January 19, 2006
The 35 Year Club: Dean earns standing ovation for memory feat
Last summer, University Week sent out e-mail to all the faculty and staff we could find who have worked here for at least 35 years. We received a variety of reminiscences, which we are beginning to print this quarter. Today, David Keyt, a professor of philosophy, looks back on retreats at Lake Wilderness and a dean with a great memory.
“One thing I remember from the Sixties is that paper shuffling between departments and administrators was almost nonexistent, perhaps because the proportion of administration to faculty was smaller than it is now. There was only one dean of Arts and Sciences, who handled all three divisions by himself with a minimal office staff and no divisional deans.
“When (Philip Windsor) Cartright was dean, to launch to new academic year he would hold an overnight before classes began at the lodge at Lake Wilderness for all of his departmental chairmen, and would begin the first meeting by introducing each chairman by name, a feat that amazed us all and always received an ovation (since there were about as many chairman then as now).”
