March
26 ,
2004
Quidnunc
100
Days and Counting The 2004 U.S. Women’s Open, the world’s most prestigious
women’s golf championship, is less than100 days away.
The championship will be played at The Orchards Golf Club
June 28–July 4. Annika Sorenstam, Juli Inkster, Se
Ri Pak, Karrie Webb, and a host of the world’s greatest
women golfers are coming to South Hadley. The setting will
be legendary. The atmosphere will be electric. The competition
will be outstanding. This challenging Donald Ross-designed
course will be a fitting venue for the crowning of a national
champion. Children 16 and under will receive complimentary
admission when accompanied by a ticketed adult. Tickets for
the 2004 U.S. Women’s Open Championship can be purchased
securely online at www.2004uswomensopen.com or
by calling 1-800-513-OPEN, Monday–Friday from 9 am to
5 pm (EST).
According to My Research… The MHC chemistry department
is organizing this year’s Five College Chemistry Lecture
Series. The first of three lectures by Professor John Bercaw
of the California Institute of Technology will be given Wednesday
March 31, at 4:15 pm in L1 Cleveland Hall. Bercaw’s talk
is entitled, “Catalysis from the Perspective of an Organometallic
Chemist Seeking New Routes to Chemicals and Materials.” Bercaw
will speak at Smith Thursday, April 1, at 4:15 pm in Room 202,
Engineering Building, and at UMass on Friday, April 2, at 11:15
am in Room 1634, Lederle Graduate Research Tower.
Flying High Irene Leverton will be speaking to the Introduction
of Women’s Studies class, taught by women’s studies
senior lecturer Martha Ackmann, Thursday, April 1, from 2:40
to 3:55 pm in Shattuck 216. Leverton’s talk is open to
the MHC community. Leverton was one of the Mercury 13—women
who were secretly tested for astronaut viability in 1961. After
the Mercury 13 tested as well as male astronaut candidates, including
John Glenn and Alan Shepard, NASA scrapped the secret program.
As a pilot, Leverton won national air races, held dangerous jobs
including fighting forest fires from a plane, and amassed thousands
of hours in the air. She is one of the subjects of Ackmann’s
book The Mercury 13: The Untold Story of
Thirteen American Women and the Dream of Space Flight. Leverton will be in Massachusetts
to be honored at a special dinner for Girls Inc. of Holyoke.
Girls Inc. is saluting women in space, including associate professor
of astronomy and geology Darby Dyar. Following her trip to the
Pioneer Valley, Leverton will return to Arizona where she is
being inducted into the Arizona Aviation Hall of Fame April 3.
Move Over, Ken Burns History professor Dan Czitrom was the chief
historical adviser and “talking head” for a new documentary,
Slumming It: Myth and Culture on the Bowery, which will be shown
at the UMass Multicultural Film Festival April 7. The film traces
the 200-year history of the characters, locations, stories, and
events that made the Bowery a central place in the creation of
New York City and modern pop culture. “What I find most
exciting about the film,” Czitrom observed, “is its
portrayal of how the city’s street life and its commercial
popular culture have reflected and shaped each other for two
centuries. The Bowery is where the ‘real’ New York
meets the New York of our collective imagination.” The
screening will be at 7:30 pm in Stirn Auditorium at Amherst College.
Czitrom and director Scott Elliot, an Amherst alumnus, will speak
afterward.
Afternoon Tea LITS will host
a visit by 11 library professionals from Kyrgyz Republic April
7. The visit is part of a three-week trip to the U.S. under the
auspices of the Institute for Training and Development in Amherst.
The 11 participants, all women, come from a wide range of library
backgrounds. One of the primary goals of the program is to increase
the participants’ understanding
of the overall functioning of libraries in a democratic society
so they can contribute to better, more efficient services and
dissemination of information in their own country. The MHC community
is invited to have tea with the Krygyz librarians at 4
pm in the Stimson Room of the library.
Tuition Set The Mount Holyoke College Board of Trustees set
tuition, room, and board for 2004–2005 at $39,830, a 5.5
percent increase. “The Board recognizes that many challenges
exist for families as well as the College due to the economic
downturn,” Board Chair Eleanor Graham Claus ’55 and
President Joanne V. Creighton wrote in a letter to faculty, staff,
and students. “While the College must make reductions in
a number of operational areas, we hold among our highest priorities
maintaining current financial aid policies and support for our
students. We are committed to helping the College get through
these difficult, but hopefully short-lived times, and we are
all optimistic about the long-term health and excellence of Mount
Holyoke.”
In Memoriam: Isabelle
Baird Sprague ’37, professor emeritus
of biological sciences, died March 8, in Bethesda, Maryland,
at the age of 87. After graduating from Mount Holyoke, she stayed
to earn a master’s degree in zoology and completed her
Ph.D. in insect physiology at the University of Kansas. She returned
to the College after the war, becoming a professor in 1964. She
served briefly as an associate dean and became a David B. Truman
Professor in 1978. She was also department chair and active in
a number of Five College committees and courses. Professor Sprague
was a naturalist and particularly enjoyed teaching ecology and
played a central role in protecting rare habitats. She was active
in academic environmental studies, as well as in local and regional
conservation projects, including the Kestrel Land Trust, the
Hawley Bog purchase, the MHC wildflower garden, and the South
Hadley Conservation Commission. Services will be private. Contributions
may be made to the Isabelle Sprague lectureship fund at the College.
There are tentative plans for a celebration of her life sometime
this spring. For more information, please contact Linda Young
at x2482.
The
counter is
915
|
