Mark your calendar: ReUnion 2008: May 29 to June 1
On the Web: Visit http://www.union.edu/reunion/index_flash.php to see more photos from ReUnion weekend
More than 1,750 alumni and guests celebrate at ReUnion
A record 1,750-plus people converged on campus for the annual celebration of Union alumni in early June. It was a time to reminisce, reacquaint and explore the campus anew.
It was also a time for giving. Graduates from all ReUnion class years donated more than $1.7 million to the College in the run up to ReUnion weekend. Additional bequests, gift annuities and other long-term gift commitments raised that total to $2.9 million in the days after ReUnion.
By all measures, the annual celebration of Union alumni was an unqualified success.
The weekend kicked off when President Stephen C. Ainlay and the Board of Trustees dedicated Breazzano House, honoring David J. Breazzano ’78. In March, College officials announced that Breazzano, co-founder and principal of an investment management firm, made a $2 million gift to his alma mater. In honor of the gift, the College decided to rename Orange House, one of seven in the Minerva House System, the Breazzano House.
A 35th anniversary luncheon brought together the pioneering women graduates of the Class of 1972 on Friday, June 1, the official opening day of ReUnion 2007. (See sidebar)
An Engineering awards reception honored outstanding individuals at Beuth House. The awards recipients were Jonathan Comeau ’97, electrical engineering, principal electrical engineer for Tyco Electronics; Richard Fateman ’66, computer science, professor of computer science at University of California at Berkeley; Lisa Freed ’86, civil engineering, a civil engineer and landscape architect for Brown & Brown; Lawrence Hollander, dean of engineering emeritus at Union College; Ivan Kaminow ’52, electrical engineering, retired scientist with Bell Labs; and Samuel Tolkoff ’96, civil engineering, director of business development for Foster-Miller, an advanced robotics and health sciences firm.
A lecture and conversation with mystery crime writer Kerrie Ticknor Droban ’87 was held at Emerson Auditorium in the Taylor Music Center as the culmination of the Alumni Writers Series. Droban also led an informal discussion about her work in Wold House.
On Friday evening more the 80 members of the Delta Phi frtaternity returned to campus to dedicate a new monument featuring a fraternity medallion. The monument marks the site if of the fraternity’s former house on Lenox Avenue, where the medallion hung on the front of the house.
On Saturday, the College honored four alumni and one faculty member at the Alumni Convocation. The Alumni Council presented the Alumni Gold Medal to Lee Davenport ’37, Joseph Hinchey ’47 and John Temple ’67, all former Trustees of the College. New York City Attorney Mark Zauderer ’67 received the Eliphalet Nott Medal, which recognizes the perseverance of alumni who have attained distinction in their field. Hilary Tann, the John Howard Payne Professor of Music and internationally recognized composer, received the Faculty Meritorious Service Award.
Also on Saturday, Aaron Feingold ’72, a cardiologist in Edison, N.J., and collector of historical artifacts, presented two historical treasures to the College at the Terrace Council and Ramée Circle Society Reception. Feingold gave President Ainlay a first edition of Albert Einstein’s book about the Theory of Relativity and an original manuscript that was part of a four-part lecture that Charles Proteus Steinmetz, Union professor of engineering and renowned scientist, gave on Einstein’s theory. The Steinmetz manuscript, dated November 1921, corresponds with Einstein’s trip to America in 1921. Einstein visited Steinmetz in Schenectady that year, the same year he won the Nobel Prize in physics.
“Union allowed me to engage in intellectual pursuits that I wasn’t previously able to discover,” Feingold said. “Union gave me the freedom to be well-rounded, the intellectual background to appreciate, explore and enjoy all these different areas of life.”
Other highlights of ReUnion included a get-together with an award-winning brewer; a chemistry symposium; a seminar on the politics of war; the dedication of Becker Library; a production of Aristophenes’ great comedy, The Birds; soccer and rugby games; and the traditional Minerva footrace, alumni parade and Saturday night fireworks.
Throughout the weekend, four of the College's most prized possessions, plates from the "Elephant Folio" edition of The Birds of America collection of engravings by John James Audubon, were on display on the first floor of Schaffer Library.
Across the generations
Erika Schnitzer '08 speaks with the Women of '72
In 1970 Union became co-educational. About 150 women, including about two dozen transfer students, entered Union that year. While the first-year students were certainly brave, I believe the women who transferred to Union and graduated in 1972 were boldest of all.
To kick off ReUnion weekend, five of the first women graduates, known as the Women of ’72, celebrated their 35th ReUnion at a special luncheon. In speaking with these women at the lunch and for a Concordiensis story, I came to see that they were truly pioneers.
Susan Mullaney Maycock ’72, a fine art photographer from Santa Fe, N.M., told me: “I truly believe that our generation changed the course of history for women. We opened up many careers to women, we went into the workforce in much greater numbers than any other generation, and we were pioneers in creating meaningful ways to have both careers and family. The decision at Union to create a co-educational institution was one of the building blocks that supported these other changes.”
Before transferring the Women of ’72 had carved out niches for themselves at women’s colleges. They took classes with women, lived with women and socialized with women. Their schools knew what women did for fun.
At Union, this all changed. Though Richmond Hall was designated as a women’s dorm, there were little renovations made. There were no athletics available and an extremely limited number of activities. Many women felt they were virtually ignored by upperclassmen who continued to socialize with women at Skidmore College, then a women’s college.
The women of ’72 showed valor at a time their world was literally changing around them. They not only embraced these changes, but they succeeded in what was a man’s world.
“The second year was much better than the first. The girls and the guys made more of an effort to join activities to meet each other. There weren't quite as many guys trekking to Skidmore every weekend. The guys I met in class were more friendly and curious about the girls on campus,” said Andrea Flagg Bolz ’72.
The College’s decision to go co-ed stemmed from a committee recommendation made in 1967. In 1968, then-President Harold Martin appointed a committee of faculty, chaired by English Professor Carl Niemeyer, to vote on the issue. A survey mailed out in November 1968 indicated that roughly 60 percent of alumni were in favor of the switch. But the committee voted overwhelmingly in favor of co-education, with only one dissenting vote.
Other schools were making, or in the process of making, a similar transition. Colgate University and Wesleyan University had recently become co-ed, and Bowdoin College, Williams College and Amherst College were all considering the change.
As I spoke with the women of ’72, I recognized that Union has come a long way in 35 years. Whereas women studying sciences was a rare sight in 1970, the science departments at Union are now filled with women. Professor Tom Werner told me the chemistry department may soon be composed of mostly women. Countless other changes have occurred over the past 35 years, and I am sure that when I return for my 35th ReUnion, there will be countless more changes on campus and in society that have roots in the advent of equal-opportunity higher education.