Sa in T Mar Y

TRUISTIC SAINTTHE MAGAZINE OF SAINT MARY’SMARY’S COLLEGE OF CALIFORNIA VOLUME 33 • NUMBER 1 • FALL 2012 LAYERS OF TIME Recently a crane operator turned up the tooth of a woolly mammoth in San Francisco while digging holes for the supports for a new downtown transit center. Woolly mammoths were shaggy relatives of the Asian elephant that are thought to have made their way to this continent over the Bering Strait. They were likely PUBLISHER done in 10,000 years ago by climate change, loss of habitat and human hunters, Michael Beseda ’79 LETTER FROM THE EDITOR although stragglers are thought to have survived on an Alaskan island until EXECUTIVE EDITOR about 1700 BC. J. Elizabeth Smith (Note at right, a woolly mammoth tooth we photographed in SMC Professor EDITOR Rebecca Jabbour’s office.) Jo Shroyer Our San Francisco woolly mammoth seems to have fallen somewhere between ASSISTANT EDITOR Mission and Folsom Streets and is so buried in time that our understanding of his Teresa Castle life and death is pretty sketchy. But the discovery of his 10-inch-long tooth, found CREATIVE DIRECTOR more than 100 feet deep in the sandy soil under the city, is a timely contextual Karen Kemp reminder as we celebrate the sesquicentennial of Saint Mary’s College: GRAPHIC DESIGNER Beth Brann Every day we stand unawares upon many layers of history and millions of stories CONTRIBUTORS that are, nonetheless, the very foundation for our world today. Chris Carter ‘97, MA ‘02 Katherine Ellison Brother President Ronald Gallagher noted during the Sesquicentennial Mass in Kathryn Geraghty Caitlin Graveson ‘11 September that it was humbling to think of all the people whose zeal, genius and Ronald Isetti faith have sustained Saint Mary’s for 150 years.“We stand proudly today on their Herman Lujan ‘58 shoulders,” he said. Dan Murphy ‘13 Ginny Prior In preparing to tell Saint Mary’s story during this landmark year, we’ve learned a lot about these hardy souls who simply refused to give up on a great idea: providing a life-changing Christian education for working-class kids who couldn’t afford the The Saint Mary’s College more expensive Jesuit schools in the area. It was a thoroughly American idea — of California experience inspires learning that lasts education for all — but also rooted in the ethos of the Christian Brothers, founded a lifetime. The College’s in France in 1680 to educate the children of the poor, in cheeky defiance of then rigorous education engages current practice. It’s no surprise that Archbishop Joseph Alemany, who doggedly intellect and spirit while awakening the desire to championed the founding of Saint Mary’s, recruited the Christian Brothers to run transform society. We are his school after it struggled to get a foothold in San Francisco. all learners here — together, Alemany worried about the temptations that the Barbary Coast presented for working to understand and shape the world. San Francisco’s young men. The 19th century Irish families living in the neighbor- For more information, see hood where our woolly mammoth tooth was found surely must have worried about stmarys-ca.edu. this, too. The excavation between Mission and Folsom also turned up numerous artifacts of their lives. Saint Mary’s magazine is Meanwhile, the excavation also uncovered a sizeable gold nugget, a symbol of published three times a year. Please send comments to 19th century events that turned the tide of California history and also played a role [email protected] in the founding of Saint Mary’s College. To fund his idea for a school, Archbishop or call (925) 631-4278. Alemany engaged a plucky young Irish priest, Father Croke, to go up into the Sierra Please submit name and address changes to to convince gold miners, many of them tender-hearted Irishmen, to share some of [email protected] the bounty they’d dug from the mountains. Father Croke came back with more than or write Saint Mary’s College, $30,000, some of it paid in gold dust. It wasn’t quite enough, but it seeded a plan for P.O. Box 4300, Moraga, CA 94575-4300. a school that has survived and thrived for 150 years. So, this year, we celebrate a significant anniversary of this remarkable college. We’ve named it the Year of the Gael, for everyone who has made this college pos- sible. As we excavate the past, we’ll share the big dreams and tales of derring do, and marvel at the close calls and David and Goliath moments that are part of our history. Of course, we’ll also look to the future, standing on the broad shoulders of people who had a really good idea. JO SHROYER EDITOR A GRAND WHY NOT THE PHOENIX: BROTHERS GAELEBRATION DREAM BIG? RISING FROM The Christian Saint Mary’s Saint Mary’s THE ASHES Brothers are the celebrated the history is a timeline In its first 150 years, passionate soul of sesquicentennial entwined with the story of Saint this college — big with a Gael of the lives of brave, Mary’s has been brothers to their a party. visionary souls a surprisingly students and determined to tumultuous tale, brothers to VOLUME 33 • 2012 NUMBER 1 • FALL 12 build something brimming with each other. worthwhile in a still near-escapes from rowdy, untamed financial ruin and 28 western town. natural disaster. 14 22 2 feedback 34 the quad Alumni: Herman Lujan | Football 2 events Alumni | Summer Wine Festival 4 the arcade | Generations of Gaels WOW | New Student Trends | gael glimpses SMC Recognized as Transformative 36 Institution | Alumni Writers Read 44 in memoriam Their Poetry | Alumni Fellowship endnote in Alaska | SMC at the Olympics | 45 Faculty Profile: Myrna Santiago Cover photo: Each year the new freshman class paints the SMC on the hillside overlooking campus. They use their bodies to coat the letters with color, so it’s a fun, messy affair. This year, with an added 150!, their work (and fun) was doubled. Photogra- phy by Andrew Nguyen ‘15. FEEDBACK Politically Correct won’t hunt, so to speak. Only when students seriously wonder about the meaning of those Seminar Redesign? books and ask those great questions to (and Your summer issue contained an article of) announcing that the Great Books program themselves, can they truly appreciate has been “redesigned” after a “…reevalua- the value of the Great Books. I can only tion of the College’s educational goals...” The imagine how difficult it is for professors redesign makes the fashionable books of the to explore questions they don’t know the moment as important as the classics of the answers to alongside our undergrads, past. It also makes SMC less committed to instead of teaching them known answers the liberal arts, the Catholic Christian tradi- with authority. But, speaking for myself, tion and De La Salle himself. I can assure professors across the College Randy Andrada ’73 that when I witnessed my professors (my tutors) trying to understand, with great dif- Read the full letter and other commentary ficulty, the challenges those texts presented, on this topic at stmarys-ca.edu/saint- and the strangely familiar ideas those marys-magazine.edu. books represented, it completely inspired me as a student and gave me the courage to explore with them as a partner in our Thinking About and shared inquiry. As tutors, they helped me Rethinking Seminar see the apparent contradictions in those texts and excited that wonder in me that Thanks for publishing a great magazine and made me want to understand. That’s why I keeping all of us informed about the happen- greatly respect all of my professors from the ings around the College. I wish to provide Integral Program — greater than all of my feedback on the article on “New famous graduate school professors. Obvi- Seminar Approach Aims to Help Students Succeed” in the summer issue. ously what I describe is easier said than done. Getting back to the point It’s always good news to hear that the administration is thinking about of my letter, I hope the changes in Collegiate Seminar will support our (and rethinking) Collegiate Seminar. As a graduate of the Integral Program professors’ continued inspiration of our students by earnestly struggling my guess is that the only way for Seminar to truly succeed with the students alongside them with these insanely difficult, and inspiring, ideas and is by exciting wonder in them. We can try to sell students on the value of texts. developing critical thinking, debate and reading skills. But if students don’t Aaron Nelson value those things to begin with, then that sales pitch won’t work — that dog Integral Program ’95 OCTOBER universities will join him in a panel on Catholic Higher Education. yearofthegael.com/catholic-higher- 6 CONTINUES THROUGH DECEMBER 16 education.html. The Art of the Cross Wednesday to Sunday, 27 Italian Night 11 a.m. – 4:30 p.m. Soda Center 6 – 9 p.m. Saint Mary’s College Museum of Art A Tuscany buffet and music by Gene Falcone, with The Art of the Cross presents works by Chagall, part of the proceeds benefiting the Guild Scholarship. Rouault, Buffet, Villon, Bernard, Charlot and Dali, RSVP by October 23 to Pat Wiegmann at among others. Also showing, Nyame Brown’s John [email protected] or (925) 376-6088. Henry’s Adventures in a Post-Black World, fantasy- 30 The Year of the Great(est) Conversation(s): style paintings of African-American folklore hero The Liberal Arts and the Common Good: John Henry. See more about these and other exhibits Educating Citizens in the 21st Century through December 9: stmarys-ca.edu/node/3422.

Load more