This is the last issue of the Chronicle for
the academic year. Publication will resume in the fall.
Drawing Einstein
Seyffie Maleki of physics got an e-mail earlier this
year from Charlotte Reischer Clark, mother of Blair Reischer '77, who
one day was amazed to see in the physics department a portrait of Albert
Einstein done by his late grandmother, Alice K. Reischer.
It seems that the portrait had been given to the
department by a Union professor of biology who as a high school boy did
odd jobs for the Reischers, his neighbors in Ann Arbor, Mich. Mrs.
Reischer encouraged the boy to pursue the sciences, and the portrait was
presented to him as part of that encouragement, writes Mrs. Clark, who was
writing to Maleki to ask for a reproduction of the work.
The picture may be rare, Mrs. Clark says, because
Einstein was not willing to let people make his likeness. Mrs. Reischer,
her mother-in-law, sketched it when Einstein was giving a lecture at
Princeton, Mrs. Clark says.
And the Union professor who got the portrait as payment
for cutting grass? None other than Carl George, professor emeritus of
biology, who thought the best home for the work would be in the physics
department. “I'm tickled pink that the Einstein portrait is
receiving a bit of attention,” he says.
–
We reported last week that President Roger Hull is to
appear on Carmine's Table, a cooking show hosted by chef Carmine
Spiro.
The show is set to air Wednesday, June 14, at 11 a.m. on
Channel 13, WNYT.
Hull and Kevin O'Connor, president of Albany's
Center for Economic Growth, joined Spiro to prepare — and eat — food,
all the while discussing community revitalization programs.
Faculty, Staff Works Listed
William Murphy, Thomas Lamont
Research Professor of Ancient and Modern Literature, was quoted in an
article, “Has Gates' Combativeness Hurt Microsoft in Court
Case?” in the May 7 edition of the Seattle Times. Written by Paul
Andrews '71, the piece quotes Murphy, “I suppose you could
characterize Gates' tragic flaw as righteousness. Early on, all Gates
had to do to preserve his pre-eminent position in the industry was to give
up one small thing – break apart the browser from Windows. But he wouldn't
do it. He wanted 100 percent.” Murphy compared the software mogul to
King Lear, who banished his faithful daughter Cordelia for the sin of
telling him the truth.
Seth Greenberg, Gilbert R.
Livingston Professor of Psychology, was a co-author (with A. Inhoff, M.
Starr, R. Radach) of a chapter, “Allocation of Visuo-spatial
Attention and Saccade Programming During Reading.” He published a
commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences titled “Words do
not stand alone: Do not ignore a word's role when examining patterns of
activation.” It examined whether investigations that report that
differential brain activation resulting from the processing of words
fitting different grammatical classes is reasonable evidence that classes
of words are stored in different locations in the brain. Theoretical
commentary was co-authored by M. Nisslein of the Max Plank Institute in
Germany. Joanna Tai '00, a student of Greenberg's presented a
paper, “Nursery Rhymes and Missing Letters,” at the 28th annual
Hunter College Psychology Convention on May 6. The paper reports on one of
several studies she did to investigate whether readers process different
grammatical categories of words differently in familiar as compared to
unfamiliar texts.
Teresa Meade, associate
professor of history, presented a paper, “Becoming Honorable:
Marriage and Identity on the Alta California Frontier, 1769-1850,” at
the Latin American Studies Association Congress in Miami this spring. She
presented a talk, “Reconfiguring the Frontier: Alta California in the
19th Century,” for the Latin American Studies Program at SUNY-Stony
Brook. Also, she spoke before the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians
in Stockbridge, Mass., on “Perspectives on the Berks: The Next 40
Years.”
M. Estellie Smith, research
professor of anthropology, has published a book, Trade and Trade-offs:
Using Resources, Making Choices, and Taking Risks (Waveland Press),
which deals with making choices and dealing with the sociocultural costs
and benefits of them. The book “casts aside the idea that economics
deals only with things that can be measured with money,” Smith
writes, and deals with the questions that arise from the necessity of
individuals and groups to deal with matters related to production,
distribution and consumption.
George Butterstein, Florence
B. Sherwood Professor of Life Sciences, authored a paper (with V. Daniel
Castracane of Texas Tech Health Sciences), “Effect of Particle Size
on the Prolonged Actum of Subcutaneous Danazol in Male and Female
Rats,” in Fertility and Sterility. Also, Butterstein, acting
dean of arts and sciences, was interviewed by a reporter from the Missoulian
during NCUR 2000 at the University of Montana recently. “What's
important about this conference is the diversity of topics,” said
Butterstein, who attended the conference with 47 Union students and five
other faculty. “It's not only science-oriented, it's across the
fields.”
Robert Sharlet, Chauncey
Winters Professor of Political Science, in November spoke on the
jurisprudence of the Russian Constitutional Court at the National Slavic
Conference (AAASS) in St. Louis. This spring, he made presentations on
post-Yeltsin constitutional issues at the American Enterprise Institute in
Washington, and at the Political Science Graduate Colloquium at the
University of California at Riverside. Of essays recently published in Americana
Annual 2000 (Grolier), a major one was on Russian political and
economic developments during 1999. He also evaluated applications of law
professors from post-Soviet states for research placements at U.S. law
schools.
Changes Approved for Faculty Manual
Faculty recently approved a number of changes to the
faculty manual. The changes:
— Add language that
requires the administration to inform the FEC of any changes that it makes
in the faculty manual;
— Limit appointments to
liaison committee for athletics, campus facilities and library to
staggered three-year terms;
— Permit the FRB may form
subcommittees as AAC does;
— Add a legislative
flowchart for FRB following the model of AAC's Flowchart;
— Grant faculty status to
the director of Schaffer Library;
— Require the Faculty
Appeals Committee to consult the chair of the Faculty Executive Committee
and the Vice President for Academic Affairs about questions of FAC
procedure;
— Clarify what happens in
the event of a faculty override of a presidential veto. (It requires a
two-thirds vote of faculty in residence; chair of the FEC is to forward
the amendment to the trustees.); and
— Increase staff
representation to two on the Planning and Priorities committee.
Jazz Ensemble Gigs in NY., VT.
The Union College Jazz Ensemble, under the direction of
Prof. Tim Olsen, will give two performances in its Spring 2000 tour.
They will perform Wednesday, June 7, at 7 p.m. in the
Norwood Village Green Concert Series, Norwood, N.Y. (just north of
Potsdam), and Thursday, June 8, from 2:30 to 3:30 p.m. at the Discover
Jazz Festival, Church Street Marketplace, Burlington, Vt.
For details, call ext. 6563.
Read MoreCruz Wants to Share Limelight
Prize
Day was bittersweet for Mario Cruz '00, who received the Bailey Prize,
the College's highest honor for campus leadership and service.
For one thing, he was sad that a number of his peers
couldn't share the limelight. For another, his mother missed the
ceremony because of car trouble halfway down the Thruway.
“It's nice to be honored, but there are so many
other students who should get recognition but don't,” Cruz said.
“That makes it kind of bittersweet for me.”
While Cruz was marching onstage to accept the Bailey,
his mother was having her car towed from the Thruway at Kingston.
“For graduation,” says Cruz, “I'll make sure she arrives
the night before.”
Cruz came to Union four years ago, not at all sure he
wanted to be a doctor. But after internships in other fields, he chose
medicine, and he will enter Albany Medical College this fall.
He took a variety of courses his first year at Union,
and he quickly developed an interest in politics. But an internship in New
York City convinced him that political life wasn't for him.
He followed up that internship with one at a large
organization of public hospitals, but quickly concluded that he wouldn't
choose health administration either. “I realized that I am more of a
people person,” he says. “That experience confirmed my decision
to become a doctor.”