Posted on Sep 1, 1996

Because students' living arrangements are such an important part of the college experience, Union works to make academics and residential living fit hand in hand. To that end, the College offers an array of living arrangements with the hope that each student will find a place to be comfortable-a place to call “home.”

First year students are assigned roommates and rooms. After that, however, a Union student has several housing choices. What follows is a look at some of those choices.

On the front porch of Wells House the table is set for twenty-five. The smell of lasagna mixes with the sounds of jazz floating through the warm spring air. Students who have gathered for an end-ofthe-year dinner talk, make jokes, and laugh a lot. They say goodbye to those who are leaving and welcome those who will be living in the house next year. The atmosphere is more like a large family dinner than a group of students eating together in a “dorm.”

Welcome to Wells House, one of a growing number of “theme houses” on campus. Theme or special interest housing is becoming a popular choice at Unionabout 200 students live in theme
houses each year-and at other colleges. At Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa., for example, there are four theme houses-an international house, a French house, an arts house, and a co-op. Bates College in Lewiston, Maine, is opening its first theme house in the fall-a Spanish house, where students will speak only Spanish and will be immersed in Spanish culture.

If you're asking yourself what is a theme house and how does it work, here's the answer….

Theme houses are student initiated, student-run living areas that often occupy a wing or a floor of a residence hall. Theme housing involves small groups of students (the largest house has fewer than forty students) who share common interests and who work toward a common goal.

Fred Alford, dean of students, says that it's usually a group of friends that comes up with an idea for a house. Sometimes the students will “retrofit” the theme to their interests, and other times the students have a definite goal in mind for their house-promoting diversity,
doing community service, or providing the community with social alternatives.

If space is available for a theme house, the interested students present a proposal to the Student Affairs Council (SAC), which looks at what kind of contributions the house will make to the Union community and how the house will enhance the cultural and intellectual life on campus.

“We basically ask ourselves `Is this a good idea?' ” Alford says. The SAC also tries to get a sense of student interest level and if the group of students will be able to fill the allotted space. Once a group is granted space, it is renewed for one, two, or three years at a time based on contributions and continued interest.

The students in a theme house are responsible for running, maintaining, and filling the house. A student house manager (usually chosen by the residents of the theme house) acts as a liaison with the Office of Residence Life and works with the residents to keep the house running smoothly.

“In a way, theme houses stand apart from the authority structure and have more autonomy,” Alford says. “They are responsible for dealing with issues and
working out things like quiet hours. They cannot meet with a problem and rely on the College to solve it. The upside is that they learn to deal effectively with challenges.”

Trish Williams, director of residence life and associate dean of students, adds, “The success of a given house is dependent on the integrity of the students who live in the house.”

This is usually not a problem, according to the house managers of Union's theme houses. Students in theme houses are there
because they want to be there.

Here's a brief look at each of Union's theme houses.

The dinner at Wells House described at the start of this story is fairly typical of life here. There is very much a feel of family among the residents – twenty-two students, sixty percent female and forty percent male, a variety of majors and class years. The residents share living space, including kitchen facilities and bathrooms. “It's just like having brothers,” explain some of the women.

The residents of Wells share a common interest in community
service, and the house strives toward community involvement, both off and on campus.

Off campus, for example, Wells House has established a program called One-on-One with Zoller Elementary School in Schenectady. One-on-One pairs a Zoller student with a resident of Wells House, similar to the Big Brothers/ Big Sisters program but slightly less structured.

On campus, Wells residents provide service to the College through activities such as serving on College committees (such as the Bicentennial committee) and working at or ushering for College events. Individually, Wells students are involved in numerous clubs and organizations, and many club presidents are Wells residents.

Mike Ferguson '97, who served as Wells House manager for two years (and leads the College crew team) says that Wells provides a lot of “latitude” for residents to participate, get involved in an activity, or hold an event.

Founded in 1994 and hailed as “little, yellow, different,”
Smith House is interested in “providing greater social alternatives, service to the community, and communal meals.”

As a way of “providing greater social alternatives,” Smith opens its doors for student organizations to hold meetings and events.
Smith has held poetry readings, concerts, art shows, and the annual “Gender Bender” party. This spring, Smith held an open outdoor jazz concert and picnic.

Service to the community comes in many forms for the fifteen or so members of Smith. Some residents have volunteered at the New Hope (Pa.) Soup Kitchen, while others participate in We-Care-About-U-Schenectady, Meals on Wheels, and Big Brothers/Big Sisters.

Communal meals play a big role in Smith's theme and contribute to the overall atmosphere. Each week, one night is set aside for a house dinner, which is open to both residents and non-residents. The tasks of shopping, cooking, and cleaning up are undertaken by the residents. It is a relaxed, fun event that brings together many members of the Union community, including an occasional professor or member of the administration.

“People in the house are very active,” says Alan Kennel '97, Smith's house manager for 199596. “There is a general atmosphere of a strong community of students. With that atmosphere, we get a lot accomplished.”

“Bridging the gap between faculty and students, and between the arts and sciences” is the theme of Ludlow House, located on the top floor of Webster House.

A main component of Ludlow House is a weekly faculty dinner. Prepared by the residents, who share chores, the dinners bring in faculty from all disciplines. Sometimes there will be a formal discussion topic, but more often an issue will arise spontaneously and the students and faculty will linger over dinner for discussions and (occasionally heated) debates.

Chris Jones '97, house manager of Ludlow, says that discussion is an important element of the dynamics of the house. “Ludlow has a really friendly atmosphere. It is made up of students who
are willing to `hang out.' The major events in our house just seem to happen. Issues arise and we share our knowledge and make contributions to the overall discussion.”

That's not to imply that the house is not without its less serious “intellectual” pursuits. Jones remembers an all-out water war that erupted one day in the lounge and spilled out onto the lawn.

Carrying out the theme of Bronner House-The Cultural Unity Center has high importance to its residents. “We are very dedicated to promoting cultural awareness,” says Tameeka Best '96, the 1995-96 house manager.

One of the smaller theme houses, Bronner had twelve residents-eight men and four women-during the 1995-96 academic year. Many residents are associated with the student organization African/Latino Alliance of Students (ALAS), although residents are not exclusively ALAS members.

Bronner House, located in North College, provides a comfortable, family-like atmosphere. “There is a communal base coming into the house, which is very important,” Best says.

In addition to serving as the meeting place for the ALAS executive board and informal meetings, Bronner House is also a place where all Union students can find a variety of cultural, educational, and social programs. One recent program was an eating gathering called “A Taste of the Tropics,” featuring food and entertainment from many backgrounds. The lounge of Bronner is also, on occasion, turned into an art gallery to display student work.

Two new houses will join the Union family of theme houses for the 1996-97 academic year.

Thurston House, located in Davidson South, will work toward bridging the gap between faculty members and students who have
an interest in Asian cultures, and it will support students who are looking to enhance their own cultures.

The eighteen members of Thurston will seek to stimulate the College community through various programs that combine intellectual excitement and social curiosity.

The largest of the theme houses, The Society, is a group of about thirty-five men and women who want to blend the cultural,
social, intellectual, and residential aspects of college life.

Living in Raymond North, the members of The Society plans to enhance music appreciation and love of arts and culture while providing an environment conducive to intellectual pursuits.

Andy Gray '99 and Brian Goldberg '99, who helped found the house and will serve as
co-presidents, say their theme house wants to provide a “service” to all Union students. They plan to have a coffee house with live entertainment and are trying to set up a recording studio that could be used by the many musicians and bands at the College.

OPTIONS

There are a number of on-campus housing choices, from fraternity and sorority houses to residence halls that offer single rooms, double rooms, and suites. Other options include:

Block Housing, which gives students the opportunity to select rooms next to each other.

Lifestyle Options, which are created to provide students with specialized living environments. The first, second, and third floors of the south side of Fox, the first floors of Richmond and South, and the second floor of West are all designated Smoke-Free. Residents who choose to live here sign an agreement not to smoke in their rooms.

The Twenty-Four Hour Quiet lifestyle is located on the fourth floor of North College in 1996-97. Here, students agree to uphold
twenty-four hour quiet hours for intense study.

Students who choose to live in Substance-Free (the lower level and first floor of Webster House) agree to keep alcohol and tobacco out of their living area.

Apartment Housing gives groups of two, three, or four students the chance to live in the Wade Lupe Townhouses, located across Union Street from the southwest corner of the campus. The apartments are considered on-campus housing, and there will resident managers.

THE LOTTERY

The selection and assignment of rooms is known as the Union lottery.

Students who want to live in any of the housing options (theme housing, block housing, Greek housing, lifestyle options, and apartments) apply and go through a mini-lottery system. Students wishing to live in regular residence halls go through the general lottery.

All students are assigned a random, computer-generated lottery number. The lower the number, the better the chance of getting the hall or room of choice. Each spring, the Office of Residence Life provides students with complete instructions and answers all questions regarding the lottery.

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Posted on Sep 1, 1996

“FOR IT WILL ONLY BE WHEN WOMEN SUCCEED IN RELEARNING
THE FACT THAT THE ONLY SERIOUS BUSINESS OF LIFE IN WHICH
THEY CANNOT BE ENTIRELY OUTCLASSED BY THE MALE IS THAT
OF CHILD BEARING THAT THEY WILL ONCE MORE LOOK WITH
RESPECT UPON THEIR NORMAL AND LEGITIMATE FUNCTION.”

Found in a nondescript folder in the Princeton University archive, these words were written almost a century ago-not by some Victorian male as one might immediately guess but by a well-known woman author who has become something of a feminist icon.

Gertrude Stein.

In the course of research for her recently published book, Sister Brother Gertrude and Leo
Stein, Brenda Wineapple, the Washington Irving Professor in Modern Literary and Historical studies, came across a previously unknown and unpublished essay. Eight pages long, typed on legal-sized paper with notations in Gertrude Stein's handwriting and probably written in the early 1900s, “Degeneration in American Women” argues that American women have too few babies, with the worst offenders being college-educated women who delay or ignore childbirth.

The educated American woman has a tendency, the
twenty-eight-year-old Stein wrote, “to mistake her education her cleverness and intelligence for effective capacity for the work of the world….” Stein concludes that the only activity that women can be better at than men is having kids.

Although Stein focused on college graduates, less-educated women don't escape her wrath. The said that the “lower-class” American woman is “incapable for the most part of cooking and sewing or any of the household duties for which her European sisters are famous.”

And what about Stein herself, a childless lesbian never known for her cooking or sewing? She attempted to dismiss the matter, saying, “Of course it is not meant that there are not a few women in every generation who are exceptions to the rule.”

Wineapple says, “Gertrude Stein argued that women would inevitably be outclassed in careers by men. Since that was the case, they should do what they do best. You can imagine how horrified early feminists must have been.”

The essay was a function of Gertrude's own depression, Wineapple says. “She had just left medical school at Johns Hopkins and decided not to pursue a degree.”

“Degeneration in American Women” is published for the first time in Sister
Brother, Wineapple's second book, which was released in April by G.P. Putnam's Sons. The dual biography is the first
completely researched biography of Gertrude Stein in twenty years and the first book ever to be written about Leo.

The book examines the relationship between the sister and brother whose Paris apartment-crowded with the early work of Picasso and Matisse and Cezanne masterpieces-can be accurately described as the time and place where modern art had its coming out.

When Leo moved out of the apartment in 1914, however, the split between the two was final-they never spoke to each
other again. When Gertrude writes of those years in The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas (Gertrude's secretary and companion), she doesn't even mention Leo's name. Gertrude goes on to become a writer and feminist icon, and Leo falls into obscurity.

In Sister Brother, Wineapple reveals a wealth of new information about the Steins-reports of Gertrude's medical career, never-before-examined papers of Leo's, and Gertrude's astonishing early manuscript.

“The voice is young, fresh, untried-and very much hers,” Wineapple writes in her introduction to the essay. “It is my hope that this voice, now recognized, will fuel future scholarship-to say nothing of pleasure and debate.”

Since the book's publication, Wineapple has received attention from The New York
Times, The Chronicle of Higher Education, the Albany Times Union and other local newspapers, and appeared on the program “New York and Company” on WNYC-AM radio.

Wineapple's previous book examined the life of the author of The New Yorker's letters from Paris. Published in 1989, Genet:
A Biography of Janet Flanner is now in its second printing.

Wineapple joined the English Department at Union in 1976 and was named the Washington Irving Professor in Modern Literary and Historical Studies in 1994. She received her bachelor's degree from Brandeis University and earned both her master's degree and Ph.D. from the University of
Wisconsin-Madison.

While working on her book, Wineapple was a Guggenheim Fellow and the Donald C. Gallup Senior Fellow in American Literature at the Beinecke Library at Yale, which holds many of the Stein manuscripts.

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Posted on Sep 1, 1996

Thanks, Bill

President Kennedy, addressing a Berkeley audience in March 1963, shared the following: “We must think and act not only for the moment but for our time. I am reminded of the story of the great French Marshall Lyautey, who once asked his gardener to plant a tree. The gardener objected that the tree was slow-growing and would not reach maturity for 100 years. The Marshall replied, `In that case, there is no time to lose; plant it this afternoon.' ”

Having been far from the Northeast in the five years following graduation, I returned to Union in 1971 and witnessed the horrible loss of our majestic elm trees, in particular those gracing North and South Lanes. While I was pleased to learn of the plans and plantings taking place under the leadership of Dean William Huntley and Professor Gilbert Harlow, I was still young and short-sighted enough to harbor a selfish disappointment that I would never get to enjoy the fruits of their efforts.

For several years now, the current specimens, while not as mature and stately as the old elms, have provided comparable dignity to that very central part of our campus. And, yes, I have lived to see it and hopefully still have a few good years left.

While Dean Huntley touched thousands of us in countless ways over his long association with the College, his most enduring legacy will assuredly be the exquisite flora of our beautiful campus. But the lessons of his vision, like Lyautey's, are as important for us to preserve and pass on as the beauty of the grounds we inherit. Beyond memorializing this remarkable man, all who care about our college can offer no finer tribute than to make the story of Bill Huntley (and Gil Harlow) a cherished part of our verbal folk history, a tale to be told over and over again to incoming freshmen and graduating seniors, so that its lessons of vision, ownership,
and contribution will be perpetuated. Long live Bill Huntley!

Thomas E. Hitchcock '66
Lexington, Mass.

The writer is a member of the
College's Board of Trustees.

Those great college days

Recently a friend sent us a copy of Larry Hart's “Old Dorp” column from the Schenectady Gazette, which mentioned Union College's Dutchman's Village. I can understand why someone today would ask if there ever was such a place. There is nary a trace of anything to remind us of the approximately eighty apartments that existed during the mid 1940's to the mid 1950's.

The village was located along Nott Street between Van Vranken Avenue and Lenox Road and provided housing for married students and some faculty. We were among those who lived there and the article reminded my wife and me of that special time in our life. For most of the students who lived in Dutchman's Village, the low-cost housing made it possible to keep the family together through college years.

The buildings were single story surplus Army barracks converted into one- or two-bedroom apartments to accommodate the surge of married veterans living on a shoe string while earning their degrees at Union. The walls were paper thin. They were cold in the winter (heated with kerosene space heaters) and hot in the summer (no air conditioning).

For many, it was their very first home. On limited budgets, each couple did their best to give the apartment a unique personality with paint, original decorations, and furniture from grandma's attic. In our living/dining area we used soft grey walls and rose colored drapes made from bed sheets. Our bedside tables were wooden orange crates. Bookcases were boards supported by cement blocks. It was amazing how creative each couple was and how one idea generated several others throughout the village. Incidentally, the cost of ground
round beef in those days averaged fifty to sixty cents a pound and monthly rent in the village was $32.

There were a few couples without children, but during one year on one street there were so many babies born that the rest of the village gave that street a sobriquet `Fertile Valley!' In the warm days of the spring, summer, and fall, as husbands finished afternoon classes and crossed the bridge over Hans
Groot's Kill, wives would be waiting with their children, and there would be a lot of squealing as the little ones jumped into their father's arms. On those warm afternoons, the wives and children gathered in the street or in one of the yards to share the news of the children's development-a new tooth, a new word
spoken or to share recipes or where there was a bargain to be had in
one of the local groceries. The children always came out when the Freihoffer bread wagon, pulled by a horse, came through. The streets in the village had very little traffic and were quite safe for riding trikes and wagons. In winter, they were great for sledding.

Everyone was on an extremely tight budget. Many of the men worked part-time jobs and shared opportunities whenever they could. A few of the wives were able to work. My wife and Ken Burnett's ('50) wife, both nurses, shared a job in a doctor's office, arranging their schedule around their husband's hours. Among the many jobs I had was one I shared with two other men during the winter. The Pasture Dorms were also converted military barracks, each with a
coal fired furnace. During the winter those furnaces had to be stoked around the clock, and we three worked the night shift, from 5 p.m. to 8 a.m. We found that the most sensible schedule was to
take the duty every third night. There was a cot in one of the furnace rooms so that we could nap, using an alarm clock to rouse us when it was time to shake down the ashes and stoke the furnace. Then we would run to the next building to do the same-on through the night. It was amazing how much coal it took to keep the dorms warm-and how we managed to get by on so little sleep!

We studied long hours, worked hard-but we also had fun (if it didn't cost money.) A few of the wives were excellent bakers and about twice a week we would get together for coffee and cake, after the husbands came home from the study hours at the library at 11:30 p.m. I had rigged up several microphones and an amplifier and placed it in our child's bedroom. When we got together for coffee, we would run a wire between apartments so that we could hear any cry or noise from any nearby apartment.

Hal Lundstrum '50 was not only fullback on the football team but was also a practical jokester. One afternoon, my wife had prepared supper and then went out, with our daughter, to visit with the other wives. Hal sneaked into our apartment, put everything away-all the dishes, the silver, glasses, table cloth, all the
food. Then he went across the street and sat on his porch to enjoy the results. When I got home, my wife said supper was ready and we went in to the apartment only to find that there was nothing ready. She thought she was losing her mind-until she looked out and saw Hal laughing his head off.

As I mentioned, the walls were paper thin. One evening the wife next door was in the bathroom
half asleep. In the apartment next to her, the wife was reading, lying on the living room sofa, when her husband came in from the library and rather loudly said “Come on, let's hit the sack.” The wife in the bathroom next door jumped up and screamed because she recognized the voice of her neighbor and thought he was in her apartment! We all enjoyed that story the next day.

One year a group of guys prepared to celebrate the New Year and decided that they would make their own liquor-they were engineering and chemistry majors and would pool their knowledge to make some inexpensive booze. Everything went along very smoothly and they had several gallons that looked very promising. However, before drinking it, they took a sample over to the chemistry lab for some tests. The results proved that it was a high grade ethyl
alcohol and their party suddenly turned
non-alcoholic!

Where the field house now stands, there used to be fields and woods. Each spring a very large growth of wild blackberries produced delicious fruit and supplied many families all they needed. Each year we would make a large batch of blackberry jelly that would carry us through the rest of the year, and also had berries for pie, breakfast, etc.

While they had some special living problems that were different from the men who lived in the dorms and frat houses, those who lived in the village were not isolated from campus activities. Several members of the football team, fraternities, members of WRUC, and many other campus activities lived in the village. The wives also formed a group which arranged teas or coffees with programs on crafts, book reviews, and talks by some of the faculty.

We were all “in the same boat” and friendships that began in Dutchman's Village continue today. There was a camaraderie and mutual caring that gave us all the strength and commitment to stay focused on the goal of earning a degree, which both husbands and wives wanted to achieve. We look back on our Dutchman's Village days as some of the best years of our lives, where the wives also earned their PHT degree: Putting Hubby Through! It was a period in our lives that helped to cement our marriage and helped build a strong family life. Today, while we have a much more solid economic base, most of us look back on those days with very fond memories.

Thor N. Trolsen '51
Little River, S.C.

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Posted on Sep 1, 1996

During the past few years twenty-six alumni who left Union before completing the requirements for their bachelor's degrees have returned to march at Commencement-and to pick up their diplomas.

They are part of a program begun in 1990. Candidates must have spent at least two years at Union in good academic standing and earned an advanced degree in a recognized field of study at an accredited institution. If the undergraduate area of study was engineering, the advanced degree must be in the same field; those who earned a bachelor's degree from another college or university are not eligible.

Joining the “new” alumni last June were Christopher H. Demos '46, Leonard S. Levine '52, and Lloyd F. Mayer '73. All three had entered medical school before completing Union's degree requirements; each received a bachelor of science degree.

Mayer, when he learned he would receive his degree, wrote, “The fact that I have no degree serves as good material for a joke every time I am introduced at speaking engagements. I guess they will have to find something else to joke about.”

Alumni who want to know more about the program-or who think they might qualify
should contact Dan West, vice president for college relations, at (518) 388-6180.

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Posted on Sep 1, 1996

In December 1994, the College received a four-year challenge grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities to support the renovation of Schaffer Library.

The first two years of the challenge have been successful. With more than $1 million in cash gifts received in support of the challenge, the College has claimed a second payment of $200,000 from the NEH.

In the next two years, Union needs to raise another $1.3 million to complete the NEH challenge.

Gifts may be sent to Dan C. West, vice president for college relations, 27 Terrace Lane, Union College, Schenectady, N.Y. 12308. His telephone number is (518) 388-6180, and his e-mail address is westd@alice.union.edu.

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