Tag: 1992

Adam writes: Hi, all: It’s time for the next round of updates from the class of 1992!
First up is my frosh year roommate, James Wilton, who lives in Charlotte, N.C. He was recently named head football coach for sixth grade at Sun Valley Middle School. He is working for Collabera as an account manager, interfacing with Bank of America. James’s wife, Tracy, is enjoying being at home with their three children—Jack (soon a high schooler), Carley, and Lola.

Also on the former roommate front (the now gone A-1 LoRise 10-person unit), Darcy Dennett got married and just returned from a mini-honeymoon, which involved a few days of challenging hiking in Canyonlands, Utah.

In another blast from the A-1 past, Sarah Guernsey reports that she had a “college day” at her middle school. Teachers made signs completing the sentence, “when you go to college…” and shared pictures of themselves from college (she reports that it was really hard to find ones that could be shared with middle schoolers!). The whole experience got her excited for the fall when she will take her son Jake to Wes for “Sons and Daughters of Alumni” weekend for high school juniors.

Juan Luque and his wife, Marie, welcomed Eva Maria Luque, who was born on April 2, weighing 7 lbs., 11 oz. Juan is also leaving his tenured position at Georgia Southern University and starting a new position as an associate professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences and Hollings Cancer Center at the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, beginning in August 2015.

Also welcoming a new addition, Stephanie Ivy Sanford and her husband, Junius Sanford, were expecting a baby in July.

Michele Eisenberg was host to a mini Wesleyan reunion at her daughter Elana’s bat mitzvah in April. Lara Small Laurence ’90, Jennifer Hammer ’91, Sarah Leavitt, and Jenny Simon Tabak ’93 were all there to sing “Havdalah” and dance the hora.

In February 2015, Shelly Gray was crowned Ms. Wheelchair Texas 2015. During her tenure she will make dozens of appearances and speeches, and compete for Ms. Wheelchair America in Des Moines in July. She is still practicing employment law with a State agency, and living with her 8-year-old son in Austin, Texas.

Vida Towne lives in Seattle with her husband, Andrew Chiodi, and their 9-year-old son, Dominic. Her days of Ultimate ended when her son was born in 2005, but she played high level Club Ultimate for many years, winning the World Championship with teammate Cory Pike ’89 in 1997 and 2002, and the National Championship in 2004. From time to time she runs into former Rugby teammate Corinne Drumheller, who has two young children and also lives in Seattle.

Shura Pollatsek is associate professor of costume design and technology at Western Kentucky University. She just had a sabbatical, during which time she began writing her first book, with the working title of Behind the Costume: The Art and Artists of Costume Design. The book is a collaboration with her husband, award-winning photographer (and DGA director and cinematographer) Mitch Wilson. She also did additional research and interviews in Paris (putting that French BA from Wesleyan to good use!). Shura also still does professional costume design, most recently for Christopher K. Morgan & Artists in the D.C. area.

Tamara O’Neil met up with Laurel Korholz and Greg Vinton in Princeton, N.J. for a terrific afternoon. Tamara is finishing her next-to-last tour in the Navy JAG Corps this September as senior counsel at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Md., and then she’ll be moving to the field of disability policy and law through the Secretary of the Navy’s Council of Review Boards at the Washington Navy Yard. Her husband, Cameron, is retiring from the Army in the next year, so they are both getting excited to join the civilian workforce.

Andrew Draper’s job in database implementation has a new home after his company was bought out. He still lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Chris Foster works at Harmonix, and is having fun working on Rock Band 4 with Greg LoPiccolo ’83 and Nicole Lewis ’96. In his spare time, he is also working on a videogame at home with his 6-year-old son.

Kevin Prufer’s new book, Churches, was cited in The New York Times Book Review as one of their “Ten Favorite Poetry Books of 2014.”

Abigail Smith Saguy was promoted to full professor of sociology at UCLA, effective July 1, 2015.

Finally, even given our advanced age, we have some adventurous folks making big changes in their life. Alfred Culliford went back to school and earned an MBA last year from the University of Tennessee at Knoxville. Currently he is director of plastic, reconstructive, and hand surgery at Staten Island University Hospital and site-director for the North Shore/Long Island Jewish Plastic Surgery Residency Program. Turning to the Northwest, Linda Perlstein is leaving the world of education and will be working for Amazon.

That’s all the news for now. But please send Paul and me your updates. We’d love to hear from you!

Adam writes: Greetings, all! As I write this, my kids are home from school for the sixth day in the last three weeks and I’m looking at 30-foot pile of snow from my window. It was so big that it actually made the local news as it became a makeshift neighborhood ski slope. It’s been a heck of a winter here in Boston. Otherwise, though, things are well. I continue to live in a 500-person graduate student dorm at MIT with my family and remain gainfully employed as a political science professor.

Last November, I went to D.C. to give a talk at George Washington University and spent a day with my old housemates Chris Heikemian and Jon Pratt. It was great to catch up, but even better, just a couple months later Jon got engaged to Bridget Lines. Jon and Bridget met in Pakistan, both working for the State Department, and will be posted together in China as their next assignment.

It was great to hear from a bunch of my old Clark 3 hallmates as well. Ruthbea Yesner Clark lives in Brookline, Mass., and has a terrific job —as a smart city expert—writing, researching, and consulting with cities and vendors around the world about emerging technologies in urban environments. She is planning her first trip to Saudi Arabia for a project there. Sam Robinson lives in Philadelphia with his wife and daughter, 11. Sam has been practicing architecture in Philly since 1998. In 2011, he started his own firm, and in 2013 formed a partnership with Jane Ahn—Ahn + Robinson Studio. They do primarily residential renovation work in the city. Finally, Anne (Jennings) Paris and her family (husband Marc, son Duncan, 10) are taking a hiatus from their lives in Portland, Ore. Over the summer, they moved to London, where they plan to be for two years. They are renting in Kew near the Thames and living out every English major’s fantasy of getting to know England. Duncan is enrolled in a state primary school. Marc works as a software design consultant, and Anne is a part-time teacher at a small private school. She keeps up with what’s happening in the States by reading Sarah Guernsey’s and Adam Blumer’s live coverage of major cultural events and trends on Facebook.

Jill Slater proudly (though belatedly) announces the birth of Slater Ande Schwartzberg. She and Jill share a birthday of 12/12. Slater is 14 months old and loves to dance. Jill continues to develop her second career as a sustainable food systems consultant, building on her first career as a city planner.

Mark Hunter is moving to Burlington, Vt., in April with his wife of six years. He published his first book in 2014 and his executive leadership coaching company (Pinnacle Coaching) is 10 years old this year and going well. Also on the publishing front, Kristina Milnor’s second book came out last January: Graffiti and the Literary Landscape in Roman Pompeii (Oxford, 2014).

In other New England news, Dina Amsterdam is a visiting scholar at MIT, bringing the practices and principles of InnerYoga to a variety of projects at the MIT Media Lab. She’s normally based in San Francisco and Marin County.

Also in New England, Jonathan Bell wrapped up his first year of running his own architecture practice in Providence. Alongside teaching drawing and design studios at RISD and Roger Williams University, he has been occupied with a number of projects, including an addition to a 1950s Better Homes and Gardens plan house, and renovations to a 1920s service station, to be repurposed as a natural-chewing-gum company’s headquarters.

Maurice Harris started a new job as rabbi/senior educator with InterfaithFamily (interfaithfamily.com), a national Jewish nonprofit organization supporting interfaith couples and families and providing training and resources to Jewish community organizations on welcoming and inclusion of interfaith families. He still lives in Eugene, Ore., with his wife, Melissa Crabbe, and their two children, Clarice and Hunter.

Amy Larson continues to practice law at a small firm in Portland, Ore. She and her partner welcomed their first child into the world in September. Also, Amy had the chance to see Eric Leach ’92 a while back at his wedding in NYC.

Also on the West Coast, Rick Barot has been living in Tacoma, Wash., for 10 years now, directing the low-residency MFA program in creative writing at Pacific Lutheran University. His third book of poems, Chord, will be published by Sarabande Books in July 2015. He’s also the poetry editor for New England Review. Corinne Drumheller lives in Seattle with her husband, David, and their two children, Talia (7) and Zane (2).

Chris Chesak just took a job as director of partnerships with Intrepid Travel and reports that he, Karen Cacase, and Mike Flynn ’93 received a warm and vibrant welcome from Costas Darras during a recent chance meeting at a restaurant in Harlem.

In November Jennifer Schonborn attended Wesleyan’s Sons and Daughters weekend, which allows Wes alums to come to campus with their kids who are juniors in high school. She brought her daughter Charlotte (an overdetermined member of the class of ’20 since Jennifer’s husband is Rik Treiber ’91), and had a great time being on campus, seeing all the new buildings, and having a nice talk with our frosh dean Meg Zocco. While there, Jennifer ran into David Kane ’92. Though they didn’t know each other at Wes, they had a great time together with their kids.

Speaking of David, he writes, “Ty Jagerson (CEO) and I are partners in an investment crowdfunding platform for clean energy projects called Village Power. Ty and the team cover the West Coast from the home office in Palo Alto, while I run East Coast operations from NYC. We recently won a SunShot grant from the Department of Energy for promising new solar finance models.”

David Shadrack Smith continues to helm a production company in New York, part2 pictures, which just showed its first narrative feature film, I’ll See You in My Dreams, at Sundance this January. Part2 is entering its ninth year and it’s best known for the series This Is Life with Lisa Ling on CNN. This fall, his series, Belief with Oprah Winfrey, will get to air after three years in production around the world.

Heather Claudine Nash continues to practice psychology. Her short collection of poems, The Problem with Loving Ghosts (published under her middle name Claudine), was recently released by Finishing Line Press.

Byron King joined, as director of software engineering, a company providing hardware and software services to credit unions across the country.

Noelle Nelson enjoys living in Atlanta and working at the CDC on vaccine research and policy in the US and globally, with a focus on hepatitis vaccine. She recently returned from Sierra Leone and the Ebola emergency response.

Wendy Moore Hershey was part of the closing bell ceremony at the NYSE on Jan. 29 because of work she does as a field consultant to nonprofit clients at Mercer Investments The biggest fans? Wendy’s kids, ages 6, 6, and 5 who went crazy “seeing Mommy on TV.”

That’s the news for now. Don’t forget to write to me or Paul—we’d love to hear from you!

ADAM BERINSKY | berinsky@mit.edu

PAUL COVIELLO | coviellop01@alum.darden.edu

Elizabeth Liang has been touring her intercultural solo show, Alien Citizen: An Earth Odyssey, nationally and internationally. It had its world premiere in Hollywood, in May 2013. Elizabeth brought it to Wesleyan in April 2014 and has also performed it at Princeton, M.I.T., Williams, Augustana, S.D., and Carleton; theatre festivals Off Off Broadway and in San Francisco; conferences in Chicago and Tyson’s Corner, Va.; and in Panama and Iceland. For more info: aliencitizensoloshow.com

Darcy Dennett writes: “My entire life has been about work for the past year—and will likely be for coming months as well! Still living in NYC despite what appears to be a massive population explosion.” She’s producing and directing The Champions, her first independent documentary feature, which will be released in 2015. Here’s the summary: “All the odds were against the 22 pit-bulls rescued from star quarterback Michael Vick’s dogfighting ring. Forced to fight for their lives, they were considered so dangerous that PETA and The Humane Society wanted them euthanized. But what no one counted on was their courage—and their story inspired a nation.”

Caitlin Boger-Hawkins has worked for Connecticut’s community college system since the late ’90s, and lives with her husband Rick, 14-year-old daughter, Julia; 12-year-old son, Thomas; and dachshund, Minerva, in beautiful Litchfield County. She would love to connect with others in the Northwest Corner!

ADAM BERINSKY | berinsky@mit.edu 

PAUL COVIELLO | coviellop01@alum.darden.edu

Adam writes: Greetings all! Hope everyone is doing well. I just finished my first year as a housemaster at a graduate dorm at MIT, living with 550 graduate students. It’s been quite a year for us but my family is having a great time. The space is great not just for entertaining graduate students but others as well—in January, I hosted a talk by Associate Professor of Religion Mary-Jane Rubenstein for about 50 Wes alums and current students. It was great to see so many folks there and I hope we can do it again in the future.

Andrea Lachenmayr lives in DC with her husband, Tom Russell, and their 11-year old daughter, Cecilia. After 15 years practicing in big law firms (primarily doing infrastructure finance), she is starting her own law practice to focus on the needs of charter schools and other education innovators.

Alfred Culliford is director of plastic surgery at Staten Island University Hospital in NYC. Currently he is also pursuing a physician executive MBA degree and will graduate in Dec. 2014. He is living in New York in a blended family with his 8-year-old daughter from a previous marriage and his partner and her 9-year-old daughter.

Katheryn Berla still lives in Louisville and saw Hal Skinner and Whitney Witt and their children Halcyon and Sammy over the holidays. The two families were able to spend the night and ring in the New Year together when Hal and Whitney were on their way back to Madison, WI.

Kevin Prufer remains professor of English and director of graduate studies of The Creative Writing Program at The University of Houston. He has two new books coming out this year: Churches (Four Way Books, 2014) and Russell Atkins: On the Life & Work of an American Master (Unsung Masters Series, 2014)

Moving to the West Coast, Mouncey Ferguson is married, living in L.A. with his wife, Elise Robertson, and their kids, Stella (8) and Sadie (7). He produced an independent horror/thriller, Donner Pass, directed by his wife, which came out in 2012 and is airing on Showtime and available on Netflix. Mouncey and his wife are finishing up a short web series for Nickelodeon which will be available on nickmom.com, called The Wisdom of Children. The rest of the time, he works in advertising.

Also in L.A. is Stephanie Ivy, who is still working for Goldman Sachs. She remarried in June 2013. Stephanie reports that she sees Scott Hatter occasionally as they work in the same building.

Ziba Kashef writes that after the last decade in San Francisco, she is heading to the East Coast. Her husband, Tony, just landed a job at the University of St. Josephs and they, and their two kids, are going to move to West Hartford in August. She’d love to reconnect with any Wes alums in the area and can be reached at: zkashef1970@gmail.com

Also on the move is Jody Sperling who writes, “This May-June I will be embarking on a six-week journey to the Arctic as research for a choreographic project entitled “Ice Melt.” I’ll be accompanying a scientific expedition aboard the US Coast Guard Cutter Healy that will be studying the relationship between the thinning Arctic sea ice and increased phytoplankton blooms that may be altering the polar ecosystem. Upon my return I’ll be developing a dance-theater piece for my company, Time Lapse Dance, that will focus on the dynamism, fragility and loss of sea ice. This is the longest I’ll have ever been away from my daughter Evie, now 2 1/2. I will miss her dearly, but the voyage is an exciting (and unexpected) opportunity. I plan to use my experience as much as possible to increase awareness of climate science.”

That’s all the news for now. Please send updates to me or Paul—we’d love to hear from you!.

ADAM BERINSKY | berinsky@mit.edu

PAUL COVIELLO | coviellop01@alum.darden.edu

Greetings and salutations from Washington, D.C. It’s a beautiful late fall day here with white stuff on the ground, and cancellations and closings on the radio. Michele and I are focused on Nutcracker shows for Julia and piano recitals for Peter, as we pack for a trip to see family and go skiing.

Jeremy Hornik adopted a baby boy at birth, Adler Bishop Quirke Hornik, in September. Jeremy continues to live in Chicago, where he is designing slot machines and running Donna’s Good Things charity honoring the memory of his daughter, Donna, with the goal “to find hope, give back, get inspired. We want a movement, not a charity!”

Maurice Harris, member of the faculty of the Judaic Studies Department at the University of Oregon, recently celebrated the release of his second book, Leviticus: You Have No Idea (Cascade Books). His first book, Moses: A Stranger Among Us, came out in 2012. Maurice and his wife, Melissa Crabbe, are raising two adoptive children, Clarice and Hunter Harris, in Eugene, Ore., where they get to hang out with Randall Phelps, who lived with Maurice in The Bayit: Randy has put away his rubber chicken antics for a career in developmental and behavioral pediatrics at Oregon Health and Science University.

James Wilton lives in the Charlotte, N.C., area where he is in his seventh year as executive director of RCS Corporation. RCS is celebrating its 20th anniversary and is expanding into new business lines around oil/gas, solar and other energy verticals. Give James a ring to connect if you are in the energy business or want to know what it is like to be the father of a teenage boy.

Lastly, I heard from Oliver Ryan, well known bachelor/magazine reader/plant care-giver and therapist, on his way to Louisville, Ky., where he was planning to meet with Juliet Cooper Gray and her husband, Mathias. Oliver and Mathias are working together to launch Count It, a new kind of workplace wellness app. Jonathan Bush is on the board of Count It, as is Larry Sosnow, Meg Sosnow’s father. Back at home in NYC, Oliver shares a desk with Dave Kane, who himself is up to his neck in a cool startup, Village Power, founded by Ty Jagerson. If all goes well, this update will be spotted by one of the members of the Wes Mafia who are running the venture capital scene in New York these days!

ADAM BERINSKY and PAUL COVIELLO
berinsky@mit.edu
coviellop01@alum.darden.edu