For University of Wisconsin-Madison Alumni and Friends

ET, Phone Antigo From northern Wisconsin, Maggie Turnbull ’98 searches for life on other planets.

Summer 2013

MOOCs in the Land of Moos The UW takes on free online classes.

In the Know Campus experts tackle burning questions.

Paid to Play Love for Legos turns into a career.

Curtain Up! A Badger hits Broadway. YOUR LEGACY. THEIR FUTURE.

We can shape how we’re UW Planned Giving 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

On Wisconsin Full Pg October 2012.indd 1 10/10/2012 11:00:28 AM SUMMER 2013 contents VOLUME 114, NUMBER 2

Features

22 The Planet Hunter By Nicole Sweeney Etter Maggie Turnbull ’98 has become an authority on the search for signs of extraterrestrial life — and she’s done it on her own terms. 38 28 The ABCs of MOOCs By John Allen As the university prepares to offer its first massive online open courses, we take a look at this new phenomenon and its implications for UW-Madison.

32 Time Travel  An aerial view provides a peek into what the UW looked like seventy-five years ago and contrasts it with today’s perspective.

34 The Accidental Actor By Jenny Price ’96 The theater world has embraced the talents of Carrie Coon MFA’06, taking her all the way to the Broadway stage.

38 Ask the Experts  On Wisconsin dispatches a bevy of reporters to track down 34 UW experts and ask for advice on everyday stuff.

44 Brick by Brick By Jenny Price ’96 Ryan Ziegelbauer MS’06 calls upon his degree in urban and regional planning to create masterpieces in a familiar medium: Lego bricks.

Departments 7 Inside Story 8 Posts 44 10 Scene 12 News & Notes 18 Collection 19 Classroom Cover A starstruck Maggie Turnbull looks 20 Sports out at the night sky from the roof of 48 Traditions the UW’s Atmospheric, Oceanic and 51 Badger Connections Space Sciences building. 63 Sifting & Winnowing Photo by Brent Nicastro 66 Flashback SUMMER 2013 3 INNOV V TION

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At UW–Madison, innovation grows. Whether in climate studies under way in a stand of hardwood trees in the Northwoods of Wisconsin, or in the observations and journals of ecologist Aldo Leopold — the past, present and future are linked in a commitment to discovery, learning and contribution. Join UW–Madison in celebrating the Year of Innovation.

4 ON WISCONSIN yearofinnovation.wisc.edu

NOW OPEN to all University of Wisconsin-Madison alumni

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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. 6 ON WISCONSIN insidestory JEFF MILLER

UW-Madison On Wisconsin professors are SUMMER 2013 media darlings. Publisher They are frequently Wisconsin Alumni Association 650 North Lake Street, Madison, WI 53706 quoted in the New York Voice: (608) 262-2551 • Toll-free: Times, the Wall Street (888) WIS-ALUM • Fax: (608) 265-8771 Email: [email protected] Journal, and other major Website: onwisconsin.uwalumni.com newspapers, and you Co-Editors can catch them being Niki Denison, Wisconsin Alumni Association Cindy Foss, University Communications interviewed on National Senior Editor Public Radio or watch John Allen, Wisconsin Alumni Association them on the latest Senior Writer episode of NOVA. Jenny Price ’96, University Communications Our professors, Art Director Earl J. Madden MFA’82, scientists, and lecturers Insects, snakes, and birds — oh, my! UW faculty and staff University Communications are go-to sources when provide answers about these topics and many more, sharing their expertise by responding to news media inquiries. Production Editor reporters look for anal- Eileen Fitzgerald ’79, University Communications ysis of current events or need help explaining complicated issues. In fact, these

Class Notes Editor experts appear in local, national, and international news media hundreds of times each Paula Apfelbach ’83, Wisconsin Alumni month. Given their visibility, it’s easy to overlook their expertise with topics that hit Association; Editorial Intern: Aimee Katz ’13 much closer to home. Design, Layout, and Production Barry Carlsen MFA’83; Toni Good ’76, MA’89; For example, take Phil Pellitteri, a veteran entomologist who cheerily takes ques- Kent Hamele ’78, University Communications tions from both reporters and the general public about all manner of insects that Campus Advisers invade the home or garden. Some people simply email him photos of pesky critters, Paula Bonner MS’78, President and CEO, and Mary DeNiro MBA’11, Executive Vice asking both, “What is this?” and “How do I get rid of it?” Scott Craven, a professor President and COO, Wisconsin Alumni of wildlife ecology, gets similar inquiries from people who want to help injured birds in Association • Amy E. Toburen ’80, Executive Director, University Communications and their yards or who hope to identify snakes that have taken up residence in their garden Marketing • Lynne Johnson, Senior Director of sheds. Communications, UW Foundation Pellitteri and Craven are not the exception but the rule. Other UW experts field a Advertising Representatives Madison Magazine: (608) 270-3600 range of questions — from a woman wondering about the origin of artwork purchased

Big Ten Alumni Alliance at an estate sale, to a grandparent concerned about a grandchild’s picky eating, to a National Accounts Manager school-age boy working on a science project about microbes. Susan Tauster: (630) 858-1558 The On Wisconsin staff began pondering things that we really wanted to know, Alumni Name, Address, Phone, devising our own list of questions about relationships, raising kids, talking politics, and Email Changes • Death Notices Madison area: (608) 262-9648 and choosing pets, to name a few. We were confident that we could find the answers Toll-free: (888) 947-2586 without having to leave campus, and we were right. Email: [email protected] Turn to page 38 and discover how much you can learn from our experts. Quarterly production of On Wisconsin is Jenny Price ’96 supported by financial gifts from alumni and friends. To make a gift to UW-Madison, please visit supportuw.org.

Printed on recycled paper. Please remember to recycle This magazine was printed this magazine. by Arandell Corporation, a SUMMER 2013 7 Wisconsin Green Tier participant. posts

Forgiveness Reverberates greater context surrounding is more rigorous and demanding team: “Hello, Liz Waters!” Your article detailing Professor the injury.” My accusers were than appears even in a “twenty- Emboldened by that, we left a Robert Enright’s research on desperate to keep their jobs in step program.” note again that night — a request the power of forgiveness reso- a profession hard hit by reces- I highly recommend Solomon that they sing “Varsity” to us. nated with me [“Uniquely Human: sion, and preserve their financially Schimmel’s book Wounds Not And they did. My favorite Badger Personal Peace,” Spring 2013 On fragile, emotionally frayed fami- Healed by Time for a clear- moment ever. Wisconsin]. I suffered an injustice lies. I was a veteran with thirty eyed and uncompromising look Carol Knutson Siedell ’71 that wounded me personally and years of experience already. at some of the questions not Cockeysville, Maryland ended my professional career due Enright’s findings affirm the addressed in this article (e.g., to the nature of the accusations value of my own journey of healing Can there be forgiveness without Ode to Hopscotch against me. and happiness. It is achievable for remorse? Are there times when it [We sang this] to the tune of I had been an educator in a those who have suffered. is the right thing not to forgive?). “Tennessee Waltz” on the way up California public school district Henry Tse ’76, MA’77, MS’79 Elizabeth Koopman MA’76 Bascom Hill and in front of the after graduate studies at Madison. Rosemead, California Hallowell, Maine Liz Waters residence hall before One day nearly two years ago, the the hopscotch match [Flashback, Sharing the Dignity Model said injustice happened. Suffice I was pleased to see the article Spring 2013]: to say the authorities cleared me “Uniquely Human” in the Spring The article by Maggie Ginsberg- of the accusations. The California 2013 issue. But the research on Schutz on Donna Hicks and [the Liz Waters Unit IV Commission on Teacher Creden- forgiveness has even deeper dignity model] was wonderful Hopscotching queens tialing, by law, also investigated, roots at the UW. In 1992, Pro- [“Uniquely Human: World We’ll see you Friday even after I retired. It, too, found fessor Beverly Flanigan of the Peace,” Spring 2013]. I’d like afternoon no wrongdoing. School of Social Work published to share it with a small group of And even in our dreams. Financially secured, my Forgiving the Unforgivable, people at our church as part of [It was ] sometimes followed by retirement is nothing but blissful offering forgiveness as a novel a series of talks called “Great an invitation to the Hasty Tasty and has afforded me the luxury approach for healing trauma. ... Conversations.” The topic this for dime beers and a friendly of time to ponder the motives I give copies to clients, sure that month was how to better open get-together. This tradition was of my accusers. Analogous to they will benefit from her graceful the church to the talents of LGBT usually held early in the fall and your quote about knowing the insights. people, and this article would be served as a great way to get to abusers’ background … in order Jane Redfield Yank ’73, MS’75 a great follow-up. know the new freshmen. to reframe, and not excuse their St. Paul, Minnesota Sue Armagost MS’81 Thanks to John Allen for behavior, I, too, can see “the Dunedin, Florida revisiting happy days at the UW. In response to “Personal Peace,” Bob Breen x’59 Spring 2013: In my work as Rowing Protocol Scottsdale, Arizona If you’d like to comment on the a psychotherapist, the word [In regard to] the Wisconsin magazine, send an e-mail to forgiveness comes up many governor complaining about the Bucky Goes to Malawi [email protected]; times a week. Current popular crew coach’s harsh language I’m a Peace Corps volunteer in mail a letter to On Wisconsin, psychology puts a great deal of [Traditions, Spring 2013]: During 650 North Lake Street, Madison, Malawi, Africa, working in an stress on [forgiveness], some- finals week 1969 at Liz Waters, WI 53706; or send a fax to (608) (extremely) rural secondary school times to the point that it is seen we would drag our mattresses to 265-2771. We reserve the right to called Luwazi. My small house in edit letters for length or clarity. to be always a good thing to the lakefront back patio to sleep. the African bush is adorned with forgive and even the only way All was tranquil until dawn, when Badger and Packer memorabilia Be Social forward. While I agree that it the crew skimmed by, and the my friends and family have sent can be a powerful act to forgive, coach from his motorboat kept Connect with us on your favorite me, and I love telling my students social media sites for more I disagree with what I see as screaming his head off — and he about Bucky Badger when I wear frequent updates from On oversimplification. didn’t limit it to “harsh” language, my Wisconsin tie to class. Wisconsin and UW-Madison. Notwithstanding the good believe me! My parents just sent me a We welcome your tweets and point that the article makes about I got the inspiration to tape a copy of On Wisconsin, so I wanted comments. the importance of addressing note to the boathouse door, not so to let you know that your publica- anger, rather than shoving it much complaining about the noise, Facebook tion’s readership extends all the aside, what I see is too often a Facebook.com/ but asking if the coach was having way to the remote hills of northern OnWisconsinMagazine tendency to rush into forgive- marital troubles or something and Malawi. Also, UW-Madison was ness as a way to feel better. But taking it out on his team. recently named the number-three Twitter forgiveness is a spiritual, not a Next morning, no yelling, producer of Peace Corps volun- @OnWisMag self-help, exercise, and as such except for this from the whole teers. ... Perhaps with some more

8 ON WISCONSIN publicity, we can get to number [Sonya Baumstein is] an inspiring hour to catch up with him. I one! Yewo! (thanks). individual, excellent piece on was always impressed with his tweets Cam Stanley ’11 rowing … [“Rowing to Extremes,” willingness to suffer and sacri- Nkhata Bay, Malawi Spring 2013]. fice with his crew. … Wonder @md_bennett Richard Purinton ’70 if they still run to the “End of Just finished watching The Online Comments the World.” I remember doing War at Home. A must-see film Pixar is fortunate to have Ms. Wonderful article [Traditions, that ten-mile run in under an for any @UWMadison student. [Allison] Nelson on their team Spring 2013]. Randy Jablonic hour, good for a dinner for two [“Imagination, Inc.,” Spring 2013]. (Jabo) had a great run at UW. I anywhere in Madison, compli- @epistemophilia She is fortunate to work at what remember chasing him down in ments of the coach. I *might* have just purchased she understands and loves to do. a woods after he had a fifteen- Paul Crave the Glenn Miller version of On Charlotte Rubinstein minute start. It took over an Wisconsin. @UWMadison

@uwbadger74 @UWMadison alums. How #uwmadison instagram often are your dreams set michelawood_12 kendallferguson somewhere in Madison?

@cour_ Watching a movie about a guy who cut his own arm off to survive. Then I’m going to see said guy speak @UWMadison tomorrow. My school rocks.

@kaye_becca tons of campus tours today @UWMadison makes me want to yell at them “NOT coming here would be the BIGGEST mistake of your life” #badgers

@JoeySherling SO to my physics professor riding around class on a rocket propelled bike #physics doversoul melgigs #UWMadison

@mattripkey After looking all over I finally decided that the school right up the road is the perfect place to be. So happy to be headed to @UWMadison

@madtownmed Go anywhere in the world wearing a @UWMadison sweatshirt and you will make friends. Already met several alumni with @erickinbrief in Kauai

SUMMER 2013 9 8 ON WISCONSIN scene The 2013 Biennial Neon and Light Exhibition at the Stock Pavilion, April 19, 2013. Photo by Jeff Miller news ¬es

A New Leader for the UW Commerce secretary named to begin chancellor post in July.

UW-Madison has a new chancellor. most beautiful campus settings in the country.” The UW Board of Regents appointed Rebecca Blank to the Despite her time in the federal government, Blank notes she has position at a meeting in April, selecting her from four finalists named been a researcher and teacher most of her life, and is elated to return by a campus search-and-screen committee after sifting through nearly to a college campus. seventy candidates. “I’m ready to come home again,” she wrote. Blank first applied for the UW job in 2008, when the regents hired Jenny Price ’96 Carolyn “Biddy” Martin PhD’85 to fill the vacancy left by the retire- ment of John Wiley MS’65, PhD’68. BRYCE RICHTER, UNIVERSITY HOUSING, HARVARD UNIVERSITY PRESS, JEFF MILLER (2) For the last four years, Blank has been in Washington, D.C., where she currently serves as acting secretary of the U.S. Department of Commerce, a job she says is not unlike running a big and complex university, given its twelve agencies and 47,000 employees. Blank will begin work as the UW’s chancellor in July, following a two-year period with David Ward MS’62, PhD’63 as interim chancellor. “Rebecca Blank has the demonstrated leadership skills to succeed as chancellor and maintain UW-Madison’s standard of excel- lence,” Ward says. “Her experience in the academic world and at the Department of Commerce will be critical as the university continues conducting research, creating new ways to teach our students, and reaching out to the state and the world.” Blank earned a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Minnesota and a PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. For nine years, she served as dean of the Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy at the University of Michigan. She also has taught at MIT, Northwestern, and Princeton. In 1985, Blank was a visiting professor at the UW for a semester. “I have been on the Madison campus many times, and you can feel the energy from both students and faculty,” she wrote in a statement as a chancellor candidate. “Your alumni are loyal. And you have one of the

Quick Takes A UW research team led by Su-Chun The Dictionary of American Regional Zhang has successfully transplanted neural English (DARE) — a five-volume, three- cells from a primate’s skin into its brain and decade research effort on regional speech watched them transform into mature brain — has been facing a funding shortfall, cells. The experiment used induced pluripo- following a drop in tent stem cells — that is, stem cells derived private giving and fewer from an adult rather than an embryo — which federal dollars, due to were converted into neurons. The results show the sequester. At press promise for personalized medicine, which time, an anonymous uses a patient’s own cells to replace damaged donor had pledged to or diseased cells. Housing contest for the best–decorated resi- help, and the editors dence hall room. Take a tour of their dorm were hopeful that addi- Freshmen Matt Dallman and Samuel palace on Housing’s Facebook page: face- tional support would Calmes of Sellery Residence Hall won a UW book.com/uwmadisonresidencehalls. keep the project alive.

12 ON WISCONSIN Signature Signatures Their genesis unknown, the names of geography students mark the decades.

After seven years of exams, BRYCE RICHTER late nights, long field studies, publishing work in top scien- tific journals, and writing and revising and perfecting a doctoral thesis, there was one more thing Jacquelyn Gill MS’08, PhD’12 needed to do before she could feel like her doctorate in geog- raphy was complete: autograph a brick. Just down the stairwell from the fifth-floor loft where the grad students toil away in Science Hall, Gill added her name and graduation year to the parting thoughts left by the students who — for as many as one hundred and twenty years — have called forever — even when I showed Science Hall resident since 1984. a decade ago: “When I look back the building home. up,” says Jude Leimer MS’82, Among the oldest legible on this year, it will be with sheer “Putting my name up there managing editor of the History of autographs are somewhat familiar disdain.” was a sort of final rite of passage, Cartography Project, and a grad- names such as Frank M. Reilly, Most students take care not and it was always nice seeing the uate student in Science Hall in the a Madison architect who, despite to mar the marks of their prede- names of those who graduated early 1980s. never completing a UW degree, cessors, and they choose to leave before me,” Gill says. “What I heard was, every carefully signed his name and on a happy and thoughtful note: People know very little about so often, someone would find a added a date — January 16, 1897 Gill, for example, paired her name the practice in the building, which ladder and climb up high, and — before he left campus. with a quote from poet Mary was constructed in 1887 and to scrawl their initials and gradua- The inherent tension of Oliver: “To pay attention, this is this day sustains ghost stories. tion date,” says Thomas Tews academia comes through a little, our endless and proper work.” “The names had been there MA’90, geography librarian and a too, in notes such as one left just Chris Barncard

of Gender and Women’s Studies, the commu- Badgers are smiling — more than any other nity — called Open House — will be located college students, according to the online at Phillips Residence Hall and will offer a university ranker Unigo. The website listed one-credit seminar in gay, lesbian, bisexual, the UW as number-one for happy transgender, and queer issues. students. The UW’s air force ROTC program was ranked first in the nation in physical A team of grad students in the La Follette fitness. The Badger cadets scored 97.42 on School of Public Affairs won first place at the a 100-point scale, making them the fittest of Policy Solutions Challenge, a national compe- the country’s 146 air force ROTC programs. tition to develop innovative responses to public policy problems. The students — Miriam The Division of Housing is adding a new Palmer, Selina Eadie, Andrew Walsh, Norma- co-ed learning community emphasizing Jean Simon ’07, MPA’12, MPH’12, and Jiaqi Lu gender issues. Sponsored by the Department — presented strategies for reducing obesity.

SUMMER 2013 13 news ¬es FROM NOVA

BUILDING PHARAOH’S CHARIOT ©1996–2013 WGBH EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION

Classic Car Enthusiast Engineering professor explores the mysteries of chariots. When Bela Sandor toured the materials for autos and aircraft — 2013, he was the sole technical all over Japan, at universities, Museum of Egyptian Antiquities was hooked. expert. In the spirit of the epic many different industries, and in Cairo fifteen years ago, he When he returned to drama Ben-Hur, the documentary government labs. was entranced by magnifi- the United States, he began (shown above) follows scientists At nearly seventy-eight years cent exhibits that showcased researching chariots. While he who built two accurate replicas of old, Sandor says he’s attempting ancient Egyptian jewelry and the found a wealth of archaeological Egyptian royal chariots. to slow down. But newfound fame mummies of famed Pharaohs. information, there was a dearth of Ancient or not, engineering from NOVA has kicked lecture He all but ignored the chariots. technical detail, meaning he had and technology have fasci- requests into high gear. With a “I was not terribly impressed,” the chance to be the first modern nated Sandor since his youth recent talk to the Madison Biblical says Sandor, who retired in 1997 engineer to explore chariot in his native Hungary. He has Archaeology Society (founded by after thirty years as a professor construction. conducted materials research the late Menahem Mansoor, a in the Department of Engineering “It’s like entering a huge toy at Lockheed Palo Alto Research professor of Hebrew and Semitic Physics. store and you are the only kid,” Labs in California and GKN studies), he is off and running But on a second visit in 2000, he says. Technology Research Centre in with yet another area of expertise. he noticed an inexplicable crack Today, Sandor has reinvented the United Kingdom. In 1985, he “Now I am in business as a freshly in a spoke on the wheel of one himself as an international expert became the first officially recog- minted Biblical archaeologist,” he of King Tutankhamun’s chariots. on chariot techno-archaeology. nized guest professor of Osaka says. “My story touches on the Sandor, who is an expert in When the PBS series NOVA ran University and was a research Iliad, the Bible, Celts and Romans, fracture, fatigue, stress, and a documentary called Building fellow of the Japan Society for the and Ben-Hur.” strain in materials — particularly Pharaoh’s Chariot in February Promotion of Science, lecturing Renee Meiller ’95

14 ON WISCONSIN SWAMP People The Software Assurance Marketplace aims to make computers more secure.

Filled with predatory hackers and do you harm,” says Miron abilities. Led by staff at MIR, the twenty-four hours a day to eval- and cyber-spies, the Internet is a Livny, the UW professor of SWAMP brings together experts uate clients’ software products dangerous environment. To navi- computer science who serves from the UW, the University of and tools — from individual gate it safely, software developers as the SWAMP’s director. “Our Illinois, and Indiana University. applications to entire operating may want to take a trip to the purpose is to help the community “This is a new and bold idea,” systems. Its goal is not only to SWAMP: the Software Assurance of software developers so that Livny says. “We’re creating a protect the country’s online infra- Marketplace, a new facility computers are safe from those place where the software commu- structure, but also to create a being launched at the Morgridge kinds of attacks.” nity — software developers, space in which software assur- Institute for Research (MIR) on Created through a $23.6 software assurance tool devel- ance tool developers can evaluate campus. million contract with the U.S. opers, and government — can and improve their products. “There are people who want Department of Homeland Security, share expertise and assistance.” The Software Assurance to take over the software on the SWAMP offers a facility in The SWAMP’s chief facility Marketplace will be open for your computer and make it do which software products are is the Continuous Software operation in January 2014. things it’s not supposed to do tested for weaknesses and vulner- Assurance Lab, which will operate John Allen

STUDENT WATCH During a business lunch, you order ribs and your potential boss orders fish. When the food arrives, you place your napkin in your lap and begin to eat the ribs one by one with your hands. Right? Wrong. Each semester, the College of Letters & Science holds an Etiquette Dinner at the University Club for students, teaching them tips and tricks for dining during a job search. Students are taught to avoid simple mistakes, such as eating with your hands when the rest of your table is using forks and knives. An etiquette profes- sional leads the group through the proper way to enjoy common foods, including soup, salad, pasta, and dessert. Caela Northey x’13 attended the event to learn what she was doing wrong and become a more conscious eater. “I never knew there were so many ways to hold a fork,” she says. She and peers at her table were surprised by the many meticulous details — from buttering a roll to excusing oneself to use the restroom — related to polite dining. “You can find anything online about how to behave at a profes- sional meal. But students learn quite a bit in this format,” says Angie White, the college’s coordinator of advising. “I’d love to host a similar dinner,” Northey says. “It would be a good way to share what I’ve learned.” “It’s amazing how effective the dinner was in a such a short amount of time,” says James Olrick x’14. “Eating has professional implications that can potentially secure a job.” Aimee Katz ’13 JEFF MILLER

SUMMER 2013 15 news ¬es JOHN MANIACI/UW HOSPITAL & CLINICS

A Promising Sight Family’s cells lead researchers closer to curing an eye disease. They looked like eyelashes and who has the Best gene muta- ashes captured in pale orange tion, and his sister Teri Selzer, jello. who does not, drove to Madison But the specks in the Petri from their homes in north- dishes were the result of years west suburban Chicago. At of research in the laboratory the Waisman Center, scientists of David Gamm, an ophthal- took a small sample of the skin mologist at the UW’s Waisman from their arms with a device Center. And as members of the that resembles a paper punch. Reese family carefully cradled Then Ruchira Singh, the lead Siblings Tim Reese and Teri Selzer, at left, provided cell samples to UW researchers David Gamm and Ruchira Singh, at right, who are the dishes, they held the future researcher on the project, used working to cure an eye disease that runs in the Reese family. of their descendants’ eyesight in induced pluripotent stem-cell their hands. methods pioneered at the UW of the most immediate promises that such cures might come They were seeing cells that to turn the skin cells back into of stem cells — creating living too late for him, but he’s thrilled were a model of their retinas. stem cells, and then grew them laboratory models to understand to help find answers about a The Reese family has Best into retina tissue. Today, Gamm’s disease and test treatments. disease that blinded his mother disease, the second-most technology has advanced so It’s also another first from the and affects younger family common inherited disorder of much that his lab can do the stem-cell laboratory of Gamm, members. the macula, the center of the same with a blood sample. director of the McPherson Eye “Losing your sight is the retina. Everyone born into the The two models allowed Research Institute, which is slowest death in the world,” he family has a 50 percent chance the researchers to understand funded by the National Eye says. “I am doing this for the of inheriting the gene that slowly why Reese was slowly losing Institute and donations from UW future. Maybe it won’t help me, destroys their retinas and, thus, his vision. They also may yield alumni and others. but it will help my children and their sight. clues on how to halt or reverse Reese, who began losing his grandchildren.” Two years earlier, Tim Reese, the process. The discovery is one central vision as a child, knows Susan Lampert Smith ’82 By The Numbers

Approximate number of flowers that make up the W Design Garden on the 1,450 University Avenue side of Humanities. There are 850 white and 600 red plants, JEFF MILLER and the UW uses a variety of vinca called Pacifica. Until 2011, the W Design Garden used Pizzazz begonias, but vincas are less susceptible to disease, according to gardener Larry Kraak, and they also hold up better in a drought. The flowers were installed just prior to graduation weekend.

16 ON WISCONSIN PUPA GILBERT Looking Sharp This looks like a colorful ocean reef, but it’s actu- ally the forming end of a sea urchin tooth. Pupa Gilbert, a UW chemistry and physics professor, used a scan- ning electron microscope to make a grayscale image and then painstakingly colored it to show the individual calcite crystals that make up the tooth. Her creation won top honors in the 2012 International Science & Engineering Visualization Challenge, sponsored by the National Science Foundation and the journal Science. Gilbert studies urchins’ ability to gnaw holes in rock to make hiding places in a dangerous ocean environ- ment. Sea urchin teeth are essentially self-sharpening, a trick that human toolmakers may someday incorporate into cutting edges that never need sharpening.

increased from 3.1 percent at the Understanding the emotional The Gray-Hair Pink-Slip Blues start of the Great Recession in effects of job loss on older December 2007 to 7 percent in workers is important in crafting Job loss packs a punch for older workers. February 2010, with the length of public-policy solutions, DeLeire Job loss can have a profound the psychological impacts of job unemployment also increasing for and Kalil suggest. Efforts to help and long-lasting effect on older loss compared to the economic older workers. displaced older workers often workers, according to research by impacts,” says Kalil, “but govern- But the news from DeLeire focus on economic solutions, UW-Madison Professor Thomas ment leaders are increasingly and Kalil’s study is not all bad. including unemployment insur- DeLeire and the University of calling for the establishment of a Older workers retained their ance and re-training efforts, but Chicago’s Ariel Kalil ’91. They ‘national index’ of positive well- sense of purpose in life even in this research shows the impor- found that older workers who being as a key indicator of a the face of job loss. And new tance of solutions that focus on suffer involuntary job loss are nation’s wealth and health.” research suggests that people older workers’ psychological substantially less satisfied with life, The employment land- who maintain that sense of health and well-being. and that significant loss of satisfac- scape is changing rapidly for purpose as they age, according to “Employment appears to not tion persists for at least five years. older workers. Those over 55 professor Carol Ryff, director of only provide financial support, DeLeire, director of the UW’s are projected to have the fastest UW-Madison’s Institute on Aging, but also social connections and La Follette School of Public growth in workforce participa- “are more likely to remain cogni- perhaps a sense of purpose Affairs, and Kalil studied data tion rates of any age group in tively intact, have better mental for older workers. Thus a lost from more than 11,000 survey the coming decade, according health, and even live longer than job means more than just lost respondents over the age of 50. to the study. At the same time, people who focus on achieving income,” says DeLeire. “We know a lot less about unemployment for those over 55 feelings of happiness.” Ann Schottman Knol

SUMMER 2013 17 collection

The Stuff of Memories

To call Patrick McBride MD’80 a collector of sports memorabilia doesn’t quite cut it. Most collectors are bystanders, folks who honor history by acquiring artifacts. McBride’s collection captures firsthand memories. At fifteen, McBride — now a professor and associate dean for students at the UW School of Medicine and Public Health — was a batboy for the Milwaukee Brewers in their inaugural 1970 season. He also worked the sidelines for the Green Bay Packers, back when they played half their home games in Milwaukee. As if that wasn’t enough, McBride was also the Milwaukee Bucks’ ball boy, and later, as a seventeen-year-old high school senior, he became the youngest-ever equipment manager in a professional sport. It was a magical time for the franchise. The Bucks landed Lew Alcindor in the 1969 NBA draft. In his second season, Alcindor, at right, who would change his name to Kareem Abdul- Jabbar, won his first pro championship. It was also the Bucks’ first and only championship. McBride remained Bucks equipment manager until he was accepted to attend medical school at the UW. Most of the mementos he acquired sat in a closet for decades, though occasionally he’d pull something out to show to friends. Last year, McBride decided it was time to part with some of the memorabilia. He auctioned a jersey that Alcindor had worn during his rookie year and the championship season. Mears Online, a South Milwaukee-based authentication service, purchased the jersey with a bid of $80,000. Mears plans to display the jersey for the public. “I have the memories. I was on the bench; I was in the dugout; I was on the sidelines — the memorabilia mean less to me because I was there for the big games and championships,” says McBride, who is preparing to sell more of his collection. “Selling this allowed me to pay for my children’s education and support some causes I believe in. Now these impor- tant parts of Wisconsin sports history can be seen by more people.” McBride is in the process of writing a book about his experience and how it has informed his medical and teaching career. He plans to call it The Luckiest Boy in the World. Greg Bump MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL © 2013

18 ON WISCONSIN classroom

Music 660: The Legendary Performers Today’s successful artists are influenced by the greats of past eras.

Learning from BRYCE RICHTER a campus legend Marching Band director Michael Leckrone has been teaching this popular class for non-music majors for more than twenty years. That sounds like a long time, but he has been at the university for forty-four years.

What’s that sound? Students show up wearing earbuds and listening to whatever is in rotation on their iPods, but when they enter the Mills Concert Hall inside the George L. Mosse Humanities Building, they take a musical step back to another sonic era. “Most of [the music] they’ve never experienced before, but have maybe had brushes with it on TV, or in movies or commercials,” Leckrone says. His students like the way Leckrone involves the class, asking them to Michael Leckrone gets students to develop an appreciation for legendary musicians and singers who describe what they hear, whether are not necessarily found on their iPod playlists, such as Billie Holiday, Bessie Smith, and Fats Waller. they like it, and why it is or isn’t music to their ears. “He teaches Spotlight on history performances abroad during Jolson. “It’s actual music — not you a different way of listening While there’s a lot of good music World War II helped lead to the like a lot of the electronic stuff to music,” says Dan Muth ’13, and a lot of good musicians, formation of the United Services you hear. … It’s not perfect — a senior majoring in industrial not all rise to the category of Organization. it’s raw.” engineering. legendary performer, Leckrone says. “They had to have estab- New appreciation Coda Defining legend lished a new style or done Leckrone doesn’t expect to After class, the earbuds and Leckrone focuses on artists from something socially that was a convert all of his students into iPods reappear. Leckrone gets 1920 to 1950 who captured the huge step forward,” he says. huge fans of Jolson or others. it: this music won’t necessarily musical magic of that time, yet “I’m very interested in what Rather, he wants to help them become part of their everyday also influence today’s artists. The has happened historically.” develop an appreciation of what music rotation — and that’s first lecture explores blues singer Take Jolson, a performer many came before today’s tunes. okay with him. “What I want to Bessie Smith. “Bessie led us to students aren’t familiar with “I knew nothing,” says Amy do is help them become more Janice Joplin; Bing [Crosby] led until Leckrone shows them Pedersen x’14, a biology discriminating listeners,” he us to Michael Bublé; [Al] Jolson clips from The Jazz Singer. The major. “After listening to some says. “Hopefully, I get them to led us to Michael Jackson,” he film is in black and white, and of this music, you realize it laid open their minds to more music. says. “Louis [Armstrong] led, and the sound isn’t perfect. But it the foundation for a lot of the We hear music all the time, but everyone followed!” The era also captures a time when Jolson modern music you hear.” So sometimes you don’t take time featured Nat King Cole, Judy ruled the music scene, singing while Pedersen is still more a to open up your ears and really Garland, Billie Holiday, Jelly Roll “Blue Skies” and “My Mammy.” fan of Jack Johnson, she has listen to it.” Morton, and Fats Waller. The students learn that Jolson’s a newfound appreciation for Kåri Knutson

SUMMER 2013 19 sports

TEAM PLAYER: Japheth Cato Up until April 27, Japheth Cato x’14 was the Badger track and field team’s lucky seven. In the heptathlon, he competed in seven events, and he was among the best college athletes in his field. But at the end of April, he ruptured his Achilles tendon at a meet in California, prematurely ending his season. The heptathlon combines the 60-meter dash, long jump, shot put, high jump, 60-meter hurdles, pole vault, and the 1,000-meter dash to rack up points during meets. “I’ve always done multi-event sports,” Cato says. “I’m pretty versatile.” Though he was redshirted his first year, he has always been eager to travel and compete with the team — so much so that during his freshman year, he walked onto the team’s bus, looked his coach in the eye, and said, “Next year, I’ll be on this bus.” Now not only is Cato aboard the bus, but he also leads the team as one of three captains. Instrumental in the Badgers’ appear- ances at the NCAA Indoor Track Championships for three years, he encourages everyone to be the best athlete possible. In 2012, Cato showed that he holds himself to the same standard, becoming the seventh athlete in NCAA history to break the 6,000-point plateau in the heptathlon. “I always push myself to do better,” Cato says, but he also keeps in mind that the competition is just like him. “They put their pants on one leg at a time,” he says. In the 2013 NCAA Championships, Cato finished runner-up for the second consecutive year, scoring a career-best of 6,165 points. Though he was hoping for more, he’s proud of breaking his own record for highest non- winning score. He is the first collegian to top 6,000 points in the heptathlon four times in a career. “I love being on a winning team,” he says. “By being willing to work through challenges and persevere, I’ve had great success with my teammates.” His next challenge will be a big one. Cato faces six to nine months of rehab as he recovers from his injury. But he still has hopes for future competition, perhaps even at the 2016 Olympic Games. “I’ll always be hungry,” he says. “Being on this team has made me always want to work hard for more.” Aimee Katz ’13

“I love being on a winning team. By being willing to work through challenges and persevere, I’ve had great success with my teammates.” UW SPORTS INFORMATIONUW SPORTS

20 ON WISCONSIN COURTESY OF KAYLACOURTESY GROSS

Good Sports When it comes to community service, UW athletes are pros. Kayla Gross ’13 isn’t a national- Back as the community relations champion athlete. She doesn’t coordinator, a role that combines run, jump, block, shoot, or score her skills in communications with at an elite level. But she repre- her love of sports and a desire to sents Badger athletics better than help others. just about anyone, though few ever After seeing a posting for a see her. Gross is the hidden hand similar position on the Minnesota behind an ambitious undertaking. Twins website, Gross was Badgers Give Back is UW inspired. She took the idea to the Athletics’ new philanthropic UW Athletics academic services outreach program, in which department and, in August 2012, student athletes have unique was hired to create a program for Kayla Gross joined several Badger football players for Read Across opportunities to help make Dane the Badgers. America Day in March and visited four elementary schools. County a better place to live. “When I came up with the Created in September 2012 to idea and said this is what I in the school of journalism, Gross Gross is responsible for publi- organize community relations want to do, everyone here — typically spends twenty to thirty cizing it on the UW Athletics efforts, the program is centered from the faculty to the staff and hours per week working with website, uwbadgers.com, and on promoting education, physical the student athletes — was so Badgers Give Back. On average, through social media sites such fitness, families, and community. supportive,” she says. “I even got she attends three events each as Twitter, using the hash tag From charity fundraising events to write my own job description.” week, year-round. During the #BadgersGiveBack. to appearances at area schools Gross oversees all requests program’s first academic year, “It’s a story people want and American Family Children’s for student-athlete appearances UW athletes clocked more than to hear, and we’ve received a Hospital, the program enables — nearly 800 student athletes in 4,250 volunteer hours at more lot of positive feedback,” says UW athletes to make a big differ- total. Her other responsibilities than 150 area events. That’s up Gross. “Our student athletes are ence off the field of play. include transporting and accom- from 3,600 volunteer hours at a tremendous group of young But the activities don’t just panying athletes to events and 68 events last year, when UW people, and the fact that they take run themselves — and that’s making sure all appearances Athletics did not have an orga- time out of their already limited where Gross steps in. Working comply with NCAA rules. nized program. schedules to be so dedicated to behind the scenes, she spent her A full-time student on the But her job duties don’t our community is fantastic.” senior year serving Badgers Give strategic communications track end there. Following an event, Libby Blanchette

Badger Sports Ticker

Drew teDuits swam to glory when he won the NCAA champion- The men’s hockey team won the Western Collegiate Hockey ship in the 200-yard backstroke. The sophomore’s victory marked the Association title at the conference tournament in March. The victory first time a UW men’s swimmer had won an individual national cham- marked the squad’s first conference championship since 1998, and pionship since Fred Westphal ’59 took the 50-yard freestyle title in the last they will ever win in the WCHA. Next season, the Big Ten will 1959, and teDuits’s time (1:38.27) was the third fastest in NCAA history. launch ice hockey play, and the Badgers will join that conference. Overall, the team finished thirteenth at the meet in March. Women’s hockey players Brianna Decker and Alex Rigsby were The men’s basketball team may have looked cold in terms of named All-Americans. Decker, a senior, is a forward, and Rigsby, a shooting in this year’s NCAA tournament, but they looked hot in terms junior, is the team’s goalie. UW SPORTS INFORMATIONUW SPORTS of looks — at least according to Cosmopolitan magazine’s website. It listed senior UW forward Mike Bruesewitz as one of the “Hottest Guys The women’s volleyball team has a new head coach. Kelly Sheffield, of March Madness 2013,” noting that his curly red hair — or “ginger formerly head coach for the University of Dayton, takes over for Pete ’fro” — makes fans swoon. Waite, who resigned in November.

SUMMER 2013 21 the planet NICO HOUSMAN/EUROPEAN SOUTHERN OBSERVATORY hunter Is there intelligent life beyond Earth? Maggie Turnbull ’98 is determined to find out.

By Nicole Sweeney Etter

Maggie Turnbull ’98 sits in the fading afternoon light of her parents’ living room in Antigo, Wisconsin, her laptop perched on the table before her. This small town of 8,200 in the Northwoods, hours from the nearest university and a plane ride away from the closest major observatory, is an unusual home base for an astronomer and astrobiologist who has dedicated her career to advancing the search for extraterrestrial life. But Turnbull is not your typical scientist. “I really like working in places like this,” she says, gazing over the back yard’s towering trees and small pond, binoculars resting nearby, in case she wants a better glimpse of the woodpeckers dining on the peanut-butter-and- suet concoction she mixes up for them. “Sometimes I just need to stare out The Milky Way is shown the window and think.” above the La Silla But the life she’s thinking about is light years away from this back yard. Observatory in Chile’s Atacama desert. The vast Once labeled a genius by CNN, Turnbull is internationally known for her expanse of stars and planets work cataloging potentially habitable planets and even has an asteroid named has always fascinated Maggie Turnbull, who turned after her (7863 Turnbull). She’s not afraid to take risks to pursue her scien- her love for astronomy into a tific dreams — first by choosing astronomy, then by focusing on the search career as a freelance astro- biologist. Working out of for extraterrestrial life, then by leaving a good job at a highly respected her home office in Antigo, institute to do science on her own terms. As a freelance astrobiologist, she Wisconsin, she has become internationally known for her focuses on life in the universe. work cataloging potentially The life she has discovered along the way: her own. habitable planets.

22 ON WISCONSIN As a kindergartner, Turnbull pored over Although she didn’t grow up with a back-yard telescope her school’s encyclopedia of planets, its pages filled with big, vivid — frankly, she was underwhelmed by the limited view — she found other ways to feed her fascination with space. In middle pictures of the solar system. “Saturn, in particular, was just so school, she devoured every book on the topic that she could find, exotic and so captivating,” she recalls. “That’s sort of my earliest including one of her father’s old college astronomy textbooks. “It memory of becoming enchanted with space.” was all words, no pictures, just a black cover. And I couldn’t tear She yearned to be an astronaut and was obsessed with Star myself away from it,” she says. “I’d come running into the kitchen Trek: The Next Generation. “I was religiously attentive to that and say, ‘Mom, did you know if you took even a spoonful from show,” she says with a laugh. “Every Monday night at nine the center of the sun, it could go crashing through this table and o’clock it would come on, and I would be in front of the TV, to the center of the earth because of how heavy it would be?’ ” In waiting. I think it probably crystallized in my mind that I was seventh grade, Turnbull tore through Isaac Asimov’s Atom, about going to do something with space exploration.” atoms and particle physics. “I remember wanting to talk about

SUMMER 2013 23 it in science class, and that wasn’t going Turnbull spent a summer Tarter with Jodie Foster. “I had not real- anywhere,” she says with a laugh. working at the Harvard Center for Astro- ized that [Tarter] was the one the movie On her high school graduation day, physics, and while she was there, the Contact was based on,” she says. “I went a friend asked what she was going to movie Contact hit theaters. In the film, from sitting in a movie theater to sitting do next. Jodie Foster plays an astronomer who in the office of the real-world inspiration “I’m going to do astrophysics,” Turn- discovers the first sign of intelligent life for that movie.” bull declared, putting her plan into words from another planet. While at SETI, Turnbull embarked for the first time. She applied to only one “I sat down ready to pooh-pooh that on an effort to help the project’s re- college — UW-Madison — and she was movie. I was going to know all the things searchers refine their search. She turned on her way. that were wrong and inaccurate,” Turnbull to the Hipparcos catalog, which lists the But once she settled into freshman says. “But by the end, I was practically names, coordinates, color, and distance year, her confidence crumbled. Of standing on my chair saying, ‘That is what of about 120,000 nearby stars, and began the forty-thousand-some students on I’m supposed to do with my life!’ ” piecing together shreds of information campus at the time, she was one of just After graduation, she landed an like a detective to better understand the three astronomy majors in her year. “I astrobiology internship at NASA’s Ames stars scattered across the cosmos. had a moment where I thought, there’s Research Center in California. She then “You have to know how far away it is just no way that’s going to work. Nobody started graduate work in astronomy at to know how luminous of a star it is. And here wants to be an astronomer,” she the University of Arizona, where she was if you don’t know how luminous it is, then remembers. “And that’s because there aren’t any jobs. Where am I going to She switched her major to biology, thinking it a more work?” So she switched her major to biology, practical path. But she felt so sick over the decision thinking it a more practical path. But that she barely slept for two weeks. she felt so sick over the decision that she barely slept for two weeks. One day, told that her UW research had set her you don’t know how massive it is, which her astronomy TA showed a video that application apart from some two hundred means you don’t know how long it’s going included the same pictures of Saturn, other applicants. to live or how old it is,” Turnbull explains. Jupiter, Uranus, and Neptune that Turn- In grad school, she met Jill Tarter, “The brightest stars only live for a million bull had first spotted in that encyclopedia then-director of the SETI (Search for years. We need to know this when we’re as a child, and she broke down in tears as Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute, building a target list for SETI, because the images flashed on the screen. which was searching for radio signals you need a nice, stable environment for “Are there any jobs at all in this field? from extraterrestrial civilizations. Using billions of years for life to take hold, espe- Tell me there’s something I can do with radio telescopes to observe nearby sun- cially for intelligent life if you’re listening my life!” she told the TA after class. like stars, SETI researchers monitored for radio signals. On Earth, that took 4.5 They talked about research opportunities millions of radio channels for evidence billion years to happen.” through NASA and the National Science of communication transmissions from Turnbull’s task: rule out the stars that Foundation, and, reassured, Turnbull intelligent beings. Turnbull begged weren’t good candidates. At the same switched her major back to astronomy. Tarter for the chance to work for her, and time, she vastly lengthened the target list Even then, she was intrigued by the Tarter was impressed by her enthusiasm. through her analysis of other stars that idea of life on other planets, but knew it “Maggie is a unique individual,” SETI hadn’t yet considered. was considered “fringe.” Tarter says. “She has a huge amount of “They had a few thousand stars that “It was an identity crisis. This is how energy, she’s pretty fearless, and she does they were looking at, but now we could I am, and yet this is how the world works, things in her own way. When she was in look at tens of thousands of stars that we and the world doesn’t have a place for graduate school in Arizona, there was no knew were good, high-quality targets,” someone who wants to do something formal program in astrobiology, so she she says. that’s that out there,” she says. created her own graduate program.” Her work became the Catalog of But if the world didn’t have a place One day, while sitting in the SETI Potentially Habitable Stellar Systems, or yet, she decided, she’d make her own. She offices in Mountain View, California, HABCAT, as it’s better known. Then she soon had her chance. Turnbull looked over and saw a photo of added data from other catalogs, including

24 ON WISCONSIN ANDRI POL information on stellar composition. To create planetary bodies and living organ- isms, you need a star rich in heavy metals — that rules out many of the older stars that lack heavy metal content. During Turnbull’s four years at SETI, her data- base grew, eventually encompassing more than 1 million stars. “I kept coming up with new questions to ask about the stars,” she says. Turnbull’s contributions have been key to the search for planets outside our solar system, says Sara Seager, a professor of planetary science and physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. “She’s known as the person who knows the most about the list of target stars,” Seager says. Not everyone gets Turnbull’s interest in extraterrestrial life. “I had really mixed On a recent visit to Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, Turnbull consults with researcher Brian Skiff (sitting) and astronomer Gerard van Belle (standing). reactions,” she says. “My parents were always very supportive. My parents are on to do more realistic things. That’s what the world I’d rather be at — that place is more imaginative people, pretty flexible most people would’ve done and have doing amazing things.” thinkers. … I’m sure others thought, ‘The done. I know a lot of people who have At the same time, she was homesick probability of detecting an alien signal is seen the movie Contact and their lives for family, for the simple pleasures of her so small, and is that really a good use of weren’t changed,” she says with a smile. childhood in northern Wisconsin. “I real- your abilities and efforts?’ ” ized that I wanted a much bigger life than Those are the same sorts of ques- just astronomy,” she says. “As amazing and tions Jodie Foster’s character encounters After earning her doctorate, fantastic as astronomy and astrobiology in Contact. Turnbull loves how the main Turnbull did an astrobiology postdoc at are, academic research does not encom- character’s discovery turns the world the Carnegie Institution for Science in pass enough of the human experience upside down, and that possibility, however Washington, D.C. Then she was hired for me to feel like I’m living a happy and remote, is her own motivation. as an assistant astronomer at Baltimore’s well-rounded life. I just felt the need for a “To me, that is what would make Space Telescope Science Institute, which major course correction.” science worth doing,” Turnbull says. “I manages the Hubble Space Telescope. She resigned after just six months realized there was nothing else in all of She helped support the Hubble’s last and decided to invent a new life as a science or in all of astronomy that I could servicing mission and found the work freelance astrobiologist at her own do that could potentially have that big of interesting. nonprofit organization, the Global an impact on humanity. … Everything And yet, she started to have doubts Science Institute. The same day she else pales in comparison. And why would again. “After a while, I began to feel like decided to resign, the phone rang. It you do something that pales?” I didn’t really belong at a big institute,” was Webster Cash, a professor from Still, Turnbull is quick to poke gentle she says. “I felt like it wasn’t quite the the Department of Astrophysical and fun at herself and Hollywood’s influence environment that I could see myself in Biological Sciences at the University on her life. long term, which caused yet another of Colorado at Boulder, and he wanted “For whatever reason, I was sort of identity crisis. I went through all of that, to know if she would lead a science innocent and wide-eyed enough to take and I actually got a job, and it was a good team for the New Worlds Observer, a that idea very seriously, whereas most of job, and I didn’t want it. I had to come up proposed mission to detect Earth-like my peers would’ve thought it was a fun with an idea of what the alternative would planets around nearby stars. Her new idea, but extremely far-fetched, and gone be, because there was no other institute in adventure had begun.

SUMMER 2013 25 ANDRI POL “You would think that all scientists are bubbling with creative ideas, but Maggie’s level of creativity is quite rare. It’s a talent she was born with, and she’s figured out how to use it in her own way.”

have the clout of large universities and farmers’ market and winning a spot on institutes behind them. the Common Council. She teaches at the “It probably doesn’t help me that I’m local technical college and is active in the at a tiny, one-woman nonprofit organiza- Antigo Bow Club. A former vegetarian tion, but I don’t think that it’s made my turned hunter, she’s proud of recently life impossible either,” says Turnbull, who bringing down her first doe. currently has funding from NASA and “In the real world, people are fighting the NASA Astrobiology Institute. for their survival,” she says of life in Antigo. Colleagues aren’t surprised that “It’s not just academics complaining that Turnbull succeeds on her own. “She does Washington isn’t putting enough money really creative and interesting things into science. People are trying to actually all the time,” Cash says. “You would stay alive and just be able to afford a roof think that all scientists are bubbling over their heads.” The New Worlds Observer with creative ideas, but Maggie’s level of Seager, the professor at MIT, admires is just a concept for now, centered on creativity is quite rare. It’s a talent she Turnbull’s attitude. the idea of a space telescope that would was born with, and she’s figured out how “Her unconventional approach to travel with something called a starshade. to use it in her own way.” life is very refreshing,” Seager says. “She The unique design of the petal-shaped And she pours that energy into her wanted to be a scientist, but only on her starshade is engineered to block powerful ongoing study of the stars that she believes own terms.” starlight so that a telescope can capture are the best targets for habitable planets. At the 100 Year Starship symposium, images of fainter objects nearby. “It’s a “I would just like to understand our an event sponsored by the Defense really cool design for an observatory, and nearest neighbors a lot better,” Turnbull Advanced Research Projects Agency and it has a lot of advantages over trying to says. “Is there a place relatively nearby focused on interstellar space exploration, block the starlight once it’s already in the in the neighborhood of the sun that is Turnbull stood up and made her pitch telescope, which is the way that it works anything like Earth at all? Maybe there for better instruments. Despite continued now,” Turnbull explains. aren’t people walking around, but maybe cuts to NASA’s budget, she sees that “The Hubble has an internal there are. What if there are animals? Even as the only way to make progress. “If coronagraph to block out the light of if there was a planet that didn’t have life you can give me a space telescope that really bright stars so that it can see the on it, but that could become habitable, is capable of finding Earth-like planets things around them,” she says. But it can’t what would that even look like? … We around nearby stars, then the [funding] see something as small as an Earth-like could find anything out there.” problems are all solved. I can tell you planet, “and certainly not a habitable Now she’s working with colleagues where the habitable zones are, and private planet, because habitable planets are very at the University of Arizona to collect industry will take over,” she says. “Once close to the star. So it would have to be a data on the stellar ages of top targets by the discovery has been made and you new telescope with really good optics and studying their rotation rates and activity have destinations, then you will have a really good starshade.” levels. She occasionally joins them for desire. People will just have an unquench- NASA recently selected the starshade a dusk-to-dawn observing run at the able desire to go there. And when you concept as a possible use for a Hubble- Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona. have desire, you have success. You find a class spy satellite that it acquired from the It’s a totally different energy from her way to do it, with or without government National Reconnaissance Office, but the usual work environment. funding.” project is now on hold indefinitely due to “To be around that many astronomers And what then? “Then we can take lack of funding. “It’s a matter of waiting puts you in a certain frame of mind that is over the galaxy, and we can meet all the for NASA to decide, are we going to have hard to replicate when you’re by yourself other civilizations that are out there,” she a dedicated mission to do something like in the woods,” she admits. says with a laugh. this or not?” Turnbull says. “And funding is At the same time, Turnbull feels For now, she’s content to keep getting tighter and tighter by the minute.” more connected to the real world in searching from her small corner of the In the meantime, Turnbull continues Antigo. Soon after moving back, she universe. n to submit grant proposals to fund her threw herself into community life, Nicole Sweeney Etter, a freelance writer and work, competing with scientists who spearheading the drive for Antigo’s first editor, lives in Milwaukee.

26 ON WISCONSIN Another Approach to Finding Signs of Life Clark Johnson’s research is grounded in the study of But if you look at the early Earth, life was dominated ancient Earth rocks, but it could reveal clues about by microbial life, so the biosignatures aren’t going to life on faraway planets. be as blatantly obvious as a big dinosaur bone.” Johnson, a professor of geoscience, leads the It’s extremely rare to find fossilized microbes, Wisconsin Astrobiology Research Consortium, which because they’re easily broken down by heat and the includes about forty researchers and staff, mostly rock-formation process. So Johnson’s team mostly from UW-Madison’s Department of Geoscience. He focuses on what he calls “the chemical fingerprints also co-teaches Astronomy 160: Life in the Universe. of life” — unique minerals, shapes, or compositions While Maggie Turnbull’s work focuses on where in early Earth rocks. we might find extraterrestrial life, Johnson’s team Ancient Earth rocks are also rare, but they can explores what that life might look like. be found in certain parts of the world. Johnson Johnson began his career as a geochemist who has spent much of his time collecting samples in studied the world of volcanic eruptions, magmas, Australia and South Africa. and the like. Then, in 1996, he read a paper in “The practical field work is on Earth,” Johnson the journal Science in which author David McKay says. “But our goal in the long term is to provide the proposed that there was life in a Martian mete- interpretative context for when we get samples from a orite. “In the end, a lot of people don’t believe this planet such as Mars. We want to know what the range idea that he proposed,” Johnson says, “but it got of life on the early Earth would’ve been, in order to people thinking about how to test this idea in a lot of recognize the potential in rocks from another planet.” different ways.” In March, NASA’s Curiosity rover found evidence Johnson was one of those people. He suddenly in Martian rock suggesting that the planet could have found himself drawn to astrobiology, the field that supported living microbes at one time. “The chemical studies life in the universe. Soon Johnson was measurements being made by Curiosity now clearly collaborating with other researchers at NASA’s show that early Mars had a significant wet, freshwater Astrobiology Institute. Then in 2007, he launched the environment — an environment that certainly could Wisconsin Astrobiology Research Consortium. The have supported early life,” Johnson says. consortium recently received a second five-year, Next, Johnson’s team is looking at how microbes $9 million grant from NASA to continue its work. might have been affected by a period of rapid change. “We focus more on the chemistry of life and what “These are really big questions, and they don’t we call the biosignatures of life. So we’re interested have easy answers,” he says. “I’d like to think of in life on the early Earth and what we might find on them as multigenerational questions. They’re tied another planetary body like Mars,” he into long-term missions to other explains. “If you find a big planets that take decades dinosaur bone in a to plan for.” rock, that’s a N.S.E. biosigna- ture. SHUTTERSTOCK

SUMMER 2013 27 the s of abc MASTERFILE moocs

By John Allen The UW is experimenting On the bookshelf in his office, John Hawks keeps a toy woolly mammoth, with the elements of its face turned in flight from a toy caveman, whose plastic hand brandishes a plastic spear. It’s hardly a museum-quality display, but the scene serves as a free online classes. reminder of the forces that Hawks studies: adaptation and extinction. What will this mean for Hawks is an associate professor of anthropology, and his specialty is human evolution. The focus of his career has been to ponder why the caveman the university? Here’s survived and the mammoth did not. a primer on higher Adaptation and extinction: Hawks sees these forces in the professional sphere as well as the prehistoric. He’d prefer that his career path evolve like education’s latest trend. the human rather than die out like the mammoth. In part, that’s why he volunteered to teach one of the MOOCs — massive online open courses — that the UW will offer beginning in fall 2013.

28 ON WISCONSIN “The world is changing,” he says. System school to offer a MOOC; UW-La had shared its educational resources with “It’s going to be increasingly difficult for Crosse created one in the spring of 2013 citizens gratis though such programs as a PhD to be hired as a professor without to teach remedial math. School of the Air. Why not online? having substantial ability to teach online.” As recently as summer 2012, UW- “I view this as part of the Wisconsin s MOOCs are one of the newest trends Madison was reluctant to get into the Idea,” says Hawks. “The University of mooc in higher education. Universities offer MOOC business at all — for reasons that Wisconsin has the opportunity to be classes online, for free, to anyone who are still relevant. a leader [in online education], so it wishes to take them. In February, the UW should be.” announced a partnership with the firm “There are things The program also fits within one Coursera to create four MOOCs during of the goals that David Ward MS’62, the 2013–14 academic year: that face-to-face PhD’63 set while serving as interim chancellor the past two years: educational • Human Evolution, taught by Hawks education can innovation. • Markets with Frictions, taught by “The opportunity [MOOCs] afford finance, investment, and banking accomplish that us is to think about education in a much professor Randall Wright online just can’t. broader sense,” Russell says. “Our current • Globalizing Higher Education structure and process is, for good reasons, and Research for the “Knowledge But on the other to focus on the traditional residential Economy,” taught by geography hand, there’s a lot student body. But only 15 percent of professor Kris Olds and University of [American students] who are pursuing an Bristol professor Susan Robertson of what we do in undergraduate degree are at a traditional • More Than a High Score: Video four-year program.” Games and Learning, with Constance face-to-face educa- Thus the UW is dipping a toe into Steinkuehler MS’00, PhD’05 and tion that’s just MOOC-y waters. The four MOOCs Kurt Squire, two School of Education launched this coming year mark phase faculty who co-direct the UW’s new chalk-and-talk. one of a pilot program; phase two may Games + Learning + Society center. That can easily be include another three to six courses, as The announcement sparked imme- done online.” the university figures out how to make diate interest. According to Jeff Russell, online education more effective. It’s the UW’s vice provost for lifelong learning essentially an experiment, an effort to and dean of continuing studies (and the “We weren’t interested in being a learn as much as to teach. administrator charged with guiding its show cow,” says Russell. “We didn’t want “I would say that right now you’re just MOOC program), more than 1,500 to get into [MOOCs] simply because seeing the first wave of online courses,” people registered to sign up for the classes all of our peer institutions were doing says Steinkuehler, “which means that within thirty hours; by mid-April, that it. We wanted to have a sound plan and people are working on the bare bones of number was over 25,000, even though the rationale, to create authentic, substantive how to structure them, how to let people university hadn’t yet set dates for when the classes — or else we knew it would be a self-pace. I think that once we’re through courses would begin. train wreck.” this phase of nuts and bolts, you’ll see a UW-Madison is hardly the first But during the last year, university lot of innovation.” university in the world to launch MOOCs. administrators came to see that MOOCs Adaptation or extinction: those, ulti- Dozens of schools around the globe offer fit within the UW’s core values, as mately, are the forces that are causing them. Coursera currently has relationships expressed in the Wisconsin Idea — the faculty, both at the UW and other insti- with sixty-one other institutions in seven- ideal put in words a century ago by UW tutions, to take a hard look at MOOCs. teen countries, and it’s just one of the three president Charles Van Hise that the Squire notes that if the university’s prime major MOOC providers. There’s also university should spread its beneficent mission is to educate — to spread infor- Udacity, created by faculty at Stanford, and influence to every home in the state. In mation and train people to think — free edX, a company spun off by Harvard and the past, the university seized on tech- online courses offer the opportunity to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. nology to fulfill this goal. When radio and serve more people at less cost than does UW-Madison isn’t even the first UW television were new media, Wisconsin traditional classroom instruction. And

SUMMER 2013 29 many of the elements that surround for learning technologies and director of academic issue, as well. The course that traditional classroom instruction aren’t academic technology, and the person ulti- Steinkuehler and Squire will teach is a intrinsically necessary to educating. mately responsible for the technical end of version of a popular class they’ve taught “Once you make information digital,” supporting MOOCs. “We’re aware that a on campus. “Our waiting list has a waiting he says, “it doesn’t really cost the univer- lot can go wrong and that we have to make list,” Steinkuehler notes, and she hopes sity much of anything to make it freely the student experience a good one.” that a MOOC format will enable her to available. As a public, taxpayer-funded teach more students than she currently institution, we have to seriously rethink “Once you make can. “I would love to have ten thousand what our purpose is and whose interest sign up,” she says. “I think that’s a very we’re serving. If our mission is to educate information digital, lofty goal.” the populace, maybe these structures it doesn’t really cost But many instructors have had we’ve created — courses, seat time, atten- trouble finding a way to engage the large dance — don’t inherently make sense. We the university much crowds that turn up online, which may, have to seriously rethink them if we want of anything to make in turn, contribute to the high dropout to stay relevant.” rate among MOOC students: typically, But the MOOC model of free it freely available. If less than 10 percent of those who sign education also raises challenges that the our mission is to educate up for a course complete it. When Stan- university — the UW in particular and ford offered a MOOC called Circuits the educational community as a whole the populace, maybe and Electronics, it attracted more than — will have to answer before free online these structures we’ve 100,000 students, but less than 5 percent classes can make an impact on American of them passed. Even Hawks admits that, higher education. The questions are as created don’t inherently while he’s signed up for a few MOOCs, obvious as A, B, C, but the answers aren’t make sense. he hasn’t completed any. so simple. “MOOC proponents say this is fine,” We have to seriously he says. “You’re hitting people where they rethink them if we want want to be. It’s free, and they’re getting out of it what they want to put into it. a is for access to stay relevant.” MOOC detractors say, how can you The most apparent difference between say that’s education, when 98 percent of MOOCs and other university courses can In addition to the technical challenges, students don’t finish?” be found in the first letter of the acronym: there are legal questions. In a traditional One of the key points those detractors massive. Traditional courses — even classroom, an instructor can assign read- note is that online classes don’t provide traditional online courses — are typically ings from a textbook or journals at the the kinds of face-to-face interactions that limited to tuition-paying students, but library. But sharing material online could enhance the educational experience for MOOCs are open to everyone, every- violate copyright, forcing instructors to students and teachers. But Steinkuehler where, who has access to the Internet. either limit readings or seek out permis- cautions that such worries shouldn’t serve This presents a technical challenge. sion from authors and publishers. as an excuse to stifle innovation. In January, a MOOC taught by faculty “It’s a copyright nightmare to create “There are things that face-to-face from Georgia Tech — and supported an open-access course,” admits geog- education can accomplish that online just by Coursera — had to be suspended raphy professor Olds. He could do as can’t,” she admits. “But on the other hand, when it proved unable to handle its college instructors traditionally do and there’s a lot of what we do in face-to-face 40,000 students. That the class had to tell students to buy a textbook, but that education that’s just chalk-and-talk. That be canceled was embarrassing enough, would negate the open spirit of a MOOC, can easily be done online.” but to make matters worse, its title was making participation difficult for the One of the most vital student-teacher Fundamentals of Online Education — poor. “Say a textbook costs $80,” he says. interactions — and one that grows it was an online course about how to “That’s more than a month’s wages in increasingly difficult as class sizes become teach online courses. some countries.” massive — is grading students’ progress. “There are a lot of issues,” says Linda But those are just the practical Checking homework and exams is a time- Jorn, the UW’s associate vice provost difficulties of being massive. There’s an consuming chore with dozens of students;

30 ON WISCONSIN it will strain the abilities of the most At the moment, the university doesn’t one’s education, to turning learning into energetic instructor with a class in the really know how much its MOOCs something with financial value. thousands. will cost. “Will they cost us $1,000?” “College credits have real currency,” So when it comes to challenges, if A is asks Russell. “No. Will they cost us says Russell, “because they roll up into a for Access, it’s also for Assessment. With $1 million? No. It’ll be somewhere in credential” — that is, a degree or certifi- unlimited students, how can instructors between.” He calls the program’s price cate, something that a student can show be sure that people are actually learning “the million-dollar question,” but that’s an to a school or an employer to advance a what they’re being taught? Testing will exaggeration. Currently, the UW is plan- career. be a challenge; grading homework will be ning for just half that: $500,000 in private The MOOC model offers no such virtually impossible. funding, which the UW Foundation will currency. And that’s important, because “Assessment tends to drive instruc- provide to cover the pilot program. But according to the U.S. Department of tion,” Steinkuehler says. “That’s the thing this is only seed money to get the univer- Education, a person with some college that belies what you think is important sity through its experimental phase. How but no degree earns $25,000 less per to the class. So we’ll have to figure out: to make MOOCs sustainable for the long year, on average, than a person with a what are the kinds of activities we can set term is still an open question. bachelor’s degree. Currently, a fifth of the up where we can see how well a student So if B is for Business Plan, it’s also workers in Wisconsin have some college knows something, understands some- for Budget — i.e., the university’s. Since but no degree. thing, or can do something?” MOOCs are free to students, they appear MOOCs could offer the opportunity to solve the issue of the spiraling price to break away from the current creden- of higher education. Since online educa- tial model and form a new one that gives b is for tion frees schools from costly overhead in students rather than institutions the buildings and maintenance, it appears to power to determine what those creden- business plan offer an answer to the spiraling budgets. tials show. But this, Olds warns, is mere illusion. There may be less teacher contact online “Most credentials are controlled Online courses don’t substitute for the than in a classroom, but from the student by universities,” says Steinkuehler, “but work of brick-and-mortar universities, perspective, MOOCs offer one advantage [MOOCs present] systems that might but add on to it. not be controlled by universities or that traditional university classes almost MOOCs, he says, “are not a replace- K-through-twelve. If I were a student, never meet: they’re free. But this is one ment for the university. They’re simply and there were some way to show that I clear disadvantage from the university a platform for engaging students, to had made my way through some complex standpoint: it blows up a school’s business reach different audiences and offer them content online, then I hold the keys to my plan. different experiences. They’re not a silver education. It’ll be interesting to see what If you think of universities in trans- bullet that resolves the fiscal imbalances the role of the university is in that context.” actional terms, they sell education in higher education.” (measured in credit hours and degrees) And that points to the other C chal- to students, who pay through tuition. In lenge: Change, which is inevitable. Online MOOCs, however, students still receive technology is exerting pressure on educa- education, and faculty still go through c is for credit tional systems to evolve. That doesn’t all the labor of teaching, but there’s no MOOCs may offer students an advantage need to be scary — it’s simply reality, and payment. How does the university stay in in that they’re cost-free, but they also a reality that Hawks embraces as he looks business? Who will pay faculty for their suffer one clear disadvantage: they’re toward his MOOC with enthusiasm. labor? Where do dollars come from to credit-free. The MOOCs that the UW “I have the opportunity to teach finance the technical needs of a virtual has created — indeed as with almost all evolution on a scale of potentially tens of classroom? MOOCs everywhere — give no credits thousands of students. I could not ignore “The rule of thumb now,” says Olds, toward earning a degree. that,” he says. “It’s the kind of opportunity “is that it costs three times as much Of course, college credits aren’t inher- that doesn’t come along very often.” n money and time and effort to create an ently necessary to education. A student online course — and to run it properly — can learn without report cards and a GPA. John Allen is senior editor of On Wisconsin, as originally estimated.” But credits are essential for monetizing a massive online (and paper) open magazine.

SUMMER 2013 31 32 ON WISCONSIN Time Travel This poster uses the “time portal” technique to compare how the campus looked nearly seventy-five years ago with how it looks today. Created by the Wisconsin State Cartographer’s Office, it blends a modern color photograph from July 2, 2010, with a historic black-and-white shot from July 6, 1937, using GIS (geographic information system) software. The poster highlights the dramatic changes that have taken place on campus and the surrounding community during this time period (although current visitors will note that even more changes have occurred since 2010). You can find the entire image of the 1937 photo and links to other historical images at www.sco.wisc.edu/uw1937.html. The “Then and Now” poster is available for $10 from the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey (608-263-7389).

SUMMER 2013 33 The Accidental Actor Carrie Coon didn’t grow up longing to be in theater. But her talent took her there.

By Jenny Price ’96 Last fall, Coon made her Broadway One of five children, Coon spent debut in the Chicago-based Steppenwolf many weekends watching her younger CARRIE COON Theatre Company’s fiftieth anniversary brothers, which left little time for extra- MFA’06 was on stage production of Edward Albee’s Who’s curricular activities beyond athletics. She at the University Afraid of Virginia Woolf? She played continued playing sports when she got to Theatre with award- Honey, the wife of an academic, and in high school and was elected class presi- winning playwright her hands, the character became a scene- dent. One day, while waiting for soccer Tony Kushner stealer. One reviewer noted that Coon practice to start, the busy fifteen-year-old when he visited should win a Tony award for “excellent stayed after school and auditioned for UW-Madison in drunk acting.” Another said her scenes Thornton Wilder’s Our Town. She landed 2005 for a reading left the audience uncertain whether to the role of Emily. “I accidentally got the of his unfinished laugh or cry. The New Yorker simply called lead in the play,” she tearfully told her play about Laura Bush. The two had not her “phenomenal.” mother. Crehearsed ahead of time. “She brings full life to this character. The production was terrible, she says, Norma Saldivar, a professor of … She’s always had that ability,” says but it was wonderful, too. She remembers theater who directed Coon one year Saldivar, who attended the play before it delivering Emily’s poignant monologue before in Kushner’s play Homebody/ ended its Broadway run in March. “There at the end of the play: “Do any human Kabul, was watching from a seat in the was no doubt in my mind from the very beings ever realize life while they live it house. Kushner began to deliver his first time I saw her that she had some- — every, every minute?” dialogue in a quick, clipped fashion. thing very special.” “I knew that it was a really important When Coon said her first line, he speech, even if I couldn’t articulate why,” stopped and simply looked at her. Coon says. “I could feel it, and [knew] Kushner, who wrote the play Angels Making It Look Easy how powerful it was, and I never forgot in America and the screenplay for the Growing up in a small town outside about that.” movie Lincoln, needed a moment to of Akron, Ohio, Coon didn’t see a lot Coon won an academic scholarship to react to what the theater student was of theater. But when she was ten, she the University of Mount Union in Alli- doing with his words. attended a children’s production with a ance, Ohio, less than an hour from home. “He was struck by what she was friend. She recalls wondering about the She played soccer and ran track, majored playing,” Saldivar says. And in that kids on stage, thinking, “I didn’t know in English literature and Spanish, studied moment, she realized, “He sees what we kids were allowed to do that. How did abroad in Spain, and set her sights on all see in Carrie.” they get up there?” being a linguist. Now more of those who love theater Mimicking some of the mannerisms of a family member who often became drunk at her can see for themselves what Kushner family’s Christmas dinner helped Carrie Coon (right) win the role of Honey in the Broadway saw then. revival of Edward Albee’s Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

34 ON WISCONSIN MICHAEL BROSILOW/STEPPENWOLF THEATRE COMPANY The Accidental Actor

SUMMER 2013 35 SARA KRULWICH / THE NEW YORK TIMES/REDUX

Carrie Coon (right) was cast in the role played by Sandy Dennis in the 1966 movie version of Virginia Woolf. She was nominated for a Tony Award for her performance, along with fellow actors Amy Morton and Tracy Letts (at left), and the Steppenwolf Theatre production received a nomination for best revivial of a play. The awards were to be presented June 9 on CBS.

Meanwhile, she continued to effort- cast Coon in Virginia Woolf, had her first gave Coon the chance to act in Madison lessly nail it in auditions. glimpse of the actress at those auditions. Repertory Theatre productions. Her During her freshman year, Coon Soon thereafter, the UW offered Coon first professional role was familiar: Emily spotted a flier seeking actors for William a scholarship for master’s study. “The in Our Town. “I [had] this wonderful Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s faculty members at Wisconsin took such a synchronicity where I got to do that role Dream. She auditioned and landed the huge risk with me, because I had no expe- when I didn’t know what I was doing — part of Titania, queen of the fairies. She rience and I was fresh out of [college],” and I was fifteen years old — and then I quit the track team after two years, but Coon says. “So the first thing I got from get to come back and do it as a profes- continued to play soccer, and acted in a Wisconsin was pure opportunity.” sional,” she says. “Applying your craft in handful of plays when she had free time the professional world is something that to rehearse during the off-season. I think a graduate-level program should As graduation neared, a theater Our Town, Again prepare you to do, and I felt like that was professor encouraged her to audition for At the UW, one of Coon’s responsibili- really possible for me [at the UW].” university and regional drama produc- ties as a graduate student was to teach After finishing graduate school, tions. With little preparation, Coon acting, something she had not formally Coon did voiceover work for commer- headed to Chicago. Her mother, grand- studied. “I had to really get to the cials and motion-capture acting for a mother, and aunts tagged along for a bottom of how I work, so that I could Madison video-game company. She also weekend of revelry and martinis. Erica help other people learn to define their did an apprenticeship with the nation- Daniels, the casting director for Steppen- own process,” she says. ally regarded American Players Theatre wolf Theatre Company who would later The UW’s graduate program also (APT) in Spring Green, playing small

36 ON WISCONSIN “There was no doubt in my mind from the

very first time I saw Carrie that she had STEWART TALENT AGENCY something very special.” roles in four plays that first summer Being a Character before getting her chance at bigger parts. She stayed with APT for four seasons, Landing a role in that legendary play is before moving to Chicago and finding one thing. Actually playing the role is work with the Goodman Theatre and the another. Remy Bumppo Theatre Company. “It’s very intimidating,” Coon says. “People have a visceral relationship to the first time they saw the film or the Playing Drunk play. You can’t think about it, because In Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, Coon’s everybody is going to have an opinion character, Honey, wrestles with how she as to what you’re doing and whether it’s feels about her life and marriage. She right or wrong or good or bad.” also has way too much to drink. It’s a role Playwright Albee attended rehearsals first played by Melinda Dillon on stage, for the play and gave notes to director then by Sandy Dennis in the 1966 movie Pam McKinnon, who directed last year’s version that also featured Elizabeth Taylor, Tony-winning Clybourne Park. “That was Richard Burton, and George Segal. really scary, but also wonderful,” Coon To prepare for the role, Coon says. “[He] had a great sense of humor and was very self-deprecating, and, actu- thought about the mannerisms of a Coon says playing character roles, such as cousin who often became drunk at her ally, was as wonderful as he could be … Honey in Virginia Woolf, is one of the keys to family’s Christmas dinner. And she for as intimidating a character as he is.” career longevity in the theater.Carrie Coon Coon welcomed the chance to play watched video of an acting class taught Steppenwolf veterans Tracy Letts and a character who is, in her words, “a little by the late Uta Hagen x’37, who origi- Amy Morton. crazy.” The role is quite different from nated the role of Martha in the play’s “When you’re working with actors the ingénue and leading-lady parts she 1962 Broadway premiere. like that, the truth is always going to be has typically played. “The ingénue parts “When you’re drunk, you don’t want somewhere on stage for you,” she says. are always like, ‘Marry me, marry me,’ anyone to know that you’re drunk, and “And you always have that to rely on, so and they cry, and the leading ladies are so you’re trying to do everything very when you’re not feeling it, somebody stoic, and they stand up really straight,” carefully,” Coon explains. [else] always is.” she says. “Playing character roles is The preparation paid off. Charles Opening night on Broadway was fantastic, and that’s also the key to Isherwood, a reviewer for the New “pretty electric,” Coon says. Famous longevity: you’re not going to have a York Times, wrote that Coon “depicts people filled the seats, including André long career if you’re attached to being an Honey’s vertiginous descent from tipsy De Shields ’70, who played the stage ingénue or a leading lady.” to sodden to sickened with hilarious manager to her Emily in Our Town at When Coon first stepped onto the physical precision.” Madison Repertory Theatre. Coon’s New York stage as Honey in October, Before auditioning for the role, Coon parents, who encouraged her to study spent time walking around her Chicago she worried about sustaining her perfor- acting at the UW when she wasn’t apartment in a slip, pearls, and high heels, mance. For one thing, eighteen months certain of her career path, were also pretending to be a 1950s housewife. had passed since she was selected for there — as they have been for every She took nips of brandy from the liquor the role, and in the meantime, she had one of her plays. On opening weekend, cabinet as she wrote out a grocery list, played two other roles at Steppenwolf twelve family members rented a loft curled her hair, and put on makeup. Theatre and a guest role on a television in Chinatown, attended the play, and “That was the first time I’d really show. For another, the play is lengthy celebrated her milestone. prepared in that way,” she says. “By the — clocking in at more than three hours “It’s all kind of a big adventure,” she time I got through to the third callback, — and there were eight shows a week says. “It always has been.” n I just didn’t think there was anybody else during the Broadway engagement. But who understood [Honey] the way I did Coon soon realized she didn’t have to Jenny Price ’96 is senior writer for — which was pretty presumptuous.” worry, given that her co-stars included On Wisconsin.

SUMMER 2013 37 Ask the Experts Need the skinny on love, money, lawn care, pets, and more? We’ve got answers.

We live in a do-it-yourself world (there’s even a cable channel devoted to the DIY movement), where information is as close as your smartphone. But that doesn’t mean it’s easy to get reliable answers to common questions, despite what the latest covers of magazines scream from the newsstand. Here at On Wisconsin, we knew we didn’t have to leave the UW-Madison campus to find a wealth of practical expertise on all manner of queries. We talked to a dozen experts, asking about topics many of us ponder at some point in our lives — or on a daily basis. We were thrilled to find their answers are more practical than professorial, and they offer some welcome bits of wisdom for our complicated times. We can’t promise that they will solve all of your dilemmas, but they will help you survive the next heated political debate at the dinner table and give you an unexpected suggestion for a family pet. Jenny Price ’96 SHUTTERSTOCK (2)

38 ON WISCONSIN Should I get a pet? The idea of a pet can be more appealing than the reality, It’s easy to conclude that something such as coffee, which says UW animal behaviorist Patricia McConnell ’81, MS’84, has no calories and can taste delicious, can’t possibly be good PhD’88. The good times are fun, but it’s crucial to weigh for you. But consumers need be concerned only if studies pop the whole package, which may include time, trouble, and up out of the blue, Weihofen advises. Research about foods expense for medical care, scheduling around an animal’s and their healthfulness should have similar themes; when this needs, arranging care when you’re away, and coping with information is interrupted by an outlandish claim in a single illness or injury. study, consumers should be skeptical. The best strategy is to Consider the worst-case scenario, she suggests, recalling look for reliable facts about the food and whether it is healthy. her own recent midnight adventures involving a lot of diarrhea New studies about coffee, for example, have found that and one very unhappy pooch. “If you can deal with that, then it prevents diabetes, lowers risks of heart disease, and helps continue your thinking about what kind of pet,” she says. to maintain better cognitive function overall. If amid these The best pet fit is highly personal, depending on the type positive findings a study claimed that coffee is a carcinogen, of interaction and time commitment you want. Some parrots it’s time to be wary of its accuracy. can live sixty years and often outlive their owners, for example, “In the past, experts truly believed that coffee was detri- and dogs need daily mental and physical exercise. mental to health,” Weihofen says. “Now studies have come out But there are many options, and some are often overlooked. on a regular basis explaining how coffee adds years onto your Want the social nature of a dog in an easy-care package? life — pay attention to those!” “People often laugh at me when I say get a rat,” McConnell says. “Rats are great pets — they’re highly social, interactive, really smart, and they love to cuddle. And yet you can be gone all day and not feel guilty about needing to take them on a walk when you get home.”

Jill Sakai PhD’06

Should I believe the stories about good foods and bad foods? With headlines such as “Study Finds Java Drinkers Live Longer,” “A Cup of Confusion: Is Coffee Healthy or Not?” and “Is Coffee Fattening?” how can consumers separate As for all those claims about magical weight loss, she says, truth from fiction? Donna Weihofen ’63, MS’67, a senior “The only miracle diet is getting the nutrients you need and nutritionist at UW Hospital and Clinics, has a simple finding an eating pattern that will help you live a healthy life.” answer: look for consistency. Aimee Katz ’13

SUMMER 2013 39 Should I give my child an allowance? Allowances are a good idea for children starting around first or second grade, says J. Michael Collins, faculty director of the UW Center for Financial Security, an expert on financial literacy, and the father of two children under age eight. meanings over time. Today, a “cold” typically refers to a rhino- Start with $1 or $2, and hand it out systematically on the virus infection, regardless of symptoms, and most respiratory same day and at the same time each week. Most important, infections cause neither chills nor fever. Collins says, the money should be in exchange for doing small “There are thousands of home treatments for colds and chores, rather than a no-strings-attached cash flow for buying fevers,” Barrett says. “Each culture has dozens, but using food to candy in the grocery store line. “That’s how it works in the change the outcome of a current illness is unknown.” real world, right? We usually don’t just get things,” he says. “It His own research suggests that any benefit is more likely can be something as simple as picking up your toys or making due to the power of positive thinking. In a recent study of Echi- your bed.” nacea, people who believed in its effectiveness recovered from One other tip: forget the piggy bank. Collins says it’s a cold more quickly and had milder symptoms, whether or not better for kids to stash the money somewhere they can watch the pills they received contained the herb. it grow, yet still get their “So if you believe in chicken soup, it will be helpful; if your hands on it to work on mom believes in ginger tea, it will be helpful for her,” Barrett their math skills. “For kids, says. “But that’s probably through some positive-outcome I think a glass jar is the psychological process that’s not well understood.” best thing because they Jill Sakai PhD’06 can see it, they can play with it, they can count it,” he says. If kids save rather than What’s the greatest source of spend, and the amount becomes too much for conflict in a relationship? the jar, Collins suggests The big three? Money, sex, and kids — not necessarily in setting up a custodial bank that order — says Darald Hanusa ’75, MS’81, PhD’93, a account, which most banks senior lecturer in the School of Social Work and a therapist offer at little or no cost to with a full-time mental health practice that includes couples

help kids continue to learn ISTOCK (3) counseling. about banking and saving. “I don’t worry so Jenny Price ’96 much about where the fight’s coming from,” he says. “I worry about how it’s dealt with once it’s Is there any truth to “feed there.” a cold, starve a fever”? Even minor issues can lead to bigger Or is it “starve a cold, feed a fever”? Either way, there’s not problems without posi- much evidence to back it up. “I frankly have never understood tive communication what it means, because a cold does sometimes have a fever,” says on a daily basis. “If you Bruce Barrett, a UW Health family physician. want to have a healthy The saying probably developed through hundreds of years garden, you have to tend of folklore, and “cold” and “fever” may have had different to it on a regular basis.

40 ON WISCONSIN Maybe not every day, but pretty close,” he says. “Relationships “I think most students could see that being able to write a are the same way. Oftentimes after the initial romantic phase is clear English sentence is a necessary skill,” he says. “If you don’t over, people forget that they have to keep doing all the positive have the sense of a mathematical way of thinking, there are things that attracted them to one another in the first place.” things you won’t be able to do.” Couples who successfully weather the inevitable conflict Chris Barncard in relationships show tolerance and acceptance for individual differences, he says. “Unfortunately, we get in the relation- ship — and we know that there are differences — [but] the first thing we try to do is force the other person to be just like us,” What is the hardest language for he says. “It doesn’t work.” What defeats most relationships is a desire to win. “If you English speakers to learn? want to win, and you want to prove your partner wrong, go The U.S. State Department’s Foreign ahead, you can do that,” Hanusa says. “But just know it always Service Institute classifies languages for comes at the price of closeness.” difficulty based on the length of time it J. P. takes its students to reach general profi- ciency in speaking and reading. The ranking lists Japanese as exceptionally difficult, and that’s primarily due to the structure of the Do my kids need to learn math? language, says Junko Mori MA’92, PhD’96,

When it comes SHUTTERSTOCK (2) director of the UW’s Language Institute to math, you and and professor of Japanese. your kids are It is easier to learn French or Spanish studying it whether because, like English, European languages you want to or have a parallel word order: subject- not, says math verb-object. But Japanese word order is professor Jordan subject-object-verb. “You have to reas- Ellenberg. semble the order of the way in which you “When it express the idea,” Mori says. comes down There are also fewer shared cognates to it, everyone and characters (rather than letters) to learn. Japanese, however, — including uses two sets of phonetic symbols, plus about two thousand university math characters borrowed from Chinese. “We have to develop [a professors — is formalizing, classifying, and dividing things up student’s] oral proficiency at the same time we have to intro- according to rules,” he says. “If you’re looking at part of some- duce this whole new writing system,” Mori says. thing, and guessing what the rest of it looks like based on what you know, that’s math.” That’s the same challenge English speakers face when A math class at school is just a formalized version of a learning other East Asian languages, including Chinese and natural kind of problem solving, he says. Although it’s fair to ask Korean. whether certain things should be in the classroom curriculum, Japanese also contains a lot of grammatical markers for that’s probably not a debate you want to have while a pile of politeness or deference toward other people or groups in math homework awaits. A better argument could paint a math- the social hierarchy. The cultural value systems embedded in ematical approach to problem solving as a basic cognitive skill, languages, Mori says, “give students the opportunity to look such as writing well, says Ellenberg, who has written a popular at the world differently, and in comparison, they can also then novel and a column about math outside the classroom, and reflect on their own language and culture, too.” regularly reviews books for several publications. J. P.

SUMMER 2013 41 What aspect of U.S. history Generally, the older ISTOCK a person is, the greater is often misunderstood? the assets (or the more The role that religion plays in government, as settled during complicated the family the Revolutionary War era, was a fundamental departure from relationships) — and the what had come before — and is often misunderstood, says greater the need for a will, Charles Cohen, professor of history and religious studies. Erlanger says. Some prop- In fact, the oft-cited division between “church and state” erty, such as a family heirloom, is a misnomer, says Cohen, who also serves as director of the may not have great monetary UW’s Lubar Institute for the Study of Abrahamic Religions. value, but a will ensures that it will go to the person you’d like The settlement occurred in the context of a culture friendly to to have it. religion, even as it divorced civil and ecclesiastical authority at Parents need a will to name guardians for their children. the federal level. Wills should be reviewed when there are major life changes, “The idea that you sever religious practice from the state is such as marriage, divorce, the births of children, or the deaths in the larger Western historical trajectory a radical step,” Cohen of beneficiaries. And if you’re doing anything out of the ordi- says. “The First Amendment says that Congress can make no nary in your will, tell family members beforehand so it doesn’t establishment of religion, and for more than two centuries, come as a surprise, Erlanger recommends. people have argued what precisely that formulation might “As soon as it gets the least bit complicated, you really mean. But the constitutional formulation of the late eighteenth should have a lawyer,” he says. “If it’s absolutely straightforward, century occurred in the context of a cultural understanding that it might be okay to do it on the web.” the United States was overwhelmingly Protestant, and that reli- Käri Knutson gion is absolutely necessary for the betterment of civil society.” That arrangement has produced a middle ground in which the alleged “wall of separation” has never been as stout as some would want it, nor the foundations of the nation as “Christian” How can I maintain my as some would prefer, Cohen says. Greg Bump lawn in tough weather? Even when a severe drought — such as that of summer 2012 — leaves many lawns looking more like deserts, homeowners can bring grass back to health, says Doug Soldat ’01, MS’03, assistant professor of soil science. Soldat’s department has done extensive research on do-it-yourself lawn care, and has found that the best approach during unpredictable weather is picking a smart grass seed to plant. And planting, he says, can begin when forsythia bushes start blooming, a sign that grass seeds are starting to germinate. He recommends renting a slit seeder from any gardening or home

Do I need a will? SHUTTERSTOCK (2) Yes, you do — although “no one likes to talk about dying,” says Howard Erlanger JD’81, Voss-Bascom professor of law. Certain assets, such as life insurance, are automatically transferred to the beneficiaries you’ve named, and a will won’t change that. But for the rest, he says, a will is your way to make sure property is distributed in the way you want it to be.

42 ON WISCONSIN store, using it to cut tiny slits in the soil, and then dropping the working together to achieve their dreams, with a few bumps grass seed inside. Small slits mean less exposed soil so weeds along the way. can’t get a foothold. “Learning for yourself is easier than ever,” McNutt says. The best grass for lawns is debatable, but Soldat recommends “We all should value high-concept TV. Shows with heart, and planting tall fescue or Kentucky bluegrass. “Tall fescue did well shows that are morally complex and thrilling, are worth your in last summer’s drought,” he says. “Deep roots make it great in time.” droughts, but you have to watch out in the wintertime, because A.K. cold temperatures and ice accumulation will kill it.” Kentucky bluegrass varieties, on the other hand, perform well in winter. Last, he says, mowing grass to three or four inches, along with providing nutrients and ample water, will make lawns How can I calmly talk politics stand out and stay healthy. Aimee Katz ’13 with people I don’t agree with? Kathy Cramer Walsh ’94’s advice is to do less talking and more listening. “There is a time and a place for political debate, but if we’re What’s worth watching on TV? trying to get along with each other, the way to do that is not to “TV is an experi- figure out how to win the fight, but to actually listen to the other ence,” says Myles person and figure out what insight [you] can take away from McNutt, a PhD that,” says Walsh, an associate professor of political science. “In student in commu- the end, by listening to what someone you disagree with has to nication arts and say, you should be able to better understand your own opinions.” author of Cultural Walsh has traveled across the state to coffee shops, Learnings, a blog that restaurants, and churches — wherever weighs in on televi- Wisconsinites gather — to listen to regular sion shows from folks for the Wisconsin Public Opinion different genres. Study. Watching great Sometimes, she says, it’s best to walk actors perform on ISTOCK away when you feel yourself getting TV and finding a angry. “It doesn’t hurt to sort of step way to “use your away for a moment before you get too brain and think” mad,” she explains. “Get up, go to is one of the best things you can do when sampling different another room, and come back and shows, he says. Viewers can use Netflix, Hulu, or other online say, ‘This is what I really meant, and I just want to understand streaming to try out shows and decide what they like to watch. SHUTTERSTOCK The idea of “high-concept television” — meaning shows why you think what you that explore more complex themes — is becoming more think.’ Ask directly about popular, McNutt says. He points to ABC’s Nashville, which whatever it is that is premiered last fall and pushed the meaning of a soap opera getting to you, and then beyond Days of Our Lives by portraying the struggle of a singer just listen.” n wanting to reinvent herself. For something lighter, McNutt G.B. wholeheartedly recommends NBC’s Parks and Recreation, star- ring former Saturday Night Live star Amy Poehler. A sharp political satire, the show depicts the daily happenings of the Parks and Recreation Department in Pawnee, Indiana. McNutt says its viewers can relate to the group of colleagues and friends

SUMMER 2013 43 by

With a passion for a very popular toy, Ryan Ziegelbauer is building miniature marvels — and a career.

By Jenny Price ’96

Ryan Ziegelbauer’s workplace is a child’s dream realized: the nine-foot walls surrounding him are stocked floor to ceiling with Lego pieces of every color, shape, and size. In his role as a master model builder for Legoland California Resort in Carlsbad, California, he gets to create things that transcend dreams. “Imagine — building eight hours a day, for five days straight — what you can accomplish with an unlimited number of parts,” says Ziegelbauer MS’06. “It is quite amazing.” When he began working at Legoland in 2010, his first big assignment was to construct models of characters and scenes from the Star Wars movies, including Han Solo and the X-Wing. Allow your inner child to let that sink in.

While studying urban Although most kids love building with Lego pieces, their and regional planning at UW-Madison, Ryan passion often fades as childhood ends. That was true of Ziegel- Ziegelbauer learned skills that help him bauer, too, until his twentieth birthday, when a friend gave him maintain miniature Lego architectural a Life on Mars set, complete with a spaceship and little green models of major U.S. cities, including New aliens. The gift induced an epiphany of sorts: “You don’t have to York. And that Lego Bucky he’s holding? put this on the shelf; you don’t have to leave this back to when Turn to page 47 to find out how he built it. you were twelve,” he realized. “You can continue to build.”

44 ON WISCONSIN COURTESY OF LEGOLAND CALIFORNIA RESORT OF LEGOLAND CALIFORNIA RESORT COURTESY

SUMMER 2013 45 COURTESY OF LEGOLAND CALIFORNIA RESORT COURTESY

Ziegelbauer has worked for Legoland since 2010. One of his first assignments was to construct models of characters and scenes from the Star Wars movies, including this 20,000-brick giant opee sea killer found on the planet Naboo in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

When Lego bricks re-entered his full-time master’s program in urban and for a three-day “build-off,” an exhausting life, Ziegelbauer was studying urban regional planning. Ziegelbauer focused on marathon of timed building challenges and geography and urban planning as an land use, indoor-air quality, and sustain- interviews. Each night, he stayed up late in undergraduate at UW-Milwaukee. able construction. He also attended free his hotel room, building models and plan- He learned how to do computerized classes offered by the campus’s Division of ning what to tackle the next day. “We had mapping, and he worked as an intern Information Technology and learned how to build under pressure,” he says. “It was at the Nonprofit Center of Milwaukee, to use Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop almost like a reality show.” where he mapped public health issues, — software he still uses today to design He didn’t win, but he kept building such as cases of lead poisoning in chil- Lego creations ranging from miniature and getting better. dren, teenage pregnancy, and asthma. cities to zombies. Ziegelbauer moved three times that His fascination with all things Lego He decided to join Hoofers Sailing year — from Madison to Milwaukee, continued on a post-college trip to Club, which proved serendipitous: and then to Weaverville, California, for Europe, where he visited Legoland in to this day, he says, he calls upon the a short-term job doing airport-use plan- Windsor, England, and marveled at the nautical knowledge he gained there ning, before starting a new position in huge models. “It really expanded my to ensure that the rigging on Lego’s Berkeley. His list of must-haves for an mind, and I thought, ‘Wow, there’s huge, miniature sailboats is authentic. “I never apartment included an unusual item: huge Lego models here, and how cool thought [what I learned] would apply to studio space to build with the Lego would it be to build these things?’ ” he a job — unless I was a professional sailor collection he and his younger brother says. “In the back of my mind, I always of some sort,” he says. had amassed during their childhood. It thought this would be a great dream job.” In spring 2006, as he was finishing filled a large duffle bag — weighing in at His next stop was Madison, where his degree, Ziegelbauer entered Lego’s seventy-nine pounds — that he moved he worked as an instrument techni- nationwide Master Model Builder search. halfway across the country from his cian, setting up operating rooms at UW First prize: that dream job. He survived the parents’ home in Johnsburg, Wisconsin. Hospital and Clinics. early rounds in Chicago, impressing judges He had just built a table and shelves He took German, urban planning, by building a pirate brandishing a knife for his new studio when Legoland Cali- and computer programming classes and flashing a mouth of gold teeth. From fornia called. The park needed additional at UW-Madison before enrolling in a there, he went to Legoland California help on a large project, and, based on

46 ON WISCONSIN his performance in the competition nine months earlier, they wanted to hire him. He said no. (This is not a typo.) Ziegelbauer had just started his new job with Build It Green, a startup nonprofit that supports sustainable construction — work directly connected to his master’s degree. “I had to turn [Lego] down. … But it ate at me, as you might imagine — offering me a full-time job, getting paid to build Legos, and I [had] said, ‘No.’ I thought, ‘Well, if they wanted me then, maybe they’ll want me in the future,’ ” he recalls. COURTESY OF LEGOLAND CALIFORNIA RESORTOn Wisconsin asked Ryan He spent two years at Build It Green before taking a job in the city of San Ziegelbauer MS’06, a master model builder for Legoland Francisco’s capital planning department. California Resort in Carlsbad, California, to take on a He commuted by train from Berkeley, continuing to build Lego models in his special project in his spare time: the UW’s beloved Bucky spare time, filling the shelves of his studio. After four years, three jobs, and a lot Badger. Ziegelbauer used a computer model to help him of Lego building in his free time, Ziegel- envision this Lego Bucky, ultimately devoting sixteen bauer decided to tackle the dream he had deferred. He returned to Legoland Cali- hours — and more than 2,000 individually glued fornia for another Master Model Builder competition in 2010. This time, he got bricks — to design and create the one-of-a-kind build. the job and the access to “unlimited brick” (as he calls it) that comes with it. “I really got to know the city, got to possible,” he says. “When I look at the There are always models to build. know all different corners of it — parts electronic version of it, it doesn’t look At Christmastime, builders create a tree that tourists don’t really go to very too much different from how a real city using 250,000 Duplo bricks, the larger often,” he says. “When we refurbished might look.” Lego pieces designed for younger chil- [the Lego model], it was kind of a Although his job has room for play, dren. Zombies and skeletons crawl out of personal thing for me.” Ziegelbauer says it also pushes him a New Orleans cemetery at Halloween, a Ziegelbauer frequently calls upon his beyond what he imagined he could do holiday that Ziegelbauer got hooked on urban-planning skills, using computer- when he first landed the position. His during his time at the UW. aided design tools similar to what ultimate goal is to design a new Legoland Legoland California is also home to architects, engineers, and city planners city or a first-of-its-kind airport from top 1/20-scale architectural models of major employ, to draw plans for new Lego to bottom. U.S. cities, including Las Vegas, New York, models or to modify current ones to “Most artists would say that they San Francisco, and Washington, D.C. He make them more authentic. For the New might never be satisfied with their proj- recently worked on refurbishing the Lego Orleans Miniland, he laid out new streets ects,” he says. “They want to move on models that make up New Orleans, a city patterned after the city’s Ninth Ward. He to the next thing and make something he first visited the year before Hurricane examined the ward’s sidewalks and how better. It’s a drive that might never go Katrina hit. He had returned on a spring away — and that exists, definitely, for me far homes are set back from the street to break trip with the Wisconsin Union at this job.” n Directorate’s Alternative Breaks program recreate a streetscape with approximately to help clean up the devastation, and he fell the same scale. Jenny Price ’96 is the mother of a seven-year- in love with the place. “We want it to be as realistic as old Lego model builder.

SUMMER 2013 47 traditions

Lakeside Cinema In the age of surround sound and stadium seating, moviegoers who crowd the Memorial Union Terrace on Monday nights each summer make a deliberate choice to eschew those creature comforts for the atmosphere and lake breezes. Since 1978, the Wisconsin Union Directorate film committee has sponsored free movies on the Terrace. Originally called Starlight Cinema, a name later co-opted by an avant-garde film series, Lakeside Cinema brings action, comedy, and cult classics to its outdoor audience. Each summer centers on a theme. Last year’s — quests — kicked off with Raiders of the Lost Ark. Other recent themes highlighted movies from the 1990s, including Wayne’s World, and musical classics such as The Rocky Horror Picture Show. The moviegoing experience vastly improved last summer with the purchase of a high-definition projector and a new screen (replacing what looked like a bed sheet with a line down the middle). The image on the screen is now bigger and brighter, and the dialogue and action scenes are easier to hear over conversations at nearby tables. UW students and city residents gather on the Terrace as the sunset paints the sky and motorboats bob offshore with lights illuminated. Serious viewers plant themselves front and center, and some look as though they have been there since midafternoon, surviving on provisions offered by the brat stand. As dusk makes way for dark, empty chairs are annexed from neighboring tables and maneuvered to ensure a better vantage point for watching the screen. Some viewers sit on the low stone wall that runs midway through the Terrace, and others park folding chairs on the narrow patch of grass behind. On one summer night, a bride and groom made their way through the crowd, eating ice cream cones. Music blares from speakers before the projector turns on. People cheer when a familiar movie title comes up on the screen, primed to laugh at famous lines and savor their favorite cinematic moments, along with the summer night.

Jenny Price ’96

What’s your favorite UW tradition? Tell On Wisconsin about it at [email protected], and we’ll find out if it’s just a fond memory — or if it’s still part of campus life today.

48 ON WISCONSIN BRYCE RICHTER 49 SUMMER 2013

free movies on the Memorial Union Terrace. Union Memorial the on free movies On summer nights for more than three decades, it’s been more for nights three than On decades, summer it’s watch to those in who for settle location location, location, Proud Partner of the UW-Madison

WHEREWHERE TRADITIONTRADITION && TECHNOLOGYTECHNOLOGY UNITEUNITE WORLD CLASS PARTNERSHIPPARTNERSHIP WORLDWORLD CLASSCLASS FACILITIESFACILITIES WORLDWORLD CLASSCLASS COLLABORATION COLLABORATION

A CLASS ABOVE THE REST

universityresearchpark.org [email protected] (608) 441-8000

50 ON WISCONSIN Badger connections DAN CLOUTIER

52 Alumni Association On Top of the World News Bucky Badger gets around. When this group of alumni took him to Machu Picchu in Peru on a Wisconsin Alumni Asso- 55 Class Notes ciation tour in 2007, he got up to about 8,000 feet above sea level. With the assistance of WAA, various incarna- tions of Bucky have been to all seven continents and floated 61 Bookshelf on every ocean. The alumni travel program is marking its fiftieth anniversary this year, and as part of the celebra- 63 Sifting & Winnowing tion, it held a photo contest. This shot, submitted by Dan Cloutier ’75, received an honorable mention. See the grand- prize winner and other images at uwalumni.com/travel.

SUMMER 2013 51 alumni association news

1976–03 1989 2001 Concorde is in service; Berlin Wall opens; Dennis Tito becomes the Half a Century on the Road can cross the Atlantic travel to Eastern Europe first space tourist; no dates in less than three and begins to flow yet for a WAA tour to space WAA Travel celebrates fifty years of tours around a half hours a world that keeps changing. 1975 Hotel key card invented This year the Wisconsin Alumni Association is celebrating fifty years 1977–86 by Tor Sørnes (it used The Love Boat airs of offering tours across the country and around the globe to Badger hole punches, not a on ABC grads and friends. The Badger spirit hasn’t changed much in all magnetic strip)

that time, but the rest of the world has changed a lot. Follow ROSE1994 BOWL WAA’s travel highlights in the bottom portion of these pages, 1973 while the top notes cultural developments over the last Bonnie Tiburzi half-century that have changed the way we look at travel. becomes the first female pilot at a 14 major airline (American) 17 2006 U.S. begins issuing 1999 biometric passports 1964–67 1971 ROSE BOWL with computer chips Gilligan’s Island premieres: Amtrak forms SS Minnow begins three- hour tour that lasts three 1970 2013 years Bernard Sadow applies for 2001 WAA celebrates a patent for the rolling suitcase 22 The Transportation fiftieth anniversary Security Administration of its travel program 1964–65 24 is formed. Please World’s Fair in New York 25 1988 report any unattended Smoking is banned on baggage! 1969–70 all domestic flights under ROSE2011 BOWL two hours 1963 Thor Heyerdahl 1978–81 Kennedy administration attempts to sail Garden State Bowl restricts U.S. travel to Cuba the Atlantic in operation 1991 (Africa to Caribbean) The Soviet Union is dissolved, 1963 in a boat made of turning one country into fifteen 1963 ROSE BOWL papyrus GARDEN STATE1981 BOWL 2013

1963: Rose Bowl: Badgers fall 1970: First WAA trip to Africa, as 1980: G’day, Bucky! First trip to 1991: First WAA cruise 2000: Badger men’s 2011–2013: Three straight Rose Bowls to USC 42-37 Mediterranean cruise lands Australia to Galápagos basketball team in 2013: WAA celebrates fifty years of 1970 1980 2010 at Tunis 1990 Final Four for first 1963: First international WAA tour 1981: First cruise around the world 1992: First WAA trip to 2000 time in 59 years; travel. What will the future bring? visits eight European nations 1978: WAA tour group returns from the North Pole; WAA tour to 1981: Jersey, here we come! Badgers 2014: Centennial cruise of the 1964: World’s Fair trip to New York London on the Concorde Santa was Indianapolis go to Garden State Bowl, first not at home Panama Canal 1965: First of annual trips to Hawaii bowl game since ’63 2002: First WAA trip to Cuba, as 2014: Time-travel tour arrives* 1967: WAA takes first cruise 1993: International travel restrictions are lessened (to Caribbean) 1983: WAA takes a Love Boat cruise football: 2014: Normandy trip near seventieth WAA takes 2002: First WAA service-learning trip 1968: First WAA trip to Asia 1986: First WAA tour to the USSR anniversary of D-Day group to watch (to Blackfoot Reservation 1969: First WAA trip to South 1987: First trip to Antarctica the Badgers play in Montana) 2019: Time-travel tour departs* America in Tokyo and clinch Rose Bowl berth 2007: First WAA trip to Vietnam * Tour will be offered only if scientifically feasible

52 ON WISCONSIN 1976–03 1989 2001 Concorde is in service; Berlin Wall opens; Dennis Tito becomes the Half a Century on the Road can cross the Atlantic travel to Eastern Europe first space tourist; no dates in less than three and begins to flow yet for a WAA tour to space WAA Travel celebrates fifty years of tours around a half hours a world that keeps changing. 1975 Hotel key card invented This year the Wisconsin Alumni Association is celebrating fifty years 1977–86 by Tor Sørnes (it used The Love Boat airs COLLEEN O’HARA of offering tours across the country and around the globe to Badger hole punches, not a on ABC grads and friends. The Badger spirit hasn’t changed much in all magnetic strip) that time, but the rest of the world has changed a lot. Follow ROSE1994 BOWL WAA’s travel highlights in the bottom portion of these pages, 1973 while the top notes cultural developments over the last Bonnie Tiburzi half-century that have changed the way we look at travel. becomes the first female pilot at a 14 major airline (American) 17 2006 U.S. begins issuing 1999 biometric passports 1964–67 1971 ROSE BOWL with computer chips Gilligan’s Island premieres: Amtrak forms SS Minnow begins three- hour tour that lasts three 1970 2013 years Bernard Sadow applies for 2001 WAA celebrates a patent for the rolling suitcase 22 The Transportation fiftieth anniversary Security Administration of its travel program 1964–65 24 is formed. Please World’s Fair in New York 25 1988 report any unattended Smoking is banned on baggage! 1969–70 all domestic flights under ROSE2011 BOWL two hours 1963 Thor Heyerdahl 1978–81 Kennedy administration attempts to sail Garden State Bowl restricts U.S. travel to Cuba the Atlantic in operation 1991 (Africa to Caribbean) The Soviet Union is dissolved, 1963 in a boat made of turning one country into fifteen 1963 ROSE BOWL papyrus GARDEN STATE1981 BOWL 2013

1963: Rose Bowl: Badgers fall 1970: First WAA trip to Africa, as 1980: G’day, Bucky! First trip to 1991: First WAA cruise 2000: Badger men’s 2011–2013: Three straight Rose Bowls to USC 42-37 Mediterranean cruise lands Australia to Galápagos basketball team in 2013: WAA celebrates fifty years of 1970 1980 2010 at Tunis 1990 Final Four for first 1963: First international WAA tour 1981: First cruise around the world 1992: First WAA trip to 2000 time in 59 years; travel. What will the future bring? visits eight European nations 1978: WAA tour group returns from the North Pole; WAA tour to 1981: Jersey, here we come! Badgers 2014: Centennial cruise of the 1964: World’s Fair trip to New York London on the Concorde Santa was Indianapolis go to Garden State Bowl, first not at home Panama Canal 1965: First of annual trips to Hawaii bowl game since ’63 2002: First WAA trip to Cuba, as 2014: Time-travel tour arrives* 1967: WAA takes first cruise 1993: International travel restrictions are lessened (to Caribbean) 1983: WAA takes a Love Boat cruise football: 2014: Normandy trip near seventieth WAA takes 2002: First WAA service-learning trip 1968: First WAA trip to Asia 1986: First WAA tour to the USSR anniversary of D-Day group to watch (to Blackfoot Reservation 1969: First WAA trip to South 1987: First trip to Antarctica the Badgers play in Montana) 2019: Time-travel tour departs* America in Tokyo and clinch Rose Bowl berth 2007: First WAA trip to Vietnam * Tour will be offered only if scientifically feasible

SUMMER 2013 53 B.O.Y. Band DON MILICI Twenty-one alumni chapters honor local Badgers of the Year. Don’t look now, but Badgers are everywhere. From Miami to Alaska, these teachers, doctors, engineers, and entrepreneurs are making their communities better. These are the people who inspired the Badger of the Year (B.O.Y.) award. Established in 2004, the awards allow local alumni chapters to recognize UW graduates who embody the Wisconsin Idea — the concept that the university can extend its benefits around the world. Alumni chapter leaders select the winners and honor them as part of their respective Founders’ Day celebrations. This year, the chapters are honoring twenty-four alumni as WAA Badgers of the Year. Four of them are mentioned below. To learn about the other Badgers of the Year, see uwalumni.com/foundersday. Dale Bruhn ’48, MS’74 of the WAA: Palm Beach (Florida) Chapter was recognized for his service as an Alzheimer’s disease volunteer and advocate. After caring for his own wife for fifteen years Kelly Kahl ’89, executive vice president with CBS Primetime before losing her to the disease, he now lobbies state government Television (in suit), accepted his Badger of the Year award from the officials to support Alzheimer’s research and mentors caregivers WAA: Los Angeles Chapter at its May Founders’ Day. With Kahl are within his Delray Beach community, serving as an example of former CBS interns (left to right) Mallory Mason ’08, Alexis Krinsky someone who faced a difficult hurdle in his own life, yet chose not ’08, Alexa Sunby ’12, Emily Coleman ’12, and Dan Brower ’11. All are now working in the L.A. entertainment industry. to let it defeat him. The WAA: Milwaukee Chapter’s 2013 Badger of the Year, & Science and has been active with Alumni for Wisconsin, WAA’s Curt Culver ’74, MS’75, is chair and CEO of MGIC Investment higher-education advocacy group. She has also been very supportive Corporation. He funds two annual scholarships for UW-Madison of the UWC-Marathon County campus, serving on the board of its real estate students and has been a guest lecturer for the program. foundation, and is the proud parent of five UW-Madison graduates. He has served on the dean’s advisory board for the business school Molly Vandervest ’04 was honored by the WAA: Brown and received the school’s distinguished alumnus award in 2006. County (Wisconsin) Chapter. As marketing and events manager with A former member of the UW golf team, Culver has also supported Downtown Green Bay, Inc., Vandervest has enhanced events ranging the new indoor golf facility at University Ridge and endowed a golf from the Holiday Parade and Gallery Night to the Summer in the Park scholarship. music series, earning her recognition from the BBJ (Bay Business Mary Clare Freeman ’48 is the WAA: Wausau Chapter’s Journal) and Bay Cities, Inc. magazine. Also active in the Green Bay honoree. Freeman has been a tireless advocate for the UW and WAA. Chamber of Commerce’s Current Young Professionals network, she She has served on the board of visitors for the College of Letters won the group’s 2009 Young Professional of the Year award. Badger Tracks

If you missed the following WAA-sponsored enrichment moment in a UW-Madison classroom or lab impacted your life. Read lectures, you can now find them online. Learn about the “Importance about how others found confidence, discovered new passions, and of Green Job Creation for Women and Youth” from Shams Banihani experienced personal epiphanies, and share your own academic aha ’03 of the United Nations Development Programme. Paul Robbins at uwalumni.com/foundersday. ’89 addressed the topic “What Keeps You up at Night? Daunting Come watch the football Badgers take on Arizona State at the Environmental Challenges and Surprising Opportunities.” You can Sun Devil stadium in Phoenix September 12–15. WAA’s tour package access both at uwalumni.com/learning. includes deluxe accommodations at the Westin Kierland Resort & Do you know an accomplished UW graduate under age forty? Spa, welcome reception, game and tailgate tickets, and more. See Nominate him or her for a 2014 Forward under 40 award (deadline: uwalumni.com/athletics for more details. July 7, 2013). See forwardunder40.com, and don’t forget to read about Alumni can get connected with the UW and one another by liking this year’s honorees while you’re there. the Wisconsin Alumni Association at Facebook.com/WisAlumni and What was your academic “Aha” moment? As part of this year’s following WAA on Twitter at @WisAlumni. Founders’ Day celebrations, WAA is soliciting memories of how one

54 ON WISCONSIN classnotes

early years [’37, MS’38, PhD’40] and Incoming Chancellor Rebecca [the late] Burt Zucker [’40]. Blank will succeed Interim At age 101, Chicagoan Les I enlisted in the army air forces Chancellor David Ward MS’62, If You Have News … Orear x’33 shared this in 1944 as a private and was PhD’63, who has reprised his Do tell! Direct the (brief, please) Thanksgiving memory with the discharged in 1946 as a major. In leadership for the past two years. details of your recent achieve- Chicago Tribune: In 1929, he 1973, I founded Prestige Medical The founding president ments, transitions, changes was a University of Wisconsin Corporation, which is now being and former CEO of the Missouri of mind, and other important freshman when he noticed a managed by my son, Richard Foundation for Health — James life happenings by email to newspaper kiosk with the head- Rashman. I would appreciate Kimmey, Jr. ’57, MS’59, [email protected]; by line that the stock market had hearing from anyone who remem- MD’61 — is the 2013 recipient of mail to Class Notes, Wisconsin crashed. “I received a tele- bers me.” You can reach Roger at Grantmakers In Health’s Keenan Alumni Association, 650 North graph message ordering me to [email protected]. Leadership Award in Health Lake Street, Madison, WI 53706- come home to Chicago to get a Philanthropy, honoring innova- 1476; or by fax to 608-265-8771. job. My family … moved in with tion, achievement, creativity, and It would be oh-so-sweet if we a neighbor. Thanksgiving was 40s–50s boldness. He began at the foun- could publish all of the submis- coming closer, and we hardly dation in 2001 with no office, sions that we receive, but space had bread, let alone an elabo- R.T. (Robert) Holtz ’47 of Glen staff, or funding strategy and built limitations prevent it. Know that rate Thanksgiving dinner.” Orear Ellyn, Illinois, alerted us to what it into the largest health-focused we appreciate hearing from you, continued that he finally did get could be “the most important grantmaker in the state, awarding though, no matter what. a job with a chain of restaurants project for global welfare in the $50 million annually. Now retired for twelve cents an hour, and twenty-first century.” He’s the from the foundation, Kimmey is Please email death notices and he looked over the steam table director of Agrasol International, a professor emeritus and exec- all address, name, telephone, and utive-in-residence at St. Louis email updates to alumnichanges@ “Thanksgiving was coming closer, and we [Missouri] University’s School of uwalumni.com; mail them to Public Health. Alumni Changes, Wisconsin hardly had bread, let alone an elaborate Alumni Association, 650 North Thanksgiving dinner.” — Les Orear x’33 Lake Street, Madison, WI 53706- 60s 1476; fax them to 608-262-3332; before leaving on Thanksgiving which is “setting up a pilot plant or call them in to 608-262-9648 night to see what was left. “I took in Kenya to prove … that the use Being chosen as a Southern or toll free to 888-947-2586 it home in a paper sack. Our of solar energy to pump water California “Super Lawyer” has (WIS-ALUM). extended family shared several from the aquifer into an irrigation become quite routine for Richard spoonfuls of Polish sausage and system is not only profitable and Baumann ’60, LLB’64 because The great majority of obituary cabbage and stuff like that. You sustainable, but will be afford- it happens every year. A member listings of Wisconsin Alumni make do with what you’ve got.” able to provide not only food but of the law firm of SulmeyerKupetz Association (WAA) members Big Badger congratula- the economic engine needed to in Los Angeles for forty-four and friends appears in our trian- tions are certainly in order for develop the country’s economy.” years, he’s written and lectured nual publication for members, Mary Van Eman Schoenike Holtz worked for B.F. Goodrich extensively on creditors’ rights the Badger Insider. If you’re not ’34 and Clifford Schoenike Chemical Company. In his retire- and commercial collections, and already a WAA member, we’d ’40: she will reach one hundred ment, he became involved with is a past national president of love to welcome you aboard the years on January 21, 2014; his Rotary International’s program the Commercial Law League of mother ship at uwalumni.com/ centenarian date was May 9, to provide potable water to arid America. membership. 2013; and their seventy-second areas of Africa, and this led to his Ronald Trent Anderson wedding anniversary will be work with Agrasol. ’61, MS’62, MFA’63 — an artist x-planation: An x preceding a June 21, 2013. They’re still in Alumni were well represented extraordinaire living in Amherst, degree year indicates that the good health and living in their on the search committee for Massachusetts — shared a beau- individual did not complete, Oconomowoc, Wisconsin, home. UW-Madison’s next chancellor, tiful photo of Mount Everest or has not yet completed, that Two of the couple’s sons are UW and who better to include than snapped during his recent adven- degree at UW-Madison. grads — Ken Schoenike ’69 one of the UW’s finest stewards, ture in Nepal with a Road Scholar of Kaukauna, Wisconsin, and Tashia Frankfurth Morgridge travel group. The highlight was an the late Steve Schoenike ’79 ’55? Adding their perspectives to “arduous, thirty-five-mile, six-day — as well as granddaughters hers were other eminent alumni, trek over ancient mountain paths Julie Schoenike Beloungy ’02 faculty, staff, and university outside Pokhara,” during which a of Thorp, Wisconsin, and Lynn leaders Doris Borst Meissner porter yanked Anderson out of a Schoenike Enter ’05, MPT’08 ’63, MA’69; Ben Graf ’75, brush-concealed ditch when he The Wisconsin Alumni of McFarland, Wisconsin. A May MD’79; Douglass Henderson became stuck. Association® (WAA) encourages birthday bash was planned. MS’79, PhD’87; George Food + travel. Eating your diversity, inclusivity, nondiscrim- “I am now ninety-eight years Hamel, Jr. ’80; Patricia Flatley way through distant lands. ination, and participation by all old and in very good health,” Brennan MS’84, PhD’86; Irwin Sounds pretty tasty, doesn’t alumni, students, and friends of writes Roger Rashman ’38 from Goldman PhD’91; Dave Florin it? That’s what Joan Baier UW-Madison in its activities. Tarzana, California. “I shared an ’92; Katherine Cramer Walsh Peterson 61, MS’72, PhD’75 apartment while at the univer- ’94; Heather Daniels MA’03; has cooked up for the interna- sity with [the late] Bob Feinstein and Aaron Bird Bear MS’10. tional culinary tours that she’ll

SUMMER 2013 55 classnotes

lead this summer in Norway and ’67, MA’77, PhD’94 to join an 70s two lawsuits on the group’s Turkey. The excursions include expert panel of trend forecasters behalf. The issue began in 1997 cooking classes, chef demon- who will design global certifica- The Alameda County [California] and was completed in 2012. strations, trips to food markets tion standards for professional Women’s Hall of Fame has It took three years to raise and festivals, and special menus, futurists. He’s also an active inducted Barbara Bernstein funds and oversee the profes- along with visiting the major member, presenter, and writer ’70 of Berkeley, a social work sional restoration of the “little tourist sights. Peterson is the for the World Future Society; administrator who’s been sister of Lady Liberty” statue author of many Eat Smart culinary teaches online courses for Jones managing nonprofit programs in Madison’s Warner Park, but travel guidebooks and the presi- International University; and offers and agencies there for the past restoration committee co-chairs dent of Madison’s Ginkgo Press, planning, speaking, and “imag- four decades. Her hometown of Barbara Cornell Arnold MA’73, which publishes them. ineering” services through Paul Long Beach, New York, has also Susan Peck ’99, and John Frey The states of Oregon and Rux Associates in Mount Horeb, paid tribute with placement on its got it done. Among their loyal Wisconsin have an avid fan Wisconsin. Wall of Fame. committee members were Anita in former UW faculty member We introduced Carol It’s “interim no more” Glasenapp Weier ’67, MA’01; Laurelyn Schellin ’61, MA’62. Beule ’69, MFA’72 to the UW for Reed Hall ’70 as he Christine Muehlmeier Style A resident of Salem, she’s served Zoological Museum so that she becomes the permanent CEO ’74; Paul Rusk ’77, MA’91; as executive director of the could find a new home for the of the Wisconsin Economic and Gerhard Pechmann ’84, Oregon Commission for Women, birds’ eggs that her late grandfa- Development Corporation all of whom worked with Madison which last year celebrated the ther E.A. Beule, a UW alumnus (WEDC), where most of the Arts Commission administrator one-hundredth anniversary of the Karin Wolf ’97, MS’06. This fall passage of women’s suffrage in “After serving four executive editors, it the Northside Planning Council the state. Schellin is also pres- honored the group’s past accom- ident of the local UW alumni was time for new horizons.” plishments and their efforts to chapter and helped out when the — John Geddes MA’76 create an endowment for ongoing football Badgers played Oregon care of the statue. State. She’s the aunt of former from around 1903, had collected. functions of the former Wisconsin If you’re a seventies grad, you Bucky mascot Jeremy Schellin Next, she and the museum cura- Department of Commerce probably have a nostalgic fond- ’05 of Minneapolis, as well as tors discussed the taxidermied now reside after the latter was ness for the blessedly cheap the sister of former varsity cheer- birds and moth and butterfly dissolved in 2011. Hall is the movies that were shown through leader Edwin Schellin ’68 of collections that her late father, former executive director of the campus film societies. Randy Columbus, Wisconsin, and the John Beule ’38, had also Marshfield [Wisconsin] Clinic and Berler ’74, MS’76 was active UW’s first nuclear engineering amassed, and they joined the had been the WEDC’s interim in programming and promoting grad, Steven Schellin ’64, eggs in Madison. Now everyone head since November. them (read: taping fliers to the MS’71 of Sussex, Wisconsin. is happy: Carol credits the You might be tempted to city’s vertical surfaces), and now, Their father, the late Ervin helpful museum staff for giving say, “That’s all she wrote” when following his retirement as a city Schellin ’33, and great-uncle her Studio City, California, home hearing of the retirement of bibliog- planner, he’s promoting films Joseph Schwada taught engi- more breathing room, and the rapher Janet Sparks Monk ’70, once again. Berler, of Torrance, neering at the UW. museum has many exciting, new MA’79 following the proud, 2012 California, uses the web platform The 2012 Robert Wood (well, old) treasures. completion of Volume 5 (SI–Z) Tugg to book screenings of foreign Johnson Foundation Health Policy If you knew you were going of the Dictionary of American flicks and art-house fare at his Fellows Lifetime Achievement to be the subject of a documen- Regional English here at our very local AMC Cineplex, rounds up a Award is both a mouthful and tary film, you might harbor a few own UW. But, we hope that she crowd through social media, takes deservedly in the hands of Karen reservations about what would be still has many excellent words and a cut, and shares the remaining Kramer Hein ’66. She’s an said … but former U.S. Secretary works ahead, albeit in different proceeds with the theater, film- adjunct professor at Dartmouth of Defense Donald Rumsfeld settings. Monk, of Middleton, rights owner, and Tugg. Medical School, a visiting fellow went into filmmaker Errol Morris Wisconsin, has also held posts John Geddes MA’76 — at Tufts University’s Feinstein ’69’s next project with his eyes with the UW-Madison General a managing editor at the New International Center, and one of — and his archives — open. Library System and the Wisconsin York Times for the last decade five appointees to the Vermont The Unknown Known: The Life Legislative Reference Bureau. and one of the top three editors Green Mountain Care Board, and Times of Donald Rumsfeld, Citizens for the Educational at the venerable newspaper — which is overseeing the state’s scheduled for release this Advancement of Alaska’s announced in January that he comprehensive health care reform summer, is drawn from extensive Children, a group advocating for would leave within a few months. efforts. Hein is also the imme- interviews between the two men struggling schools, has directed He reflected fondly on his tenure diate past president of the William and never-before-seen materials part of the proceeds that it won in a note to the staff, concluding, T. Grant Foundation and the that Rumsfeld provided. Morris’s in a lawsuit against the state of “After serving four executive shepherdess of a small herd of The Fog of War documentary — Alaska to fund the future defense editors, it is time for new hori- American Cashmere goats at her about another former secretary of the Alaska constitution’s right zons.” Before joining the Times home in Jacksonville, Vermont. of defense, Robert McNamara to education. This legal war chest in 1994, Geddes spent thirteen The Institute of Futures — earned him an Oscar. Morris, has been named the Howard S. years at the Wall Street Journal Studies and Knowledge of Cambridge, Massachusetts, Trickey Constitutional Defense in New York and Europe. Times Management, part of the EBS made an excellent subject himself Fund in honor of Howard executive editor Jill Abramson Business School in Wiesbaden, as the star of On Wisconsin’s Trickey ’72, the Anchorage called him “the consummate Germany, has tapped Paul Rux Spring 2009 cover story. attorney who pursued and settled newsman with superb instincts

56 ON WISCONSIN which took her mother’s life. Marshall Brickman ’62: The Jersey Score How? Garratt has flown around the world — more than once — in

“My theory of life — and career choices — then and now © 2012 JOAN MARCUS her single-engine Mooney airplane is to hang out with people that I don’t mind having lunch and has raised funds through with,” muses Marshall Brickman ’62. For the banjo- sales of her books about these playing comedy writer, that simple guideline has resulted flights (alsworldflight.als.net). Her in an astonishing show biz career encompassing movies, second flight set a world record: bluegrass music, television, and musical theater. circumnavigating the globe in In his most recent incarnation, Brickman co-created eight and a half days. Her most Jersey Boys, but the Tony-winning musical peppered recent flight — detailed in her third with songs by 1960s singing group the Four Seasons book, Upon Silver Wings III — was represents just one of many Zeitgeist moments for the in decided contrast to the second: Brooklyn-raised talent. this time, she spent eleven In his Madison days, Brickman focused on folk months to enjoy thirty-five coun- music. His apartment served as the unofficial headquar- tries. When Garratt’s not in the air, ters for the campus folk scene (and a then-unknown she has her feet on the ground in Bob Dylan crashed there on his way to New York Worthington Springs, Florida. City, fame, and fortune). Shortly after graduating with Already a respected audiolo- a double major in music and science, Brickman and gist, educator, and administrator, Eric Weissberg x’61 recorded the New Dimensions in Kenneth Wolf PhD’77 can Banjo and Bluegrass album that provided most of the now add the position of dean to soundtrack for the 1972 movie Deliverance, including his curriculum vitae: he’s been the hit “Dueling Banjos.” Not long after that, Brickman appointed dean of the College was back in New York, where he found himself crafting of Science and Health at William Johnny Carson’s Carnac the Magnificent bits as head Paterson University in Wayne, New Brickman followed Jersey Boys with The writer for The Tonight Show. Then, Brickman teamed Jersey. He was formerly the asso- Addams Family musical, and he’s now with Woody Allen to co-write four pictures, including writing a biopic about the Mamas and ciate dean of faculty affairs in the Annie Hall. the Papas, with whom he played in a folk College of Medicine at the Charles Describing his collaboration with Allen, Brickman group before they became famous. R. Drew University of Medicine recalls, “Our work took the form of an extended and Science in Los Angeles. Wolf dialogue. We would go out for walks and talk the thing out: ‘What if this or that happens?’ It would not look is also a fellow of the American like we were working. It would look like we were having a conversation.” Academy of Audiology and the About ten years ago, after directing four movies of his own, Brickman shifted creative gears when American Speech-Language- poker buddy Rick Elice sounded him out about developing a musical featuring the Four Seasons’ top-forty Hearing Association, and he’s catalog. Brickman took a pass. earned the latter’s Dreyer Award “I still wake up screaming, realizing that I almost turned the thing down,” jokes Brickman. “They for Volunteerism. wanted to use their catalog of songs and retrofit them to some fictitious plot like they did with Mamma Mia. Frank Sinatra was known as I said, ‘Not my cup of tea.’ ” the Chairman of the Board, but Brickman changed his mind after hearing personal stories from band members Bob Gaudio and now Mary Sweeney ’78 actu- Frankie Valli. “Over a couple of lunches, Bob and Frankie warmed up and told us what their life was like ally is one: she’s the new chair of growing up in New Jersey, being poor, trying to make it in show business, the casual involvement with the the board of Film Independent, Mafia, and all this stuff that eventually found its way into the musical. Rick and I said, ‘If that’s not a home which produces the Film run, it’s certainly a triple, and if you let us do that, we’re in.’ ” Independent Spirit Awards, the In 2006, Jersey Boys won four Tony Awards, including Best Musical. The show continues to enjoy Los Angeles Film Festival, and the touring productions worldwide as Brickman helps to shepherd the project toward a big-screen adaptation. Film Independent at LACMA film “Songs are obviously a big part of the show, but there has to be a good story, too,” he says. “We snuck in series. Sweeney is a screenwriter some references in the dialogue to T.S. Eliot and Vivaldi that give the show a little more dimension than if it and director, as well as the De were simply a tribute show. The audience eats it up.” Laurentiis endowed professor at Hugh Hart ’72 the School of Cinematic Arts at the University of Southern California. ABET is the recognized accreditor for college and univer- for stories and people.” Quarles & Brady partner who’s Sharon Pendzick Clay ’77, sity programs in applied science, Among those named 2013 also the national chair of the who got to work on her presiden- computing, engineering, and engi- Leaders in the Law by the firm’s health-law group and was tial duties in January. During the neering technology, and among its Wisconsin Law Journal were the Wisconsin State Bar’s 2011 rest of her professional life, Clay 2012 fellows you’ll find William Allen Arntsen ’77, JD’81, choice for Wisconsin Health Law is a professor of weed science at Wepfer PhD’79. He was chosen a partner in Foley & Lardner’s Attorney of the Year. South Dakota State University in for his “contributions to accredita- Madison office who’s strongly “I am the first woman in one Brookings. tion-related training of department committed to the future of the hundred and five years to be CarolAnn Garratt ’77 chairs, recruitment and mentor- city; and Sarah Edelman Coyne elected president of the American has thus far raised more than ship of new program evaluators, ’87, JD’95, a Madison-based Society of Agronomy,” writes $370,000 to find a cure for ALS, and development of accredita-

SUMMER 2013 57 classnotes

tion capabilities worldwide.” Since 1980, Wepfer has held a variety of Jeff DeGraff PhD’85: Dean of Innovation posts at Georgia Tech in Atlanta and currently serves as chair of its He advises U.S. Cabinet AMY LONGATO/DETROIT PUBLIC TELEVISION Woodruff School of Mechanical departments, state govern- Engineering. ments, and symphony orchestras, and his client list has included the likes of GE, 80s Pfizer, Toyota, Coca-Cola, American Express, and 3M. He If you’ve never heard of the writes, teaches, lectures, and World Choir Games, you’re about composes music. to. And you will also learn that Not bad for a fellow who the Mansfield [Pennsylvania] considered retirement more University Concert Choir was one than twenty years ago, only of only two American choirs — out to decide “it was awful” when of 362 from sixty-four countries — he realized that meditation, to receive three gold medals in the playing guitar, and reading self- July 2012 games. Their director help books went only so far. was, of course, a Badger: Peggy Jeff DeGraff PhD’85 is Ochsner Dettwiler MMusic’80, the managing partner of the ’82. In addition to her roles as a Ann Arbor-based consulting “After serving four executiveJeff DeGraff editors, is shown it is at timethe Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Mansfield professor of music and firm Competing Values and Michigan, the site of his 2011 PBS special. The museum was director of choral activities, she founderfor ofnew the Innovatrium horizons.” — John Geddes MA’76 created to chronicle the history of American innovation. represents Pennsylvania on the Institute for Innovation. He board of the National Collegiate also teaches at Michigan’s Ross School of Business, but some may know him as the author of the book Choral Organization. Dettwiler Innovation You, which presents a four-step program to “bolster your ingenuity and remake your life.” has earned five degrees because The book was featured in a PBS special in 2011. she believes that “the choral DeGraff credits his success in connecting the dots between emerging technologies and traditional conductor must be an educator businesses to his “joyous experience” in Madison in the early 1980s. He loved Madison’s outdoor culture. as well as a performer, and must “Even though I had no money, I lived on the lake,” he says. DeGraff also appreciated Madison’s art have a thorough knowledge of galleries and the “very democratic sensibility that everyone belongs.” vocal pedagogy.” DeGraff sees no problem in translating ideas for business innovation into positive change for Northwestern Mutual has individuals. honored wealth-management “The key is to turn something that isn’t working into an opportunity to try something new,” DeGraff adviser Steven Braun ’83 with says. “Use the twenty-eighty rule. It’s easier to change 20 percent of your life [by] 80 percent, than 80 membership in its 2012 Forum percent of your life [by] 20 percent. Remember to fail early and often off-Broadway. When you finally reach group to recognize another the big stage, you’ll be ready to perform.” outstanding year — in quite a After receiving his doctorate in educational technology, DeGraff planned to join the University of series of outstanding years — of Michigan’s medical school, but instead took a flier with an up-and-coming pizza company called Domino’s. helping clients to achieve financial His work as vice president of communications and new ventures helped to build Domino’s into a national security. This annual achievement name and earned him the nickname “Dean of Innovation.” Meanwhile, he was also serving on the advisory puts Braun, of Highland Park, board of Apple. Illinois, in the top 5 percent of the “People have to be humble about being in the right place at the right time,” DeGraff says. “I could more than six thousand financial have been at a pizza company that ended up being a local business or a computer company that didn’t representatives in the company. go anywhere.” As if that wasn’t enough, he’s DeGraff eventually returned to academia to teach at Ross, but under the condition that he would also qualified for the third time for conduct classes the way he wanted — in museums and other public spaces, for instance. He built courses exclusive, Top of the Table status around innovation and creativity before eventually starting Innovatrium, his “innovation laboratory.” within the Million Dollar Round When he helped Reuters, the venerable British news service company, to “reinvent itself as a twenty- Table (MDRT) — an international, first-century media and information-services firm,” the first meeting was held in one of London’s old tram independent, premier association warehouses to keep the topic of change top of mind. of financial professionals. Braun is “If you want to become better and new, the positive tension that comes from diversity, people holding a twenty-four-year MDRT member. divergent views, is essential to making innovation happen,” he says. Jeffrey Keisler ’85, a True to his mission, DeGraff is not done growing. “I’ll see if I’m up to reinventing myself again,” professor in the College of he says. Management at the University of Richard Rothschild Massachusetts-Boston, is also heading the Decision Analysis Society (DAS) as its president. researchers and management of the UW’s industrial engineering policy-development counsel with The society is a subdivision of scientists. Keisler says he has department. Medical Protective, a medical INFORMS, the world’s largest the pleasure of working with DAS Tom Werlein ’85 of malpractice insurance provider. organization of operations past president Vicki Bier, chair Appleton, Wisconsin, is the first

58 ON WISCONSIN 90s a 13,500-student system in the through the nonprofit American says that “we all decided it would Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. Rivers look to Stephanie be best to roll up our sleeves and Way to go, Tina (Kristina) He was re-elected in 2011 and Lindloff ’94, MS’98 as their aid in the recovery effort” — while Merwin ’92! She’s been became the board’s president leader: she’s the senior director proudly wearing Badger gear, promoted — in what seems like last year. of the group’s River Restoration of course. The Kimbels live in record time — from technical O. (Oscar) Marcelo Suárez Program. Her job encompasses Verona, Wisconsin. writer to assistant vice president MS’93, PhD’00 has shared overseeing grant programs, Get ready for some amazing and retail technical communica- impressive Badger news: of the spearheading policy initiatives, stats about Ironman triath- tions specialist for retail banking twenty-five professionals world- and advising on restoration proj- lete Jesse Marquardt ’95 of at Associated Bank in Milwaukee. wide who were honored in ects. Lindloff works out of the Gardner, Massachusetts. At his Bamboo is “good for the October as 2012 fellows of the Northeast field office in Albany, qualifying competition in July, he world,” say Kevin Scharnek materials information society New York, but her favorite finished eighteenth overall and ’92; Steve Royko ’95, MBA’01; ASM International, three were streams are the spring creeks of third in his age group in a field of and Justin Hajny ’02, MBA’10, UW graduates — including southwestern Wisconsin. well over two thousand. His time who acquired and restarted I’m him. Suárez is a professor at The Association of School of 9:51:13 was better than those Organic, a Madison company the University of Puerto Rico- Psychologists of Pennsylvania of eighteen of the twenty-seven that seeks to “spread the organic Mayaguez and director of its thinks so highly of Rob professional triathletes who were mission through fun, fair, safe, Nanotechnology Center; William Rosenthal MS’94, PhD’99 there. Then, at the Ironman World and eco-minded products.” But Lenling ’84, MS’86 is president that it’s named him its School Championship in Kona, Hawaii, in bamboo is just part of their story: October, Marquardt placed 392nd the firm offers apparel, household “We all decided it would be best to roll up our in a field of 1,936 competitors items, and greeting cards, as well from sixty-four countries, with a as custom, branded merchandise sleeves and aid in the recovery effort.” time of 10:05:12. for businesses and organizations. — Brent Kimbel ’95 Felicitations to Robert Alberta Auringer Wood Tarrell MFA’95: for “cultivating writes that she and her husband, of Thermal Spray Technologies Psychologist of the Year. personal, professional, intel- Clifford Wood PhD’92, have in Sun Prairie, Wisconsin; and Rosenthal is the director of lectual, and spiritual resources partaken of the “absolutely deli- C. (Chengheng) Robert Kao autism-spectrum services at the to empower others, and for a cious” hamburgers offered at PhD’94 is a National Taiwan Growth Opportunity Center in commitment to teaching and Burger Wisconsin in — get this — University professor and depart- Huntingdon Valley and recently preaching through the arts,” Wellington, New Zealand. Their ment chair. became a supervisor of pupil he’s earned the Mazzuchelli sleuthing on the eatery chain’s When the students who services in the Abington School Medallion from Madison’s origin led to this explanation: the create the J-School’s Curb District as well. Edgewood College, where he’s company is proud to be owned Magazine — an annual print and Where have some of our a professor of art. and operated in New Zealand, but online publication — held their 1990s legal eagles flown? Beth Longtime readers of On it also pays tribute to “the history 2012 launch party and cele- Webber Clark ’95 has been Wisconsin may remember the of great burgers through our brated Curb’s tenth anniversary, promoted to special counsel in byline Michael Penn MA’97 name Burger Wisconsin, which they landed a prestigious guest the New York office of Stroock preceding many excellent feature reflects Wisconsin, USA’s title speaker for the event. She was & Stroock & Lavan, specializing stories. He’s been at Duke ‘Home of the Hamburger.’ ” When journalism alumna Ali (Alison) in reinsurance and insurance University in Durham, North they’re not Down Under, the Weisberg Zelenko ’93, now a litigation and arbitration. Chicago- Carolina, since 2011 and has now Woods live in Ilderton, Ontario. vice president of communications based Quarles & Brady attorneys been promoted from managing Already a leader in the educa- at Time, Incorporated in New Thomas McCarthy ’97, JD’00; editor of Duke Magazine to tion-reform movement, Rob York. Norah Jones ’98; and executive director of marketing Birdsell ’93 is poised to make Brothers Brad Igl ’94, Christopher Fahy ’99, JD’05 and communications for the further progress as the new CEO MS’97 and Brian Igl ’95 belong have all been named 2013 Illinois university’s alumni association. of the Alain Locke Initiative in to a family that’s been growing Rising Stars by Illinois Super Scott Tappa ’98 of Iola, Chicago. The nonprofit educa- potatoes near Antigo, Wisconsin, Lawyers magazine. Jessica Wisconsin, writes, “After [former tion organization focuses on since the 1930s, and in recent Lewis ’98 is a new associate in Badger football star] Russell “closing the achievement gap by years, they’ve transitioned to a the intellectual-property group of Wilson completed a Hail Mary energizing urban schools with completely organic operation. Quarles & Brady’s Madison office, pass to lift his Seahawks to a the high-impact leaders of today This is apparently a rare thing for and Michelle Waller Cohen ’99 Monday Night Football victory and tomorrow” through the Alain spuds in our part of the country, has been elected to the partner- over the Packers, most fans Locke Charter School, the Inner- which makes the brothers Igl a ship of Patterson Belknap Webb went to sleep.” But Tappa and City Teaching Corps, and the hot (potato) commodity in the & Tyler, a New York law firm. the team at Oppermacher.com Ryan Fellowship. Birdsell was Madison and Twin Cities markets. Brent Kimbel ’95, Sara seized the moment, creating a most recently the president and And they’re nice folks, too: they Schroeder Kimbel ’95, and shirt that read, “Worst Call Ever CEO of the Cristo Rey Network. donated truckloads of their their sons were in the Big Apple 09.24.2012.” “With the help of A 2008 popular vote placed produce to help feed victims of in November so that Sara could incompetent officiating and wide- Jorge Rodriguez MS’93 on Superstorm Sandy. take on the New York City spread media attention,” he the board of education for the People across the nation Marathon. But, when the city took continues, several thousand of Grapevine-Colleyville [Texas] who work to restore the form and on Superstorm Sandy instead the shirts were snatched up by Independent School District, function of rivers and floodplains and the race was canceled, Brent customers in all fifty states and as

SUMMER 2013 59 classnotes

far away as Germany, Colombia, with the launch of an oncology under pressure, and we’d like to handled. He completed his PhD and Afghanistan. program, the arrival of assis- think that writing about sports for in mass communications at the Boy Meets Girl is the begin- tant professor Shawna Lowrey the Badger Herald during his UW University of Iowa in December, ning of a timeless story, but it’s Klahn ’00, DVM’07, and the days set Raju on his current path became an assistant professor also a New York-based fashion hope she holds to build an inves- of success. at Florida International University brand that’s recently added a tigative research program that’s Healthcare Business Insights, in Miami, and is toiling over a UW-themed product line. Why? linked to the oncology program. a national, provider-focused book about black migration in the One reason is that the company’s Klahn was previously a veteri- research firm, has hired Tim upper Midwest. founder and creative director is nary medical oncology clinician at Lantz ’03 as the managing Global brand-manage- Badger Stacy Morgenstern Igel Upstate Veterinary Specialists in director of its new Supply Chain ment firm dunnhumbyUSA has ’99. Her new products blend Boy Greenville, South Carolina. Academy. He also founded welcomed Patrick Johnson Meets Girl’s “edgy yet wearable, Two alumni played special Pantheon BC, a consulting firm EMBA’07 to its Cincinnati office stylish yet casually classic” look roles in the November elections. that he sold in August, and serves as associate director of client with the UW’s signature colors Josh Levin ’00 writes that he as the VP of the Waukesha solutions. Most recently, he was and logo. Igel is also a mentor, “led the campaign for marriage [Wisconsin] County chapter of the Western & Southern Financial frequent lecturer, and advocate equality in Maryland: the first Wisconsin Alumni Association. Group’s director of business for nonprofits that fight breast state to approve gay marriage News of three 2000s attor- development. cancer and bullying in schools. at the ballot box, and the first neys made its way to Class Notes An Amtrak train moved Todd south of the Mason-Dixon Line HQ: Illinois Super Lawyers maga- Brogan ’08 from Minnesota to Brooklyn, New York, a week 2000s “I can’t wait to be able to do it all.” after his UW graduation. There, he became the communica- Custom, handmade, ceramic — Lauren Kendall ’05 tions coordinator for the Damon growlers — those half-gallon Runyon Cancer Research beer jugs that are popular among to achieve it by any means.” zine has named Alissa Misun Foundation and married his microbrew aficionados — are the Meanwhile, says Levin, Sam Pohlman ’03, an associate with college sweetheart. And now, specialty of artist Tim Carlburg Nitz ’04 of Washington, D.C., Ulmer & Berne in Chicago, as a in addition to his political and ’00, the proprietor of Carlburg “worked as targeting director for 2013 Illinois Rising Star; Anders community-organizing endeavors, Pottery in Kalispell, Montana. He’s EMILY’s List, where he helped to Holmgren ’06 is a new asso- Brogan has become press secre- celebrated his fourth anniversary increase the number of women ciate at Flanagan Partners in tary for New York City mayoral of selling his wares nation- and in the U.S. Senate to twenty” New Orleans following a stellar candidate Sal Albanese. worldwide, and to some acclaim starting this year. career at Tulane Law School; Ben Raznick ’08 may as well: one of his creations was Chicago filmmaker Alana and Caroline Belloff ’08 has be one of those people who’s showcased in the November Grelyak ’02, MMusic’04 hit been promoted from apprentice good at everything and stopped 2012 issue of Men’s Journal, and it big as a finalist in the recent to associate in the business and by nothing. As a UW junior, he they made a guest appearance on Catdance Film Festival, spon- finance practice group at Much studied in Argentina, which led to the 2012 season finale of NBC’s sored by Fresh Step cat litter to Shelist in Chicago. a two-year stay in Buenos Aires Parks and Recreation. Carlburg is showcase original, scripted film The new national coordi- after graduation, a passion for the also proud to be a veteran and a shorts about felines. Grelyak nator for the American Academy country’s music and culture, and licensed K–12 art teacher. wrote the script for Catalogue, of Family Physicians’ National the inspiration to record Tango Anyone who thinks that a acted in it, and composed its Family Medicine Interest Group y Folklore Argentino, his first hobby can’t morph into a career music. She attended the film’s (FMIG) Network (phew!) is professional CD of piano music, hasn’t met Tim Kopacz ’00 screening at the Sundance Lauren Kendall ’05, a fourth- the artwork for which — no of Marquette, Michigan. He Channel’s headquarters in Park year student at the University surprise — he designed himself. acquired a passion for disc golf City, Utah, and became part of Illinois at Chicago College Next Raznick headed off to teach the first time he tried it … which of a nationwide competition to of Medicine. She works with English in the Andalucía region of caused him to propose a design claim the most votes and the regional FMIG coordinators to Spain, where he created a web for a new course … which trig- $10,000 Viewer’s Choice prize. develop and strengthen FMIGs series called Pueblo, the last gered a passion for course design Unfortunately, Catalogue didn’t on medical-school campuses, episode of which premiered at the and improvement … which led win, but it was seriously funny. all in an effort to promote family Philadelphia Film Festival. These to founding Watch It Bend, a Manu Raju ’02 of medicine as a career. Already a days, you can listen to Raznick’s company that’s now consulting Washington, D.C., has been a passionate advocate for disad- piano stylings during Saturday- on and building courses around political reporter for the last ten vantaged patients, Kendall plans night gigs in Barcelona, where Michigan’s Upper Peninsula (UP). years and is currently a senior to practice in a rural, underserved he’s gearing up to co-direct two Moreover, as the vice president congressional reporter for area where she can “connect with short films. of the local Disc da UP group, POLITICO, which means that you the community, [and] practice Kopacz and his comrades are may see him on major TV news everything from obstetrics and In the unlikely event of a water committed to “creating a disc golf outlets or hear him on NPR. Raju newborn care to geriatrics. I can’t landing, Class Notes compiler destination here in the UP!” was fêted at the White House wait to be able to do it all.” Paula Wagner Apfelbach ’83 The fight against animal Correspondents’ Association Doctorate? Check. suggests reading Class Notes cancer has gained new strength dinner as a 2012 winner of the Employment? Check. Book in while awaiting rescue. at the Virginia-Maryland Regional Merriman Smith Award for excel- the works? Check. Ted (Robert) College of Veterinary Medicine lence in presidential coverage Gutsche, Jr. ’06 has got it

60 ON WISCONSIN bookshelf

n Barbara Klessig Oehlberg ’54 of Solon, Press. Windy City foodies may start rejoicing Ohio, has long taught child-assault preven- because his latest work is Chicago’s Classic tion, is a certified child trauma consultant, Restaurants: Past, Present, and Future. and has studied extensively how early trauma Prior to this second career in writing and pub- alters brain development. In her latest book, lishing, Samors spent twenty-five years with the Ending the Shame: Transforming Educational Testing Service, including a post as Public Education So It Works for All executive director of market development. He Students (RoseDog Books), she asserts that lives in suburban Buffalo Grove, Illinois. teachers alone cannot ameliorate the nation’s n Would you like to achievement gap or drop-out rate: policymak- grow delicious, health- ers must also commit to a leadership role in ful fruits — easily? Then forging school reform. Ending the Shame out- listen to the advice of lines how this can be accomplished through horticulturist Lee Reich a “trauma-informed education system” and ’69, MS’76, MS’77 closes with advocacy recommendations. as he adds Grow n Like a Waking Dream: The Auto- n Ecology is at the Fruit Naturally: biography of Geshé Lhundub Sopa heart of many of the most A Hands-On Guide (Wisdom Publications) is authored with Paul important decisions that to Luscious, Home- Donnelly PhD’97 and includes a foreword face humanity. Roots grown Fruit (Taunton Press) to his gardening by the Dalai Lama. In 1967, Sopa was invited of Ecology: Antiquity series. Reich gives guidance on using natural to teach in the recently formed UW Bud- to Haeckel (University controls and highlights the importance of dhist studies program and is now a professor of California Press) is the choosing the right fruits for your locale. He’s emeritus. In 1979, he became the founding only work to gather a vast worked in fruit research for Cornell University abbot of the Deer Park Buddhist Center in literature that chronicles and the USDA, and now writes, consults, and Oregon, Wisconsin, and remains one of the the deep ancestry of this science from the early works in his “farmden” in New Paltz, New greatest living masters of Tibetan Buddhism. ideas of Herodotus, Plato, and Pliny, through York. Sopa’s also orchestrated several visits to the Linnaeus and Darwin, to those that inspired n The name Harold Madison area by the Dalai Lama. The book zoologist Ernst Haeckel, and ultimately informed Scheub PhD’69 is both covers these accomplishments and more, but our modern view. The book is based on Frank familiar and fond to many also his extraordinary experiences in Tibet Egerton PhD’67’s long-running series of col- readers as a folklorist and prior to the Chinese occupation and his flight umns. He’s a UW-Parkside professor emeritus longtime UW professor over the Himalayas into exile. Geshé-la, as of history who lives in Racine, Wisconsin. of African languages and Sopa is affectionately known, turns ninety this n For centuries, arsenic literature who’s perfected year. Donnelly is an associate professor of reli- has been a staple of mur- his storytelling art through gious studies at Northern Arizona University in der and suicide in literature years of listening to indig- Flagstaff. and real life, and now John enous tale crafters as he’s traversed Africa. n On May 8, 1983, biog- Parascandola MS’67, Scheub’s latest book is Trickster and Hero: rapher Diane Middlebrook PhD’68 examines the Two Characters in the Oral and Writ- left Carl Djerassi PhD’45. surprising history of this ten Traditions of the World (University of In the despondent wake of lethal element in King of Wisconsin Press), which surveys a rich array losing his life’s great love Poisons: A History of of oral traditions, folktales, mythologies, and came literary revenge: Arsenic (Potomac Books). literature to illuminate two seemingly opposed a “poetic volcanic eruption” In the past, it was frequently found in wallpa- characters who often unite as one. of brutally open and vulner- per, paint, cosmetics, medical treatments, and n Combining memoir, travel literature, able free-verse poems, even candy, and today arsenic remains a major and food writing, Christopher Bakken ’89 now collected in both public-health menace as an industrial toxin explores what he sees as an under-appre- German and English as and agent of chemical warfare. Parascandola ciated European cuisine in Honey, Olives, Tagebuch des Grolls, A Diary of Pique, has served as chief of the National Library of Octopus: Adventures at the Greek 1983–1984 (Haymon Verlag). Middlebrook Medicine’s History of Medicine Division and as Table (University of California Press), which unexpectedly returned to him in 1984 and the historian of the Public Health Service. He’s is illustrated by Mollie Katzen of Moosewood became his wife. Djerassi, of San Francisco, currently a historical consultant and teaches at Cookbook fame. Bakken looks at the tradi- London, and Vienna, is known as the “Father the University of Maryland in College Park. tions, history, and leisurely ceremonies of the [birth-control] Pill” and is an eminent n Neal Samors ’65 is “Mr. Chicago”: surrounding eight pillars of Greek cuisine and scientist, author, playwright, and Stanford he’s authored, co-authored, and/or published scouts the country looking for stellar examples University professor emeritus of chemistry. twenty books on its downtown, landmarks, of each. He’s an associate professor and He received a Distinguished Alumni Award neighborhoods, and city life through the chair of the English department at Allegheny from the Wisconsin Alumni Association in 2012. company he founded in 2003, Chicago’s Books College in Meadville, Pennsylvania.

SUMMER 2013 61 n A sequel to debut Communication Arts at Salisbury [Maryland] n How political elites novel The Goat Woman of University. use religious language, Largo Bay has come from and how voters respond n The University of Gillian Royes MA’73 to expressions of religion North Carolina Press in the form of The Man in the public sphere has published Visions Who Turned Both of Power in Cuba: are examined in Chris- Cheeks (Atria Books). It’s Revolution, Redemp- topher Chapp ’02’s the story of a beautiful, but tion, and Resistance, Religious Rhetoric and poverty-stricken Jamaican American Politics: The 1959–1971, about the village “in a land where Endurance of Civil tumultuous first years religion is strong, but life is cheap and violence Religion in Electoral Campaigns (Cornell of the Cuban revolution, is often the answer.” There the people grapple University Press). One reviewer praises the when Fidel Castro and with family secrets, broken relationships, the work as “a thoughtful addition to a continuing, other leaders saturated the media with their quest for love, and a dangerous plot to banish uniquely American, conversation.” Chapp is “campaign to win the hearts of Cuba’s six a taboo that threatens their future. Royes was an assistant professor of political science at million citizens.” The resulting mass “support” born in Kingston, Jamaica, and now lives in UW-Whitewater. quickly became a requirement for political the U.S. Virgin Islands. inclusion in a new Cuba that policed dis- n The intimate details n How would workplaces sent and silenced dissenters. Author Lillian of the Civil War and army be different if the employ- Guerra MA’94, PhD’00 focuses on the life, conveyed through ees were also the owners? experiences of citizens as they struggled to the words of those who In Co-operative Work- resist repression. She’s an associate professor fought in it, are captured in place Dispute Resolu- of Cuban and Caribbean history at the Univer- This Wicked Rebellion: tion: Organizational sity of Florida in Gainesville. Wisconsin Civil War Structure, Ownership, Soldiers Write Home n Jeff Strahl ’93 and Ideology (Gower (Wisconsin Historical of Denver has writ- Publishing), Elizabeth Society Press). Editor ten a big, colorful Hoffmann ’91, MS’95, John Zimm ’03 selected correspondence book about small, JD’98, PhD’01 focuses on dispute resolution from the Wisconsin Historical Society’s sometimes colorful — a key element of work-life quality — and renowned Quiner Collection of more than homes: a photo- finds several important differences between eleven thousand Civil War missives to reveal graphic survey of worker cooperatives and conventional, hier- the soldiers’ desperation and fear, encounters the cottages that archical business models. Hoffmann is an with slavery, struggles with the reasons for frame Madison’s associate professor of sociology at Purdue the war, and visions of disease, combat, hero- Lake Mendota. In University in West Lafayette, Indiana. ism, and heartache. Zimm has worked for the Little House on the Lake (Spring Harbor Wisconsin Historical Society Press since 2002. n Nearly ten years of Press Limited), he explains that as lakefront research and twenty trips property values have risen, so has the square n When you flip the to the UK for archival footage of these lakefront homes, leading cover of the children’s study — while teaching to a more densely packed shoreline and the story Open This Little and studying full time, and removal of the cottages that once enhanced Book (Chronicle Books), caring for two terminally Mendota’s charm. Strahl’s goal was to docu- you get to open another ill parents — have cul- ment the remaining homes before they’re book, and another, and minated in Paving the gone. Anne Biebel MA’85 of Cross Plains, another, until you come Empire Road: BBC Wisconsin, summarizes the history of the area to its heart and then Television and Black in the book’s introduction. get to close all the little Britons (Manchester University Press). It’s books one by one — definitely a draw for n The title of Michelle Richter Dudash author Darrell Newton MA’96, PhD’02’s kinesthetes. Along the way, this multi-volume ’99’s book, Clean Eating for Busy historical analysis of the BBC’s broadcast Families: Get Meals on the Table in volume teaches kids about colors and reminds policies and practices from the 1930s to the Minutes with Simple and Satisfying us all about the power of friendship and read- post-millennium period as African-Caribbeans Whole-Foods Recipes You and Your ing. The story is the work of debut author and have assimilated into “constructs of British- children’s book editor Jesse Klausmeier Kids Will Love (Fair Winds Press), pretty ness.” Newton hopes that his experiences ’04 of New York City, who wrote the first draft much says it all. She’s a registered dietitian, while writing the book will inspire others to when she was a mere five years old. columnist, and television personality; has persevere despite adversity. “This is particu- taught at the Arizona Culinary Institute; and larly important to me,” he writes, “as the first earned her toque from Le Cordon Bleu Col- African-American student in the media-studies lege of Culinary Arts in Scottsdale, Arizona, Hello, bibliophiles! program at Vilas.” Newton is an associate where she makes her home. You’ll find the rest of our new-book news professor and chair of the Department of at onwisconsin.uwalumni.com.

62 ON WISCONSIN sifting &winnowing BARRY ROAL CARLSEN News By Lisa Mattingly ’07

“Good news and bad news,” Dad said. “Which do you want first?” I was standing in the Wellfords’ kitchen. I had been a nanny for their four children since I moved from Wisconsin to Brooklyn, New York. I was washing the dishes, the wet phone resting between my shoulder and chin. He always does this — makes up some good news in order to tell me what’s really going on. I told the kids to go into the living room and start their homework. I asked him to start with the good, as a slight swell ballooned in my throat. “I’m retiring,” he said. There was a pause. I let my silence answer him. He inhaled, and said, “It’s the C-word again.” Here it was, that word, shrieking across Midwestern airwaves to this cluttered kitchen, anger that his little girl was growing up. We went on ski trips and road to this slushy block in Brooklyn. After sixteen years of hiding, it had trips and college visits. He met my boyfriends and took photos of found me once more. Back then, when I was eleven, I barely spoke for me when I dressed up for prom. We went to a movie together every a year. When I did, it was in the form of a whisper to my dad when he Sunday night. We were quietly best friends. tucked me into bed at night. “I miss her,” I’d say. He’d hug me, leaving After college, I didn’t stay in Wisconsin — or any one place — the scent of Old Spice on the side of my face and my neck. “Me, too,” for very long. I moved around and traveled to all corners of the world, he’d reply. sometimes for years at a time, making small spaces for myself here Before we lost her to ovarian cancer, my mother had a way about and there. I used a variety of foreign currency, baht and reais and her that emanated light, positivity, and honesty. She was modest, pounds, to call him long distance. Our conversations were short, the didn’t wear flashy clothes, spoke softly, and believed strongly in the trans-Pacific and trans-equatorial connections always cutting us off. miracles that childhood gives us. During my childhood, she was That evening, as I stood in that Brooklyn kitchen, Dad explained my miracle. At the time I needed her most, she was there. After the that surgery was scheduled for a month away. After we hung up, I winter of 1995, my friends had families who became families to me: gathered the extra dishes and put them in the sink, shaking. One of mothers who mothered me, beds that held me, vans that took me to the kids I had sent to the living room stepped slowly into the kitchen. soccer practice. My aunts and uncles and grandparents were around She hugged my side. I wanted to stop crying and shield her from my to play cards with us, cook us meals, and to hug us when we needed pain, but she had already seen my tears. “Your parents will be home someone to remind us of Mom. soon,” I said, wrapping my arms around her as if she were my own, My brother and sister, each several years older than me, dealt with scared, eleven-year-old self. our mother’s death with the solace of friends and cars, in their own But there’s good news and good news. Dad’s surgery was dark basements of grief. Soon, they went away to college, leaving not successful, and two years later, he still has a clean bill of health. Today, just one enormous gap to fill, but three. The dishes sat on the counter he spends a lot of time with his new grandchildren. Now when I tell for months at a time, the laundry heaped in piles, and the bright tele- people that I lost my mom when I was young, they frown and touch vision stayed on mute, as my father and I walked around in a numb my arm. “I’m so sorry,” they say. “Don’t be,” I reply. “I’ve gained more state, together. We built a two-person team to fight against the grief families than you can imagine since I lost her, and I’ve gained the best of losing wife and mother: the sun around which the world orbited. friend I will ever know.” We grew into a rhythm, and each slow year that passed, we became more and more alive. When I was thirteen, I got my first period, started Lisa Mattingly ’07 is an assistant manager at an wearing bras and deodorant. Each time I had a birthday, he’d feign independent bookstore and lives in Burlington, Vermont.

SUMMER 2013 63 Compassion Has An Address

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64 ON WISCONSIN SUMMER 2013 65 flashback JEFF MILLER

We’ve Got Mail! Travel back with us now into the shadows of ancient history, to the December. That was enough to occupy a pool of modems using 200 year A.D. 1993. That fall, the UW took a great leap forward in terms telephone lines. In January 1994, the service was extended to faculty of communication, when, for the first time, the university offered all and staff, and campus hasn’t looked back. students email accounts. You may think: big deal. Students text nowadays, so isn’t email old We’re not sure how students communicated before this. Legend hat? But email remains a primary method of communication for students says that they used smoke signals, or perhaps they beat out coded and faculty. The UW’s wiscmail server processes 2 million messages a rhythms on drums made of dinosaur hide. Or maybe it just feels that day and supports 100,000 active accounts. In addition, the university’s way — it’s difficult to imagine a time when the @ symbol was one of the Learn@UW online support system helps 2,000 instructors to manage least-used keys on the board. online course content every semester. The Wisconsin Experience is Email wasn’t exactly new in 1993. The Madison Academic increasingly an online experience, and it all started with email. Computing Center (one of the forerunner organizations of today’s The photo above was taken in 1996 in Bradley Hall, and it shows Division of Information Technology) began supporting a few accounts Carrie Johnson ’99, Alisha White ’99, and Heather Hazelwood ’00, as early as 1978. But it wasn’t until ’93 that email became a general JD’11 waiting their turn to check email. Their posture indicates that, perk. And while not all Badgers took advantage right away, about a then as now, the arrival of a message in any format is exciting. quarter of the student body (around 9,500 people) had signed up by John Allen

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