DISPATCHES

Getting In ... Again Gaining admission to some UW programs is becoming a major issue.

In recent years, UW-Madison’s supply cannot always meet class. Admissions criteria are also admissions standards have the demand,” says Michael up across the School of Educa- become more competitive, Knetter, dean of the business tion, although just how far up forcing students to work harder school, which last fall admitted depends on what students hope in high school to stand out 377 students from a pool of 515 to teach. The elementary-educa- among thousands of applicants. applicants. “We’re not restrict- tion program, for example, However, few students realize ing access because we think you turned away 150 students last that once they are in, they face need to be a rocket scientist to semester, while admitting one another admissions test: getting get a business degree.” hundred. into the major of their choice. Knetter admits that a stu- Jeffrey Hamm, assistant For many students, it’s an dent’s grade point average isn’t dean of the School of Educa- “We thought that chalk would increasingly difficult chal- tion, attributes the be easiest, because if someone lenge, sometimes requiring increased demand to high SPENCER WALTS found something offensive, them to settle on a less- interest in teaching. And they could just rub it off with desired major or to extend the competition isn’t likely their hand.” their time on campus. to ease up anytime soon. In 1998, for example, Budget pressures prevent — UW police officer Heidi the minimum grade point the school from admitting Golbach, explaining the average required for more students — or even decision to put chalkboard admission to the School maintaining the status quo. paint on elevator landings of Business’s BBA degree “We will have to cut our around the art department in program was a 2.9. Today, enrollment next year by the Mosse Humanities Building, even some students who fifty students,” Hamm says. which have often been covered have perfect 4.0s in their “And that is directly related with graffiti. Students are pre-business courses to a resource issue.” now free to leave temporary aren’t guaranteed a spot. Intense competition messages and doodles on the Other majors, especially means that students who walls, which are periodically pre-professional programs don’t get into their first wiped clean. that have built-in career choice have to decide possibilities, are equally whether to try again or forbidding, turning away look elsewhere. Some stu- hundreds of students dents apply two or three each year. always the best gauge of who times to the same program, One reason behind this has the makings of a successful often preventing them from trend is that students and their businessperson, but he knows graduating in four years. parents are more focused on of no other way to manage But selecting a different career options, says Tim Walsh admissions, given the school’s major isn’t always a matter of $44,000,000 MA’84, PhD’93, director of the resources. Before new admis- settling for a second choice. In Approximate value of UW UW Cross-College Advising Ser- sions standards were enforced, education, for example, Hamm System trust funds managed by vice, which counsels undecided Knetter says that too many says there is a national trend students in UW-Madison’s students on possible majors. students were being accepted, of students following less tradi- Applied Securities Analysis He says that during the past straining the school’s resources tional paths into teaching. Program. Students began decade, demand has been on and making it difficult for stu- Walsh also notes that students investing about $10 million of the rise for majors where there dents to graduate in four years. may be underestimating the fixed-income securities in 1998, are clear employment tracks “We need to give a quality versatility of liberal arts majors. and in October, the Board of awaiting graduates. These days, experience to the people we That proved true for Ryan Regents voted to triple the fields such as pharmacy and let in,” says Knetter, adding that Button ‘05, who bypassed the assets under their management. nursing, which have been noted he is optimistic about finding School of Business and majored It’s believed to be the largest in national media coverage as resources to help the school in economics in the College of pool of capital managed by having strong job prospects, are expand. Letters and Science. His friend students at any U.S. university. growing in popularity. Around campus, many Kendall Garrisson x’06 went But without a significant departments are facing similar the B-school route. The result? increase in faculty or classroom issues. At the School of Journal- Both received job offers from space, those majors have little ism and Mass Communication, the prestigious Wall Street firm choice but to watch their stan- 270 students applied last spring Goldman Sachs. dards climb. “Unfortunately, the for one hundred spots in the fall — Joanna Salmen x’06

SPRING 2006 9 DISPATCHES

Returning History Sixty years after World War II, the UW sends a German collection home.

For more than two decades, a Knowing that Würzburg is shipped the items back to Q AND A cigar box sat on a shelf in UW- also home to one of the oldest Germany in December. Megumi Madison’s Geology Museum. It universities in Europe, West- Frimmel says the university, Lohrentz contained a small collection of phal figured it was a good bet rebuilt after the war, now minerals and artifacts — and a the collection came from there. features “a very nice miner- When warmer weather very large mystery. He sent some labels that were alogical museum, attracting arrives, Library Mall is full The box was given to the loose in the box to the Institute many visitors, students, and of carts serving up worldly museum by Clarence Olm- of Mineralogy at the University school kids, and it is in that cuisines, including Zen Sushi, stead, a former UW-Madison of Würzburg, where professor museum where we intend owned and operated by professor of geography who Hartwig Frimmel was able to to display the repatriated Megumi Lohrentz, who is had plucked it from the rubble match the specimen labels with samples.” originally from Japan. of a German city during the old university records. Westphal — Terry Devitt ‘78, MA’85 Q: How do you get a spot final days of World on Library Mall? War II. But Olm- A: Each year, the Vending stead, who served as JEFF MILLER Oversight Committee [a a U.S. Navy ensign subcommittee of the City for the Office of Council] judges all applicants Strategic Services on thirty criteria, such as cart during the war and appearance, quality of food, was typically among and uniqueness. Only the top the first Americans carts are allowed a spot. to enter German Q: How long have you had cities captured by your cart? Allied forces, could A: I have been making home- not recall exactly made Japanese food for three where he’d found it. years here. “I sat in front of Q: How many customers that box for I don’t do you get on the average know how long,” day? says former museum A: About eighty. Business is director Klaus best in the fall, when the Westphal. “It had students come back. a story to tell.” Q: Do you get claustropho- After retiring as bic in the cart? director in 2004, A: No, actually. I have one of Westphal, a native the biggest carts, and I am of Berlin, set about halfway outside. I love it, to find the origin and I have eight workers who of the collection. never complain. Studying the box, Q: What is the most popu- he noticed a splotch lar item on the menu? of red ink, faded by A: Number four [a traditional, age to an illegible home-style sushi]. Almost all smudge. With the my customers know their help of a magnify- favorites by number. ing glass and a black Q: Do you have plans of light, he was able to starting a restaurant that make out a few let- doesn’t have wheels? ters that identified A: Yes, I am looking into it the box as being now. I just need the right from a cigar shop in location. Würzburg, Germany, an ancient city that Klaus Westphal, retired director of the Geology Museum, holds a prehistoric stone was devastated by knife, one of several artifacts left in an old cigar box at the museum more than Allied bombing twenty years ago. After some detective work to find the minerals’ rightful owner, during the war. Westphal recently returned them to the University of Würzburg in Germany.

10 ON WISCONSIN RESEARCH

Tortured Legacy Alfred McCoy’s new book takes on the CIA and its interrogation tactics.

The problem with torture, said the Roman jurist Ulpian, is that MICHAEL FORSTER ROTHBART it usually doesn’t work. The strong have the will to resist it, and the weak will say anything to stop the pain. Thus, Ulpian wrote in the third century, the use of torture to gain informa- tion had to be considered a “delicate, dangerous, and deceptive thing.” Of course, this did not stop the Romans from engaging in torture. Eighteen hundred years later, as another superpower considers its position on tor- ture, Alfred McCoy is sound- ing like a latter-day Ulpian. In his new book, A Question of Torture, the UW professor of history and Southeast Asian studies peers into the dark cor- ners of the United States’s war on terror and concludes that the government, through the covert action of the Central Intelligence Agency, has devel- oped, propagated, and prac- ticed a system of interrogation that he calls “psychological Researching torture has shown historian Alfred McCoy that “humans torture.” are capable of enormous kindness and unfathomable cruelty.” And while the book was published in January — just seem to forbid the kind of that the practice will end. days after President George W. harsh tactics he describes — “This is the third time in Bush signed the law that would McCoy has no expectation our history that we have banned torture forever,” he says. “But psychological torture Tropical Cow has proved to be surprisingly resilient in the face of reform.” International agriculture experts have long tried to export some In the book, McCoy traces of Wisconsin’s milk-producing bounty to tropical nations, which the evolution of psychological typically suffer from a lack of dairy products. But while Wisconsin interrogation techniques, some- Holsteins may be the best dairy animals in the world, they aren’t times called “no-touch torture,”

big travelers, and so far, they haven’t shown much taste for SPENCER WALTS to the onset of the Cold War. living abroad. Born from university-run experi- But if you can’t put a Wisconsin cow in the tropics, you may ments conducted during the be able to put the tropics in a Wisconsin cow. Animal science 1950s, the approach focuses on professor Jack Rutledge has developed a genetically modified cow attacking a person’s mental state, embryo that is capable of thriving in hot climates. Created in the lab rather than harming a subject by combining eggs of Wisconsin cows and semen from tropically physically. Interrogators use sen- adapted bulls, the embryos can be shipped to developing nations and sory deprivation, self-inflicted implanted in native cows. Success rates are still relatively low, but when the technology improves, pain, and humiliation to soften Rutledge estimates the cost of these hybrid calves will be around sixty dollars, while calves produced subjects for questioning in an by traditional methods run upward of several hundred dollars a head. — Staff attempt to diminish their resist-

12 ON WISCONSIN RESEARCH

ance and coerce cooperation. between physical and mental use the controversial practices Stem Cells: Practiced by CIA agents during torment in defining torture. if he deems necessary. New Lines, the Cold War and disseminated The U.S. government, how- The result, says McCoy, is New Promise to anti-Communist allies around ever, has consistently argued that the United States “persists the globe, the new strategy for the exclusion of psychologi- in practicing a basic doctrine of UW-Madison’s stem-cell sparked a modern revolution in cal techniques from torture interrogation techniques that research team has developed how security forces deal with prohibitions. Before ratifying the rest of the world regards as two new lines of human potential informants, McCoy says. the U.N.’s convention against torture.” And in doing so, he embryonic stem cells that An expert on the political torture in 1994, U.S. represen- says, it risks the moral high take the science beyond a sig- machinations of Southeast Asia, tatives objected to the defini- ground in the war on terror. nificant obstacle on the road McCoy first came across the tion of “mental” pain as “Torture has a symbolic to fulfilling their promise. techniques while researching an torture. And when Bush signed importance that goes far beyond Since they were first elite band of the Philippine mil- the recent law forbidding the treatment of three dozen top isolated at the UW in 1998, itary in the 1980s. Although he “cruel, inhumane, and degrad- al-Qaida captives or a couple hun- human embryonic stem cells began to explore the connec- ing punishment,” he added a dred detainees at Guantanamo have typically been grown in tion to the CIA then, he eventu- statement indicating he would Bay,” he says. “It’s a statement a medium containing mouse ally put the project aside. interpret the law consistent about who a people are. It makes cells and other animal prod- “It’s a miserable topic, and with his constitutional author- one of the most profound state- ucts, which help the cells live every time I began to look into ity as commander in chief, ments about a society in the outside the body. The exis- it, it left me depressed,” he says. which many analysts say shows international community.” tence of animal cells presents The now-famous photo- he wants to reserve the right to — Michael Penn a risk of cross-contamination, graphs from Iraq’s Abu Ghraib effectively eliminating the prison convinced him to resume possibility that stem cells his research. Looking at the grown in this manner could most recognizable of those be transplanted into humans. images — which showed a MARCIA MIQUELON In January, researchers hooded Iraqi prisoner standing at the UW-affiliated WiCell on a box with wires attached to Research Institute announced his extended arms — McCoy that they had created a new saw not the work of rogue sol- medium free of animal prod- diers, but sophisticated tactics ucts. “All of the concerns drawn from the pages of the about contaminating proteins CIA’s Cold War interrogation in existing stem-cell lines can manual. “The hood is for sen- essentially be removed using sory deprivation, and the wires this medium,” says Tenneille are for self-inflicted pain,” he Ludwig PhD’01, a research says. “These are telltale signs of scientist who led the effort. the CIA’s techniques. This didn’t “This work helps us clear some come from the bottom; it was of the major hurdles for using ordered from the top.” Harvesting crops is made easier with a UW-designed rolling cart. these cells therapeutically.” Seven U.S. soldiers were Although the two new court-martialed in that case, COOL TOOL lines have survived in the lab and officials from the Pentagon Grow on the Go for more than seven months, and the White House have each has developed an abnor- repeatedly denied that U.S. For some gardeners and small farmers, aching backs and sore mal chromosome, which forces engage in torture. knees are the price of loving the land. But they don’t have to be. remains a challenge for But McCoy says it may come To take some of the agony out of agriculture, the Healthy Farm- the evolving field. James down to how one defines tor- ers, Healthy Profits project in UW-Madison’s biological systems Thomson, the professor of ture. Psychological interrogation engineering department designed a wheeled cart that allows a anatomy who first isolated techniques can have devastating person to sit in a comfortable position while scooting across fields the cells, says the changes long-term effects on a subject’s to plant, weed, or harvest. The cart is one of several time- and indicate that “further work is mental functions, he says, not- labor-saving tools marketed by the project, which was formed to needed to understand chro- ing that the United Nations and help small farmers and produce growers improve their opera- mosome stability of stem cells groups such as Amnesty Interna- tions. To see plans for a build-it-yourself cart, visit during long-term culture.” tional make no distinction bse.wisc.edu/hfhp/. — Staff — Terry Devitt ‘78, MA’85

SPRING 2006 13 RESEARCH

Tag — You’re IDed UW research is helping share the radio-frequency revolution.

With the push of a button, the this game of tag is increasingly surveillance or to enhance the race is on. A half-dozen cartons important. Wal-Mart now ability of marketers to track indi- of Glade Clean Linen Air Fresh- requires three hundred of its viduals’ buying behavior. Such ener zoom around on a high- top suppliers to use the technol- applications are not the focus of tech conveyor belt, at times ogy, and Target and Best Buy the lab’s work, Veeramani says. hitting speeds of six hundred are ready to follow suit. Accord- “It is wrong to say that the feet per minute — the pace of ing to a survey of five hundred technology is evil — it’s the way conveyors in Wal-Mart distribu- firms by AMR Research, 69 per- you use the technology,” he tion centers. cent were planning to evaluate, says. “Some are worried about These boxes, however, pilot, or implement an RFID pro- whether people can drive by your aren’t destined for a Wal- gram — with an average house and determine what you Mart. As they spin budget of $548,000 in 2005. have in your refrigerator, but that around a laboratory But the RFID’s uses are is not technically possible today. in the Engineering widening, and radio-frequency There is a lot of due diligence Research Centers tags are beginning to pop up being done to make sure that building, the on everything from passports to safeguards are in place to protect air fresheners parking-lot access passes. Con- individual privacy.” are telling a sumers have likely seen the A number of companies, story. Each white plastic tags on compact- including Rockwell Automation, package disc cases. The technology is also Dorner, Autologik, and Red bears a behind toll-road systems such as Prairie, contributed more than small Illinois’s I-Pass, which allows cars $500,000 of equipment and radio with RFID tags to whiz through software to start UW-Madison’s transmit- tollbooths while a toll is auto- RFID lab, which studies the sci- ter, which matically deducted. ence behind the tags and tests constantly Drug-maker Pfizer plans things such as how placement of sends out to use the tags to combat drug the tags affects readability. The information counterfeiting, airlines are con- content, packaging, and shape about what sidering the technology to keep of items inside boxes can pose a and where better track of luggage, and challenge, since metals tend to it is. credit-card companies are reflect radio waves and liquids The technol- experimenting with tagged tend to absorb them. When ogy is known as cards that allow consumers to researchers are finished with

SPENCER WALTS SPENCER WALTS radio-frequency identi- make purchases by simply wav- air fresheners, cases of Master fication, or RFID, and it is ing cards in front of terminals. Locks or Countrytime Lemonade quickly reshaping the way busi- “The integration of various or Kraft Macaroni and Cheese nesses track and ship products. technologies creates a new take a spin. By capturing the information realm of possibilities,” says Raj “And tags, like people, sent by RFID tags, products can Veeramani, a professor of behave differently when they are be tracked from manufacturer industrial and systems engineer- alone or in groups,” says Gutier- to checkout lane, reducing labor ing who directs UW-Madison’s rez. “We want the tags placed so costs and the potential for E-Business Consortium, which is they are the most effective and human error in shipping and spurring on the university’s allow objects to be easily identi- inventory. investigations of RFID. He notes, fied, even in groups.” At UW-Madison, Alfonso for example, that perishable The lab is also looking at Gutierrez MS’94 consults with food products with RFID ways to improve the perform- about forty companies to test tags could be used with other ance and reduce the price of the and refine the technology. “The built-in sensors that could detect tags, which now cost between companies we work with wanted spoilage and help enhance ten and twelve cents each. “The a sandbox where they could try quality and safety. “There’s more panacea would be under five out the technology and gain to RFID than shipping products cents,” Gutierrez says. “Compa- hands-on experience with apply- to Wal-Mart,” he says. nies are not just going to jump ing RFID in a working environ- Those seemingly limitless at this technology because it ment,” he says. “We’re a resource possibilities have raised concerns is cool. It has to benefit the for basic and applied research.” among privacy advocates, who bottom line.” For businesses, mastering fear that RFID might be used in — Dennis Chaptman ’80

14 ON WISCONSIN RESEARCH

A World without Snow Days Model shows that long-term melting may have some chilling effects.

What would Earth be like if atures, cloud cover, atmospheric permafrost would expand in Scientists have learned how to one fine day all the snow circulation patterns, and soil the absence of snow, affecting make human collagen in the melted away? moisture levels. Some of the ecosystems and populations lab, a breakthrough that they Obviously, it would be a model’s predictions are counter- living in snowy climates. have been working toward for much warmer place. But what’s intuitive: without snow, for Such changes are already thirty years. interesting is how much example, the ground in some under way in parts of Alaska, UW-Madison warmer. Working with com- northerly parts of the world where expanding permafrost biochemist puter-generated simulations, would actually get colder. is creating problems in the con- Ronald Raines Stephen Vavrus MS’92, That’s because snow pro- struction of roads and build- led the team PhD’97, an associate scientist vides an insulating layer for ings, says Vavrus, and, he adds, that devised a at UW-Madison’s Center for soil, keeping it from chilling “there’s every reason to think method for Climatic Research, found that into the permanently frozen we’ll see even stronger effects synthesizing in the absence of snow cover, turf known as permafrost. In in the future.” the protein, global temperatures would Vavrus’s model, regions of — Paroma Basu which plays a Ronald Raines likely spike by critical role in about eight- connecting tissue and supporting tenths of a degree STEPHEN VAVRUS/CENTER FOR CLIMATIC RESEARCH the body’s structure. The research Celsius. opens the door to using synthetic That increase collagen in medical procedures, represents as such as reconstructive and plastic much as a third of surgeries, that now commonly use the warming that forms of animal collagen, which climate change sometimes can carry pathogens experts have pre- that infect the recipient. dicted may come from rising levels UW-Madison’s new Microbial Sci- of heat-trapping ences building has yielded a dis- greenhouse gases, covery even before it opens. suggesting that Working in the thirty-five-foot- any significant deep hole where the facility is disappearance of Change (tenths of now rising, geologists gathered degrees Celsius) snow may be an bits of sediment left by a mas- important factor In a computer model created by UW researcher Stephen Vavrus, a world without sive ice sheet that once covered in the global- snow looks like a significantly warmer place. The map shows how air temperature the Madison area. The professors warming equa- would change in the absence of snow. were able to date the relics to tion. And as 25,000 years ago, providing the reports mount of first reliable estimate of when steady ice melt in Antarctica Cloudy Science glaciers last covered the area. and falling snow levels in the Through the ages, the shape-shifting allure of clouds has fascinated northern latitudes, a world dreamers and scientists alike. Yet for all the time people have spent Much like Gene Kelly, bacteria without snow is not a com- looking at them, even the community of professional sky-gazers still gotta dance, says a team of pletely hypothetical scenario. knows relatively little about what makes a cloud a cloud. chemical and biological engi- “This was not just a what-if “The problem is that what we define a cloud as depends on the neers. But it’s not the music that question,” says Vavrus. “I type of instrument we’re using to define it,” says atmospheric scien- moves the brainless, single-celled wanted to quantify the influ- tist Steven Ackerman, the director of the Cooperative Institute for organisms. The researchers ence of global snow cover Meteorological Satellite Studies at UW-Madison. developed a model demonstrat- on the present-day climate, Although the emergence of weather satellites in the 1960s ing that as bacteria swim, they because that has relevance for opened the horizons on cloud research, measuring their formations stir fluids in such a way as to cre- the type of climate changes we from space is a fuzzy matter. Satellites use waves of energy to “see” ate coordinated motion. These are expecting in the future.” clouds, and results can vary by 5 to 10 percent between different insights are helping researchers Vavrus, a climate modeling satellites. There is a need for more consistency, says Ackerman, understand how bacteria feed specialist, digitally simulated a because cloud patterns significantly influence not only weather, but and influence their environment. snow-free world and measured Earth’s hydrological and energy cycles, making accurate detection the effect of missing snow and definition of cloud cover critical to short-term and long-range cover on a range of climatic climate predictions. variables, including soil temper- — P.B.

SPRING 2006 15 DISPATCHES

Headlines for the Homeless New student-run publication redefines the power of the press.

As they pass the corner of MICHAEL FORSTER ROTHBART Edwin Lightfoot, an emeritus State and Lake Streets, peo- professor of chemical and bio- ple coming and going from logical engineering, was named campus occasionally stop to as one of eight winners of the offer a few spare dimes and National Medal of Science, the quarters to the homeless country’s highest honor for sci- people who often stand ence and technology. Lightfoot, there. But three UW-Madi- a pioneer in the field of bio- son students are offering a chemical engineering, is the different kind of change — eleventh UW-Madison faculty one that is giving voice to a member to be designated for quietly desperate segment the award since it was created of the Madison community. in 1959. This winter, Ryan Richardson x’06, Claire Cornell University professor Muller x’07, and Mel Molly Jahn was named dean Motel x’06 launched the of the College of Agricultural Homeless Cooperative, a and Life Sciences. An expert in monthly newspaper whose plant breeding and genetic mission is to provide Madi- mapping of agricultural plants, son’s homeless with a means At UW-Madison’s College Library, students (from left) Jeff Alexander, Jahn will assume leadership of of steady employment and Claire Muller, and Ryan Richardson review copy for an issue of the Home- the college. Described by Chan- a way to get their stories less Cooperative, a newspaper started by students to assist Madison’s cellor John Wiley MS’65, PhD’68 heard. Homeless people homeless, who can earn money by selling issues of the paper. as a “gifted scholar ... in the write much of the content, true Wisconsin tradition,” Jahn and they also earn money the Madison Warming Center Because of city regulations, will begin her duties in August. distributing the paper around Campaign, a local homeless Homeless Cooperative can’t be the city. advocacy group. “I know of at “sold” on State Street, but it There’s a new name and a new “We wanted to find a way least one vendor who, through can be given in exchange for a dean at the UW School of to bring immediate, tangible sales of the paper and his part- suggested one-dollar donation. Medicine and Public Health. change to the lives of homeless time job, has been able to get Vendors purchase copies for Formerly known as the Medical people in Madison,” says off the street and find a place twenty-five cents and keep the School, the unit changed its Richardson, who met the other to stay.” rest as profit. With financial name to reflect the evolution editors while volunteering with support from the UW’s Mor- of its public health programs. gridge Center for Public Service Leading the newly named and a few donations from school will be Robert Golden, Classrooms without Walls friends and family, the students vice dean of the University of printed two thousand copies of North Carolina School of Courses centered on fieldwork or service projects used to be novel the first issue this past Novem- Medicine. A psychiatrist on the departures from the tried-and-true formula of lecture-based learn- ber, and copies quickly sold out. UNC faculty for twenty years, ing. Increasingly, they’re the rule. Interim Provost Virginia Sapiro Each issue features articles writ- Golden will succeed Philip recently reported results of a study that found that four of five UW- ten by local people who are Farrell as dean in July. Madison undergraduates participate in some kind of experiential homeless, illuminating the learning — a broad net that encompasses courses that go beyond harsh conditions and hopeless- For the first time, the university classroom interaction and offer opportunities to work directly with ness they often experience. has created a formal plan to faculty and staff. Although two of Homeless manage the Lakeshore “We want every one of our students to have a challenging and Cooperative’s co-editors will Nature Preserve, which enriching academic experience as an expected part of their under- graduate in May, Richardson includes natural areas such graduate work,” Sapiro says. “We’re not looking at these as extras.” hopes to continue the initiative as the lakeshore path, Picnic Nor do students seem to regard them that way. According to long term by incorporating as a Point, and the Eagle Heights the study, among students who graduated in 2004–05: nonprofit organization. Community Gardens. The • 16 percent had studied abroad during their academic career; “The paper empowers master plan outlines steps to • 22 percent took honors courses; these people in a way that isn’t restore and preserve these • 35 percent took interactive seminars; just a handout,” he says. “It’s areas, including the restoration • 46 percent pursued independent study with a faculty member; more of a hand up.” of lake views that have been • 30 percent performed fieldwork for academic credit. — Erin Hueffner ‘00 obscured by overgrown trees.

SPRING 2006 11 ARTS &CULTURE

Pushing Puccini Class project markets opera to students.

Everyone knows what to expect in June 2005, wants JAMES YOUNG at an opera: beefy women in to change opera’s horned helmets; long-winded image, especially songs in foreign tongues; notes among UW stu- so high they shatter glass; and dents. It’s not just a a sparse audience of ossified matter of the art aristocrats sipping sherry and form’s reputation — looking disdainfully at the it’s about viability. world through monocled eyes. “To enhance the Everyone knows this — but then vitality of the Madi- everyone, Allan Naplan points son Opera,” he says, out, hasn’t been to the Madison “we need to attract Opera. a younger demo- Naplan, who became that graphic.” organization’s general director To get through to that demo- graphic, Naplan

COLLECTION JEFF MILLER turned to Sarah Galápagos Botham — or more Remains importantly, to her class. Botham Had evolution gifted Charles teaches Family and Darwin with some of the abili- Consumer Journal- ties of the chameleon, he Zvetelina Vassileva and Ted Lee hit the high ism 515: Public Infor- notes in the Madison Opera’s fall program, might turn himself green with mation Campaigns Tosca. With help from Journalism 515, the envy at the thought of the and Programs, and opera aims to attract more students. UW’s zoological museum. For one of her projects the museum, in its Galápagos team aimed to increase atten- requires student teams to put Collection, contains every dance at Giacomo Puccini’s together marketing plans to aid evolutionary scholar’s desire: Tosca, the Madison Opera’s local organizations. The class the largest concentration of fall show. They posted notices members were wary of Naplan, Galápagos animal remains in about it on a variety of student- and before he could get their the world. That this collection frequented Web sites, sent help, he had to convince them exists at all — let alone at out mass e-mails to university Elizabeth Pillaert shows off the that everything they knew the UW — is the work of bones of a blue-footed booby. departments and schools, and distinguished researcher about opera was wrong. arranged to have Naplan inter- E. Elizabeth Pillaert, the museum’s curator of osteology. “I had never been to an viewed on WSUM, the student Pillaert is one of the few people in the world allowed to opera because of the stereo- radio station. remove animal remains from the Galápagos. “It’s a dirty job,” types surrounding it — the Along with those efforts, she says, “but someone’s got to do it.” She’s made more than a inability to understand [a] Naplan also offered students dozen trips to the archipelago since 1978, and each time, she’s foreign language, the lack of discounted ticket prices. When brought back the bones and decaying remains of its wide variety excitement, and the fact that he counted up the final sales of unique fauna — collecting only animals that had already died. opera’s usually frequented by a totals, he found that Tosca Her favorites, she says, are the birds. “I’ll pick up anything I can more distinguished audience,” had sold well over two hundred get on penguins and flightless cormorants,” she says. says Sara Gullicksrud x’06. student tickets, more than Due to the islands’ prominent position in natural history, the “I knew that if I avoided opera doubling his target. government of Ecuador strictly regulates what Pillaert takes with because of these stereotypes, But sales were not his chief her. “Half of what I collect goes to Ecuador, and half goes to our other students were probably concern. “My real goal was just museum,” she says. “But that only goes for complete skeletons. doing the same.” to get some exposure for opera Ecuador isn’t really interested in partial remains.” Because At first, she was put off by among the students,” says scavengers and natural phenomena tend to break up and scatter the idea of working with Madi- Naplan. “I want to get rid of the animal carcasses, there are far more partial skeletons than full son Opera, but the more she idea that there’s an off-putting ones, and Pillaert gets to keep the partials for the UW. talked with Naplan, the more dress code and etiquette at the The Zoology Museum is a working research facility, and so its he infected her with his enthusi- opera and lose the stereotype of collections are available for viewing by appointment only. asm, and eventually, she agreed the Valkyrie in Viking horns.” — J.A. to lead the effort. She and her — John Allen

16 ON WISCONSIN ARTS &CULTURE

Researcher to Rights Activist Anthropologist turns philanthropist to aid the Sudanese people. In February, Derek Kwan MBAx’08 brought home a Grammy award

As an anthropologist, Sharon MICHAEL FORSTER ROTHBART for Best Traditional Tropical Latin Hutchinson feels that she and Album. Kwan, who’s enrolled in her colleagues should be as con- the business school’s Bolz Center cerned about human suffering for Arts Administration, was the as they are about human cul- associate producer on the album tures. “We have a huge respon- Bebo de Cuba featuring Bebo sibility to give back to the Valdes. He also served as co-pro- places we study from,” she says. ducer on the album Una Noche This philosophy guides not Inolvidable, which was nominated only how she teaches, but also in the same category. how she lives her life. For twenty-five years, Hutchinson The film Brokeback Mountain, has been involved in the south- which is making a splash at the ern Sudan as an anthropologist Oscars, was inspired in part by a and human-rights activist. She book originally published by the UW Press. Farm Boys: Lives of began her work as a University Sharon Hutchinson gives back to the places she studies. of Chicago graduate student Gay Men from the Rural Mid- studying the Nuer, the second- government reached a compre- teachers’ salaries, searches for west, by Will Fellows, came out largest group of people in south hensive peace agreement with and sends over books and com- in 1996 and offers first-person Sudan, and over time, she felt a the Sudan People’s Liberation puters, and purchases supplies. accounts of rural gay life. It is strong connection to the area. Movement, and this has “I’m very excited, because I one of the UW Press’s best-selling “I kept going back,” enabled Hutchinson to start a specifically found places where titles, and according to Broke- Hutchinson says, “both because new — and possibly her ulti- I’m quite sure the government back Mountain producer James I felt I was one of the few mate — endeavor. of Sudan are never [going to Schamus, it provided background voices that actually brought “I had a longtime dream go] but there are large popula- and inspiration to the film’s back some news from the area, that as soon as peace came, tions of school children.” actors and director. and also, as time went on, I’d be able to channel in some She hopes her efforts inspire there were a lot of organiza- money to start some primary Americans as well as Sudanese. Highlights from Tandem tions in the area and they schools. I have three schools “We live in a bubble,” she says. Press’s first decade will be on needed some help.” now,” says Hutchinson, who “But you really can have a large display at the Chazen Museum Since Sudan gained inde- was among the thousand impact in a lot of places. I just of Art. Tandem has published pendence in 1956, it has been women to be collectively nomi- wish people would take a look fine art prints by such artists as wracked by a series of civil wars nated for the Nobel Peace around a little bit more and Suzanne Caporael, Robert Cot- that have displaced more than Prize. The effort is funded with jump out of their bubble.” tingham, Jim Dine, Sam Gilliam, 4 million people. Last year, the her own money. She pays the — Daniel Uttech ‘01 Gronk, Al Held, Judy Pfaff, and Jaune Quick-to-See Smith. The work will be exhibited until April History in Brief 9 at the campus art museum. When it comes to understanding people — even the people who shaped our world — it’s the small details As part of Madison’s sesquicen- that matter. And so history professor John Kaminsky is doing his best to compile the minute characteristics that tennial celebration, the Center surround the biggest names in American history. for the Humanities is working Through a new series of chapbooks, Kaminsky is pulling together personal portraits of America’s founders. with the Department of Theatre Chapbooks are small volumes — Kaminsky’s run less than a hundred pages each — that can be printed quickly and Drama and Madison Reper- and inexpensively. Unlike more traditional biographies, Kaminsky’s slim tomes try to give the skinny on their tory Theatre to present Thorn- subjects — they focus on character, mannerisms, and physical appearance rather than reciting political views ton Wilder and the World of Our or accomplishments. To make sure these portraits are accurate, Kaminsky relies entirely on the writings of the Town, a play and discussion of subjects themselves, and on firsthand accounts by their contemporaries. this classic show. “We’ve seen a sort of Founding Fathers chic lately,” Kaminsky says. “The popular press has come out with lengthy biographies of Adams, Washington, Hamilton, and others. But they’re so long — they really aren’t for Afro-American studies pioneer everyone.” With the thin chapbooks, he hopes to spread interest in the nation’s founders to readers who might Nellie McKay died in January of be intimidated by lengthy works — especially younger readers. “They’re written so that high school students liver cancer. A member of the can understand them,” he says. UW faculty since 1978, she estab- Published by the UW Libraries’ Parallel Press, the series currently includes two volumes — on George lished the university as a national Washington and Thomas Jefferson — but three or four more will follow each year. leader in the field of African- — J. A. American women’s literature.

SPRING 2006 17 CLASSROOM

Shakespeare at Lunch In and out of class, Heather Dubrow spreads enthusiasm for the Bard.

Eavesdropping on conversa- student, it means a (2) MICHAEL FORSTER ROTHBART tions in the Lakefront Cafete- lot that a real scholar ria, one is most likely to hear of Shakespeare will tales of the weekend and take the time to sit gripes about studying. How- down with students ever, at one table each Tuesday for lunch each afternoon, a different topic week,” says Ali dominates: Shakespeare. Rothschild x’09. On Tuesdays during the Dubrow, who’s semester, Heather Dubrow, known for her many who teaches English 162: translations of Shake- Shakespeare and the Twenty- speare’s works, makes First Century, gathers some of an extra effort to her students after the lecture make the Elizabethan to discuss the classic works playwright relevant over lunch. to today’s genera- “When you have a huge tion. Class members lecture, especially as a new are not only required to read many plays (the assigned text- book weighs no less CLASS NOTE than fifteen pounds), A Global View of AIDS but also to watch in subsequent lectures, partly movies based on Shakespeare’s International Studies 603: Global AIDS: to make the members of the Interdisciplinary Perspectives works and attend a live per- group realize that their insights formance of Macbeth. The HIV/AIDS pandemic really do matter, and partly “It is fun to see almost the is one of the world’s because I genuinely learn from entire lecture at the theater for ongoing disasters, and want to deploy those Macbeth,” Rothschild says, and its effects insights,” says Dubrow. Plus, it adding that before the per- stretch far beyond helps her keep track of who is

SPENCER WALTS formance, Dubrow invited all the fields of coming to class. the students to join her at Casa health and medi- However, she insists the Bianca, a local pizza joint. cine. With more than course is not just about the “I’ve worked to make the 40 million people writer and his works. She also course interactive and more infected — and 3 million analyzes cultural issues raised deaths last year alone — the disease also has a deep impact on social — through the lunches, by Shakespeare. His world, she the social and economic spheres of life in many nations. To take the theater party, and student says, is “very different from a more global look at this worldwide problem, the Division of performances,” Dubrow says. ours” — and that can be an International Studies has created an interdisciplinary course for Holding the attention of asset for students as much as undergraduates and grad students. the more than three hundred an obstacle. By helping them “We’ve grown somewhat complacent about AIDS in the undergraduates who enroll in understand such a different Western world,” says Professor Richard Keller, who teaches med- the course each semester seems culture, Dubrow hopes to help ical history and bioethics. “Right now, it seems to be something like no easy feat, especially them better interpret their own that’s playing out primarily in the developing world.” Keller is with the bad rap Shakespeare world. She capitalizes on this working with Maria Lepowsky, a professor of anthropology and sometimes gets. But Dubrow relationship between past and women’s studies who also has a master’s degree in public health. keeps them interested through present by assigning modern They hope that the course will make students aware of the inter- techniques such as sonnet writ- texts that closely relate to sections between illness and culture so that they can see how ing contests, class perform- Shakespeare, such as contem- AIDS affects far more than the people it infects. ances, and required feedback. porary sonnets and fiction. “The sexual revolution utterly transformed society in the At the end of lectures, she asks Incorporating modern West,” Keller says. “AIDS is one consequence of that transforma- the class to fill out note cards works, Dubrow believes, will tion. But it also serves as a barometer for other social phenomena and relay any idea from read- not only make Shakespeare — from the place of religion in culture to the migration of popu- ing or lectures that particularly relevant. It will also reveal how lations to the spread of intravenous drug use.” interests them. to approach any written work, — John Allen “I often refer to their ideas whether a Shakespearean

18 ON WISCONSIN CLASSROOM

Comparative literature professor Tomislav Longinovic is trying tragedy or a letter from a She says she realizes the like to watch a play in Shake- to inject a little new blood into friend, from a wide range of content of the course, no mat- speare’s era, and to demon- the curriculum — literally. He’s perspectives. It shows students ter how interesting, is no good strate just how good a writer teaching a new course entitled how to pay close attention to without a great teacher to get had to be to command The Vampire in Literature and language and form and how to a student’s attention. “I am attention. Film this semester. Students will analyze a text — lessons they very grateful to my own teach- Another way to keep get a look at the various roles will use for the rest of their ers who helped me understand everyone’s interest? Jokes. that bloodsucking fiends have academic careers. the importance of great teach- “My jokes are probably played in stories by Tolstoy, “I encourage students ing, and I want to give that to the worst they will hear,” says Byron, and Goethe, as well as in to become more responsive, these people,” she says of her Dubrow. “I encourage them to films that range from the 1922 acute, and enthusiastic readers teaching assistants. And she hiss.” But as bad as the jokes silent classic Nosferatu to Francis Ford Coppola’s over-the-top Bram Stoker’s Dracula.

Associate professor Toni Whited has won the Brattle Prize in Corporate Finance for her contributions to a paper titled “Debt Dynamics,” co- authored by Christopher Hen- nessy for the Journal of Finance. The paper attempts to explain corporate capital decisions. The honor will have a positive influ- ence on Whited’s own finances — she and Hennessy will share the prize’s $10,000 award.

Joan Ershler with the Waisman Center and Carol Keintz with the Dane County Parent Council will lead a project called Teach- ers Teaching Teachers: A Profes- sional Development Model, which aims to enhance the class- room and social interaction skills Heather Dubrow, professor of English (center), teaches Shakespeare to a lecture class with more than 300 of instructors at Dane County students. To get to know her students better, she invites them to have lunch with her once a week after Head Start. These teachers work class in the Lakefront Cafeteria in Memorial Union. At this session, Chris Mills, left, and Rebecca Hillary, with a highly needy population, right, compare the writing styles of Kurt Vonnegut and William Shakespeare. yet state records indicate that only about half of them have an early childhood degree. of all texts, from other literary tries to encourage them to may be, there is no doubt that ones to newspapers and even remember that teaching does she knows what she is talking More and more, science is sub- conversations,” says Dubrow. make a difference. about, and that’s something ject to politics, especially when it She makes extra time not Dubrow knows that, like a that gets everyone excited comes to biomedical engineer- only for her students but for playwright, a teacher can’t about Shakespeare. ing. The UW wants to prepare her teaching assistants as well. communicate with her audi- “Yes, her jokes are not the students for the social pitfalls After mandatory department ence unless she keeps its atten- best,” says Dan Gibbons of research, so it’s launching a meetings, she asks her TAs to tion. So she tries to impart a MA’01, PhDx’07, a teaching new course titled Politics, Ethics, help her make the class stimu- true flavor of Elizabethan per- assistant for the course. “But Propaganda, and Current Issues lating for the students, and she formance — at the semester’s her knowledge and excitement in Biomedical Engineering that seeks out their advice through- first lecture, there are pickpock- for the material make up for it. draws on expertise from guest out the semester. “They are my ets in the class and people try- She makes the students excited lecturers, including state legisla- team and they are an essential ing to sell apples while she is about Shakespeare.” tors and newspaper writers. part of the class,” says Dubrow. talking, to simulate what it was — Joanna Salmen x’06

SPRING 2006 19 JEFF MILLER The Year of Unfortunate Events During 2005, UW-Madison endured a string of bad news that frustrated its leaders and strained relations with state legislators. Can the university calm the stormy waters? Or are there more clouds on the horizon?

By Michael Penn MA’97 It is not the case, as some college guides suggest, that one can stand in front of Bascom Hall and look all the way down State Street to Wisconsin’s capitol. Because of a slight crook in how the hill aligns with the street, the view doesn’t quite work out, leaving the capitol’s granite dome off in the periphery. Some say it’s an accident of poor planning. Others claim that whoever placed UW-Madison’s administration building got it just right, reflecting the fact that Wisconsin’s lawmak- ers and its flagship university are eternally looking past each other, never quite seeing eye to eye. That was never more true than in 2005, a particularly miserable year for UW-Madison’s legislative relations. In a six-month period,

SPRING 2006 21 three UW-Madison faculty were con- Wisconsin would deal with a relationship stories swirling, Wiley placed Barrows victed of felonies while on payroll, and that seemed to be coming apart. in a program specialist position in the a top administrator’s seven-month paid provost’s office, a fallback job with a leave of absence turned into a messy BY THE TIME 2005 STARTED, THE SEEDS nearly $73,000 annual salary that was public ordeal that drew ire from the outlined in Barrows’s appointment with for a bad year had already been planted. other end of State Street. To make mat- the university. So-called back-up posi- Two months earlier, Wiley had a conver- ters worse, the bad news spilled out just tions exist at many universities and are sation with Paul Barrows, his vice chan- as legislators deliberated the state’s commonly offered as enticements for cellor for student affairs, that would set budget for the next two years, making tenured faculty who take on administra- things in motion. Wiley thought Barrows the university an easy target for cuts. tive roles, the idea being that they could use some time off. In the hot glare of the public spotlight, wouldn’t want to serve as deans or In September, Wiley learned that the venerable institution looked a little chancellors if it meant risking their Barrows had been involved with another worse for wear. Its budget was snipped, teaching positions. Barrows, however, employee, a relationship that Barrows its administration called out publicly, and held a non-teaching academic staff posi- said began and ended consensually. The its generally impeccable reputation in the tion, and some wondered why a career situation posed no apparent conflict with state took a hit. Even John Wiley MS’65, administrator would need such a benefit. university policy, but in November, PhD’68, UW-Madison’s normally unflap- After hearing of the arrangement, Wiley was told that the relationship had pable chancellor, seemed happy to put the Governor Jim Doyle ’67 told reporters been with a graduate student, and that year behind him. that he was “very frustrated,” adding, many staff and students seemed upset “There is no denying that it was a “We really have to be concerned about a about it. Believing that Barrows had rough year,” he said in January. system where this is going on.” Others shown poor judgment and could no But as the calendar turns and the were more blunt. In an interview with longer be effective, Wiley asked him to Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, headlines fade, questions linger. How did step down as vice chancellor and agreed the state repre- the university find itself in such a jam? to his request for some time off to sort sentative Robin Kreibich, a Republican Was it just bad luck, or are there deeper out some personal issues. He told Bar- who chairs the state assembly’s commit- issues to face? Will the wounds heal? rows to use vacation time and sick leave tee on universities, said, “I can’t think of More than anything, the events of accumulated during his sixteen years at another state agency or private sector 2005 raise concerns about UW-Madi- the university. Shortly thereafter, Wiley [employer] that would provide a safety son’s relationship with state government, announced that he was reorganizing the net for highly paid administrators that an often-rocky arrangement that many student affairs division, eliminating the screw up.” observers say has grown especially vice chancellor position entirely. A legislative audit later revealed that uneasy in recent years. Even before By June of last year, Barrows was 1,092 employees throughout the UW recent events, a series of tight state budg- still on leave at his $190,000 annual System were guaranteed back-up posi- ets has created a rift, leading university salary, leading a handful of state legisla- tions, about half of which are required officials to doubt legislators’ commitment tors to ask why he hadn’t returned to by state law. The UW Board of Regents to higher education, and legislators to work. Initially, the university cited med- has since suspended the practice for new doubt the university’s commitment to appointments and ordered a study of “It’s important for the university to address these issues head on. When something happens on a UW campus that generates headlines, people do begin to question how the university is being run. Really, what’s at stake is the integrity of the system.” financial austerity. While these debates ical reasons, but journalists soon discov- alternatives, such as fixed-term contracts are taking place in just about every state ered that he had been well enough to for administrative appointments. house in the country, the situation in apply for jobs at other universities during But back-up appointments weren’t Wisconsin has turned more rancorous — his absence. That same month, two the only personnel crisis university offi- and more ominous — than most. At a women accused Barrows of sexual cials would face in 2005. Between March time when states and public universities harassment, although neither filed a and August, three UW-Madison faculty must come together to confront new eco- written complaint. were convicted of felonies, one for sexu- nomic realities, the question became how With public attention mounting and ally assaulting three young girls, another

22 ON WISCONSIN for e-mailing sexually explicit material to who sought to curb spending. Republi- address these issues head on,” says state a teenage boy, and a third for stalking. cans, who hold a majority of seats in both senator Sheila Harsdorf, a Republican Because state law prohibits the univer- houses of Wisconsin’s legislature, voted who chairs the senate’s committee on sity from firing an employee solely on the to slice an additional $35 million from higher education. “When something basis of a criminal conviction, all three the UW System’s share of state funding, happens on a UW campus that generates

“For the past forty years or so, the university has been kind of a sacred cow around here. They never really had to face scrutiny about how they were spending their money. But when budgets got tight, the UW got thrown on the table.” cases remained wrapped up in university erasing most of a modest increase headlines, people do begin to question investigations and appeals even months proposed by Doyle. how the university is being run. Really, after the professors were sentenced for “There were some serious cases of what’s at stake is the integrity of the their crimes. Two of the professors used mismanagement, and at the same time, system.” vacation time to collect their pay while in we had a very tight budget,” says John But some say that the cases played jail, ultimately being placed on unpaid Gard, the Republican speaker of the into the hands of a group of legislators leave. The third was placed on adminis- state assembly. “In some people’s minds, who were determined to score political trative leave with pay, pending appeal. it made it easier to hold the line on some points at the university’s expense. Even Although they recognized the univer- of the university’s spending.” before the Barrows situation became sity’s due-process obligations, some law- The governor restored most of the front-page news, a small but aggressive makers were incensed that the university funding in the final budget, leaving in group of representatives, predominantly couldn’t rid itself of felons any faster. place only a $1 million cut directed Republicans, were attacking the univer- After a summer in which the papers had specifically at UW-Madison’s administra- sity on a number of fronts, ranging from been full of stories about paid leaves and tion, which lawmakers had written in — how much it spends on administration to guaranteed back-up jobs, it seemed to apparently as a reprimand for its han- its stand on divisive social issues such as confirm the worst stereotype of cushy dling of the personnel cases. But while stem-cell research. Last spring, some of university life, in which faculty and staff the issues ultimately may not have cost these legislators led the criticism of a enjoy privileged status far beyond that of the UW much money, they exacted a UW System policy to give chancellors a most citizens. bigger price in public perception. The seven-hundred-dollar-a-month allowance “Our personnel system is very UW System submitted to a legislative to pay for their automobiles. In their complex,” admits Wiley. “When people audit of its personnel policies, and an eyes, the Barrows case became another have looked at the details, with very few independent investigator was appointed prime example of administrative bloat. exceptions, they understand the deci- to study how the Barrows situation was “There are five or six guys that have sions we made. But at the same time, it’s handled. The latter report faulted the just been beating the tar out of the uni- difficult to understand how someone can chancellor for failing to adequately moni- versity system. They look for opportuni- be charged with a felony, given a fair tor Barrows’s use of sick leave, which ties to ding the UW every chance they trial, convicted, and thrown in jail, and has led the university to change how get,” says Republican state senator Scott we still are grinding our civil law process days off are requested and approved. Fitzgerald. “But does it make the system months later.” More significantly, the cases raised more accountable? Absolutely. So I’m By this February, one of the profes- doubts about the university’s credibility not going to say that those guys aren’t sors had been fired, and the firing of a in the eyes of some of its constituents. doing their jobs.” second was awaiting approval by the Many legislators felt that its initial Board of Regents. The third case response to the personnel issues was UW-MADISON IS NO STRANGER TO remained in appeal. slow and provided incomplete answers legislative discord. In the 1930s, Gover- For the university, the flood of bad about the steps taken to address the nor Philip La Follette and Progressives news couldn’t have come at a worse time. situation. “The appearance was that the in the legislature engineered the firing of The stories broke during negotiations on university was somewhat indifferent to it UW President Glenn Frank, who they the state’s new two-year budget, provid- and tried to hide things,” says Gard. felt wasn’t liberal enough. More than a ing ready-made talking points for those “It’s important for the university to decade later, conservative allies of U.S.

SPRING 2006 23 Senator Joseph McCarthy sponsored UW history, That cut was eventually their public universities, allowing them a legislative commission to investigate offset by a $150 million tuition increase. to replace public support with higher subversive and Communist activities on But nothing has affected the land- tuition and private gifts. While taxpayers campus. And in the true spirit of the scape more than Wisconsin’s perennially footed more than half of the bill for pub- public interest, the legislature intervened tight financial picture. Squeezed on one lic colleges and universities in the 1980s, in 1953, after professors voiced opposi- side by the rising cost of obligations such today they provide only about 30 percent tion to the idea of sending the Big Ten as Medicare and secondary education, of their budgets. And as in Wisconsin, champion to the Rose Bowl every year, and on the other by a tax base that has economic conditions have made the cur- by slashing the UW’s budget and con- remained virtually flat in recent years, rent picture especially bleak. Nationally, demning the faculty. legislators have little flexibility to make per-student state support fell by 18 “There have always been legislators the state’s budget add up, leaving them percent between 2000 and 2004. who criticize the university. That’s no choice but to reduce spending in The problem is not that states have nothing new,” says Jack O’Meara ’83, other places, including the UW System. suddenly decided to hate their universi- who handles legislative relations for an “For the past forty years or so, the ties. Budget realities are simply making organization of UW-Madison faculty. university has been kind of a sacred cow them hard to afford. “But particularly in the past year, it’s around here,” says Fitzgerald, chair of “Public universities are caught in gotten worse.” the legislature’s joint finance committee. this perfect storm” between a growing “Legislators seem to feel that the “They never really had to face scrutiny pile of demands on states and a national university is easy pickings right now, about how they were spending their appetite for tax cutting, says former UW and they’ve tended to pile on more than money. But when budgets got tight, the System president Katharine Lyall, now a necessary,” says Mark Bugher, director UW got thrown on the table.” scholar with the Carnegie Foundation. In of the University Research Park and a The pressure has been most acute a new book, The True Genius of America at former official in the administration of during the past decade, as Wisconsin’s Risk, Lyall and former UW System chief Tommy Thompson ’63, JD’66. “It’s not manufacturing-based economy stagnated budget officer Kathleen Sell PhD’95 that the university should be exempt and the state ran up a deficit that argue that these fiscal and political winds from criticism. But this kind of show- reached $1 billion in 2002. After small are causing “de facto privatization” of boating is really frustrating.” increases during the late 1990s, UW- America’s top public universities, making What’s changed? Observers point Madison’s state funding fell by nearly them look and operate less like publicly to the legislature’s shift in power from 10 percent from 2001 to 2004. When accountable institutions. Democrats to Republicans, as well as a special-purpose appropriations such as The authors note, for example, that general tide toward heightened partisan- building maintenance and utilities are state funding now accounts for only ship, as laying the groundwork for more factored out, in 2005 the state allocated about 8 percent of the University of adversarial relationships. Certainly, the $255.1 million to UW-Madison to sup- Virginia’s budget and less than 7 percent university’s past political fumbling also port the university’s core mission, slightly at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

This larger issue of accountability seems to underlie many of the recent squabbles between UW-Madison and state leaders. Most of the debates boil down to a simple question of control: to whom — and on what issues — is the university answerable? deserves some blame. Many legislators less than in 1995. Taxpayer money, “It is not realistic to expect that a world- remain chilled by the 2002 decision by which in the early 1970s accounted for class university can indefinitely continue the Board of Regents to freeze admis- nearly half of UW-Madison’s revenue, to raise its own funding, compete in the sions at all UW campuses in response to now funds only about 19 percent of the marketplace for top faculty, staff, and Republican-proposed budget cuts. Some university’s $2.1 billion annual operating students, but be accountable only to its Republicans were further irked that uni- budget. shrinking public investors,” Lyall says. versity officials seemed to make little fuss But the situation is not unique to This larger issue of accountability the following year, when Doyle, a Demo- Wisconsin. Confronted by many of the seems to underlie many of the recent crat, sliced the UW System’s funding by same budgetary quandaries, many other squabbles between UW-Madison and $250 million, the largest budget cut in states have rolled back commitments to state leaders. Most of the debates boil

24 ON WISCONSIN down to a simple question of control: hard on the university when it does not accessible and affordable education. to whom — and on what issues — is appear to be serving the public good. “Virtually every state in the nation the university answerable? Some legislators argue that the uni- has these kinds of issues, and those The dynamics of privatization exist versity is dismissive of voter concerns on things will tend to ebb and flow,” says at UW-Madison, as well. From 1995 to social issues, such as stem-cell research Aims McGuinness, a scholar for the 2004, while state funding crept up by 13 and protecting students’ moral and National Center for Higher Education percent, the university’s overall budget religious freedoms. State representative Management Systems. “The real ques- grew by 68 percent. Its endowment more Daniel LeMathieu was furious that a tion is, can legislators and the university

“Virtually every state in the nation has these kinds of issues, and those things will tend to ebb and flow. The real question is, can legislators and the university come together and work toward a common purpose?” than tripled, and it ranked among the top UW-Madison student health clinic ran come together and work toward a three public universities in the amount of ads in campus newspapers just before common purpose?” research grant money brought into the spring break last year that reminded stu- McGuinness, who advises states university by faculty. To some, the fact dents to get prescriptions for the morn- on how to retool their partnerships with that the state is no longer the prime source ing-after pill. Saying that the ads showed universities, says the fundamental prob- of funding entitles it to have less say in how “public universities are out of touch lem facing Wisconsin is that manufactur- how the university conducts its business. with average Americans,” he quickly ing-based economies don’t have good “It’s one thing to be told what to do introduced a bill, which has passed one prospects for long-term growth. “Unless if the state is providing 50 percent of the house of the legislature, that would pro- the economy is revitalized, state revenues overall support for the university, but it’s hibit university health clinics from dis- are going to continue to be stretched,” another when that support is below 20 pensing the form of birth control, which he says. “Really, the conversation needs percent,” says Bugher. “At some point, he considers “chemical abortion.” to be about the role that the university you have to ask, ‘Does the legislature In another extreme example, Democ- plays in the future of the state.” deserve to have a role?’ ” ratic representative Marlin Schneider Leaders at both ends of State Street But to others, those statistics rein- MS’79, a longtime critic of the university recognize the need to focus on the UW’s force fears that UW-Madison is growing who once derided it as being full of role as an economic engine, if for no to look more like a private commodity. “white-wine-drinking, quiche eaters,” last other reason than that making the state Because research grants and private gifts year introduced legislation that would wealthier would ultimately help bring are usually designated for specific pur- mandate, among other things, a maximum more money to the university, as well. poses, the university has supported its weight for textbooks and where parents Sheila Harsdorf, who represents a dis- core educational mission as state money can park during move-in. Although his trict in western Wisconsin along the has waned largely by transferring costs to so-called student bill of rights never came Minnesota border, notes that people in students. Tuition for in-state students has to a vote, it struck some around the uni- the Badger state earn on average four more than doubled in the past decade, up versity as a sign that there were no limits thousand dollars a year less than their nearly 66 percent from 2000 alone. to legislative pestering. neighbors to the west. “That’s an issue As much as Wisconsinites may like In all of these discussions, there is we have to consider when we look at the the fact that UW-Madison is a world- a tension between public accountability affordability of the System, but we also renowned research institution, public- and micromanagement that can jeopard- need to recognize the role the university opinion surveys have consistently shown ize both the university and the state. can play in addressing this situation by that what they value most about the UW Move too much in one direction, and attracting higher-paying jobs,” she says. System is its mission to educate state citi- states infringe on universities’ ability to To accomplish those goals, a few zens. Rising tuition, along with increased be flexible and to capitalize on new fund- states are moving away from the tradi- competition for admission on most UW ing opportunities that can leverage the tional ways public universities have been campuses, is shutting more families out state’s investment. Move too much in the managed. In North Dakota, for example, of the system, and legislators sense that other, and public universities may begin state government has put $50 million into there is more willingness to come down to drift away from their commitments to the creation of university-run innovation Continued on page 61

SPRING 2006 25 The Year of Unfortunate Events those meetings have gone over well with known for his love of numbers, can rattle Continued from page 25 representatives, who complained that off a dozen benchmarks that indicate that centers, which work to translate univer- they lacked personal contact with univer- things may not be as bad as they seem. sity ideas into new business for the state. sity leaders in the past. “When I look at the data,” he says, “we’ve Virginia and Florida are among the states “I have seen President Reilly and never been in better shape in almost every that have taken steps to loosen regula- the chancellor more in the past year than dimension of our activities.” tions on their public universities, freeing ever before,” says state senator Fitzger- But even the university’s leaders have them from costly reporting requirements ald. “That’s a positive sign.” tended to zero in on the outliers. They while also creating incentives for achiev- Jack O’Meara, citing concerns about were reminded of how much the person- ing specific public goals. The trend is to morale among faculty, is somewhat more nel matters had come to dominate their use budgets less to punish universities guarded in his optimism. “My hope is vision late in the year, when they gath- for doing something wrong, and more to that we can start to turn the corner, but ered for a regular monthly meeting to reward them for doing something right. I think the key is that everybody needs discuss the university’s public relations. That’s something that McGuinness to realize the importance of the univer- Most of them, showing the wear of doesn’t see in Wisconsin, which he says sity to the state and its future economy. months of trench warfare during the uni- appears to be stuck in a position of The legislature certainly has the right versity’s various legislative battles, were demanding hyper-accountability on to criticize the university, but too much decidedly gloomy about the university’s administrative minutiae, while paying of this back and forth will eventually prospects. The sole exception was UW relatively little attention to bigger issues, hurt the university.” Foundation president Andrew Wilcox, such as how the state can continue As brutal as the year was, however, the chief architect of UW-Madison’s to afford a sustainable level of public it may ultimately prove to have been ongoing capital campaign.

“The key is everybody needs to realize the importance of the univer- sity to the state and its future economy. The legislature certainly has the right to criticize the university, but too much of this back and forth will eventually hurt the university.” support for its universities. more embarrassing than damaging. The How many reasons did he have to “The debate seems to be about a lot general sentiment, as Representative be happy? About 1.5 billion of them. of peripheral issues,” he says. “Histori- Gard says, is that “the university took a Despite the university’s political prob- cally, Wisconsin recognized way before hit, but not a lethal one.” lems last year, Wilcox reported that other places how important the univer- “Most people around here are pulling donors gave more than $194 million in sity was to the future of the state. But for them. I don’t think that’s always 2005, up 20 percent from the previous right now, I would have to say that you understood — the vast majority of peo- year, and more than enough to exceed are falling behind.” ple in the legislature will do what they the campaign’s $1.5 billion goal. can to help,” he says. “Those folks don’t Wilcox does not suggest that the necessarily get quoted in the paper as UW’s undeterred success in fund raising THERE ARE SIGNS THAT WISCONSIN IS often. The detractors get a lot more ink.” should supplant concerns about future regaining its footing. Legislators and uni- The lasting legacy of 2005 may be state budgets. It does, however, offer a versity officials indicate willingness to the power of bad news to trump good. lesson in perspective. move past the injuries of 2005 and find While its personnel issues dominated local “Around the university, we tend to more constructive ways to work together headlines, UW-Madison was otherwise internalize a lot of things that we ought in the future. UW System president ticking off a quietly productive year, one to just get over,” Wilcox says. “We all Kevin Reilly, Chancellor Wiley, and that contained many stories less salacious, make mistakes, and most of the time, members of the Board of Regents have but perhaps no less important, than those people will forgive you. They might not made the rounds with legislators of both crises. Graduation rates are near 80 per- forget, but they do forgive.” parties to pledge their commitment to cent, a high-water mark for the modern avoiding the kind of messy public spats era. The average time it takes students to Michael Penn MA’97 is senior editor of On that erupted last year. From all signs, earn a degree is at an all-time low. Wiley, Wisconsin.

26 ON WISCONSIN THE 0157:H7 STRAIN OF E. COLI BACTERIA ESCHERICHIA SEM X25000 GAUGLER/VISUALS UNLIMITED GARY

26 ON WISCONSIN or a long time, bugs were bad. already billions of E. coli bacteria living slaughter bugs indiscriminately with They caused tetanus, cholera, happily inside the human intestine. If those germ-killing cleansers — is that tuberculosis, and a host of other they weren’t there, producing vitamin K science can learn more about how life diseases. About 150 years ago, for your body, your blood would not clot, works by studying its relationships, Fmicrobiologists began waging war and you would bleed to death. rather than its individuals. against bacteria, leading to some of the The idea that organisms often live Symbiosis — which includes most enduring triumphs of medicine: life- and work together, which scientists call mutualism, where both parties benefit, saving vaccines and antibiotics that symbiosis, isn’t new. But for generations, and parasitism, where one party benefits steeled our bodies’ defenses to attacks biologists didn’t really have the tools to at the expense of the other — represents a from the inside. In their quest to out- deal with life’s complexity; they were departure from the rugged individualist’s smart or outright kill unwelcome guests forced to isolate organisms and study view of biology, which says we’re all — including bacteria, fungi, and viruses them one by one. Technological evolu- competing to survive. Jo Handelsman — doctors also engendered the notion tion in the life sciences has changed all PhD’84, a professor of plant pathology that the road to health passed through that, and that’s led to a flurry of activity and an impassioned advocate for the a graveyard of microbes, breeding a surrounding the science of symbiosis. study of symbiosis, describes it as “the century-long epidemic of bacto-phobia At UW-Madison, dozens of faculty idea of conversation, not combat.” that led to those colonies of antibacterial from around the life sciences have begun In biology, as in marriage, under- soaps and cleansers. to probe more deeply into the relation- standing how parties communicate is the Guess what? They were wrong, or ships between organisms. What they’re key to understanding any relationship, at the very least, not entirely right. finding is that symbiosis is a whole lot she argues. “There is a much finer line The notion that bugs are bad is as more complex — and a whole lot more between a mutually beneficial relation- simple as it is misleading. Without interesting — than we ever imagined. ship and a pathological one than we nor- bacteria and fungi, life wouldn’t be just mally believe. On the one hand, you have nasty, brutish, and short. Life — at least, It Takes a Village a relationship between two organisms human life — would not be possible. that are talking, cooperating, and on the Bacteria did just fine without us for sev- The symbiotic revolution reflects a other, something has gone wrong. It’s eral billion years, but we could not live a growing realization that life is a matter probably a conversation that has gotten minute without them. of context. Even particularly malevolent out of hand.” Consider the numbers: a healthy per- bacteria can be quite useful given the Researchers are beginning to under- son hosts about 2,300 species of bacteria. right surroundings. Some animals are able stand just how intricate those relation- In most bodies, bacterial cells outnumber to detect the type and number of microbes ships can be. In the UW’s bacteriology human cells by ten to one. Almost all are nearby and select which ones they want department, associate professor Heidi harmless, and many are helpful, even to keep around. Similarly, plants that Goodrich-Blair studies a soil-dwelling crucial. Take the bacterium E. coli: while depend on certain bacteria and fungi many people probably think of E. coli as nourish those microbes, but not others. Facing page: Despite their well-known nasty streak, E. coli bacteria live and thrive in the a harmful agent that enters the body The upshot — beyond just that human intestine, helping our bodies produce through contaminated meat, there are maybe it’s not such a good idea to vitamins that are essential to our survival.

SPRING 2006 27 ILA ORMEROD WILLIAM nematode — a tiny, simple cross-disciplinary teams of worm — that has a com- faculty who work collabo- plex relationship with a ratively on emerging areas particular bacterium. that don’t neatly fit into any Together, the two organ- one department. Symbiosis isms form a killing is a prime example. machine. After the worm “There has been an enters an insect, it releases interest in symbiosis all the bacteria, which over- along,” says Goodrich- whelm the insect’s primi- Blair, “but we have estab- tive immune system and lished a larger group cause death. The six- through the cluster hiring legger becomes dinner for initiative.” the nematode, which after Together with bacteri- eating collects the bacteria ologist Katrina Forest, and stores them in a Goodrich-Blair wrote a specially made pouch. proposal to hire three sym- For biologists, that biosis researchers, and the nifty system is full of ques- College of Agricultural In the Hawaiian bobtail squid, the same bacterial toxin that causes whooping tions that go to the heart cough and gonorrhea in humans is responsible for the development of vital and Life Sciences funded of understanding how organs, which suggests to scientists that bacteria aren’t universally good or a fourth position. Along symbiosis works: What bad, but that their behavior depends significantly on their surroundings. with several like-minded tells the bacteria to leave colleagues already on cam- the nematode? How do they shut down pus, those new professors — Margaret the insect’s immune system? How do “Like any other McFall-Ngai, Edward Ruby, Cameron they know to come home after dinner? friendship, it’s got to be Currie, and Jean-Michel Ané — are cre- It’s also a good model of what ating a symbiosis on symbiosis, which scientists call “species specificity.” This reinforced at a number promises to help unravel the chemical nematode is not interested in any old of points, before you communication that greases the coopera- bacterium, but how does it tell one tion of species big and small. species from another? lower your guard. McFall-Ngai and Ruby are studying Apparently, it recognizes proteins on And there is no greater a tiny Pacific Ocean squid, which the outside of the bacteria. These pro- employs a type of bacterial flashlight teins, like all others, are made by genes, lowering of your for survival. The Hawaiian bobtail squid and Goodrich-Blair has now identified lives in deep, dark water, where predators three genes in the mutualistic bacterium guard than opening look up to see the shadows of prey that seem to allow it, and only it, to colo- your tissue.” against the bright sea surface. With nize the nematode. When she transferred the help of glowing bacteria, the squid the same genes to different bacteria, they, becomes effectively invisible to predators studying life that requires more coordina- too, were acceptable to the worm. below. But if you’re a squid, how do you tion among experts on various types of “That’s exciting,” says Goodrich- know to lease your premises only to light- organisms. UW-Madison’s efforts in the Blair. “We have identified a set of genes emitting bacteria, and how do you keep field have gotten an assist from the univer- of unknown function that have the the right number of bacteria around? sity’s “cluster hire” program, which allows ability to expand the host range.” You do it with chemical signals, says for the hiring of But symbiosis isn’t just a new way of McFall-Ngai, a zoologist who has been looking at biology — it’s an entirely enthralled with this symbiosis for more different approach to than a decade. “The symbiont and the host have to say the right thing; it’s a very complex dialogue in time and space over forty-eight hours. If the dialogue fails, the host gets rid of the symbiont.” The nematode, a simple worm, practices a not-so- One thing the squid wants to know simple form of symbiosis to earn its dinner, pro- viding a home for a fleet of insect-killing bacteria is whether the bacteria, members of the that it releases at meal time. genus Vibrio, make light, since there is no

28 ON WISCONSIN point in offering housing to “dark too, he says. “They have a specific behav- of gypsy moths and cabbage white butter- mutants,” says McFall-Ngai. In experi- ior to detect and remove the parasite, to flies, where four to twelve species of bac- ments, the squid ejects these slackers weed it out of the fungal garden.” teria coexist in a complex symbiosis. within thirty-six hours, she says. “The Currie then discovered that the ants Using the techniques of molecular biology host says, you’re outta here; somehow also harbor a bacterium that kills the and genetics, she will seek to document they can perceive that an individual fungal parasites, and in 1999, he pub- and explain the entire micro-ecosystem bacterium is not doing its job.” lished papers describing “four completely operating inside the insects. Ruby, in the medical microbiology connected, coevolved organisms” that Handelsman sees the insect gut as and immunology department, studies the cannot live independently and which her scientific fate. “We want to describe other half of the equation — the bacterial apparently evolved 50 to 65 million years everybody there, every part of the net- flashlight. “It’s looking more, as time work, how they communicate, and goes by, that it’s not a single magic which are competitors, which are JEFF MILLER key that allows you to start living with cooperators, and under what circum- your host,” he says. “Like any other stances,” she says. Such a project is friendship, it’s got to be reinforced at a likely impossible for the human gut, number of points, before you lower which is home to about one thousand your guard. And there is no greater microbial species, but Handelsman lowering of your guard than opening says moths are “very much within your tissue.” reach in my lifetime.” Once identified, these signals The work tackles many ecological should be useful to traditional, germ- issues, such as how and why microbes fighting microbiologists, because invade their hosts and what makes pathogens “probably use some of the communities robust enough to resist same passwords to get in and attack attack. One fundamental question is an unsuspecting host,” Ruby adds. whether an ecosystem with a few Perhaps the most amazing aspect species is easier to invade than one of the squid system, however, is the with many. In a recent experiment, identity of the bacterial molecule that Handelsman found that a moth treated tells the squid to make a pouch for the with antibiotics was more susceptible bacteria. Called TCT, it’s a toxin made to invasions, supporting decades-old by other Vibrio bacteria, which cause claims of natural healers, who say that cholera and gonorrhea. The idea that foods such as yogurt restore beneficial a single molecule could be directing a bacteria in the gut. mutually beneficial relationship on the There is further evidence that our one hand and a parasitic relationship internal microbial soup promotes on the other returns to Handelsman’s Growing microorganisms such as these soil- health. UW-Madison surgery profes- based bacteria in the controlled environment picture of symbiosis as a conversation. of a Petri dish is one of the most common sor Kenneth Kudsk ’71 has found that Could pathogenic activity be the result ways researchers study the diversity of life, hospital patients get fewer infections but it’s also a limited view. Biologists esti- when fed through a tube directly into the of normal conversation that somehow mate that less than 1 percent of the bacteria degenerates into an argument? that live in soil can be cultured in the lab, small intestine, rather than through an suggesting that life interacts in countless intravenous tube. The intestine is a major ways that we have yet to observe. source of antibodies, used by the immune We’re in This Gut Together system to defeat pathogens, and feeding Even the normal conversations defy easy ago. Overall, says Currie, the system is a helps the intestine produce them. But it explanation. Biologists have long been fas- “great example of evolutionary innova- also seems to tame intestinal bacteria, cinated by the symbiosis between ants and tion through symbiosis.” Rather than try which tend to get nasty when they’re the fungal gardens they grow for food, for to deal with the disease by evolving an hungry. instance, but Cameron Currie, an assistant ability to produce their own antibiotic — “As long as we keep eating, and keep professor of bacteriology, has found evi- an ant-biotic, perhaps? — the ants them fed, they are happy,” says Kudsk. dence that the relationship is a lot more formed an alliance with some microbes “But when we can’t eat, your immune complicated than it appears. A few years whose skills proved useful. system is down-regulated, and bacteria back, Currie noticed that a parasitic fun- Jumping ahead in the degree of com- appear to get more aggressive. It sets up gus was eating one of the fungal gardens plexity, Handelsman has embarked on a an opportunity for bacteria to invade.” tended by ants in his lab. The ants noticed long-term study of the intestinal ecology

SPRING 2006 29 Studies consistently show that intes- Rhizobia, a group of bacteria that help than four hundred varieties of bacterial tinal feeding cuts the rate of pneumonia plants grab nitrogen from the air. There’s residents, and thousands may live in the in hospital patients from about 31 per- a similar process going on underfoot, average clump of soil. And this is why cent when intravenous feeding is used to where fungi known as mycorhizzae take science is just now catching up with the 12 percent, says Kudsk. Since he first up residence on plant roots and help idea of life in context. Traditionally, noticed this benefit of feeding through a them absorb nutrients from the soil. microbiologists isolated organisms to tube more than twenty years ago, most Jean-Michel Ané, an assistant professor study them in the lab, but in the real hospitals have changed their practices of agronomy who studies both processes, world, microbes are usually found in and now use intravenous feeding only says about 70 percent of plant species groups containing dozens or hundreds of when the patient’s condition prevents host the mycorhizzae, and that the fungi species. The sheer complexity of all feeding directly into the intestine. probably helped plants colonize land those interacting genes was just too As the hospital story illustrates, a about 460 million years ago. Surpris- much for the old techniques to handle. parasite is not always a parasite. That’s ingly, he has found three plant genes that And by the time you sort it all out, something that Caitilyn Allen, a profes- are essential to both symbioses, even things may well have changed. That’s sor of plant pathology, has found in her though the plant-mycorhizzae relation- what life does — it responds to the life studies of a bacterial wilt that affects a ship predates nitrogen-fixing bacteria by around it. wide variety of plants. The wilt can be some 400 million years. Even in the earliest stages of multi- so devastating that some strains are But beyond their overlapping genet- cellular life — during the blooming deemed a “select pathogen” by the ics, the two processes reveal something Cambrian period, some 540 million Department of Homeland Security, else about how microbes have changed years ago — microbes were around to based on their potential for use in bio- the structure of plants. Several former influence the process. The oceans were logical weapons. UW researchers have studied how teeming with bacteria, viruses, and fungi Usually, bacterial wilt attacks a chemical signals from Rhizobia trigger — simple organisms that had already plant’s connective tissue, making it look plants to make enlargements called nod- been evolving for more than two and a parched. But that’s not always what hap- ules on their roots, which become home half billion years. The question of how pens, Allen says. “The wilt can be to the bacteria. Ané thinks the older these neighbors affected the complex life around but cause no trouble. In gerani- mycorhizzal symbiosis also may have that evolved in their midst has gotten far ums, it almost never causes symptoms, altered plants earlier in its evolution. less attention than, say, the chemistry of even when the population is just as high “Roots as we know them are the per- the atmosphere or the acidity of the as in sick tomato plants,” she says. fect hosts for fungal symbionts,” he says. ocean. Yet when it came to shaping evo- How does a geranium survive an In other words, those little root hairs lution, McFall-Ngai insists, “The living infection that would kill a tomato? “My you see all over the place may have context was at least as important as the understanding is that the bacteria pro- evolved specifically to house fungi that dead context.” duce something that in the tomato elicits help the plant eat. The reality of evolution is that we a violent response from the self-defense Roots aren’t the only indication that are ourselves symbiotic beings, not system, so the tomato seizes up, wilts, plants have been redesigned by symbio- nearly so independent as we might imag- and dies, while the geranium is able to sis. Scientists have long known that ine. From the mitochondria in our cells put up with the population surge with- chloroplasts, the cell components that to the countless bacteria in our guts, we out trouble,” says Allen. convert sunlight into chemical energy, rely on other organisms. True, we battle In other words, the disease is actu- probably descended from independent- some pathogens, but we give a home to ally an interaction of bacteria and plant. living bacteria. Similarly, the mitochon- others that help our survival. As “You can’t really say who did it. They dria — microscopic bodies that process Goodrich-Blair says, “All higher organ- did it together,” says Allen. “It’s like a energy in animal cells — contain their isms evolved in the presence of divorce: you can never go back to say it’s own DNA because they, too, once were microbes, not the other way around. We one person’s fault.” separate organisms. Both chloroplasts developed some mechanisms, like the and mitochondria, therefore, could rep- immune system, to cope with the sea of The Host with the Most resent the product of a symbiosis that microbes. And we developed other went so swimmingly that the single- mechanisms to take advantage of Once you start looking, it’s hard to exag- celled cooperators were invited inside microbes: to give them a home and get gerate the importance of symbiotic rela- the host — permanently. them to do us some favors.” tionships between plants and microbes. These symbiotic relationships are lit-

Farmers who grow soybeans and erally all around us. The human mouth, David Tenenbaum MA’86 covers science regularly alfalfa, for example, know the value of according to new estimates, has more for the Why Files (www.whyfiles.org).

30 ON WISCONSIN RADLUND PHOTOGRAPHY/MARK AMBROSE; PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY EARL MADDEN EARL BY ILLUSTRATION PHOTO AMBROSE; PHOTOGRAPHY/MARK RADLUND

Just when ya t’ink ya’ve herd it all... Peter and Lou Berryman have made a career of spoofing the city and state they love.

Peter x’69 and Lou ’77 Berryman know what “He had a brat fry tailgate party out in the it’s like to be living, breathing, singing sou- parking lot,’’ Lou says. “He set up a little cor- By Susan Lampert venirs of your college experience. ner of Wisconsin in the middle of California.” Smith ’82 They’ll be playing somewhere on the After the shows, some of the Badgers usu- national folk circuit, maybe Ann Arbor or ally stick around, and they often have similar Ithaca or Berkeley, they’ll look out in the audi- questions for the duo. So similar, in fact, that ence, and there are middle-aged people wearing the Berrymans have a song about it. Here’s the red Wisconsin sweatshirts, and singing along. refrain: “People from the UW graduate, go all So how’s old Madison, Wisconsin? around the country, and seem to wind up living Is that Paul Soglin still the mayor? in these college towns,’’ says Peter. Lou, his And is Rennebohm’s expanding? wife for a few years while they were in their Is the Club de Wash still there? twenties, and his music partner for many more I used to sit out on the Terrace years than that, remembered a show in Davis, and watch my grade point disappear. California, where a UW-Madison graduate For the life of me, I don’t know went the extra mile. how I wound up here.

30 ON WISCONSIN If you’ve been to Madison recently, you Cheese & Beer & Snow know that Soglin has joined the corpo- r and cheese rate world, Rennebohm’s sold out to Lunch and cheese and dinne nd cheese Walgreen’s long ago, and, sadly, the Fall and cheese and winter a nd cheese Club de Wash burned down a decade Chips and cheese and jerky a nd cheese ago. But the Berrymans? The Berry- Nuts and cheese and turkey a nd peas mans, who turn fifty-nine this year, are Cheese with pies and peppers a still going strong. You may have grown Snow and beer and cheese up and moved away, but it looks like and snow these ultimate children of the 1960s may Cheese and snow and hockey nd snow never have to. Cows and snow, Milwaukee a They’re still writing and singing and snow Boots and snow and dripping their weirdly eccentric songs, ranging d snow Ice and snow and slipping an from the one that warns “I don’t want to on’t go Wind and snow, a car that w hear you use that F-word with your Beer and cheese and snow mother,’’ to another about painting the living room while worrying about envi- nd beer Snow and beer and bowling a ronmental tragedy. And then there are nd beer Golf and beer and trolling a their anthems about the strangeness of g and beer School and beer and sleddin life in Wisconsin. A new one, “Dem g and beer Love and beer and a weddin Deer,” is about watching the roads for ere Cold beer here, getcher beer h Wisconsin’s whitetail menace, and it’s as Cheese and snow and beer likely to get stuck in your head as oldies such as “Up in Wisconsin.” ck Slush and ale and Monterey ja The Berrymans’ road to modest, six pack Flakes and brie and a cheap Midwestern-size fame and fortune has of good suds Drifts and curds and a head enough weird twists and turns to give of Buds Cheese whiz ice and a couple them material for another album or two. s All keeps well at thirty degree Along the way, they’ve been the subject Snow and beer and cheese of a folk song that made it to number one in Canada and have sung from the ©1988 Lou and Peter Berryman mouth of a giant fiberglass musky in a commercial for Wisconsin tourism. They’ve written lyrics for a musical, Love is the Weirdest of All, and had one of tion, he didn’t support the war. Lou says they mainly lived in Vancouver, where their songs recorded by Mojo Nixon that being drafted prompted both their Peter did graphic arts and Lou was a and Jello Biafra of Dead Kennedys early marriage at age twenty and their weaver. fame. decision to drop out of the UW and As they were getting ready to come Their story begins in the early head to Canada. home from Canada, a friend, Craig 1960s, in Wisconsin’s Fox River Valley, “We left after his physical and Wood, wrote a song called “Peter and or, as the Berrymans have renamed it in before they came to get him,’’ she Lou” as a farewell. Later, it was a song, “Squirrelly Valley.” They met in recalls. “I, of course, wanted to go with recorded by a Canadian folk singer high school in Appleton. Their first him, and we stood a much better chance named Valdy, and their tribute song hit group was a jug band with the very of gaining entry [to Canada] as a mar- the top of the Canadian charts. (In the folksy name Town Council Morning ried couple.’’ mid-1970s, Valdy was second only to Valley Craftsmen. It was there, during what Peter Gordon Lightfoot in the Canadian They moved to Madison and began describes as “a five-year Canadian music world.) studying at the UW — Lou as a music odyssey,” that they first began perform- “Friends would write to us from major and Peter as an art major. But the ing regularly, at a wrong-side-of-the- Canada and say, ‘There’s this song that war in Vietnam was in full gear. Peter tracks railroad hotel in London, sounds like it’s about you,’ ” Lou says. was drafted and had his military physi- Ontario, which may have foreshadowed Decades later, the Berrymans, Valdy, cal, but like many men of his genera- their later gig at the Club de Wash. But and Wood all wound up at a folk festival

SPRING 2006 31 GARY KNOWLES

The Berrymans got their first break when they started playing regular gigs at the Club de Wash in the old Hotel Washington in the late seventies. For years, they charged a twenty-five-cent cover. Once they had proved that patrons would frequent the venerable dive, the club became the venue for other musicians such as Paul Black and Free Hot Lunch. This photo became the cover of the Berrymans’ first album, Lou and Peter Berryman, No Relation. Peter says they still run into people featured in the photo, and there is talk of one day having an “audience reunion.” in Nova Scotia, where they presented a mans got together at Lou and Mark Scheel, was a wildly eclectic collection workshop on the song and its history. Hodgson’s home to talk about their of low-cost rooming, clubs, and office But while the Berrymans lived on as unique career. The couple’s home has a space. (Isthmus, Madison’s alternative a couple in Canadian folk music, they view of Lake Mendota and is across the weekly, had some of its first offices divorced after returning to Madison in street from Congresswoman Tammy there.) Each venue had a unique per- 1973, then formed their duo, Peter and Baldwin JD’89’s restored lakefront Vic- sonality: the Barber’s Closet, with its Lou Berryman, No Relation. torian. As Peter talked, Lou hauled out secret entry and ice cream drinks, was While people have expressed amaze- a souvenir of their first paying gig in the ultimate first-date bar. Unless, of ment that a divorced couple can spend Madison, playing at the World Dairy course, you preferred Rod’s, a region- thirty-plus years as a successful perform- Expo on a stage made from half a silo. ally known gay bar in the basement. ing duo, the Berrymans don’t see it as There, they met fellow folk singer Pat The hotel also housed the Cafe Palms, a odd at all. Maybe it’s better to view their MacDonald, who became a longtime spot for late night dining popular with marriage as the aberration in a lifelong friend, and won a trophy inscribed restaurant workers, and the New Bar, a friendship. Both have long since remar- “First Place, Silo Singing.” dance club. ried, Peter to Kristi Seifert ’70, a veteri- But their real break came in Novem- And then there was the Club de nary technician, and Lou to Mark ber 1977, when a bartender friend got Wash, which can nicely be described as Hodgson, a computer programmer. Both them a gig at the Club de Wash. a dive. It smelled of antiseptic cleaning couples live on Madison’s east side. In the 1970s, the Hotel Washington, products and boasted a clientele that On a blustery winter day, the Berry- owned by brothers Rodney and Greg ranged from UW students to railroad

32 ON WISCONSIN guys who still lived upstairs, even though the depot next door had long ago closed. Public Radio’s Michael Feldman ’70 hosted an early version of his radio show there, as did local writer George Vukelich. Because residents still lived upstairs, any music had to be acoustic. Rodney Scheel was skeptical that any- one would come to Club de Wash for music. But the Berrymans said they’d play for whatever they got at the door; for years they charged a cover of twenty-five cents. “You could see people outside at the door, trying to decide if they wanted to pay,’’ Peter remembers. “A whole bunch of people came. Rodney was The Berrymans, who tied the knot while they were still UW students, got divorced in 1973 and beside himself.” named their duo Peter and Lou Berryman, No Relation. Since then, they may have set a record Convinced of their appeal, Scheel for being the world’s longest-peforming, amicably divorced couple. “Yah Hey” refers to their roots in Wisconsin’s Fox River area, or “Squirrelly Valley,” where they met in Appleton as high loaned the Berrymans money for their school students. first album. The duo played a regular weekly gig at the Club de Wash from One odd twist in their career came have a waltz to the “Weyauwega Moon,” the late 1970s until about 1986, inaugu- in the mid-1990s, when they got a and a tribute to some of the often over- rating a place that would become a reg- phone call from Pat MacDonald (of looked benefits of Wisconsin winter — ular home to musicians ranging from Timbuk3 fame). Recalls Peter, he asked, the fact that “snow and beer and cheese, bluesman Paul Black to Free Hot “Didn’t you write, ‘Are You Drinking all keep well at thirty degrees.” Lunch. Folk singer Willy Porter started With Me Jesus?’ ” Indeed, Peter had Their song “The Limburger Ballad’’ his career there, and touring bands from written the anthem during the duo’s is about a standoff back in 1935 Soul Asylum to Smashing Pumpkins to early days, and it appeared on their first between a Wisconsin dairyman and an Alanis Morissette played there, too. album. MacDonald had heard a CD Iowa postmaster who refused to deliver “It was so cool how Rodney mixed recorded by Mojo Nixon and Jello his cheese on the grounds that it smelled up all those subcultures — gay, straight, Biafra, which attributed the song to an so awful. (We’re not making this up.) different races — and everyone got unknown writer. It turns out that some- And who else would sing about Ponia- along,’’ Peter says. one had handed Nixon the lyrics to the towski, the Wisconsin burg that’s: Looking back, the Hotel Washington Berrymans’ song at a concert in Min- Exactly half the way from the equator seems like a mirage, a 1970s experiment neapolis. Once Peter contacted him, he to the pole in true multicultural entertainment. says, Nixon was very gracious. A quarter of the way around the Rodney Scheel died of AIDS in 1990, “He conceded all the copyright to planet as a whole and the hotel burned down, the victim of us,’’ Peter says. “To this day, we still get It’s very hard to find it on a map a smoldering cigarette, on a bitter Feb- royalties from it.” All that for a tune that of county roads ruary night in 1996. Peter described to Acoustic Guitar maga- Ridiculously easy on a four-inch globe. By then, the Berrymans had long zine as a “sophomoric bar song” that since left their spiritual home. Since the they almost never perform anymore, James Leary, professor of folklore mid-1980s, they’ve toured on the because, says Lou, “We don’t want to at Wisconsin and the author of a book national folk circuit. They’ve appeared offend anyone.” on Wisconsin folk humor, is one of the on Prairie Home Companion three times, “It’s such a strange story that maybe Berrymans’ fans. and opened for national folk stars such we should write a song about that “They’re really funny,’’ Leary says. as Tom Paxton. They’re also regulars at song,’’ muses Peter. “They’re very grounded and don’t pre- festivals ranging from the Philadelphia While the Berrymans’ sense of tend to be from anywhere else. They Folk Festival to the Big Muddy Folk humor is gentle, their appreciation for have broad appeal in the same way a Festival in Missouri to the Funny Songs the quirks and strangeness of Wisconsin folk singer from Tennessee who evokes Festival in Cambridge, Massachusetts. is what makes their music special. They Continued on page 57

SPRING 2006 33 Peter and Lou Your State’s Name Here Continued from page 33 lown by the breeze Sometimes when the grass is b the mountains does.” leaves of the trees There’s a far away look in the Leary, who used to co-host the ingly clear A memory returns heartbreak Down Home Dairy Land show on public state’s name here) Of a place I call home, (your radio, says that the Berrymans have lasted so long because they’re also good ter so clear No sky could be deeper, no wa promoters and entrepreneurs. They sell our state’s name here) As back in the meadows of (y their CDs through their Web site. And I don’t know when I’m gonna go back although Lou’s dining room table is filled with our state’s name again) There’s no other place like (y correspondence on their latest venture: renting scripts of their CHORUS: h, (again) what a state Oh, (your state’s name here), o musical, Love is the Weirdest of All, to reasonable date) I have not been back since (a theater groups. rows soft in July every year Where the asphalt g ) All this, plus traveling the country to gs of (your state’s name here In the warm summer mornin perform, has allowed the Berrymans to turn on the game achieve a long-lost goal of much of the My grampa would come and ur local beer’s name) sixties generation: they never had to sell And fall asleep drinking (yo the garden for hours out or get a day job. And while others While gramma would sing in igenous flowers) their age may have climbed the corpo- To all of (the names of ind rate ladder only to be shoved off, the somewhat obscure The songs that she sang were Berrymans have created a career with wnspeople I’m sure She learned from the local to true job security. ery clear The language they use is not v “This is the kind of gig you can ight here) Like (place a colloquialism r maintain forever,’’ Lou says. “If your e state songbird) sings looks go to hell, or your voice does, I’d love to wake up where (th names of some things) that’s okay. Old folk singers are sup- Where they manufacture (the ker so clear posed to look and sound that way.” Like there on the bumper, a stic en (your state’s name here) Actually, the Berrymans still look and An “I”, then a heart, and th y ear sound pretty darn good. They sold out a Whisper it soft, it’s a song to m state’s name here) performance on New Year’s Eve 2005, a (Your state’s name here, your ere I’ll grow old rare Madison show to raise money for the It’s there I was born and it’s th rches of gold. Atwood Community Center. Peter By the rivers of blue and the a reported to the crowd that one of their tunes, “Wonderful Madison,” is up for ©1988 Lou and Peter Berryman consideration as the city’s official song, which will be named this year to celebrate Madison’s 150th birthday. It’s ironic, he Oh Wonderful Madison mother of cities Unless, that is, you’re content with told the crowd, because he’d written it Queen of all Dairyland, waiting for me reliving the experience via a Berryman “teasing the jingoism of city promotions.” Wonderful Madison, jewel of Wisconsin concert and a beer, beside the clear But, like nearly everything the With more than one high school waters of [your state’s name here]. Berrymans perform, “Wonderful Madi- and cable TV son” is pretty funny and appeals to the Susan Lampert Smith ‘82 attended her first Lou never-graduating university student Hard working mother you lion of business and Peter Berryman show at the Club de Wash as inside all of us: From Shopko to Oscar’s and all through a UW-Madison student in the late 1970s. She often the Isthmus quotes their lyrics in her Wisconsin State Journal She wears her lakes like a diamond tiara column, because they describe life “Up in Wiscon- Her necklace is known as the mighty Yahara But if getting a job doesn’t seem to sin” better than anyone. Around her the Beltline is draped be prudent You can take out a loan and return For more information about Peter and like a garland Lou Berryman, visit their Web site at And brings in commuters from way as a student. http://members.aol.com/berrymanp/index.html. past McFarland

34 ON WISCONSIN ©JOHN PACK/IMAGES.COM

THE ARCHITECT OF SOCIAL SECURITY Social Security isn’t just the federal government’s most important domestic program; it’s also the most far-reaching result of the Wisconsin Idea, a unique product of the UW’s economic doctrine, the state’s progressive politics, and a professor named Edwin Witte.

BY JOHN ALLEN Paul Ryan is on the run. “I can only talk for about six minutes,” he told me over the phone in early December. “This is a very busy time.” Ryan represents Wisconsin’s first district in Congress, where he sits on the House’s powerful Ways and Means Committee. In December, the House of Representatives was working feverishly to tie up its end-of-year business: tax cuts, spending cuts, appropriations. The Ways and Means Committee was at the center of all that activity. “I’m sorry about the brevity,” Ryan said. He’s terse, but not irritable — though he certainly had cause for irritation. For if Ryan was on the run, his prize bill wasn’t. That bill, H.R. 1776, is a 127-page document with a straightforward, if pedestrian, title: “To reform Social Security by establishing a Personal Social Security Savings Program and to provide new limitations on the Federal Budget.” It’s Ryan’s attempt to address the looming shortfall in the national retirement fund by diverting a portion of the Social Security tax into private accounts.

34 ON WISCONSIN PHOTOS COURTESY OF UW-MADISON ARCHIVES (3) PHOTOS COURTESY

Social Security “is the most impor- the grandson of Edwin Witte ’09, tant program we have in the federal gov- PhD’21, the longtime chair of the UW’s ernment,” he said. “It’s the largest tax economics department and the man for the majority of workers in America, whom the Social Security Administration [and] it prevents most people from going refers to as “the father of the Social into poverty in old age.” And, he warns, Security Act,” though John Witte says it’s going broke — slowly, but inevitably. his grandfather “never used or even He believes his reform package could not acknowledged that title.” He maintains only save the program, but offer people that his grandfather had a particular the chance to better their station in life. vision for Social Security, and that vision “Right now, half of American workers didn’t include personal accounts or pri- are investors,” he says. “That means the vate investment. “My grandfather meant other half aren’t. We can make everyone for Social Security to be conservative,” he a member of the investor class.” says. “It’s a rock, and you need a rock.” Last April, when Ryan introduced H.R. 1776, it seemed to have a bright future. President George Bush, fresh off his particular rock is likely to re-election, had called for such a plan dominate American finance in his State of the Union Address — it Tfor the next century, but it’s would, he’d said, be the major domestic also a relic, a direct outgrowth focus of his second term. But the public of the Wisconsin Idea when it was at the never really got on board. Throughout peak of its influence. In the early decades 2005, AP polls showed opposition to pri- of the twentieth century, the university vatization plans running at about 60 per- brought together a unique blend of per- cent. By the end of the year, Bush seemed sonalities, theory, and politics, and Social to have given up on the plan, talking of “a Security, which John Witte calls “the diminished appetite in the country” for most important piece of American legis- altering Social Security. Ryan’s bill was lation of the last hundred years,” is one stalled and not likely to be revived. product of that mix. Edwin Witte’s vast files and thorough For Ryan, this inaction was frustrat- research habits helped create Wisconsin’s When Edwin Witte came to the UW ing, the result, he fumed, of “politics and Legislative Reference Library. from his native Watertown, Wisconsin, demagoguery.” the university was dominated by the His opponents, naturally, see it differ- Edwin Witte, the longtime leaders of the Progressive movement. ently. One of them, Tammy Baldwin Though most weren’t socialists, they JD’89, represents Wisconsin’s second chair of the UW’s economics were generally convinced that capitalism district, including Madison, and she department and the man was broken, and that only scientifically believes Ryan is overstating his case. applied government intervention could “Because of the time we have to fix Social whom the Social Security fix it. John Commons, one of the leading Security, I see it as more of a challenge economic theorists of his day and an than a crisis,” she says. Turning the pro- Administration refers to as evangelist for active government, domi- gram into a series of personal accounts, the father of the Social Secu- nated the UW’s economics department rather than the pay-as-you-go system in and drove this principle into his students, which current workers’ taxes pay the rity Act, meant for Social including Witte. benefits of retirees, is too radical a change Security to be conservative. A faculty fixture from 1904 until — a violation, she feels, of the spirit of 1933, Commons was a proponent of a Social Security. “Social Security is one of “It’s a rock, and you need school of thought called institutional our most successful programs,” she says, economics, which in his eyes aimed to “because it speaks to a deeply held value, a rock.” redress the inequities of the free market. an intergenerational commitment and Institutionalism, he wrote, emphasizes investment in the common good.” minor changes.” He has a strong personal “management over equilibrium, or Political science professor John Witte interest in the program. He turns sixty control instead of laissez faire,” and ’68, too, believes that “we could make the this year, making him just a few years shy encourages the regulation of economic program solvent indefinitely with just of eligibility. But he also happens to be matters. His teaching blended in history,

SPRING 2006 35 into economic health. But he expected it would address the underlying causes of the Depression. It would, he hoped, “pro- mote recovery by helping to allay the frightful sense of insecurity which is one of the greatest obstacles standing in our way.” He believed that if people felt more secure, they would be willing to buy more, invest more, launch more busi- nesses — if they had some sort of safety net, they would engage in the potentially risky ventures that make the economy go. Witte’s line of reasoning found wide appeal, particularly at the White House. When, in the summer of 1934, President Franklin Roosevelt decided to give America an economic safety net, his administration chose to do so through a government-sponsored insurance pro- gram. Edwin Witte was the only econo- mist in the country who had experience turning such a plan into working law.

ut when Roosevelt needed him, Witte was no longer in Bgovernment. Commons had retired in 1933, and Witte John Commons, the legend of the UW economics department, sits in his office in Sterling Hall. returned to the UW to take up his pro- Commons was one of the great forces of the Wisconsin Idea, designing legislation on labor fessorship. Witte wasn’t a particularly and industrial regulation during the state’s Progressive era. prominent academic then. His list of publications was relatively short — up sociology, and psychology to place eco- Commons was Witte’s mentor to that time, he’d written only one book, nomics within the vast context of human through graduate school and afterward. The Government in Labor Disputes, an expan- social development. He helped land Witte a position as chief sion of his doctoral dissertation published One of the early proponents of the of the Wisconsin Legislative Reference in 1932. Wisconsin Idea, Commons promoted an Library from 1922 until 1933, enabling “I’ve never been much interested in economic doctrine that stressed fairness them to continue pursuing Commons’s economic theory,” he once confessed to over the creation of wealth — a popular progressive agenda. The reference Commons. Instead, he preferred “to have philosophy during Wisconsin’s Progres- library was more than a research office a part in solving practical problems and sive era. His writings infused many of — it was also where most of Wisconsin’s shaping political developments.” the state’s labor and industrial laws in laws were drafted. While Witte was That was the attitude the Roosevelt the early twentieth century, and he becoming an expert at writing bills, he administration was looking for. It didn’t virtually wrote Wisconsin’s workmen’s also read deeply about the social insur- need academic credentials — it needed compensation law, the first such pro- ance plans that were gaining popularity action. gram in the country. It was largely in in Germany and Britain, writing articles The summer of 1934 wasn’t a good tribute to Commons that Theodore about them for academic and political time to be in Roosevelt’s administration. Roosevelt, when he was running for journals. And when the Depression hit He had been in power for fifteen months, president on the Progressive Party ticket Wisconsin, he designed an unemploy- but though his Democratic Party held in 1912, said, “All through the Union, ment insurance plan for the state — both houses of Congress and had passed we need to learn the Wisconsin lesson another national first. much of his New Deal legislative pro- of scientific popular self-help, and of Unemployment insurance would not, gram, the Depression showed no signs patient care in radical legislation.” Witte knew, directly launch Wisconsin of ending. More than a quarter of the

36 ON WISCONSIN country’s working population was unem- states had set up, how to phase in a pay- Witte also wanted people to believe ployed and more than half of the nation’s roll tax without the expense serving to old-age insurance was respectable so that elderly didn’t have enough money to worsen unemployment, and what to do they would take advantage of it, retire, support themselves. With midterm elec- about all those Americans who were and open up job mobility. The program tions approaching, Roosevelt faced a already retired or would reach retire- was designed, his staff wrote, “with the potential rebellion within his own party ment without making adequate contribu- definite purpose of encouraging retire- as the public demanded that government tions to the new insurance program. ment at the age of sixty-five. It is recom- do more to protect them from poverty. Each night, he met with his executive mended that retirement be compulsory at To counter the rising calls for action, overseers from 8:30 to 11:30 to decide the age of seventy in order to increase Roosevelt created a Committee for Eco- which aspects of his staff’s work to the opportunities of younger workers.” nomic Security — by which he meant include in the law. Witte and his staff slaved away for “security against the hazards and vicissi- five months, and when their labor was tudes of life … especially those which It was largely in tribute to complete, they had generated more than relate to unemployment and old age” — two thousand pages of neatly typed chaired by his second assistant secretary Commons that Theodore memos and studies. From these, Witte of labor, Arthur Altmeyer ’14, MA’20, Roosevelt said, “All and Altmeyer put together the draft of PhD’31. the legislation that would become the Altmeyer was another Commons through the Union, we Social Security Act and presented it to disciple, and he’d worked with Witte in Roosevelt on January 15, 1935. Witte Wisconsin state government and as an need to learn the Wisconsin hoped he could then return to Madison, unpaid lecturer in the UW’s economics lesson of scientific popular but he was required to testify at the department. On July 24, 1934, he Congressional hearings on the bill, offered Witte the job of executive direc- self-help, and of patient which lasted well into February, and tor of the Committee for Economic Secu- then to defend it from political attacks. rity — essentially, the committee’s head care in radical legislation.” The bill met opposition from both technician, its highest ranking non- conservative and liberal elements. UW political employee. president Glenn Frank, who had felt that Witte immediately accepted, and The committee’s work generated con- creating the social insurance program though he wrote later that he “had no siderable excitement, and in the 1934 was so important, changed his mind previous indication of being considered midterm elections, Roosevelt saw his when he saw the bill. He chaired the for this position,” he must have had some majorities in the House and Senate Republican policy committee, which cir- inkling, for he left Madison on July 25. increase. But Witte worried that the pub- culated a pamphlet declaring that the He didn’t even wait to get formal permis- lic was misinterpreting the nature of his plan’s “promised Utopia is … one more sion to take a leave from the university. effort. “The present popularity of unem- whited sepulcher” for America’s business Two days later, he wrote to Glenn Frank, ployment insurance is, to a considerable community. Its taxes, they said, would then the UW president, to apologize for extent, due to the prevailing notion that cripple any recovery and lead to deeper not taking “the time to see you before I it is a substitute for relief,” he wrote. unemployment. Any attempt to construct left for Washington. As you were gra- “This is a very erroneous assumption.” a social safety net ought to wait until cious enough to say, however, the work- Confusing social insurance with relief after the economy recovered. ing out of a national program for social would, he feared, undermine the psycho- Others were more severe. Industrial- insurance is such an important work that logical effect of the program. Insurance ist Henry Ford publicly scoffed at the it would not do for me to turn down the was a respectable, middle-class institu- idea of social security. “No government opportunity to be associated with it.” tion that people could rely upon without can guarantee security,” he said. “It can Witte was given a staff of actuaries, shame when they fell into difficult straits. only tax production, distribution, and statisticians, financial managers, and Relief, however, was for the poor, and service and gradually crush the poor to sociologists to study the problems of cre- particularly the incurably poor. As one of pay taxes.” ating a nationwide insurance program his staffers put it, relief has “a disastrous But Witte felt that conservative that would cover tens of millions — and psychological effect … which in turn attacks on the program presented less ultimately hundreds of millions — of breeds more dependence. The quality of danger than those from the left. “The citizens. For the next five months, they self-respect which perhaps more than strongest opposition we have comes from spent their days examining those prob- any other helps to build and maintain a groups that think that our proposals are lems: how to unify the various old-age sturdy community has an important dol- too moderate and too pro-employer,” he and unemployment programs that some lars and cents value to society.” wrote. “Business men, in my opinion,

SPRING 2006 37 make a very serious mistake in opposing direst consequences of want, that they accept,” he wrote to one applicant, “as I the President’s program. In doing so, they put forth their best efforts or are capable have had all the administrative experi- merely invite more extreme measures.” of doing so,” he said. ence that I want.” And there were many more extreme In the end, Congress passed the measures. A group of clergy wrote an Social Security Act with overwhelming open letter to the president in 1935, support: the vote ran 371 to 33 in the t didn’t work out that way. Witte demanding socialism and declaring that House, 77 to 6 in the Senate, making returned to government work “there can be no permanent recovery as Witte’s plan law on August 15, 1935, just Imany times during the remainder long as the nation depends on palliative thirteen months after he’d left Madison of his career, serving as an adviser legislation inside the capitalistic system.” for Washington. to the Social Security Administration Witte wanted his social insurance Witte called his work on the bill “the during the program’s launch and as program to save the capitalist system, most rewarding experience of my life,” chairman of the War Labor Relations not undermine it. He hoped to preserve but he was eager to get back to teaching. Board in Detroit during World War II. the sense of liberty and dynamism of When various federal employees wrote But he also taught extensively, advis- market economics — and believed that him asking for an opportunity to join the ing some fifty-six doctoral candidates a minimum sense of security would new Social Security Administration, he through their dissertations and filling encourage people to have more confi- told them that he was leaving govern- the ranks of American economists with dence in the market. “It is only when ment and had turned down any opportu- institutionalists in his and Commons’s people are not undernourished, enjoy nity to take a leadership role in the tradition. Social Security didn’t encour- good health, and have hope for bettering implementation of the program. “I have age him to retire at sixty-five. Rather, he their lot, or at least for being spared the made up my mind that I could not stayed on the faculty until 1957, when he

The Great Econ Fracas Edwin Witte’s interventionist, pro-labor stance on many not only the Commerce faculty, but also professors in political and economic issues may have been popular Witte’s economics department, where the executive com- with Franklin Roosevelt’s administration, but it often mittee voted against offering Friedman a job. “The situa- put him at odds with other economists. One of his most tion is such that the appointment of Mr. Friedman will severe conflicts came over the work of Milton Friedman, intensify the bitterness within the department,” Witte today the nation’s foremost advocate of free-market wrote to Sellery and UW president Clarence Dykstra. “It policies. But when they clashed in 1940, their struggle may even result in the resignation of some of the most wasn’t so much political as academic — a far more valuable members of the department, and may lead to a vicious arena. row which may reach not only the Regents but the Gov- Friedman was then just a lecturer at the UW, and ernor and the Legislature.” though he was still trying to finish his doctoral disserta- Sellery and Dykstra went to the regents anyway, and tion, another UW economics professor, Harold Groves, asked them to hire Friedman without departmental asked him to evaluate the university’s statistics courses, approval. But after a copy of Friedman’s statistics memo then taught through the School of Commerce. Friedman found its way into the pages of The Capital Times, the was brutal in his assessment. “A student cannot secure issue became a scandal. Ultimately, Friedman settled the training at UW sufficient to qualify him to teach matter by withdrawing himself from consideration. advanced statistics or to do independent work in the Witte succeeded in holding the UW’s economics field of statistical methods,” he wrote. “Even if he takes department together, but he couldn’t stop the spread of all the work offered, he will be but indifferently quali- Friedman’s influence. After landing on the faculty of the fied to do research involving the application of modern University of Chicago, he developed his free-market statistics.” monetarist theory of economics, which earned him a The memo impressed Letters and Science dean Nobel prize in 1976 and has dominated American politics George Sellery, who wanted to hire Friedman full time from the Reagan administration to the present. starting in the fall of 1941. But Friedman had offended — J.A.

38 ON WISCONSIN Edwin Witte (circled at left) poses with the members of the UW’s Socialist Club for the 1912 Badger yearbook. Two members of that year’s club ended up with long careers on the economics faculty: Witte, a professor from 1933 to 1957, and Selig Perlman (not pictured), a labor theorist who became a professor in 1927 and retired in 1959. Both were disciples of John Commons. turned seventy and Wisconsin law “In a way, this is a uniquely privatize Social Security. He sees it as required him to retire. fitting into previous legislative efforts at The Social Security program that Wisconsin debate. Social strengthening the program, and main- Witte designed quickly grew in popular- Security reform is a tains that personal accounts would ity. As early as 1937, before the program save Social Security, not end it. In that had paid a single cent in retirement ben- progressive idea. It bucks respect, he feels that his work is the true efits, Arthur Altmeyer could claim that heir of Commons, Witte, and their Wis- “both labor and employers have come to the status quo. We want consin Idea colleagues. accept the Federal old-age insurance to make sure that this “In a way, this is a uniquely Wiscon- plan as something permanent, as some- sin debate,” he says. “Social Security thing apart from administrative change.” is around for future reform is a progressive idea. It bucks Though the Social Security Act has been generations. We believe the status quo. We want to make sure amended seventeen times in its seventy that this is around for future genera- years, each piece of legislation has been this is the only way to do it.” tions. We believe this is the only way designed to extend or strengthen the to do it.” program. But Tammy Baldwin remains con- As they were drafting the original population than they once did, and vinced that Social Security’s genius lies bill, Witte and his actuaries calculated retired people make up a larger and in its status as a rock, as something the program’s revenues and expenses for larger portion. In 1945, just before the immune to the vicissitudes of the free forty-five years, until 1980. They pre- baby boom began, there were nearly 42 market. She believes that the same con- dicted, with relative accuracy, the length- workers paying into Social Security for cerns that drove the Wisconsin Idea’s ening of the American life span and the each retiree taking benefits out. In 2005, progressive policies are as valid today as growth of the elderly segment of the this ratio had dropped to 3.3 to 1, and by they were in Witte’s time. “We need part population, from 5.4 percent (or around 2030, it will fall to 2.2 to 1. This deficit of of our retirement plan to be guaranteed, 7 million) in 1935 to 11.3 percent (or workers is what threatens Social Secu- inflation adjusted, and risk free,” she more than 20 million) in 1980. rity’s — and the economy’s — future. says. “If we privatized Social Security, But they failed to predict the effect of “The remarkable thing about today’s and then there was another market the post-World War II baby boom — or, Social Security debate is that everyone crash, then we’d just have to re-create more importantly, the baby bust that fol- agrees about the numbers,” says the system, or something very like it.” lowed. Because of the drop in fertility Cameron Sholty, the Wisconsin director rates that began in the late 1950s, young for Freedom Works, a lobbying group workers make up a smaller portion of the that supports Ryan’s and other efforts to John Allen is associate editor of On Wisconsin.

SPRING 2006 39 THE Life OF Pie

For generations of students and alumni, there’s nothing quite like a slice of UW-Madison’s fudge-bottom pie.

But who introduced the dessert on campus

round the time of UW-Madison’s is a riddle wrapped in a the layers of this campus legend. The A 150th birthday, I helped edit a graham-cracker crust. idea was to get to the bottom of fudge- booklet that commemorated 150 bottom pie, no matter how many great achievements of the university, a calorie-laden forkfuls it took. happy little celebration of the things that BY MICHAEL PENN MA’97 make Wisconsin unique. We included a hen it comes to UW-Madison brief passage about Carson Gulley, the Wtraditions, fudge-bottom pie is gifted and ebullient head chef in UW’s older than Bucky Badger, the residence halls for twenty-seven years Fifth Quarter, or the Terrace sunburst and the only person of color for whom a chair, and it has fueled more all-nighters campus building is named. The item was has been served on campus since Harry than any mochaccino or latte on the sixty-five words, barely a paragraph Truman was president — everyone block. Recipes vary, but the basic tech- long. But in the end, only three mattered: wants a piece. The dessert may not have nique is deceptively simple: pour a layer fudge-bottom pie. the edificial permanence of Bascom Hall of dark chocolate onto a graham-cracker We wrote that among Gulley’s con- or Camp Randall Stadium, but it repre- crust, and then pour vanilla-flavored cus- tributions to campus was a “lip-smacking sents ground no less hallowed. Genera- tard onto that. Top with whipped cream fudge-bottom pie,” an innocuous-seem- tions of alumni cherish it, and so, too, do and shaved chocolate, and you’ve got ing link between cook and cookery that the two campus organizations that lay yourself a slice of campus history. we’d seen made in many places, includ- claim to it. Skillwise or tastewise, it’s not quite ing Gulley’s own spiral-bound recipe Both the Union and the Division of crème brûlée. But it would he hard to book. We might have provoked less University Housing serve their own ver- imagine another dish so indelibly inter- controversy if we had said Gulley sion of the pie — and their own version meshed with the fabric of campus life. invented Bucky Badger. of its origins. One story says that the pie At the Memorial Union’s Lakefront on The publication had been out only was invented at Memorial Union, where Langdon cafeteria, fudge-bottom pie is a few days when we received a missive it’s been served every day since at least the only dessert that earns a regular shelf from Ted Crabb ’54, director of the Wis- the 1950s. A competing theory gives spot; the others all wait out a three-week consin Union from 1968 to 2001, who credit to Gulley, whose name graces the rotation. It also appears frequently in the said that we’d printed a mistake. Gulley pie served by Housing’s kitchens, as well Rathskeller and on the menus of catered “had nothing to do with fudge-bottom as the cafeteria building where students dinners, and all that demand keeps pie,” Crabb wrote. “Fudge-bottom pie is eat it. Union bakers busy. For the year a Union dessert item.” He was polite Past attempts to reconcile these between the May 2004 and 2005 com- about it, yet insistent that we “set the histories have tended to lead to frus- mencement ceremonies, they cranked out record straight” about a valued piece of trated ends — and a lot of heated 1,776 pies — nearly five a day — using the Union’s heritage. debate over a chilled pie. But seeking 172 pounds of chocolate, 521 pounds of What we learned is that when the truth, reconciliation, and a reason to granulated sugar, 341 pounds of confec- subject is fudge-bottom pie — the deca- charge pie to the On Wisconsin expense tioner’s sugar, 333 quarts of heavy cream, dent custard-over-chocolate creation that account, I decided to dig deeper into and 444 pounds of butter and margarine.

40 ON WISCONSIN ILLUSTRATIONS BY JULIA SONMI HEGLUND pie had better be, as well. “We receive irate calls from alumni when they are back in the building and can’t get a piece of fudge-bottom pie,” says Julie Vincent ’74, MS’79, the Union’s assistant director of food and retail services. In 1998, the Union failed to serve the pie during a meeting of its own trustees, and they’re still hearing about it. Barbara Manley ’52, a trustee from Greenwich, Connecti- cut, complained to a local newspaper reporter that she looked forward to a few special things when returning to campus, “and fudge-bottom pie is one of them.” Vincent, who is not herself a rabid fan of the pie, sometimes wonders why it gained such mythical status. “We do some other extraordinary desserts, and I think, why don’t any of them get that kind of attention?” she says. “We have an espresso chocolate torte that is amazing.” But the foodie in her understands that the devotion to fudge-bottom pie is about more than just a pleasing combination of ingredients. “It’s the nostalgia,” she says. “The foods we love often represent the tradi- tions we grew up with or the things we grew accustomed to at a particular point in our lives. For a lot of alumni, fudge- bottom pie is one of those traditions.” There is disagreement, however, about whose traditions the pie repre- sents. Both the Union and Housing have been making the dessert for decades, and each claims to be first on the fudge- bottom scene. It’s a mostly good-natured contest of two campus institutions — the UW’s living room and its bedroom — In residence-hall cafeterias, the pie is on the menu. Crash just about any that often compete on the same turf. appears less often, typically about once a catered event on campus, and you’ll But pie seems a particular point of pride month. But that’s only because they don’t discover that fudge-bottom pie is more for both. serve alumni, who are more maniacal ubiquitous than rubber chicken. For last “There’s always been kind of a about their pie than students. Go where year’s football banquet, for instance, the friendly rivalry between the food service the old-timers eat — comfort-food spots athletic department ordered 140. units, and fudge-bottom pie is one of such as Dotty Dumpling’s Dowry or the Food managers have come to learn those things that goes back a long way Stamm House — and some version of it that if alumni are present, fudge-bottom for both of us,” says Housing director

SPRING 2006 41 Both the Union and Housing have been making the dessert for decades, and each claims to be first on the fudge- Paul Evans. “We don’t compare hot dogs bottom scene. It’s a mostly Housing’s current version bears more or burgers or brats. It’s just the pies we resemblance to the pie served by the good-natured contest of talk about.” Union. And there’s good reason for the For Housing, the story of fudge-bot- two campus institutions — similarity, says McCutchin: she stole the tom pie is tied to the legacy of Carson the UW’s living room and its Union’s recipe. Gulley, one of its most distinguished Although McCutchin inherited former employees. (See Flashback, bedroom — that often Gulley’s recipe book when she took page 66.) As head chef of the Van Hise compete on the same turf. over the residence hall kitchens in 1958, refectory, now known as Carson Gulley But pie seems a particular she says the Union’s version of fudge- Commons, Gulley built a legend every bottom pie was growing popular among bit as rich as the pie linked to his name. point of pride for both. students, and many wanted something Born in Arkansas in 1897, Gulley like it served in the campus dining halls. taught himself cooking while working But the Union’s recipe was then — as it a series of kitchen jobs throughout is today — a well-guarded secret. the South and Midwest before “The mystery was the chocolate,” landing at UW-Madison in 1927. says McCutchin. She couldn’t quite He was quickly promoted to head match the Union’s dusky bottom chef, a role he held until 1954. In layer until the early 1960s, when an the kitchen, Gulley was a master employee familiar with the Union’s of detail, dabbing and fussing method taught her how they did it. over a string of innovative cre- Housing has essentially followed ations, including one of the first that formula ever since, and its pie methods for preparing boneless remains similar to — although not turkey breasts. George Washington the same as — the one served at Carver, who once hired Gulley to Memorial Union. lead a dietetics course at Tuskegee That fact would seem to affirm Institute, described him as “an artist … a Union heritage for at least the dealing with the finest of all arts.” He modern version of fudge-bottom pie. was also a friend and confidant to several But the pie story down on Langdon generations of students, who revered him Street is only somewhat less fudgy. for his warmth and wisdom. As an Ted Crabb says that the pie was the African-American civil-service worker liked the idea that this was his pie.” work of two Union chefs, Lewis Marston on a largely white campus, he achieved The problem is that the pie Housing ’32 and Maurice Coombs, who intro- an iconic status usually attained by only serves today isn’t much like the one duced it at the Union in the 1940s. He the most luminary of professors. yielded by Gulley’s recipe. Gulley used a cites conversations with Paul Cleary ’55, Many say that Gulley’s masterpiece chocolate-flavored custard to form the who began a job in the Union dish room was his fudge-bottom pie, a dessert that pie’s bottom layer, but current versions as a high school student in 1944 and he apparently — more on that in a call for a denser base of pure dark choco- spent twenty-five years on the Union’s moment — served to students in the Van late. “It’s a different kind of pie,” says food management staff. According to Hise dining hall. His recipe, published in Rheta McCutchin ’56, who worked as Cleary, who died in 2004, Marston his 1956 cookbook, Seasoning Secrets, is Housing’s food service director for already had the recipe when he joined widely cited as the progenitor of the vari- thirty-six years before retiring in 1994. the Union as food production manager ous iterations served in Madison today, She says that Gulley’s creation is closer in 1940. With his head chef Coombs, he including the one Housing proudly calls to a traditional black-bottom pie, a perfected the pie and put it on the Union “Carson Gulley’s Fudge-Bottom Pie.” The Southern dessert that is often made with menu sometime around 1945. name honors the man as much as the cre- layers of chocolate- and rum-flavored Marston left that same year, eventu- ation, says Evans. But he adds, “I always custard. ally landing in Washington, D.C., as

42 ON WISCONSIN head chef for the U.S. Senate cafete- four cookbooks, believes it ria. Coombs, who helped make the had something to do with the pie’s Union bakery one of the city’s best, exotic appeal in an era of apple and succeeded Marston as food produc- banana cream. “This was a recipe so tion manager. “They were very well- different from any pie we grew up known for making all kinds of eating that we were in awe of what pies,” says Rose Edwards ’41, who it looked like and how it tasted,” joined the Union food staff in 1947. she says. She confirms that fudge-bottom pie Yet it may be that fudge-bottom was already in the mix by the time pie was never as popular in reality she arrived. Coombs is also responsible To alumni, a slice of fudge- as it is in the memories of a certain for establishing fudge-bottom pie off generation of alumni. Sentimentality is a campus, putting it on the menu of the bottom pie carries more than a significant part of food: ask anyone who Simon House, a Madison restaurant he rich combination of has gone out of their way to find an old helped open in 1952. favorite burger joint or to have Babcock flavors. It tastes like the old It isn’t known, however, whether Hall ice cream shipped to their homes. Gulley’s chocolate-flavored-custard days, hearkening memories “Whatever you remember about campus version predates the Union pie, or if he of the happy indulgences — whether it’s Observatory Hill, the had any influence on its creation. As a Terrace, Bascom Hall, or fudge-bottom native Arkansan, Gulley may have been of college. Its tradition is as pie — those things take on greater sig- acquainted with the Southern tradition much about where you ate the nificance in your mind after you leave,” of black-bottom pie, but history reveals says Crabb. pie and with whom you ate it little about when he began making it in To alumni, a slice of fudge-bottom Madison. He featured a black-bottom pie as it is the pie itself. pie carries more than a rich combination recipe on the Cooking School of the Air of flavors. It tastes like the old days, radio program in December 1952, and hearkening memories of the happy indul- his cookbook, published four years later, gences of college, of people and places includes black-bottom and fudge-bottom givens of life at UW-Madison, just part fondly stored in the scrapbooks of our pie recipes, both of which use the twin- of the way things are around here. minds. Its tradition is as much about custard method. A few alumni have told People don’t ask why Bascom Hill has where you ate the pie and with whom me that they recall eating Gulley’s pie as a statue of Abe Lincoln, a Kentuckian you ate it as it is the pie itself. early as the 1930s, but their recollections by birth with no obvious connection to The pie’s contested history, too, is are hazy. Wisconsin. It is just there, and it always part of its intrigue. As Paul Evans says, “It’s pretty difficult, after all these has been there, at least for our lifetimes. “Maybe it’s better not to know. If nobody years, to try to remember when you first We know that fudge-bottom pie has can really claim it, we can continue this had a pie,” says Newell Smith ’41, who not always been the dessert of choice banter about who was first and whose directed Housing from 1955 to 1983 and on campus. In the Union’s first quarter- pie is better.” We’re left with a legacy believes he may have had the pie as a century, people swore by its chocolate that is like the pie itself: it is light and student in the 1930s. “As I recall, nobody nougat cake, which is listed in a 1953 airy on top, but beneath lies a murkier paid too much attention to it, other than brochure as the Union’s most popular layer thick with myth and folklore. And to say it was a good pie.” dessert. Crabb says fudge-bottom pie everyone knows the bottom is the most was “coming on strong” during his delicious part. raditions don’t begin as traditions, student days in the early 1950s, and T and so it should not surprise that now nobody remembers nougat cake. Senior editor Michael Penn and the On Wisconsin the first campus fudge-bottom pie No one is sure what precipitated the staff participated in a side-by-side taste test of the was not met with fanfare and a team of fudge-bottom boom. Catherine Tripalin UW’s two fudge-bottom pies. To see the results and to share your own memories of the pie, visit archivists. It seems to be one of the Murray, a Madison native and author of uwalumni.com/onwisconsin.

SPRING 2006 43 SPORTS

Net Assets With volunteer coach Bill Howard, UW hockey saves more than money.

The Wisconsin JEFF MILLER TEAM PLAYER men’s hockey team Emily Carpenter is grateful that some things in this Five things to know about world are free. Badger swimmer Emily Bill Howard, for Carpenter x’06: instance, is a price- • A native of Kansas City, less asset who Missouri, she began swim- comes without ming competitively at a price. age six. She also loved to In his thirty- dance, and that same year, fifth year with the she combined her interests Badgers, Howard is by signing up for synchro- a volunteer member nized swimming. of the coaching • For nine years, she com- staff. His role is to peted in both sports, which help develop the kept her in the pool up to UW’s goaltenders, four hours a day. On more who are a big than one occasion, she reason that the advanced to nationals in Badgers have been For the past thirty-five years, assistant coach Bill Howard has overseen the devel- both sports. vying for the West- opment of Badger hockey goaltenders — including seven who went on to earn All- American honors and two who are starring in the National Hockey League. • Although she gave up syn- ern Collegiate chronized swimming after Hockey Association the eighth grade, she says title this year. seven All-American goal- Mike Richter x’89 and Jim her background still gives “His contribution is very tenders: Julian Baretta ‘80, Carey x’96 also learned net her an advantage as a racer. big, to say the least,” says head MBA’85, Roy Schultz x’82, management from Howard. She says she can hold her coach Mike Eaves. “His history Dean Anderson x’88, Curtis But the best testament breath longer than anyone speaks volumes for itself.” Joseph x’92, Duane Derksen to Howard’s value may be a else on the Badger team. That history includes being ‘98, Kirk Daubenspeck ‘97, Badger who doesn’t yet have • An interior design major, part of five NCAA champi- and Bernd Brückler ‘05. those kinds of accolades — she plans to attend UW- onship teams and coaching National Hockey League stars junior Brian Elliott. Madison’s graduate school next year and study sports architecture. For her Runners Reach the Summit research, she calls on her athletic background and This time, there was no settling for second for the UW men’s cross country team, which came tantaliz- talks to athletes about how ingly close to a national championship in each of the past three seasons. In November, the Badgers factors such as lighting and placed six runners in the top twenty finishers to win their first team title since 1988. seating design affect “We were ready for a fight this year,” says Simon Bairu x’06. “Losing a close one last year prepared their mental and us. People who saw us this year before the race physical per- knew we were going to win. Nothing was stop- INFORMATIONUW SPORTS (3) formances. ping us this time.” • She looked For the second straight year, Bairu won forward to the individual national title, finishing the making the 6.2-mile course in 29 minutes, 15.9 seconds. trip to Ohio He is the first Wisconsin runner to win the State for the Big race twice. Chris Solinsky x’07 placed third, Ten champi- just fourteen seconds behind Bairu. Big Ten onships in February, Freshman of the Year Matt Withrow x’09 finished and not just because it ninth. The top six Wisconsin finishers, including Bairu, was a big meet. Ohio State Solinsky, Withrow, Antony Ford x’06, Stuart Eagon recently built a pool, and x’09, and Tim Nelson x’07, earned All-American honors. she wanted to take notes The championship was the first for coach Jerry Schumacher, who in eight years at Wisconsin has on the new facility. never had a team place lower than sixth at the NCAA race. The U.S. Track Coaches Association recognized Bairu and Schumacher, respectively, as its national athlete of the year and coach of the year. — J.S.

46 ON WISCONSIN SPORTS

Brian Calhoun rushed for 213 Elliott entered this season Johnson at Colorado College goaltending schools, now yards and a touchdown to help having played little in two from 1964 to 1966. Johnson numbering ten in five states. the football Badgers bring down years behind Brückler. Many moved to Wisconsin the next He has created two goaltend- seventh-ranked Auburn in the fans feared that the team season, and Howard did, too, ing videos, which come with a Capital One Bowl, 24-10. Calhoun, would not be able to replace starting the hockey program at seventy-two-page manual, that who announced in January that he the All-American in goal, but Madison Memorial High School, are currently used by five hun- will enter the National Football Howard had little reason to where he led the school to two dred hockey programs, goalies, League draft, earned second-team worry. state titles in ten years. He and coaches around the world. All-American honors for Wiscon- “I had full confidence that continued teaching business He employs several of his pro- sin, which finished 10-3 overall Elliot would be able to step law at Memorial until 2001. tégés during the summer as and ranked fifteenth in the right in and be every bit as Johnson hired Howard for coaches — although they are national polls. The bowl title was good as Brückler,” he says. “It his UW staff in 1973, and he has also still students. the eighth for retiring coach Barry just so happens, Elliott is not held the same position under “When they teach it, they Alvarez, who finished his career just as good — he is better.” three head coaches. He was a also learn it,” says Howard. with the highest bowl-game In fact, for his career, Elliott paid coach until seven years ago “And it works out as a good wining percentage of any NCAA has saved 93.9 percent of shots when the NCAA reduced the summer job for them.” coach. on goal, the best average in number of assistant coaches It’s a good job, in part, program history. Through mid- who could be on salary. Cutting because Howard pays students Led by third-team All-American January, he had allowed just his pay, however, was not a decent wage. That’s because Sheila Shaw x’06, the UW 1.4 goals per game, the lowest enough to stop Howard. he knows that nothing in life volleyball team advanced to mark in the nation, and helped Building off the success of comes for free — except, of the regional finals of the NCAA the Badgers climb to the top the goalies he had coached, course, him. tournament before losing to spot in the national polls. Howard launched specialized — Joanna Salmen x’06 eventual national champion When Elliott suffered an Washington. The Badgers fin- injury that forced him out of ished the year with a 26-7 record the lineup, the Badgers needed and ranked tenth in final help from another Howard IN SEASON national polls. Shaw, the sixth project, Shane Connelly. The Women’s Tennis Badger to earn All-American freshman filled in for seven A young team that lost two honors in the past seven years, games, including the Badgers’ of last year’s top three players led the team in hitting percent- 4-2 win over Ohio State at to graduation, the Badgers age and was second in blocks. Lambeau Field. are trying to get back to the She finished her career ranked Howard works with the NCAA tournament for the as the third most accurate hitter goalies for forty-five minutes third time in four years. And in UW history. before each practice begins, as they have for the past and he spends even more time Caitlin Burke eighteen years, they kicked off For six weeks in December with them during the off-sea- the spring season with a juggernaut, the ITA National Team and January, the men’s and son. During those hours, he Indoor tournament, which brought sixteen of the nation’s top women’s hockey teams were indoctrinates players into his teams to the UW’s Nielsen Tennis Stadium in early February. ranked number one in the signature “system,” which is Despite the tough competition — this year, Wisconsin lost three nation, the first time both designed to keep goaltenders matches, all to top ten teams — the Badgers say the ITA tourna- programs have simultaneously under control and prevent ment is their favorite event of the year because of the challenge occupied the top spot in the wasted motion. Howard of facing the best college players from around the country. It polls. The men’s team climbed teaches structured save tech- doesn’t hurt that almost every fan in the stadium is wearing red. to number one on November 28 niques for every shot, and he and stayed there until losing claims to make his goalies do Circle the dates: March 13–17, Badgers take a spring break trip twice to Denver in late January. each technique thousands of to sunny California for matches against San Diego State and The women earned the number times each season. the University of San Diego; April 27–30, Big Ten Tournament, one nod December 13 and held it “His system has really Champaign, Illinois. until early February. worked for me and is some- thing that is different from Keep an eye on: Junior Caitlin Burke, who entered the year at anyone else’s,” says Elliot. “I number thirty-two in the ITA singles rankings. can’t say enough good things about his system or him.” Think about this: Since the ITA tournament began in 1988, the A distinguished goaltender champion has gone on to win the national title eight times. himself, Howard played for Bob That bodes well for Stanford, which won the crown this year.

SPRING 2006 47 WAA NEWS

Home-Made Ideas Lifelong Learning events showcase the impact of the Wisconsin Idea.

Alumni are taking an inside operations. A UW faculty or According to Budzak, look at the UW’s far-reaching staff member also joins the the film gave her a deeper effect on state industry, thanks group to field questions and appreciation of SC Johnson to Made in Wisconsin tours, a add insight. as a family enterprise. “It was Badger Career new series from the Osher Life- Some sixty-five alumni very personal, very touching,” Network long Learning Institute. The joined the trip from Madison she says. events, which are designed to to Racine for the SC Johnson Another fifty-five alumni WAA’s career networking show how UW-Madison gradu- tour, which included an explo- participated in the Harley- tool has changed its iden- ates and researchers shape the ration of the company’s head- Davidson trip, which included a tity, though the service Wisconsin economy, kicked off quarters building, designed by behind-the-scenes tour of the remains unaltered. Now with a bus tour of SC Johnson famed architect Frank Lloyd factory, lunch with UW alumni called the Badger Career headquarters in Racine last Wright x1890. “It was a fasci- who work there, and a talk by Network, the online tool November and followed up nating tour,” says Kathe Carl Vieth of the engineering formerly known as SEARCH with a trip to the Harley- Budzak MD’69. “My grandfa- college’s Department of Profes- still offers an opportunity to Davidson motorcycle factory in ther was a bricklayer who sional Development. share information and Wauwatosa in January. helped build the building, but “We plan to do a couple of advice about jobs by loca- “We’re looking to integrate I’d never set foot in it before.” these events each semester,” tion and field of interest. lifelong learning with the Wis- Participants also had an says Schutt, adding that future To join the Badger Career consin Idea and industry in the opportunity to view the docu- tours may involve the paper or Network, visit WAA’s Web state,” says Sarah Schutt, WAA’s mentary Carnauba, A Son’s cranberry industries. “In part, site at uwalumni.com and director of alumni learning. Memoir, which tells the story of we hope they’ll give alumni a click on the careers button. The events follow a basic the personal and physical jour- feeling of how interdependent formula. Participants gather in ney that Sam Johnson, SC John- the state and UW-Madison are. Madison for a bus ride to a par- son’s former CEO, made as he Essentially, we want to call ticular corporate facility, where retraced his father’s 1935 South attention to the reach of the they meet with employees American expedition along university.” and learn about company with his sons, Curt and Fisk. — John Allen

A Policy for Fluffy

ALYSKA BAILEY ALYSKA The cost of health care is rising at an unhealthy rate. It’s hard for man, and it’s certainly hard for beast. That’s why WAA is now offering a group rate pet- insurance policy — to protect families from the financial strain of Fluffy’s pain. Carried by Veterinary Pet Insurance, the plan offers cover- age for vaccinations and routine care, as well as accidents, hospi- talizations, and illnesses, includ- ing cancer treatment. UW alumni receive a 5 percent discount on premiums through WAA. See uwalumni.com/insur- ance to find out more about High school students talk about the UW during Prospective Scholars Day last November. Run by WAA’s pet insurance. student affiliate group, the Wisconsin Alumni Student Board, Prospective Scholars Day offers the inside scoop on opportunities at UW-Madison for high-achieving students of color from the Madison, Milwaukee, — Staff and Chicago areas. During the November event, more than 100 high-schoolers came to campus, and 86 of them requested information about enrolling at the UW.

48 ON WISCONSIN WAA NEWS

Wonder-Full Badger Days highlight the UW’s connections to the Fox Valley.

Science begins with something events sponsored by the univer- UW Connections Program DARREN HAUCK brighter than photons and more sity and WAA that showcased luncheon,” says Mike Fahey forceful than gravity, outreach UW-Madison’s effects on cities ‘89, WAA’s director of state specialist Jim Reardon told the from Appleton to Neenah. UW- relations. UW Connections is a children of Wilson Elementary in Madison has more than six link between UW-Madison and Neenah, Wisconsin. It begins, he thousand graduates living in the UW System’s thirteen two- insisted, with a sense of wonder. that industrial region, many of year campuses. Students who And then he shot off a fire whom are leaders in its econ- aren’t accepted at UW-Madison extinguisher. omy, politics, and education. may enroll in the program, Reardon’s antics were part In addition to the Won- attend one of the UW Colleges of his Wonders of Physics show, ders of Physics, the program for their freshman and sopho- an exploration of such phe- included a discussion led by more years, and then transfer nomena as motion, heat, light, the new dean of the School of to Madison. sound, electricity, and magnet- Education, Julie Underwood, In November, there were ism that aims to help young called Culture Wars: Caught in eighteen UW Connections par- people see the excitement of the Crossfire, which covered ticipants studying at UWC-Fox science. He took the show to issues facing today’s schools. Valley in Appleton. “The pro- Wilson and to Mapleview Ele- The university also honored gram helps keep UW-Madison mentary in Kimberly, Wisconsin, area Alumni of Distinction, and the other System schools as part of Badger Days in the including Outagamie County integrated, and this gave us a Fox Valley last November. district attorney Carrie chance to see its effects,” says “The kids were really Schneider JD’98, Menasha Fahey. “Not only did those kids psyched,” says Reardon. “They Industries CEO Tom Prosser have the opportunity to meet Outreach specialist Jim Reardon knew they were going to see ‘58, and Appleton mayor Tim- with UW-Madison officials, but lets off some steam during a Wonders of Physics program something special, and they othy Hanna x’80. UW offi- all the deans of the UW System at Wilson Elementary School were ready to be excited by just cials also paid a visit to the Colleges were there.” in Neenah, Wisconsin. During about anything. But they were Kimberly-Clark corporate The next Badger Days event Badger Days in the Fox Valley, also ready to learn.” headquarters in Neenah. will be in April in the Chippewa Reardon gave the program Badger Days in the Fox Val- “One of the nicest things Valley region around Eau Claire. twice, once at Wilson and again at Mapleview Elementary in ley was a two-day series of was that the event included a — J.A. Kimberly, Wisconsin.

Sweet Treat Mousse. Éclairs. Bonbons. sor Richard Hartel. After a tour impact of chocolate’s past, from State Your For centuries, chocolate of Chocolate: The Exhibition, its beginnings as a frothy drink Opinion has held our imaginations alumni indulged in a to-die-for made in ancient Mexico to the (and expanded our waistlines). chocolate buffet. sophisticated confections found “The Year of Unfortunate But how much do we really “We learned about the in today’s boutiques. Events” (see page 20) know about this decadent process of making chocolate, This event was one of the explains some of the issues dessert? and the professor gave us sam- first partnerships between that currently divide UW Last November, eighty-four ples to see if we could tell the Wisconsin Alumni Lifelong and legislative leaders. participants enjoyed a delicious expensive from the everyday,” Learning and the UW-Madison Would you like to voice your Wisconsin Alumni Lifelong says participant Marilyn Han- Osher Lifelong Learning opinion on the state of the Learning event at the Milwau- nan. “I couldn’t believe I picked Institute, which provides university’s relationship with kee Public Museum, where the cheap chocolate.” funding for noncredit enrich- the state? WAA wants to they gained insights about the The exhibition, on loan ment courses for the general hear from you. Visit www. science of chocolate-making from Chicago’s Field Museum, public. alumniforwisconsin.org, from UW food science profes- shed light on the cultural — Erin Hueffner ‘00 and share your thoughts.

SPRING 2006 49 ALUMNI NEWS

Compiled by Paula Wagner spondent and Chicago Times could hardly be more timely. Apfelbach ’83 columnist, Carolyn Levin Its author, Bernard Shull Looking to Share? Gaines ’44 has more recently PhD’57 of Lawrenceville, New turned her writing attention Jersey, even includes material If you have recent early years to The Modest Memoir of a on the late John Commons, a accomplishments, transitions, Yankee Yenta (Authorhouse), prominent UW economist of The first biography of the late which recounts her activism in the 1920s and ‘30s. (For more or other significant life Mary Ingraham Bunting- the civil-rights and conservation on Commons, see page 34.) happenings that you’d like to Smith MA’32, PhD’34 — movements. She and her Manfred Weidhorn drawn from her diaries, letters, spouse, Tom Gaines ‘47, have MA’57 shared two of his share with our readers, please private papers, and more than lived in Connecticut for more dozen books with us: The e-mail the (brief, please) details one hundred interviews — has than fifty years. Person of the Millennium: The been written by author Elaine Hazel Holden Stauffacher Unique Impact of Galileo on to [email protected]; Yaffe. Mary Ingraham Bunting: ’45 of Darlington, Wisconsin, World History, and Landmines mail them to Alumni News, Her Two Lives (Frederic C. Beil) shared that five of the eleven of the Mind: One Thousand tells the story of the woman friends from her Mortar Board Asseverations, Surmises, and On Wisconsin Magazine, who was a president of Radcliffe group — now scattered from Questions about the Design of College, a respected and Hawaii to New Zealand — the Universe and the Meaning 650 North Lake Street, groundbreaking Yale microbiol- attended WAA’s May 2005 of Life (both from iUniverse). Madison, WI 53706-1476; or ogist, the first woman to serve reunion of the Class of 1945. Weidhorn, an Austrian native on the Atomic Energy Commis- Ginna (Virginia) Miller Nel- who lives in Fair Lawn, New fax them to (608) 265-8771. sion, and a pioneering feminist. son ‘45 of Oshkosh, Wisconsin, Jersey, has taught English Space limitations prevent us The book also details the per- has since restarted the friends’ literature at New York’s Yeshiva sonal tragedy that compelled round-robin letter, which was University since 1963. from publishing all of the items Bunting, in mid-career, to lost several decades ago. Judith VanderMeulen we receive, but we do appreciate reinvent herself and embark Keith Brown ‘46 was an Crain ‘59 has long been active on a new way of life. organizing member of WAA’s in state and community affairs hearing from you. Paul Eckhardt, Jr. ‘33 was alumni chapter in Hot Springs in Green Bay, Wisconsin, includ- the oldest living UW letter win- Village, Arkansas, where he’s ing serving for many years on ner in rowing at the time of his lived for twenty retirement the city’s school board. But as death in October, we learned years. In May, he received an part of a solid Badger family — Please e-mail death notices and from Brad Taylor ‘68, author Outstanding Leadership Award her spouse, John Crain ‘59, of Wisconsin Where They Row: from Arkansas’s lieutenant and three sons are all Mad all address, name, telephone, A History of Varsity Rowing at governor for the many volun- grads — it was perhaps only and e-mail changes to the University of Wisconsin. teer leadership positions he’s a matter of time before she’d Eckhardt frequently attended held, including president of the turn her attention to the UW: [email protected]; Wisconsin’s East Coast races, board of the city’s property Judith joined the UW System fax them to (608) 262-3332; hosted crew dinners, and in owners’ association. board of regents in May. 1948 wrote a history of Badger Glenn Martin ‘49 hopes mail them to Alumni Changes, rowers for the UW’s Centennial that his sixth book, Things I Wisconsin Alumni Association, Athletic Review. He retired Learned Along the Way: 60s from his work for the Veterans Putting Life’s Lessons in Per- 650 North Lake Street, Administration in 1964 and spective, will help others on The beautiful work of artist Madison, WI 53706-1476; or lived in Garrison, New York. their life journeys, but his fifth Ronald Trent Anderson ‘61, book (both from iUniverse), MS’62, MFA’63 was featured call them in toll free to (888) was penned just to make read- in an October retrospective 947-2586. Most obituary listings 40s–50s ers laugh. It’s called Some of exhibit of paintings, prints, and the Funniest Things Happen drawings in his home commu- of WAA members and friends It’s easy to lose yourself in the in the Most Unlikely and nity of Amherst, Massachusetts, stories that Robert Feeney Unexpected Places. Martin is as well as in the fifth Biennale appear in the , Badger Insider MS’40, PhD’42 tells in A a retired United Methodist Internazionale dell’Arte Con- WAA’s publication for its Grandfather’s Remembrances minister who now writes, temporanea in Florence, Italy, in — a self-published gem of a teaches, and makes music in December. If you missed those, members, published thrice booklet about the life of this Duluth, Minnesota. don’t miss his retrospective at annually and inserted into Davis, California, retired profes- With Alan Greenspan’s the UW’s Memorial Union in sor of biochemistry. He has retirement as Fed chair a reality, June — a month before his On Wisconsin Magazine. authored several books, includ- a new book called The Fourth Madison West High School ing Professor on the Ice, about Branch: The Federal Reserve’s fiftieth class reunion. An art his research in the Antarctic. Unlikely Rise to Power and educator for thirty-eight years A former foreign corre- Influence (Greenwood/Praeger) before retiring in 2000, Ander-

50 ON WISCONSIN ALUMNI NEWS

son received the UW School of Kansas’s 4-H and youth leader he’s titled Maurice and Alec in stay at the Scott Lake Lodge Education’s Alumni Achieve- from 1966 until 1981, and has America (AuthorHouse). Carrier, there, Ted Kenniston ‘90 of ment Award in 2001. been a tireless volunteer in of Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania, Mason, Ohio, wrote, “I didn’t Dale Johnson MS’63, Manhattan. All of these efforts says that his book honors his know it beforehand, but the PhD’70 and Bonnie Von Hoff were honored when he joined mentor, the late UW professor [lodge’s] owner is Tom Klein, a Wilson Johnson MS’76, the National 4-H Hall of Fame’s Harvey Goldberg ‘43, PhD’51, fellow Badger. He ran his own PhD’84 are two Oakdale, New Class of 2005. in making a plea for equality. publishing business before York, educators who believe Among the many fine attor- Coincidentally, Susan Stern- following his love for fishing by that the procedures used by the neys who’ve come out of the gold ‘71 of Suffern, New running the best fishing lodge National Council for Accredita- UW Law School, here are some York, also wrote to us about to which I’ve ever been. It’s tion of Teacher Education who were selected by their Goldberg and shared photos located 300 miles from the (NCATE) do not, in fact, create peers for inclusion in the 2006 from a September gathering of nearest road and 550 miles from better teachers. They also edition of The Best Lawyers in some of his former students. the nearest cell tower.” contend that the council has America (Woodward/White): The occasion was the dedication Okay, Class of ‘71: who become too powerful and goes Stephen Chernof ‘65, JD’68; of a classroom to Goldberg at among you is one of the virtually unquestioned. The Howard Pollack ‘68, JD’73; New York City’s Brecht Forum. world’s leading authorities on Johnsons present their critical and Arthur Harrington ‘72, Sterngold notes, “We all had a the identification, conservation, analysis of NCATE in Trivializing JD’75 of Godfrey & Kahn’s great time reconnecting and and care of American and Euro- Teacher Education: The Accredi- Milwaukee office, plus Kevin remembering.” pean costumes and textiles? It’s tation Squeeze (Rowman & O’Connor 72, MS’78, PhD’86 Edward Maeder ‘71, the cura- Littlefield), which includes a and Jon Anderson ‘78 of La tor of exhibitions and textiles foreword by UW education Follette Godfrey & Kahn in 70s at Historic Deerfield [Massachu- professor Michael Apple. Madison; Charles Herf ‘65, setts]. His international renown Calling all fans of Wisconsin JD’68 of Quarles & Brady The RedNova (now RedOrbit) has led to work with many of Public Radio’s Ideas Network! Streich Lang in Phoenix; Web site had plenty of good the big names in fashion, and Do you miss Tom Clark ‘64, its William Fisher MA’66, JD’78 things to say about Carol Bartz Maeder’s unusual paper dresses retired morning talk host? of Dykema Gossett’s Detroit ‘71 in a July article: she has have been featured on Martha Well, now you can find him as office; Allen Blair ‘67 of Harris unusual longevity in Silicon Stewart’s television program. the sidekick of Zorba (Robert) Shelton Hanover Walsh in Valley, and she’s one of the few The latest recipient of the Paster ‘69 on the nationally Memphis, Tennessee; founding female CEOs of a major technol- American Meat Science Associa- broadcast program Zorba partner Joel Hirschhorn JD’67 ogy company: Autodesk, a tion’s Distinguished Research Paster on Your Health. of Hirschhorn & Bieber in Coral leader in computer-aided-design Award is Joseph Sebranek Bill Tuttle, Jr. MA’64, Gables, Florida; and Dinsmore & software based in San Rafael, MS’71, PhD’74, a professor PhD’67 is a leading scholar of Shohl’s Chauncey Curtz JD’81 California. Bartz spent a decade of animal science, food science, African-American life. In 2004, in Lexington, Kentucky. at Sun Microsystems before and human nutrition at Iowa the University of Kansas profes- While working on exhibits taking the helm of Autodesk State University in Ames. He sor of American studies earned for the new Memorial to the in 1992, and sits on the boards also holds two patents for a that institution’s Balfour Jeffrey Murdered Jews of Europe, of Network Appliance, Cisco meat grinder/bone-chip- Research Award and the Chan- researchers found photos and Systems, and BEA Systems. removal system. cellor’s Club Career Teaching poignant letters that Joel In addition to being a part- The wildlife artist who won Award. His most recent book, Alpert ‘67, MS’68 had ner at Michael Best & Friedrich’s the 2006–07 Federal Duck Daddy’s Gone to War: The Sec- discovered and posted on the Madison office, Linda Bochert Stamp Art Contest, Sherry ond World War in the Lives of Internet about cousins who ‘71, MS’73, JD’74 has been Shibata Russell Meline ‘72, is America’s Children (Oxford Uni- had died in Lithuania during appointed to a three-year term only the second woman to have versity Press), was nominated the Holocaust. In May, the on the Wisconsin Department done so. Her amazing painting for a Pulitzer Prize, and he’s memorial’s foundation invited of Natural Resources’ Green of Ross’s geese, chosen from worked to support building a Alpert and eight family mem- Tier Advisors Committee. She’s 233 entries, will grace the new museum to honor the victims of bers to attend the opening of also a co-chair of the Working stamp, available on July 1. (The the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921. the Berlin, Germany, memorial, Lands Initiative Steering Com- National Wildlife Refuge System The 4-H organization has where the material is now on mittee, which will develop “a acquires waterfowl habitat with been part of life for Glenn permanent display. Alpert, of consensus vision on managing the roughly $25 million gener- Busset PhD’65 since he Woburn, Massachusetts, also Wisconsin’s valuable land ated annually through duck- became a member at age four- edited The Memorial Book assets.” Super Lawyers maga- stamp purchases.) Meline and teen in Coffee County, Kansas. for the Jewish Community of zine named Bochert one of its her spouse own the Wingbeat He entered the work force as a Yurburg, Lithuania: Translation twenty-five Top Female Wiscon- gallery (www.wingbeat.com) in county Extension 4-H agent, and Update (Assistance to sin Super Lawyers in 2005. Mount Shasta, California, and which led to other Extension Lithuanian Jews). Fisherfolk, it’s time to meet she has a four-year commission positions in India, Europe, the Fred Carrier PhD’68 Tom Klein ‘71. Upon returning to paint waterfowl stamps for Middle East, and the Philip- has written a sequel to E.M. from a summer fishing trip to the twelve provinces of Canada. pines. Busset then served as Forster’s work Maurice, which northern Saskatchewan and a Lamar University geology

SPRING 2006 51 ALUMNI NEWS

professor Roger Cooper MS’73 with the logistics of all of its writes that he’s a consultant Bookmark and his spouse, fellow geologist reunion races; and its 1975 with thirty years’ experience in Dee Ann Cooper, recently coach (and Sue Ela’s spouse), the design and construction of unearthed the first and second Madisonian Jay (Joseph) mining, environmental, and Cretaceous-Era fossil squids Mimier ‘71, JD’74, for coach- waste-management projects, with preserved soft body parts ing all of those races. Michael both in the U.S. and in India. ever found in this country. They Traut ‘55, who let us in on this He’s also an avid Chicago-area made their discoveries — esti- news, also notes that this crew volunteer and the 2004 co- mated to be 89 million years old took first at the National Colle- founder of the India Develop- and extremely rare because of giate Rowing Championship ment Coalition of America, the soft body parts — in Big in 1975, becoming the first which promotes sustainable Bend National Park. Roger made women’s national champs from development projects in India a third exciting find in the same Wisconsin. They plan to row for (www.idc-america.org). area: the second known discov- another World Masters title in Who’s the new executive ery of the vertebrae of an elopid Sydney, Australia, in 2010. deputy secretary of the budget Isn’t spring a little early to be fish. The couple lives in Lumber- The American Political Sci- and chief financial officer of thinking about football? For ton, Texas. ence Association has welcomed the commonwealth of Pennsyl- most Badger fans, it’s never Madisonian (Van) Russell Timothy Kaufman-Osborn vania? It’s Mary Myers Soder- too early to look ahead — or, Whitesel JD’74 has made MA’77 to its executive council. berg ‘78 of Camp Hill. She in this case, to look back. history: he was one of the first He’s a professor of politics and was previously vice chancellor A new book by Dave Peace Corps volunteers in its leadership at Whitman College for finance and administration Anderson ’77 called Univer- forty-four-year existence to in Walla Walla, Washington. for the fourteen-university sity of Wisconsin Football work domestically. In Septem- With many years and Pennsylvania State System of (Arcadia Publishing) begins ber, the group activated its hundreds of gigs under his belt, Higher Education, as well as with Camp Randall’s infancy Crisis Corps — a group of Johnny Russo MMusic x’77; the executive director of the as a training center for Civil exceptional former volunteers his longtime musical partner, Pennsylvania House Democratic War troops and the first UW who re-enroll for short-term Doug Robinson; and their East Appropriations Committee. football team in 1889. It then assignments — to aid Gulf Hill Classic Jazz Group have In an effort to make genet- offers a delightful (and some- Coast hurricane victims. White- created what the Ithaca [New ics accessible to non-biologists, times surprising) look at sel served in the Peace Corps in York] Times says is Russo’s finest Charlotte Omoto PhD’79 has game programs, starting in Turkey from 1965 to 1967 and record — a CD of old “beautiful co-authored Genes and DNA: 1896, and the bowls, starting was most recently a member of gems” and original composi- A Beginner’s Guide to Genetics with the 1953 Rose Bowl. Wisconsin’s legislative council. tions called Bluebird from the and Its Applications (Columbia Scattered throughout are “Did you know that the Sky (www.watershed-arts.com University Press). She’s a profes- more than two hundred vin- 1975 Badger women’s crew just or www.amazon.com). The sor of biological sciences and the tage images, plus plenty of won the World Masters title in paper also calls him “Ithaca’s interim director of the Electron good old stories and stats. Edmonton, Canada, on July 28 hardest-working musician.” Microscopy Center at Washing- Finally, Anderson hon- for the 50–54 age group?” One special highlight of Russo’s ton State University in Pullman. ors some of our greatest queried an e-mail this summer. career was accepting the invita- The U.S. Navy’s Fleet Home- players — and nicknames: Actually, we hadn’t heard! The tion of his old friend, Maestro town News Center has updated Pat O’Dea LLB 1900, the boats included Madisonian Peter Tiboris ‘70, MS’74, to us on these Badger grads: Navy “Kicking Kangaroo”; Elroy Sue Ela ‘75, the longtime head perform at Carnegie Hall. Reserve Captain Henry “Crazylegs” Hirsch x’45; coach of the Badger women’s Robin Wall Kimmerer Scheller, Jr. ‘79 has retired Alan “The Horse” Ameche rowing program; Carie Graves MS’78, PhD’83 is in good com- after twenty-six years while ’56; and the Great Dayne, x’75 of Austin, Texas; Jackie pany: both she and the late UW serving as commanding officer Ron Dayne x’00. Zoch Backman Major ‘76 of professor and environmentalist of Supreme Allied Command The author is a native Birmingham, Alabama; coxswain Aldo Leopold have received Transformation Detachment son and lifelong Badger Beth Traut Bosio ‘77 of the John Burroughs Medal for 205 in Buffalo, New York. devotee whose personal Broomfield, Colorado; Karen nature writing — Leopold for Senior Chief Petty Officer touch — sharing his own fun Ela ‘77 of Stillwater, Minnesota; A Sand County Almanac in Andrew Schmitt ‘81 re- football experiences — pro- Madisonian Mary Grace 1977, and Kimmerer in 2005 for enlisted while serving with vides that “something extra.” Knight ‘77, MS’80; Peggy her first book, Gathering Moss: Afloat Training Group Atlantic When not watching Bad- McCarthy Bailey ‘79 of Breck- A Natural and Cultural History in Norfolk, Virginia. The navy ger ball, Anderson — now of enridge, Colorado; and fellow of Mosses (Oregon State Uni- has awarded Captain Dennis Lincoln, New Hampshire — Coloradoan Deb Oetzel ‘79 of versity Press). She teaches envi- Argall JD’83 the Legion of works as a marketing execu- Golden. Bosio wishes to thank ronmental and forest biology Merit during his service as tive and writes about travel, the crew’s 1975 manager, Bar- at SUNY in Syracuse. commanding officer of the history, and, yes, sports. bara Schaefer ‘75 of Kamuela, Vasudevan Rajaram Trial Service Office East, also Hawaii, for returning to help PhD’78 of Oak Brook, Illinois, in Norfolk. Ensign Robert

52 ON WISCONSIN ALUMNI NEWS

Lennon ‘93, JD’97 has enrolled in the Uniformed Finding Your Dream Job . . . on Vacation? Services University of the So you say you want to be a choreographer ... or a sports announcer ... Health Sciences in Bethesda, or a cattle rancher ... Maryland. Lieutenant Comman- But are you sure? With a new concept in career reinvention called der Randy Van Rossum ‘95 VocationVacations (www.vocationvacations.com), you can take several giant has returned to San Diego from steps toward finding out. While on a VocationVacations holiday, you work an Asian deployment and alongside an expert mentor who shares your passion and offers valuable support to the Maritime Secu- insights about the career field you’re exploring. Two additional sessions with rity Operations in the Persian a life coach help you to further refine your goals. There are currently more Gulf. Marine Corps Reserve than eighty career offerings available in the U.S. and the United Kingdom. Sergeant Mark Budzinski ‘97, VocationVacations are the brainchild of founder and president Brian JD’00 is deployed in support of Kurth ’88. He’d been doing fine in the corporate world — in the U.S., Operation Iraqi Freedom, while Brian Kurth wants to Estonia, and Hungary — but couldn’t help feeling a certain emptiness about Seaman Stephanie Roberts fuel your passion — his career and lifestyle. Getting laid off from a dot.com startup was just ‘04 recently completed U.S. for a career change. the break he needed: a chance to take a six-month road trip and let his idea Navy basic training, with for this new business percolate. By the end of the trip, Kurth had conceived honors, in Great Lakes, Illinois. his dream job in the form of VocationVacations. He moved from Chicago to Portland, Oregon, and officially launched the company in January 2004. Most people spend a lot of time working, yet how many are pursuing what they’re truly passionate 80s about? From the beginning, Kurth and his staff have tried to increase that number by following a simple vision: that “happiness and passion can and should be an integral part of what you do.” No The American Psychological matter what your current occupation, they say, it’s important to be true to yourself. Foundation’s 2005 Timothy “VocationVacations is going really well,” says Kurth. “We’ve helped hundreds of Vocationers to Jeffrey Memorial Award for test-drive their dream jobs, and we’re growing the number of VocationVacations offered each month. Outstanding Contributions to [We were] even a featured prize on the Wheel of Fortune during NFL Players Week on January 27.” Clinical Health Psychology has But that’s not all. Now this team will have a chance to reach even more people with its message of gone to Helen Coons ‘80, following your bliss: Kurth shares that “we have the complete excitement of launching the new Travel MS’85. She’s the founder and Channel TV series based on VocationVacations called This Job’s a Trip, to air primetime beginning in president of Women’s Mental April.” He’s the co-executive producer of the program, and his firm will be the fulfillment house behind Health Associates in Philadel- the scenes — because, Kurth says, “there’s no other company out there like VocationVacations!” phia, a clinical associate profes- This try-it-out-before-you-quit-your-day-job concept appeals to those who simply want an unusual sor of psychiatry at Drexel vacation, but also to those who are seriously contemplating a career change. Maybe that leap to golf University’s College of Medi- pro, Broadway actor, private investigator, or wine maker isn’t so far fetched after all. — P.A. cine, and an adjunct faculty member at Pennsylvania Hospi- tal. Coons lives in Bala Cynwyd. The Boys & Girls Clubs of We heard from Robert that supports a “healthy, plural- Jewelry (Schiffer Publishing). America (BGCA) has welcomed Holland ‘80 of Chicago that istic, spiritual, and ethical Few among us could deliver Kimberly-Clark chair and CEO his book, Chicago in Maps: foundation for Israeli society.” a presentation titled “Manag- Thomas Falk ‘80 of Dallas to 1612–2002 (Rizzoli New York), Stepke is also on the board of ing the World’s Largest Net- its national board of governors. came out in October. WAA’s New York City alumni work,” but that’s just what A longtime BGCA volunteer, Doing good is part of the chapter, the Big Apple Badgers. Matt Korn MS’84 did at he’s also pledged Kimberly- daily work of consultant With the New York transit an October conference after Clark’s support for a new five- Claudia Stepke ‘80. The head workers’ strike a not-too- receiving the 2005 UW E-Busi- year, $7 million initiative to of Claudia Stepke Associates, distant memory, a new book ness Institute Distinguished integrate BGCA’s family-based she’s proud to produce market- by Josiah Bartlett Lambert Fellow Award. Korn, of curriculum into its network of ing and communications for the MA’81, PhD’98 is particularly McLean, Virginia, is the execu- neighborhood-based facilities Parent-Child Home Program timely — If the Workers Took tive VP of network and data- nationwide. (www.parent-child.org), a a Notion: The Right to Strike center operations at America New to the board of the grassroots effort that prepares and American Political Online and oversees about one American Academy of Family children to enter and succeed in Development (Cornell Univer- thousand network engineers Physicians is Brad Fedderly school; the one-hundred-year- sity Press). The author teaches and programmers worldwide. ‘80, MD’85 — a family physi- old Partnership with Children political science at St. Bonaven- The American Rehabilita- cian with the Covenant Medical (www.partnershipwithchildren- ture [New York] University. tion Counseling Association has Group in South Milwaukee, nyc.org), which helps at-risk Congratulations to acknowledged the outstanding Wisconsin, and the medical children to thrive in school; Chicagoan Susan Maxine research of Chow Lam MS’84, director of the Franciscan Villa and Masorti (www.masorti.org), Klein ‘82 on publishing her PhD’85 with the 2005 James Nursing Home. a Jerusalem-based movement first book: Mid-Century Plastic F. Garrett Award. Lam is a

SPRING 2006 53 ALUMNI NEWS

professor and the director of objective of ending child came in. The founder of Always Bookmark the Rehabilitation Psychology hunger by 2015. Since 1988, Come Evening, a Chicago-based Program at the Illinois Institute Rierson has made his home in Web design firm, he and Vitale of Technology in Chicago. Asia, where he’s built a diverse developed a new service to fill Using the violin as a background, particularly as this need: ConnectEd (www. metaphor for U.S. democracy, a fund raiser. He speaks connectcenter.net). Madisonian Larry Eriksson Mandarin and French. Here’s something we don’t PhD’85 has written Broken Is modern philosophy hear very often: “I recently Strings, Missing Notes: racist? Andrew Valls ‘88 has wrote an original television Strengthening Democracy and endeavored to answer this movie for the Sci Fi Channel and Seeking Justice in a Nation out question through editing Race Mindfire Entertainment called of Tune (Quarter Section Press). and Racism in Modern Philoso- Dead and Deader — Zombie He’s also a consultant and phy (Cornell University Press). Attack!” Such was the news author on technology, manage- He also teaches political from Steven Kriozere ‘91 of There’s always been much to ment, and globalization issues. philosophy at Oregon State L.A. “In honor of the UW,” he celebrate about the women When Charles Olsen ‘87, University in Corvallis. adds, “I named one of the char- of this state, but a new book MBA’00 of Glen Ellyn, Illinois, Performing together in a acters Major Bascom, after the — Women’s Wisconsin: From wrote that 2005 was a year of 1992 Broom Street Theater famous hill we’ve all proudly Native Matriarchies to the contrasts, he meant it. In Janu- show was just the beginning of climbed numerous times.” Look New Millennium (Wisconsin ary, Ford Motor Company pro- the music — and musicals — for the film’s world premiere on Historical Society Press) — moted him from central-Chicago for Catherine Capellaro ‘89 the Sci Fi Channel this year. makes it official. Lincoln-Mercury manager to and her spouse, Andrew Rohn. Terence Yoshiaki Graves Its editor, Genevieve regional franchising coordinator. The Madisonians’ latest show, ‘92 also felt the call of L.A. and McBride PhD’89, has com- In March, he worked with the Walmartopia, played locally this answered it. There, he worked piled the first single-source UW’s ROTC cadets to host the winter, portraying a future run on films, music videos, and at history of Wisconsin women historic National Scabbard and entirely by the retail giant. Virgin Records until his band, ever published — a collec- Blade Honor Society’s centennial Other collaborations include the Black Eyed Peas, signed a tion of article excerpts, let- convention. And April brought Temp Slave, the Musical; six- record deal in 1997. Graves and ters, reminiscences, and oral another promotion — this time, year-old twins; and the dance fellow Pea Mike Fratantuno III histories that have been pub- to lieutenant colonel in the U.S. band VO5. Capellaro is also the ‘92 toured and recorded with lished over many decades in Army Reserves. Olson is now managing editor of Rethinking the group until 2003, when they other Society Press publica- supporting Operation Enduring Schools magazine. founded Transcenders (www. tions. She also offers the Freedom for eighteen months. Felicitations, Charise transcenders.tv), a firm that contextual commentary and Fort Lauderdale, Florida, Studesville ‘89! Her screen- composes and produces music analyses needed to make the has long been known for its play Love, Sydney earned the for films, TV, advertising, and histories of these women — tourism and marine economies, Best Screenplay award during recording artists. Graves says, the natives and newcomers, but thanks in large part to the eighth annual Film Festival “Our time in Madison has the famous and anonymous Mark Nerenhausen MA’88, of African American Women in undoubtedly shaped our work — more accessible to read- the city now boasts a strong Cinema, held in New York in ethic, and we strive to be the ers. A very notable woman cultural economy as well. He’s October. It’s the story of five best at what we do.” herself, Wisconsin Supreme the president and CEO of the young women who became We hear a lot about Planet Court Chief Justice Shirley Broward Center for the Per- friends at the UW and are Propaganda, a Madison-based Schlanger Abrahamson forming Arts, and one of the reunited after the death of advertising company that JD’62 wrote the foreword. visionaries who saw to the cre- one of them. Studesville lives boasts Rob Sax ‘92 as its presi- McBride is the director ation of the diverse, downtown in Oak Park, Illinois. dent, and Wade Breaux ‘91 of women’s studies and Riverwalk Arts & Entertainment and Travis Ott ‘99 as brand an associate professor of District, which attracts 1.4 mil- managers. Among the firm’s history at UW-Milwaukee, lion visitors annually. Thanks to 90s clients are Miles Gerstein ‘70, and has also written On another of the city’s residents, president and CEO of UpperCut Wisconsin Women: Working Bob Hoysgaard ‘64, for David Vitale ‘90, MS’98, Images, and Cathy Dethmers for Their Rights from Settle- sharing this news. PhD’05 is the director of curricu- ‘94, the owner of Madison’s ment to Suffrage. The United Nations World lum and instruction for the High Noon Saloon. One reviewer concludes, Food Programme has a new Watertown [Wisconsin] School From South Bend, Indiana, “There is so much we can private-sector donor officer in District. While pursuing his PhD, Notre Dame Assistant Professor learn from the courage, Brett (Breton) Rierson ‘88. he observed the lack of a Web- of Political Science Keir Lieber tenacity, and intelligence of Working from Bangkok and based tool that would allow ‘92 writes that he’s “keeping his Wisconsin women. This is Hong Kong, he oversees educators to create and maintain allegiance to the Badgers on the an excellent read for citizens private-sector partnerships with professional profiles — which is lowdown until after tenure of every state.” those who share the program’s where Richard O’Donnell ‘94 review,” and shares that his first

54 ON WISCONSIN ALUMNI NEWS

book, War and the Engineers: DVD about the history of Camp Participation honored the Jersey. With declines in market The Primacy of Politics over Tech- Randall. When the Stones came Verona, Wisconsin, resident share to Japanese automakers, nology (Cornell University Press), calling again this past summer with the President’s Bronze some advise American manufac- came out this fall. His spouse is to offer Bomberg a promotion Volunteer Service Award. turers to adopt the practices Meredith Bowers ‘92. Lieber’s as Jagger’s guitar tech, he Harvey Sernovitz ‘95, of rivals Toyota or Honda — father, Robert Lieber ‘63, has opted to stay put and build his JD’99 is on a grand adventure but Mehri cautions otherwise. also written a new book called business, Story Me This Produc- with his spouse, Jo Ann Smith His three years as a computer- The American Era: Power and tions (www.storymethis.com). Sernovitz ‘96, and family. simulation engineer for a Strategy for the 21st Century New to the Hong Kong He’s a U.S. Department of State Toyota-group company in Japan (Cambridge University Press). office of the law firm Debevoise foreign-service officer who provided a view of unsafe con- He’s a professor of government & Plimpton is David Zeiden recently finished his first over- ditions, racism, intimidation, and international affairs at ‘94, who specializes in mergers, seas tour in Guangzhou, China, mandatory overtime, and more. Georgetown University in acquisitions, and private equity and is now working in Taipei, Artist Koji-Jun Jun’ichirö Washington, D.C. transactions. Taiwan. “It’s amazing the num- Ishida MFA’97 writes that Like the 1992 grads Graves Andrew Frank-Loron ‘95 ber of Badgers I run into,” he “2005 was a fruitful year.” In and Fratantuno III above, “recently received recognition says, “even though I’m about the spring, he had a solo show Ramsay Adams ‘93 believes for his active volunteer life 7,500 miles from Bascom Hall.” in his home community of in the power of the music that from President Bush,” writes Notes from Toyota-Land: Jersey City, New Jersey, and accompanies our media. He’s a Andrew’s spouse, Rhonda An American Engineer in Japan received the Rebecca Goldfarb film and television music super- Frank-Loron ‘95, JD’00. (Cornell University Press) is a Fellowship for completing the visor who’s co-authored Music Specifically, the President’s new work by Darius Mehri [Carl] Djerassi [PhD’45] Art Supervision: The Complete Council on Service and Civic MS’96 of Jersey City, New Residency of 2004. The fall Guide to Selecting Music for Movies, TV, Games, & New Media (Schirmer Trade Books); teaches music supervision at A New Twist on the Neti Pot New York University’s Center for As a pediatric otolaryngologist, Diane Gallo Heatley ’82, MD’87 saw Advanced Digital Applications; “a lot of children with chronically snotty noses” and became interested in and has just music-supervised finding a gentle, effective way to treat them without surgical intervention the film Heights, starring Glenn or drug side effects. Close. He and his spouse, Of course, the problem isn’t restricted to children. Heatley, who’s Ananda Thorson Adams ‘93, also an associate professor in the UW Medical School, says that some 70 mil- live in New York City. lion Americans suffer from sinus problems. Start with allergies, and add in Another Badger is making irritants such as cigarette smoke, air pollution, pollen, dust, and mold, and it big in entertainment: Paul Diane Heatley wants you’ve got a whole lot of uncomfortable people. Decongestants, nasal sprays, Scanlan ‘93 is a co-founder and to make nasal wash- and antibiotics may fix symptoms temporarily, but there’s no proven cure for the chief operating officer of ing a common — and sinus trouble. more accepted — MobiTV (www.mobitv.com) in practice. Realizing that sometimes the simple approach is the best one, Heatley Berkeley, California: the first devised a solution called SinuCleanse. It’s based on the neti pot, a “genie global multimedia network and lamp”-shaped pot that’s been used for centuries in a nasal-cleansing ritual in the practice of yoga — technology company providing something she learned about through a nurse. The user mixes a batch of warm, salinated water in the TV and radio services on mobile pot, inserts its spout into one nostril, tilts the head, and pours the water through the sinuses and out phones — more than twenty- the other nostril. five channels of both live and Because traditional neti pots are made of ceramic or glass, they can break easily, especially in the made-for-mobile content. In wet hands of children using them around bathroom sinks. Heatley’s twists were to develop an unbreak- September, MobiTV received an able plastic version, and to put it in a convenient package with packets of saline, a stirring spoon, and Emmy Award for Outstanding instructions. This kit was originally launched in the Madison area in 1997, and is now available nation- Achievement in Engineering wide at major drugstore chains, some physicians’ offices, and online at www.sinucleanse.com. Heatley’s Development. business partner and brother, Dave Gallo, runs Med-Systems, the company that produces SinuCleanse. Justin Bomberg ‘94 This modern take on ancient wisdom has paid off. Heatley says she knew that the potential mar- knows Mick Jagger — person- ket for her product — which has met with “excellent success” — was huge, and she expects it to grow ally. Working first in TV-news as more people hear about it. She explains that “nasal washing makes so much sense — allowing the photography and editing, he sinuses to work better and heal, and treating the actual root of sinus problems — that most people are ended up as the on-stage and more than eager to try it.” Heatley adds that it’s safe for children and pregnant women because it’s backstage video photographer drug free — which is good news in an era of increasing resistance to antibiotics. for the Rolling Stones’ 2002–03 “One of our favorite comparisons for the skeptics,” says Heatley, “is between tooth brushing and world tour. Afterward, he nasal washing. Nobody in our society sees tooth brushing as weird — it keeps the mouth and teeth returned to Madison and clean and healthy. Keeping the nose clean isn’t as familiar to most Westerners, but it makes just as produced In the Red Zone, a much sense.” — Staff

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brought two additional solo (www.fooltimecircus.org), a 2000s Tales shows, as well as numerous program that promotes the group shows. You can see some circus arts to “build confidence, Hip Hop Homos, a short of Ishida’s paintings, drawings, expand life choices, and inspire documentary directed by Dave and photos at www.junart.net. artistry.” This summer, they O’Brien ‘00 of L.A., premiered John Sherman ‘97 had a also launched 888 Monkeys, a in October as part of Logo TV’s memorable — and enviable — performing-arts program for Real Momentum series. This 2005 as well. A reporter for kids. Gentile lives in San Fran- film — his first — profiles God- WBAL-TV, the NBC affiliate in cisco and St. Louis, Missouri. des and Deadlee, two openly Baltimore, he received not only The next time you’re in gay hip-hop artists who share Outdoor Adventures of a Peabody Award for his piece Valders, Wisconsin, drive by the When their experiences and hardships My Youth “Chesapeake Bay Pollution elementary school and think of — a collection through music. O’Brien is also Investigation,” but also an Jason Procknow ‘98, MS’04 of stories written and completing his thesis film, Dave Emmy and an Edward R. — he’s the new principal there recorded on CD by Straight Boys — which was shot Chittenden MS’57, PhD’61 Murrow Award, and was named after six years of teaching at entirely in Madison — to earn one of Baltimore magazine’s Madison’s Lapham Elementary. — arrived at Alumni News an MFA at the University of 2005 “Baltimoreans of the There’s been a lot of buzz headquarters, it had been on Southern California. in the National Football League a sixteen-year journey. Year.” The Shermans doubled BusinessWeek Online (NFL) about whether its over- That’s because Chitten- their pleasure in August by selected Madisonian Anand time rules are fair, but brothers den, of Orange, California, becoming the parents of twins. Chhatpar ‘05 as one of twenty Chris Quanbeck ‘98 of Water- was trained as a chemical Kris Warren ‘97 has “gone Top Entrepreneurs Under 25 in town, Wisconsin, and Andrew engineer and “tried to be one Hollywood” and wrote to share a recent contest to “find the Quanbeck ‘01 of Madison aim for many years,” specializing his advice to “inspire graduat- next generation of Michael to change that. They’ve pro- in computer simulation of ing students to chase their Dells.” Chhatpar is the CEO of posed the “cut-and-choose” bid chemical and physical dreams.” He’s currently the BrainReactions, which he system to NFL owners: a solu- processes. But that was manager of TV development founded in 2004. The idea tion in which the loser of the before discovering that he for Wonderland Sound and came out of his internship at coin toss would decide where was actually a storyteller in Vision, but it was a long road the Pitney Bowes Advanced the opening overtime posses- engineer’s clothing. Chitten- — which started at a reception Concept Technology Center: if sion would start, and the win- den learned this when he desk — that took him there. he could harness the creativity ner would choose whether it joined Toastmasters in 1989 Tenacity, focus, luck, connec- and insight of diverse young started on offense or defense. and, without meaning to, tions, hard work, and a willing- minds, he could solve compa- The NFL’s competition commit- began presenting his talks in ness to start at the bottom will nies’ problems. BrainReactions tee was expected to discuss the form of stories. all help, but this is the clincher, is a pool of two hundred pro- overtime further in February. Chittenden’s talent led says Warren: “If you’re going to fessional brainstormers who Abbie Fayram ‘99 of San him to the South Coast chase that Hollywood dream, think up new products, services, Francisco wrote to tell us how Storytellers Guild, several of now is the time to do it. Don’t markets, and strategies for she was really blown away by its leadership positions, and look back in ten years and clients. It also recently released the wedding of Amber Fritch performances at the Once regret not going for it.” a public beta site of an online ‘00 — almost literally. Fritch, Upon a Story Festival in UNITE (UrbaN Impact brainstorming tool of San Diego, was to be married San Juan Capistrano, Cali- Through Education) is a pro- at www.brainreactions.net. on a beach near Cancún, fornia, and the Los Angeles gram of the Inner City Teaching Former UW women’s Corps in Chicago — an alterna- Mexico, on October 21, but Storytelling Festival. Plus, hockey player Meghan Hunter tive teaching-certification Hurricane Wilma forced the another CD is on the way. ‘05 has joined the Niagara program dedicated to serving bridal party’s evacuation 170 And here’s the Wiscon- University [New York] Purple children in underfunded miles inland the day before. sin link: although Chitten- Eagle coaching staff as an assis- schools — and Beatriz Diaz Making the best of it, Fayram, den’s stories are fictional, tant coach, following a season ‘98, JD’01 is one of its newest Jamie Smith ‘00 of Minneapo- many were inspired by his as a volunteer assistant coach graduates. She’s also pursuing lis, and Sarah Edens Hoffman adventures with the UW at Wisconsin. Hunter played for an MS in education from North- ‘99, MPT’01 of Waukesha, Hoofers Outing Club. the Badgers from 2000 until western University and teaches Wisconsin, created a “normal To join the storytelling 2004, finishing as the team’s bilingual elementary students. Saturday” by watching the revival that’s been going on career leader in points (177), Few can claim to be Badgers’ victory over Purdue during the last few years, goals (83), and assists (94). professional circus performers via the Internet in their hotel’s Chittenden suggests visiting She’s also the niece of National and teachers, or the president lobby. By game’s end, the three the National Storytelling Hockey League players Dave, of the American Youth Circus wedding-goers had gained a Network (www.storynet. Dale, and Mark Hunter. org) or e-chatting with him Organization, but Orlene dozen new friends who were about this pursuit or his Marie Arceo Carlos Gentile also “looking for a little bit of Compiled by WAA’s alumni news MS’98 can. She and her spouse, comfort in a good old American recording at dchittenden@ editor, Paula Wagner Apfelbach ‘83, socal.rr.com. Carlo, head up Fool Time Circus college football game.” who feels she is suitable for framing.

56 ON WISCONSIN PHILANTHROPY

Quiet Generosity Following a family tradition, John Feldt puts his money where his heart is.

Growing up in a blue-collar one thing: anonymity. president of finance, Feldt will neighborhood on Madison’s His father’s quiet, generous leave a legacy of management south side, John Feldt ‘66 saw example helped mold one of skill, professionalism, and invest- the lessons of humility and serv- John Feldt’s core beliefs. ment savvy in the upper reaches ice playing out again and again. “If people care about you of the organization. But coax When a family in his Lake- and you’re doing things the him — and it takes a fair bit of side Street neighborhood fell right way, you’re going to coaxing — and Feldt admits on hard times or relatives were know that. You won’t have to that the legacy he leaves among strapped for cash or the local be told about it by others,” says students working part time at food bank needed a hand, his Feldt, whose thirty-nine-year the foundation’s headquarters father, Walter, would often step career at the UW Foundation is is just as meaningful. in and provide an assist. winding into its final months Feldt’s understated In return, the big-hearted until retirement. generosity created the Walter, liquor salesman expected only The foundation’s senior vice Helen, and Loretta Feldt Memo- rial Scholarship, which has been awarded seventy-three times Philanthropic investment since 2001 to student employ-

JEFFF MILLER (2) ees at the foundation — those in UW-Madison promises to provide who file, sort, deliver mail, run a tremendous return as the errands, and make fund-raising phone calls. The scholarships university applies its resources to have ranged between $100 bring greater understanding of our and $1,200. “I know how hard it is to world and to find answers to society’s work and go to school,” says Feldt, who worked at Mont- most critical problems. For more gomery Ward’s on State Street information about the University and at Oscar Mayer to help pay his way through the UW’s busi- of Wisconsin Foundation or ness school. “I had some support Create the Future: The Wisconsin from my parents, because they both believed strongly in educa- Campaign, call (608) 263-4545. tion, but they just didn’t have the wherewithal to pay for all of it. They helped a little, and I remember how much it meant to me.” The endowed scholarships are named for Feldt’s parents and his late wife, Loretta ‘90, who died within about three months of being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in 2001. “People [at the foundation] allowed me to basically spend three months at home during her illness. She was home during the whole process, and I’m really happy I was, too. We talked about everything, and she thought this would be an John Feldt, here with students Brooke Krause and Justin Boyd in the absolutely perfect thing to do,” lobby of the UW Foundation building, has provided seventy-three scholarships through a fund he established in 2001. The organization’s Feldt says. vice president of finance, Feldt makes a special effort to get to know It was a perfect fit in part the students who work in the mail room during their college years. because Feldt is known for his

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rapport with students. It’s not health and physical education at Another important change unusual for him to socialize with Sun Prairie High School. has been in the way the founda- student workers and build last- Sometimes, former student tion manages its investments, ing relationships. workers stop by to show off Feldt adds. Solid decision-mak- Emily Johnson ‘02, a their new families. Feldt is ready ing has produced returns that transportation engineer who to please this next generation keep research projects, scholar- has received two scholarships, with a drawer full of toys that ships, and named professorships says Feldt always made time to he replenishes regularly. well funded. chat with students. More friend Proof of the scholarship’s Those sorts of returns give than executive, Feldt has always popularity is found in the way donors confidence that the been a student favorite. foundation employees con- foundation is a good steward “He’s down to earth and tribute to the annual internal of their resources. has an enormous heart,” John- fund drive: they have ear- “The returns that you son says. “I worked all through marked more funds for the generate from investments are college at the foundation. Feldt Scholarships than for any just as important as raising new That’s how I supported myself. other single cause. dollars, because it makes it eas- Getting the scholarship meant Sandy Wilcox, UW Foun- ier to raise money if people are a lot because of that, but also dation president, says Feldt has proud of the organization and because it meant a lot to John.” been the “heart and soul” of they see you have a well-run Jason Smith and Justin the organization. operation,” says Feldt, who Boyd, two mail room employ- “Although his role is finan- plans to retire in June. ees, count themselves lucky cial, people know him, trust Feldt also has shared his “John’s not one who to have worked with Feldt and him, and like him,” Wilcox says. management and investment gives you something, to have won the scholarships. “He loves students. So much of acumen in the community, Boyd, a sophomore from Wau- our employees’ support of the serving on boards that provide expecting something nakee majoring in biochemistry, scholarships is from what we all business and investment back. It’s not about says the aid eases some of the went through when Loretta guidance to the American that for him. He doesn’t financial pressure. died. It was heartbreaking Heart Association, Access “He’s very kind and seems because we all love John.” to Independence, the Attic need that recognition. to genuinely care about every- In many ways, Feldt’s sense Angels Foundation, and the He does it out of the one else,” Boyd says of Feldt. of duty is a reflection of how Evjue Foundation. goodness of his heart.” And Smith, a senior eco- the roles of the foundation and The lessons Feldt learned nomics major from Racine, says its donors have evolved since from his parents — those of self- it’s a treat to be able to work he began work there as an less, quiet giving and the value with the man who made the accountant in July 1967. The of education — will live on for scholarship possible. foundation had about $6 mil- generations of student filers, “Tuition keeps increasing, lion in assets under manage- mailers, and errand-runners to and it’s nice to have the scholar- ment then, compared to about come. Chad Kavanaugh says ship, but it’s just as nice to have $2 billion today. Feldt’s example is both powerful the interaction with him. The The need to raise money to and persuasive. students definitely appreciate benefit the university has been “John’s not one who gives it,” he says. amplified as state support for you something, expecting some- Chad Kavanaugh ‘03, higher education has declined thing back,” he says. “It’s not who was among the first to over the years, Feldt says. about that for him. He doesn’t receive a scholarship, remem- “We have become much need that recognition. He does bers being surprised by how more like a public-private it out of the goodness of his approachable Feldt was to organization. Out of the need, heart.” students. you develop a program that The coaxing of John Feldt “He’s one of the most encourages people to be gener- continues. Asked to summarize important people at the founda- ous,” he says. “You’re not ask- what he’ll leave behind at the tion, yet he takes the time to get ing people for money. You’re foundation, he offers this: “If I to know students in the mail saying, ‘Here’s an opportunity have any legacy at all, it’s what room. He’ll ask you to go golfing for you to make a difference.’ the institution is all about. It’s or just shoot the breeze,” says They either believe in that, or about the students.” Kavanaugh, who now teaches they don’t.” — Dennis Chaptman ‘80

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