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SEPTEMBER 4, 2013 SYRIA, CIVIL RIGHTS, A PRE-NUP AND CAMPUS SPORTS This new edition includes relatively painless ways to follow the news about Syria, remember the March on Washington, eavesdrop on a pre-nup in China, see a New York Times update on an actor classmate, and disagree about college sports. Plus three new obituaries. Feel free to stick your neck out and comment. PUBLIC AFFAIRS TOPICAL TENNIS, ANYONE? HERE'S A TERRIFIC CLIFF NOTES From his home in Santiago, Chile, Bill Stott has been outdoing himself in steering speed-reading friends to intelligent perspectives on the possible strike on Syria - and on a lot else. As many classmates know, to a listserv of people who request it, he sends an almost-daily handful of verbatim opinion articles and some videos from a range of media, sometimes with his own deft analytic introductions. Sick of war? Stick around. He'll steer you to health and tennis. Over the Labor Day weekend, for example, he was a day ahead of The New York Times in quoting the skepticism of Ryan Crocker, a former US ambassador to the Middle East (and fellow at Yale last year) who wrote during July in a source you may not know about, Yale's online magazine Yale Global. The next day he relayed an article from the online newsroom Mint Press News in which a seemingly trustworthy, independent correspondent in Syria reported rebel fighters' assertions that the chemical weapons might not have come from the Asad regime at all, but from rebels and a troublemaking Saudi prince. The posting started with a warning from Bill to mistrust conspiracy theories. As a counterpoise to skepticism, he also relayed the limited rationale for Obama's possible action articulated by the Times's conservative op-ed columnist Ross Douthat. Bill is now a retired emeritus professor of English and American Studies at the University of Texas. Ask to be on his list at wstott@utexas.edu. For those not on it (yet), a sampling of recent subject lines suggests his immense scope: "What the West should do about Syria. Six or seven opinions"CLICK HERE TO COMMENT (and see comments on this item from others). HISTORY RECOLLECTIONS OF THE CIVIL RIGHTS MOVEMENT By Chip Neville 
I came late to the Civil Rights Movement. Yale was too good at teaching me to see both sides of every issue, and to see everything in shades of gray. What did it for me was the attack on the marchers at Selma. You see, while I was a typically obtuse white person who just didn't get it, I did firmly believe that EVERYONE HAD THE RIGHT TO VOTE. What brought all this back to mind was the movie, "The Butler," which paralleled in some respects my personal experiences in the Movement; the movie "Fruitvale Station," which illustrates how far we still have to go; and the rebroadcast of Martin Luther King's August 25, 1963 appearance on "Meet the Press" this morning, exactly 50 years later. Truth in advertising: I was NOT a Freedom Rider, I joined the movement later, but I was in a car that got attacked by a stone throwing mob of angry white teenagers. "The Butler" is the only movie that gets it right about how frightening such an attack is, about the way the bus or car rocks back and forth from the impact of the rocks, and the violent way the glass ... CLICK HERE TO READ MORE, to comment, and see comments on this item from others. BUSINESS HINTS FOR DOING BUSINESS IN CHINA — FROM A 1930s PRE-NUP  Will Mother approve? Hannibal Liu, a well-accoutred, carefully rebellious son of an influential Chinese family, with his portable record player in England in the 1930s, when he told his family he was in forbidden love. A new book co-authored by Sherm Cochran casts light on today's Chinese family and business networks. 
Tourists and foreign businesspeople in China, not to mention scholars, often struggle to understand the country's tight and seemingly opaque business and family networks, which often are one and the same. Outsiders now can get fresh insights into the strength of those networks from an extraordinary new book by Sherman Cochran, a distinguished China historian at Cornell, in collaboration with a colleague at Grinnell, Andrew Hsieh.In The Lius of Shanghai (Harvard University Press), Sherm uses his expertise in 20th century Chinese business history to present and analyze a treasure trove that he earlier had a hand in preserving (see box). The treasure is more than 2,000 letters between the parents, nine sons and three daughters of one of Shanghai's most wealthy, prominent and influential 20th century families, the Lius. With skill and will, Sherm writes, the family retained high positions through "the two most tumultuous events in twentieth-century Chinese history - the Sino-Japanese War of 1937-1945, and the Communist revolution of 1949." Their conglomerate of factories and trading offices was involved in coal, textiles, Portland cement, matches (a big business for nations with skimpy electricity), banking, port facilities, insurance, and real estate. In the following excerpt, revealing both the grip of the past and the inevitability of the new, a problematic marriage threatens to disrupt the Lius' close-knit family culture and is resolved with a mandatory tea ceremony. (Click here for the story and to comment, as well as read comments on this item from other classmates.) Late news: great reviews. Click here to read other reviews of Sherm's book, including one from the Times of London Educational Supplement saying "Cochran and Hsieh have successfully complicated our picture of the fabled Chinese patriarchal system and have enabled a rare glimpse into the private life of one family... They have also contributed to a simple yet powerful message: Chinese families were as much guided by likes, dislikes, love, emotion and competition as their counterparts outside the country. The Lius of Shanghai is a reminder that attempts to orientalise China's family structures should be treated with caution." CLASSMATES IN THE NEWS LIGON RULES This story on Tom Ligon appeared in the August 21 New York Times, and triggered a small flurry of nostalgic emails from other classmates (below) when Tom's freshman roommate, Al Chambers, sent it around. He Used to Be on Police Dramas, Then He Met a Bad Guy in Real Life (Click here.) In a subsequent E-mail aftermath: Dan Neary recalled a Dramat production Tom had been in and suggested it was "Sleep of Prisoners," which Dave Honneus confirmed: "The Dramat 'traveling production' toured to local churches, etc. The singing group of Tom Ligon and the Four Prisoners was created from the cast and performed the pseudo rock version of Antony's funeral oration complete with 'let sip the dogs of war' and 'Cry Havoc!,' etc., ending with 'Romans and Countrymen' followed by 'Unh, cha cha cha!!'" Phil Proctor sent this photo - the "'Oh Pardon Me, Thou Bleeding Piece' recording session"...  and wrote: "I can still remember and sing my part!!! I know there is a recording of 'Oh, Pardon Me' somewhere... Anyone capable of sending an MP3? Maybe I can get it on the 'oldies' station. Actually, The Firesign Theatre is launching FIRESIGN RADIO on the web next month, and I could assuredly play it there!..."  CLICK HERE TO COMMENT (and see comments on this item from others). YALE NO TO THE JOCKERNAUT Dealing especially with "Big Sports" on campuses, Lee Bolman, an expert on leadership and professor at the University of Missouri, was one of 12 alumni from various classes who commented on Rick Levin's presidency in the July/August Yale Alumni Magazine. Said he: "Rick Levin showed courage in making occasional risky and controversial decisions. Yale in Singapore is an obvious example, and he deserves credit for bucking the growing dominance of Big Sports in higher education by reducing the number of admissions slots reserved for coaches. He's taken a lot of heat from alums and student athletes, and who knows when we'll net win The Game. But it's fitting that a president who reaffirmed the preeminence of the academic mission was rewarded with an NCAA hockey title in his final year." CLICK HERE TO COMMENT (and see comments on this item from others). NECROLOGY NEWLY POSTED Sad losses since our last edition. Recent deaths (full obituaries are in process): Boyd Brown, Tom Luckey, Don Nichols, Alan Ordway and Jim White. Full obituaries are now online for James H. Heroy III, M.D., John Howard Hill and Lee W. Patterson. Classmates are welcome at a casual open-house celebration of John Hill's life hosted by his longtime partner William Shanley at John's home, 1317 Fairstead Lane, Squirrel Hill, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on Sunday, September 15 from 12 to 4 p.m. NOTIFYING CLASSMATES OF SERVICES If you would like classmates to be notified about your funeral or memorial activities, the Class of 1962 will send information to our email list, providing we get the information in time. Please ask those who will be in charge to send the details to Bob Oliver at oliver@moglaw.com, phone 203-624-5111, and for backup to John Stewart, Co-Corresponding Secretary, at johnhargerstewart@gmail.com, phone 845-789-1407. We will not send information unless someone makes this request. Even if services are not involved, please encourage those involved to send basic information to the above and to the Yale Office of Information Resources at alumni.records@yale.edu or PO Box 208262, New Haven, CT 06520-8616, telephone 203-432-1100. YOUR COMMENTS SOUGHT Let us know what we're doing right, what we're doing wrong, and especially, what you'd like to see on our website. We're here for you. Thanks. CLICK HERE TO SEE MORE AND COMMENT (and see comments from others). |
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