Letters to the Editor
Thrift Store Treasure
I found this [image] in a Goodwill store in New Jersey near my home.
It looks like the distant mesa from either “The Hill” or the hill where NCAR was built. Maybe you can tell.
I hope it is interesting enough to be included in the Coloradan. I sure do miss CU.
Richard Thomas Burke (Engl’69)
Red Bank, New Jersey
Boulder’s Fireflies
I’ve seen fireflies in Boulder County, too, in the marsh on the south end of McIntosh Lake in Longmont.
Jeff Mathews
Lyons, Colorado
Mary Rippon in 1882.
The Secret Life of Mary Rippon
This was a really interesting article. I really love Professor Rippon’s story. Stories like these need to be brought up and told, or they will be forgotten. Keep up the great work.
Bryce Perea
Westminster, Colorado
Clarifying CU Dining
Being that my daughter will be a sophomore at CSU next month, I left the issue open for her to see the “Kale, Yeah!” article. She said she does not believe CU Boulder offers the food options shown in the issue to the general student body participating in the on-campus meal program, and that the dining options offered at CSU are known to be better than CU. I am skeptical, too. Could you please send me information on how my daughter and I can visit CU food services prior to her semester at CSU, so we can see for ourselves what is presented in the Coloradan?
Martin Orner (EnvDes’83)
Longmont, Colorado
[Editor’s Note: All of the food options featured in the story’s photo were taken directly from the student buffet lines during a Wednesday lunch service at the Village Dining Center.]
CU Performing Arts Concern
The latest issue contains not a single piece on the performing arts scene at the university, home of the world-renowned Shakespeare Festival. What excuse can there be for this omission, which happens on a regular basis?
Hugh Heckman (PolSci’69)
Forest Hills, New York
[Editor’s Note: CU Boulder comprises 11 colleges and schools and over 150 courses of study. We try to balance coverage from across the university, including research, student life and alumni success via our three issues per year.]
Lamp Post Memories
When I attended CU in the early 1960s, pre-Dark Horse days, the go-to place for the over-21 crowd was the Lamp Post. It was way more mellow and mature than the frenetic Sink and Tulagi. I still have a few swizzle sticks from the place. Just before my graduation in 1963, the Lamp Post advertised the “Last Blast,” a night when seniors and their dates could get free drinks. Naturally, my girlfriend and I went. The crowd was so huge that I can’t remember if we ever got up to the bar. I was living that last semester at the large Skyland Apartments, and all students had to vacate during graduation week so the apartments could be rented to families of graduates. I spent my last few nights in Boulder crashing on a friend’s couch.
Gerald Miller (Bus’63)
Pueblo, Colorado
The Gift of a Lifetime
Alan Cohen [Q&A, Spring 2025] and I were fraternity brothers at UC Berkeley. We remained friends until the Iraq war, when we parted ways due to political differences. Alan’s wife, Susie, introduced me to my now-wife of 56 years. That was in Guatemala in 1968. I am forever grateful to them for that astounding gift.
Richard Golden
Colorado Wolves
Early on a blue-steel cold January weekday in 1976, I was ice-fishing on Left Hand Reservoir up the foothills west of Ward. There was not another human soul for miles.
A movement caught my eye. Standing stock still, I watched a gray wolf emerge from the tree line, a snowshoe rabbit in his jaws. He dropped his prey to get a better bite and glanced around. I whistled; he hightailed it.
How do you introduce a wolf into Colorado? “Hello, wolf.”
Drew Clearie (Psych’72)
Sarasota, Florida
Facebook Love
I always look forward to receiving my husband’s alumni journal in the mail. It’s so well done — from editorial to design layout, a model college publication.
Margaret Thresher
Via Facebook
[Correction: In our “Boulder Buffs” cover story for the summer issue, we did not list Jun Ye’s CU Boulder doctorate. He graduated in 1997 with a PhD in physics. We regret the error.]
Flatirons photo provided by Richard Thomas Burke, Mary Rippon photo courtesy Carnegie Library for Local History/Museum of Boulder Collection, wolf photo courtesy CU Boulder