By Barbara Anderson

IT'S HISTORY

Kevin Roddy. Photo: Neil Michel/Axiom.

It’s often said that history is just that: It’s past. Gone. So yesterday. So what’s a medieval studies lecturer to do to bring those long-ago times to life? For Kevin Roddy, clothes make the medieval man; he’s established a tradition of donning his academic robes for the quarter’s first class meeting. Roddy says the robe “is an ordinary medieval long gown that any prosperous professional would have worn in the late Middle Ages.” Doctors and lawyers wore them, too; teachers were distinguished by three velvet stripes on the sleeves. During winter quarter, Roddy’s class focused on events and personalities of the later medieval period, from 1325 to 1500, including the origin of printing, the Black Death and Chaucer. Those long, heavy robes doubtless kept the chill at bay while teaching in a dank castle or monastery, but it’s a sure bet they would never have been invented at a campus located in California’s Central Valley. Seersucker, anyone?

BLUE BOOK BLUES

Put away your notes, class, and pick up your pencils. It’s time to see how much you remember. Following are some representative questions taken from previous quarters’ midterm and final exams. Go ahead: raise the curve.

Econ 1B: In a Keynesian economy with unemployment and with stable prices, suppose that the marginal propensity to consumer (= mpc = b) is 3/4, and the marginal tax rate is 1/5. In this economy, what is the value of the government-spending multi-plier? Show your work.

Bio Sci 104: Expression of a mutant allele of the gene that encodes the bipolar kinesin in Drosophila results in the formation of abnormal monoastral mitotic spindles, unlike the bipolar spindles observed in the wild-type flies. This mutant allele is a temperature-sensitive, recessive, loss-of-function mutation. Under what conditions would the mutant phenotype occur?

Statistics 13: The probability is .7 that a well driller will find water at a depth of less than 100 feet in a certain area. Wells are to be drilled for six new homeowners. What is the expected number of wells that will find water under 100 feet? What is the standard deviation for the number of wells that will find water under 100 feet? Extra credit: The word “drawer” is spelled with six Scrabble tiles. The tiles are then randomly rearranged. What is the probability of the rearranged tiles spelling the word “reward”?

Time’s up. These classes may not be repeated for credit.

GRAND SLAM

Computer science professor Chip Martel spends his time here at UC Davis researching the practical application of algorithms. In his spare time, he plays bridge. But it’s not just your lunch-hour pick-up card game; in November, Martel won his fifth world bridge championship, this time nabbing the Bermuda Bowl team duplicate bridge title in Paris. In an interview with Dateline UC Davis, the campus’s faculty and staff newspaper, Martel said his interest in playing bridge is “a little like my research with problem-solving. But bridge is also nice because there is a human element. You interact with a partner.” Martel’s wife, Jan, does more than provide moral support from the sidelines—she was the coach of her husband’s Paris world championship team.

A BACKWARD GLANCE

Spring on campus 50 years ago, as culled from the pages of the California Aggie, April and May 1952:

What, no Norelcos? Prizes to be awarded in the month-long junior class beard-growing contest ranged from argyles to electric alarm clocks. Blowin’ in the wind: Gov. Earl Warren opened the 39th annual Picnic Day, which was deemed a success despite a wind and dust storm of “near-tornado proportions (or so it seemed to scores of disgruntled Aggies).” Cranking it out: The ASCA (Associated Students, College of Agriculture) business office began offering mimeograph service. “The rates are reasonable,” the Aggie proclaimed, “and the people there treat you real nice.” Co-eds rule: The Aggie women took over the campus during Co-ed Week, May 17-24. “The old tradition of a week when ‘the woman is required to pay’ has long been established on the Aggie campus and is eagerly awaited by both the fellows and the girls.” Ad for Wayne’s Men’s Shop: “Enjoy yourself in . . . Suppledrape faded blue denims. $4.95 each for jacket, slacks. No cleaning worries—these easy-fitting California denims are sanforized! No fashion worries—even though they’re inexpensive, Suppledrapes are favorites in the best resorts!”