Connecticut College Alumni Magazine, Summer 1976 Connecticut College
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Connecticut College Digital Commons @ Connecticut College Linda Lear Center for Special Collections & Alumni News Archives Summer 1976 Connecticut College Alumni Magazine, Summer 1976 Connecticut College Follow this and additional works at: http://digitalcommons.conncoll.edu/alumnews Recommended Citation Connecticut College, "Connecticut College Alumni Magazine, Summer 1976" (1976). Alumni News. Paper 197. http://digitalcommons.conncoll.edu/alumnews/197 This Magazine is brought to you for free and open access by the Linda Lear Center for Special Collections & Archives at Digital Commons @ Connecticut College. It has been accepted for inclusion in Alumni News by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Connecticut College. For more information, please contact [email protected]. The views expressed in this paper are solely those of the author. Connecticut College AIumni Magazine Summer 1976/Volume 53 Number 4 Summer Report The campus celebrates: Seniors file into Palmer Auditorium to receive degrees; two alumnae observe reunion activities from a vantage point in Cummings Arts Center; balloons brighten a dormitory's granite wall. ,~.. ~. Coming back p.5 Reunion '76 in notes and photographs Finishing up p.I The class of 1976 goes out in style Getting out Richard Kadzis '76 looks ahead with mixed emotions VOWME 53 'UMBER' CONNECTICUT COLLEGE ALUMNI MAGAZINEISUMMER REPORT 1976 The happiness of pursuit Rain brought commencement exercises While most of the graduates wore caps into a crowded Palmer Auditorium but and gowns (above right), one eschewed had no effect on the spirit of celebration the traditional outfit in favor of a more that hundreds of students, parents, friends conspicuous white suit and panama hat and alumni brought to the campus. A (right), In the sculpture court, final ad- graduate provided a break in the not-so- justments were made (below, right) and solemn ceremonies by handing a frisbee pictures were taken (above, left). After to W.E.S. Griswold, chairman of the Col- the ceremonies, chaos reigned, with a few lege Board of Trustees. Griswold (Top of understandably seeking refuge above the page) in tum gave the frisbee to com- crowd (top, right). And nearby on the de- mencement speaker George Plimpton, serted Fanning green, unused chairs were who winged it expertly into the audience. stacked and carted away. PAGE 2 CONNECTICUT COLLEGE/SUMMER REPORT George Plimpton and his "My father used to say that cousin, Oakes Ames, enter the Declaration of Indepen- Palmer Auditorium on com- dence could be tampered with mencement day. Excerpts slightly, and to its benefit. from Plimpton's address: That 'life, liberty and the pur- "We writers are aware that suit of happiness' could be our craft is becoming extinct. changed to the principle of I heard the great novelist, life, liberty and the happiness Kurt Vonnegut, on the subject of pursuit. Now you are prob- the other day and he's also, of ably thinking of the opposite course, worried about the sex ... but the happiness of future of books. His solution pursuit would apply to just was that everyone on welfare about anything ... And so, could only pick lIP their relief graduates of the Class of 1976, checks by handing in a book the happiness of pursuit to all report." of you." "Whatever dreams, whatever ideals, Three: endless small sacrifices of whatever goals, whatever hopes you time, sacrifices which no one but you have for yourselves on this day," will know about, or appreciate." said the Reverend Alvin A. Carmines Carmines is minister of New York's The happiness in his baccalaureate address, "will Judson Memorial Church, and has only be realized in the following won numerous awards as a com- ways. One: endless committee meet- poser, director and playwright. of pursuIt ings. Two: endless paperwork. Continued Alumni, seniors, brothers, sisters, parents, husbands, faculty and friends devour fried chicken and ice cream on the sunny lawn outside Harris Refectory. < PAGE 3 CONNECTICUT COLLEGE/SUMMER REPORT Looking in your eyes Kind of heaven eyes Closing both my eyes Waiting for surprise To see the heaven in your eyes is not so far Cause I'm not afraid to try and go it To know the love and the beauty never known before Shedding the l'llleave it up to you to show it. -Stevie Wonder here is no recourse, for the cocoon time has arrived for the Class of 1976. Change Tstares us in the face, transi- By Richard Kadzis '76 tion which four years ago seemed so distant. But in the meantime we lived an education together. And in those four years we experienced an opening of the mind made possible only through the numerous and varying contacts with people offer- ing you and me something to learn. Through acquaintances, teachers, administrators, friends, and even lovers, the message is clear: college - raised our consciousness. We are ---- ::~~~=~=~~~~~~~---_.- ~ all, I hope, more aware of our posi- tions as individuals in many differ- ent relationships with the people - -- - ---- - - - - we have known and will come to know. And for this reason we are emotion-not sentiment, mostly more attuned to the state of transi- a difficult one to handle. After all, "No, not sentiment ... " "Of romance?" transition. But I must slice through tion which now beckons the most a change in lifestyle is never easily "Well, I'm certainly no Amory the emotion to convey my message. significant assimilation of our lives. accomplished, despite the immi- Blaine," 1 reply. "I feel no need yet After all, I may never have another For almost all of us, the world is nence of change in our cases. What to return to alma mater seeking an- opportunity to reach you collective- no longer that small and pleasing I'm saying is this: through in- creased awareness, we become all swers to romantic failings and jy again." entity that comprises the life of the philosophic queries about life's pur- Yes, the problem is just that- student and undergradnate. The the more perceptive of our change, and we are made ready for it. We suit. I have not been outside long transition -change in the form of world becomes the all-too-real en- displacement. Our perspectives be· have no choice but to leave those enough to let my confusions take tity of society. Our microcosmic ex- come somewhat confused as the who both taught and accompanied charge." istence has passed. We are sudden- "What is it then?" you press. larger world claims our member- ly spewed forth like pollen into the us in our mind-expanding en- "You seem to be having trouble ship. The thought of a new environ- complex environment that is so- deavors ... teachers and students, expressing yourself." ment triggers thoughts of people 1 ciety in order that we may take respected pedagogues and loved "That's just it; you see, for once I will soon be separated from. Now seed in the unsettled soil of a career. comrades, all of them now figures feel that perhaps my writing skills that the Class of 1976 has been But it is precisely our expanded of a life passed and well-lived. are failing me, as if they were mainlined into the societal throng, states of mind which make the "Ah! Do 1 detect a hint of senti- mechanisms overcome by some Continued on page 15 whole idea of an extreme transition ment?" you ask. Two Botany profs retire By Margo W. Reynolds '72 sentence. If, miracle of miracles, If a man tells me he has an intense she was able to exact from her stu- love of Nature, I know, of course, dents an entire paragraph well- that he has none. Good observers written, she was overjoyed. We have the manners of trees and ani- were none of us budding novelists Richard mals, their patient good sense, and Betty but we made conscious efforts to be if they add words, 'tis only when more concise. I learned as much words are better than silence. Thomson about English from her as 1 did Goodwin The first time 1 stumbled across about science and I shall be forever Emerson's description of a profes- grateful. Never again will 1 use sor, I knew immediately to whom "and/or" in a sentence. She told he was referring. The passage was Were 1 to name the ten people 1 ad- me that was bad form-and 1 be- too uncannily accurate to be about mire most, few of my selections lieve her. anyone other than Dick Goodwin. would come from the realms of the If the truth be told, Betty Thom- Ralph Waldo Emerson and Richard world-renowned and famous. Most son should get a medal for tolerat- Hale Goodwin-Harvard men, both would be people 1 know. Betty ing me for four years. I'm sure I -never met, of course, but had they Thomson would undoubtedly be on caused her much alarm on occasion. had the opportunity I'm sure these my list. 1 like to think that a great 1 literally got down on bended knee two men of nature would have many of the good things that 1have one spring and begged her not to shared this single common bond. been able to accomplish since leav- make me take Plant Physiology, a I am only one of the many who ing college are attributable to cer- required course. I knew I would have had the good fortune to walk tain intangible tenets and basic fail. 1 begged, 1 pleaded, 1 cajoled. with Dr. Goodwin. 1 count myself truths 1 learned from her. "It's too scientific for me," I wailed.. Betty Thomson taught many luckier than most, however, for 1 "I just have no aptitude for it." things, among them perseverance, have had the privilege often.