-division teaching, it sounds like a real problem and a chore. To them, I suggest keeping eyes and ears open for another kind of reality, and this brings me back to what I think you’ll agree is nothing but good.
This good comes from two sources: my first-time stint as coordinator of our team-taught English 302—Introduction to English Studies—and my ongoing role as chair-welcomer to new graduate students. From the first source, as I sit in class listening to our faculty lecturers talk about the ideas of English studies that most turn them on, I can’t help but share the thrill our incipient English majors feel as they begin to explore their own ideas and find their own ways in studying literature, rhetoric, writing, and linguistics. These ideas may be inchoate, naïve, even wrong-headed—but they are all full of energy and enthusiasm, and they are all looking to become better.
And the same goes for our new graduate students, who, in the welcoming chats I have with them, are so unrestrainedly excited about the ideas that are opening up to them. Absolutely, without a doubt, our new graduate students are thrilled to be here, embarking on this new journey. So—coming from two ends of the department student spectrum, this youthful enthusiasm, energy, and excitement simply wrap me up and make me even more determined to face the wolf at our door.
But in my doing that, I must also turn to you for your continued support and help. So—once again, as I sincerely thank you for your past support, I am as sincerely asking for your present and future support. With your help, students and faculty alike can continue to work hard in keeping the humanities and liberal arts at the heart of universities like ours.
We can meet the wolf at our door; the question is, will we let him in? We look forward to hearing from you and wish you the best for strong, productive times to come.
George E. Kennedy
Professor and Chair
Paul Brians (WSU 1968-2008)
Last year our budget was tight, and we made only short trips; but this year things look better and we hope to resume our wanderings abroad.
At Thanksgiving time we drove to California to celebrate the holiday with Paula’s relatives near Napa, and to visit with my 93-year-old father just a few weeks before he died. It was great to connect with him one last time.
I gave a couple of talks at the local senior center and another at the Hansville community center, but my biggest lecture trip was to address the annual meeting of the Oregon Court Reporters Association in Salem on “Common Errors in English Usage.” They were an interesting and lively bunch, despite the fact that their profession is being rendered obsolete by digital audio recordings which are e-mailed to stay-at-home transcriptionists who then zap each day’s proceedings to the lawyers and judge electronically. Some of them are finding work as live supertitle writers for the deaf at events like church services.
Common Errors in English Usage continues to sell steadily; but the annual calendar is being discontinued after five years. My small publisher (William, James & Co.) has survived hard times by cutting back severely on expenses, and continues to hold its head above water.
We made two trips to British Columbia: a weekend in Vancouver exploring Stanley Park and another to Ucluelet, on the west coast of Vancouver Island, where we had a great time beachcombing and hiking the rainforest trails. We’ve also been out exploring regional parks and hiking trails on the Kitsap Peninsula.
Our garden exploded this year in a riot of color. It’s hard to stay on top of things, but a great change from the discouraging soil and climate of our Pullman yard. We gave up on tomatoes (not enough sun) but raised a nice crop of garlic.
Paula continues to sing with the local chorale and other vocal groups. She’s about to begin rehearsals with Ave, a new Seattle choir specializing in the music of Renaissance nuns. This summer she enjoyed for the fourth time attending the summer workshop of the Tallis Scholars. This year the repertoire was 15th- century Flemish polyphony.
In May we hosted the northwest chapter of the Music Librarians Association, of which Paula has been a member for many years. We also enjoyed hosting four members of a touring choir from Hahnheim, Germany at our place this summer. In July eleven members of the Pullman “Knitters” group took over our house for three days while I took up residence in a Seattle hotel. Former members came from Texas, Vancouver, and other distant points.
Alex and Barb Hammond paid us a visit in August and explored some of the island with us. It was great to see them again.
I continue to be active in the local photo club. In September our art supply store asked me to be their featured artist for the monthly “art walk.” A nice crowd turned up for the exhibit opening, and the next day my photos literally leapt off the wall—a hanger gave way and a framed print tumbled down, knocking another one beneath it onto the floor, shattering the glass in the frames and creating a mess.
I was asked for the second year to photograph the annual Bainbridge Island Land Trust fundraising dinner, but this time was also asked to provide some of my botanical photography to be given away in the form of packs of gift cards to the attendees at the end of the event.
We enjoyed meeting and chatting with Bill Marler, former WSU student and trustee, who’s a major supporter of the Land Trust.
The big event of my year was the creation of a new book of my photographs: Four Seasons on Bainbridge Island. There has been no commercially available book depicting the natural attractions of this place, and this volume aims to fill that gap. This was my first venture into self-publishing, and it’s been fascinating and time-consuming. The book was printed in Malaysia and delivered by cargo vessel and train, arriving on a truck at our house just last week.
So far, it’s had a warm reception. It’s in six stores on Bainbridge and in three major bookstores in Seattle including Arundel Books (below).
Cheers,
Paul
Leota Day (WSU l970-1988)
Dear friends,
After 2.5 years of childcare two days a week for our little terrorist, we have been released into re-retirement and we’re planning travel again. We’re spending a few weeks in Ireland this fall, renting a car, and hoping to conquer the left side of the road.
However, freedom is fleeting. We’ve just learned Kecia is expecting her second baby in February. Terrorist #1 will have some adjustment to make, having been the center of the universe for 3 years. Isaac considers us, his grandparents, as rather large playmates, directing us to share (“Grandma, you’re finished with that toy now. It’s Grandpa’s turn.”), and in matters of his routine (“I usually take my shower in the morning,” when I’m trying to get him into the tub at night). He’s learning to spell by reading letters on things (“C-o-n-a-i-r spells ‘hairdryer’”). All right, all right! Enough, Leota! Let’s have another topic.
Dutch and I have been enjoying outdoor concerts this year, both at Ste. Michelle Winery and the Woodland Park Zoo. So far, the weather’s been terrific on those nights. A couple of years ago, we were all huddled under ponchos and tarps in a downpour. Being confirmed Seattleites, we’re pretty well-prepared for rain. Speaking of weather, this summer it feels like we’re San Francisco—foggy until afternoon. Our vegetable garden is hardly producing anything—except huge zucchini. Anyone want some? Free shipping!
Here Dutch and I are avoiding our garden, sitting at a Sonoma Valley winery and awaiting a taste. Surely this is an accredited form of meditation which will lower our blood pressure, reduce our stress and increase our lifespan and mental clarity.
Kecia and her family are doing fine and we see them weekly. Chad comes for dinner every week. If we feed him, he will come. He still hasn’t been able to find work yet. It’s been a year and a half and jobs are scarce. So much so, that a person advertising for someone to clean dog kennels got over 600 applications.
Thanks to Paul for continuing to gather and organize these letters from all of us. I love to read about what you all have been doing.
Leota & Dutch Day
5653 11th Ave.
NE Seattle, WA 98105
Email: carvil@comcast.net
Diane Gillespie (WSU 1975-2001)
Last year at this time, we were looking forward to a September trip to New Hampshire for Dick’s nephew’s wedding and a Domey family reunion. This year, we’re just back from our annual trip to northern Minnesota. This time we took an Amtrak train from Spokane as far as Minneapolis/St. Paul. The train ride, partly our protest against the increasingly unfriendly skies, was pleasant, the main drawback being the ungodly Spokane departure (1:30 a.m.) and return (1:40 a.m.) times. We went to spend a week with my sister Carole, in her fourth year of living (the important word) tolerably well with lung cancer treatments. We also got together with rarely seen cousins from my mother’s side of the family, and with the cousins on my dad’s side who spent summers growing up with us at “the lake.” One of them is writing a history of the forty-eight acres on which my dad and his four siblings built and rebuilt cabins over the years. Most of our sentences all week began with “I remember” or “Do you remember…?” or “When did they…?” We should have asked the previous generation for answers while we still could.
Our next trip will be in October 2010. Through Untours, we have an apartment on the Rhine (St. Goar) for a week. Then, through Elderhostel/ Exploritas/Road Scholar (an organization clearly undergoing an identity crisis), we will spend several days in Lisbon before joining a small group tour of northern Portugal. After that, we fly to the Netherlands for a few days with Dick’s brother Bob and wife Hendrien. If we have to endure two trans- Atlantic flights, we might as well cram in as much as possible between them. Fortunately we have a good cat-and-house sitter.
As usual, this past June I attended the (20th) International Conference on Virginia Woolf, this time in Georgetown, Kentucky. My paper from the previous (2009) conference is just out in that year’s selected papers, as is my chapter on Woolf and painting in The Edinburgh Companion to Virginia Woolf and the Arts. Another chapter, for a book on the Woolfs and the Hogarth Press, is forthcoming this fall. I continue, therefore, to pursue my research and writing, mainly by mining the Woolfs’ personal library (in Manuscripts, Archives and Special Collections at WSU) for the cultural contexts of her work.
Other than that, I’ve taken a couple of drawing classes, read a lot of books, kept on an exercise schedule at Anytime Fitness, observed Neill Public Library Board meetings for the League of Women Voters, and ridden the wild stock market with the investment club several of us founded in 1997. Dick has been doing his usual volunteer work at the Gladish Community and Cultural Center; most recently he, Al von Frank, and one of the Gladish employees painted the entire gymnasium, including the ceiling. He’s also been finishing up details (stack stone, tile, railings, mosaic) on our new siding and the front-of-house changes we designed. Now that he’s had knee surgery to repair a torn meniscus, we can continue our hiking and our ballroom dancing with the Palouse Dance Club. We always attend Best of Broadway and Interplayers productions in Spokane as well as support local drama and musical organizations.
So here we are, cheerfully tending our own gardens (literally and figuratively), fully aware that we do so in the midst of a chaotic and violent world. In “Thoughts on Peace in an Air Raid” (1940), Virginia Woolf stresses the importance of everyday creative activity, of “private thinking, tea-table thinking….‘I will not cease from mental fight,’ Blake wrote. Mental fight means thinking against the current, not with it. That current flows fast and furious,” she adds. “It issues in a spate of words from the loudspeakers and the politicians. Every day they tell us that we are a free people, fighting to defend freedom.” But we are not free, she concludes, unless we recognize our own complicity in hierarchical thinking and intolerance. Since WWII, we have invented a lot of high-tech media, only to reveal and reinforce how little human nature and politics have changed.
Diane
945 SE Glen Echo Rd.
Pullman, WA 99163
gillespie@pullman.com
Alex Hammond (WSU 1975-2009)
Dear Fellow Retirees,
New to this group, I’ll just offer up a few words. I retired from WSU in May 2009 after watching the preparations in English and the CLA for the first of the current round of budget cuts. Barbara retired two months later after twenty years as Director of the WSU Counseling Center. I’m continuing to do a bit of Poe scholarship, Barbara maintains a small private practice as a psychologist, we’re able to see children and grandchildren (two) a bit more often, and we live on Pullman’s College Hill in order to not lose the sound of student party life.
Retirement has allowed us a bit more traveling. In the fall of 2009, I gave a Poe paper in Philadelphia and we toured the Outer Banks, Charleston, and Savannah; saw Shelli Fowler and Karen DePauw (and the shooting grounds) at Virginia Tech; and ended with the battlefield at Fredericksburg in honor of Dick Law. In May of 2010, we were able to combine a brief trip to Athens and the Greek Islands with a splendid two- week tour of Turkey with Bob Staab’s group (mainly folks from WSU, UI, and the Washington D.C. Press Club).
While we feel the loss of Bob McLean deeply (and no more so than when we wanted to talk over our wine and food in Athens and Istanbul with him), we remain in touch with various other English department retirees in Pullman and Moscow, and we had the pleasure of seeing Paul Brians and Paula Elliot on Bainbridge Island this September.
Until next year,
Alex (and Barbara)
1110 N.E. Indiana St.
Pullman, WA 99163
Email: BarbAlexH@gmail.com
Bill Hirschfeld (WSU 1978-1988)
Two transitions, one planned and the other unplanned, have caused me to miss contributing to the last two editions of the English Retirees Newsletter.
In 2006, Marilyn and I concluded that we were nearing the point when we would be unable to cope physically with our idyllic home and garden on relatively rural Bainbridge Island. After considerable investigation, we chose a new continuing-care facility (not yet under construction at the time) planned by the Presbyterian Retirement Communities of the Northwest for Seattle’s First Hill. We chose a two- bedroom independent living apartment in the 26-story building which overlooks St. James Cathedral and the Frye Museum, with glimpses of the Cascades and the Sound. The location suited our tastes: the museums, theaters, symphony, Town Hall all in easy walking distance, three major medical facilities just three blocks away (in different directions), and a short drive to see our son and grandchildren in Wallingford. A connected structure houses assisted living, memory support and skilled nursing facilities which will be available at considerably “lower than market rate” if/when needed. So, we happily embarked on the adventure of downsizing from over 3,000 sq ft to 1,350!
Ironically, in April 2007 not long after submitting our application and attending the ground breaking for Skyline at First Hill, Marilyn’s shortness of breath was diagnosed as lung cancer. She responded exceptionally well to aggressive chemotherapy which permitted us to celebrate our 50th anniversary in September 2007 with family on a cruise to Alaska followed by a few days at Lake Crescent. We also attended her 50th reunion at Stanford a month later. Follow-up radiation in December left no visible sign of the original tumor. After placing our house on the market in April 2008, we treated ourselves to a delightful and nostalgic cruise from Seattle with stops at each of the Hawaiian Islands where we lived 40 years ago.
As happens all too often with this dreadful disease, a new tumor (attributed to cells which had survived the initial treatment) showed up that Fall. We resumed chemotherapy which showed some promise initially. Our efforts at downsizing and planning for our move to Skyline kept us well occupied and gave Marilyn a lot of pleasure; she was so happy when we closed on the sale of our home just a year ago and was particularly pleased to visit our just completed apartment on October 5. All this time, the treatments continued but every step forward was followed by two back. With our move in progress, complications led to hospitalization on October 8; she rallied briefly but then died on October 17 having told her doctor and our son that she could rest peacefully knowing I would be here.
I’ve been in our Seattle apartment since October. Our new home is just as we had planned it, and the residents are a nicer group than we dared hope for—a lot of Boeing retirees but a fair number of retired professors, clergy and other professionals all of whom make dinner table conversations lively and interesting. A good number have lost spouses and assure me that one never really gets over the loss and it’s OK to weep from time to time. As one of four elected officers of our new residents’ association, I’ve kept particularly busy helping to get the community—including our embryonic library—up and running; having all this to think and write about has been very good for me. I’ve also found walking all around Seattle mentally and physically stimulating. And organized hikes at Mt. Rainier and Snoqualmie are a good counterpoint to museum visits, theater and the symphony. If you are ever this way and have some time, I’d be delighted to see you.
Bill
725 Ninth Avenue, Apt. 1305
Seattle, WA 98104-2064
Virginia Hyde (WSU 1970-2004)
Dear Retirees,
I think I told you in my last letter that I would be writing more poetry, now that I have the time. So I will begin by saying that this year I won a prize of $100 in a national contest for religious poetry. This may not sound like a fortune, but I used to be glad, many years ago, to place a poem in a “little magazine” or book anthology for about $5-10, so this prize was the largest sum I have ever received for poetry! This year I also made the best royalties of my life from my Cambridge edition of Lawrence’s Southwestern essays. Needless to say, I haven’t usually thought of my writing in connection with profit!
Another book “Terra Incognita”: D. H. Lawrence at the Frontiers, which I edited (with Earl Ingersoll of SUNY), was issued in July by Fairleigh Dickinson University Press. It is especially beautiful with color illustrations of paintings by Lawrence (a little-known New Mexico landscape), Georgia O’Keeffe (who stayed at the Lawrence Ranch in 1929), and Dorothy Brett (who painted there for about fifty years after moving from Bloomsbury to Taos with the Lawrences in 1924). This book concentrates on the Southwestern period, heavily using my new Cambridge edition of Lawrence’s Mornings in Mexico and Other Essays. This past summer I have been assisting in the Taos Community Foundation fund drive for preservation of the Lawrence Ranch.
It is good to have free time to read simply for pleasure, isn’t it?! I am still involved in a literary society for the English novel and the Browning-related groups like Friends of Casa Guidi. This year I resolved to read back through the Trollope novels, but I was forgetting the size of some of them! Many thousands of pages later, I have barely made a dent. I have mastered all the family alliances in “Barsetshire” but am now deep in the equally multi-volume histories of the Pallisers (twenty-six serial parts). One of my last dissertation students wrote on The Way We Live Now, which certainly gives one of Trollope’s darkest visions of America and of the English class system in the 1870s. Did some of you see the dramatization of this novel on PBS with David Suchet (Hercule Poirot actor), also on video?
This summer I injured my leg in a freak kitchen accident and have been nursing it along and hobbling about, but luckily it is healed now. My health has kept us from very extensive travels, but for our wedding anniversary (23rd), Dave and I went back to one of our honeymoon locations, to the Hotel Coeur d’Alene on the lake; the Lindens were also there with their boat. We plan to go soon to Victoria, where we enjoy high tea in the Empress Hotel. Dave still goes to regional Scottish festivals, sometimes wearing his regalia, and we get to some conferences, literary or mathematical or genealogical.
I have hesitated whether or not to include a photo of Stan Linden, Nick Kiessling, and me at Avery Hall last spring. It was a wet, blustering day and we were all in our “walking” gear when we remembered a photo session that was scheduled in the Bundy Room, with our colleague Debbie Lee as photographer. Hope my colleagues approve this publication—though we look a little wind-buffeted, don’t you think?
Best wishes always,
Virginia
Bob Johnson (WSU 1957-1988)
Dear Fellow Retirees:
Like everyone else, I’m putting on the years, and I don’t travel no more. Far from it, I reside in the assisted living section of Bishop Place in Pullman. I need to use a walker.
Barbara, who is five years younger, drives me to this and that, most recently to a shop where I could buy her a birthday present. She lives in our home with our cat Samantha. They’re only three or four miles away.
We just bought a Chevy four-wheel drive for the coming snow. Haven’t seen snow in years, but our winters in Arizona are way in our past.
Assisted living isn’t always a positive. People check on me too much. I like to do a lot of things for and by myself. Food’s not bad, except for those d. carrots and peas they keep throwing at us.
Our offspring report: Susan lives in Parker, Colorado, a suburb of Denver, and David lives in Eugene, Oregon. Together, they have given us five grandchildren.
Cheers,
Bob
Nick Kiessling (WSU 1967-2000)
Dear Fellow Retirees,
Life in Pullman continues to be good for us. We have friends and the gyms, libraries, galleries, pubs, and easy escapes into the country, which keep us content. Also, we get away as much as in the past—to Priest Lake several times during the summer, the month of November on Bainbridge Island, two weeks in New York City, two weeks on Anna Maria Island in Florida, a month in London, and the month of June in the Ballard area of Seattle. All very pleasant places and we survived without illness or accident.
Karen has finally resigned from some of her favorite committees, the Grand Avenue Greenway Beautification Project, which she founded in 2000, and the Police Advisory Committee. She served on the latter since 1992 and leaves it at the same time the Police Chief, whom she hired in 1979, retired from his post. That leaves her still busy with the League of Women Voters and her Fortnightly book club.
I continue to work on trivial pursuits—they keep me occupied and help me believe that I am still useful. In November the Bodleian Library published my The Life of Anthony Wood in his own Words, and in May 2010 perhaps my last article appeared in Recusant History. Some time during the autumn copies of Bibliographia Schegkiana, a 400-page analytical bibliography of the works of Jacob Schegk (1517–1587), will be sent to scholars and libraries throughout the western world. This bibliography was begun by a friend in 1960 and left dormant in 1980 until his death in 2001. His widow expressed the desire to have it appear in some form, and I have been updating and adding details since 2003. It is a relief to have it finished.
Next year promises to be very lively, with planned stays of two weeks in New York City (September), the Harry Ransom Library at Austin, Texas (January and February), and London (May). If any of you plan to be in one of these locations when we are, please let us know. I wish that we could be more upbeat about the situation at WSU and in the Department of English. The most recent cut of over 6%, announced this week, will hurt the department badly.
All the best,
Nick K
Dick Law (WSU 1970-2009)
In my second year of retirement, the manic urge to catch up on all the reading I had been postponing has subsided a little, though I still immerse myself in books like a graduate student. I am still cherishing all the unfamiliar free time to do what I want—every evening seems to be Friday night and every day is Sunday. If I can’t find something to do to amuse myself there is no one to blame but myself. I like to look at my watch and remind myself: “It’s time to NOT go to a meeting!” So far, good times have not been hard to find.
Retirement has opened up new opportunities to spend time with family, and that is where Fran and I have been putting our energy and finding amusement. We have always loved to hang out with our kids, but this year has been especially joyful, as our family seems to be growing by leaps and bounds. Our granddaughter Natalie, Dave’s daughter, celebrated her first birthday in Seattle in June, and we had two new grandsons: Paden Armstrong, born April 21st, the son and first child of our daughter Kathy, and Xavier Godat, the second child of our daughter Susie, born July 5th, in Santa Fe. We have five grandchildren now, and the oldest, Sophia and Nora, are fast approaching their fourth birthdays. They are all continual delights.
The absence of the distractions and anxieties and fatigue we experienced while raising our own children makes an extraordinary difference. As grandparents, all that is required of us is that we enjoy and appreciate and soak up every detail of these young children’s development. We are providing three days of child care per week to Kathy’s son Paden in Post Falls, and we are already wondering if we can ever pry ourselves away from this “duty.” (The best gig we have ever had.) Kathy lives very close to Coeur d’Alene, which is a very lively small city, and it’s as if we have moved to a new and more interesting location, but without the chore of actually packing up all our stuff—especially my books—and moving them.
A visit to Pullman by Nora and Natalie Law, Dave’s daughters, in August.
Special regards to all the old timers, and all those who still labor in the flint mines of WSU.
Dick Law
430 SW State Street
Pullman, WA 99163
Stanton Linden (WSU 1967-2002)
Despite the enormously dispiriting condition of the world in which we live, Lucy and I have had a very active, interesting, and satisfying year: we have traveled (both internationally and around the Northwest), enjoyed fine operas, musical performances and theatrical productions, and sailed and skied (in season). When we’re not involved in such pursuits, Lucy’s time is taken up with the League of Women Voters, her investment club, and a generous measure of exercise, fitness, and social activities.
I keep busy with gardening, volunteer work for a Pullman food bank and (currently) the Whitman Co.
Democrats, assorted academic projects, and running and weight room workouts several times a week. We feel fortunate to have the leisure and the good health—occasional aches and pains notwithstanding— to carry on doing what we want to be doing. (I had my 75th birthday this past April and observed the event—I won’t say “celebrated”—by running the Snake River Canyon half marathon.)
Highlights of the past twelve months relate mainly to foreign travel. In September and early October, 2009, we spent nearly a month in England and Paris. First, we had several days in Cambridge, where I participated in a colloquium and read a paper on two little known seventeenth-century scientists who sought to unlock the mysteries of the natural world through empirical investigations of several sorts. We then went on to London for a lovely week among many of our favorite haunts: the National Gallery, V&A, the National Theatre and the Globe, the British Library, the BM, and many more. We stayed for the first time in a Bankside flat just south of the Thames and were thus dazzled by the incredible amount of refurbishment and gentrification that that part of London has received in the past few years. We thoroughly enjoyed living literally in the shadow of the Tate Modern (not long ago that ugly old defunct power plant!) and having the Globe and even St. Paul’s (via the newish Millennium footbridge)—along with many fine pubs and restaurants—within a few minutes’ walk. We reflected on the contrast with the Southbank’s seedy past, when we once joined hundreds of British actors, civic leaders, politicians, and theater-goers to protest the threatened destruction of the few remains of the old Rose Theatre, then newly discovered during excavations for the very buildings responsible for the Southbank’s renascence.
A week in Paris followed, greatly facilitated by the now 2+ hour Eurostar trip from St. Pancras station in London to the Gare du Nord. (For those of us who survived many stormy channel crossings on ferries between Dover and Calais, the “chunnel” train is no less cause for reflection and rejoicing—unless the train stalls, as it once did with us on it.) Our apartment in the Marais district was a perfect center point for daily excursions to old favorites, e.g., the Louvre, d’Orsay, Cluny museum, Pompidou Centre, the Left Bank and beautiful churches, parks, and public buildings of central Paris. Occasionally, we discovered what would become new favorites, such as the Jacquemart-André Museum with its splendid collection of Italian Renaissance paintings and much more. Not surprisingly, when we returned to Pullman in late October, the adjustment was difficult.
Our final foreign trip of the year, a cruise tour of Egypt and its antiquities, had not entered our minds until jet lag from the European flight had subsided. It was now only a couple of weeks before the 16-day Grand Circle tour was about to start; its itinerary looked good, and since I had long hoped to visit Egypt (an aspiration reinforced by all those years teaching Humanities courses), we decided to re-pack our bags and head for Cairo. We’d been assured that we could purchase the required visas at the Cairo airport in a few minutes for about $15. Briefly, this trip greatly exceeded my expectations, with ample time at the beginning to visit several of the major museums, mosques and churches of Cairo as well as the pyramids of nearby Giza and Saqqara. Then, following a flight to Luxor and visits to the Valley of the Kings, we boarded a ship for the cruise further into upper Egypt to Aswan and eventually by bus to perhaps the most interesting temple of them all, Abu Simbel. Our only real regret about the trip was that we had far too little time to spend in Alexandria, with its wonderful Mediterranean setting and antiquities and beautiful, new space-age library.
Lest I leave readers with the impression that too much of the past year has been given over to hedonistic pursuits, I hasten to add that I have completed several works and tasks that qualify as “scholarly”: a long piece on Chaucerian satire and the works of George Ripley, the fifteenth-century alchemist, will appear in a Festschrift later this year; a second Festschrift article based on the aforementioned Cambridge paper is nearing completion; the April, 2010 issue of Speculum includes a review I’ve written; and I’ve refereed at least four articles for major journals, including Modern Philology and Emblematica. That’s more than enough. Besides, with the sailing season about to end, we must begin to pack for our next trip: we leave on October 25 for a week in London followed by two in Florence. Those Botticelli’s hanging in the Uffizi aren’t getting any younger!
Best wishes and good health to all,
Stan
500 SE Crestview St.
Pullman, WA 99163
Email: linden@wsu.edu
Howard McCord (WSU 1960-1971)
My 78th year has been excellent. Six children, spouses, and five grandchildren are all well and thriving. A sixth grandchild is due next month. Jenny has but two more years to teach to have 35 years in. As I have for the past dozen years, I went West in June, and Dan McLachlan and I went into the back country for some camping and wandering. This time we went into Owyhee Canyon country The Southeastern Oregon desert reminds me a bit of home in West Texas, though it is considerably greener. Most importantly, it is wonderfully Empty of Humankind.
Eldest daughter Susannah turned in the final version of her dissertation at Harvard last week. I spent the week with her, helping out a bit by proofreading a manuscript already proofread by Jenny and Eva (who are much better than I am at the task). Her defense is on 20 September, and I know it will go well. Her doctorate will be in Medical Policy, a cross- disciplinary program with the Philosophy Department, The Kennedy School of Government, The Harvard Medical School. Her research has focused primarily on possible conflicts of interest among researchers and industry. She is a Safra Fellow, and her post-doc is at Massachusetts General Hospital and Dana Farber. She is due to have her second child in the middle of October.
Daughter Julia continues in the Ph.D. program in Social Work at OSU. Youngest daughter Eva is taking a new position at Microsoft as a Usability Expert when she return from Scotland and Ireland on September 18. Wyatt Asher works for the Muscular Dystrophy Foundation in Seattle. Robert is settled in the English Department at McHenry College for the long haul, and eldest son Colman is getting a degree in Water Treatment Plant Management.
Our eleven dogs—Pugs, Scotties, and two Scugs—are all well. Puppies have we none. Our back acre is going totally wild now—half of it swamp for eights months a year, with many a critter in residence—a woodchuck family burrow, possums and coons for sure, a couple of deer beds noted, many snakes and frogs. I have given up dealing with the strip I used to mow. Let it be Wilderness, or as close as Ohio can come to that. Forty oaks or more. Thick understory. I don’t venture there.
The French translation of my novel did well, and I hope some foreign publisher picks up my Walking to Extremes. I am working on “The Thistlebone Poems,” which I can imagine might take the rest of forever. Might as well.
Susan H. McLeod (WSU 1986-2001)
Dear WSU friends,
I enjoyed reading the last Retirees Newsletter— somehow I didn’t get around to contributing to it, so I’ll try to do better here. We are enjoying San Diego, especially since it’s near our daughter and her husband. Both of us are involved in various volunteer efforts. Doug reads for the blind (a special service of the local public radio station) and is a tax aide for AARP, doing tax returns for people who can’t figure out how to do them themselves and can’t afford H&R Block. I tutor international students at San Diego State, helping them with the oddities of idiomatic English and enjoying getting to know them; I also tutor at a school for homeless children once a week. We are singing in two choirs and seem to have subscribed to every theater series in town (Santa Barbara had good music but was short on professional theater, which is probably why we over-did it here). I am still series editor for two book series with Parlor Press (one on writing program administration, the other a more general series called “Perspectives on Writing”), and enjoy reading the manuscripts that come in.
We did a lot of traveling this year. The most interesting trips were a safari to Tanzania, led by one of Doug’s college friends who had just retired as the director of the Honolulu Zoo. We had been in Tanzania during our Peace Corps years (1967 to be exact, shortly after independence) so it was also interesting to see how the country has changed since then. I’ll include a couple of pictures (you will see that we got uncomfortably close to the lions in the trees in Serengeti Park).
Then at the end of the summer we took part in an international choral workshop in Italy. We were among the few Yanks there—it was mostly Italians and Brits, with a few French and Eastern Europeans. The contrast between the British (who have a long tradition of choral music) and the Italians (who don’t) was interesting—the director kept having to tell the latter not to talk all the time during rehearsal. We sang music by Josquin des Prez and a few other Renaissance composers for an entire week, and it was wonderful, even though the concert at the end could have been better. From there we went to Sienna on our own, then joined a Road Scholar tour to Sorrento, Capri, Herculaneum, Pompeii, Paestum, and the Amalfi Coast. It was fascinating to see that people still build up the slopes of Mt. Vesuvius, which is still an active volcano; I guess that’s not too much different from building directly over the San Andreas Fault.
I hope all of you are doing well.
Best,
Sue
Email: mcleod@writing.ucsb.edu
Ron Meldrum (WSU 1965-1996)
As usual, we made a few trips to familiar places: Arizona (for Christmas with our family), Mexico (for dental work), Vancouver, Victoria, Seattle, the interior of B.C. and countless drives to the lakehouse at Powderhorn Bay on Lake Coeur d’Alene, where we spent most of the summer. It’s a pleasant retreat any time of the year—a place to host family and friends in the summer, and a place of quiet and beauty in the winter months.
We are both in relatively good health although I had relapsing tick fever in August, an unpleasant experience. Barb had it Sept. to Oct. 2009, much worse than mine and complicated by relapses during our auto trip to Arizona. I’m writing this the day before her knee replacement surgery; hopefully it will go well and she can resume a more active life as it heals. Any travel plans are hypothetical at this point, depending on her agility. We may go again to Victoria, a place we dearly love, and again to Arizona perhaps for Christmas with Deedee’s family. Genevieve will again be dancing in the Nutcracker—she has become an excellent dancer, taking first place in various competitions. She’s a very petite eleven-year-old. Tad (Thaddeus) is now 15 with all that entails as an active teenager. Cindy’s daughter Vienna, now 12, thrives at her Waldorf school and is an excellent violinist.
Deedee, by the way, is relinquishing deanship of the engineering school at ASU to head a new Biosignatures lab (at ASU) that is in early stages of construction. They will be developing personalized medicine through genetic research.
We reached the 50-year mark in our marriage on Aug. 30, and our daughters hosted a lovely reception-party for us Sept. 3rd at the McConnell Mansion in Moscow. It is headquarters for the Latah County Historical Society, a beautifully restored Victorian home. Nearly forty of us enjoyed good food and conversation, plus violin music from our three grandchildren.
I often think of WSU and colleagues there from the past, but seldom see them—the Newsletter is a welcome way to get an update on old and older friends.
My best wishes to all,
Ron Meldrum
Shirley Price (WSU 1963-1989)
We’ve had peaks and valleys since last year’s newsletter. We‘re missing a unique friend we had enjoyed for over sixty years, my best friend’s husband. We last saw Stan at Sharon’s 80th birthday occasion last July. At that time, Stan was undergoing thrice- weekly dialysis. When bone cancer complicated his health, it was too much of a challenge. He died in late November. We remember him for his upbeat, fun-loving, energetic persona. And his notable high standards became part of his family’s legacy. In Stan’s early twenties he began flying at the little airport in Aberdeen. Working six days a week, and with an increasing family, in his “spare” time he built two experimental airplanes. He also stick built two quality homes for his family and two comfortable summer homes on South Puget Sound. Sharon and Stan frequently joined us at Cannon Beach. On three of the occasions, John and Jean Elwood joined the four of us. John and Stan were cut out of the same cloth, and the energy from the two of them bounced off the wall! Such good times we had. And we miss these two men.
This became out maintenance year, starting with a defunct garage door opener that was replaced so that we could access two cars trapped in the garage. Our son-in-law ordinarily cleans our roof for us. Last winter created so much moss that we had to have a professional roof cleaning–not cheap.
But the real doozie happened when Shirley’s left leg disappeared up to her knee in the deck. It was time to replace 520 ft. of the deck and underpinnings. Ten days after writing a hefty check for the new deck, we had to replace the gas heated water heater. So much for stimulating the economy.
But there’s more. The badly bent budget took another hit when daughter Kimberly’s unemployment benefits expired (she’s one of the 99ers), and we’re now her sole support. The possibility of congress extending these benefits for another twenty weeks is bleak, given political machinations that ignore 99ers desperate needs.
Despite of the unusually cool spring and summer, we Puget Sounders enjoyed a bonus display of bumper blooming dogwoods, rhodies, and all things that bloomed throughout spring and summer. The extraordinary floral display was produced by mid-December’s arctic blast of below-freezing temperatures which signaled plants to go into a survival reaction.
As a couple of oldies but goodies, we’re both fine. We make a monthly trip to the Northwest Retina Center where Bud has his macular degeneration checked, and a shot in the eyeball (ouch!) when required. And his team of physicians manages his BP and kidney function. Shirley sees her oncologist twice yearly and takes no meds.
We enjoyed our neighborhood (thirteen houses) summer block party on August 21st. We appreciate this congenial neighborhood, And we treasure our good friends and family.
Last year’s state of the nation and the world by Doug Hughes is spot on. Each weekday morning I tune in to Thom Hartmann’s three-hour radio program. Each Friday morning his guest for 30 minutes is Sen. Bernie Sanders. I’d be pleasantly surprised if the Inland Empire had a progressive radio station as we have in Seattle. I’m also a faithful subscriber and reader of The Nation and Mother Jones.
Best wishes to all!
Camille Roman (WSU 1992-2008)
I feel that this year has been more a matter of “refiring” than “retiring” as I continue to organize a variety of cultural work projects. My coeditors Steven Gould Axelrod (UC-Riveside) and Thomas Travisano (Hartwick College) and I are working now with the production staff at Rutgers University Press to publish volume three of The New Anthology of American Poetry in late 2011. This text will focus on contemporary American poetry and will complete the three-volume anthology set. Since 2011 is also Elizabeth Bishop’s centenary year, I also published a reflection on her work this summer in the Bishop Centenary Blog edited by the Elizabeth Bishop Society of Nova Scotia, Canada. As part of the Bishop Centenary celebrations, Vassar College Libraries will feature a special exhibit on her archives; and I am working with them currently to present my use of their archival materials in Elizabeth Bishop’s World War II: Cold War View. Next year should also see the Frost/Hemingway project cosponsored by both author societies in The Hemingway Review.
Now that these projects are almost safely into the press I can turn to further goals and planning. Chris and I are finding that our apartment in Portland (1000 SW Vista Ave. Apt. 610 Portland OR 97205) is enjoyable: with a view that reminds me of Central Park in Manhattan, and not far from where my grandparents were born. Our downsizing efforts accompanying the sale of our home in April have given us a great deal of mobility; and we will take advantage of that soon.
My best to everyone; and please contact me at roman@wsu.edu if you are planning a trip to Portland! I would enjoy seeing you!
Barbara Sitko (WSU 1989-2005)
Dear Friends,
Greetings! This year brought one of those “trips of a lifetime” through CMU alumni. In snowy February, Jeannette and I went on a safari to Tanzania during the “Great Migration.” Visiting the Olduvai Gorge has been a dream of mine since hearing Richard Leaky in the 70s, so we determined to make the dream a reality. Through Gohagan, we traveled with alumni from Tufts and George Washington U. After months of preparations, vaccinations, visas, paring down our luggage, we nearly exhausted our energy on the first day, because although it was warm and sunny in our region, “weather” had somehow cancelled the first leg of the journey, a puddle-jumper Pittsburgh to Detroit. To stay on schedule with the tour (who were coming from truly weather-stricken areas) we rented a car. Jeannette covered the five-hour trek in four hours; it was Super Bowl Sunday, early in the morning, no turnpike sentries in sight. We found that we needed no introduction at the opening cocktail party, as news travels even faster on tours than in small towns. The tour itself was expertly designed, progressing gradually from Tanzania’s small local parks to national parks, the Olduvai Gorge and the Ngorongoro crater. Tanzania’s land mass is 1/3 national park, and with 50% of the population under 18, they are swiftly learning how to turn their natural resources into sustainable economic support. Our guide had adopted a rural primary school, so we witnessed what tour contributions could accomplish over time. And the animals! Overall, what I didn’t expect and was most impressed with was the sense of peace and “rightness” of the ecology, especially in the crater, a “natural” park millions of years old. I experienced a palpable and pervading sense of our tiny human part in the rhythms of Earth, the migration and the clever adaptations of surrounding life-forms.
On return, after congratulating ourselves on completing the safari without incident, we had a jolt—Jeannette fell at home and broke her hip. We were six weeks away from a move across town and of course we had left the packing to “worry about after the trip.” But all ended well—we are settled in our new address, mending satisfactorily, and enjoying the benefits of rural living in the surroundings of Pittsburgh and Cleveland, two cities who love the arts. Our latest discovery is the Met in HD, so Saturdays are divided between opera and tending to the deposits of our neighboring 300-year-old white oak. Such is life in western PA!
Warm Regards,
Barbara
144 Church St.
New Wilmington PA 16142
sitko@wsu.edu
Albert von Frank (WSU 1984-2006)
Since Jane has not yet retired, we travel only a little more than usual. Our dabbling in timeshare condos, however, is giving us a dangerous taste for luxury. We’ve had weeks in Las Vegas, St. Augustine, Sedona, and the Berkshires of Massachusetts.
My time for the past two years has been largely devoted to the most ambitious, most complex project of my career: the editing of Emerson’s poems for the definitive Harvard Press edition of the Collected Works. In addition to establishing the text of the poems with the help of Thomas Wortham of UCLA––a task that involves listing all the variant readings from all the authorized editions and printings––I wrote the Historical and Textual Introductions to the volume and all the poem headnotes, which give for each poem its sources and background. I expect that Poems: Volume IX of the Collected Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, now in press, will come to between 500 and 600 pages when it is published in the Spring of 2011. Since it contains a good deal of new information and some fresh scholarship, I have fond hopes that it might make a difference.
Earlier this year, I published two substantial essays in The Oxford Handbook of Transcendentalism, edited by Joel Myerson, Sandy Petrulionis, and Laura Walls—one on “Religion” and one on “The Visual Arts.” At about the same time I delivered a paper at the American Literature Association conference in San Francisco on the future of Emerson studies. Presently, as I await page proofs for the Poems, I am working on a commissioned essay on Margaret Fuller and anti-slavery.
My most recent publication was of a more personal and unaccustomed sort, illustrating the fact that those whom we regard as closest colleagues are usually in our field at other institutions. Recently Barbara L. Packer retired from the UCLA English department. Undoubtedly one has to be an Emersonian to appreciate fully the significance of that fact, but she wrote what is probably still the best critical work on Emerson (Emerson’s Fall, 1982) and what is certainly the best general history of Transcendentalism (1995, rpt. 2007). She’s been a friend for almost thirty years, so that when her husband, Paul Sheats, determined to surprise Barbara with a handsome, privately-printed collection of tributes, I was privileged to be among the invited writers. It is fitting also that Tom Wortham and I have chosen to dedicate the Emerson Poems to her.
Nelly C. Zamora (WSU 1976-2003)
I was so surprised to get an email from Paul reminding us to send contributions to the 20th
edition of the English Retirees Newsletter. I did not realize that it’s been a year already since I sent my last contribution to the newsletter.
My sister, Nori, who came in July 2009 on an immigrant’s visa, became “homesick” and decided to return with us to the Philippines last November. It took almost 26 years for her to receive an immigrant’s visa; however, we realize that family comes first and the separation was not easy for her. If only her family could follow, she would have stayed.
Cesar and I were scheduled to go on a tour of Great Britain and Ireland last April 19, 2010, but due to the eruption of Eyjafjallajökull Volcano in Iceland, we had to rebook our flight and tour for June. Maybe the volcanic eruption was “divine intervention,” as an hour after we rebooked our trip, we received a call from the Philippines informing us of the death of Cesar’s oldest brother. So, instead of flying to London, we flew to Manila to console with his niece and nephew.
Our tour of Great Britain and Ireland finally happened on June 22 to July 2. The tour began in London and headed west to prehistoric Stonehenge, picturesque Salisbury, and the Roman excavations in Bath. We then travelled to Cardiff and to Pembroke for a ferry crossing to Ireland. We toured Waterford, the castle in Kilkenny, and admired the stallions and mares at the Irish National Stud Farm near Kildare. We had two days to explore Dublin (Trinity College and the 1200- year old Book of Kells, etc.), but had a short visit to Belfast where we boarded a ferry to Scotland. Our tour of Scotland included Edinburgh and its historic castle, crown jewels, a taste of the dreaded “Haggis” (a mixture of the internal organs of sheep), and the magnificent Floors Castle near Kelso-Jedburgh. During our return to England, we viewed a section of Hadrian’s wall (dating back to the 2nd century) and stopped overnight in medieval York. On the way to London, our coach (the driver did not want us to call it a bus) got caught in a 3-hour traffic jam (due to a road accident) and our tour director decided to skip Stratford-upon-Avon so that we could all meet our commitments in London for that evening (which included the musical, “Billy Elliot,” at the Victoria Palace Theater).
We spent two extra days in London and toured the Buckingham Palace area, Westminster Abbey, the House of Parliament, the British Museum, etc. We did a lot of walking to see these places; luckily, our hotel, Park Plaza Westminster, was just across the bridge from Big Ben and within a mile or two walking distance to most attractions.
We are scheduled to tour Peru in October and visiting families in the Philippines in November. We are spending Christmas with our daughter and her husband in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Enjoy the rest of 2010!
Best wishes to all of you.
Nelly
1710 NW Deane Street
Pullman, WA 99163-3508
Obituary
Robert C. McLean
Robert Colin McLean, emeritus professor of English at Washington State University and resident of Pullman since 1961, died Nov. 3, 2009, of complications following an operation at Pullman Regional Hospital. He was 82.
Robert was born Sept. 3, 1927, in Chicago, Ill. After service in the U.S. Army from 1945 to 1947, he received his bachelor’s and master’s degrees from Indiana University in 1949 and 1952 and his doctorate in English from Washington University in St. Louis in 1960. After initially teaching at the University of Rochester, he joined the literature faculty at Washington State University in 1961, advanced to full professor in 1969 and retired at that rank in 1993.
As a teacher and scholar of 19th-century American literature, Robert was a member of Phi Beta Kappa, the recipient of Ford Foundation support and other fellowships, and a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Edinburgh. He was author of George Tucker: Moral Philosopher and Man of Letters and numerous articles on American literature and culture, with a special emphasis on the fiction of Henry James. After helping to bring ESQ: A Journal of the American Renaissance to WSU in 1972, Robert variously headed that scholarly journal as co-editor and editor from 1975 until 1993.
After his retirement, he continued to serve as example and mentor to former colleagues and graduate students and remained active with his work on James.
As one former colleague put it on Robert’s retirement, “He has done much for WSU, for ESQ and for our profession, earning the respect and gratitude of countless individuals who know him and admire him and his work.”
Robert married Kathleen Rieman of New Jersey in 1951. They adopted one son, Colin Garrison McLean, in 1967 after their move to Pullman. Kathleen, a professional editor who joined WSU’s scholarly journals in 1970, shared Robert’s interests in 19th- century American literature and Italy, to which the family traveled during his sabbaticals.
Robert is survived by his son, Colin, now an agent with the U.S. Border Patrol, and his daughter-in- law, Maria McLean, of Blaine, Washington, as well as by his younger brother Edward B. McLean of Crawfordsville, Ind.
Robert also is survived in Indiana by his nephews Andrew McLean of Columbus and Ian McLean of Crawfordsville and by his nieces Jan Brenneisen of Indianapolis and Elizabeth Belser of Franklin, as well as by his niece Judy Adams of Dayton, Ohio. Robert was preceded in death by his wife Kathleen in 1988, and by his older brother Donald A. McLean and his sister, Glenna Brenneisen, both of Columbus, Ind.
Surviving relatives and friends celebrate Robert’s long life and will sadly miss his wit, skepticism, and kindness.