Volume 30 · Number 3 · Spring 2013
Letters
From the editor
Some of the best perks of editing this magazine are that I learn so much and get to help tell so many great UC Davis stories. And with every issue, I get a clearer picture of the people and events that have made this campus.
Who’s your mama?
Not to take away from the excellent work by Dr. Grosberg and colleagues [“Who’s Your Daddy,” winter 2013], but the idea that male-only parental child care is an “outlier” is a human misconception. For example, male-only care is the norm in fishes, and fishes comprise the bulk of the vertebrates (animals with backbones). It is also found extensively in many other groups, ranging from birds and frogs to diving beetles. So, in reality, female parental care is the rarity. That said, parental care in any of its myriad forms is remarkable and amazing.
Ron Coleman
associate professor, biological sciences
California State University, Sacramento
Remembering Peter Rock
Peter Rock
I was very pleased to read in the fall 2012 issue that Chem 194, the large auditorium in the chemistry building, was being named Peter A. Rock Hall. In fall 1968, I was one of those freshman sitting in that room taking general chemistry. At least one term that year was taught by Professor Rock. Later, as a chemistry major, I took physical chemistry from Professor Rock. That was the most rigorous course of my undergraduate career! I was intrigued by electrochemistry and thus, as a senior, worked on an undergraduate research project in his laboratory. He then paid me to stay for the summer after I graduated to finish the project. We ultimately published the work in the Journal of the Electrochemical Society.
I was not a top student, but Professor Rock got me very interested in research and urged me to apply to graduate school. I earned my Ph.D. in analytical chemistry from UC Riverside in 1976. Now, after 35 years of teaching and research at Miami University (Ohio), I am near retirement. I’m afraid that over the years I did not keep in touch with Professor Rock. Now I guess the best I can do is let the UC Davis community know what an exceptional and inspirational professor he was.
Thomas Riechel ’72
Oxford, Ohio
At home at the CoHo
[Re: “Queen of the CoHo," fall 2012] You don’t know how many cold, rainy winter days I spent at the Coffee House with only $2 to spend. I always had, still do have, my blue coffee mug, and would buy a “baked bar.” And that’s all I had for breakfast or lunch. I loved the Coffee House and the old piano by the wall.
Even when the Silo got a Carl’s Jr. later on, I still went to the Coffee House where I felt more at home.
Linda Kim ’93
Apex, N.C.
Replies to ‘Offended’
‘Pleased with fairness’
I’m writing in response to the [winter 2013] letter from reader Ben From, who was so disgusted by the magazine’s sharing of happy news about a lesbian alum that he is withdrawing his support.
As I’m sure you’re aware, there are far more alums, like me, who are pleased with UC Davis’ atmosphere of equality and fairness.
I’m looking forward to more articles in the future about all the faces of UC Davis.
Troy Williams ’93
San Francisco
A History of exclusion?
In the summer of 1951, West Hall was torn down and we males who had lived there were placed in one of the new dorms just south of Russell Boulevard. Many of us didn’t like the new rules imposed there. A house mother? I’d left mine on a farm near Redding.
One recently transferred-in student proposed getting funding for an off-campus site by setting up a new chapter of a national fraternity. A popular member of our group was Jewish. The fraternity, like most, did not accept Jews. “No problem,” presumably thought the proponent. “He’s not my friend.” Some rejected the concept of racial fraternal exclusion out of friendship for Merv Shenson, some as a matter of principle. UC Davis had had the UC’s first black student body president, Horace Hampton [in 1949].
The writer’s name seems familiar, but my memory has faded much in the past 62 years. Was the fraternity proponent Ben From ’53, who was recently “offended” by an alumna’s essay about how she had met her wife?
R. Larry Ferral ’51, M.S. ’57
Sacramento