Monthly Archives: May 2017

Colby College

Colleges

Verdant yet flawed.

For an alphabetical index of the New England College series of pieces, click here.

Founded in 1813, Colby College is home to 1,800 undergraduates and encompasses 714 acres in central Maine, some 50 miles north of Lewiston-Auburn. The school has a strong liberal arts tradition and is in excellent repair throughout.

Our visit here was a mixed bag for while the college has a vibrantly verdant setting there is no sense of a cohesive whole that is to be found in other schools. Frankly, much of this impression is based on the architecture, frequently shockingly bad and the use of the main building as a library is a very poorly done conversion. Most books were shipped offsite and the awful low ceilings quite destroy the interior in contrast to the superb exterior.


A verdant setting.


Poor architecture.


Farmhouse brick style does not cut it; tent remains from the past weekend’s graduation ceremonies.


Not even the poor weather obscures the beauty of the Miller Library ….


…. yet the interior with its low ceilings and chintzy furniture could hardly be worse.


More farmhouse architecture. These people cannot even get bricks right ….


…. and when it comes to glass and steel the result is downright awful. This is the art museum.


This is what passes as seating inside the museum, amply counterpointed by the ugly, rusted cube outside.


More chintzy mediocrity in the Lunder Reading Room, though the photography library is extensive and excellent.


I can only think a sarcastic comedian made this banality the center of the art displays. This is Frederick R. Spencer’s ‘The Harriott Children’ of 1844 and must surely be one of the worst formal portraits ever painted. Even the dog looks like he shared a plastic surgeon with the First Lady.


More kitsch. This horror is Paul Manship’s ‘Dancer & Gazelles’ of 1916.


Duh!


Well, the toilets are nice ….


No stopping this Olin chap, whose guilt extends to yet another building on a New England campus.


This works ….


…. whereas this needs nothing so much as a wrecker’s ball.


The Lorimer Chapel is fine but rather hidden away in a corner of the campus.


The main quad from the Miller Library.


There’s no arguing with the presentation of the Miller Library.

So the question for aspiring entrants is not so much the academic standards, which are fine, but whether they can live with so much mediocre architecture, and having to do so for four years could constitute cruel and unusual punishment.

Alumni of Colby College include a bunch of politicos, including economist Eric Rosengren of the Fed, Billy Bush of pu**y grabbing fame and the fine historian Doris Kearns Goodwin.

Bowdoin College

Colleges

In Brunswick, Maine.

For an alphabetical index of the New England College series of pieces, click here.

Some of the best American schools are to be found in remote Maine, and Bowdoin (pronounced ‘Boh-din’) is very much a study in excellence. There are 1,800 undergraduates here in a school dating from 1839. A healthy endowment helps see to it that the school is maintained in pristine condition.

If distinction it be, then Bowdoin is distinguished as being the first college we have visited without a disfiguringly ugly modern building. Even the later additions here are beautifully integrated and the school’s building committee is to be congratulated. Bowdoin is one of the highest ranked liberal arts colleges in the nation despite its relatively modest size.


The Hatch Science Library.


Though glass and steel, the exquisite Peter Buck Center for Health and Fitness fits its surroundings perfectly.


The perfectly proportioned Bowdoin Chapel anchors the Quad.


Alumnus Robert E. Peary, class of 1877, led the first successful expedition to the North Pole in 1908, and hence the school’s mascot is the polar bear.




Eschewing the more commonly found stained glass, Bowdoin’s Chapel favors murals.


The Hubbard Hall and Peary-MacMillan Arctic Museum is also on the Quad.


The Bowdoin College Museum of Art is opposite the Chapel and is simply one of the finest small art museums we have visited. Pride of place is given to Mary Cassatt’s impressionist masterpiece ‘The Barefoot Child‘. Cassatt, the impressionist from Pennsylvania, can hold her own with the greatest French masters.


Studying on the steps of the Art Museum.


Winston enters the Art Museum through the side entrance.


Gibson Hall


Wild sundial.


The Hawthorne-Longfellow library. The writers Nathaniel Hawthorne and Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, both graduated Phi Beta Kappa in 1825.


The Studzinski Recital Hall.

Distinguished alumni, in addition to those named above, include Reed Hastings (Netflix), Ken Chenault (AmEx), President Franklin Pierce, hedgie Stanley Druckenmiller, Alfred Kinsey and Joan Benoit (Olympic gold in the marathon).

The Waterfront, Portland, Maine

Photographs

A photographer’s paradise.

Fishermen’s wharves are hard to resist and the one in Portland, ME is especially appealing. You can almost smell the fish in these pictures and I can assure you we very much did smell them when these were snapped.


Absent the cars, this could have been taken any time during the past century.


As could this.


This gentrifying area blesses the new residents with fish straight from the sea. Just be sure to live upwind!


Procurement and inventory management.


As fresh as fresh gets.


Primary colors.


The Porthole, the place to eat.


The trendies have arrived.


No guessing the age here.


The surreal is always to be found.


Fixing the nets.

All snaps on the Panny GX7 with the kit zoom.

Wesleyan University

Colleges

The right ‘vibe’.

For an alphabetical index of the New England College series of pieces, click here.

Founded in 1831, Wesleyan holds 3,100 students, almost all of whom are undergraduates. Named after the English creator of Methodism, it started life as exclusively male but is now co-educational, the genders equally represented. The 360 acre campus includes over 340 buildings.

We are learning the strangest thing during our month of New England college tours and it is that the undefinable element of ‘feel’ or ‘vibe’, if you prefer, is present in abundance. And while my subjective opinions are irrelevant to my son’s eventual decision they are an important element in his deliberations. With a four year commitment the feel must be right, and we both just adored that of Wesleyan.

As luck would have it our visit today was on graduation day and even the weather cooperated. (Hint: park in the residential area on the other side of Washington Street – Route 66! Nowhere else is possible on such a day without a pass).

Though the campus houses many buildings, it manages to remain compact and accessible.


The Center for African American studies.


The Davison Health Center, curlicues and all.


The Davison Art Center. We visited a fine photography exhibition there.


Every campus has its ugly building and the Performing Arts Center bears that distinction at Wesleyan.


The Usdan Student Center.


Inside the Usdan.


Andrus Field is at campus center.


Wesleyan is making significant progress in widening the ethnicities of its student base.


In superb repair, the Memorial Chapel echoes the red and black colors of the school in its roof.


Inside the Memorial Chapel, taken in near darkness. Thank goodness for pews!


The many stained glass windows are surprisingly ornate given the relatively strict nature of the Methodist religion. This window honors those lost in WW2.


Graduation Day! The Van Vleck Observatory dates from 1914 and sees Wesleyan graduating more astronomy and astrophysics graduates than any other U.S. school.

Magnificent Romanesque architecture on the South College building.


The Davison Health Center has a lovely, light look.


Hanging out. A campus which encourages socializing.


Campus life.


The magnificent Olin Memorial Library, designed by McKim, Mead and White. The Olin Foundation seems to have donated buildings to every campus we have visited, some small compensation for the founder’s sins. John Olin was an ammunition manufacturer.


Another eyesore, the Science Library opposite the Olin.

The alumni list at Wesleyan is long and distinguished, with the college exceptionally well represented in Hollywood. Alumni include Bill Rodgers of marathon fame, Michael Bay, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Bill Belichick, Robert Ludlum, Timothy Hutton and Merce Cunningham.

Three faculty members have been awarded Nobel Prizes – V. S. Naipaul, Woodrow Wilson and T. S. Eliot.