All News

Hamilton sophomores Dave Hamilton, Tom Irvin, Katherine Alser, Yuqi Mao and Victoria Jenkins are heading to Chicago to compete in the National College Curling Tournament from March 16-18.

Sixty-six Hamilton students are trading beach towels and suntan lotion for hammers and hardhats as they head south to volunteer at nonprofits in six cities, including two that still trying to recover from Hurricane Katrina.

Recent Grammy winner Bill Harley '77 was featured in a Boston Globe article (3/9/07) about his life as a children's entertainer. Harley's "Blah, Blah, Blah ... Stories About Clams, Swamp Monsters, Pirates and Dogs" recently won the Grammy for best spoken word album for children. The article highlights Harley's career as a storyteller and notes "he is among the very best at the many things he does." According to the Globe story, "... his education served him well. 'I got a good foundation in myth and story, and that kind of structure is something that still, even today, underlies a lot of the writing I do,' he says. 'I do feel like I'm not just trying to entertain. I want to do that - the first thing you have to do is entertain so they pay attention - but I don't want to lecture.'"

Physics Professor Emeritus Philip Pearle has published a paper titled "How Stands Collapse I," in the Journal of Phys. A: Math. Theor. 40 (2007) 3189-3204. In this work, he reviews the current status of a theory called "dynamical wave function collapse," begun by him in the 1970s, which since then has been developed significantly by others as well as himself. It changes standard quantum theory, which may be thought of as describing a collection of identical systems, enabling it to describe an individual system's behavior. He presents 10 problems raised by his initial theory, and shows how five of them were overcome. In a future paper, to be published in a volume honoring the physicist-philosopher Abner Shimony, he discusses the the other five problems, some of which have also achieved a resolution.

Seventy Hamilton students and staff members participated in America’s Greatest Heart Run and Walk on Saturday, March 3, at Utica College. These volunteers joined 8,000 others in walking and running between three and five miles. The annual event raises money and awareness for the American Heart Association and its fight against heart disease and stroke. Hamilton has fielded a team for many years.

The Richard W. Couper Press published the first issue of American Communal Societies Quarterly (ACSQ) in January 2007. The Couper Press, the publishing arm of the Hamilton College Burke Library, will publish the ACSQ in January, April, July, and October of every year.

Hamilton College president Joan Hinde Stewart was among eight college presidents featured in a cover article “Top of the Class” in The Good Life, Central New York Magazine in its March/April issue. The magazine, published six times a year by The Post-Standard (Syracuse) highlights eight women who head Central New York colleges and universities.

Ken Herold, director of library information systems, participated in a 2003-2005 mapping study, "Knowledge Map of Information Science," a Critical Delphi study with an interdisciplinary panel composed of 57 leading scholars from 16 countries. Results have recently been published at www.success.co.il/is/index.html summarizing the findings of the study, an investigation of the theoretical foundations of the field.

Hamilton College’s Burke Library received the donation of Adirondacks murderer Chester Gillette’s diary from his grandniece in a ceremony on March 6. Gillette was convicted of the 1906 murder of his lover Grace Brown at Big Moose Lake in the Adirondacks. The diary was written between 1907 and 1908 while Gillette was in Auburn prison, awaiting his execution.

On March 6, Georgetown University professor of justice and peace studies and philosophy Dr. Mark Lance spoke in the Science Center Auditorium. Marianne Janack of the Hamilton philosophy department introduced Lance, pointing out that in addition to his scholarly work, Lance has been an activist for more than 20 years.