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by Carolyn Marcus Jacobs, CW ‘68

Over the winter of 1967-1968, the women’s basketball team completed an undefeated season.

Before we get all excited about that, let me describe the climate of women’s sports at Penn.

Remember, it was the late ‘60s and Title IX which mandated that equal money be spent on sports for men and women was still several years away.

We often had to drag a bag of practice balls from campus to 30^th Street Station to take the train to Swarthmore or Bryn Mawr. This was, of course, the cheapest way to get us to the Main Line and back.  We had no training staff and when one of us was injured (and I had notoriously weak ankles), our coach, Faye Bardman, went to the men’s trainer to ask how she should be taping ankles.  Women, as you know, could not be expected to run the full length of the court, so we played a game with six team members … two permanent forwards, two permanent guards and two rovers, the only ones permitted to cross the center line. Defense was almost always a zone … a box, a diamond or a triangle with a one-on-one if we needed to stop the other team’s star player. Oh, and we had to wear little dresses with bloomers underneath. (Let me not disparage the basketball uniforms. They at least existed, unlike the softball team whose members wore whatever we had with a Penn logo. Check out the team picture in our yearbook and note that one of our players was even wearing a Yale sweatshirt)

We played an 8-game schedule and, if we played a team from a school with a top-flight phys ed program like Temple or West Chester, we likely played their third string team since the varsity or JV would have run roughshod over us.

Nevertheless, we persisted.

In our freshman year, we also had an unblemished record, one unblemished by a win. Our indomitable coach, Faye Bardman, stuck by us, worked us hard, taught us to dribble without looking at the ball, to play relentless defense, to shoot and shoot and shoot. She never gave up on us. In successive years, thanks to an influx of both height and talent, we won two games, then four games and finally, all eight.

Our ’67 – ’68 team was led by co-captains Barbara Linnehan, and Ellen Morrow, both dead-eye shooters and hard-nosed defenders who played the rover positions. Our offense was ably supported by underclassmen Barbara Stocking and Joan Sanders. For me, Kate Merritt and Jan Miller who “stuck it out” for four years, that season was the reward for all of the hours and hours of practice in Weightman Hall, all the late nights getting home from away games and missed meals in the dorm cafeterias.

The personal highlight for me was the final game of the season against Immaculata which, if you recall, went on to win the first national championship in 1972. Math tells me that not a single one of the national championship players in 1972 would have been playing in 1968. Whew! I recall being the high scorer in that game and sinking some crucial foul shots which (in my maybe-distorted memory) were instrumental in our final victory. It was the game that gave us an 8-0 record and was the capstone to four years of devotion to this team.

Next time you are in the Palestra, look (hard) for the display cabinet dedicated to women’s sports at Penn and you will see a picture of a women’s basketball team from that era in our navy blue jumpers. Erroneously (and sadly), that picture is of the ’66-’67 team, but nonetheless it honors a very special time for those of us who proudly wore the Red and Blue.

By Don Morrison, C’68

 

When I was 18, my daddy put me on a Greyhound bus with a small cardboard suitcase and $200 and sent me off to a strange city a thousand miles away. I was finally on my own, turnpike-bound for glory.

That elation evaporated a day and a half later when, amid tropical heat and humidity, I arrived to learn that the trunk full of clothes and bedsheets that I’d shipped in advance to the Philadelphia bus depot had gone missing.

So I headed from Center City to my new home, a much longer walk than was apparent from the map, especially with a suitcase full of books. The clothes I had slept in were soaked through by the time I got there and found my dorm. Minutes later, my charming, confident, New England prep-school-formed roommate rolled in with his equally presentable parents, who suggested we all go to Bookbinders for dinner. Did I by any chance have clean clothes and, um, a jacket and tie? No problem, I said. I’ll meet you there in a jiffy.

Why such bravado? Because, while I may have been lacking in clothing, I did have friends in this unfamiliar place, and at least one of them was about my size. True, I had come from a two-bit town with a small, undistinguished high school whose graduates rarely left the county, let alone the state. And yet that wide spot in the road had sent Greyhound-loads of kids to Penn in recent years. There was a half-dozen in my entering class alone. As I stepped out of the shower, my borrowed suit arrived courtesy of a guy I’d grown up with. I strode off to meet my roommate, his parents and my first-ever lobster.

What were so many of my fellow hometown hayseeds doing at a university that even back then was dauntingly difficult to enter? It had less to do with our uncommon brilliance, I think than with the rather tenacious hold this particular school has on the imaginations of those it shapes.

The detailed explanation begins about three decades earlier when a shy young man named Dudley Giberson became probably the first son of our hamlet to attend the University of Pennsylvania. He lasted one semester.

Oh, he did fine, academically and socially. But his father died unexpectedly, and he hastened home to save the family’s commercial insurance business from the Depression. Dudley saved it brilliantly, never resuming his college career but forever crediting it with giving him the stuff to do the job. During my high school years, his affection for the place burst forth: He became a one-man recruiting department.

Early in my senior year, Dudley held a dinner at the only real hotel in town, invited about 20 of my brighter classmates and even persuaded somebody from the Office of Admissions in distant Philadelphia to come give a presentation. I was hooked. So were five other diners, which wasn’t a bad yield at all.

We fortunate few became a loose mutual aid society, sharing friends, funds, and rides back to the prairie. The guy with the suit was my entrée to a genial fraternity. The brothers there nudged me toward the Daily Pennsylvanian, where I gained the skills that would determine my career and where I met the friend who set up a fateful encounter with my future wife (long story) and served as an usher at our wedding along with a guy from both the fraternity and the DP who later worked with me at Time magazine and met his wife at the aforementioned wedding, to which she had come as the girlfriend of a guy I’d met through the second individual mentioned in this paragraph. Got that?

Even in those days I wasn’t a particularly gregarious character, but my varied campus networks kept expanding and merging with others – publications, honor societies, religious and intellectual groups, political protest cabals, classroom seatmates, people who hung out at certain bars. That process continues to this day. I recently had dinner with a new neighbor who happens to be a classmate I hadn’t seen in decades who introduced me to a neighbor of hers who, it turns out, lived next door to me for years in Hong Kong, though we didn’t know it at the time.

Lest my stay in West Philadelphia sounds like one perpetual networking party, I must note that our years there embraced one of the most tumultuous periods in recent American history. An unpopular president was presiding over an unpopular war — also an alarming military draft — and the fight for racial and economic justice was raging. Oh, and the university itself wasn’t making many friends in my generation with its research ties to the military (these were wound down after much agitation) and its plans for an undistinguished arts building in one of the few green plots left in the center of campus (it got built despite bitter opposition). We spent many of our undergraduate hours in protests, counter-protests and trying to make it to class around them.

Despite all that turmoil, however, I struggle to recall any deeply unpleasant conversations or permanently ruptured friendships. Perhaps because our campus was then relatively confined, we ran into each other constantly. And we had developed webs of overlapping connections too thick to be severed by mere ideological disagreement. Families are like that.

I eventually left this particular family. I had moved on. Indeed, I had moved to the ends of the earth. I had retired from Time and was teaching at a university in China, living in a polluted corner of Beijing so distant from the city center that I went there infrequently – and few people came to see me. Then one day I received an e-mail from a gentleman in the Development (now Gift Planning) Office, 7,000 miles away. Against all odds, he had tracked me down in my hideaway to say he was going to be in Beijing and wanted to get together. I was so astonished that I invited him to lunch at our proletarian faculty club, and we passed a jolly afternoon.

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past. Or, to steal another literary reference: The past isn’t dead; it isn’t even past. I learned both those lines, and embarrassingly little else, during my college years, and I have come to treasure them.

Which brings us to the case of the errant trunk. (Remember that?) I revisited the bus station several times that hectic first semester, but the cursed thing never turned up. I made do for a while through energetic borrowing and eventually acquired new items. As for the trunk, I found another, more durable one. I filled it with friends and memories, which, I’ve come to realize, never really go missing.

A PennPAC leadership role supports a career transition

Eugenia’s appreciation for the importance of service began at a young age. Her father runs the US chapter of a Colombian based nonprofit, Children of the Andes. She began collecting school supplies and running clothing drives for the nonprofit when she was still in high school. A 2012 Penn Huntsman Program graduate (earning a BS in Econ and BA in International Studies), Eugenia is now in a career transition bolstered by her PennPAC volunteer leadership role.

For the past five years, Eugenia has worked as a research analyst for an asset management firm in the consumer food and beverage sector. The sector is appealing to her, but she would like to shift to a marketing role with an emphasis on branding and consumer insight. To help reach this goal, Eugenia will study marketing research and consumer behavior in a one-year program in Madrid this coming fall.

Volunteering with PennPAC Philadelphia has been another important piece of her transition puzzle. Seeking new experiences, Eugenia found the PennPAC volunteer opportunity attractive and thought, “I have no consulting experience, but it can’t hurt to apply.”

On her project for Concilio, a nonprofit serving children and families in the Latino community, she seized the opportunity to become a team leader. “The team needed someone to step up and I volunteered” and she is very happy that she did. “I was nervous and it was not always easy. It put me out of my comfort zone, but I learned a lot about myself. I learned that I have the skills to be a team leader and how much I like leading a team.”

Eugenia truly enjoyed her project teammates. “It is really cool to work with people from so many graduating classes, see our shared values and bond over our shared past experiences from Penn.” She was also impressed by their effectiveness. “Two months seemed short, but we managed to get so much done because everyone does their part. Everyone has been so happy to work with each other. We are a lot more productive than I would have expected given everyone’s busy lives.”

She also felt the strong impact of the team’s work on Concilio. Their client “didn’t realize how many opportunities they had out there, so much low hanging fruit” and as a result, they are “so excited, grateful, receptive and appreciative.”

If she returns to a city with PennPAC, Eugenia plans to volunteer with us again. We wish you the best of luck in Madrid, Eugenia!

Learn more about the PennPAC consulting experience and apply by 8/18 to join us.

By Lee Gordon, C’68
As a college student, how fortunate it is to have a special person mold your personal universe. Someone so dynamic and brilliant that you feel at once transformed into a thinking adult, while you could sense that you were in the presence of genius. That was me, Lee Gordon, fifty years ago, at the University of Pennsylvania.

The Daily Pennsylvanian “Course Guide” cited Russian History 149 as one of the finest introductory courses in the University. Yet it was the guide’s reference to the course professor that truly resonated: “The Great One, as many students refer to him, received unanimous ratings of excellent from his students. His lectures are regarded as consistently interesting, often humorous, and always very well organized. He was also praised for his interest in the individual student, a trait not often found in one who lectures to 500 pupils.”

And so Alexander V. Riasanovsky — “The Great One” — entered my life.

Watching Professor Riasanovsky on the grand stage in College Hall was mesmerizing. His cadence was fast-paced, his baritone voice carried in a thunderous roar when he emphasized a certain point, and his command of Russian history was awe-inspiring. Alex Riasanovsky was Penn personified. His Russian history course was popular with students from all programs: Wharton, pre-med, engineering, and liberal arts. Everyone wanted to hear him lecture. He was the consummate Penn ambassador, speaking to all the Penn Clubs throughout the United States, with alumni eager to hear his talk.

I got to know Alex more intimately when he allowed me the privilege of taking his graduate course in Russian history, and to this very day, I fondly remember our conversations about the Russian intelligentsia. In his graduate seminar, Professor Riasanovsky challenged you to think analytically. He had edited a masterful book “Generalizations in Historical Writing” and believed that since history was approached from numerous philosophical, religious, social, political and economic positions, the historian must be able to frame meaningful generalizations.

Born in Harbin, Manchuria China in 1928, Alex’s childhood innocence ended abruptly at age 10 when he witnessed a Japanese soldier behead a prisoner. His family fled and found safe haven across the Pacific Ocean in Eugene, Oregon.

The Riasanovsky family was living history. Alex’s father Valentin was the preeminent scholar of Mongol law and his mother Antonina won the Atlantic Monthly prize for fiction in 1940 for her novel “The Family”. Both Riasanovsky sons were Rhodes Scholars and both became famous Russian history professors, with Alex at Penn and his brother Nicholas at the University of California at Berkeley.

But Alex was more than just a wonderful history professor. He was also a true Renaissance man: a historian, a freethinker, a fine artist and a prolific poet.

I wish I had learned the Russian language because my bookshelf is filled with his poetry written in Russian. A Wallace Stevens devotee, Alex wrote poem after poem, and, gratefully, some were translated into English.
Philosophically, Professor Riasanovsky was a man of peace, and he loved to poke wicked fun at the imperious political megalomaniacs. In a 1995 poem he lamented eloquently:

This long
This gray
And twisted way
Marked by festoons
Of broken flowers
Leads to a land
Where blood-soaked sand
Is raised
In monuments and towers

Here judgement’s rendered
In a glance

Of lying levity, by clowns

Here means and ends
Are seen

As one
And executioners
Wear plastic crowns.

I will long cherish Alex’s books, especially the one with the inscription: “To my favorite student family”. But even more important, I will always cherish the memories with Alex and the love and friendship we shared together these many decades along with my wife Sandy and our three sons Alex, Eric and Michael.

When my eldest son was born, we proudly named him Alex. I still have the wonderful note Professor Riasanovsky sent: “I’m very happy to hear about your son. What a lovely name you have given him!” Yes, Alex, a lovely name indeed!

 

A note: Class of 1968 will be hosting a Professors Forum:  A reunion with some of 1968’s favorite faculty members led by coordinated by Lee Gordon and will be held on Saturday, May 12, 2018, from 9:00 to 10:30 AM, with breakfast from 8:00 to 9:00 AM.

Tuesday night, during a beautiful evening in Philadelphia, the Penn Club of Philadelphia and the Penn Alumni Engineering Society hosted a very special event for Penn Alumni, students, and friends at the newly-opened Pennovation Works. Dr. Michael Borda, Penn Director of Research Initiatives, kicked off the evening with a behind-the-scenes tour of the center, an amazing 60,000 sq ft incubator and laboratory that provides resources and space for researchers, innovators, and entrepreneurs. After the tour, guests enjoyed a panel discussion and Q&A focused on the stages of entrepreneurship, with a special focus on how Penn actively supports the growth and maturation of companies developed by Penn students and alumni. Panelists included Dr. Michael Borda, Director of Research Initiatives, Aleksandr Kushleyev, EE’07, GEE, 07, co-founder, K-Mel (now Qualcomm), Nonya Collier, WG’12, founder Pad Porter, Dr. Mark Yim, Professor and Director of Integrated Product Design, Michael Aronson, W’78, co-founder Red & Blue Ventures. The panel was moderated by Farnia Fresnel, Eng’98, Board Member, Penn Alumni Club of Philadelphia, and Bernard Jones, Eng’01, Director, Engineering Alumni Society.

On Wednesday, March 1st, the Beaumont Retirement Community of Bryn Mawr held its first University of Pennsylvania reunion. Over 40 residents attended, and enthusiastically celebrated their days at Penn. Those days were fondly remembered as a defining period in their lives. There were many favorable comments regarding Penn’s growth in physical stature from the time when we were students on that campus, until now. The College for Women, The College of Arts and Sciences, and The Law School were most heavily represented, but there were those from other departments as well. Our oldest graduate was from the class of ’41, and the youngest was from the class of ’68. Alumni Relations supplied us with assorted Penn Memorabilia, which added much to the celebratory atmosphere.