Thank you, Wisconsin. The University of Wisconsin SchoolUW of MedicineHealth Adand Public Health recently received a prestigious national award for its outreach and community service throughout Wisconsin. We are extremely proud to receive the Spencer Foreman Award for Outstanding Community Service from the Association of American Medical Colleges. We are grateful to all of our partners on campus and from communities across the state. This honor would not have been possible without their vision and commitment to a healthier Wisconsin. We thank our partners, and you, from Milwaukee to Marshfield, La Crosse to Green Bay and everywhere in between; we are all serving the Badger State. Thank you, Wisconsin. Sincerely, Robert N. Golden, MD Dean, University of Wisconsin School of Medicine and Public Health MS-38061-13 med.wisc.edu COME NEXT DOOR FOR A VISIT THIS FALL In August 2014, The Edgewater opens its doors, ready to welcome back alumni, families, students, and faculty with the same generous care and warmth as the original. After over 60 years, this old friend of UW-Madison has been completely reimagined. The Edgewater will open with more than 200 rooms and suites, new restaurants, wedding and banquet facilities, meeting rooms, a luxurious spa, and just about every amenity and convenience we could think of. And it’s all right next to campus, on Lake Mendota, minutes from everywhere you need to be in Madison. We can’t wait to show you what we’ve been so busy building. For information and reservations, please call 800-922-5512, or email us at [email protected]. SPRING 2014 3 1001 WISCONSIN PLACE • MADISON, WI 53703 • THEEDGEWATER.COM • FACEBOOK.COM/THEEDGEWATERMADISON 14edg001_Edgewater_Ad_OnWisconsin_r3.indd 1 1/13/14 12:31 PM KEEP ON As long as Badgers keep on doing what we do—so uniquely, so passionately, so astoundingly and so joyfully—we will continue to change the world. WWW.WISC.EDU ON WISCONSIN 4 Message furnished by the University of Wisconsin–Madison 12795 UW Print Ad_v3.indd 1 7/17/13 1:48 PM SPRING 2014 contents VOLUME 115, NUMBER 1 Features 24 Creative License By Marianne English Spoon MA’11 Now a UW faculty member, renowned cartoonist and author Lynda Barry explores the genesis of creativity, teaching the powerful connection between our hands and our brains. 32 Radio Daze By Eliza Krigman ’05 The predecessor to today’s campus radio station may have been tiny, but it forged lifelong bonds among students from the 1950s to the early ’90s and sponsored one heck of a trivia contest. 24 36 Coming of Age By Jenny Price ’96 Children diagnosed with autism will grow up, and that pre- sents entirely different challenges for them and their families. Now the UW’s Waisman Center is offering guideposts for the journey. 42 Frankenpianist By John Allen Music professor by day and eccentric genius by night, Christopher Taylor is creating a double-keyboard instrument that could revolutionize the world of piano-playing. 36 Departments 9 Inside Story 10 Posts 42 12 Scene 14 News & Notes 20 Q&A 21 Classroom 22 Sports 48 Crossword Puzzle Cover 49 Badger Connections We asked and crossed our 60 Sifting & Winnowing fingers. Happily, she consented. 66 Flashback Illustration by Lynda Barry. SPRING 2014 5 YOUR LEGACY. THEIR FUTURE. We can shape how we’re remembered. Remembering the University of Wisconsin-Madison in your will is an investment in the future. For our children. For our university. For the world. To discuss your legacy, contact Scott McKinney in the Offi ce of Gift Planning at the University of Wisconsin Foundation at [email protected] or 608-262-6241. supportuw.org/gift-planning UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN FOUNDATION 6 ON WISCONSIN On Wisconsin Full Pg October 2012.indd 1 10/10/2012 11:00:28 AM NOW OPEN to all University of Wisconsin-Madison alumni Overnight accommodations at the Fluno Center offer a welcome retreat after a long day of meetings, a convenient place to stay after a Badger game, or simply a luxurious night in the heart of campus. STAY IN THE Enjoy spectacular views of Madison while you HEART OF CAMPUS relax in style. The Fluno Center: Steps Away. A Notch Above. Visit fluno.com for more information. On University Ave. between Lake St. and Frances St. SPRING 2014 7 8 ON WISCONSIN WARF_OnWisAdpaths.indd 1 1/11/14 10:10 AM insidestory COURTESY OF WAISMAN CENTER COURTESY OF WAISMAN To many families, On Wisconsin it is known simply SPRING 2014 as Waisman. Publisher For forty years, the Wisconsin Alumni Association Waisman Center has served 650 North Lake Street, Madison, WI 53706 as home to scientists who Voice: (608) 262-2551 • Toll-free: (888) WIS-ALUM • Fax: (608) 265-8771 study every stage of human Email: [email protected] development. And for fami- Website: onwisconsin.uwalumni.com lies in Madison and beyond, Co-Editors the center’s staff members Niki Denison, Wisconsin Alumni Association are invaluable partners on Cindy Foss, University Communications the journey of raising children Senior Editor with disabilities. Prestigious gathering: Harry Waisman (at left), with John Allen, Wisconsin Alumni Association But Waisman’s legacy Wisconsin Governor John Reynolds, Senator Edward M. Kennedy, and his brother-in-law R. Sargent Shriver at Senior Writer started a decade earlier — Jenny Price ’96, University Communications the opening of the Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. Laboratories and with a different name: at the UW in 1963. Art Director Kennedy. Earl J. Madden MFA’82, University Marketing In 1963, UW-Madison opened the Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. Laboratories with help Production Editor from a grant from the Kennedy Foundation. Senator Edward M. Kennedy and his Eileen Fitzgerald ’79, University Marketing brother-in-law R. Sargent Shriver, director of the Peace Corps, attended the facili- Class Notes Editor ty’s dedication. And two days before he was assassinated, President John F. Kennedy Paula Apfelbach ’83, Wisconsin Alumni Association sent a telegram congratulating researcher Harry Waisman and his colleagues on their work. Editorial Intern: Preston Schmitt x’14 During Kennedy’s term, Congress established the National Institute of Child Design, Layout, and Production Health and Human Development within the National Institutes of Health (NIH). One of Barry Carlsen MFA’83; Toni Good ’76, MA’89; Kent Hamele ’78, University Marketing its core missions is ensuring “that all children have the chance to fulfill their potential to live healthy and productive lives.” Campus Advisers Paula Bonner MS’78, President and CEO, In 1965, with Waisman’s urging, the new NIH institute chose the UW as one of two and Mary DeNiro MBA’11, Executive Vice initial sites in the United States for a multidisciplinary center to study human devel- President and COO, Wisconsin Alumni opment and what was then called mental retardation. The federal institute was later Association • Vince Sweeney, Vice Chancellor for University Relations, and John Lucas, named for Eunice Kennedy Shriver, who pushed her brother to include the proposal Interim Executive Director, University for the NIH institute in his first health message to Congress. Their sister Rosemary Communications • Lynne Johnson, Senior had developmental disabilities, and Kennedy Shriver would later found the Special Director of Communications, UW Foundation Olympics. Advertising Representatives Waisman (pronounced “Wace-man,” like “grace” or “face”) died in 1971, before Madison Magazine: (608) 270-3600 the UW center that bears his name opened two years later on the far west end of the Alumni Name, Address, Phone, UW-Madison campus. But in writing about the center’s work on autism spectrum and Email Changes • Death Notices disorder for this issue of On Wisconsin, I found that the passion he and the Kennedy Madison area: (608) 262-9648 Toll-free: (888) 947-2586 family had for improving the lives of people with developmental disorders lives on. Email: [email protected] Today the Waisman Center is considered one of the world’s leading centers of research, education, and outreach on developmental disabilities and neurodegener- Quarterly production of On Wisconsin is ative diseases. It has provided clinical services and other support to more than ten supported by financial gifts from alumni and friends. To make a gift to UW-Madison, thousand people of all ages. And it has shared its knowledge with the world through please visit supportuw.org. research and discovery, and by training more than ten thousand undergraduate and graduate students. Jenny Price ’96 Printed on recycled paper. Please remember to recycle This magazine was printed this magazine. by Arandell Corporation, a Wisconsin Green Tier participant. SPRING 2014 9 posts Moo-ved by Dairy Story Allen will be forced to re-take the philosophy. Sigh … of politics and world history, with That is a beautiful cover picture Babcock Butterfat Test until he Mykos Ress ’02 emphasis on the horrible past and of UW Wonderment Taylor [Winter passes. Ogema, Wisconsin present effects of religious belief. 2013]. Yes, most will laugh, but I Alan Johnsrud ’53, MA’54, PhD’58 am framing it — not just for her I was troubled that such a lengthy Albinism Coverage Arlington, Virginia captivating beauty, but also for article on the dairy industry was I was interested to read “Pigment the great memories she evokes. silent on the issues associated Prejudice” [Winter 2013]. In Live Badger Sighting I believe that the College of with factory farming. The article the early 1990s, while I was on Thank you for “Badger Tracking” Agricultural & Life Sciences is one did not analyze the public-health the faculty of the UW-Madison [News & Notes, Winter 2013]. of the most undervalued assets of threat related to the abuse of Department of Medical Genetics, This summer I woke to the UW-Madison.