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Spring 2009

Letters in the Spring 2009 issue

 

A time machine

My hat is off to your staff for what should be an award-winning issue. It was like a time machine for me. I spent many hours in the Conner Museum as an undergrad, marveling at the enormous moose and large black wolf. My high school friends and I explored Point Defiance Park in Tacoma every time our basketball team made it to the state tournament. Your article, “Rethinking the fundamentals,” is a classic. I can’t agree more that we need to rethink the way we farm. I’m glad you had as much fun with Shepherd’s Grains’ co-owner Fred Fleming as I … » More …

Spring 2009

Building Green

Jeff Feinstein ’85 finds green investment a hedge against a down economy

Our gas-guzzling, carbon-spewing automobiles draw a lot of the blame for the build-up of greenhouse gases most scientists say is making the world warmer. That’s led to a worldwide flurry of investment in biofuels research and more fuel-efficient vehicles–even hybrid diesel Kenworth semis, built by Paccar in Kirkland.

But amid all that traffic, a quiet community of builders and designers is starting to speak up, saying that if we want to make real reductions in energy use, we just have to look closer to home–to our houses, offices, and high-rise condos.

“The … » More …

Spring 2009

Cougar Memory

An essential part of being a Cougar (as well as being human) seems to be the need to tell one’s story of one’s youth and experiences here at Washington State University.

To make it easier to do so and to share it with your fellow Cougs, we have introduced a new feature on our website called Our Story.

Together, the 140,000 or so living alumni of WSU have an extraordinary collective story to tell, not necessarily of the comings and goings of presidents and professors, of scientific breakthroughs and other major news, but of the day-to-day life on campus, of one’s … » More …

Spring 2009

The Love Letters

In 1907, Othello had no high school, so Xerpha Mae McCulloch '30 traveled 50 miles to Ritzville to finish school. There she met, and fell in love with, Edward Gaines, a few years her senior. The recent gift to Washington State University of her steamer trunk reveals the life of a woman whose story is not only threaded through the University's, but also through the story of agriculture in Washington State. » More ...
Winter 2008

What I’ve Learned Since College: An interview with Sonny Spearman

Sonny Spearman ’86 has traded technology for toys. As co-founder and chief marketing and operating officer of Matter Group, she leads a company focused on creating products to foster awareness of the environment.

Spearman started her career in technology and media, riding the wave of the Seattle-based tech boom in the late 1980s and early 1990s. She’d still be in the tech sector if she and company co-founder Amy Tucker hadn’t decided develop a business focused on sustainability.

Their first product, which was released in 2006, is Xeko, an award-winning eco-adventure game for children eight and older. With a force of “secret agents” intent … » More …

Winter 2008

Murrow’s door

First came the doorknob.

The workers in the office of Washington State University’s school of communication didn’t know what to expect when the first of two shipments arrived from New York last spring. But they opened the box, took out the old doorknob and passed it around, wondering what sort of door it belonged to, wondering whose hands had touched it.

A few weeks earlier Darby Baldwin, an assistant in the dean’s office, had called two CBS retirees on the East Coast because the husband had written a thoughtful opinion piece about his time working with Edward R. Murrow. It turned out that Joe … » More …

Winter 2008

Unstoppable Rueben Mayes

On a raw, wet fall afternoon in Eugene, Oregon, in late October 1984, Rueben Mayes’ feet carried him to what was at the time the greatest accomplishment of any NCAA running back.

Just a week earlier, Mayes ran for 216 yards at Stanford in a rally that brought Washington State University from a 28-point third quarter deficit to a 49-42 win.

“The game against Stanford was one of his greatest efforts as a college player,” says Mark Rypien, quarterback of the ’84 team. But then he did one better. “The numbers that he had against Oregon were unbelievable.”

It’s a performance that can be … » More …

Winter 2008

Special delivery

Cliff Berkman is taking aim at prostate cancer.

The Washington State University chemist is using part of the cancer cells themselves as a bull’s eye, targeting a protein that occurs on prostate cancer cells and nowhere else.

The protein, called PSMA (Prostate-Specific Membrane Antigen), shows up as soon as prostate cells become cancerous. PSMA is different from PSA, the prostate protein that is currently used to diagnose prostate cancer. PSA is released by prostate cancer cells into the bloodstream. PSMA stays attached to the cancer cells, like a neon sign saying “CANCER HERE!”

Since PSMA is so specific to prostate cancer cells, Berkman thought … » More …

Winter 2008

Who moved my cupola?

During a quiet weekend last July, a crew came to campus to steal away one of the University’s oldest landmarks–the Ferry Hall cupola. The quaint 12-foot by 12-foot Georgian-style structure had already survived more than a century and a major relocation. Now it was on the move again.

A lot of Washington State University’s history is tied up with the architectural element, starting with the original Ferry Hall, the University’s first dormitory, occupying the south end campus. Men and women lived on separate floors there until Stevens Hall, the residence dedicated for women, went up on the opposite end of campus.

While he liked the … » More …