Feedback Fall 2020

Shakespeare at CU

Your summer issue arrived at a most welcome time for those of us older Buffs who have been mostly staying at home. I loved the nostalgic photos and was especially moved by Sarah Kuta’s article on the Shakespeare festival.

Shortly after my family moved to Boulder in 1957, we started attending those outdoor productions, and the accompanying 16mm film presentations in the Forum auditorium. Although my brothers and I didn’t at first appreciate all the dialogue, we liked the sword fights.

I would also like to say hi to Sam Sandoe (BioChem, Thtr’80). Your father Jim was a remarkable man, who besides his work on the festival was responsible for making the acquisitions at Norlin Library. His class in comedy, which I took my senior year, is one of the two or three educational experiences I had at CU that I think back on the most often.

Lawrence Chadbourne (Class’70)
Chapel Hill, North Carolina

Please pass along to Sam Sandoe (BioChem, Thtr’80) how much I treasured, and still treasure, my freshman year, five-day-a-week classes with his amazing father. Dressed in jeans and a jeans work shirt, he introduced us to a world outside the Hellems classroom. The buttoned-down world of high school was nothing like this. I can still remember some of the questions on his final exam, and the license his assignments gave us to see connections. He inspired us to travel through books — we read a lot of history — and planes. We saw many of the paintings we studied during our 11-week, “Europe-on-$5” adventure — the first of about 20 times to cross the Pond. 

After my 32 years teaching English, my wife and I co-produced a PBS show on the Marshall Plan, and that took us to work for the State Department on the renovation of the Talleyrand in Paris. I’ve had many bracing experiences; James Sandoe’s classes were first. 

Eric Christenson (Edu, Engl’60)
Southern Pines, North Carolina

Phi Kappa Tau, 1950s

In the summer issue of the Coloradan, I noticed a letter, “Spring of 1946,” written by Ruth Duffy Hirsch (A&S’49). I am a Phi Kappa Tau member, having gone active in March 1953. I lived in the fraternity house for over three years. The house mother in the article was my house mother as well, and this letter serves to make a slight correction. The house mother’s name is Mrs. Rose “Owens,” not Mrs. Rose, and she preferred to be called “Mother Owens.”

She was a wonderful woman with whom I was very close, and who, during her term as house mother, ran a very tight ship and was highly respected. She grew up in Leadville in the late 1800s during some violent times, saw many bloody occurrences and had no appreciation for firearms. 

Thanks to Ms. Hirsch for the article.

James Berger (Mgmt’56)
Colorado Springs

Picture Perfect 

I just wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed the cover art on the Summer 2020 issue. Two seconds after retrieving the issue from my mailbox, I was immediately transported back to my dorm room in Cockerell Hall. Cockerell Hall is located directly across the quad from Aden Hall, so the art depicted is exactly the view I feasted on for nearly two years from my dorm room.  

Even today, 41 years after my graduation, this is the view in my mind’s eye when I think of the years I spent in Boulder. Great memories! 

Chris Glasow (IntlAf’79)
Broadlands, Virginia

Oh how I appreciated the “Thinking of You” postcards in the Summer Coloradan. The postcard picturing the bridge over Varsity Lake is special to me. What decades of student experience the bridge could tell us.

The bridge was the route to Norlin Library study hours, dances in the Glenn Miller Ballroom, Saturday football at Folsom Field. It was the place of Greek pledge sneaks. The meetings of Hysperia, the Junior Women’s Honor Society. The clandestine passing of class notes and exam questions. The snow and slush walks to January final exams. And many a late-night romantic kiss.

Students crossed the bridge to the world of ideas, challenges of thinking and learning, the opening of young minds. From the chrysalis of learning, students crossed the bridge into adult life. Decades of grads took with them fond memories of the bridge and gratitude for a CU education.

Judith Hannemann (A&S’57)
Cape Elizabeth, Maine

My husband and I are both alumni and we always enjoy reading the Coloradan. We especially enjoyed this issue’s “Thinking of You,” when we noticed the picture of the Old Main postcard. Just a couple of years ago, we discovered this same postcard in some belongings of Ruth Platt, my husband’s paternal grandmother who resided in Wyoming and Boulder in the early 1900s. Ruth’s son Lester (A&S’53); her grandson, my husband Lester (EnvDes’83); and great-grandson Trevor (AeroEng’20) are all graduates of CU. 

This year when our daughter Cori (Mktg’23) began her college career, we gave her this postcard as a reminder of her family’s connection to Boulder and CU and she displayed it on her desk in her dorm room. 

Kim Willson (CivEngr’96)
Lakewood, Colorado 

University Pride 

Thank you for continuing to send the Coloradan. I read every one and have saved them as well. The photos and the articles are outstanding and make me proud to be an alum. I graduated in 1965, so I remember Paul Danish (Hist’65) well and always look for his column. Please keep the same format.

Sally Adams O’Connor (Edu’65)
East Hartland, Connecticut 

The Connection 

I was the game room manager and assistant director [of The Connection] from 1974 to 1980. I succeeded long-time manager Larry Burkett. I was hired by Jim Schafer, the student union director, immediately upon my graduation in 1974.

Before I became assistant director, we modernized it along with having a naming contest. Therein is how The Connection got its name. “The Connection,” said it all — a place to connect with friends and family.

We had a lot of fun remodeling and modernizing the area. We brought in graphics, colors and lights, which brightened up the area with life. We were able to get permission to add 3.2 beer. Needless to say — that was a big hit — it drew in beer drinkers and added to the atmosphere of fun. 

We also brought in nationally known pool trick shot artists as another way to promote the game room. It was a fun job, and a vital part of the student experience. We hosted the ACLU games on numerous occasions.

It appears from the Coloradan that The Connection has been taken to yet another level, all for the enjoyment of students and patrons. 

Mike Nunnery (PolSci’74)
Baton Rouge, Louisiana

I was a member of the UMC Board during my time at CU. After dinner at the Alferd Packer Grill and our meetings on Tuesday evenings, the whole board would go bowing at The Connection. Both staff and student members participated. The prize for each member of the winning team was a 50-cent can of pop bought by the losing team members from a machine located on a landing of the main stairway. I live in Boulder and still bowl at The Connection sometimes!

Kate Carroll Schmid (Anth, Ger’92)
Boulder