Amherst Magazine: Summer 2014
FEATURES
Life After Amherst?
By William H. Pritchard ’53
Twelve years after his once-imagined retirement date, an English professor wonders whether he’s now said enough.
Out of the Shadows
By Geoffrey Giller ’10
Kirk Johnson ’82 takes a science writer behind the scenes of the most visited natural history museum in the world.
Are You Getting This Down, Boolie?
By Emily Gold Boutilier
Singer-songwriter Jonatha Brooke ’85 spent two years caring for her mother, who had Alzheimer’s. Then she wrote a musical about it.
DEPARTMENTS
College Row
Playing piano where Brahms once played, Erasing the “Amherst Awkward”—with hugs,
Research on glass houses and rejecting privacy, and more
Sports
Tennis: Doubles champs Jordan Brewer ’14 and Gabby Devlin ’14
Beyond Campus
Medicine: A health care hub in a busy soup kitchen
Small business: Selling antiques in an Ikea world
Social action: Helping kids in postwar nations
Depression: How do depression drugs work?
Sailing: Leadership lessons from the sea
Amherst Creates
Music: Tim Kepner ’00 and his rock band; kids’ music from Ben Gundersheimer ’89
Fiction: Professor Judith Frank’s All I Love and Know
Biography: The couple behind the Folger Shakespeare Library
Sculpture: Wrenford Thaffe ’13 had an exhibit at the Boston Children’s Museum
Creating connections
A special section from Amherst’s advancement office
Remember When
The 1952 tennis team outlasted Yale and Williams to retire a coveted trophy
Now and Then
Crew
At reunion in May, about 30 alumni met at the boathouse at Coolidge Bridge to relive their
college rowing days. The annual reunion row has taken place at least as far back as 1998.
“It’s an incredibly connected family,” says Coach Bill Stekl. Above, members of the women’s crew
in 1981. Then a varsity sport, rowing is now a club sport at Amherst.
Its teams have won some 50 medals at New England championships in the past 15 years.
Old photo from Amherst College archives; new photo by Rob Mattson