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st. lawrence university magazine | spring 2015
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sciences from both a humane and an ana-
lytical perspective. When I think about
my many positive learning experiences at
St. Lawrence, Bernie Lammers is always a
major portion of the equation.
Issues of social justice were a major part
of his life view. When he saw wrongs, he
fought for what he viewed as good for the
college, the community and his country.
Our contact with Bernie crossed gen-
erations through my brother Sterling ’84
and our daughter Jessica ’04. My wife,
Melissa, and I had the good fortune of
spending time with Bernie in May of
2013, during a class reunion. A short
Christmas note just before his passing
showed, as always, his upbeat nature and
hope for humanity.
—Jim Goodspeed ’73
Queensbury, New York
The Van de Waters’ country place
I was sorry to read of the death of Peter
Van de Water ’58. His future wife,
Becky Blaisdell ’60, lived just a few
doors down from me freshman year in
Dean-Eaton Hall. In about 1965, the
Van de Waters bought a shabby old
place near St. Regis Falls, my home-
town. They were often at my dad’s saw-
mill buying supplies. We both had three
children by then, so we were invited out
for s’mores over a fire. I will never forget
that day. We have read about Peter and
Becky ever since because of their in-
volvement in so many worthy activities.
—Jeanne Giffin Wright ’60
Manchester, Connecticut
A different kind of performance
Most alumni know that the new Kirk
Douglas Hall [see page 30] is named in
honor of the actor, philanthropist and
loyal Laurentian. But few know that he
was also president of Thelmo his senior
year (1938-39), and an advocate of
higher academic standards at the college.
That year, Prof. Harry Reiff, of history
and government, lamented the “incred-
ible clutter of extra-curricular activities
on the campus...a situation inimical to
the best interests of an institution intent
on developing citizens with a good
scholastic background.” (The Hill News,
April 17, 1938.) A solution proposed
by Douglas (then known as Isadore
Demsky) was a committee, made up
of students, which could review poor
student performance brought to its
attention by professors.
Thus, the new dormitory honors
not just a notable actor, but also his
contribution to St. Lawrence as a
student leader and advocate of higher
academic standards.
—Daniel D. Reiff
Kenmore, New York
The writer is Harry Reiff’s son and the
author of Teacher, Scholar, Mentor: Dr.
Harry Reiff of St. Lawrence University,
available through Brewer Bookstore.
Remembrances of Bernie
We were saddened to learn of the passing
of teacher, mentor and friend Dr. Bernie
Lammers in December [see “In Memory,”
page 80]. He helped me view the social
ST. LAWRENCE university magazine volume lxIV | number 2 | 2015
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and at additional mailing offices. (ISSN 0745-3582) Printed in U.S.A. All opinions expressed in signed articles are those of the author and do
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Editor-in-Chief
Neal S. Burdick ’72
assistant editor
Meg Bernier ’07, M’09
art director
Alex Rhea
associate art director
Susan LaVean
vice President for communications
Melissa Farmer Richards
Design director
Jamie Lipps
photography director
Tara Freeman
News editor
Ryan Deuel
class notes editor
Sharon Henry
ing team has done for public awareness,
though being national champions twice
in the last three years merits more than a
footnote mention. This proposition does
not require wreaths and ribbons to clear
the jump: The horses on campus and the
students who care for them exemplify the
liberal arts philosophy that so many of us
are giving our lives to perpetuate.
When I visit the Elsa Gunnison Apple-
ton Riding Arena, affectionately known as
“the barn,” for a horse show or an impulse
drop-in, I observe qualities that I wish
every student at St. Lawrence will find
in equivalent ways. I notice the constant
atmosphere of patience and pace while
walking the corridor of stalls. Its whis-
pered air resembles the feeling of a library.
The French scholar Arlette Farge once
wrote, “To feel the allure of the archives
is to seek to extract additional meaning
from fragmented phrases found there…
an unplanned glimpse offered into an
unexpected event.” The barn has the pull
of an unfinished story at the pen’s nib,
a first draft taking patience to trace and
write down.
I have witnessed in my barn tours a way
for students to be emotionally connected
to an activity without being foolishly
emotional. We expect the sciences to
teach a cool detachment in front of the
he guide in paris
left the message to
meet at the statue
of Charlemagne
by Notre Dame
Cathedral. No
matter what grand
city, it is easy to
find on horseback
a marble king or
a bronze general to mark the place of
rendezvous. We had earlier been in Nor-
mandy’s medieval city of Rouen to visit
St. Lawrence students, a city known by
a fixed Napoleon on a rearing horse. In
London, where other St. Lawrence stu-
dents attend class and theater, the Duke
of Wellington rides again after Waterloo
in three-dimensional stillness. Closer to
campus, a day trip made by students and
faculty to the capital city of Ottawa usu-
ally begins the tour at the War Memorial,
a vivid freeze frame of 1915 that captures
a scrum of exhausted combat soldiers,
one of whom rides a draft horse, an eye-
riveting large animal with brute shoulders
pulling a big gun on a muddy road.
When we come back to Canton,
however, there remains a subtle sense of
a living past. The North Country is still
frisky as horse country. The “rush hour”
on Main Street signals the familiar whir of
passing cars (and pick-up trucks), but then
there is the occasional clip-clop cadence
as old as the rhythms of a Roman road.
At home, I hear daily the Amish buggies
on market errands. It makes me think of
the pictures kept in our archives of college
professors on horseback and the children
of the farms who brought their trunks to
campus by horse cart.
St. Lawrence’s widespread reputation
reaches many admirers of our accom-
plished liberal arts alumni in every field
of work and service. We have numerous
reasons for the world to know
St. Lawrence. And yet, we should also be
known as a place that cares about horses.
This is not a personal appeal to nostalgia
or “back-to-the-land restorationism”
inspired by a historian’s active imagina-
tion. Yes, I know that if Napoleon had
installed a reliable supply chain of fodder,
he might have reached Moscow sooner
than the first snowfall.
The fact is I never learned to ride,
though my mother, wife and daughter
can be found in family albums sitting a
horse confidently. I grew up in a city with
more than two dozen equestrian statues,
but now I live in a setting with more than
two dozen active equestrians (almost all
women) who manage a liberal arts educa-
tion accompanied by an equal number of
school horses owned by St. Lawrence.
My appreciation for St. Lawrence as an
appropriate home for horses is not drawn
materially from the great good our rid-
AWord From thePresident
T
Been Around the Barn
facts as presented; we also expect that
literary texts will cause human feelings
to stir in class, but without losing the
capacity to analyze what things mean
or matter. I marvel at the mature
emotional intelligence being developed
around the horses by an experience for
students that shows the grace of trust
and the gift of being trusted.
Years ago, I spent a day with a
St. Lawrence alumnus at his workplace
on a Hudson Valley farm. A world-re-
nowned breeder and trainer of Arabian
horses, he took me into a round barn,
told me to stand quietly against the
wall as he worked the paces and turns
of a young horse. It was a truly sublime
and beautiful moment to see this man
and magnificent horse communicate
so effectively in a language that ap-
proached something mystical.
It takes tremendous athletic balance
and intellectual poise to ride a horse, a
creature that is both extremely power-
ful and remarkably gentle. While I
couldn’t achieve that myself in exactly
the same way, I can take its example
and use it to explain a college’s purpose,
in making clear how we want all our
students to turn out, bringing gentle-
ness out of power, equilibrium out
of speed. Socrates once had a student
who wrote knowingly about horses. He
maintained that in looking at a horse,
the key is to pay attention to the feet.
And in the liberal arts, too, the show is
never the same as knowing the source.
—WLF
I have witnessed
in my barn tours
a way for students to be
emotionally connected
to an activity
without being
foolishly emotional.
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