Vanderbilt Magazine Fall 2006

V A NDERBILT MAG A ZINE Vfall 2006 Nobel Peace Prize Winner Muhammad Yunus, PhD’71 How $27 and a simple idea changed the lives of millions also: New Hope for Autism Alaskan Sanctuary Meth Explosion Photos by Peyton Hoge and Vanderbilt Creative Services V 1-866-882-FUND www V in anyamount,willcountgreatlytoward Just knowthatyoursupporttoanyarea, most toyou. or givetoadonorsociety want toparticipateinyourclassReuniongift youmay to aspecificcollegeorschool.Or, canchoosetogive you’d liketosupport.You you decidewhatparticularareaofV Fund, With yourparticipationintheVanderbilt difference ever In fact,ever E anderbilt’s continued success,every year. anderbilt’s v er ITAL .vanderbilt.edu/thevanderbiltfund y giftcounts.E y giftisvital…andtrulymakesa y dayinthelifeofVanderbilt. Whatevermatters v er y year anderbilt . To see all 53 of the limited-edition prints from Anderson Thomas Design’s Spirit of Nashville Collection, Collection, Nashville of Spirit Design’s Thomas Anderson from prints thelimited-edition seeall53 of To the PERFECT GIFT for the PERSON WHOHASEVERYTHING the PERSON GIFTfor the PERFECT please visit our web site at: www.spiritofnashville.com or call615-327-9894. at:www.spiritofnashville.com site please visitour web A few of the 53 designs in the critically-acclaimed collection designsinthecritically-acclaimed the53 of few (or the STUDENT WHOHASNOTHING!) theSTUDENT (or 18” x2 “Kirkland Hall” 4” G allery -Gr ade Limit by JoelAnderson by ed E dition Print © 2006 Anderson Thomas Design, Inc. • www.andersonthomas.com • All rights reserved. Contributors Editor Debra McKinney Andrew W. M. Beierle A fourth-generation journalist, Oregon-born Debra McKinney became a Art Director and Designer feature writer more than 20 years ago for the Anchorage Daily News. In 1994 Donna DeVore Pritchett 2006 issue the Fall For she and photographer Fran Durner won the $10,000 Dart Award for coverage of victims of violence. McKinney was part of a team of reporters who won Editorial a Pulitzer Prize in 1989 for a series about alcoholism and despair in rural Associate Editor Alaska. In the summer she disappears to her off-the-grid cabin near Fairbanks, where she GayNelle Doll grows a huge garden and goes for days without writing a single word. Arts & Culture Editor Gary Gerson Bonnie Arant Ertelt, BS’81 Gary Gerson, BS’85, majored in geology at Vanderbilt. After doing archaeology Class Notes and Sports Editor in Kenya, getting lost in the Nepalese Himalayas, and playing a season of foot- VNelson Bryan, BA’73 ball for the Amsterdam Rams, Gerson took a job teaching and coaching for Science Editor Cranbrook Schools in Michigan. He and his wife, Shelley, are the parents of David F. Salisbury Maddie, 4, and Eli, 3. Gerson would love to hear from former Commodore teammates at [email protected]. Production and Design Ryan Farha Production and Advertising Manager Phillip B. Tucker Ryan Farha is a junior in the College of Arts of Science. He hopes to graduate in 2008 with a major in history and minors in Islamic studies and French. Chief Photographers Farha is on the staff of the Vanderbilt Hustler and is a member of Delta Kappa Neil Brake, Daniel Dubois Epsilon, the Middle Eastern Students Association, and Dores for Palestine. He Color Correction and Retouching plans to return to study or work in the Middle East in the spring, and is con- Julie Turner sidering careers in government, journalism or academia. Vanderbilt Magazine Advisory Board Audrey Peters Roy Blount Jr., BA’63 Caneel Cotton, BA’88 Audrey Peters graduated from Vanderbilt in 2004 with a B.S. in English and Terry Eastland, BA’71 political science. As a student she participated in the McGill Project and was Robert Early, BA’71, MDiv’76 a copy editor for Slant, Vanderbilt’s satire magazine. She spent the first two Sam Feist, BA’91 years after graduation as a portrait photographer and is now an adjunct pro- Frye Gaillard Jr., BA’68 fessor at Northeast State Technical Community College’s Regional Center for Janice Miller Greenberg, BS’80 Applied Technology, where she teaches developmental writing and learning strategies. G. Marc Hamburger, BA’64 Wendell Rawls Jr., BA’70 Anthony Wilson Edward Schumacher Matos, BA’68 Anthony Wilson was born in Atlanta and spent his childhood there before Michael Schoenfeld moving to the swampier environs of Lafayette, La., at age 11. There he found Advertisers interested in purchasing ad space in Vander- a very different kind of South: a distinct blend of cultures marked by unique bilt Magazine should contact Phillip Tucker, advertis- cuisine, music, and relationship to the landscape. He carried his interest in ing manager,at [email protected] or 615/322-3989. multiple Southern cultures into graduate school at Vanderbilt, where he Vanderbilt Magazine is published quarterly by Van- derbilt University from editorial and business offices at received his Ph.D. in English in 2002. His book, Shadow and Shelter: The Swamp in Southern 110 21st Ave. S., Suite 1000, Nashville, TN 37203. Phone: Culture, grew out of his interest in the relationships between Southern culture and literature 615/322-2601. Fax: 615/343-8547. E-mail: vanderbilt- [email protected]. Please send address corrections and ecology and environmental studies. Wilson is now an assistant professor of English at to Gift Records Office,Vanderbilt University,VU Station B LaGrange College. 357727, 2301 Vanderbilt Place, Nashville, TN 37235-7703. Opinions expressed in Vanderbilt Magazine are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the Additional Contributors: Joanne Lamphere Beckham, Joan Brasher, Caroline Sarros views of the Magazine or the University administration. Colley, Ari Dubin, Lisa DuBois, Courtney Evans, Ryan Farha, Angela Fox, Terryl Hallquist, Vanderbilt University is committed to the principles of equal opportunity and affirmative action. Rick Hilles, John Howser, Bridgette Kohnhorst, Princine Lewis, Melissa Marino, Melanie Copyright 2006 Vanderbilt University Moran, Jessica Pasley, Jim Patterson, Kathy Rivers, Cindy Steine, Cindy Thomsen, Terri Witek 4 F all 2006 DoreWays From the Editor From the Reader The Walk-on Stretching a Point Let’s see. Four out of five of the featured hen I arrived at Vanderbilt in mid-August, an unusually contributors to your Summer 2006 issue are hot Nashville summer was stubbornly refusing to relinquish its men. The lead sports article is about a man. grip on the city. Nonetheless, the campus was aswarm with work- “Vanderbilt Holdings” is about a man. The men feverishly preparing for the arrival of the incoming Class of ideasA forum for exchanging W “In Class” article is about a man. There is a 2010 some two weeks hence: replacing a window in the lobby of moving feature called “Waiting in the Light” Carmichael East, grooming the lush carpet of grass on Alumni Lawn. about Tom Fox, an amazing and very coura- Having spent most of my professional life on college campuses, I am familiar with geous man. Most of the sidebars and fea- the ebb and flow of life at a university: the bustle of arriving students after a blissfully turettes are about or include men (as well as quiet summer, the welcome solitude of the winter holidays, the frenzied run up to Com- women). mencement. But the sights and sounds of this university were new You’d have to ignore an awful lot of the to me, and I felt like something of a freshman myself. content about strong men or strong people I was warmly welcomed by my colleagues, but nonetheless I felt a lit- to declare that you see an emerging theme tle intimidated during my first weeks on campus. I was, after all, joining about strong women [From the Editor, p. 5]. a team of professionals who had worked with each other for the bet- Why not get off the political soapbox and ter part of a decade. I was the newcomer, the rookie, the walk-on. focus on Vanderbilt, in which case the theme In some ways, I imagine I was feeling a bit like Gary Gerson, is clear and something to be proud of: Van- BS’85, who during his freshman year at Vanderbilt decided to join derbilt produces strong alums and is attend- the football team—with virtually no experience on the gridiron. ed by strong students. Gerson tells his remarkable story in our feature “A Pipsqueak Men and women. Among Giants,” which begins on page 40. Chip Heartfield, BA’78 “There was no turning back now,” Gerson writes. “All 5-foot- Bethesda, Md. 10, 145 pounds of me was going to be a football player for the Van- derbilt University Commodores.” One Article,Two Views Gerson was embraced by coaches and fellow players alike, and he Ordinarily I find great pleasure in Van- became part of the legendary 1982 Commodores team who played KEVIN MENCK derbilt Magazine. However, I am writing to in the Hall of Fame Bowl. And though his cleats never touched the express my disappointment in the article gridiron during regulation play, I am inspired by Gerson’s tenacity—and his heart. “Warriors in a Post-9/11 World” [Summer “I had never thought of quitting,” he writes. “On the field I had gotten a tiny bit of 2006 issue, p. 30]. What these ROTC students respect from men who were going to the NFL. It was worth every bit of pain—and not are undergoing and will undergo was cov- something that could be explained to most people who had never played football.” ered as if it were a beauty contest instead of The analogy to my own experience is not perfect. I am, in reality, no rookie, having a deadly serious topic. War is not “a game.” spent the past 26 years editing a university magazine. But like Gerson, who struggled to People die; people are maimed.

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