Letters to the Editor

Winter 2019

Pb Story Remains Unfinished

Thanks for the great article and the fun graphic story on Clair Patterson ’43 in the Summer 2019 issue [Page 20]. Clair presented a seminar in 1970, while all four of his children were Grinnell students (think about that tuition bill!). He presented his Pb story, which was hot news during those nascent environmental times. I remember his chart showing the historic Pb in the environment. A long, slow increase hugging the X-axis since the Bronze Age, an inflection of maybe 10x increase in slope with the industrial revolution and another inflection in 1929 with the addition of tetraethyl lead to gasoline. The slope went through the roof. (The current historic plots are more nuanced, noting for instance the pollution from the Roman era. If anyone has a copy of Patterson’s 1970 plot, please share!) Professor Patterson’s speech was a significant event in my increasing awareness of and commitment to environmentalism and a career dominated by environmental chemistry.

The Pb story remains unfinished as we continue to clean up sites, remediate Pb paint, struggle with poisoned water systems, and work toward getting it back to background levels. Of the many good-news stories resulting from Clair’s science and lobbying: “[a]n estimated gain of 5-6 points in mean population IQ score was associated with the decline in mean blood level concentrations …” (World Health Organization, “Childhood Lead Poisoning” 2010, Page 36). Wow! And I mean WOW!

Fast-forward to the 2010s, I use Patterson’s story of the trifecta of aging the earth, developing clean rooms, and removing Pb from the environment in various speeches, including class lectures to Grinnell students. Any one of those accomplishments would be notable, but all three? Again, wow! Not only was he an outstanding analytical chemist (I know formally he was a “geochemist,” but I welcome him to our “analytical chemist” fraternity), but a passionate environmentalist and a tenacious advocate for the “get-the-Pb-out” cause. His story needs to be told more widely; the Regenold and Cannon article was a great contribution!

Grinnell needs a Patterson Environmental Science Building!

- Mitch Erickson ’72

Fall 2019

Different and Fun

2019 Summer Grinnell Magazine coverI love Grinnell but I am absolutely awful about spending time reading The Grinnell Magazine. Although I may or may not actually read the magazine, I still want to receive it just to flip through it for familiar faces. I was doing my casual flip through the magazine when I came across the brilliant, hand-drawn graphics and speech bubbles that just screamed, “Look at me, I’m different and fun!” [“Get the Lead Out,” Page 20].

Michele Regenold ’89 and Kevin Cannon ’02 worked together to create a 10-page comic that was aesthetically appealing, informative, and interesting. They graduated 13 years apart from one another. Thirteen years. I know technology has really enabled us to transfer information and connect more easily but seeing a product like this is really exciting.

Hopefully the editors of the magazine continue in publishing collaboration projects and using alternative forms of storytelling!

- Jenny Dong ’17
Great Scientist

The Michele Regenold ’89 [and] Kevin Cannon ’02 illustrated story: “Get the Lead Out” [Page 20] in the summer issue of The Grinnell Magazine is brilliant. It tells a lively and vivid story of a great scientist who improved the lives of everyone on our planet — and he was a Grinnellian.

- George Drake ’56, president emeritus
Thanksgiving 1944

Black and white photo of women dining in Quad dining hall,1944I immediately recognized the inset photo on Page 16 of “Then and Now” in the Winter 2018 issue, historic and contemporary images of the Quad dining hall. My mother, Phyllis Miller Lawrence ’48, has it displayed on her dresser. She’s the one looking right at the photographer, as if the picture is of her alone and everyone else is just background.

She distinctly remembers the occasion. It was Thanksgiving of 1944 [not 1950], and the government had declared that college students were not to travel home for the holiday to keep the trains free for the war effort. She remembers the meal was better than usual and that students were to dress up. She also recalls exactly what she was wearing — a black velveteen jumper that my grandmother had sewn for her and a white crepe blouse.

I was thrilled to see this familiar image in the magazine, as was my mother, but we wanted to correct the date for the archive. I have my own happy memories of the Quad and am glad that it still serves as a venue for special events and more memories. 

- Maggie Lawrence Banning ’82
Honoring Veterans

Cutting from list of veterans of the U.S. Civil War with name and rank as well as date and location of death Regarding the item in the summer edition of The Grinnell Magazine about a memorial honoring our deceased veterans of all wars since the Civil War [Page 5], this is clearly an entirely worthy and important project.

Reading about it, however, raised a question in my mind. Is there ever a thought or recognition of those Grinnell men and women who fought those wars, who were in most cases forced by the draft to leave college, enter service and spend precious and dangerous years in far-off places?

I entered Grinnell in the fall of 1941 as a freshman at the age of 17. Two weeks after I turned 18, Pearl Harbor was attacked. By the end of the following school year, the College was almost emptied of male students and drained also of a significant number of female students.

Most of us in service spent the next three years or so in faraway places, out of touch with families and loved ones, except for censored mail stripped of any mention of our location or activities. At least for those serving in the Pacific theatre, there was virtually no leave, no R and R, and little expectation of going home until the war came to an end, estimated to be years away.

Grinnellians were certainly represented in those remote places. I accidentally ran into three people from Grinnell in those years overseas, one in New Guinea and two in the Philippine Islands. I did not know them well, but running into someone from college was almost like running into one's own brother. Acquainted or not, we had a perfectly wonderful hour or two.

At age 21 or 22, I commanded a 160-ton ship manned by a crew of 14 (ages 19 to 33) and one other officer. What an experience for an Iowa boy who had only seen salt water just once in his life. It was dangerous. We lost one of our crew at Leyte Gulf, a nice young man from Norwalk, Connecticut — the worst day of my life, so far.

However, on the plus side, the experience enabled me to go to law school on the GI Bill, something that would have never been feasible otherwise, mostly for financial reasons. A rewarding career followed — 38 years of law practice and 12 as a judge. A good enough trade-off, as it turned out.

- George McIntosh ’45
Science Behind the Activism

I so enjoyed your summer issue of The Grinnell Magazine. When I graduated, I moved to [New York City] and my next-door neighbor was an activist on gasoline lead and ended up with her picture in Newsweek. I had no idea of the years of work that went into the science behind her demonstration. Thank you for the article on Clair "Pat" Patterson [“Get the Lead Out,” Page 20] — and I really enjoyed the comic format. Great artwork, too! Please do keep it up.
 

- Peggy Barlett ’69

Spring 2019

Curious mentions by John Grisham

A couple of years ago I posted a blog [grinnellstories.blogspot.com] devoted to appearances of Grinnell and Grinnell College in modern fiction: Stuart Kaminsky, Robert Heinlein, and Ray Bradbury all make mention of Grinnell. Kaminsky and Heinlein both had personal connections to the College, but what Bradbury’s was I don’t know. 

Later I encountered Grinnell references in several of John Grisham’s books: Runaway Jury (1994), Testament (1999), and Last Juror (2004) all mention Grinnell College. What I haven’t learned is what Grisham’s connection is to Grinnell. Were it just one mention or were Grinnell paired with similar institutions, I might conclude that it was happenstance. But the frequent mentions and the characterizations indicate that he knows something — or someone — at Grinnell. 

The online Scarlet & Black knows no reference to him except in a series of bestseller lists; the online alumni directory knows no Grisham. So I send this letter to the magazine, wondering whether any Grinnell grads out there know John Grisham or know how he came to know about Grinnell? Contact me at kaiser[at]grinnell[dot]edu.

- Daniel Kaiser
Recognize creative work

Horse jumping on farmThank you for including my notice about my first photography exhibit. I’m a 67-year-old woman, just concluding a career as a religious studies/English professor. So as I turn from my 40 years of teaching and scholarship, I’m excited to be learning a new skill and a new medium for expression — photography. I’m the owner of Free Spirit Photography LLC, and my first exhibit, Defy the Machine, paired images of horses with political images by a colleague. 

My turn toward photography was previewed by the Grinnell Activism exhibit (2012) that I curated with David Hechler ’72. He did video and text; I did the images. We supplied the archives with a treasure of original materials from the 1969–1973 era.  

I like having the “Artists and Scholars” section distinguished from “Classnotes.” It gives rightful prominence to Grinnell’s ongoing body of creativity. But, I’m very disappointed that you didn’t print one of my photos with my note. Would you reconsider? 

- A.J. Morey ’73
Mourning Ed Moore

Once again I write to mourn the recent loss of another member of Grinnell’s English department in the 1970s. I was saddened to learn of the death of Ed Moore [“In Memoriam,” Page 50, Winter 2018). His grace, humor, and fearsome intellect created memorable introductions to the humanities and Shakespeare in his classroom. His upper-level seminar in Shakespearean studies ranks among the top three seminars of my undergraduate and graduate career. He had high expectations of his students, tempered by his sense of humor. My classmates remind me that when he called the roll, he would recite my full name, Anne Brickey Barriault, as if he were amused by its sound. His students were certainly inspired by the sounds of Shakespeare under his careful guidance. Rest in peace, Ed Moore, and thank you.

- Anne Barriault ’74
What do you want to be when you grow up?

“What did you want to be when you were nine years old?” That’s how I started many career-counseling sessions back in the ’70s. Invariably, the initial response was gloomy. “Well, I wanted to be a transatlantic Concorde plane pilot, but heights make my nose bleed.” We would then set about to translate the nosebleed scenario into other air/space related possibilities and their requisite aptitudes and skills. Had lots of success but no research to bring me counseling notoriety.

So, “Blind Turns and Cryptic Crossroads” [Page 18, Winter 2018] warmed my heart, as if I needed credibility beyond Grinnell alumni status. What does being a French major have to do with career development? Contemplating career goals can seem to be a pretty, foreign exercise — no?

- Stephen Fischer ’53