Spring 2008

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Editor in Chief

John P. Hamill

Managing Editor

Tom Quinn

EditorsStephen GaroneLisa LincolnElaine Weisenberg

Contributing WritersJamilah EvelynJoe FodorRichard Sheridan

Class Notes EditorStefanie Low

Brooklyn College Magazineis published by the Office of CommunicationsBrooklyn College 2900 Bedford AvenueBrooklyn, New York 11210-2889.Copyright © 2008 Brooklyn College.E-mail: bcmag@brooklyn.cuny.eduWeb site: www.brooklyn.cuny.edu

table ofContents

D E PA RT M E N T S

2 From Our Readers

4 College News

28 Alumni News and Sightings

36 Class Notes

41 In Memoriam

42 Recent Books

44 A Road Less Traveled

8 Why We’re LiberalsProfessor Eric Alterman onLiberals, Conservatives,and What Is at Stake

10 Hobart JarrettThe Real Great Debater’sjourney from the Tulsa Riots tomovie inspiration

Vol. XXII • No. 1 • Spring 2008

26 The Torah Meets ComicsArchie Rands huge painting is alabor of love—and religion

Art DirectorJoe Loguirato

Senior DesignerLisa Panazzolo

Production AssistantMammen P. Thomas

Staff PhotographersClaudia MandlikJohn Ricasoli

Cover art: Lisa Panazzolo

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from ourReaders

E D I TO R ’ S N OT E Dwelling in Hell

To the Editor :I am a graduate of Brooklyn College andread the article by Robert E. Murphy titled“Fifty Years? Say It Ain’t So!” in the Fall2007 Brooklyn College Magazine about theDodgers leaving Brooklyn fifty years ago.

In Murphy’s article Ron Schweigerdid not begrudge Walter O’Malley forleaving Brooklyn and gave a couple ofreasons for that. Among them, he said,was the fact that O’Malley was innovativeand experimental in his hiring of JackieRobinson, the first black ballplayer inMajor League Baseball.

Schweiger is completely wrong in hisstatements. Robinson was hired in 1946by Branch Rickey . . . to play for theBrooklyn farm team in Montreal, Canada.The next year, 1947, Rickey––and notO’Malley––signed Jackie Robinson to aMajor League contract to play for theBrooklyn Dodgers all the way throughthe 1957 season.

Long before the negotiations withLos Angeles were over, O’Malley hadmade a binding agreement with the cityto move the Dodgers there, and in realitytruly deserves the rancor andcondemnation by all true Dodger fanswho know that he will dwell in thebowels of Hell for eternity. . .

Leonard Crifo, ’64

To the Editor :I was surprised to read some of theremarks about Walter O’Malley by Brooklyn[Borough] Historian Ron Schweiger. . .

O’Malley didn’t hire Robinson.Branch Rickey was president [and generalmanager] of the Dodgers at that timeand there is little indication of O’Malley’sinput into the hiring of Robinson. RachelRobinson writes of her husband, “He andWalter O’Malley, Rickey’s successor aspresident, were never able to develop acomfortable relationship. O’Malley calledJack a ‘Rickeyman’ and a prima donna.Tensions between them surfaced frequently.”

Furthermore, O’Malley was thefourth owner to open up baseball toother parts of the United States in thefifties (or maybe the fifth since HoraceStoneham announced the Giants’ moveto California earlier in 1957). Also, thereis strong historical evidence that the St.Louis Browns would have moved to LosAngeles for the 1942 season until thebombing of Pearl Harbor ended thatpossibility. . .

Paul Elstein, ’65

To the Editor :While I enjoyed reading the Fall 2007article “Fifty Years? Say It Ain’t So!” there isan inaccuracy in it that I believe should beaddressed. . .

Branch Rickey was the generalmanager at the time, and he was theinstrumental man in recruiting, negotiating[with], and hiring Jackie Robinson.

Victor Goodstone, B.A. ’80, M.A. ’95P. S. And to many of us Dodger loyalists,O’Malley (along with Robert Moses) isstill a bum for taking the classiest andmost beloved team in baseball, theDodgers, out of Brooklyn!

To the Editor :. . . In the course of reminiscing about“Brooklyn’s Beloved Bums,” [in Robert E.Murphy’s article “Fifty Years? Say It Ain’tSo!” in the Fall 2007 Brooklyn CollegeMagazine, Ron] Schweiger issues WalterO’Malley a posthumous pass for hijackingthe Dodgers to Los Angeles, and thenadds: “And his [O’Malley’s] hiring of JackieRobinson can’t be overlooked.”

Branch Rickey changed the courseof American history by bringing JackieRobinson to Brooklyn, and Robinsonnever forgot. To Robinson, he was always“Mister Rickey,” and when he died in1965, Robinson said, “I will always defendMister Rickey. I owe him a debt ofgratitude. I will always speak out with theutmost praise for the man.”

Robert A. Moss, ’60

Ron Schweiger responds:

It is true that Branch Rickey was in fact the one that signed JackieRobinson to a Brooklyn Dodger[s] contract. There may have been amiscommunication between me and the author of the article. Jackiesigned that contract in the Dodgers’ home office at 215 MontagueStreet in downtown Brooklyn.

As far as hoping that the L.A. Dodgers defeat the Yankees in the2008 World Series, I would hope the Mets get first crack at it. Ifthey cannot win the National League pennant, then let Joe Torre andhis Dodgers do it. Keep in mind that most Brooklyn Dodger[s] fansHATED the Yankees because the Yankees defeated our “Bums” in the1941, 1947, 1949, 1952, 1953, and 1956 World Series. Finally, in 1955the Brooklyn Dodgers were world champs over the Yankees.

If you read Michael Shapiro’s The Last Good Season, or viewed theHBO special The Brooklyn Dodgers:The Ghosts of Flatbush, it was madequite clear that initially,Walter O’Malley wanted to stay in Brooklynwith a new stadium at Flatbush and Atlantic Avenues. It was RobertMoses who was the major culprit that hindered that from happening.At a meeting at Gracie Mansion, with O’Malley, Moses, and MayorRobert Wagner, it became quite evident that Moses was willing tohave a new stadium built for the Dodgers. However, he offered thatto O’Malley to have it erected in QUEENS, not Brooklyn. Of courseO’Malley refused while Wagner sat there without uttering a word.Moses had more power than Wagner.

After those events, O'Malley was made an offer from Los Angelesthat he couldn’t refuse. As they say,“the rest is history.”

Ron Schweiger, ’70Brooklyn Borough Historian

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Never Pressured

To the Editor :In the Fall 2007 issue of the BrooklynCollege Magazine, David Herbach, ’46,stated in a letter that the administrationinsisted he sign up for the G.I. Bill so thatBrooklyn College could collect G.I. dollars.He “gave in” but is still bothered by thedecision.

I, too, was a returning veteran. Myservice was related to World War II and Ielected not to use the G.I. Bill during mytwo remaining years at the campus. Mypurpose was to save the benefits inhopes of being accepted to graduateschool. It proved to be a fortuitousdecision, because I stretched for threeyears toward my four years at NYUCollege of Dentistry.

At no time did the Brooklyn Collegeadministration communicate any pressureon me to utilize my benefit at the college.

Alvin Janklow, D.D.S., ’53

Heating Up

To the Editor :Thank you for the Fall 2007 issue ofBrooklyn College Magazine, which Irecently received in the mail. Kudos tothe editors of the magazine for publishingthe two stunning letters on page 3regarding geothermal renewable energy.

James Koenig, ’54, and ProfessorRobert Bell, chair of the Department ofEconomics, have opened my eyes andmind to the importance of conveying thisvital information to the media, theCongress of the United States and to thecitizenry of this country. We need a“wake-up” now. Thank you.

Cassia Brahms, ’49

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Harvard law professor, Constitutional scholar, author,academic superstar, and Brooklyn College alumnus AlanDershowitz, ’59, lived up to his larger-than-life reputationthis spring when he alternately enlightened andentertained a large audience of students, faculty, staff, andalumni in the library’s Woody Tanger Auditorium.

Dershowitz was there to discuss his book FindingJefferson: A Lost Letter, a Remarkable Discovery, and the FirstAmendment in the Age of Terrorism. He had donated hispersonal papers to the Brooklyn College Library in 2003,and now described his discovery and purchase two yearsago in New York’s Argosy Bookstore of a handwrittenletter penned by President Thomas Jefferson on July 3,1801. It was an acquisition that inspired him to write thefirst 10,000 words of Finding Jefferson, his twenty-seventhbook, that very weekend.

During his talk, he shifted seamlessly betweenimpassioned scholarly analysis and highbrow shtick whilepacing the stage where the mounted Jefferson letterserved as a backdrop. “The letter was electric,” he said, “inthat it deals with issues such as the limits of free speech,censorship, and who should be empowered to draw theline between dangerous speech and harmful conduct.”

Dershowitz said that he strongly disagrees withJefferson’s suggestion that the marketplace of ideas

eventually selects and chooses the best ones, pointing outthat although Hitler was elected chancellor of Germany,and the tenets of Nazism triumphed in the marketplace ofideas, these ideas were not sound nor did they bring awelcome result.

But he also said that he agreed with Jefferson’s cautionthat “though liberty is both dangerous and cacophonous, itis less dangerous to allow provocative speech than toallow censorship. Because history tells us that the appetitefor censorship in government is not easily satisfied.”

Following his remarks, Dershowitz fielded questionsfrom the audience on subjects that ranged from what todo about a too-loud call to prayer from a local mosque(“You should probably learn to live with it.”) to the linebetween robust interrogation and torture (“Informationobtained by torture is usually useless anyway!”).

Dershowitz also found time to praise his alma materand the faculty and students who make it unique. Hemade a special point of admitting that his “inability tothrow anything out” had made Brooklyn College ArchivistAnthony M. Cucchiara a very popular man around theDershowitz home.

“My wife has come to love Tony Cucchiara, and shecheers every time she sees yet another box of paper leaveour house,” Dershowitz concluded.

Top ofthe Quad

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Alan Dershowitz Comes Home to Brooklyn College

Alan Dershowitz’s complete lecture is available

as a podcast on

CUNY’s website at:

www1.cuny.edu/forums/podcasts/?cat=8

5

BROOKLYN COLLEGE MAGAZINE SPRING 2008

The Shirley Chisholm Project of Brooklyn Women’sActivism—1945 to Present continues to expand. AndBarbara Winslow, the director of the project, couldn’t bemore pleased about the new directions it has taken. Anassociate professor in the School of Education and theWomen’s Studies Program,Winslow focuses her researchon the intersection of class, race, and gender issues insocial protest movements. Her first book, Sylvia Pankhurst:Sexual Politics and Political Activism, tells the story of animportant suffragette, peace campaigner, internationalsocialist, and feminist. But the Chisholm Project is moreabout present-day America, she explains.

Inspired by Assistant Professor of History PhilipNapoli’s oral history project, “In Our Own Words: Portraitsof Brooklyn Vietnam Veterans,” [See page 6.],Winslowconceived the Chisholm Project during her 2006–07sabbatical. Housed in the Shirley Chisholm Center forResearch on Women, the project is also creating aninstructional webpage to provide materials to educatorsinterested in developing curricula about Chisholm andother Brooklyn activists.

A daughter of immigrants from Barbados, ShirleyChisholm (1924–2005) graduated from Brooklyn Collegein 1946. As a member of the New York State Assemblyfrom 1964 to 1968, she coauthored legislation thatinstituted SEEK (Search for Education, Elevation, andKnowledge), a program that provides funding and guidanceto disadvantaged youth. She was the first AfricanAmerican woman to be elected to Congress in 1968.Her fourteen-year tenure as a Congresswoman forBrooklyn’s 12th District was punctuated by severalmilestones, including the founding of the BlackCongressional Caucus. She wrote two books, Unboughtand Unbossed (1970) and The Good Fight (1973). A daringpolitical pioneer, Chisholm’s improbable quest for theWhite House in 1972 was a forerunner of Hillary Clinton’sand Barack Obama’s presidential campaigns.

As Winslow was hatching the project, a crucial factcame to light: When Chisholm was elected to Congress,her district was 70 percent women. “This changed thescope of things substantially,”Winslow says. It meant thatChisholm was the product of a very particularenvironment and that there were other women activistslike her. “The project needed to include them and collecttheir documents and artifacts,” she says.

While trying to get funding for the project, the FordFoundation suggested that she establish partnerships withorganizations in Chisholm’s district, especially Medgar EversCollege, where Winslow has also taught. Medgar EversPresident Edison O. Jackson promptly convened a meetingwith the college’s Department of Social and BehavioralSciences and gave Professor Maria De Longoria reassignedtime to work with Winslow.

“This spring Brooklyn and Medgar Evers cosponsoreda conference in which we brought together Chisholmscholars as well as Brooklyn activists to present theirresearch,”Winslow says. More than two hundredparticipants attended the event, including a sizable numberof elected officials, and scholars and students from bothinstitutions. “We’ll continue to have joint public events andconferences.”Late last spring,Winslow secured a $200,000 grant fromthe Westchester Jewish Women’s Fund to start theChisholm Archive, to help collect printed material andartifacts about Chisholm’s life and interview people whoknew her, such as her campaign managers and assistants, aswell as constituents who were close to her.

“With the help of Archivist Anthony Cucchiara andAssociate Librarian Marianne LaBatto we’re going to befiling, classifying, and storing all the stories on Chisholmfrom the New York Times, news footage on her, andmaterials that former Chisholm aides and assistants havebeen kind enough to donate,” says Winslow.

continued on page 39

Unlocking theLegacy of Women’sActivism

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TO P O F T H E Q U A D

War Remembered:In Their Own Words

Capturing the wrenching personal journeys of scores ofBrooklynites who went from fighting a controversial war inVietnam to discussing their experiences thirty years laterwas an opportunity for Brooklyn College Assistant Professorof History Philip Napoli to fill a serious academic void.

The resultant oral history project and upcoming book,In Our Own Words: Portraits of Brooklyn Vietnam Veterans, ison display through the end of 2008 at the BrooklynHistorical Society in Brooklyn Heights. Through a series oflistening stations, a display of Vietnam War–era medals andartifacts, and life-sized photographs of some veterans,Napoli, photographer Alison Coryn of Picture ProjectsAlison, and the BHS curators have carefully culled frommore than five hundred hours of recorded interviews acharged distillate of moving memory.

“As a historian, I saw this is as a rich vein ofcontemporary material that needed to be tapped now,”Napoli says, adding that a $50,000 gift from privatesources and money from his own pocket fueled this labor-intensive, four-year effort.

“These men and women arebeginning to age, and their vital storiesneed to be captured immediately,”Napoli says, noting that resourcesavailable to complete the research arecurrently exhausted. While impatientthat much valuable academic workremains to be done in this area, Napoli

is pleased to point out that, unsurprisingly, several of theveterans featured in the exhibit are Brooklyn Collegealumni.

“I have come to learn that guys like BC grads AnthonyWallace, ’75, who came out of the Marcy Houses inWilliamsburg, and Bernie Edelman, ’68, from Canarsie, aremuch more typical of Vietnam veterans than thestereotype of the violent, crazed human time-bombs thatfar too many people are still comfortable with believing,”Napoli says. Wallace is currently enjoying a successfulcareer at Con Edison, and Edelman, a widely respectededitor, author, and photographer, remains very active inveterans’ affairs.

“These veterans are our brothers and sisters andfathers and uncles and bosses and friends,” Napoli says. “Ihope this exhibit represents them fairly, with all their warts,but also with the dignity and respect that they deserve.”

Brooklyn Vietnam Veteran Rudy Thomas

(behind lectern) presents parachute to

Professor Phil Napoli and his delighted

daughters, conveying honorary paratrooper

status on the Brooklyn College historian.

Fellow Vietnam Veteran, Judge Lucian

Vecchio, (center, in suit) looks on bemused.

BROOKLYN COLLEGE MAGAZINE SPRING 2008

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Teaching Teachers to Be Masters[In Educational Law]

As a certified teacher, a principal, and a parent-activist, Associate Professor of Education David Bloomfield is no stranger to the needs

of educators to be versed in U.S. educational law. Infact, he teaches it to would-be principals andsuperintendents.

A graduate of Brandeis University, Bloomfieldlanded a job as an intern at the Boston City Hall atthe height of the busing crisis in the 1970s, when thefederal government was forcefully desegregatingschools across America. “Those were challengingtimes,” he says. “I witnessed how the educationalrights of citizens became an important social issue.”Educational rights was a fairly new concept in boththe education and law fields, and it soon became anew lens through which to look at the many socialissues at work.

“It had a direct connection to thecivil rights struggle,” Bloomfield adds,noting the historic importance of Brownv. Board of Education of Topeka in regardto the rights of minorities.

After attending Columbia UniversityLaw School, Bloomfield practiced law for aprivate firm in Washington, D.C., thenbecame general counsel to the New YorkCity Board of Education. Some years andseveral “educational rights” cases later, hedecided to pursue training in educationaladministration and supervision at BaruchCollege in the early 1990s.

A frequent columnist and contributor inseveral journals, Bloomfield has just published hisfirst book, American Public Education Law (PeterLang Publishing, 2007), an unorthodox volumethat has been praised as a practical primer for educators.

Geared for use by teachers, parents, and the laypublic, the book uses a “fact and find” method. It presentsreaders with short, real-life scenarios and guides them infinding all relevant laws in their locality and state.

“Most books present education lawnationally, but they don’t teach youhow it works,” he says. “And thelaw applies differently across thecountry, according to localregulations.”

Unlike many other books onthis subject that tend to beunwieldy legal casebooks, this

volume is unique, accessible, and easy touse. Bloomfield’s primer encourages educators to navigatethe perilous waters of public education law—and sail to safety.

8

Eric Alterman is a professor of journalism in the Brooklyn

College English Department and was named a distinguished

professor of English by the CUNY Board of Trustees in

2007. His latest book, Why We’re Liberals: A Political

Handbook for Post-Bush America, was published this

spring. As a journalist, author, and political blogger, he is

both revered and hated, depending on the political

viewpoint of the observer. Staunch conservatives regard

him as an implacable opponent, but he has also feuded with

some who wear the liberal label.

Equally comfortable in the classroom and in TV studios,

Alterman was hired as a political commentator by MSNBC

in 1996. Altercation, the daily weblog he started under the

network’s auspices in 2002, was picked up by Media Matter

for America in 2006. He is also a regular columnist for the

liberal weekly The Nation.

His first book, Sound and Fury: The Making of the

Punditocracy (HarperCollins, 1992), won the George

Orwell Award. In addition to Why We’re Liberals, his

seventh title, he has published When Presidents Lie:

A History of Official Deception and Its Consequences

(Viking, 2004), and What Liberal Media? The Truth

About Bias and the News (Basic Books, 2003).

Before joining BC, Alterman was an adjunct professor

of journalism at New York University and Columbia

University.

Liberal Is Not a Four-Letter Word:Professor Eric Alterman on Liberals, Conservatives,and What Is at Stake

You say in your book that “the wordliberal has been employed as thepolitical equivalent of an untreatablebut potentially containable socialdisease.” Are you a liberal?I’m a liberal.

When did you contract the disease?I was born in Queens but my familymoved to the suburbs when I wasfour.Whenever I took the train toManhattan, which traveled throughthe South Bronx and East Harlem, I’d

see burned-out buildings and kidsplaying in garbage-strewn lots. I wasstruck by the contrast with where Ilived, and I didn’t see a good reasonfor these kinds of inequities in ourcountry.

Do you see yourself as part of anelite?Though I’m not sure whatconservatives mean when theyaccuse liberals of being elitist—theynever bother to explain—yes, I guessyou could say I’m part of an elite.Every country needs an elite.Thequestion is whether you have aresponsible or an irresponsible elite,like the Republicans in power today.

You say liberals tend to be toonuanced and they find too manydifferences and divisions where theyshouldn’t.It’s more accurate to say that mostliberal arguments are built on anunderstanding of the world’scomplexity. I wouldn’t say the samefor most conservative positions. Thisis a moral and intellectual strength forliberals but a political weakness. Partof it may be a psychological issue.But part of it, too, is that the

conservatives’ case—reducing issuesto sound bites—is far easier to make.

Are conservatives more naturallyadroit at avoiding divisions in theirranks?In the past liberals haven’t been verystrategic, and they’ve been fighting forthe spoils of the economic pie ratherthan joining with each other in orderto enlarge the pie. Conservativeshave been more strategic.

You say TV tries to wipe out thedifferences among Americans.TV is a tool, like the Internet or the phone. It’s supposed to beentertaining, quick, funny. And soliberals are at a disadvantage becauseit’s a medium that doesn’t allow them

to make their case in such a shorttime. It doesn’t matter whether whatyou’re saying is true or not. So themore shameless side tends to win.

You argue that, in their zeal tocreate rights for minorities, liberalslost the working class.Rights were not created—they wererecognized—for minorities. It’s truethat we needed to redress somefundamental aspects of our societythat were unfair to minorities, but wedid it on the backs of the whiteworking class. When the latterquestioned why they had to pay forthis, why their jobs had to go, or whytheir neighborhoods had to becomeless safe or the quality of theirschools had to decline, we calledthem racists.That is wrong andcounterproductive. No wonder theyhad to find somewhere else to go.This was a big lesson liberals wereslow to learn.

You suggest that, by using thecourts to move their social agenda,liberals have resorted tonondemocratic means to create amore just society.A lot of the liberals’ short-termvictories were won in the courts, butthey lost an enormous amount ofpolitical power and influence becauseof that. And some people they weretrying to help were worse off in theend. It was a very shortsightedapproach, and liberals have paid aconsiderable price for that. In theend, the shortcut was a bad idea.

Why is abortion still part of thepolitical divide in this country?This is a much more religious countrythan any of the other advanceddemocracies—although abortion is tillpart of the debate in Italy. It’s a centralissue in politics. In England they nevertalk about religion like we do.

BROOKLYN COLLEGE MAGAZINE SPRING 2008

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continued on page 39

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Hobart Jarrett:

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The words could have been taken straight from a script

outline describing a dramatic scene from The Great

Debaters, one of this year’s Golden Globe nominees for Best

Motion Picture: “The debaters of Wiley College en route to

an eastern university, stop their steam car at a general store

to get some water. A half-intoxicated upholder of Nordic

superiority shoots at them twice with a Winchester . . .”

In fact, the words were published under the headline“Adventures in Interracial Debates” in The Crisis, the official publication of the National Association for theAdvancement of Colored People, in August 1935.

The author of the piece was Hobart Jarrett, whoyears later would become a professor of English atBrooklyn College. He was nineteen years old at the time,and a member of the debate team at the tiny, all-blackWiley College in Marshall,Texas, which would become thesubject of The Great Debaters. As a boy of five, Jarrett hadsurvived one of the most infamous race riots in Americanhistory, in his hometown of Tulsa, Oklahoma. At agesixteen, he was admitted to Wiley on a full four-yearscholarship. And mere months before his article appearedin The Crisis, he and other members of the team hadcompleted a 5,000-mile tour during which they debatedopponents from both segregated black and whiteinstitutions of higher learning, and won each and every oneof their competitions.

Among their victories was a contest on April 1, 1935,before a mixed audience of 2,000 people packed inBovard Auditorium on the campus of the University ofSouthern California. The debate pitted tiny Wiley againstthe mighty debate team of USC, then the reigning nationalchampion. “The newspapers of the Pacific Coast are stillwriting about that signal event,” wrote Jarrett with almostpalpable glee, following the victory that surprised no oneat Wiley College.

After his graduation from Wiley, Jarrett went on tobecome a noted Shakespearean scholar, an early leader in

The Real “Great Debater”

the civil rights movement and,eventually, the first AfricanAmerican to become a fullprofessor in Brooklyn College’sDepartment of English. He taughtat the College for twenty-fiveyears, retiring in 1986 with thetitle of professor emeritus ofEnglish.

Born November 1, 1915, inthe small east Texas town ofArlington, Jarrett grew up in Tulsa,where his family had movedwhen he was still quite young.There, in the northern part ofthe city, a number of well-to-doblack residents had established aprosperous community known asGreenwood. So noted for itswealth and good fortune wasGreenwood that many people––blacks and whites both––praised the community as a“black Wall Street.”

But Jim Crow laws ruled instates throughout the AmericanSouth in the early decades of the twentieth century,dictating racial segregation in almost every aspect of life.Fear and jealousy underlay relations between the races.The stigma of this radical division sometimes made itdangerous for blacks to step out of the shadow of whites.So it was on May 31, 1921, when a rumor that a blackelevator operator in a downtown department store hadattacked a young white female passenger inflamed an angrymob––sending hundreds of armed whites rampagingthrough Greenwood for two days. The Red Cross laterreported that three hundred black citizens of Tulsa werekilled in the rioting, more than eight hundred were injured,and ten thousand were left homeless. An area of thirty-fivecity blocks composed of 1,257 residences was destroyed byfire and millions of dollars in property damage was done. Itwas the worst recorded race riot in U.S. history.

During an interview conducted by Herbert Liveseyfor his 1975 book, The Professors, Jarrett recounted theterror of that time. “My family and its various parts and all

the other Negro people wereobliged to leave our homes inNorth Tulsa,” he said. “My fatherwas a grocer. His store wasburned down. When wereturned from having run, wefound our house was notburned, but our things werestrewn about in a terribleshamble.” He added, “Mygrandfather really made meproud. He refused to leave inthe pickup truck with us . . . Mygrandfather sat on the frontporch with a shotgun. Becauseof him, neither his house norours was burned.”

Because Jarrett’s father didnot trust banks, he had kept allthe family’s money at the store.After the fire, the only capitalthe Jarrett family had to rebuildtheir business was thirteendollars that young Hobart Jarretthad kept in a box at home.

Noted historian John HopeFranklin, chairperson of the Brooklyn College HistoryDepartment from 1956 to 1964 and currently professoremeritus of history at Duke University, was a childhoodfriend of Jarrett’s. “I was a year older,” said Franklin. “Fromthe time I was ten until I was sixteen, we were practicallyinseparable.”

Franklin moved to Tulsa four years after the riots. Thetwo never discussed the violent event, he said. “Boys atthat young age don’t talk about old bad things,” he toldBrooklyn College Magazine. “We played marbles, went tothe Boy Scouts, and after we started high school we joinedthe debate team.”

After they left Tulsa for college—Franklin to FiskUniversity, Jarrett to Wiley College—the two boys regularlymet during summer trips back to their hometown, Franklinsaid. It was a pattern that continued for decades. For atime the pair were colleagues at Brooklyn College.Franklin remembers Jarrett from that time as “very elegant,very proper. I called him ‘Mister Correct.’” It was a

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John Hope Franklin

F E AT U R E J A R R E T T

demeanor that hadbeen painstakinglyhoned during hisyears at WileyCollege.

At Wiley, Jarrettfine tuned hisdebating skills underthe college’sinnovative anddemanding coach,Melvin B.Tolson,whose idea it wasto debate againstwhite colleges afterhis teams provedunbeatable againstsquads from rivalblack colleges.

“Ourpreparation for these interracial encounters is gruelinglyintensive and extensive,” wrote Jarrett. “ Our debate squadreads hundreds of magazine articles and scores of bookson government, economics, sociology, history, andliterature. We are taught to be prepared for anything.”He added, “we must learn to handle our knowledge withreadiness and poise growing out of a mastery of theplatform.”

Added to these rigors were ever-present threats oflynching as the team traveled to white colleges and pushedracial boundaries. In his article for The Crisis, Jarrettrecounts that in Beebee, Arkansas, the debate squad hadto slip past a white mob with flaming torches scatteredalong the road, looking for a black drifter suspected ofkilling a deputy sheriff. On a debate tour in West Texas,“the colored hostess” asked Coach Tolson, who hadbecome particularly friendly with the coach of the whiteteam, if he wanted “to get all three of them lynched forpracticing racial equality.”

“Many have inquired if I were afraid,” wrote Jarrett,referring not to the dangers he faced on the road but onthe debate platform. “This is rather amusing. After adebater has thoroughly prepared himself for severalmonths in research work, after he has weighed all the pros

and cons andmastered the art ofdelivery andrefutation, there isnothing to fear.”

The year afterthe article appeared,Jarrett graduatedfrom Wiley College.He earned a master’sdegree in Englishfrom SyracuseUniversity in 1937.He then studiedEnglish andphilosophy atHarvard beforereturning to Syracuseto earn his Ph.D. inthe humanities in

1954. It was in Syracuse that he met his future wife,Gladys; the couple would be wed for sixty-five years.

Jarrett’s teaching career began in 1937 at LangstonUniversity in Oklahoma. There he quickly rose frominstructor to chairperson of the Modern LanguagesDepartment. In 1949 Jarrett moved to Bennett College, asmall black college for women in Greensboro, NorthCarolina, where he served as professor and chairperson ofthe Humanities Division.

Greensboro was also where he emerged as an activistin the cause of civil rights. According to Herbert Livesey,Jarrett was discontent with the slow progress blacks weremaking on the road toward equality in American society.He saw an opportunity to help improve their situationwhen four young black students decided to challenge thewhites-only policy at a downtown five-and-dime lunchcounter. They were allowed to sit at the counter, but werenot served.

“One of the great highlights of my life was workingwith the sit-ins in Greensboro,” Jarrett told the author.“The boys announced they were going back the nextSaturday. Nine men––black men considered prominent inthe town––met the next morning. I was namedcoordinator of the group, the liaison between adults and

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“Many have inquired if I were afraid. . . . After a debater has thoroughly prepared himselffor several months in research work, after he has weighed all the pros and cons and masteredthe art of delivery and refutation, there is nothing to fear.”

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the students. Wecontacted others,the thingsnowballed, andthen I was namedthe president ofwhat we called the‘GreensboroCitizensAssociation.’Things had to bedone in a hurrybecause weexpected therewould bebloodshed.”

Greensboro’sblack residentssupported thestudents by putting up money for their bail and boycottingthe downtown stores. Said Jarrett: “Business came to astandstill, and then the managements of the stores wereready to listen. We met. They said we were ruiningeverything. We said that was the way it was going to be.”

Negotiations between the two sides got under way.Soon, with Jarrett at the bargaining table, the storemanagement buckled and agreed to open their lunchcounters to blacks. It was an early victory that was soonemulated by civil rights protesters across the South.

A year later, in 1961, Jarrett accepted a teaching postat Brooklyn College. During his tenure, he receivedpresidential medals from three presidents and a specialcitation from CUNY for excellence in teaching. He alsochaired the Equal Educational Opportunity Committeethat doubled the number of minority students to fourhundred in one year prior to the introduction of “openadmissions.”

Students flocked to his classes. “I loved that man,” saidMarianne Scarino, ’83, who graduated summa cum laudewith a B.A. in English. Now working in marketing, shegraduated from New Utrecht High School in 1969, but“had done poorly in high school.” She enrolled in theSpecial Baccalaureate Program in 1976, going to class fournights a week. She had Jarrett for her first two semesters.

“He wasextraordinary,” shesaid. “We were areal mixed group.It was openadmissions. Therewere dropouts,businessmen,housewives,hoodlums. Hemade us scholars.He taught me tolove learning.”

Jarrett’sfellow facultymembers greatlyrespected his skilland collegial spirit.One was Professor

of English Robert Viscusi, director of the Ethyle R.WolfeInstitute for the Humanities. Viscusi recalled meetingJarrett for the first time in the fall of 1968, when he was ayoung lecturer.

“He was the first person ever to observe me, whichwas a big ritual around here,” said Viscusi. “He talked tome about my teaching at great length. He was veryfriendly and very helpful. And he always rememberedwhat I had spoken about that day. It was Henry IV.”

Viscusi also remembered that Jarrett was “a rolemodel” for younger instructors. “He had a kind ofsenatorial air,”Viscusi said. “He was a man of great dignity.”

Perhaps the most apt summation of Hobart Jarrett’scharacter was an observation he himself gave to HerbertLivesey, author of The Professors. “Literature not onlyaffords the touchstones that intelligent, sensitive, honest,good human beings need, but helps them understand theirvery life processes,” he said. “Teaching people those ideasis an honor, a challenge, a joy. I know no one who looksforward with glee to going to work. I do.”

On May 8, 2005, Jarrett died back home in Tulsa aftera long illness. John Hope Franklin spoke at his memorialservice at Riverside Church, recalling the important roleJarrett played in the struggle for racial equality, and hisimpact on generations of students.

Professor Hobart Jarrrett, center, with fellow English Department faculty, 1965.

“Literature not only affords the touchstones that intelligent, sensitive, honest, goodhuman beings need, but helps them understand their very life processes,”

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The TorahMeets the Comic BookArchie Rand believes that size, indeed, matters. The Brooklyn College

Presidential Professor of Art says that size was at least in the back of his mind

when he set out to create his 1,700-square-foot painting, 613. The work’s

component canvasses each illustrate one of the 613 commandments contained

in the Torah, the first five books of the Hebrew Bible.

While the Bible tells us that God created the world insix days, it took Rand a little longer to finish 613—from2001 until 2006 to be exact. After five years of hardwork, the Sunset Park muralist and painter had goodreason to smile recently, following a well-received openhouse at his Clinton Hill warehouse/studio that drewseven hundred visitors, including the New York media,observant Jews, and curious passersby from thesurrounding artist-heavy community near Pratt Institute.

Rand is a self-described unobservant Jew who hasvisited religious themes in his work for decades, includingillustrations of the Bible’s 54 books. While artisticallyexploring Jewish religious tenets via the paintbrush is farfrom common, Rand whose work has appeared in theMuseum of Modern Art among other venues, confessesthat the sheer number of commandments in Jewish lawhelped lure him to the project.

“The seemingly pure silliness of the number ofcommandments that needed attention was what drew

me,” he recalls. Of the paintings, he says, “They are vulgarimages painted in garish colors.” The comic book style ofthe individual acrylic paintings is a definite homage to DCcomic books and Mad magazine, which were a seminalinfluence during his childhood. However, in the aggregate,the combined effect of the garish and the vulgar seem tocancel each other, to finally suggest a more seriousgrandeur.

Rand states that he “wanted to imagine and create adistinctive image for each commandment that would bememorable with or without the text,” which he concedeswas a necessity, considering the commandment numbersare written in Hebrew. “To be honest, this came rathernaturally to me,” he says.

Indeed, some of the more arcane commandments(“To break the neck of the first-born donkey if the ownerdoesn’t claim it”) seem to cry out across the ages forirreverent illustration. Others, such as Rand’s huge open,screaming mouth illustrating the biblical missive “not to

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insult or harm anyone with words,” ring as true andtimeless today as when they were set to parchment.

Rand insists that his slightly off-center approach to613 is part of a centuries-long tradition of illuminating andinterpreting religion through art and is in no way dismissiveof the power of religious belief.

“All art is religious.Western art in particular wouldsimply not exist without the religious themes andpatronage that nourished it,” Rand says, noting that theenduring tradition of art and artists being inspired byreligious belief endures today. “Warhol never missedSunday Mass,” he says. “Matisse referred incessantly toGod, and Cezanne was a very religious man.”

Rand himself is offering one prayer for 613: “This is, asfar as I know, the largest free-standing painting in theworld. So finding a venue for a public display is a hugechallenge. I pray we find one.”

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“All art is religious.Western art inparticular wouldsimply not existwithout the religiousthemes andpatronage thatnourished it,”

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collegeNews

Slusher Gift Supports BC AthleticsHoward S. Slusher ’59, a former sports agent and retiredNike executive, has given the Brooklyn College athleticsprogram a donation of Nike apparel and equipment with aretail value of $325,000.

Slusher played soccer, golf, and track while he was aBC student and was inducted into the College’s hall offame in 2003. He has lived on the West Coast, in Oregonand California, for thirty years, but last summer for his 70thbirthday, his wife arranged a trip back to New York. “I juststarted thinking about Brooklyn College,” he says.

Bruce Filosa, director of athletics, says the donationfrom Slusher and his wife, Rebecca, couldn’t have come ata better time. Along with the dramatic upgrade to theathletics facilities in the new West Quad building, the giftwill give Brooklyn College athletics a real boost.

“Generally, we stretch every dollar but with thisdonation, we will have more apparel and equipment thanwe’ve ever had and it will be more comparable to the kindof quality that you see at Division I schools,” says Filosa,who notes that the College teams normally wouldn’t beable to afford Nike’s high-quality gear.

Filosa adds that he thinks the upgrade will help stirmore interest from student athletes. “There’s no doubt itwill draw attention to the program and ultimately, that willhelp with recruitment,” he says.

Slusher majored in physical education at BrooklynCollege and then went on to get a master’s degree and aPh.D. in education from Ohio State University. He workedas a professor for more than ten years, first at Ohio Stateand then at the University of California.` “While I was at USC, I met a lot of athletes anddecided that becoming an agent would be a cool changeof career,” says Slusher, who eventually obtained a lawdegree and then went on to represent athletes.

Nicknamed Agent Orange (he had red hair) andHoldout Howard, he has represented fifteen players thathave been inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame. Hethen went to Nike for twenty years and worked as anassistant to Nike cofounder and chairman Phil Knight.

Student ProfileAya Shohat

For biology doctoralstudent Aya Shohat, it’sall in the genes. Herdissertation researchinvolves looking intohow those long strandsof DNA affect celldivision. Using yeast toobserve the process ofcell division, she’sworking to identifygenes and mechanismsthat play a role in thatprocess, a discoverythat could have a widevariety of applicationsfor other researchers,

including those who are trying to understand cancer better. “Ifwe find that a gene is important for cell division in yeast, there isprobably a more advanced version of that gene that plays a rolein cell division for humans,” she explains.

Shohat works in the lab of Professor Dan Eshel, deputychairperson of the Biology Department and head of BrooklynCollege’s doctoral consortium in the field. Born in Israel, shemoved to Brooklyn when she was thirteen. She attendedBrooklyn College for her undergraduate studies and stayed onas a graduate student in order to work with Eshel, her biologyprofessor during her freshman year. “I like the freedom he givesme to pursue whatever specialty I want to study,” she says. “Weget a set of results in this lab and it’s up to the graduatestudents to take different directions. He really encourages us tobe independent and to find out what interests us.”

Shohat plans to finish her studies next year and hopes togo on to a postdoctoral program. Her long-term goal is to leadher own lab at a university. “What’s gratifying about myresearch,” she says, “is the possibility of discovering a novelprocess or a gene product whose function was previouslyunknown and that other researchers who are studying, saycancer, can build on to make further discoveries.”

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Books,Not Bombs

There are many ways to measure the cost of theIraq War. The Brooklyn College Anti-War Coalitionwould like you to consider this one:The $720

million spent each day on the war could pay for nearly35,000 full four-year university scholarships.

BCAW, which was organized in the summer of 2005,is one of the few groups on campus that includesstudents, alumni, faculty, and staff members,and it may be the only campus group inwhich every member has an equal sayin planning, publicizing, andcoordinating events and actions.“Our membership is diverse inmany respects—age, experience,and belief—and the coalition isdemocratic, so it’s amazing weget anything done,” saysadministrative staff member Lisa Lincoln, “but we’re are alldetermined to end the war in Iraq.The galvanizing power of that sharedpurpose, call it the BCAW effect.”

Says David Arnow, a professor of computer andinformation science, “It’s wonderful to work with studentsand colleagues on an equal basis, with no regard fortraditional rank and status. The students are utterlyamazing—organizing locally and connecting nationally, evenglobally.” The BCAW student club, a component of thebroader coalition, is a member of the nationwide CampusAntiwar Network (CAN).“It’s great to have people from ‘both sides of the desk.’”says Terri Bennet, ’08, “to have people in the group whoare simultaneously mentors and friends.”

“I love the collaboration with students,” says AssociateProfessor of English James Davis, “their idealism renewsitself on a more rapid cycle.They’re usually not socommitted to one or another hidebound political doctrine

that they won’t embrace others with different politicalviews.That inspires me.”

BCAW meets weekly during the academic year, andmaintains a large mailing list and website,www.bcantiwar.org. Founded in summer 2005, thecoalition has coordinated a well-attended, all-day teach-in;

engaged in demonstrations andcounter-recruitment activity,

hosted film screenings, guestspeakers, and study

groups, and mostrecently held a RockAgainst the Warevent on theQuadrangle.“I teach aboutsocial movements,”

says AssociateProfessor of Sociology

Tim Shortell, “so it’sgratifying to work with such

an active group. I tell mystudents that the only way to change

society is through organized collective action. Workingwith BCAW makes me realize how true that is.”

IVAW member Matthis Chiroux, a freshman at theCollege, helped plan and stage the 2007–2008 BCAWfinale. An army sergeant, honorably discharged after fouryears of service, Chiroux recently received a redeploymentorder to Iraq. Soon after the event, he traveled toWashington, D.C., to publicly announce his intention toresist.

One of the founders of the coalition, Professor ofPsychology Nancy Romer, summarizes BCAW’s effect.“When we join together as peers, sharing our knowledgeand ideas, forming close relationships, and relying on eachother, we form a learning and action community and weare all the better for it.”

Louis Camporeale, ’84; M.S., ’87,was working as a legal assistant in 1994, when, researching a

transportation-related issue, hediscovered how many people hadsued New York City over tickets theyreceived for parking at brokenmeters.

Broken meters he knew well. Asa Brooklyn College student, he hadroutinely scoured Bedford Avenue,Campus Road, and all the streetssurrounding the campus for a spotthat might save him a little money. Healso knew about getting tickets onbroken meters, which he alwaysdisputed—successfully—because the$20 fines amounted to a full day’s payfrom his jobs at the campus bookstore and the pool. “That was my

weekend going-out money,” he saysnow. “I wasn’t going to hand that

over to the city.”But when he realized

years later that people weresuing over the issue, he hadan epiphany. “It dawned on

me that the city wasn’tinforming people of their

rights,” he says, “because it was totheir advantage not to. Most peopleeither didn’t care to fight the systemor didn’t know how to.”

A little research turned upanother striking statistic—“New York,the city with the greatest publictransportation system in the country,issued $10 million in tickets annually,”he says, whereas, Los Angeles––thecapital of America’s car culture––wrote only $3 million in tickets. “Howdo you come to terms with that?”

Camporeale couldn’t. So hecame up with an idea to helpuninformed motorists in the fiveboroughs: A windshield placard,brightly hued and with bold letteringthat reminds traffic agents that theyaren’t about to ticket just any passiveparker.This one knows that in section4-08, subsection (h), subsection (3), ofthe NYC Department of Traffic Rules,(which Camporeale obtained only

after he filed a Freedom ofInformation Act request) there areclauses stipulating that motorists areallowed to park at broken andmissing meters.

The Parking Pal was born.Camporeale knew he was on to

something when he was eating at arestaurant on Avenue U and saw atraffic agent about to issue him aticket. She noticed the placard in hiswindshield and simply walked away.“It was one of the greatest momentsof my life,” he says.

He caught a break when fellowBrooklyn College alumnus and NewYork Post columnist Neil Graveswrote a story about the Parking Paland his products, leading to a surgeof interest.

He went on to make placardsfor commercial vehicles, medicalprofessionals, and residents with legaldriveways. By 1998, he had writtenhis first book, The New York CityParking Survival Guide: How to Dealwith Parking Tickets Effectively, whichthe website About.com selected asthe No. 2 reference book in NewYork City, right behind the Zagatrestaurant guide.

Camporeale became a regularcontributor to New York Now, a

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Brother ActsThis past season, the Brooklyn College men’s basketballteam posted its best record in a quarter-century, making itto the ECAC Metro semifinals. The team’s top twoplayers––possibly the two best players in the CityUniversity of New York Athletic Conference––are theyounger brothers of two former members of the team.

Richard Jean-Baptiste, a sophomore forward whoranked fourteenth nationally in scoring in Division III with22.8 points per game, was the first men’s basketball All-American at the College since the return ofintercollegiate athletics to the school in 1994. He wasalso named Division III player of the year by theMetropolitan Basketball Writers Association. Jean-Baptiste’s older brother, Jeffrey, averaged better than 20

program of the PBS-affiliated WMHT-TV, and made a name for himself asthe New York media’s point personon all things parking, appearing on“Good Day New York” and inNewsday and the New York Times.

He earned his badge of honorduring an interview with a reporteroutside the city’s Department ofTransportation offices: A DOT official,realizing Camporeale was theinfamous Parking Pal, lamented, “Oh,you’re the guy who’s trying to put us

out of business.” (Camporeale says hehas never been contacted by cityofficials about his manual or productsthough he jokes that he was “a littleconcerned during the Giulianiadministration.”)

Humor aside, he sees a biggerpoint in all of this, one about thepower of an informed citizenry in ademocracy and individuals claimingtheir rights and taking on the system.

“The entire world disinvested inSouth Africa and look at what

happened,” he says, sounding a bitfrustrated with submissive citizens. “Ifeveryone who got a ticket in NewYork City fought it, it would crush thesystem.They’d have to dismiss thetickets because they wouldn’t be ableto respond to them all in time. Andall it would take is for all of us towrite a letter.”

Meanwhile, Camporeale iswriting his next book, which hehopes will be out sometime nextyear. If his first could be consideredNYC Parking 101, then think of thesecond as an intermediate text, withexamples of how to prepare differenttypes of letters of defense and howto find good parking spots in the firstplace, something at which Camporealehas become quite adept.To this day,he still looks for broken meters.

“Now, that’s laundry money,”he says.

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points per game playing point guard under coach StevePodias from 2002 through 2006. He ranks as the thirdleading scorer in Brooklyn College’s history and currentlyserves as assistant coach for the team.

Sean Weismuller, a center and power forward, wasselected as the CUNYAC preseason player of the year. Hedidn’t disappoint, scoring 16.4 points per game and 6.4rebounds.The 6’ 8’’Weismuller’s older brother, Danny, wasa member of the Bridges from 1999 to 2003, and iscurrently working on a graduate degree in physicaleducation at the College.

Both sets of brothers grew up playing a variety ofsports, though not always against each other because oftheir age differences. But there’s still a healthy competitivejostle between them.

“He mimics a lot of my moves,” says the older Jean-Baptiste, Jeffrey, of his celebrated younger brother. “Makesure you put that in the story.”

“I stole maybe one or two of his moves,” concedesRichard, who is on pace to surpass Jeffrey’s scoring record.

The Weismullers are from a sports-saturated family.Their father played basketball at the University of Iowa andtheir sister, Kelly, also currently plays basketball for BrooklynCollege, and led the team in field-goal percentage this pastseason.

“There was always a basketball hoop around theWeismullers growing up,” says Danny, who played smallforward and never missed a game in his four years. “We’vealways been in leagues.We played every sport you canthink of.” Sean also runs cross-country at Brooklyn College.Podias says all four players were easy to coach. Of theWeismullers, he says “Danny was like a coach on the courtbecause he thought through every possession while Seanhas more ability to take over a game when the teamneeds him to,” he says.

continued on page 39

A knockout collection of materialrelating to boxing history wasbequeathed to the Brooklyn CollegeLibrary following the recent death ofits owner, Hall of Fame boxinghistorian Hank Kaplan. Consisting ofthousands of documents,photographs, memorabilia, and otherartifacts, the collection, according toBrooklyn College Archivist AnthonyM. Cucchiara, is “easily the largestboxing-related collection in theworld. It is preliminarily estimated tobe worth well over one milliondollars.”

Cucchiara, himself a boxer whotrains at the storied Gleason’s Gymon the Brooklyn waterfront, said thecollection was amassed over manyyears by Kaplan, who died lastDecember at age 88. Cucchiara andKaplan met through their mutualinterest in boxing.

The sport of boxing is as old ascivilization, said Cucchiara, anddepictions of boxers have been foundin Sumerian art as early as the thirdmillennium B.C. The ancientEgyptians, Greeks, and Romans, too,all enjoyed boxing. Cucchiara citesthe Roman poet Virgil’s comment onthe sport, “Now, whoever has thecourage and a strong collective spiritin his breast let him come forward,lace up the gloves, and put up hishands.”

“But the Kaplan Collection reallyis about much more than sport,”Cucchiara added. “Here in theUnited States, you can trace the great

waves of immigration to this countryand the striving of ethnic groups bythe names and nationalities of theboxers throughout the nineteenthand twentieth centuries—the Irish,Italians, Jews, African Americans, andmost recently Hispanics.”

According to Cucchiara, Kaplandrew on his friendships with a varietyof boxing greats, including fightpromoters, such as Chris Dundee;boxers Muhammad Ali, Sonny Liston,and Kid Galvin; trainers such asAngelo Dundee, as well as numeroussportswriters and authors, such asDavid Margolick (Beyond Glory),Jeremy Schaap (Cinderella Man), andRon Ross, ’52, (Bummy Davis), whoover the years had come to rely onthe Kaplan Collection as an invaluable

research resource. Many wereconcerned that this vital tool wouldend up outside the New York Cityarea and were relieved to learn it hadfound a home in Brooklyn.

In assembling this rich collection,Cucchiara said, Kaplan searched oldbook shops on trips to New YorkCity, buying boxing histories, recordbooks, and other materials to fill outhis collection. But his major sourceremained the thousands of friends hehad made over a lifetime of passionfor the “sweet science.”

“I visited Hank at his Floridahome to examine the collection formyself,” Cucchiara said. “Boxes filledwhole rooms in his house and werestacked floor to ceiling in his two-cargarage.”

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World’s Largest Boxing CollectionScores KO as Donation to Library

Barbara Kaplan-Haar stands with her husband in front of just a portion of the

vast collection of boxing memorabilia willed to the College by her dad, Hank.

Included in the Kaplan Collection are

• Approximately 2,600 volumes of history,biographies, and record books.

• Roughly 150,000 photographic prints andnegatives of bouts and boxers.

• 1,000 broadsides/posters of fight events held inthe United States.

• Bound and unbound copies of Ring Magazineand Boxing Digest.

• Nearly 800 boxes of newspaper clippings datingfrom the 1890s to the present.

• 150 binders of ephemeral collected materials ofvarious sorts, many signed by the top stars ofboxing.

• 300 audio- and videotapes of fights andinterviews.

• More than 300 items of memorabilia.

The Kaplan Collection now occupies two roomson the fifth floor of the Brooklyn College Library,where it will remain until an assessor’s evaluationof the dollar value of the collection is completedlater this year.

“It took us five days to carry it from the firstfloor to the fifth,” said Cucchiara.

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Cucchiara returned to Florida for a last visit in April2007 to conduct a videotaped oral history interview withKaplan. It turned out to be the last time he would see hisfriend.

Kaplan died on December 14, 2007. His daughter,Barbara Kaplan-Haar, phoned Cucchiara to inform him ofher father’s passing. “She said, ‘Dad willed his entirecollection to you and Brooklyn College,’” Cucchiara said.“It really took me by surprise.”

At a small ceremony in the Archives and SpecialCollections Division of the Brooklyn College Library onThursday, May 8, Kaplan-Haar signed over ownership ofthe collection to the Brooklyn College Foundation.

“My older brother,” she said, “always thought of thecollection as my Dad’s third child. Dad told us what goodis knowledge if you keep it to yourself. There is no betterplace for his collection than Brooklyn College.”

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C O L L E G E N E W S

In April, the Brooklyn College School of Educationcosponsored a project that paired a group of East NewYork high school students with a group of high school

students from London to produce a performance projectat the College and at the Julia Miles Theater, an off-Broadway playhouse in Manhattan.

The performance, What Do We Want to Say to theWorld? featured students from the Performing Arts andTechnical High School in Brooklyn alongside students fromSt. Francis Xavier College, a high school in South London.During the late winter and spring, the two groupspracticed several times via videoconference, with the EastNew York students coming to Brooklyn College where theinformation technology staff provided the infrastructure forthe cross-Atlantic cyber-connection. The students also setup a Facebook page where they communicated aboutdetails of the performance.

The goal of theproject, according toAssistant Professor ofEducation Wayne Reed, whohelped arrange thecollaboration, was to use thearts to give low-income highschool students theopportunity to develop theirintellectual, cultural, andsocial competencies. Theperformance, which featuredsong, dance, and poetry,focused largely on theirsense of feeling alienatedand prejudged as youngpeople of color.

“When we startedthe simulcast, students onboth sides of the Atlanticwere overwhelmed thatstudents in another part of

the world could have similar life experiences,” Reed says. “Ithink they felt affirmed in their struggles. There’ssomething really stimulating about connecting withsomeone from another country who doesn’t come fromthe same background as you. Many of these East NewYork students have had very limited exposure to peoplebeyond Brooklyn.”

Reed adds that the United Kingdom takes a differentapproach to performance art that includes more reflectionand discussion among the artists as opposed to therehearsal model more typical in New York theater. “It wasreally good for students from both countries to learn newtactics and methods,” Reed says. He believes that thismodel of using technology to foster such collaborationshas tremendous potential for future projects.

London Cyber-Bridge

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G OT C L I P S ?

If you’ve been in the news

lately, let us know. Items for

Alumni News and Sightings

may be e-mailed to

bcmag@brooklyn.cuny.edu

or mailed to Brooklyn

College Magazine.

First-time director John Harlacher, ’00,shot his gory horror thriller Urchinwithout permits in the streets andsubways of New York. Released lastyear, the film has received raves––theVillage Voice called it an “aggressivelylow-budget movie” that “captures theeerie rhythm of the subway at night.”Because it was filmed illegally andaudaciously in some of New York’smost security-heavy locations,Harlacher’s film was scheduled to beshown last September at the Hack inthe Box conference in Malaysia, anannual gathering of computer hackersand security experts. But theMalaysian Film Censorship Board puta stop to Urchin’s South Asianpremiere, ruling the film posed a“threat to culture.”

Bankruptcy lawyer Harvey R. Miller,’54, has been called “the DeanAcheson of distressed debt” for hisfinesse in handling delicate financialsituations, including New York City’sfiscal crisis of the 1970s. InvestmentDealers Digest got the lowdown fromthe man it calls “the godfather ofbankruptcy,” who foresees a newwave of bankruptcies. In the past fewyears private equity firms have goneon a binge of deal-making, leveragingcompanies and selling them to otherprivate equity firms who, in turn, sellthem to others. “It’s almost likemusical chairs,” Miller reflected. “The

question is: Who is the last onestanding when the music stops?”

For forty years, lawyer RobertChanin, ’56, has been the generalcounsel for the nation’s largest union,the 3.2 million–member NationalEducation Association. He has arguedcases before the U.S. Supreme Courtfive times and has negotiatedhundreds of labor contracts. But ithasn’t been easy the past few years,he told the National Law Journal.“Public education is under attack,” hereports, citing a Bush administration’scharacterization of the NEA in 2004as “a terrorist organization.” Chanin’smost recent battles have been withthe No Child Left Behind Act, and theNEA filed suit last year on thegrounds that Congress is defaulting on$72 billion in education aid promisedin the legislation but never delivered.

Marian Holtzberg Kent, ’38, isperhaps best known as an orchidgrower and as the founder of theMid-Hudson Orchid Society, a groupof avid orchidists she started in 1978.This April an exhibition of her recentwatercolors graced the art gallery atDowning Park in Newburgh, NewYork, her longtime home.The exhibitfeatured her depictions of the scenicHudson Valley, seascapes, andbotanicals, including a generousselection of orchids.

alumniNews and Sightings

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A L U M N I N E W S A N D S I G H T I N G S

Michael Lowenberg, ’63, has beenpracticing law in Dallas since 1966,and has gone native. Not only did hemarry a Texan and raise three Texanchildren, but he’s become an expertin Texas history. He’s now serving hissecond two-year term on the DallasCounty Historical Commission, whichhelps determine sites of historicalinterest and highlights thecontributions of the people who builtDallas. Lowenberg told the DallasCounty News that one of the goals ofthe commission will be to recognize“the great pioneer blues musicianswho lived and performed inDallas––Blind Lemon Jefferson,T-BoneWalker, and many others.”

Thomas Edison may have inventedthe lightbulb and the phonograph, butEdwin H. Cohen, ’62, is the forcebehind Edison Village, a $230 milliondevelopment project that will turntwenty-one acres of the prolificinventor’s Invention Factory andCommerce Center in downtownWest Orange, New Jersey, into amixed-use residential development.At the ribbon-cutting ceremony inApril, Cohen told the New York Timesthat the factory, which is on theNational Register of Historic Places,will host “distinctive apartments withan industrial flavor,” with many unitshaving 14- to 16-foot ceilings and 10-foot windows.

Poet Harold Norse (Albaum), ’38,once ran with the likes of Auden,Ginsberg, and Bukowski. Considerablyslowed these days, the ninety-one-year-old San Franciscan is still apresence in the City Lights Bookstore,the North Beach institution foundedby Lawrence Ferlinghetti that has

published and sold the works of Beatwriters for years. Not only is Norsewell represented on the shelves, butthis March the poet gave a reading inthe bookstore from In the Hub of theFiery Force: Collected Poems of HaroldNorse, 1934–2003 (Da Capo Press).

Michael Kessler, ’68; M.S., ’74, is aretired New York City schoolteacherand a comedian who has opened forRodney Dangerfield and YakovSmirnoff. He is also a singer-songwriterwho has released two CDs of originalmusic. But what the Pocono Recordwanted to talk to him about whenthey visited his East Stroudsburg,Pennsylvania home was his rocks,specifically the tons of minerals he hasamassed in a half century ofrockhounding. Ores, tuffs, shales, andskarns cram this geologist’s home—and filled three moving trucks whenhe transported them to the Poconosin 2002. He’s still on the hunt formore and loves sharing his sprawlingcollection.“I’m hoping to pass it on toanyone who has the slightest interest,”he says of his passion for rocks. “Itgrows. It takes you.”

Stanley Charap, ’53, saw the futureof data storage, and it was crowded!In a series of influential paperspublished in the 1990s, Charap, aprofessor emeritus of electrical andcomputer engineering at CarnegieMellon University, foresaw afundamental physical mechanism thatwould limit the density on diskstorage systems. Since then,computer scientists have beendiscovering ways to circumvent this“superparamagnetic” limitation.Thisspring, the Institute of Electrical andElectronics Engineers presentedCharap with the IEEE Reynold B.Johnson Data Storage DeviceTechnology Award for his work insecuring the future growth of the $60 billion data storage industry.

Joe Pennacchio, ’76, ran a toughcampaign in an effort to join fellowBrooklyn College alumni BarbaraBoxer ’62, (D-CA) in the U.S. Senate.In a tough, three-way contest,Pennachio finished second in theRepublican primary on June 3 with40 percent of the vote. In hiscampaign materials, the MorrisCounty (N. J.) dentist and statesenator made no secret of hisBrooklyn past, and even boasted ofworking at famed Bay Ridge pizzeriaSpumoni Gardens while attendingLafayette High School.

Without the role-playing fantasygame Dungeons & Dragons, GaryLynch, ’01, might never have foundlove. After the death of D&D creatorGary Gygax in March, the New YorkTimes caught up with Lynch in TheCompleat Strategist, a well-knowngame shop in Manhattan. Lynch, arehabilitation facilitator, credited

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Gygax’s Dungeons & Dragons forintroducing him to his wife, DaraStallings.The pair met at the BCscience fiction club a decade ago andwere married in Brooklyn’s GrandProspect Hall in February. “Withouthim, I would never have gottenmarried.” Lynch said of Gygax.

Former Glaceau Vitamin WaterDirector of Operations Cliff Oster,M.A., ’76, is taking his beverageknowledge to Skinny NutritionalCorp., where he will head upproduction on Skinny Water, the firstzero-calorie flavored water thatsuppresses appetite. At Glaceau he iscredited with formulating the firstthree Vitamin Waters in the UnitedStates as well as overseeingproduction. Oster is also a skilledstained-glass artist and is a memberof the American Glass Guild and theBritish Society of Master GlassPainters.

Composer Lyudmila German, ’96,was recently appointed minister ofmusic at Bethlehem Lutheran Churchin Georgetown, Connecticut, wherethe News Times visited her. A native ofUkraine, German is a prolificcomposer and has taken greatpleasure in seeing her works debut,including Gone, a piece for tenorsaxophone and electronics that shepremiered in New York’s Yamaha Halllast year : “It’s a great feeling to hear

my own music being performed.”Violinist Stéphane Tran Ngoc,M.Mus., ’87, is an assistant professorof music at Lawrence University inAppleton,Wisconsin, where his wife,Arden Lambert, ’87, also teaches. Butwhen the Lawrentian, the LawrenceUniversity student newspaper, wroteabout him, they didn’t dwell on histraining in France, his pricelessFrancesco Gobetti violin, or hisextensive repertoire andperformances.They wanted to knowwhy he doesn’t wear shoes when hejogs around the campus. “I’m one ofthe very few barefoot runners in theworld,” he explained. “I’m interestedin how to use the body in the mostproductive ways.” He added that hehas found that a shoeless run ishealthier and cuts down on joint strain.

Gladys Margolis Seisler, ’48, wasdesignated a “living legend” ofAlexandria,Virginia, by the localRotary Club for her work with theNaughty Knitters of Montebello.Thesalaciously named group of fiberartists, founded by Seisler fourteenyears ago, has produced more than5,300 hats, blankets, scarves, andmittens for needy children andseniors in the United States as well asColombia, Belarus, and South Korea.There are currently twenty knittersinvolved in the project whose mottois “every stitch is made with love.”

Harvey Elgart, ’72, loved movies somuch he bought a movie theater, SurfSide Cinema in the Rockaways.That

was thirty years ago. Most recently hehas been running the Cobble HillCinema (formerly the Rio Theater onthe corner of Court and Butlerstreets), and the Kew GardensCinemas (formerly the Austin Theatreon Lefferts Boulevard). Both are intrendy neighborhoods, and formerCobble Hill neighbor Heath Ledgerwas a frequent patron of Elgart’sCourt Street multiplex. It’s a far cryfrom his first movie job, at the Avonon 9th Street in Park Slope. “It was aporno house then,” he told the DailyNews. “I worked one day and thatwas enough for me.”

At first, Neil Neches,’75, thought he haddone something wrongwhen a New York Timesreporter called him upto ask him about hisuse of a semicolon inthe text of a subwayposter about newspaper litter :“Please put it in a trash can; that’sgood news for everyone.” ButNeches received no brickbats for hiswordsmithing, only bouquets. A writerfor New York City MetropolitanTransit Authority who is alsoresponsible for the Poetry in Motionsubway campaign, Neches was happythat his semicolon, which he has beenusing since the third grade, receivedsuch prestigious notice. Grammarianscontacted by the Times wereunanimous in their praise of Neches’spunctuation, though M.I.T. linguisticsprofessor Noam Chomsky was lessenthusiastic. “I suppose Bush wouldclaim it’s the effect of No Child LeftBehind,” he said.

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Donald Zingale, ’67, spent thirtyyears with the California StateUniversity, most recently as the vice-president for academic affairs at theCalifornia Maritime Academy. But thisspring he deserted the Golden Stateand accepted the president’s post atthe State University of New YorkCollege of Agriculture and Technologyat Cobleskill. It won’t be the first timeZingale has ventured into the heart ofNew York State. “I learned to ski inthe Catskills,” he told the SchenectadyDaily Gazette.

The Honorable Carolyn E.Wade, ’78,was elected to the Civil Court of theCity of New York and is currentlyassigned to a Queens courtroom, butin January she chose to be sworn in atBrooklyn’s Borough Hall, not far fromwhere her father, the late JusticeGeorge E.Wade Jr., ’55, served on theBrooklyn Supreme Court. The BrooklynDaily Eagle reported that it is Wade’sintention to carry on her father’slegacy: she even wore her father’sjudicial robes for the ceremony.

In January Walter E. Block, ’64, whoholds the Harold E.Wirth EminentScholar Chair in economics and isprofessor of economics at LoyolaUniversity in New Orleans, receivedthe 2007 Dux Academicus Award, thehighest honor a Loyola professor canreceive, for excellence in teaching andscholarship. Block, whose libertarianpath was set when he went to hearAyn Rand lecture at Brooklyn Collegein 1963, was also the top economicadviser for presidential candidate RonPaul, according to the Chronicle ofHigher Education.

Songwriter Larry “J. Phoenix” Loftin,’93, has written a fair number of songs,including cowriting credits for “ThugzMansion,” a posthumous track by TupacShakur that was chosen for inclusionlast year on The Best of 2PAC, Part 2:Life. He has also written pop, jazz, R&B,and gospel tracks for such artists asNancy Wilson and Earth,Wind & Fire.But he’s also a great singer, asMasterpiece, his first solo CD, proves.Loftin’s soulful debut features thirteentracks produced by some of the toptalent working in New York.

A dozen paintings inspired by the longand eventful life of Peter Bel, ’72,made up “Signs! Signs! Signs!,” his firstsolo show, at the Riverhead Town Hallthis spring. Some of the artist’s imagescome from his thirty-six years as alongshoreman; other works, featuringbanners advertising bingo games andthe Police Athletic League, draw uponmemories from his childhood on thestreets of Brooklyn. Newsday praisedthe “sharply realistic” style of paintingand said the show “lives up to itsname.” Bel’s wife,Trudi, worked in theBrooklyn College Library for manyyears, and their son, Marc, is betterknown as Marky Ramone, thedrummer for the celebrated NewYork punk rock group The Ramones.

Mike Camardese ’77, has spent twenty-five years as head coach of the Chiefs,the Canarsie High School football team,racking up an impressive 182-72-7record. He’s also taken his team to thePSAL finals several times, most recentlylast November, when the Chiefs lost tothe Curtis Warriors 22-16 for the PublicSchools Athletic League championship.A week after that loss, Camardesepicked up the New York Jets HighSchool Coach of the Year Award, forserving “the best interests of the gamethrough the teaching of sound footballfundamentals, the motivation of youngplayers to achieve, and the promotionof youth football by way of theirdedication to their community, theirschool, and their student-athletes.”

Alissa Goldring (Alice BermanReiner), ’42, has lived a life ofromance and adventure. Highlightsinclude marriage at age seventeen;stints at the anarchist Ferrer Colony inStelton, New Jersey; divorce; andmoving to Mexico with her twochildren in 1954 to work as aprofessional photographer. Goldring’sphotos from those days are now heldin the Special Collections and Archivesof the University of California, SantaCruz. (Goldring has been a Californianherself since returning from Mexico in1972.) A lively oral history of the artistand her peripatetic life has beenpublished by the University of SantaCruz, titled “I Respond:Alissa Goldring’sPhotographs of Mexico in the 1950s.”

Painter Michael Kareken, M.F.A., ’86,finds inspiration in trash, especially thestuff heaped in the giant recyclingplant next to his St. Paul, Minnesota,studio.While Monet focused onhaystacks, churches, and waterlilies,Kareken’s paintings, like CompressedOil Drums, Metal Pile, and ScrappedEngines #2, are drawn from industrialsources.This year “Urban Forest,” hissolo show at Minneapolis’s GrovelandGallery, collected twenty-four grittyurban paintings that the Star Tribunepraised for their “brooding grandeur.”

Mort Künstler, ’46, often cited as thenation’s premier historical artist, isbest known for his meticulouspaintings of the Civil War. Woundedveterans from a more recent conflictwill be able to appreciate his worknow that the artist has provided atcost sixty art prints for use atVaccarro Hall at the Walter ReedArmy Medical Center in Washington,D.C., where approximately 250members of the Warrior TransitionBrigade are recuperating from theirwounds sustained in the currentconflicts. Künstler’s donation of printsof an American flag painting to theRed Cross after 9/11 raised$250,000, according to Newsday.

Matthew Appelbaum, ’73, was on hisway to California with a master’sdegree in computer science from theUniversity of Wisconsin, when hestopped to visit a friend in Boulder,Colorado.That was thirty-one yearsago. Last November, Appelbaum waselected to the Boulder City Council,where he had previously served from1987 to 1996. In an interview withthe Colorado Daily, Appelbaumremembered his days in the nascentBrooklyn College Computer ScienceDepartment: “They had just startedoffering computer classes at BrooklynCollege, and nobody really knewwhat they were doing,” he recalled.“The teachers didn’t know, thestudents didn’t know, but it was ahuge amount of fun. It was sort offree-form—everybody was learningtogether, and it was just fascinating.”

Gertrude Himmelfarb, ’42, has a fanin the new British Prime MinisterGordon Brown. Brown, the BritishLabour leader and successor to TonyBlair, has written the introduction tothe U.K. edition of The Roads toModernity:The British, French andAmerican Enlightenments, her 2004book, which has just been published inEngland. He has also mentioned herwork in speeches, and when he wasChancellor of the Exchequer he invitedher to lead a seminar at 10 DowningStreet, the chancellor’s residence. Hisoffer to hold the launch party for thebook at 10 Downing Street has been“politely declined,” according to theLondon Times.

Much honored throughout his career,Stuart A. Rice, ’52, the Frank P. HixonDistinguished Service Professor ofChemistry at the University ofChicago, honored two of his BrooklynCollege professors in this year’sAnnual Review of Physical Chemistry. Inan autobiographical sketch entitled “AFortunate Life in Physical Chemistry,”Rice lauds Melba Phillips as “intelligent,sophisticated, and socially aware,” andremembers her classes as“characterized by an elegance ofpresentation coupled with deepinsights.” Donald Wright, while not abrilliant lecturer, communicated “thegrand themes in chemistry.” Moreimportantly, when Rice tested positivefor tuberculosis soon after graduating,Wright was able to have himaccepted as a patient in a trial of newanti-tuberculosis drugs at Brooklyn’sGrace Clinic. Within a few weeks anytraces of Rice’s TB had disappeared,and he was able to go to Harvard forgraduate school.

Muriel Feldshuh, ’62, has combinedher love of children’s literature andher quilting skills to create quiltsfeaturing her favorite illustrators.Theretired school librarian mails eachillustrator a fabric square, along with aletter explaining the project. Thenshe stitches the artwork into a quilt.She has received nearly a hundredpieces of art, has completed twoquilts, and is well on her way on athird, she told New York Teacher. In2003 this longtime member of theBooks for Kids Foundation waspleased to have the library at theBooks for Kids Library and LiteracyCenter at Marcy Children’s Center inWilliamsburg named in her honor.

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Compressed Scrap Metal, oil on panel, 24” x 19.75”, 2007

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Lloyd Hezekiah, ’66, has had a longand distinguished career in the arts.He was the assistant director of theBrooklyn Academy of Music from1967 to 1969, and the director of theBrooklyn Children’s museum from1969 to 1984. Now splitting his timebetween Brooklyn and his native St.Kitts, Hezekiah has had his first play,written in 1963, published. Entitled TheBreast of Heaven, the play is the storyof Louis-Auguste Cyparis, one of onlytwo people in St. Pierre, Martinique, tohave survived the eruption of Mt.Pelée in 1902.“The genesis of thatplay began right here in St. Kitts,” hetold the St. Kitts/Nevis Sun. “Mygrandmother told my mother thatlegend said there was only onesurvivor, and he was a prisoner in anunderground jail. I was always intriguedby that story, and I began to formulatethe seeds of a play.”

Last December the Mid-New JerseyChapter hosted its “BC LovesWomen” dinner, honoring ChiefJustice Deborah Tobias Poritz, ’58.The former New Jersey attorneygeneral and chief justice for the stateof New Jersey talked about herexperiences on the bench and fieldedsome pointed and importantquestions. Also honored at this eventwere chapter founders RobertaHochlerin Salovitch, ’59, and JillBlaker-Gordon, ’68, who werethanked for their dedicatedleadership and guidance. In April, thechapter presented “Brooklyn beforethe Television Set.” Participantsenjoyed readings from Doris KearnsGoodwin’s No Ordinary Time, abouteveryday life during the FDRAdministration, and David

McCullough’s The Bridge, about thebuilding of the Brooklyn Bridge, byaward-winning narrator Nels Runger.

In January, the Palm Beach CountyChapter enjoyed a luncheon at theBoca Raton Country Club withBrooklyn College Professor andChairperson of the Department of Anthropology and Archaeology H. Arthur Bankoff, ’65, as the guestspeaker. His presentation,“Archaeological Research in Europe,New York, and Israel,” was highlightedby slides of BC students excavating allover the globe.

The Brooklyn College FormerAthletes Affiliate held its eighteenthannual reunion in January, in BoyntonBeach, Florida. Despite the terriblerainstorm it was a huge success, withthe second largest turnout ever,including eight Hall of Famemembers.There were good company,good food, and lots of stories.WilliamHealy, ’99, senior philanthropy adviserwith the Brooklyn CollegeFoundation, represented PresidentKimmich and brought the group upto date on the progress being madeon the new physical education andathletic facility. All teams representedhad group photos taken.

Fiftieth Reunion of the Class of 1958

Members of the Class of 1958 returned to Brooklyn College to attend afiftieth reunion celebration held on Commencement Day. After gatheringfor breakfast in the Georgian Room, the group donned gold caps andgowns and posed for a class photo. Following this they took part in theCommencement processional and marched to their seats amid cheersand applause. Brooklyn College Foundation Trustee Donald Kramerspoke on behalf of the class during the Commencement Exercises.The day ended with a luncheon for the reunion class and their guests.

In January, the San Diego Chapterheld a different kind of event for thepolitical season. Gloria Stern Penner,’52, of radio and KPBS-TV, leddiscussions with audience participationand a primary vote to choose acandidate for each party from thelikely contenders. An election of a”president” followed all for fun.

February was a busy month withmany chapters holding events.Broward-Dade held its verysuccessful “We Love BC” annualscholarship luncheon. The programspeaker was BCAA board memberand Distinguished Professor Emeritusof Biology Martin Schreibman, ’56.Schreibman is the founder anddirector emeritus of the BrooklynCollege Aquatic Research andEnvironmental Assessment Center(AREAC), a $2.5 million teaching andresearch institute that studies aquaticorganisms and environments thatthey inhabit.

Tucson Chapter members welcomedVice-President for InstitutionalAdvancement Andrew Sillen, ’74, asthe guest of honor at their Februaryluncheon. Sillen, the son of two BCalumni, was a professor ofpaleoanthropology and chairpersonof the Archaeology Department atthe University of Cape Town, SouthAfrica, before becoming the UCTdirector of development. He spokeof his journey around the world andback home again to Brooklyn.

In February, Los Angeles/SouthernCalifornia alumni gathered for aperformance of The Rabbi and theShiksa followed by a special receptionfor BC alumni on stage with theactors.This hilarious play was written

by BC alumnus Art Shulman, ’63.Alumni were happy to have theopportunity to meet Vice-PresidentAndrew Sillen, ’74, who joinedchapter members for this event.

Also in February, the Campus Chapterhosted a presentation by attorney andProfessor of Accounting HowardDavidoff entitled,“The Four Pillars ofWealth Preservation.” Davidoff, anexpert in the areas of wills, trusts andestates, and taxation, provided alumniwith basic techniques and strategies tokeep assets in the family. In hisinimitable robust fashion, he imparted agood deal of information and kepteveryone wide awake with hischaracteristic sharp wit and humor.

On March 30, the Long IslandChapter hosted a chapter celebrationbrunch at the Culinary Institute atNew York Institute of Technology,Central Islip Campus.The featuredspeaker was Anthony Sclafani, ’66,distinguished professor of psychologyand director of the Feeding Behaviorand Nutrition Laboratory at BrooklynCollege. Appropriately enough, after alavish buffet brunch, Sclafani talkedabout “The New Discoveries on theBiology of Taste and the Psychologyof Food Preferences.” Alumni werefascinated to learn why they choosethe foods they do.

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Alumni College Night 2008

In April the Brooklyn College Alumni Association honored past andpresent students on Alumni College Night.

Madelyn Schwartz Gould, ’72, and Elliott A. Norse, ’69, were therecipients of Distinguished Achievement Awards. Dr. Gould is aprofessor in clinical public health (epidemiology) at the ColumbiaUniversity College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Mailman Schoolof Public Health and a research scientist with the New York StatePsychiatric Institute. Norse is an ichthyologist who is the founder andpresident of the Marine Conservation Biology Institute, a Pew Fellow inMarine Conservation, and an adjunct professor in marine conservationpolicy and science at the Duke University Marine Laboratory.

Harriet Levy Rosenblum, ’76, was the recipient of the Jerome S.Milgram Award for Service. She has served as an officer and memberof the Brooklyn College Alumni Association Board of Directors, theBCAA Southwest Brooklyn Chapter, and the BCAA AccountantsAffiliate.

The annual BCAA Students Awards were presented to KennyAdvocat, ’09, a member of several of the Brooklyn College musicensembles;Yitzchak Fogel, ’08, a paramedic and officer of the BrooklynCollege Emergency Medical Squad; and Alexander Pyronneau, ’08, atutor with the Research Initiative for Scientific Enhancement (RISE)program.

BCAA Student Awards are presented to students who have madea contribution to the Brooklyn College community or performing artsprogram. In accepting their awards, the recipients expressed theirappreciation not just for the present honor, but also for the roleBrooklyn College has played in their lives by providing the academicfoundation for them to build on. In speaking of the benefits they havederived from the College, they also addressed the importance of givingback to their alma mater.

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1 9 3 3Herbert NestlerClass Correspondent5850 Sugar PalmCourt, Apt. BDelray Beach, FL33484-1093

1 9 3 5Irwin GlickClass Correspondent5071 C NestingwayDelray Beach, FL33584-1093

1 9 3 6In December,screenwriter andprofessor emeritus,University of SouthernCalifornia School ofCinema, Malvin Waldwas honored by theLibrary of Congresswhen the 1948 classicfilm noir The NakedCity, which he cowrote,was added to theNational Film Registry.

1 9 3 7Harry W.AnisgardClass Correspondent2563 Greer RoadPalo Alto, CA 94303

1 9 3 9Leo AshenbrennerClass Correspondent52 Mackey AvenuePort Washington, NY11050

1 9 4 0Beatrice Persin FadenClass Correspondent7185 N.W. 9 CourtMargate, FL 33063-1936

1 9 4 1Shirley EdelmanGreenwaldClass Correspondent1 Washington SquareVillage, Apt. 16BNew York, NY 10012

1 9 4 2Paul Treatmancelebrated his secondbar mitzvah at ageeighty-three; theinclusion of hisbiography in the 2008edition of the MarquisWho’s Who in America;his citation by thegovernment of Franceas a “chevalier,” orknight, in the FrenchLegion of Honor; andthe publication of hissecond book of Haikupoetry.

1 9 4 3Romola EttingerKaplanClass CorrespondentP.O. Box 648East Quogue, NY11942

Carol L. Klapper washonored with theFriend of CSC Award,presented by theNational Council ofJewish Women (NewYork section) at JazzOn Second Avenue ata gala luncheon buffetand cabaret to benefitCouncil Senior Center.A retired magazinepublisher, she cochairsthe Council SeniorCenter (CSC).Evelyn HorowitzWeinstein has beenchosen as NassauCounty Senior Citizen

for 2008. NassauCounty ExecutiveThomas R. Suozzipresented this award toher at the 34th AnnualOlder Americans MonthLuncheon/ Conferencein May.Weinstein retiredin 2003 after twenty-two years as thedirector of theOmbudservice Program,where she implementeda patient advocacyprogram in nursinghomes throughoutNassau County.

1 9 4 4Renee B. Landau EidlinClass Correspondent30 Oak Street Ext.Apt. 507Brockton, MA 02401

Irving Roth is a retirednational sales managerfor the American RealEstate and PetroleumCorporation (AMREP)who initiatedconstruction of theNew Mexicocommunity of RioRancho’s first modelhomes, in addition toother buildings.

1 9 4 5Cyrus Ettinger recentlypublished a memoirentitled The CountryPharmacist (see AlumniBooks). A retiredpharmacist, Ettingerhelps translate Frenchand Spanish at theCaridad Clinic ofBoynton Beach, Florida.He also consults withstaff physicians onappropriate medications.

1 9 4 6Bernard R. SchwarzClass Correspondent404 Beach 143 StreetRockaway, NY 11694

Elliot Levine haswritten program notesfor chamber musicconcerts at MusicMountain in Falls Village,Connecticut.Thisseason’s series willinclude string quartetsby Janáãek andShostakovich as well assongs by FranzSchubert.Theseconcerts are broadcastby WQXR-FM andwww.WQXR.com.

1 9 4 7Reva Frumkin BiersClass Correspondent4631 Ellenita AvenueTarzana, CA 91356

1 9 4 8Eneas Sloman ArkawyClass Correspondent27110 Grand CentralParkway, Apt. 8GFloral Park, NY 11005

Murray Bromberg, theauthor of The Wagers ofSin, has completed arite-of-passage booktitled, I Slept withMarlene Dietrich…andOther Confessions—and is looking for apublisher brave enoughto handle it.

1 9 4 9Constantine K. HallClass Correspondent190 Maple StreetBrooklyn, NY 11225

classNotes

To all alumni:Many class yearsinclude the name andaddress of a classcorrespondent, who is the link betweenyour class andBrooklyn CollegeMagazine. When youhave news about youraccomplishments thatyou would likepublished in themagazine, please writeto your correspondent.If your class has nocorrespondent, pleasesend items directly to Brooklyn CollegeMagazine, BrooklynCollege, 2900 BedfordAvenue, Brooklyn, NY11210-2889.

You may alsoreach us by fax, (718) 951-4609, or e-mail, bcmag@brooklyn.cuny.edu.

If you wish tovolunteer to serve as aclass correspondent,please write to theaddress above or call(718) 951-5065.

—Class Notes Editor

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1 9 5 0Louise J. KaplanClass Correspondent175 West 12 StreetNew York, NY 10011

1 9 5 1Marion Unger GordonClass Correspondent70 East 10 StreetApt. 9PNew York, NY 10003

Samuel T. McSeveney,professor emeritus ofhistory at VanderbiltUniversity, taught in theuniversity’s OsherLifelong LearningProgram in 2008.

1 9 5 2Sheila Talmud RaymondClass Correspondent3 Lakeside LaneBayshore, NY 11706Irene Danzker Deitchhas been appointed therepresentative from theAmerican PsychologicalAssociation Division29–Psychotherapy tothe APA Public InterestDirectorate Network.In April, as part of theannual fundraiser forCASC (CommunityAgency for SeniorCitizens), she gave a

lecture entitled “Agedto Perfection: PositiveAging, Living, Loving,Laughing” at the StatenIsland Hilton. Inaddition, she wasinterviewed by MitchStacy, an AssociatedPress reporter, for anarticle about bridgesuicides. Ruth DrescherDombrow published Inthe Belly of the Moon, acollection of artworkand poetry.

1 9 5 3Ben SuntagClass Correspondent1311 Franklin LaneRockaway, NJ 07866gatnus@gmail.com

1 9 5 4Marlene (Marcia)Jacoby HillmanClass Correspondent255 West 94 Street,Apt. 6QNew York, NY 10025

1 9 5 5Geraldine MillerMarkowitzClass Correspondentgermarkowitz@earthlink.net

1 9 5 6Mike SaluzziClass Correspondent1351 E. Mountain StreetGlendale, CA 91207-1837msaluzzi@earthlink.net

Irwin Federman, generalpartner of U.S.VenturePartners, received the2008 SpecialAchievement Award atthe InternationalBusiness ForumConferences’ 19thAnnual Venture CapitalInvesting Conference, inSan Francisco. RichardJohnson is the founderand administrator ofBEYOND BARTER,TheLos Angeles SkillsPool, anorganization of folkswho share services of allkinds with each other atno charge. It’s not abarter club— servicesare shared freely, notexchanged.Theorganization, whichrecently celebrated its thirty-secondanniversary, hasmembers as far away as the British WestIndies and Malaysia.Details are at http://beyondbarter. com.

1 9 5 7Micki GoldbergGinsbergClass Correspondent217 E. Maple AvenueMoorestown, NJ 08057ginsberg10@gmail.com

1 9 5 8Sandra Seigel PikoffClass Correspondent4500 Williams Drive#212-320Georgetown,TX 78633

Don Kramer, CEO andchairman of ArielReinsurance, washonored with a LifetimeAchievement Award atthe Bermuda InsuranceInstitute’s 10th AnnualInsurance IndustryAwards. He is currentlya director of theNational Benefit LifeInsurance Co. of NewYork (a subsidiary ofCitigroup), of AtriumUnderwriting, and ofValiant InsuranceGroup. He also chairsthe National DanceFoundation of Bermudaand is a member of theboard of the AmericanBallet Theatre.

1 9 5 9Rosalie Fuchs BerleClass Correspondent260 Garth RoadApt. 3J5Scarsdale, NY 10583

Angelo A.Volpe,president emeritus ofTennessee TechnologicalUniversity, was awardedthe Honorary Doctorof Science Degree atthe May 2008commencement ofTusculum College inGreeneville,Tennessee.

1 9 6 0Saul KravitzClass Correspondent3382 Kenzo Ct.Mountain View, CA64040kravitzsaul@gmail.com

Fran GittermanOrenstein wrote herfirst tween (middlegrades) novel, The GhostUnder Third Base, anadventure story forboys and girls, ages9–13 (see Alumni Books).

1 9 6 1David S. HerskowitzClass Correspondent1175 Kildeer CourtEncinitas, CA 92024technologicalforecasting@yahoo.com

Leonard H. Bermanwrote A World ofSecrets, the sequel tohis 2001 historicalnovel, Consider MyServant (see AlumniBooks). In March, MartinA. David, artisticdirector of the . . . AndStill Dancing theatreand dance project inthe San Francisco BayArea, participated inSergei Ostrenko’sPhysical TheatreLaboratory in Latvia.

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1 9 6 2Steven J. NappenClass Correspondent38 Troy Hills RoadWhippany, NJ 07981

1 9 6 3Cliff RosnerClass Correspondent111 Blue Willow DriveHouston,TX 77042-1105

1 9 6 4Jay OrlikoffClass Correspondent20 Beaverdale LaneStony Brook, NY 11790

Builder Levy wasselected as aGuggenheimFoundation Fellow inphotography for 2008.Five of his vintagephotographs will beincluded in twoexhibitions: Road toFreedom: Photographs ofthe Civil RightsMovement, 1956–68, atthe High Museum ofArt in Atlanta, and theMary Wilson Collectionfrom the Supremes, atthe Victoria & AlbertMuseum in London.

1 9 6 5Barbara BermanLeveeneClass Correspondent24 Jubilee CircleAberdeen, NJ 07747

1 9 6 6Felicia FriedlandWeinbergClass CorrespondentP.O. Box 449Clarksburg, NJ 08510

Davina Rubin is acolumnist for the NapaRegister and informationofficer for the NapaValley Child CarePlanning Council inCalifornia. She is also apainter with artworkcurrently in the JesselMiller Gallery in Napaand in Arte de SayulitaGallery in Sayulita,Mexico. She has beenchosen for anexhibition at the NapaTransportation andPlanning Agency.

1 9 6 7Sharon WeinschelResenClass Correspondent1740 Kimball StreetBrooklyn, NY 11234

Edward Krasnove, areal estate attorney, wasrecently promoted tothe position ofexecutive vice-presidentand general counsel ofFoursquare Properties,Inc., a real estatedevelopment,management, andinvestment companybased in Carlsbad,California. Donald P.Zingale was appointedthe next president ofSUNY Cobleskill.

1 9 6 8Eileen McGinnClass Correspondent210 East 15 StreetApt.10NNew York, NY 10003

Mark Pollak was one ofsix Baltimore attorneysnamed “Leaders inTheir Field” in the 2008edition of the

prestigious guideChambers USA,America’s LeadingLawyers for Business. Heworks in the RealEstate Department ofBallard Spahr Andrews& Ingersoll, LLP.

1 9 6 9Edward M. GreenspanClass Correspondent1237 Avenue Z, Apt.6GBrooklyn, NY 11235-4360

Helen ZegermanSchwimmer wrote Like the Stars of theHeavens, an anthologyof articles firstpublished in The JewishPress.

1 9 7 0Barry SilvermanClass Correspondent176 Stultz LaneEast Brunswick, NJ08816Barry@successfulu.com

Roselyn FeigenbaumGraff is a substituteteacher in Cordova,Tennessee.

1 9 7 1Constance FortePigozziClass Correspondent7802 16 AvenueBrooklyn, NY 11214

Helen Ungar Friedmanwas a guest of honor atthe Hebrew Academyof the Five Towns andRockaway’s (HAFTR)thirtieth annualscholarship dinner atthe Woodbury JewishCenter in Woodbury,Long Island. She was

recognized for herpassionate dedicationto the OrthodoxJewish yeshiva and theJewish community.

1 9 7 2Stanley A.AlexanderClass Correspondent4 Indian Valley RoadEast Setauket, NY11790

Mary Claire Dunn isthe founding artisticdirector of Charlie’sPort, a professionalchildren’s ensemble inAtlanta. A recentproduction was Waitingfor My Growth Spurt, aone-man show writtenand performed bythirteen-year-old JasonDavid. She also actsperiodically, writes, andcoaches, and iscurrently designingeducational DVDpackages for highschool performing artsprograms. DebbieEisenstadt Mandel’sthird self-help book isentitled Addicted to

Stress: A Woman’s 7-StepProgram to Reclaim Joyand Spontaneity in Life(see Alumni Books). Sheis also a motivationalspeaker, stressmanagement expert,personal trainer, andhost of the radioprogram Turn on YourInner Light Show, heardon WGBB–AM 1240 inNew York City.Ita Mairanz Mond is acofounder of FromUnder the Hat, anOrthodox womenartists groupheadquartered in SilverSpring, Maryland. Shealso teaches painting tolocal women.

1 9 7 3Linda E. Gross Carroll212 Stony Point DriveSebastian, FL 32958lcarroll32@comcast.net

1 9 7 4Diane Oeters VaughnClass Correspondent80 Kelsey PlaceMadison, CT 06443BR

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Lucille L.Abellonio wasrecently appointed thesuperintendent ofClairton City Schools inPittsburgh. DianeKirschner was certifiedby The HumanistSociety as a Humanistminister, authorized toperform all life passageceremonies, andlicensed by the city ofNew York as a marriageofficiant. Albert A.Kruger of the Office ofRiver Protection of theU.S. Department ofEnergy, was named glassscientist for the WasteTreatment andImmobilization Plant onthe Department ofEnergy’s Hanford Site inWashington State.

1 9 7 5Rubin LeitnerClass Correspondent138 East 96 StreetBrooklyn, NY 11212

Ben Katchor is aMacArthur Foundation“genius” grant–winnerand writer of theoriginal musical TheSlug-Bearers of KayrolIsland, which premieredat the Vineyard Theatrein Manhattan. He is bestknown for his comicstrip, “Julius Knipl, RealEstate Photographer,”which chronicles Kniplthroughout a historicNew York landscape.Iris Weinshall washonored as the CUNYPartner of the Year atthe 21st AnnualPartners for ProgressGala. She wasappointed vice-

chancellor for facilitiesplanning, construction,and management atThe City University ofNew York in April 2007,after having served thecity of New York formore than twenty-fiveyears, most recently ascommissioner oftransportation.

1 9 7 6Henry P. FeintuchClass Correspondent50 Barnes LaneChappaqua, NY 10514

Oheneba Boachie-Adjei, an orthopedicand spine specialist, washonored at the 6thAnnual African HealthSummit for hissignificant contributionsto medical educationand global practice.Theevent was hosted bythe Ghana Physiciansand SurgeonsFoundation of NorthAmerica. Yael Zarhy-Levo, associateprofessor in theDepartment ofLiterature at Tel AvivUniversity, wrote abook of criticismentitled, The Making ofTheatrical Reputations:Studies from the ModernLondon Theatre.

1 9 7 7Michael HannaClass Correspondent12 Woodlawn RoadSomerset, NJ 08873

Rhonda Kontner wasrecently named thedirector of theInterdisciplinary Center

for Child Development,a special school forstudents with disabilitiesin Queens. Michael A.Vitelli was promotedto executive vice-president of Best BuyCorporation.

1 9 7 8Susan A. KatzClass Correspondent120 Pinewood TrailTrumbull, CT 06611-3313

Kathleen Alaimo iscurrently serving asdean of the College ofArts and Sciences atSaint Xavier Universityin Chicago.

1 9 7 9Anthony EspositoClass Correspondent265 Hamilton DriveRed Bank, NJ 07701

1 9 8 0Rose Kanarek joinedthe firm of RosenSeymour Shapss Martin& Company LLP inNew York City as taxmanager. DavidLeibowitz is theprincipal conductor ofthe MassapequaPhilharmonic, one ofthe largest orchestrason Long Island. He isthe founder andcurrent music directorof the New YorkRepertory Orchestra,which is in its sixteenthseason. In addition, he ison the conducting staffof the Rome Festival,

leading opera, ballet,and concertperformances in Italy.

1 9 8 1Gershonah CynthiaWhitley wrote her firstbook, Looking for Self inAll the Wrong Places,which is based on TheWizard of Oz (seeAlumni Books).James F. Faraguna is aVietnam veteran whocoaches Americanfootball in Turkey.Rhoda Seidenberg isthe associate curator atthe Yeshiva UniversityMuseum at the Centerfor Jewish History inNew York City. DonnaTait is the proposedprincipal of theMcCown ExpeditionaryLearning School, whichwill open in StatenIsland in Septemberunder the aegis of NewYork City OutwardBound. She is currentlyassistant principal at theMath, Science, andTechnology Institute inBrooklyn.

1 9 8 2Eileen ShermanGruberClass Correspondent69 Derby AvenueGreenlawn, NY 11740

1 9 8 3Michael KosikClass Correspondent331 Newman SpringsRoad, Building 1Red Bank, NJ 07701michael.kosik@ubs.com

1 9 8 5Peter HuertasClass Correspondent5135 Fedora DriveSan Antonio,TX 78242alamodude2001@yahoo.com

1 9 8 6Ian Lee BrownClass Correspondent13978 Sawteeth WayCenterville,VA 20121

Lorna Wallach, a cantorwith Congregation B’naiIsrael in Millburn, NewJersey, and a soloistwith the Zamir Chorale(the first modernHebrew-singing chorusin North America),performed at theireponymous CarnegieHall presentation,Celebrating Israel at 60.

1 9 8 7Eric SteinhardtClass Correspondent915 East 7 StreetApt. 1HBrooklyn, NY 11230

1 9 8 8Lauren Korn PopkoffClass Correspondent951 Woodoak DriveBaldwin Harbor, NY11510

1 9 9 0Beth Debra KallmanClass Correspondent8718 Ridge BoulevardBrooklyn, NY 11209

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1 9 9 3Gina A. Liccardo ownsLiccardo Enterprises!,which specializes insalsa instruction inNew York andcorporate chairmassage in New Yorkand the San FranciscoBay Area.

1 9 9 4Ilene BerkowitzClass Correspondent1575 46 StreetBrooklyn, NY 11219

1 9 9 5Nathan SolatClass Correspondent2793 Lee PlaceBellmore, NY 11710

1 9 9 6Anthony VitaleClass Correspondent554 Beach 129 StreetBelle Harbor, NY11694

Racquel Goodison isthe recipient of theAstraea 2007Emerging LesbianWriters Fund $10,000grant.

1 9 9 7Tara M. DowdClass Correspondent440 West 34 Street,Apt. 10ANew York, NY 10001

Ronald Jeancompleted his post-master’s certificate insocial workadministration atHunter College inMarch.

1 9 9 9David MoskowitzClass Correspondent2327 East 18 StreetBrooklyn, NY 11235

2 0 0 1Tatesha Bennett ClarkClass Correspondent540 East 82 StreetBrooklyn, NY 11236

Michael Bradford is anassistant professor ofdramatic arts at theAvery Point and MainCampuses of theUniversity ofConnecticut. His playFathers and Sons

premiered at AContemporary Theatrein Manhattan. His playLiving in the Windplayed Off-Broadwayand was nominated forseveral prestigiousAudelco TheatreAwards. RaymondCollins teaches atWake ForestUniversity in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.Victoria Gitman is amathematics professorat New York CityCollege of Technology(City Tech). She is therecent winner of aNational ScienceFoundation grant tosponsor the SecondAnnual New YorkWomen inMathematics Network(NYWIMN)Conference on theCity Tech campus inMay. She is acofounder ofNYWIMN, anorganization dedicatedto helping femalemathematicians form

the professional andsocial networksnecessary for success.Uraline SeptembreHager was recentlyselected to participatein an artist residency inEngland for two weeksin August. She is aspecial educationteacher for the NewYork City Departmentof Education whocurrently teaches aseventh-grade inclusionclass in a Bronx publicschool. MauriceWatson received hisNational BoardCertification forPhysical Education/Early/MiddleChildhood, one of fiveteachers to hold thatdistinction in New YorkState. He teachesphysical education atthe Academy ofCulture andCommunications atPleasant ValleyElementary School inSchenectady, NewYork.

2 0 0 2Igor GalanterClass Correspondent1342 East 18 StreetApt. 6CBrooklyn, NY 11230

2 0 0 4Yael Abraham FogelClass Correspondent570 Ocean PkwyApt. 5CBrooklyn, NY 11218yct.fogel@gmail.com

2 0 0 6Mimi Meserve is thenew theater teacher ather alma mater,Kennebunk HighSchool, in Kennebunk,Maine. She has alsodirected nine plays,two of which shewrote and for all ofwhich she helpedcreate sets andcostumes. TomNazziola composedand conducted themusic to BusterKeaton’s Battling Butlerwhich was performedby his group The BQEProject at the DrydenTheater/GeorgeEastman House inRochester, New York.Edward J.Ware is apercussionist andcomposer whorearranged the tunesof Thelonious Monkwith a quartet of localmusicians for theeleventh WellingtonInternational JazzFestival, held lastNovember inWellington, NewZealand.

2 0 0 7Ezra RichClass Correspondent205 West 95 StreetNew York, NY 10025EzraRich@gmail.com

2 0 0 8Stefanie LowClass Correspondent3-A Putnam AvenueGlen Cove, NY 11542stefanielow@yahoo.com

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Alumni

Elizabeth Hall Conant, ’33

Zach Baym, ’34

Ethel Schachner Dancis, ’34

Samuel Romm, ’34 Moses (Morris) Weinstein, ’34

Ben Franzino, ’35

Gertrude KleinmanRosenbloom, ’35

Milton S. Schechter, ’35

Jack E. Armore, ’36

Helen Greenberg, ’36

Leo Herbstman, ’36

Irving Pilson, ’36

Edward R. Simkin, ’36

Malvin D.Wald, ’36

Morton Hollander, ’38

Muriel Hauser Nester, ’38

David Rosen, ’38

Bernice Halwer Elkind, ’39

Gertrude Debare Mandelbaum, ’39

Abraham S. Eisenstadt, ’40

Edna Blueweiss Newman, ’40

George Schwartzman, ’40

Israel Weber, ’40

Mildred Cantor, ’41

Jerome L. Graff, ’41

Rita Good Rector, ’41

Abbott A. Rosenberg, ’41

Albert H. Small, ’41

Jacob Soddin, ’41

Lillian Schweitzer Weinstein, ’41

Barbara Freis Cahn, ’42

Kayla Pomerantz Horowitz, ’42

Eleanore Marie Maimone Sivell, ’42

Tobias (Ted) Wolman, ’42

Marie Buscemi Scardapane, ’43

Donald J. Sibbett, ’43

Gloria Dymond Weiss, ’43

Helen Jaffee Alfred, ’44

Stanley Bashkin, ’44

George J. Bolton, ’44

Gerald Charles Thorner, ’44

Harry Beilin, ’46

Louis Berkofsky, ’46

Helen Horn Haber, ’46

Estelle Mishler Zweig, ’46

Lawrence Goldstein, ’47

Shirley Witkowsky Landman, ’47

Arline Hyman Passman, ’47

Ruth Goidell Robinson, ’47

Martin Groffman, ’48

Ruth Ginsberg Goldstein Glanz, ’49

Elayne Alenick Lash, ’49

Neilan Sleven, ’49

Janet Kranis Sperling, ’49

Larry Zide, ’50

Edwin Jacobson, ’51

Marilyn Talve, ’51

Barbara Steele Schwartz, ’52

Lawrence Field, ’53

Irwin Lainoff, ’53

Marcia Bender Winograd, ’53

Bernice Buchwald Sklar, ’54

Leonard J. Katz, ’55

Ronald J. Baumgarten, ’56

Barbara Blitz, ’56

Constance Gelb Gordon, ’56

Stanley Nesheim, ’56

Elaine Eisenberg Niederhoffer, ’56

Byron L. Pinsky, ’56

Gilbert Smolin, ’56

Barbara Krupp, ’57

Gerald M. Plevin, ’57

Stanley D. Ashkinos, ’58

Steven L. Roemer, ’58

Martin Schulman, ’58

Emanuel SteinholtzStonewood, ’58

Shulamit Drandoff Rogoff, ’60

Ruth Rubenstein Bernstein, ’61

Loretta Eisenman Weingarten, ’61

Ines Girson Baron, ’62

Barbara Stern Rossoff, ’62

Richard Epstein, ’63

Cynthia Jean Fein Stolman, ’64

Charles E. Bryan, ’67

Michael Stampnitzky, ’68

Janice Katzen Gelfand, ’69

Louis Roseman, ’72

Felisa Lunerman Gebot, ’74

Christina Miastowski Potters, ’74

Helen Bernstein Turer, ’78

Melinda Koral Zimbler, ’78

Wang Chi Wong, ’79

Palma R. Lilley, ’81

Faculty

Karl BecksonEnglish Department

Chaya GurwitzComputer and InformationScience Department

Dante NegroModern LanguagesDepartment

inMemoriamBROOKLYN COLLEGE MAGAZINE FALL 2007

Bernd Renner, Department of ModernLanguages and Literatures. Difficile estsaturam non scribere: L’ Herméneutiquede la satire rabelaisienne. Droz, 2007,$158.92, hardcover.

George Rodman, Department ofTelevision and Radio. Mass Media in aChanging World, 2009 Updated Edition.McGraw Hill, 2008, $98.75, paperback.

___________ , Department of Televisionand Radio, andRonald B. Adler. Understanding HumanCommunication, 10th ed. OxfordUniversity Press, 2009, $74.95, paperback.

Robert M. Shapiro, Department of JudaicStudies, and Piotr Wróbel. eds.YehielYeshaia Trunk. Poyln: My Life withinJewish Life in Poland, Sketches andImages. University of Toronto Press, 2007,$40, hardcover.

Mac Wellman, Department of English, ed.7 More Different Plays. Broadway PlayPublishing, 2007, $24.95. paperback.

__________, Department of English. AChronicle of the Madness of SmallWorlds.Trip Street Press, 2008, $15,paperback.

__________, Department of English.Harm’s Way. Broadway Play Publishing,2008, $12.95, paperback.

Alex S.Vitale, Department of Sociology.City of Disorder: How the Quality of LifeCampaign Transformed New York Politics.New York University Press, 2008, $40,hardcover.

Christine Vitrano, Department ofPhilosophy, and Stephen M. Cahn. eds.Happiness: Classic and ContemporaryReadings in Philosophy. OxfordUniversity Press, 2008, $21.95, paperback.

Alumni Books

Irving Benig, ’65, A Story for Rose.Bertelsmann Publishing, 2008 – Germany.

Leonard H. Berman, ’61, A World ofSecrets. Xlibris Publishing, 2008, $35,hardcover.

Leah Garchik, ’66, Real Life Romance:Everyday Wisdom on Love, Sex, andRelationships. Chronicle Books, 2007,$12.95, hardcover.

Hadassah Haskale (Judith HadassahDavis), ’56,Wayfaring. Mazo Publishers,2007, $14.95, paperback.

Bruce Isaacson, ’92, Dumbstrck at theLights. Zeitgeist Press, 2008, $12.95,paperback.

Debbie Eisenstadt Mandel, ’72, Addictedto Stress: A Woman’s 7 Step Program toReclaim Joy and Spontaneity in Life.Jossey-Bass, 2008, $22.95, hardcover.

Fran Gitterman Orenstein, ’60,The GhostUnder Third Base.TRIAD Twins, 2007,$10.95, paperback.

Christopher A. Puello, ’80, Papers from aHarvard/Yale Man: Examples of CollegeWork. iUniverse Inc., 2007, $10.95,paperback.

Veronica Schreiber, ’01, Flash Baby.TraffordPress, 2007, $20.78, paperback.

Michael P. Sweeney, ’88, In Memory of theFast Break. Plain View Press, 2008, $14.95,paperback.

Rena (Rosenbaum) Rotenberg, ’57,Miriam, P. Feinberg, Rita Rotenberg, andSaul Wachs, Lively Legends – JewishValues: An Early Childhood TeachingGuide. Behrman House, 1993, $29.95,paperback.

Rena (Rosenbaum) Rotenberg, ’57,YonaChubara, and Miriam P. Feinberg,TorahTalk: An Early Childhood Teaching Guide.Behrman House, 1989, $26.50, paperback.

Gershonah C.Whitley, ’81, Looking forSelf in All the Wrong Places: Based on theWiz.Tate Publishing & Enterprises, 2008,$8.99, paperback.

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Faculty Books

Jonathan E. Adler, Department ofPhilosophy, and Catherine Z. Elgin. eds.Philosophical Inquiry: Classic andContemporary Readings. Hackett, 2007,$39.95, paperback.

Eric Alterman, Department of English.Why We’re Liberals: A Political Handbook forPost-Bush America. Viking Adult, 2008,$24.95, hardcover.

Leonard R. N. Ashley, professor emeritusof English, and Wayne H. Finke. eds.Language and Politics: Selected Papers ofthe International Conference September29–October 2, 2004, Sponsored by theAmerican Society of Geolinguistics,Baruch College (CUNY). Cummings &Hathaway, 2008, $25, paperback.

David Balk, Department of Health andNutrition Sciences. ed. Handbook ofThanatology:The Essential Body ofKnowledge for the Study of Death, Dying,and Bereavement. Routledge, 2007, $90,paperback.

Jonathan Baumbach, professor emeritus ofEnglish. You: Or the Invention of Memory.Rager Media, 2007, $24.95, hardcover.

Jeffrey Biegel, Conservatory of Music. HoHo Hanukah! Ho Ho Christmas! CarlFischer, 2008, $1.60 per sheet, minimumpurchase 6 copies.

__________, Conservatory of Music.Different Kind of Hero. Carl Fisher, 2008.

David C. Bloomfield, School of Education.American Public Education Law Primer.Peter Lang, 2007, $18.95, paperback.

Giancarlo Pontiggia, Selected Poems. trans.Luigi Bonaffini, Department of ModernLanguages and Literatures. GradivaPublications, 2008, $20, paperback.

William F. Browne, professor emeritus ofEnglish. In the Blood. Xlibris, 2007,$31.99, hardcover.

George Cavalletto, Department ofSociology, Crossing the Psycho-Social Divide:Freud,Weber, Adorno, and Elias. Ashgate,2007, $99.95, hardcover.

Robert Cherry, Department ofEconomics. Welfare Transformed:Universalizing Family Policies That Work.Oxford University Press, 2007, $24.95.hardcover.

Robert Cherry, Department ofEconomics, and Annamaria Orla-Bukowska. eds. Rethinking Poles and Jews:Troubled Past, Brighter Future. Rowman &Littlefield, 2007, $75, hardcover.

Samir Chopra and Scott Dexter.Department of Computer andInformation Science. Decoding Liberation:The Promise of Free and Open SourceSoftware. Routledge, 2008, $95, hardcover.

Howard Davidoff, Department ofEconomics, Robert L. Dixon, and HaroldE. Arnett. The McGraw-Hill 36-HourCourse: Accounting, 4th ed. McGraw-Hill,2007, $19.95, paperback.

James C. Davis, Department of English.Commerce in Color : Race, ConsumerCulture, and American Literature,1893–1933. University of Michigan Press,2007, $24.95, paperback.

Tibbi Duboys, School of Education. ed.Paths to Teaching the Holocaust. SensePublishers, 2008, $39, paperback.

Jack Flam, Department of Art. HungarianFauves from Paris to Nagybáná,1904–1914. Hungarian National Gallery,2006, $123.16, paperback.

Kenneth A. Gould, Department ofSociology, David N. Pellow, and AllanSchnaiberg. The Treadmill of Production:Injustice and Unsustainability in the GlobalEconomy. Paradigm Publishers, 2008, $83,hardcover.

Jacqueline A. Jones and Keith Harrow,Department of Computer andInformation Science. Problem Solving withC++. Pearson Custom Publishing, 2007,$61, paperback.

Jerome Krase, professor emeritus ofsociology, The Staten Island Italian-American Experience. The DaVinci Societyof Wagner College, 2007, $30. paperback.

Jerome Krase, professor emeritus ofsociology, Frank B. Pesci, Sr., and FrankAlduino. eds. Italian Americans Before MassMigration:We’ve Always Been Here.American Italian Historical Association,2007, $35, hardcover; $25, paperback.

Yedidyah Langsam, Department ofComputer and Information Science.Workbook for C++. Pearson CustomPublishing, 2007, $49, paperback.

Veronica Manlow, Department ofEconomics. Designing Clothes: Culture andOrganization of the Fashion Industry.Transaction Publishers, 2007, $34.95,hardcover.

Paula J. Massood, Department of Film. ed.The Spike Lee Reader. Temple UniversityPress, 2008, $69.50, hardcover.

Simon Parsons, Department of Computerand Information Science, Nicolas Maudet,and Iyad Rahwan. eds. Argumentation inMulti-Agent Systems:Third InternationalWorkshop, ArgMAS 2006, Hakodate, Japan,May 8, 2006: Revised Selected and InvitedPapers. Springer, 2007, $59.95, paperback.

Gerald M. Oppenheimer, Department ofHealth and Nutrition Sciences, andRonald Bayer. Shattered Dreams?: An OralHistory of the South African AIDS Epidemic.Oxford University Press, 2007, $35,hardcover.

Rohit Parikh, Department of Computerand Information Science, Amitabha Gupta,and Johan van Benthem. Logic at theCrossroads: An Interdisciplinary View. AlliedPublishers, 2007, $63.49, paperback.

Margaret-Ellen Pipe, Children’s StudiesProgram and Department of Psychology,Michael E. Lamb,Yael Orbach, and Ann-Christin Cederborg. eds. Child SexualAbuse: Disclosure, Delay, and Denial.Lawrence Erlbaum, 2007, $34.95,paperback.

Tomás López-Pumarejo, Department ofEconomics, and Lorenzo Vilches. eds.Culturas y Mercados de la Ficción Televisivaen Iberoamérica: Anuario OBITEL 2007.Gedisa, 2007, $33.99, paperback.

Courtney Queeney, Department ofEnglish. Filibuster to Delay a Kiss: andOther Poems. Random House, 2007,$19.95, hardcover.

recentBooks

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L I B E R A L S continued from page 9

You say liberals don’t see theDemocratic Party as their politicalarm.Because the Democratic Party is nota liberal party; it’s a coalition in whichliberals may be the largest segmentbut not necessarily the strongest.Liberals need to establish coalitions.

You contend liberals are tooprincipled and unwilling tocompromise.People who are unwilling tocompromise shouldn’t be in politics.Unless you are talking about adictator, politics is the art ofcompromise. And when you say, “I’mnot going to compromise myself, andI’m voting for Nader instead ofGore,” that’s therapy, not politics.

One of the flaws you attribute toliberals is that they seek theendorsement of organizations thatdon’t resonate with the public atlarge, such as the pro-choiceNARAL,ACLU, etc.A lot of these organizations werecreated in the time of “identity

politics” and have outlived and losttheir usefulness. They protect theirown, narrow interest instead of thepublic’s—which would help liberalsmore.

Is the U.S. ready to elect a blackpresident?The country is, but not all parts of it,and some swing voters may not be. Ibelieve America is ready, but keep inmind, we have a funny electoralsystem.

You suggest liberals should use thelabel with pride.That’s what the book is about. Andit’s possible to do it. Do I predict itwill happen? No. It’s part of ourrole as intellectuals to light a sparkand see an idea take hold. JFK, who Iquote in my book, defined what aliberal was in 1960 and welcomedthe label. Eight years of Bush mayhave cured a lot of people in thecountry who’ve become averse tothe liberal label. There’s a ways togo, but I think the problem isreceding.

Of the Jean-Baptistes, Podias saysthey’re both the players you wantwith the ball with the game on theline. “It’s a great feeling as a coach toknow you can count on players likethat,” he says. “I’ve always had greatconfidence in both of them.”

As a coach, Jeffrey now feels thatway about Richard. But he confessesthat he probably saves his most bluntcriticism for his younger brother. He

can do that.They’re close, they bothsay. But if Richard were to surpass hisbrother’s scoring record?

“With every game, you don’t gointo it thinking about your record.You’re just rooting for your team towin,” says Jeffrey. “Richard is on myteam, so I’m always rooting for him.”Being his big brother might havesomething to do with it, too.

B R OT H E R A C T continued from page 21

W O M E N ’ S A C T I V I S Mcontinued from page 5

An educator who developssocial studies curricula for elementaryand secondary classes,Winslow plansto use multimedia technology tointroduce the story of Chisholm’srole and of women’s political activismin the history of Brooklyn and thenation. “Although the actual archivalmaterial in the College library will beaccessible for researchers, we’reworking together to make sure it’salso available online,”Winslow noteswith pride.

The project has developedcollaborations with the WeeksvilleHeritage Center, the BrooklynHistorical Society, and the RutgersUniversity Library, which houses anarchive of Shirley Chisholm’s papers.“Our hope is that by March 2009—straddling Black History and Women’sHistory months—we will have one ofthe most thorough Chisholmarchives, live or online,”Winslow says.It’s an ambitious project, and Winslowbelieves the late Congresswomanwouldn’t have had it any other way.“But the project is more thanteaching about Chisholm’s life andlegacy,”Winslow says. “It’s to inspireschool kids and give them a sense ofthe importance of political activismand of being engaged in yourcommunity.”

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Marine HeroElliott Norse, ’69, knew what he wanted to be since he wasfive years old, although it was unlikely he could pronounceit at the time: an ichthyologist, which is to say he wanted tostudy fish. Growing up in Gerritsen Beach—“with anestuary for my backyard”—Norse says his true friendswere always the sea creatures he observed endlessly.

After earning a degree in biology from BrooklynCollege he attended graduate school at the University ofSouthern California. His plan was to teach at a universitywhere he could also conduct research on marine life. Buta tight academic job market made him put those plans onhold. He took a detour to Washington, D.C., for what wassupposed to be a two-month internship at the U.S.Environmental Protection Agency. Some eighteen monthslater he was hired as a staff ecologist for President JimmyCarter’s Council on Environmental Quality. He wascharged with writing briefing papers for senior staff. Hefound it thrilling. “I was taking a broad-brush look at thehealth of the planet in a lot of my work there,” he says.

Working inside the federal government, he realized howmuch corporate lobbying, misguided public policy, andAmerican overconsumption were combining to threatenmarine habitats. So he decided to become a conservationist,and that meant he really needed to study people.

“Marine ecosystems are not disappearing because ofsome failure of their own biology,” Norse says. “It’s us. It’speople, families, governments.”

In Washington, Norse worked on developing regulationsfor the offshore oil and gas industries and wrote a chapter inthe Council on Environmental Quality’s annual report to thepresident in which he argued that preserving ecologicaldiversity should be the main priority of conservation efforts.It was a crucial insight into the nature of the problem, onethat helped galvanize the environmental movement and stilldrives it today. He had found his groove.

All of a sudden, the liberal arts education—theWestern civilization and sociology courses—that Norsereceived while at Brooklyn College was a valuable andessential tool in his work.

“Working in the policy world is where all the things Iever learned came together,” he says. “I still flirted with theidea of academe, but I had Potomac fever. I got to dothings on a level I could never have imagined.”

He went on to a string of positions at environmentalorganizations. By 1996, he had met a lot of scientists who

were doing important research, but their efforts lacked thekind of coordination that could make a real impact. That’swhen he decided to found the Marine ConservationBiology Institute in Seattle, a think tank that brings togethernatural and social scientists to research and advocate onenvironmental issues.

“I felt the most important thing I could do would be toencourage the growth of a new science of marineconservation biology and to apply that science to the mostpressing problems we face,” he says. “By bringing togetherpeople who think about how oceans work and people whothink about how humans work, we can better understandthe nexus of those two and come up with solutions.”

During his thirty-year career, he’s had some impressiveaccomplishments. He worked behind the scenes toconvince the National Oceanic and AtmosphericAdministration to establish four of the earliest nationalmarine sanctuaries. He played a key role in encouragingPresident Clinton to launch the Marine Protected AreasCenter, which serves as a focal point for developing anational system of protected areas. He also played acritical role in convincing the current administration toadvance legislation to protect marine life in thenorthwestern Hawaiian Islands.

“There are actual pieces of real estate on this earththat I helped protect because I was at the right place atthe right time with the right message,” he says. “I am solucky I didn’t get what I asked for. I crossed the line frombeing somebody who thinks about things to somebodywho applies that thinking to doing things, and it feels rightfor me.”

a roadLess traveled

Planned Giving—and Other Ways to Support Brooklyn College

There are many ways to help Brooklyn College pursue ourtraditional mission—to provide high-quality, affordableeducation. One option is to remember the College in your will.

If you are like many alumni, you want to support futuregenerations of Brooklyn College students. Making a bequest tothe College costs you nothing in your lifetime, helps satisfy yourphilanthropic objectives, and— with the proper planning—canprovide estate tax savings.

If you are considering including a bequest to BrooklynCollege in your will, ask your attorney to use the followinglanguage:

I bequeath to the Brooklyn College Foundation, Inc., a not-for-profit organization organized under the laws of New YorkState, with its principal offices located at 2900 BedfordAvenue, Brooklyn, N.Y. 11210, ___ % of my residuary estate(or the sum of $__________ ) for its general unrestrictedAnnual Fund.

If you have already made provisions for Brooklyn College inyour will, we encourage you to notify the Brooklyn CollegeFoundation so that you may be listed as a member of theLegacy Society.

To find out more about a bequest to the College,contact Bill Healy, senior philanthropy adviser, atwhealy@brooklyn.cuny.edu or (718) 951-5074,or log on to our website,www.brooklyncollegefoundation.org.

Two ways of giving and one terrificschool.What are you waiting for?

Brooklyn College Foundation, Inc.2900 Bedford AvenueBrooklyn, New York 11210-2889 Telephone (718) 951-5074 Fax (718) 951-4248www.brooklyncollegefoundation.org

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