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Summer 2024

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Winter 2007

The Cougar wears Prada

FLORENCE, ITALY—She’d perused the vintage vendors on London’s Portobello Road and seen the Chanel logo stamped onto the most prestigious silk in the world in Como, Italy.

By her first morning in Florence, with its supple leather, luxury textiles, and elegant, well-heeled locals, Katy Daly’s fingers were getting restless.

“I really need a needle, thread, and some fabric right now,” said Daly, of Kent, Washington. By afternoon, she was winding through the narrow cobblestone alleys in the shadow of Giotto’s bell tower with a small scrap of paper on which she had penciled the word merceria in hopes of finding an Italian haberdashery shop with … » More …

Winter 2007

Language lessons

When Saad Alshahrani came to graduate school at Washington State University, he didn’t speak a bit of English.

Addled by the long flights from Saudi Arabia, he tried to walk out of the airport in Seattle. He didn’t understand that his new home was still 300 miles to the east. The airport officials put him on a small plane to Pullman, which left him in a near-empty airport just after midnight.

“Imagine that,” he says. “I didn’t know anybody. No taxi, and no hotel.”

Fortunately, Devon Anderson, who works for the WSU Foundation, saw Alshahrani get off the plane. She understood that he was a … » More …

Winter 2007

WSU’s rarest book? Frederick Meserve’s Historical Portraits

One of the great joys of my job at Washington State University is the time I spend in the rare books vault in Manuscripts, Archives, and Special Collections. “Rare books vault” is a romantic way to describe two large, secure, climate-controlled rooms located on the ground floor of the Terrell Library, but it’s fitting, given the treasures held within.

I’ve been aware for years of our 28-volume set of Frederick Hill Meserve’s Historical Portraits, a terrific source for locating photographs of leading Americans of the Civil War era. The collection’s gilt-tooled, crimson, Morocco-leather spines cry out “open me.” In addition to its beauty, the set … » More …

Winter 2007

Jazz Down the Middle

A little before 8 a.m. one Tuesday last spring, the jazz band at Pullman’s Lincoln Middle School, a bit bed-headed and bleary-eyed, was working on a tricky rhythm. Standing at the whiteboard in Room 806, the director, Joe Covill, wrote out the notes and sang the syncopated notation.

“This is how it looks,” he said, “and this is how it sounds.”

It was only a refresher lesson, one they’d heard before, not only from Covill, but from the composer himself.

Greg Yasinitsky, a music professor at Washington State University, has been the middle school’s composer-in-residence for the past four years. In two days’ time, this … » More …

Winter 2007

Secrets & Spies

The Office of Strategic Services, our country's first centralized intelligence agency, was formed during the Second World War to train men and women in the arts of sabotage and espionage and then to send them around the world to protect our nation's interests. Among the many Washington State College students and alumni who served in that conflict, five friends and classmates trained together in the OSS, then went to North Africa, Italy, England, and China to help win the war.

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Winter 2007

Time will tell

Climate change is nothing new to our planet. But this time it's different. The carbon dioxide we are putting into the air through industry, vehicle emissions, and deforestation is changing the way our soil works. That in turn affects plant, animal, and eventually human life. Through their research Washington State University scientists are challenging the conventional view that more plants and forests will solve our CO2 problems. » More ...
Summer 2009

Harley Cowan—Chicken sedan

There’s an old knee-slapper that goes something like this: Why does a chicken coop have two doors? Because if it had four doors (drumroll, please) it would be a sedan!

“It’s a really lousy joke,” says architect Harley Cowan ‘96, who can’t help chuckling often these days after the “Chicken Sedan” he built for his backyard flock snared two of Portland’s top architectural honors, earning billing alongside designs for major condominium projects, university buildings, and medical facilities.

Spurred by wife Carrie’s interest in raising chickens  and armed with a bit of research, Cowan designed his combination coop and sheltered run with a classic A-frame, … » More …

Summer 2009

Jacqueline van Wormer–Advocacy for juveniles

One morning this winter, the Benton County Juvenile Justice Center is quiet since most of the residents are in classrooms and only one teen waits in lock-up. A couple of the guards are having an early lunch at a table at the end of the long corridor.

Through the security doors and down a few hallways Jacqueline van Wormer (’90, MA ’92)and her team sit at their desks looking up at a dry erase board with words detailing steps to help these residents and other young people in their community steer away from more time in custody. At the top of the board the team … » More …

Summer 2009

Nadia Daud–No place like home

Nadia Daud spends nearly 80 percent of her time living abroad, traveling to some of the most troubled regions of the world. When she’s not overseas, she has an apartment in Washington, D.C. But ask her where her home is, and she’ll tell you—Pullman, Washington.

The 31-year-old refugee officer with the U.S. Department of Homeland Security grew up south of Pioneer Hill in Pullman, graduated from local schools, and then matriculated to Washington State University. It was a remarkably stable childhood for someone who now lives out of a suitcase and spends her days interviewing refugees.

“In this last year and a half I … » More …