Colby College Digital Commons @ Colby Colby Alumnus Colby College Archives 1986 Colby Alumnus Vol. 75, No. 1: December 1985 Colby College Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.colby.edu/alumnus Part of the Higher Education Commons Recommended Citation Colby College, "Colby Alumnus Vol. 75, No. 1: December 1985" (1986). Colby Alumnus. 132. https://digitalcommons.colby.edu/alumnus/132 This Other is brought to you for free and open access by the Colby College Archives at Digital Commons @ Colby. It has been accepted for inclusion in Colby Alumnus by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Colby. DECEM BER 1985 THE ALU M NUS 10 12 15 20 22 FEATU RES DEPARTMENTS 10 Two Josephs-on Wheels! Eustis Mailroom Free of daily duties in the Spa after 30 years, John and Pete Joseph still "belong" to Colby. 3 News from the Hill 12 A Special Kind of Care 8 Ex Libris Hospices, a tradition founded in the Middle Ages, fill an intense need in today's society. 24 Colby in Motion 15 Extending Our Limits 26 Class Correspondence Four Colby professors discuss constancy and change in the College curriculum. 41 Milestones 20 Worlds Together Alumni Club News (inside back cover) Shared faculty appointments allow four Colby couples to juggle numerous interests and commitments. 22 Schussing into the Skiwear Market A well-conceived product and some lucky breaks are shaping one senior's future. Volume 75, Number 1, December 1985 The Colby Alumnus is published quarterly for the alumni, friends, parents of students, seniors, faculty, and staff of Colby College. Address corre­ spondence to: Editor, The Colby Alumnus, Colby College, Waterville, Maine 04901-4799. Editor: Lane Fisher; Assistant to the Editor: Regina Gilmartin Knox; Design and Production: Bonnie Bishop; Production Assistant: Martha Freese Shattuck; Editorial Interns: Thomas A. Hagerty '88 and Brian Norton Connors '88; Contributing Writers: Peter J. Kingsley, Earl H. Smith, Edward Day and John Beaudoin '87; Photography: Catherine Anderson (pp. 3, 7, 15, 17, 19, 20, 21, 25 top and bottom left), Yasser Alwan '86 (pp. 10 right, 11, 24 top, 25 bottom right), Lynn Mosher Bushnell (pp. 16, 33), Scott Davis (pp. 24 bottom, 25 top right). On the covers: (Front) A participant in the annual Family Winter Weekend competes joyfully in the cross-country ski race. See page 6 for details about this year's Winter Weekend. (Back) The soft silhouette of the sloop Hero is framed by berried branches on a winter day. Photos by Lynn Mosher Bushnell. --�;E:---.:_u__s T __I s ___f\1 A I LR 0 0 M The Bixler Legacy satisfaction to me and to other members of Colby students. It was, therefore, a great the Class of 1930 that Dr. and Mrs.Bixler pleasure to find that my husband's parents ...I remember hearing, one beautiful were honored guests at our 50th reunion would become the Bixlers' neighbors when spring evening, a clarion call from the dinner in 1980. they moved to Jaffrey, N.H., in 1971. back of the women's dorms on Mayflower We shall cherish and be continually Over the years I became acquainted with Hill: "Young ladies, would any of you like inspired by our memories of him . this wonderful couple -Seelye, who still to play softball? If so, I challenge you to a possessed a keen mind and used it to ex­ game!" It was President Bixler. He would Norman D. Palmer '30 press his philosophy of life and morality be pitcher for his team, and he was good. Me mber, Colby fa culty, 1933-47 while, at the same time, drawing out his We sure had fun playing with him , even Friday Harbor, Wa sh. listeners with genuine interest in their though his team won the games. ideas and experiences, and Mary, his de­ At the time when I went to Colby, a voted and intelligent wife, who added her woman was paged at her dorm room if a ... I was no great student at Colby and own charm and humor to neighborhood man wanted to see her.Several times I Dr.Bixler knew that. However, he always gatherings. was "rung up " by President Bixler to play encouraged me in the field I entered- I feel fortunate to have had a second ping-pong with him at the Women's social work. When I won the Albion chance to know the Bixlers. Union. Prexy was an excellent player, but Woodbury Smail sociology prize at com­ Joan McGhee Ames '64 I held my own on several occasions. mencement, he ...asked my parents to Marlborough, NH. I felt it was very important that I take take a picture of us and kidded me that he a class with President Bixler, and so I took deserved that prize, as he always had told his American Philosophy course. We had me, "If you work a bit harder you can I may possibly have been the first Colby many rousing confrontations in class, but I never tell what you can do." After I earned student to meet Dr. Bixler. During the got to know the magnanimity, scope of my graduate degree in psychiatric social winter of 1942, President Franklin W. knowledge, love of learning, and depth of work, Dr.Bixler phoned me with congrat­ Johnson asked me to meet with Dr.Bixler feeling that Dr.Bixler had as a teacher ulations. We continued to have a close re­ during spring break as a representative of and as a human being. lationship through notes and cards. Colby students.Ostensibly the reason for And then there were the many Sun­ My last note from Dr.Bixler was from my selection was that I was the editor of day evenings spent at the Bixlers', enjoying Hawaii in April 1982. He told me he The Colby Echo. In reality, I think it was good conversation, discussions with in­ would see Nels and me at commence­ because I would be home in Boston for vited guests, musicales given by the Bixler ment, but that I would "have to sit spring vacation, and so there would be no family, and delicious refreshments. It was through one of philosophical com­ his travel expense. (If you knew Dr. Johnson, a warm, loving, caring atmosphere, a mencement speeches." We did just that, you knew he was tight with money­ "home away from home." I shall treasure and when I saw afterwards his first him Colby money, that is, not his.) ...What the memories .... remark to me was "Oh my heavens, Kaye, was important to me was that this occa­ you had your hair chopped off-I liked it sion was the beginning of a friendship. Patricia Sales Malekow '49 so much better long." I have laughed ...From time to time in his retire­ Skokie, many times about that, knowing that even nz. ment, my wife and I would meet Dr.Bix­ though I never would be a student of Soc­ ler at alumni gatherings. His warmth and rates, my friend Dr.Bixler cared about his brilliance never diminished.The last time ...J. Seelye Bixler was the architect former students, was filled with kindness main was three years ago, when we returned to of Colby's expansion at its new Mayflower and goodness, and had a great interest in the College for the 40th reunion of my location, in an intellectual as well as a people. His memory and sense of humor Hill class. The giant still stood tail. physical sense. And his contributions to were superb attributes. I shall miss my When I think of how Colby moved Colby, which were greater than any of us friend. from an average college during my years can fully grasp, were only a part-although to the good college it is today, I have to a major part-of his services to the world Kathleen Monaghan Corey '43 credit a triumvirate of presidents: Johnson, of scholarship, of higher education, and of Gardiner, Maine the visionary financier; Bixler, the intel­ human betterment. lect; and Strider, the solidifier. ...In the My contacts with date back to his him center was the magnet, Seelye Bixler. assumption of the presidency of Colby, As a prospective Colby student touring Without him, Colby could not be where it and they continued spasmodically, but campus in the spring of 1960, I heard so is today. meaningfully, throughout the rest of his much about the outgoing President Bixler life. He was one of the finest human be­ that I always regretted having missed out Milton W. Hamilt '42 ings I have ever known. It was a special on the experience of so many earlier Philadelphia, Pa. THE COLBY ALUMNUS A Builder of Character should be acceptance as a bona fide mem­ First Things First ber of its league. Specifically, it would be I was delighted to read the fine article The fo llowing letter was written to an officer nice to travel outside of New England and about Mike Ryan in the May issue of the of the Delta Upsilon Alumni Association. A hear Colby mentioned in the same breath Alumnus. As the article emphasizes, Mike copy was fo rwarded to the College with the as Colgate, Brandeis, and Middlebury. was a great track star and a great track writer's permission to print it here. This is nice company to keep, and such coach, but he was also much more -he inclusion is a necessary first step, as yet was a builder of character and integrity I am one of the 426 Colby DUs, or 84 per­ untaken, toward becoming an Ivy League and an advocate of the development of a cent, who did not reply to the earlier let­ school.