occidenta l - oxy.edu

Jack Kemp ’57: Lessons From Lincoln Losing a Friend: Erica Murray ’01

OCCIDENTALWINTER 2009

A DREAMREALIZEDA DREAM

REALIZEDA DREAM

REALIZEDFrom 1600 Campus Road to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue:

The Odyssey of Barack Obama ’83From 1600 Campus Road to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue:

The Odyssey of Barack Obama ’83

D E P A R T M E N T S

2 C O R R E S P O N D E N C EA mash note to assistant professor DamianStocking, a remembrance of Bill Parker ’50,and a question for Occidental Magazine:“What were you guys thinking?” Also: newadditions to the Occidental bookshelf.

4 F R O M T H E Q U A DOxy responds to the fluctuations of thestock market by tightening its belt and taking the long view—while the studentinvestors running the Blyth Fund hunt forbargains. Also: From a mud-covered play-ing field to meeting Jane Russell—and notin that order—Raisin Bowl memories comeflooding back Homecoming weekend.

2 8 T I G E R W I R EClass notes for odd years.

5 6 A P P R E C I AT I O NThe wonder of Erica Murray ’01, who lost athree-year battle with leukemia Dec. 4.

OCCIDENTAL COLLEGE MAGAZINEVOLUME 31, NUMBER 1 WINTER 2009

F E A T U R E S

1 0 O T R I U M P H E ! After a campaign season nearly as long as his two years at Oxy, BarackObama ’83 is president-elect of the United States—and Occidental prideis running at an all-time high.

1 2 F R I E N D S O F B A R RY

Roommates, classmates, and lifelong acquaintances remember the philosophy, politics, poetry, pride, and promise of Obama’s Oxy years.

1 8 R E D , O R A N G E , & B L U E

For a generation of Oxy undergraduates voting in their first presidentialelection, Obama’s historic win defines a once-in-a-lifetime moment.

2 0 A G E N T S O F C H A N G E

As the Obama campaign mobilized volunteers and eager youngstaffers nationwide, alumni and students brought their energies to the movement.

2 5 P O L I T I C A L F O O T B A L L

Fresh off the trail for fellow Republican John McCain, Jack Kemp ’57reflects on the task of rebranding the GOP—and the challenge of converting promises to prosperity.

2 6 W E S L E Y A N D M EA 4-day-old barn owl with a damaged wing flew into the heart of biologistStacey O’Brien ’86—and their decades-long love story has hatched a best-selling memoir.

5

Cover photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images.Page 5: Blyth Fund directors Sarah Henderson ’11, Andrew Blythe ’09,Braylan Carroll ’09, and president Jason Kwok ’09. Photo by Marc Campos.0: Emily Deans ’09, Margot Seigle ’09, and Tessa D’Arcangelew ’10at an Obama rally in Charlottesville, Va. Photo courtesy Margot Seigle.Page 56: Erica Murray photo courtesy Jamie Murphy ’01.Oxy Wear photo by Marc Campos.

20

56

2 Occidental Magazine

C O R R E S P O N D E N C E

That, and the Economy I cannot imagine a dumber subject to featureand put on the cover (“Family Matters,” Fall2008). I am sure it will do wonders for alumnicontributions in the coming year.

BURT ZILLGITT ’52

Corona del Mar

Fast TimesMany outstanding memories surfaced whenI read about the death of Bill Parker ’50(Obituaries, Fall 2008). I attended Occidentalfrom 1949 to 1952. Since I was very muchinterested in track and field and was invitedby track coach Payton Jordan to join the Oxyteam in 1950, I remember very fondly thehuge and very exciting relay race when theOxy team of Parker, John Barnes ’52, TedRuprecht ’51, and Walt McGibben ’52 beatthe favored Morgan State team and estab-lished the fastest time that year (the worldrecord?) in the 1,500-meter relay race. Tocorrect just one error in your obituary ofParker: The Coliseum Relays that year wererun in spring 1950, not 1952.

I remember the years of 1950, 1951, and1952 as the golden years in the small Occi-dental track achievements, and the Oxy teamplaced eighth in 1950 and fourth in 1951and 1952 in the NCAA track and field cham-pionships—attended by all universitiesregardless of the student body size, unlike itis now. We also came very close to beatingUSC, the best collegiate track team duringthose years, in our annual dual meets, andsent two (Barnes and Bob McMillen ’53) tothe 1952 Olympics—where McMillen, to thesurprise of the whole world, achieved the sil-ver medal in the 1,500-meter run, just one-tenth of a second behind the gold medalist.

AARE TRUUMAA ’51 M’52

San Diego

CorrectionDue to an editing error, the wedding date forC. Ming Saelee ’02 and Jeffrey Yin ’00 was in -correctly reported last issue. Ming and Jeffreywere married on March 3, 2007. DaughterAlyssa Hsiao-Ling Yin was born on May 8, 2008.The family lives in Maryland Heights, Mo.

OMG!When I opened up the article featuringDamian Stocking (“Dock Star,” Fall 2008), Isquealed like a teenager who just receivedthe latest copy of Tiger Beat. Any man whocan recite ancient Greek poetry in Greek willmake a girl swoon.

In all seriousness, it was so nice to seeProfessor Stocking getting the credit andrecognition he so genuinely deserves. Dur-ing my time at Oxy, I found his knack formaking the classics both understandableand applicable to the iPod generation veryrefreshing, and I’m glad to see that other stu-dents feel the same way.

Now where can I get one of those awe-some shirts?

LINDSAY (WHITE) ESTORGA ’05

San Diego

Dubious PropositionAs the top comedian of my college years,Steve Martin, used to say, “Excuuuuse me!” Imean, really, what were you folks thinking?You published an article extolling gay “mar-riage” (“Family Matters,” Fall 2008) duringan election year as if it represents the major-ity opinion of Occidental students, faculty,and, most importantly, the alumni who con-tribute to the College? Give me a break. Doyou really think it was so important that itcouldn’t wait until after Election Day, andeven so, that it had to be represented on thecover of the magazine?

The timing of the article betrays insen-sitivity to those of us who are still conflictedabout the whole gay marriage issue, andreally poor judgment on the part of editorialstaff members who are responsible for mak-ing such publication decisions.

For many, if not most, of us, Occidentalis the lifeline that keeps alumni up to date oncollege life and what’s happening with thegraduates. In fact, I express my best wishesto Mr. and Mr. Waters-Voecks. I am just notready to read about their union as a coverstory at this particular time; I don’t think Iam alone.

MIKE MALOUF ’82

Mission Viejo

There’s Gold in That There HainesI watched Huell Howser’s “California’s Gold” and itwas fascinating. Much to my surprise it looked tome as though Barack Obama ’83’s first room, inHaines Hall, was my room in 1940. I was part ofthe first group of students to live there. It had justbeen built. My roommate, Jeanne Maxon, and Iwere thrilled with it. What I wondered about wasthe wash bowl, between the two clothes closets,that was missing. Our room was at the end of thefirst floor hall, on the right side.

The campus looks so beautiful now, more sothan ever I think. My “war years” there are a veryhappy memory, especially the mixers everyWednesday night to the music of the big bands.We had the V-12 Navy Program on campus then sothere were always plenty of boys to dance with.The war seemed very far away. How spoiled someof us were.

We all have high hopes for Barack. He seemsperfect for the job that is very much needed now.A little bit of Oxy goes with him.BOBBE LYON HARRISON ’44, La Cañada Flintridge

I watched the Huell Howser program on KCET andhad to marvel at how Oxy has changed since I waslast there (for my 40th, I think). But what really fas-cinated me was that Obama lived in Haines Hall—something that hadn’t occurred during my time ofsame-sex dorms, and I also noticed that Haineswas much updated from what I remember. Mysenior dorm room was pretty ascetic, with an ironbed, tired mattress, and minimal space. Nonethe-less, I have good memories.

JUDY CARDWELL ’61, San Luis Obispo

According to College records, Haines Hall waserected in 1940, enlarged in 1954, and renovatedin 1991. Named in honor of donors Mary OrrHaines and the Rev. Francis S. Haines, a Presby-terian minister, Haines Hall was originally built toaccommodate 73 women. The 1954 annex addedspace for 32 more students, and is the sectionwhich housed the president-elect as an Oxy fresh-man in 1979-80. His room is currently unoccupied.

From left, Mohamed Nur-Sed ’12, Michael Field ’11, Ken Sulzer’82, “California’s Gold” host Huell Howser, Amy McDonough ’11,and Adam Davis ’11 stand outside the Haines Hall room BarackObama ’83 lived in as a freshman at Occidental. Nur-Sed, Field,McDonough and Davis live in nearby rooms, while Sulzer (“Friendsof Barry,” page 12) was a neighbor during the 1979-80 school year.

Winter 2009 3

BookshelfTHE SCHOOL OF ESSENTIAL INGREDIENTS, byErica (Reictin) Bauermeister ’80 (Putnam;$24.95). In her debut novel, Bauermeisterfollows the lives of eight students who gath-er in Lillian’s Restaurant every Monday nightfor cooking class. Each one seeks a recipe forsomething beyond the kitchen—from Claire,a young mother struggling with the demandsof her family, to Tom, awidower mourning theloss of his wife to breastcancer. Chef Lillian,whose connection withfood is both soulful andexacting, helps themcreate dishes whose fla-vor and techniquesexpand beyond the restaurant and into thesecret corners of her students’ lives. One byone the students are transformed by the aro-mas, flavors, and textures of Lillian’s food.Brought together by the power of food andcompanionship, the lives of the charactersmingle and intertwine, united by the revealingnature of what can be created in the kitchen.Bauermeister holds a Ph.D from the Univer -sity of Washington, where she has taughtliterature and writing. She lives in Seattle.

GOVERNOR JAMES ROLPH AND THE GREAT

DEPRESSION IN CALIFORNIA, by JamesWorthen ’64 (McFarland & Co.; $39.95).After serving an unprecedented five terms asmayor of San Francisco, businessman JamesRolph went on to win California’s 1930

gubernatorial election. As a Depression-eragovernor, however, Rolph severely underesti-mated the challenges he would face. Ulti-mately, in spite of good intentions and a loveof civil service, Rolph was unable to translatehis mayoral triumph, with all its charm andstyle, into success in Sacramento. Worthen, aformer federal government administrator,lives in Pismo Beach.

HELOISE: A STORY OF LOVE, SEX, AND META-

PHYSICS IN THE WILD AND MARVELOUS SIX-

TIES, by Bill Neblett (University Press of theSouth; $29.95). Set in West Los Angeles andHollywood in the 1960s, Heloise exploresintellectual and emotional concepts throughthe musings of vivid characters. Philosophi-cal choices and answers become the centralfocus of each of these bohemian’s lives asthey interact, evolve, travel, and create. Dis-covering passions in music, theater, andpoetry allows the characters to mature andunderstand more than the theoretical. Unex-pected actions and consequences propel thenovel as much as the eccentric characters.Neblett is an emeritus professor of philoso-phy. He lives in Fountain Valley.

Listen UpMAGICAL TUNES & MARVELOUS TALES (CDBaby; $15), a CD of children’s music per-formed by the Plymouth (Mich.) CantonSymphony Society, includes a compositionby Andre Myers, assistant professor of musicat Oxy. “Paddle to the Sea” vividly depictsthe adventures of a toy boat as it travels theGreat Lakes on its way to the Atlantic Ocean.

OCCIDENTAL COLLEGE

Robert Allen SkotheimPresident

John T. “Tom” Tomlinson Jr.Vice President for Institutional Advancement

Eric FrankVice President for Academic Affairs

and Dean of the College

William D. TingleyVice President of Admission and Financial Aid

Barbara AveryVice President for Student Affairs

and Dean of Students

Jim TranquadaDirector of Communications

James JacobsDirector of Alumni Relations

EDITORIAL STAFF

Dick AndersonEditor

Samantha B. Bonar ’90Colleen Sharkey

Contributing Writers

Marc CamposContributing Photographer

Marsha InouyeWeb Editor

Gail (Schulman) Ginell ’79Class Notes Editor

Claudia SanSoucieDesign

Diversified Litho ServicesPrinting

OCCIDENTAL MAGAZINEPublished quarterly by Occidental College

Los Angeles CA 90041-3314www.oxy.edu

To contact Occidental MagazineBy phone: 323-259-2679By fax: 323-341-4967

By e-mail: [email protected] mail: Occidental College

Office of Communications F-361600 Campus Road

Los Angeles CA 90041-3314

All letters should include the writer’s name,address, and daytime telephone number.

Letters selected for publication may be editedfor length, content, and style.

Volume 31, Number 1, Winter 2009

OCCIDENTAL FAIR (The Booksmith Group; $50). Thefirst-ever coffee-table history of the College, OccidentalFair (produced in close collaboration with the Office ofCommunications) is a 128-page hardcover collectionof Oxy memories and milestones in academics, arts,athletics, and student life. With more than 200 photosand illustrations—including many never-before-published images—as well as recollections from generations of alumni and faculty, the book brings theOccidental experience to life. From bonfires, beanies,and barbecues to History of Civ, summer theater, andHoward Swan’s Glee Clubs, Occidental Fair will bringout the Tiger in you. Revisit Oxy’s greatest gridiron wins,the timeless track and field squads of Payton Jordan, andthe gender-shattering milestones of women’s athletics.An ideal read for a lazy Sunday afternoon, Occidental Fairwill have true Tigers of all ages shouting “Io Triumphe!”(Available at oxy.thebooksmithgroup.com)


F R O M T H E Q U A D

Tigers and Bears, Oh My!

As Occidental stares down the deepest recession since Remsen Bird was president, the College

tightens its belt, monitors applications and annual giving closely, and takes the long view

By JIM TRANQUADA

Illustration by PATRICK CARLSON

S VICE PRESIDENT for adminis-tration and finance and Collegetreasurer, Mike Groener keeps afirm grasp on the performanceof Occidental’s endowment.

But this fall, amid a market crisis that haswiped out the gains of the last decade,Groener has been monitoring Oxy’s highlydiversified portfolio far more carefully. It hasn’t been pleasant. Like all colleges and universities, the College’s endowment,which stood at $360 million at the end ofJune, has experienced double-digit losses—24.6 percent as of mid-November. Moody’s

A

Winter 2009 5

Investment Service, which tracks collegeendowments, is predicting higher educationportfolios will have lost as much as 30 per-cent of their value by the time the end of thefiscal year arrives June 30.

Occidental is no different from any indi-vidual investor whose 401(k) or other invest-ments have taken a beating, Ian McKinnon’89 of New York-based Ziff Brothers Invest-ments, chair of the Board of Trustees’ invest-ment committee, said at the group’s Oct. 20meeting. “There has been no place to hide.”

Despite the losses, Oxy has not experi-enced the kind of draconian measures seenon some other campuses—layoffs, salarycuts, mandatory furloughs, and mid-yeartuition increases. Thus far, there have beenfew requests from students and their familiesfor new or additional financial aid because of the declining economy, reports MaureenMcRae, Occidental’s director of financial aid.While 97 percent of Oxy students with loanshad to find a new lender this year, none hadproblems securing loans. Interest in the Col-lege remains high, boosted by the historicelection of Barack Obama ’83, according toBill Tingley, vice president for admission andfinancial aid.

But the continuing market turmoil andgloomy economic news have cast a pall ofuncertainty over campus. “Next semesterwill be a very different story,” predicts McRae.“We’re going to hear from families who haveexperienced layoffs, and now have only onewage earner. That’s when we’re going to seethe full impact of the crisis.” Admissionstaffers are watching events with an equallywary eye, unsure whether Oxy’s record-set-ting rise in applications over the past decadewill continue with the Class of 2013. “Wewon’t know until January’s application dead-line how we’re really doing,” says Tingley.Faculty are feeling the uncertainty as well;two professors who had applied to retire atthe end of this year have withdrawn theirapplications.

Because the College has a policy of spend-ing 5 percent of a five-year average return onthe endowment, the real impact on thisimportant revenue stream won’t be seen foranother two years or so, Groener says.(Endowment revenue accounts for approxi-mately 18 percent of this year’s $79 millionbudget.) Today’s circumstances provide astark example of why the College has such a

CAN A 14-PERSON, STUDENT-RUN OXY INVESTMENTgroup do what the likes of AIG, Washington Mutual, andBear Stearns could not: survive? The board of directorsof the 31-year-old Charles R. Blyth Fund says yes; theymight even benefit from it.

Oxy’s Blyth Fund, a six-figure portfolio carved outof the College’s endowment, has faced a loss ofapproximately 30 percent this financial year. Butthey’re not being passive. The fund has scheduledemergency meetings, sought professional consulting,done aggressive market research, and started a majorreconstruction of personnel and holdings.

“We are absolutely treating this as a potentialrecession or depression,” says Blyth Fund presidentJason Kwok ’09, an economics major from San Fran-cisco. “This is one of the worst downturns people haveever seen in their lives.”

On the first day of class this fall, the Dow Jonesopened at 11,416.42. On the last day of classes (Dec.3), the Dow Jones stood shakily at 8,330.68. The mar-ket’s volatility has been shocking: down 800 pointsone day, up 400 the next.

Even so, the Blyth Fund isn’t backing out. “Therewas a motion to sell all the holdings,” says Kwok. “Butwe decided it was not a good idea to sell based onmarket panic.” Conversely, the fund is taking cues frominvestor Warren Buffett, who sees economic downturnsas prime times to buy. “The market has created a num-ber of opportunities for us,” says Kwok. “We’re trying totake advantage of this as much as we can.”

Not only is the fund looking for opportunities tobuy, but also opportunities to learn. The student group

sees this downturn as perhaps a once-in-a-decadechance to experience and weather the pitfalls of afinancial crisis. “The purpose of the fund is to aggres-sively pursue opportunities to learn,” says Blyth Fundsecretary Josh Lu ’09, a diplomacy and world affairsand economics major from Portland, Ore. “These mar-ket conditions don’t happen very often.”

Blyth members enlisted the help of Scott Weiner’80, a managing principal of local investment firm Pay-den & Rygel, in an effort to take the fund in a more pro-fessional direction. The fund is actively looking formore input from Blyth Fund and Oxy alumni. Addition-ally, the fund has opened up applications for next yearearly. “With these kinds of market conditions, we wantthe best applicants possible,” says Lu.

The applications are usually not available untilspring semester, but they have been made available toincrease the size and diversity of the pool.

Going forward this financial year, the big questionis: How bad will this economic crisis be? “We’ve prob-ably seen the worst of it,” says Kwok.

Only time will tell if he’s right. But for now, as Lusays, “We’re buying.”—CHRIS BEST ’12

The Blyth Ultimatum:“We’re Buying”

policy—to avoid precipitous drops in revenuewhen the market falters. However, lowershort-term interest rates on Oxy’s workingcapital, the economy’s impact on alumni giv-ing (the number of gifts is running close toeven compared to last year, but the averageamount is down $72) and the anticipated risein students’ need for financial aid all makebelt-tightening necessary, Groener says.

As a result, a freeze on all new non-fac-ulty hires and a ban on all supplemental bud-get requests have been imposed, and a policyof careful scrutiny of filling vacancies put inplace. When trustees consider next year’sbudget at their January meeting, salary andoperating budget increases will be modest atbest. “We will be considering worst- andbest-case scenarios for net tuition, financialaid, and other income to help guide the finalproposal,” he says. “It is clear we are facing a

recession—how deep and how long, we donot know. For the next couple of years theCollege must be prepared to address theinevitable financial challenges of an economicdownturn.”

Still, Groener adds, it’s important to takea long view. Moody’s points out that enroll-ments at highly selective private liberal artscolleges with national market reach like Oxyare better positioned to weather an economicdownturn than less selective institutions andpublic universities reliant on shrinking pub-lic tax revenues. “Occidental survived theGreat Depression and every other economicdownturn of the past 121 years,” he says.“Our fundamentals—outstanding studentsand faculty, a beautiful, well-equipped cam-pus, and a national reputation for excel-lence—are stronger than ever. We plan onbeing around another 121 years.”

Photo by Marc Campos

O

Waterfield—who was sitting in the standswith Russell—Dennis sent in second-stringquarterback Don Ross. His play-action passes,coupled with a 3-for-3 outing by point-afterkicker Steve Smith ’50, won the game for theunderdog Tigers.

“I was really concerned when I wasgoing to kick the last extra point,” Smithadmits. Oxy guard Bud Ingersoll ’50 “hadmud smeared all over his face and he hadone tooth knocked out. He put a dirty,muddy finger on my chest and said, ‘Smitty,nobody’s comin’ through, so you make thisG.D. kick.’” Ingersoll was good to his word.

A less-pleasant memory for Petersonwas sharing Bob Chilcott ’51’s sweaty hel-met—the only Oxy helmet big enough toaccommodate their large noggins, so theycould never play at the same time. Chilcott,a first-string quarterback, would wear thehelmet first and then pass it off to Peterson.

At the reunion dinner, nine members ofthe original squad were treated to a 20-minute highlight reel of their unlikely win

Nearly 60 years after pullingoff a New Year’s Day upsetof Colorado A&M in 1949at the fourth annual RaisinBowl—the post-war brain-

child of the Fresno Junior Chamber of Com-merce—the most vivid memories of that leg-endary Oxy football team’s members are lessabout precise passes and perfect kicks andmore about meeting pin-up girl Jane Russell.

The then-27-year-old actress attendedthe game with her high-school-sweetheart-turned-husband Bob Waterfield, quarter-back of the Los Angeles Rams and a VanNuys High School teammate of several ofthe ’49 Tigers. He stepped in during the sea-son to assist veteran coach Roy Dennis ’33,best known for his ginger hair (his playersnicknamed him the “Red Spider”) and no-nonsense gridiron fundamentals. Trailing14-0 at halftime, the Tigers roared back tostun the Aggies with a 21-20 victory.

“They got ahead of us pretty good,” saystackle Bob Peterson ’51. On the advice of



RaisinReduxA playing field covered in mud, a sweat-drenched helmet for two, and a meet-and-greet with Hollywood bombshell Jane Russell: Raisin Bowl memories come rushing back Homecoming weekend

1. John Campbell ’50 holds the vintage football commemorating the 1948 season. The Tigers rolled overtheir opponents en route to a 9-0 record. 2. Jim Else ’50played guard for Oxy. 3. George “Bud” Ingersoll ’50 (No. 52for the Tigers) holds the official key to the city of Fresnogiven to Oxy after winning the fourth annual Raisin Bowl in 1949. The fifth bowl would be the last.

4. “Only when I try to move does it feellike it was 60 years ago,” says Tigers running back/punter Hugh Tassey ’50. 5. Steve Smith ’50, whose prowess kickingpoint-afters won the game for the Tigers,shook hands with Los Angeles Rams quar-terback Bob Waterfield after the contest.Unable to attend the reunion was futureNFL referee Jim Tunney ’51, who “warmedthe bench” for the ’48 Tigers. “The ath-letes who formed this great team wereoutstanding,” he writes. “I’m proud to beassociated with them.”

Photos by Marc Campos

4

5

1

2

3

6. Members of the 1949Raisin Bowl championshipsquad during halftime ceremonies at Oxy’s Home-coming on Nov. 15: Backrow, from left: John Andrews’51, George Goff ’51, TedCalderone ’51, Lloyd “Stan”Stanford Johnson ’50,George “Bud” Ingersoll ’50,Stephen Smith ’50, TheodoreStevens ’50, Hugh Tassey’50, Joe Johnson ’50, andBob Sutton ’51. Front row,from left: Samuel McClung ’51, John Campbell ’50,and Jim Else ’50. 7. “Most of the guys on the teamwere World War II veterans—I was really a youngpunk compared to them,” says Sam McClung ’51,who played end. “It was a thrill to compete withpeople who were, on the average, five or six yearsolder than I was.”

8. Quarterback Joe Johnson’50 (No. 26) started the firsthalf of the game for Oxy. 9. Tackle Bob Peterson ’51wears his original letterman’sjacket. 10. End John Andrews’51 recalls 1948 as a “dreamseason” for all 47 membersof the Occidental squad. Dueto bowl roster restrictions,only 37 Tigers were allowedto suit up for the contestagainst the Aggies.

Winter 2009 7

(actual game footage shot by Universal Pic-tures for the 1949 Donald O’Connor pigskincomedy Yes Sir, That’s My Baby, which wasrecently transferred to disk by Occidental’sSpecial Collections department).

The following day, four more teammatesjoined them to watch the ’08 Tigers completean undefeated regular season with a 48-14win against Whittier (following page). A goodtime was had by all—even if Jane Russell wasnowhere to be found.

—COLLEEN SHARKEY

6

8

7

9

10

Fall Sports Wrap-Up

A 9-0 Regular Season for Football; Men’s CrossCountry Builds a DynastyFor only the eighth time in Occidental histo-ry, the Tigers football team went undefeatedduring the regular season, claiming its thirdconference title in five years before falling tothe Willamette University Bearcats (rankedsixth nationally) in the first round of theNCAA Division III playoffs. Beginning with a41-0 road victory over Colorado College, theTigers followed up with eight more wins tofinish the regular season with the SouthernCalifornia Intercollegiate Athletic Confer-ence crown and a No. 11 national ranking.Seeded second in the West region, the

Tigers traveled to Salem, Ore., Nov. 22 totake on No. 1 seed Willamette, but came upshort in a 48-33 loss. Senior quarterback andSCIAC Offensive Player of the Year Justin

Goltz went 35-for-50 for 317 yards and fourtouchdowns, but it wasn’t enough. “The bot-tom line is that we made big plays, but notenough big plays, and they did,” says headcoach Dale Widolff.For the season, the Tigers produced

21 All-SCIAC players, including Goltz, hisfavorite targets—wide receivers and brothersChris Washington ’10 and SCIAC Newcomerof the Year Jordan Washington ’12—andpunter Alex Groh ’10, ranked second in thenation with an average of 43.1 yards perpunt. The Tigers’ powerful offense scored 50touchdowns and accumulated 4,616 yards oftotal offense overall, averaging 38.5 pointsper game (15th in the nation) on 459.9 totalyards per game (eighth in the nation).Led by freshman phenom and SCIAC

Runner of the Year Eric Kleinsasser, thenationally ranked men’s cross country teamstaked out a dynastic claim as well, claimingits third consecutive SCIAC title and narrow-ly missing a trip to the national champi-

onships. With each runner recording a newpersonal record, the Tigers finished fourth atthe Nov. 15 West Region Championships inSalem, Ore.—just 10 points out of secondplace, which would have automaticallyqualified them for the nationals.Three individual Tigers qualified for the

nationals, with team captain and All-SCIACrunner Keith Blumenfeld ’09 leading theway to place 70th in the 278-man field witha personal best of 25:22:52 in his final colle-giate race. Kleinsasser struggled a bit in hisfirst NCAA championship appearance,crossing the line in 25:47:89, and All-SCIACpick Clay Hoadley ’09 finished close behind,capping his collegiate career with a time of25:49.68.Other fall sports produced nine All-

SCIAC picks, including men’s water polo(fourth in SCIAC, with two All-Conferenceathletes), men’s and women’s soccer (both ofwhich finished sixth in conference, with atotal of five All-Conference players), andwomen’s cross country (fifth in conference,with two All-SCIAC runners). Under newhead coach Mike Talamantes, volleyball fin-ished sixth in the conference.



Photos by Kirby Lee

ABOVE LEFT: With Eric Kleinsasser ’12, far left, in front,the men’s cross country team races toward a SCIACcrown. ABOVE: All-SCIAC runner Keith Blumenfeld ’09paced the Tigers at the nationals. BELOW: A jubilantTigers squad hoists “The Shoes” trophy high follow-ing its 48-14 Homecoming win over Whittier.


Winter 2009 9

Presidential Search Update

Up to 3 Finalists Likely toVisit Campus in FebruaryWith the search for Occidental’s next presi-dent on schedule and on target, the presiden-tial search committee expects to formallyinterview a small group of six to eight peoplein January before selecting up to three finalcandidates, according to trustee and commit-tee chair John Farmer. “The committee feelswe have a pool of absolutely outstandingcandidates, and one that is much larger thanwe had imagined,” Farmer says. “My feelingis this is going to make the final decisionvery difficult.”The 14-member committee has win-

nowed the initial pool of 89 candidates downto the individuals who will be invited tointerview with the full search committee.Remarkably, because committee membershave been active participants in encouraginglikely candidates to participate in the search,traveling around the country to do so, mostof the candidates already have had somekind of face-to-face contact with Oxy, notescommittee member and Faculty Council chairMovindri Reddy. “It’s a very rich pool,” theassociate professor of diplomacy and worldaffairs told a Nov. 20 faculty meeting. “It’s alsoquite clear that Occidental is well regardedin the national academic community.”

Up to three finalists will be invited tovisit campus and meet with the Oxy commu-nity, provided they can do so without com-promising their current jobs, Farmer says. Aspecial meeting of the Board of Trustees inMarch will be necessary for the board tomeet with the entire committee—a new twist—to consider its evaluations and pick thenew president. The board’s goal is to haveOxy’s 14th president start July 1.

Phi Beta Kappa

10 Oxy Seniors Tapped forFall Semester InductionTen Occidental seniors have been elected tomembership in the Delta of California Chap-ter of Phi Beta Kappa, the nation’s oldest andmost prestigious academic honors organiza-tion. They are: Andrew Blythe (an economicsmajor from Gold River), Meredith Burke(sociology, Oakland), Elizabeth Chang (soci-ology, Taiwan), Erin Conley (English andcomparative literary studies and religiousstudies, Los Angeles), Molly Frolich (psy -chology, Bellingham, Wash.), Talia Gusfield(sociology, Davis), Wynne McAuley (econom-ics, Barrington, R.I.), Laura Mellem (criticaltheory and social justice, Bloomington,Minn.), Jessica Simes (sociology, Los Angeles),and Caroline White (biology, Orinda). Oxy’sPhi Beta Kappa chapter was chartered in 1926.

Occidental in BriefAssistant politics professor CarolineHeldman’s efforts to help rebuild the livesof women in post-Katrina New Orleansare being recognized by the V-Day Move-ment with an $8,000 V to the TenthLeadership Award. Heldman has been onthe front lines since the first days follow-ing Hurricane Katrina, traveling therewith groups of students who participatedin rescue and rebuilding efforts. She servesas director of the New Orleans Women’sShelter and works with CommonGround, a grassroots relief organization.An organization founded by Eve Ensler,creator of The Vagina Monologues, V-Dayis a global movement to stop violenceagainst women. � Occidental is one of thecountry’s top recipients of federal researchfunds among liberal arts colleges, accord-ing to the National Science Foundation.The more than $920,000 in NSF grantsOxy faculty received in 2006-07 place the College in the top 25 nationally, aheadof such schools as Amherst, Swarthmore,and Pomona. � Seventy-three Oxy stu-dents representing the sciences, humani-ties, and social sciences made presenta-tions at the 2008 Southern Cali forniaConference on Undergraduate Research—a contingent larger than all the ClaremontColleges, USC, UCLA, and Caltech com-bined. The conference was held Nov. 22at Cal Poly Pomona.


Mixed signal: From the Occidental mailbag comesthis contribution from Jeanette (Babikian) Jeanes’61, whose husband snapped this image at theintersection of President and Smith streets inBrooklyn, N.Y. “During the election campaign, alocal artist painted a figure of an Obama support-er on a pedestrian crosswalk signal in our neigh-borhood,” she writes. “To our delight, the city hasallowed the altered signal to remain.”

Hundreds of people on the Oxy campus (including students Miles Painter ’10 and Mallory Nezam ’09, duckingunder computer desks in the library) were among the millions of participants in the Nov. 13 Great SouthernCalifornia ShakeOut, billed as the largest emergency preparedness drill in U.S. history. The OxyAlert emergencynotification system was tested in conjunction with the ShakeOut. The College’s newly installed siren systemsounded, and students, faculty, and staff received test emergency notification e-mails and voice mail.

Photo courtesy Jeanette (Babikian) Jeanes ’61

After a campaign season nearly as long as his two years at Oxy, Barack Obama ’83 is president-elect of the United States—and Occidental pride is running at an all-time high

OTRIUMPHE!

by DICK ANDERSON Photo by JEFF HAYNES/Reuters

HIS CAMPAIGN SLOGANShave become national mantras:“Yes, We Can,” “Change,”“Hope.” Yet it was little morethan four years ago that he

stepped into the political spotlight at theDemocratic National Convention with aspeech that found a kinship between redstates and blue states, between black Americaand white America and Latino America andAsian America.

Barack Obama has been a member of theOccidental family since he migrated tocampus from Honolulu in the fall of 1979.We wish he had stayed a little longer—trans-ferring to Columbia University after hissophomore year, in part, because the lure ofthe Big Apple was greater than the City ofAngels (although, to hear his freshman room-mate Paul Carpenter ’83 tell it, he must havemissed the surfing). But there is little doubtamong those who have followed his cam-paign that the lessons of Occidental—andprofessors such as Roger Boesche, LarryCaldwell, Anne Howells, David James, andothers—have stayed with him over the lastquarter-century.

If Occidental changed Obama, then itmust be said that Obama has changed theCollege as well. Mention that you went to Occidental now, and that “Obama wentthere,” and a smile crosses many faces (well,at least 68 percent of those faces, if currentpoll numbers hold). There is a palpableexcitement in the Oxy community as thecountdown to Jan. 20 draws near. You’ll seeit on campus, in the bookstore, with all sizesand iterations of BarOxy Wear. You’ll see it in the scores of alumni who are making thetrek to Washington, D.C., to witness historyon Inauguration Day. And you’ll see it in the 14 Oxy students who spent most of thefall “empowering individuals and buildingcommunity,” as Campaign Semester partici-pant Tessa D’Arcangelew ’10, a diplomacyand world affairs major from Charlottesville,Va., put it. (“The moment Barack Obama wonVirginia and then the presidency was the mostamazing moment of my entire life,” addsNonda Hanneman ’10, an urban and envi-ronmental policy major from Eugene, Ore.)

In his 2004 memoir Dreams From MyFather, Obama writes: “[I] was accepted intoseveral respectable schools, and settled on

Winter 2009 11

TOP LEFT: Obama wears an aloha shirt as he strikes a pose in front of the then-new Lucille GilmanFountain, which was dedicated in November 1979.The photo was taken by Eric Moore ’83. TOP RIGHT:

Barack Obama ’83, Mark Anderson ’80, and RomeoGarcia ’80 at a festival in Pasadena’s Central Park in spring 1980. ABOVE: Obama on the senatorial campaign trail at a stop in Illinois in 2004.

Occidental College in Los Angeles mainlybecause I’d met a girl from Brentwood whileshe was vacationing in Hawaii with her family.But I was still just going through the motions,as indifferent toward college as toward mostanything else.” As he went on to say, some-thing changed along the way, and you couldargue that the path to 1600 PennsylvaniaAvenue started at 1600 Campus Road.

We like to think so, anyway. O

Photos courtesy Eric Moore ’83

Photo by Pete Hisey


The convocation address was deliveredby the soon-to-retire Richard Reath, a mem-ber of the Oxy faculty since 1947 and theCecil H. and Louise Gamble Professor inAmerican Institutions (who shared teachingduties with Roger Boesche in the politicalscience course that Obama took that year).While his specialty was constitutional law,the topic of his address was “How ToBe Sophisticated”—which The Occidentalreported as a primer on “how to jump overthe hedges of life with worldly wisdom,grace, and a minimum of bruises.”

Even though the 1980 election wasmore than a year away—and the presidential campaign season wasn’t nearly as long as it is today—there was a “Students forKennedy” movement on campus support-ing the Massa chusetts senator, and a“Democrat-Socialist Alliance” as well. TheSoviet invasion of Afghanistan promptedmuch discussion on campus, as did the possible reinstatement of the draft, whichhad ended only six years earlier. (ProfessorBoesche was quoted in The Occidental underthe headline “New Cold War MentalityCritiqued.”) The Student Coalition AgainstApartheid was formed at Oxy in late 1978,and divestment would become a bigger issuein days to follow.

While much has been written aboutObama’s two years at Occidental in the main-stream media, many questions remain: Didhe play JV basketball? Why did he transfer toColumbia? Did he have any girlfriends?While we don’t have all the answers, a seriesof interviews with many who knew “Barry”best—some of whom talk on the record for the first time—presents a more personalportrait of a president-elect.

Ken Sulzer ’82: Our hallway in Haineswas quite diverse—a number of African-Americans, Asians, Hispanics, and MiddleEastern people. There were athletes andpoets. That hallway is what Oxy aspired to and eventually became—an ethnically,culturally diverse place. It was a microcosmof what Oxy was to become.

Paul Carpenter ’83: We had a really goodhallway; there were a lot of interesting folks.A lot of times the doors would be open andpeople would be milling about. It was a veryfriendly atmosphere.

Phil Boerner ’83: What was differentabout Haines, for a freshman, was that incontrast to Stewie, the all-freshman dorm,there were students of all classes (freshmento seniors) mixed together, so Barack andother freshmen there could hang out withcooler, more worldly older students, andbenefit from their perspectives on Oxy andthe world.

I became very good friends with PaulCarpenter, and through him I got to knowBarack (and Imad). So initially Barack wasthe friend of a friend of mine. My dormroom was directly opposite Barack, Paul, and

FRIENDSof BARRY

Roommates, classmates, and lifelong acquaintancesremember the philosophy, politics, poetry, pride,and promise of Barack Obama’s Occidental years

Obama and freshman roommate PaulCarpenter ’83 at a 2007 event in Phoenix.

BARACK OBAMA ’83 arrived on theOccidental campus on or aroundSept. 15, 1979, when residencehalls opened for occupancy. Menstill outnumbered women on the

campus at the time, and the Punahou Schoolgraduate was one of 243 men out of a fresh-man class of 458. He settled into the 25-year-old annex section of Haines Hall, and foundhimself in a triple with two roommates: PaulCarpenter ’83, a political science major fromClaremont, and Imad Husain ’83, an econom-ics major from Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

by COLLEEN SHARKEY Photos by MARC CAMPOS

Photo courtesy Paul Carpenter ’83

Imad’s room. My general first impressionswere that he was a very nice, easygoing guy.Barack listened carefully to all points of view,and he was funny, smart, thoughtful, andwell-liked. It was easy to sit down with himand have a fun conversation.

Tom Moyes ’82: I have a fuzzy memoryfrom the fall of ’79 of going down to Hainesto drink beer and play cards with VinceCoscino ’82 on some random weekend. Justhanging out with a bunch of guys. HainesAnnex was a great meeting place for peopleto get together and hang out. Obama struckme as a very ordinary, regular guy. He wasordinary but impressive—like I think HarryTruman was.

Simeon Heninger ’82: I lived in a roomnext to Barry in Haines Annex when I was asophomore and he was a freshman. We werefriends. One thing I always remember is talk-ing to him alone, and asking why didn’t

President Roosevelt do more for the poor ofthis country when he had the chance?

Eric Moore ’83: The most profound mem-ory I have of Barack was soon after we met, we were sitting in the dorms chattingand I remember asking him what kind ofname “Barry” was for a “brother.” And heexplained to me where he was from and thathis real name was Barack—and because Iwas imbued with African-American pride Itold him, “You should rock Barack! That’s astrong African name. I like it better thanBarry,” and I always called him Barack fromthat day on. Whereas most everyone elsecalled him Barry, I insisted on calling himBarack, and I think he appreciated that.

Amiekoleh Kimbrew Usafi ’83: He wassmart and charismatic. Students would go tothe Cooler if they missed lunch, dinner, orjust to hang out. I recall he would be theresometimes and even then, he would draw

a crowd. If he spoke, people definitely lis-tened. He was perhaps the most confident—not cocky—person I think I’ve ever met. Hecertainly was the most confident and relaxedblack guy I had ever met. But he was justreal cool and laid back, walking aroundmostly in flip-flops and shorts.

He had a real relaxed demeanor. He didnot discuss that he was biracial, and when Iwas accepted in Crossroads Africa and wasbeing sent to West Africa, he congratulatedme on my acceptance but didn’t mention hisbackground. Maybe he was trying to figurelife out just like the rest of us.

Lou Hook ’80: Barry was a guy that youcould really see was really comfortablehanging out with black kids and the generalpopulation. [Hook was an active member ofUJIMA, formerly known as Black StudentsCaucus at Oxy.] At the time, the blackstudents were struggling to keep the civil

Eric Moore ’83“I think he’s awakened andintroduced a whole newgeneration to politics. My3-year-old daughter justlooks at the TV and says,‘Obama! Obama!’”

Winter 2009 13


rights movement “feel” to what we weredoing. There was sentiment on both sidesthinking, “Why is he so comfortable hangingout with those folks?”

After participating in the Crossroadsprogram in West Africa, I got to know a lot of African students here on campus. Theirperspective was often that the white studentswere more open to them than black students.These types of experiences at Oxy forced meto address my own race consciousness, andresulted in a sensitive spot for Barry becauseof his African roots.

Usafi: A lot of girls liked him, but heseemed to keep himself away from all of that.He could have gotten into a lot of nonsense,but he didn’t. He really could have been outthere in terms of being a playboy. Occidentalis a small campus. He just seemed very cen-tered and focused.

Moore: I never knew him to have a par-ticular girlfriend. Maybe he was just very dis-

creet—or ascetic. I don’t recall. He was neverjust out “on the make”; he used to just loveto converse and philosophize with people.

Boerner: We discussed the reinstatementof the draft (“Draft Beer, Not People” wasone sign I recall at an on-campus rally in February 1980), the Soviet invasion ofAfghanistan, apartheid in South Africa, thehostages in Iran, and the Contras in LatinAmerica, among other current news topicsfrom that time.

Carpenter: We were both poli sci majors,and we discussed the issues that were in thenews. We also discussed things that we werelearning about in our classes. He was verybright. I knew he would do well, but I hadno idea in what direction he would go. In theintervening years, we stayed in contact, and Iwatched him have one success after the next.

Sulzer: We played pick-up and intramur-al basketball games. I was not supposed toplay because I was a varsity baseball player.

He was a decent, pretty competitive player.He was not on the JV team. We played noonball, and some of the guys who played on JV would play with us, and they were muchbetter than we were. Neither Obama nor Iwas up to the college level of play.

Carpenter: Barack liked to go to Newportand Venice beaches, and he’s a good bodysurfer—we used to go to the beach together.I wanted to body surf with him at SandyBeach on Oahu. I used to go to the Wedge inNewport Beach, and it’s my hope somedaythat we’ll get to body surf in Hawaii.

Margot Mifflin ’82: I befriended Barryduring my junior year, because I dated hisclose friend, Hasan Chandoo ’81, and becauseI was in a creative writing class with him. Theclass was small and contained an assortmentof characters, from Barry’s friend ChuckJensvold ’81, who had developed a fullyformed neo-noir prose style, to Mark Dery’82, who was writing surrealist punk poetry,

Amiekoleh Kimbrew Usafi ’83Watching Obama’s success during the campaign motivatedUsafi to complete a children’sbook that she had been workingon for years. It will be published in January; she hopes to share it with her classmate.

to Jeff Wettleson ’82, a seemingly conven-tional guy whose writing was anything but.A number of the people in the class weredead serious about being writers, but I don’trecall Barry being one of them. Still, he pub-lished in the campus literary magazine thatyear and continued to send his stories toChuck even after he’d left Occidental.

Our professor, David James, was good atprompting us to drop our pretensions andwrite about something authentic. I think thathappened for Barry with the poem “Pop,” inwhich he describes an exchange with hisgrandfather, who asks him what he’s going todo with his life. Barry didn’t tell us that hisgrandfather had raised him—he just put thepoem out there for critique, and I rememberrecognizing immediately that his relationshipwith his grandfather was unlike anything I’dexperienced with a grandparent. His previouspoems had been more abstract and fanciful;this one hit a nerve, portraying not only“Pop” but also Barry himself very intimately.

It was in no way a tribute: The old manhas ashes in his chair and a stain on hisshorts; he’s drinking whiskey and needlinghis grandson; Barry’s yelling at him andimagining him as a spot in his brain that he can squeeze out, then they’re laughingand hugging and Barry’s putting his child’sarms around this titanic figure. The poemcaptured the feelings of a kid judging andbeing judged, wanting to step away andenjoying being close, trying to define him-self apart from an adult, and failing. Theclass liked it for its honest ambivalence andbecause it was so unabashedly personal,especially coming from someone who tendedto be reserved. It was also our first windowinto his unconventional family life.

Heninger: I seem to recall him showingme a picture of his grandparents. It was sucha strange thing to see these two white people.Barry was extremely appealing and easy toget along with.

Carpenter: We did have turkey day dinnerwith my family in Claremont or at Grandma’shouse in Downey. All those memories arefond. My mother loves him. He was unas-suming, easygoing, and good-natured. Thosewere fun times. He did love my mom’s applepie and her coconut pumpkin chiffon pie.

Chuck Carpenter (Paul’s father): He’d comeover because he lived a long way away and

you do things with your roommate. … Hewas just a wonderful young man. Just a very fine young man. Polite, personable.Occidental made him the man he is today,there’s no question.

Sulzer: I took at least two poli sci classeswith him. There are a lot of parallels to whatwe learned studying De Tocqueville—com-munities and people being engaged in theircommunities. As Americans, we are joiners—one of the things that we were taught byBoesche. Obama became a community orga-nizer, and perhaps he picked up a lot of thatfrom Boesche.

Boesche taught us the intellectual rigorof what’s considered a soft science. He was amodel for us—giving us the tools to dissect

Freud or Kierkegaard or whomever. Thatwas one thing Boesche left with me and,I’m sure, Obama. Boesche was such a goodteacher and a nice man and an amazing intel-lectual. He was so nice to us and so genuine.Young people really responded to him.Boesche was of the liberal, optimistic, idealis-tic perspective—similar to Obama’s rhetoric.

Carpenter: I had to debate against him, ina team format, in Professor Larry Caldwell’sclass. I don’t know how I sized up againsthim. It had to do with nuclear disarmament.He was a formidable opponent!

Moore: On one occasion when he was asophomore, I recall talking to him with afriend of ours, Richard Casey ’80 (who wentto Harvard Medical School), about his plans

Winter 2009 15

Paul Carpenter ’83With parents Chuck and Alicein his old room in Haines Hall: Obama “had gracious manners and was very warm,” says Alice, who fed the president-elect over Thanks giving break.


for the next year. And Barack said he wasgoing to transfer to Columbia. Both Richardand I tried to talk him out of leaving but,needless to say, he didn’t heed our advice. Hewas looking for a greater challenge.

Boerner: We both decided to transferfrom Oxy to Columbia in the spring of 1981.We did not decide on this together but inde-pendently applied to Columbia and foundout that we were both going there after we had been accepted, or perhaps it was atsome time during the application process. Ialso applied to a few other schools, and myapplication was not part of any joint Oxy-Columbia program.

My reasons for transferring were that Iwanted to attend a larger university and Iwanted to be closer to home (I was from theEast Coast). Oxy had about 1,600 students,which was smaller than my high school, andit felt a little like Peyton Place to me—every-

body knew who was dating who, what theywere up to. That can be a positive and a neg-ative. Looking back, I certainly would havebeen happy if I had stayed at Oxy and wouldhave had the advantage of knowing whichprofessors to take from having attended for two years. When you transfer to a newschool, you start that acclimation process all over again. Columbia had something like4,000 undergraduate students, and was partof a larger university with 17,000 graduatestudents, and that seemed like a better fit.

Sometime in the summer, Barack hadfound an apartment and suggested that Iroom with him. So that is how we becameroommates in New York.

The fact that many of our friends at Oxywere upperclassmen may have had an influ-ence on our decision to transfer—they weremoving on, leaving Oxy, and we may havefelt it was time for us to do that as well.

At Columbia Barack became more disci-plined about his studies, and socialized less.This was partly a function of being a transferstudent—you miss out on the freshman yearwhen you get to know many of your class-mates, and as a transfer student you can’t livein on-campus housing. So, it becomes morelike attending a commuter school. By neces-sity, he became more focused on the worldoutside of the campus and the opportunitiesthere—in New York it’s all “in your face,”whereas at Oxy you are in this protectedcocoon, and have to choose to leave it if youwant the experience of the larger world.

Sulzer: My congressman pal, AdamSchiff, is a good buddy from law school. Itold him at our 2005 Harvard Law reunionthat I was friendly with Obama at Oxy. Schiffwas really interested and said he knew andliked Obama.

In September 2007, Schiff ’s schedulercalled me and asked if I wanted to havelunch with Schiff at McCormick & Schmick’sin Manhattan Beach. He was doing due dili-gence—asking me questions about Obama.The talk among many of the Democrats atthe time was that Obama had the best chanceof bringing their party together, unifyingboth parties and winning the presidency.

Carpenter: I saw that groundswell of sup-port in the last year in Iowa, with peoplecoming in during the freezing weather toreport on their precincts. When the resultscame in from Iowa, there was jubilation.

Moore: I reconnected with him inChicago and then another time here in LosAngeles. I was really struck by the factthat—even when surrounded by press andpaparazzi—he came up to me, embraced me, and we talked about old memories atOxy. He is still the same person I knew, veryforthcoming, very gregarious. Devoid ofego, just very genuine.

It’s unbelievable that he now takes hisplace alongside all the heroes that we haddown through history. We used to discussMartin Luther King and Malcolm X and civilrights leaders of the time and Bob Marley.We took many of the same classes, sameprofessors. My world outlook is identical tohis, and he expresses and articulates thoseideas as if they were coming from my heart.

Moyes: My wife, Claire, and I bothworked for his campaign. We met up with

Ken Sulzer ’82 “We used to stand outsidein the Haines Hall Annexhallway and bull----. Therewas an alcove with a littlecouch, and we’d just hangout and chill and talk.”

Winter 2009 17

Obama in February—Claire gave him a lei(she’s Polynesian), which he accepted infront of thousands of people (just after thedebate with Hillary Clinton at the KodakTheater). He was very gracious.

Boerner: We have exchanged a few let-ters and family photos over the years. Thelast personal letter I got from him was inNovember 2004, after he became a senator,and I write to him about once a year. …Basically, Barack moved to Chicago and Imoved to Sacramento in 1990, and we neverhad a reason to visit each other’s city. Had I gone to Chicago, I would have looked himup and been received warmly.

Moore: I heard him say during the cam-paign that the two most formative years ofhis life were the ones in L.A., at Oxy, andthat’s a tremendous testament to the Collegeand the people around him. And I agree withthat. My years at Oxy were the most enrich-

ing and valuable. Many of my friends werelike Obama—of that caliber. I tell anyonewho asks me about him that he’s wonderfuland remarkable, but not anomalous. That’sthe kind of quality that Oxy produces.

Carpenter: On election night, I stayedhome—I was too anxious to go to a party. Iwas with my wife (Beth Kahn ’83) and someneighbors and friends. When the resultsstarting coming in, we had a bottle of cham-pagne, and then I fielded phone calls frompeople who were elated, as I was.

Usafi: My son and I are going to D.C. forthe inauguration. What an exciting event. Iwant to experience that energy.

At Oxy, Obama just had that “thing.” Hethought he was cute. He was cute. And smartand had a good education. I was impressedby how well prepared he was. I believe he wasraised by a very open and expanded-mindedmother who taught him that the possibilities

are endless when you come prepared. That’swhy I’m taking my son to Washington.

Hook: This election has been a very pro-found experience for me. Barack Obama isnow the leader of the free world—the mostpowerful man in the world—and his basictraining model is what we all experienced. Itlifts us and inspires us. … I just spent a weekin Ireland, and the people there are inspired.The United States has always had an Achillesheel: slavery and racism from its beginnings.This election put an exclamation point onthe progress our country has made. A taxidriver in Ireland said for a black person to beelected in the U.S., there’s no doubt that thepeople elected him. People are cynical aboutthe power of the people and democracy, butthere’s no doubt this time.

We need to change in a way that empow-ers us more. I am confident in Barack’s trainingmodel and that he can do it. Yes, he can!

Lou Hook ’80“Oxy offered this diverseexperience—the ultimatemelting pot—that’s reallysymbolic of what the U.S. isall about. And now we canclaim Obama as our own.”

O

would close—many networks indicated thatthey would call the race on the hour. A cho-rus of Oxy voices counted down from 30seconds to the hour, and when the networksposted a digital banner that read “ObamaElected President,” the cheers were deafen-ing. All over the room students hugged,cried, and screamed with joy. Nate Weiss ’10,a theater major from Leverett, Mass., stood,jaw agape, silently pointing his finger at thebig-screen TV while tears ran down his face.

Many students saw it as a personal vic-tory, not just because Obama shares theirOccidental lineage, but because they workedon his campaign or lobbied to register vot-ers. “I’m so proud of my fellow Oxy stu-dents, of my country—I can’t describe howhappy I am right now,” said Mazzeo,between shouts and high fives.

EVEN IN A CROWD OF SOME300 students who jammed intoSamuelson Pavilion on electionnight, watching the returnstrickle in as polls closed across

the country, Derek Mazzeo ’11 stood out.The lanky politics major from Yorba Lindaand Oxy Students for Obama co-presidentsprung up like a pogo stick intermittentlyover his peers—many of them wearingObama gear and a look of wide-eyed won-derment—but maintained that he was only“cautiously optimistic” in the early going.

As the clock neared 8 p.m.—when tradi-tionally Democratic-voting California polls

RED, ORANGE,

& BLUEFor a generation of Oxy undergraduates votingin their first presidential election, Barack Obama’shistoric win defines a once-in-a-lifetime moment

ABOVE: From left, Bobby Phillips ’12, Justin Morgan’09, and Darrell Winfrey ’12 flaunt foam fingers out-side the Cooler on Oct. 31. RIGHT: Sophomores DerekMazzeo and Justin Choh paper the campus withcampaign signage on the eve of election day.


by COLLEEN SHARKEY Photos by MARC CAMPOS

A capacity Cooler crowd goes bananasat 8 p.m. on election night, Nov. 4, asObama is declared the nation’s 44thpresident. Celebrants include (l-r)Andy Dakopolis ’09, Nate Weiss ’10,Stephen Bent ’09 (jumping), AmyMcDonough ’11, and Malia Latin ’11.

Working with Oxy Democrats, OxyStudents for Obama had an informal goal ofregistering 90 percent of eligible Oxy studentvoters. Although neither group has officialstatistics, Mazzeo says they registered morethan 200 Oxy students.

Co-president of Oxy Students forObama and resident of Haines Hall (Obama’sold dorm) Amy McDonough ’11 worked for more than a year with the Obama cam-paign. McDonough shared many duties withMazzeo including registering voters, plan-ning and going on campaigning trips to LasVegas, organizing campus phone banks, sell-ing T-shirts, organizing a speech-watchingparty for the DNC, and making sure studentswent to the polls on Election Day.

“The support we’ve seen here at Oxy isjust amazing,” said McDonough, a diploma-cy and world affairs major from Brookline,Mass. “We’ve had students coming up to us every day asking how they could getinvolved. I think, because of this election,youth in general are going to be interested inpolitics at an earlier age and hopefully they’ll

Winter 2009 19

miered locally Nov. 13 and will air statewideon PBS in January; it’s also available on DVDat the Occidental Bookstore).

“Barack Obama is president, he’s anOccidental alumnus,” sophomore MelvinRichardson told KABC news reporter RobHayes. “If you don’t think that means any-thing, you’re crazy.” O

keep that momentum going throughouttheir lives.” McDonough was also struck bythe camaraderie and cooperative nature ofthe diverse groups she worked with on thecampaign. “For me—I’m only 19—I wasseeing all these people who were in their 50sand 60s who had never worked on cam-paigns before. I don’t have a lot of experi-ence, but I was getting the sense that thiswas really something different. There’s a sortof energy to the Obama campaign that I’venever really seen before.”

“Without hyperbole or exaggeration,this is one of the most important elections of our generations in terms of what it did,the message it sent, the sense of pride thatfirst-time voters like myself feel,” said OxyDemocrats treasurer Dwight Hobbs ’11, adiplomacy and world affairs major fromMenlo Park. “I’m not sure if it will ever bematched again because Obama was such aninspiring candidate. I hope that this sets atrend for participation in politics in America.I don’t know if it’s going to get any biggerthan this; this is huge!”

Obama is only the sec-ond U.S. president to haveattended a small liberal artscollege west of the Rockies,the first being RichardNixon of Whittier College.While Occidental has oftenbeen referred to by collegeguides as “the Princeton ofthe West,” Mazzeo offeredcom parisons to another IvyLeague school. “We’re thenew Yale,” he said, beaming.

In the days to follow, theQuad was covered in chalktributes to the president-electthat ranged from “Obamawas here” to “Our president is black.”Reporters from the Pasadena Star-News, theKorea Daily, the Los Angeles Times, and TVstations KABC and KTLA all filed “Obamaat Oxy” stories. Even KCET stalwart HuellHowser journeyed to campus for the firsttime ever to tape a typically folksy episodefor his “California’s Gold” series (which pre-

LEFT: Derek Mazzeo ’11, right,and classmate AlexanderKaplan-Reyes ’11 make callsto battleground states onbehalf of Oxy Students forObama from Haines Hall on election night. BELOW:

Sophomores RachelMcCandliss and AlisonPentland break out the redand blue markers as statesare called for the candidates.BOTTOM: Sophomores DwightHobbs, Joseph Mohorcich,and Aly Eber watch thereturns come in online.


POLITICAL MODERATE VELMAMcKelvey ’55 had wanted tocampaign for Barack Obama ’83ever since she read his booksDreams From My Father and The

Audacity of Hope, but wasn’t sure how to get started. A chance meeting with the nowpresident-elect at a Los Angeles train stationlast December motivated her anew.

“I was waiting for a train at UnionStation when I saw him at a light waiting tocross the street,” McKelvey recalls. “I called

out and said, ‘I went to Occidental.’ He said,‘Occidental!’ and immediately crossed thestreet and came over and talked to me. Hejust couldn’t have been nicer or more real,”she recalls. “I said I was from Claremont,and he said, ‘Oh, Pomona,’ and made a face.It was a terrific moment.”

So when she saw volunteers outside of her neighborhood Starbucks seekingObama campaign workers soon after, sheimmediately signed up. McKelvey canvassedneighborhoods, worked phone banks, andhelped arrange a gathering with Alice andChuck Carpenter, the parents of Obama’sfreshman roommate Paul. The couple sharedtheir memories of Obama, who spent theThanksgiving holiday at their home whenhe was an Oxy student.

McKelvey was just one of scores ofOccidental alumni of all ages across the coun-try who volunteered for the Obama cam-paign. Fourteen Oxy undergrads also toiledin six states (Arizona, Colorado, Minnesota,North Carolina, Pennsylvania, and Virginia)as part of the College’s campaign semesterprogram, in which students spend themajority of the fall semester working for apolitical campaign, then write a paper aboutthe experience. (Students had the option towork for the McCain campaign as well, butnone chose to do so.) And a number ofrecent graduates criss-crossed the country inthe months leading up to election day.

The pay was low to nil for alumni andnonexistent for current students (who

received class credit), and the days werelong. “Throughout the campaign, the aver-age workday was at least 12 to 15 hours,”recalls Katie DeMocker ’10, who was sta-tioned in Arizona. “During the last twoweeks, we were lucky if a 20-hour day wasthe norm.” However, most of the Oxy work-ers share DeMocker’s ultimate sentiment: “Ihave never been more proud to be a part ofanything in my entire life.”

Sara El-Amine ’07, a diplomacy andworld affairs major from Duxbury, Mass.,began as an Obama for America deputy fieldorganizer in Iowa in November 2007 alongwith Noah Glusenkamp ’07 and Brian

AGENTSof CHANGEAs the Obama campaign mobilized volunteers andeager young staffers nationwide, alumni and studentsbrought their talents and energies to the movement

by S A M A N T H A B . B O N A R ’ 9 0

After a chance meeting at Union Stationin Los Angeles last December, VelmaMcKelvey ’55 boarded the Obama forAmerica movement back in Claremont.LEFT: On the night before the close ofvoter registration, Nonda Hanneman ’09takes to the streets near the University ofVirginia campus in Charlottesville.


Photo courtesy Nonda Hanneman ’10

Winter 2009 21

McGrane ’06 (“Fired Up, Ready to Go,”Winter 2008). “Making sure the right per-son gets elected as the next president of theUnited States is the highest calling rightnow,” she said at the time. She headed toIdaho after Obama’s surprise Iowa win, andthen to Texas, Mississippi, Indiana, andColorado before finally landing in the battle-ground state of Virginia after Obama securedthe Democratic presidential nomination.

As part of Virginia’s Campaign forChange, El-Amine managed 12 offices andmore than two dozen staffers, fellows, anddeputy field organizers in 22 counties andfive cities. She was stationed in “the incredi-

bly red northwest, where we are contestingevery precinct for the first time in the historyof the state.” Her charges included campaignsemester participants Tessa D’Arcangelew’10, Emily Deans ’09, Margot Seigle ’09, andNonda Hanneman ’10—whom she praisesuniformly as “professional, hardworking,well-rounded, and competent.” “They havebrought a new energy to the team and arethe backbone of our regional organization,”she said in October.

Seigle ran her own office in Luray, a con-servative town of fewer than 5,000 in Virginia’sShenandoah Valley. “She has literally runout of calls to make and doors to knock

because she and her volunteers are so hard-working,” El-Amine observed prior to theelection. Deans and D’Arcangelew worked as deputy field organizers in the college townof Charlottesville, handling swarms of volun-teers, managing phone banks, and canvassinglaunches and surrogate events. Two 2008graduates, Chris Nelson and Brian Damron,were field organizers stationed in two of themost difficult areas of the state—Nelson inStaunton, Va., and Damron in Shenandoahand Clarke counties.

“I generally feel like I’m going to throwup all day, every day from nerves,” El-Aminesaid two weeks before election day. “I’ve been


TOP: Deputy field organizers Emily Deans ’09 andTessa D’Arcangelew ’10—two of 14 participants inOxy’s campaign semester program—canvass aneighborhood in Charlottesville, Va., in late October.ABOVE: Chris Nelson ’08 and a coworker check thelatest field data in Obama’s Staunton, Va., office inOctober.

Photos by Andrew Shurtleff

doing this too long now for it to fall through.”In one weekend alone just before the elec-tion, her staff knocked on 16,000 doors. “Thefield staff out here is incredible. No one hastaken a day off or even a lunch hour inmonths now,” she said. “They stay past mid-night meticulously entering our data fromthe day—hundreds of doors knocked andthousands of phone calls—so that we canhave updated lists every morning.”

D’Arcangelew was among a group offour Oxy students and alumni who metObama at a Shenandoah Valley rally in lateOctober. “He talked about Oxy and aboutTommy’s Burgers and ‘kickin’ it’ in EagleRock,’” says D’Arcangelew, who worked theevent as crowd control and line manager.“He really likes chili on his cheeseburgers.”

Hanneman, in charge of voter registra-tion and volunteer recruitment at theUniversity of Virginia, hardly slept duringthe last two weeks of the campaign andstayed up all night Nov. 3. “The few daysleading up to the election were insane,” sherecalls. “We hung door hangers starting atmidnight on Nov. 4. I handled volunteers

all day as hundreds wandered into the officewanting to help. Later in the afternoon I leftthe office to knock on every single door inevery single dorm. In the pouring rain, weran through the libraries, dining halls, andathletic centers reminding people to vote.”

“When there were no lines when pollsclosed I was convinced something had goneterribly wrong,” she admits. “However, asOhio and other swing states came in blue Istarted to feel more positive.” When Virginiawas called for Obama—the first time thecommonwealth voted Democrat since1964—Hanneman was in a room with about200 UVA students: “There was not a dry eyeor a couple of strangers not hugging. It wasa blur of screaming, sobbing, and shaking.”

Oxy junior DeMocker, the youth votedirector in Arizona, had to swing into frenet-ic action at the last minute. Because it waslong assumed that the state would go to itsfavorite son—Republican Sen. John McCain—the Obama team maintained just a smallstaff in the state, with limited resources. Latein the campaign, sensing a possible swingtoward the left, the Obama team flexed its

Winter 2009 23

muscle. DeMocker was quickly trained onthe Voter Activation Network and begancoordinating and directing the thousands ofvolunteers who poured in from across thestate to her eight-person office.

“The final week was by far the craziest,”she says. “Our office had phone bankerseverywhere. We had tables outside on thegrass with people calling, kids coloring signsto hold at street corners, and stations sendinggroups out for canvasses.” While the GrandCanyon State ultimately stayed in the McCaincamp, “We got close,” DeMocker says. “Weworked incredibly hard, and we are extremelyproud of where it ended in Arizona.”

As the world knows, the ultimate prize

Photos courtesy Nonda Hanneman ’09 (left), Sara El-Amine ’07 (below)

Photos courtesy Margot Seigle ’09 (above), Noah Glusenkamp ’07 (below)TOP LEFT: Oxy seniors NondaHanneman and Emily Deanswork the phones in Charlottes -ville. ABOVE RIGHT: Sara El-Amine’07 gets a hug from MichelleObama on Nov. 10, 2007, at the Iowa Jefferson JacksonDinner. ABOVE Obama poses for a photo opportunity withstaffers and volunteers inHarrisonburg, Va., after a rallyOct. 28. Emily Deans ’09 is to his right and Margot Seigle’09 is in front. LEFT: NoahGlusenkamp ’07 (wearing anObama-Biden shirt) managed a full-time staff of five, 10interns, and an army of volun-teers in Douglas County, Colo.


went to Obama that night. When he wasdeclared president-elect, “I cried for hours,”Hanneman, the Virginia campaigner, recalls.“Not only did the candidate that I so desper-ately wanted to see as president win, thosefew months of total stress and exhaustionhad paid off.”

“I’m pretty much in disbelief,” BeccaLoegering ’10, who was stationed in Colo -rado, said on election night. “I wasn’t surethis moment would come. We were so proudthat Colorado turned blue for Barack Obama.I’m very proud of all the work that everyone

has done on this campaign, and I feel lucky tohave been a part of it.”

Assessing the impact Obama’s win couldhave on Occidental, Loegering says, “I thinkthe fact that Obama started off at Occidentalshows that we might not have the Ivy Leaguecredential, but we have the faculty and theresources to produce someone who canchange the direction of the country.”

DeMocker adds, “Before when I toldpeople I went to Oxy, and that it was a liber-al arts college, they didn’t seem to knowwhat it meant. Now when I tell people that

WHILE THE SELECTION OF BARACK OBAMA ’83 ASpresident has redefined “morning in America” for many,a number of students who participated in the CampaignSemester are having a difficult time adjusting to lifeback on campus.

“After working 15 hours every day toward somethingI was so passionate about, being a normal college stu-dent seems insignificant,” admits Nonda Hanneman ’10,who worked for the Obama campaign in Virginia. “I feelvery disconnected from students here and almost out ofplace, even though I love Oxy so much. I think it will justtake time to adjust to being back from such a life-chang-ing experience. No matter how long it takes, though, Iwould not trade the Campaign Semester experience foranything; I am so grateful to have had the opportunity.”

Katie DeMocker ’10, who campaigned for Obama inArizona, echoes Hanneman’s sentiment. Being back oncampus feels “overwhelming and strange,” she says. “Itis a good feeling to see everyone again, but at the sametime, it is hard to suddenly be taken out of such anintense and amazing experience and jump back intowhat is an everyday class routine.”

“I have mixed feelings. I miss Virginia a lot,” saysMargot Siegel ’09. “I ran an office on my own and gotattached to the people I worked with, and to get abrupt-ly pulled away from that was kind of hard.”

Peter Dreier, Dr. E.P. Clapp Distinguished Professor ofPolitics, explains the returning students’ ambivalence.“They were working 80 hours a week, the adrenalin wasflowing, and they were being challenged to do thingsthat they’d never done before and doing them in waysthat were exceptional,” says Dreier, who conceived theCampaign Semester last spring. “It was almost an out-of-body experience for them. And then they come backand they’re students again. It must feel a little mundane.

There’s almost no way they can translate what theyexperienced to their friends in a way that captures thealmost spiritual quality of it.”

Campaign Semester students received eight creditsfor their “field work” in the campaign, during which timethey kept daily logs of their activities and wrote weeklyjournal entries/analyses of the campaign. They also hada weekly e-mail check-in with professors Dreier andCaroline Heldman, who co-teach the seminar the stu-dents take upon their return. The next four units arederived from a 25-page paper that each student willwrite between now and the end of the year. The final fourunits are based on the class, which is focused on dis-cussions of readings and will include public presenta-tions by each student. (Occidental is the only college inthe country that offers a full semester of college creditfor working on a political campaign, according to Dreier.)

“I’ve stuffed almost a semester’s worth of readinginto four weeks,” Dreier says. “Their academic experi-ence is now pretty intense. But what they went throughwas a life-changing experience, and I think you justcan’t compare that to being a college student.”

“I think it helps that they’re all in the class together,so they can share their experiences,” he says. “I’m alsotelling them to try to hone a narrative about what theydid, so they can tell other students about it. And to jour-nal—it helps them deal with the feelings they’re goingthrough about coming back to school.”

“These students learned a lot,” he says. “Theylearned how campaigns are run, they learned a lotabout other people from diverse backgrounds, and theylearned a lot about themselves—who they are, how theycan multitask, take risks and survive, walk into strangesituations and learn how to cope with them.

“The campaigns don’t give you a lot of time to beself-reflective. One of the luxuries of being back is itgives you that time to think about what they learnedabout themselves, about politics, and about other people.

“They can’t be too modest about it,” he concludes.“Most of them rose to extraordinary heights.”

—SAMANTHA B. BONAR ’90

Obama went to Oxy, their eyes light up. Iwould love to see Barack come back to Oxynow that his campaign is over.”

“I think this whole election has putOccidental on the map,” D’Arcangelew adds,“but more importantly, Barack Obama standsfor the same things that Oxy stands for—strong values and beautiful principles aboutlife. I think his win gives a lot of hope to theOxy students who share his values andbeliefs and want to make the world a betterplace—that they can make a difference withtheir lives.”

Seniors and Oxy roommates Margot Seigle and EmilyDeans drive home their love for the president-elect.

O

Photo courtesy Margot Seigle ’09

YES, WE DID!…Now What?

Winter 2009 25

to heal foreign policy rifts, and an all-outeffort to “jump-start” the economy withmuch-needed infrastructure spending andso-called middle-class tax cuts. I’ve beencritical of raising tax rates on investmentcapital and especially so during a recession.My hope is the new Secretary of TreasuryTim Geithner will suspend the tax increasefor two years or permanently.

Can Obama deliver on his long list ofinitiatives while maintaining his campaignpromise of a tax cut for 95 percent of allAmericans?

I believe he will have to scale back hiscampaign promises and focus on economicrecovery.

What steps should Obama take to deal-ing with the housing crisis?

He should, in my opinion, help lowermortgage rates by fiat, through the use ofFannie Mae and Freddie Mac now in conser-vatorship. Until and unless we get housingprices stabilized and turned around, familieswill not be able to stay in their homes, to theextent possible, and bank balance sheetscannot recover sufficiently to jump startlending both in housing and commerciallending arenas.

If you could give Obama one piece ofadvice, what would it be?

Read Gabor Boritt’s Abraham Lincolnand the Economics of the American Dream.

Obama reads and admires the 16th presidentimmensely, and this book would round outhis understanding of Mr. Lincoln’s economicideas that transcend class distinction andemphasize equality of opportunity for allpeople to rise to their God-given potential.

What will it take for the RepublicanParty to get back on track?

Read Boritt’s Abraham Lincoln … as welland put his ideas of emancipation, liberation,civil rights, social justice, and economicgrowth back as the political lodestar of a GOPdevoted to recapturing the American Dreamfor all people. The GOP must emphasize byreaching out in a dramatic new way to peopleof color that it’s truly a party of Lincoln—with inclusion, not exclusion, as its predicate.

You’re a member of the AbrahamLincoln Bicentennial Board. What wouldLincoln (who was born in 1809) make ofBarack Obama (inaugurated in 2009)?

Mr. Lincoln (as would Dr. Martin LutherKing Jr.) would be absolutely thrilled thatwe’re one giant step closer to their “dream” ofa more “perfect union.”

As a fellow Oxy alumnus, what lessonsdo you think Obama will take from 1600Campus Road to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue?

President-elect Obama will take awayfrom Oxy the same lessons as all of us takeaway: a love of liberal arts, and a reverencefor history and its lessons for our future.

IN THE GAME of bipartisan politics,Jack Kemp ’57 knows the playbook.The nine-term Congressman (1971-1989), secretary of Housing andUrban Development (1989-1993),

and onetime vice presidential candidate(1996) stumped actively for Sen. JohnMcCain in his quest for the White House.

And while the election of Sen. BarackObama ’83 has tilted the balance of power in Washington, Kemp—who runs a strate-gic consulting firm in Bethesda, Md.—isready to reach across party lines. “Like allOxy grads—Democrats, Republicans, andIndependents—I wish him well and pray forhis leadership of our whole country,” heexplains in a Q&A with Occidental.

When did you first meet President-elect Obama?

In June 2006 at an event in Washington,D.C., announcing the nation’s first PublicInternet Channel under the auspices of One Economy, a progressive urban economicdevelopment company bringing technologyinto the homes of all people. The speakerswere Obama; Martin O’Malley, former mayorof Baltimore and current governor ofMaryland; and me, all of whom are support-ers and sponsors of this nationwide effort.

What do you think the hallmarks willbe of an Obama presidency?

Racial and ethnic reconciliation, attempts

“All bets on economic growth are off if Obama persists in raising tax rates on investment,”says Kemp, left, campaigning with McCain at a rally in Dayton, Ohio, on Oct. 27.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Fresh off the campaign trail for fellow Republican John McCain, Jack Kemp ’57 reflects on the task of rebranding the GOP—and the challenge of converting promises to prosperity

POLITICAL FOOTBALL

O

26 Occidental Magazine26

A 4-day-old barn owl with

a damaged wing flew into the

heart of biologistStacey O’Brien ’86—

and their decades-long love story

has hatched a best-selling memoir

WESLEYME&

By DICK ANDERSON

Photo by MAX S. GERBER

A 4-day-old barn owl with

a damaged wing flew into the

heart of biologistStacey O’Brien ’86—

and their decades-long love story

has hatched a best-selling memoir

Winter 2009 27

The Southern CaliforniaMouse Shortage of 1986may have gone unno-ticed by most, but forStacey O’Brien ’86, itnecessitated a plan ofaction. “I was competing

with everyone to find out where the micewere,” says O’Brien, who found herself learn-ing pet store delivery schedules in an effortto secure enough rodents for her barn owl,Wesley. She started to feel like a male owl,who is tasked with retrieving more than 35mice a night to feed a family of seven. “I wasalways trying to get mice,” she says.But because she kept the owl’s existence

a secret to most (“There was areal extremist animal activistmovement going on”), O’Brienfed the pet stores a little whitelie: “I told them I had lots ofsnakes.” And because theybelieved her, they frequentlypeppered her with questionsabout the legless reptiles.“Thank God my dad had stud-ied herpetology and we wouldgo to the zoo a lot,” she recalls with a laugh. Over the course of 19 years, O’Brien

estimates that she fed Wesley more than28,000 mice. Between meals, “Wesley and Imade some pretty neat discoveries,” shesays—and their relationship evolved intoThe Remarkable Love Story of an Owl and HisGirl, to borrow the subtitle of Wesley theOwl, O’Brien’s recently published memoir. As a child, O’Brien developed a natural

interest in biology, turning over rocks to col-lect and study the pillbugs beneath. “I startedgetting up before the sun came up and I’dwatch the birds and their behavior for hours,”she says. “I just had it in my blood to be abiologist.” Following a lecture at Caltech byprimatologist Jane Goodall, O’Brien, then 8,was so certain that she was going to studychimpanzees in Africa that she convinced herparents to enroll her in Swahili classes.That phase passed, but O’Brien’s educa-

tion was largely financed by a lucrative child-hood career as a singer. “My sister and Icould read music and sight-sing when wewere really young,” says O’Brien, who grewup in a show-business family (her grandfa-ther played drums in big bands, and heruncle is former Mouseketeer Cubby O’Brien).

That led to steady work singing in hundredsof ads, including spots for Little Friskies andMcDonald’s, and on the scores of many films,including Rocky II and IV and Exorcist II: TheHeretic (“Our mom made us turn our backsto the screen” during the sessions, she says).O’Brien skipped her junior and senior

years of high school and enrolled at GlendaleCollege. A midsummer meeting with thehead of Oxy’s biochemistry program led toan invitation for admission, and she trans-ferred to the College that fall. ProfessorGeorge Cleland ’42 “was a huge influence onme in organic chemistry,” she says.Thanks to the College’s exchange pro-

gram with Caltech, O’Brien wound up takinga neurobiology class as a senior,and that led to a position in thebehavioral biology department atCaltech. Soon after, as an assistantin the owl laboratory, she wasasked to take home an owlet whowas unable to go back into thewild. “His little eyes were stillshut, and he had nerve damage inhis right wing,” says O’Brien, whowrites in Wesley the Owl that she

was “both thrilled and terrified by the oppor-tunity—scared by the enormous responsibili-ty I would assume for this young life.”With Wesley imprinting on O’Brien as

he would his own mother, he related to hiskeeper as he would another animal. “When Iwould brush my teeth, and Wesley would tryto drink and try to get his face wet,” she says.“He thought I was teaching him what to do.He became fanatically addicted to water.”O’Brien talked to Wesley constantly, and

her biggest discovery was that the owl withthe heart-shaped face not only knew whatshe was saying, but had developed a lan-guage of his own. “It took me a while to fig-ure out what he was doing,” she says. Wesleycame up with perhaps 20 different calls relat-ed to begging. “One would mean, ‘I want amagazine,’” she explains. “He’d rip it up, flyaround, and jump on it like a kid jumpinginto a pile of leaves.”In 1998, in her late 30s, O’Brien discov-

ered that she had a brain tumor “that wasinoperable but not cancerous,” she writes. “Iwas in a wheelchair for a month and experi-enced speech and memory lapse, but eventu-ally recovered,” although she continues tosuffer from narcolepsy to this day. Wesley’s

well-being helped her to persevere: “I thinkhe was fine as long as I was around. Heseemed to have come to the conclusion thatwe were growing old together.”When Wesley died in January 2004 of

liver cancer, “I went into shock,” O’Briensays. “I started writing that very next day.”Three weeks later, she had a 400-page draftthat she would spend two years refining. With a first printing of 5,000, Wesley the

Owlwas published Aug. 19 to a starred reviewin Publishers Weekly and a four-star notice inPeople. The book debuted on the New YorkTimes hardcover nonfiction best-sellers chartdated Sept. 28, and Simon & Schuster nowhas some 60,000 copies in print. Wesley hassince been licensed from the UnitedKingdom and Korea to Australia and Brazil.The book’s out-of-the-box success “came

as a surprise,” says O’Brien, who is writing afollow-up, The Way of the Owl, which she sayswill go deeper “into how different specieshave a certain ethic or certain set of assump-tions about that they will and won’t do.”In the meantime, Wesleymania contin-

ues to spread its wings. In response to popu-lar demand, O’Brien turned to friend WendyFrancisco, a professional soft sculptor, whocreated a plush Wesley collectible (availableat www.wesleytheowl.com). Wesley the Owlhas attracted “a lot of interest” in Hollywoodcircles as well, O’Brien says. That means thatshe and her sister, Gloria, may one day findthemselves singing on the story of Wesleyand Stacey—or, as longtime friend KeithMurray ’85 suggests wryly, “a Lifetime TVmovie: Not Without My Barn Owl.”

LEFT: O’Brien and Wesley in 1985. RIGHT: Wesley at 15.OPPOSITE: O’Brien wears a necklace that had belongedto her grandmother, who had a large collection of owlephemera. Only after her grandmother’s passing didO’Brien learn that “She had raised a barn owl just likeI did”—an owl named Weisel, coincidentally enough.

Photos courtesy Wendy Francisco

O


BELOW LEFT: Erica and little sister Jaci in 1986. BELOW RIGHT: Erica in 2005. Contributions to a fund inmemory of Erica may be sent to Occidental (pleasewrite “in memory of Erica Murray” on the check).

Erica Murray ’01 made a world of friends in her 29 yearsamong us—and we all lost a best friend with her passing

A P P R E C I A T I O N

The Elf on the Wall

“Is it the fluorescent luminescence that drawsme back time and time again? The bone-grind-ing procedures, the hilarity of my bodily func-tioning being table talk, or maybe those dang-good-spirited nurses smocks perhaps? No, it isis none of these things that find me here again,in yet another room at Stanford Medical Center.

“I’m here because I woke up with a highfever on Thursday, 11/18, and fevers are agood sign that there's some kind of infection inthe body. … So if anyone asks you, How’sErica? you can say that neither she nor herdoctors have any idea.”

(Erica Murray blog entry, Nov. 23, 2008)

WHEN ERICA MURRAY ’01 LOSTher nearly three-year battle withleukemia Dec. 4, the news trav-

eled quickly through her many circles offriends. There were those who met Erica as astudent at Occidental; those who knewErica through her work with Oxy’s alumnirelations office; those who encountered

Erica through her graduate studies at theFletcher School; and countless others whohad their first exposure to Erica through hervery public fight to live after her sister,Jaci, launched ericamurray.blogspot.com inFebruary 2006.

“The blog was created to give Erica’sloved ones updates on her health and treat-ment, but quickly took on a life of its own,”longtime friend and former roommate JamieMurphy ’01 observed at a memorial servicefor Erica on Dec. 9 in Redwood City. Through198 entries by members of “Team Erica” (andcountless comments by scattered friends,acquaintances, and total strangers), visitorsto her blog experienced the highs and lows ofErica’s journey.

“Erica once said to me that she felt likeshe was a jack of all trades but a master ofnone,” Murphy said in her eulogy. “She knewshe was talented and creative but didn’tfeel like she excelled at any one thing. But Ibeg to differ. Erica was truly a master of

human relationships. She had the mostamazing ability to make everyone she camein contact with feel like her best friend. Andshe made friends to the very end. She wasnaturally the most welcoming and friendlyperson I have ever known, and she broughttogether people from around the world asher friends.”

Soon after her initial diagnosis, Ericacreated a top 10 list of “the best things abouthaving cancer—leave it to Erica to find thebright side of having cancer,” Murphy said—and No. 1 was bringing her loved onestogether. “I love it when people from differ-ent segments of my life have the opportunityto meet and get to know one another,” Ericawrote March 12, 2006.

“Jamie called it my ‘elf on the wall’ trick(the joke sort of deriving from me being theobvious elephant in the room, but trying tobe like a fly on the wall). But many hours ofeach day were spent in a semi-snooze listen-ing to my Mom get to know my friends, ormy sister get to know my graduate schoolcolleagues, or a friend from Japan getting toknow a friend from high school. I loved justlistening to their precious voices and know-ing they were there.”

Occidental Magazine shared her story(“Places to Go, Things to Do,” Summer 2008)with even more people. Erica herself was“mystified” by her selection, and wrote asmuch on her blog: “The alumni magazine issupposed to be about people who are outthere in the world, kicking ass and takingnames,” she wrote July 2. “I am currentlykicking ass at playing games.”

Given her fondness for games, shemight appreciate the fact that we are withinsix degrees of Erica Murray. Her YouTubevideo she made with Jaci last March, “If IHad a Real Good Donor” (more than 36,000views through mid-December) will continueto prod mixed-race registrants to the Nation-al Bone Marrow Program (www.marrow.org).And we’ll remember Erica with a smile andwith gratitude for having shared her life.

As she concluded in what would be herlast blog entry Nov. 23, “Friends and visitorsand all the tokens that they send remind mewhy life’s worth fighting for.” O

occidenta l - oxy.edu

Documents