READERS WRITE

Thanks to the alumni who wrote to us with their memories of a favorite place on campus. Nice job to all, but we especially liked Faith Brown Kerr’s look back at Billings. She had us at “an inch of slush.” Faith wins an 8 x 10 color print of a campus scene from the stock of UVM Photography Services.

NEXT ASSIGNMENT: Write to us with your most memorable UVM sports moment. Athlete or spectator, what was the shot, the race, the game that has stuck in your mind for years? Don’t restrict yourself to varsity sports – your friend Josh’s awesome catch at the 1987 Ultimate Frisbee tourney in Northampton is fully eligible. Please limit text to 100 words or fewer. E-mail responses to vermontquarterly@uvm.edu or mail to Vermont Quarterly, 86 South Williams, Burlington, VT 05401.
THE PRIZE: Our favorite letter will get a state-of-the-art UVM hockey jersey (those letters are sewn on, people) from the UVM Bookstore.

HALLWAY HANGOUT
Every Friday and Saturday night, the smell of air-popped popcorn, Domino’s pizza, or All-American Hero sandwiches lingered in the narrow hall of the fourth floor of Buckham Hall. Many of us girls would gather outside our doors, sit on the floor, eat, and discuss whatever was on our minds. Boys (especially the men’s soccer team), our last trip downtown or party we attended, and all the studying we faced were always favorite topics. I made some of my best friends in those moments and smile now anytime I think of those times.

Amy Evans Sparks ’84
Amherst, New Hampshire

LOFTY READING
Billings in the late 1970s was a mixed bag. The snack bar in the basement always had an inch of slush on the floor, and piles of steaming parkas saving places for people. Cold air would blast in constantly as the double doors opened. After a quick lunch, I’d climb the stairs to the higher reaches of Billings. There were catwalk/mezzanines above, that looked down on the atrium – just wide enough for a chair and table. That’s where I would read between classes – the 900-page novels for 19th-century lit especially – with the dull roar from below and a great view out the windows for a break.

Faith Brown Kerr ’82
Ivoryton, Connecticut

KITTY WRITES!
My favorite spot on campus, back when I was there, was the usually unnoticed breezeway connecting Patrick Gym to Gutterson.  The dank, fluorescently lit, cement-floored hall was tracked with mud and melted snow. When it was packed with pumped, or even disappointed, Cats fans it hummed with a palpable UVM spirit as we celebrated Vermont’s favorite hockey team. The hall would sometimes be dotted with Coke cups or dropped team programs, yet it captured all of the energy, excitement, and pride of being a UVM Catamount. Go Cats, Go!

Kitty Catamount ’89
South Burlington, Vermont

CREEPING V. CRAWLING
In my ROTC class in the Old Mill at UVM in 1930, the instructor, a tough old bird named Sgt. O’Connor, asked “What is the difference between crawling and creeping?”

I’d use the techniques years later during World War II, but I didn’t know them then. Naturally, I was called on to answer. After I gave the wrong answer, Sgt. O’Connor said, “Mr. Gould, go to the supply room and have the sergeant outfit you in fatigues, then return here.”

I was outfitted in fatigues about four times too big. I looked like “Sad Sack,” and, of course, the room exploded in laughter when I returned. I then spent the next 20 minutes crawling and creeping across the classroom floor. After that, I never forgot the difference. Creeping is done on your hands and knees. Crawling is done on your belly.

Phil Gould ’34
Essex Junction, Vermont

MAT MATTERS
As I daydream and reflect on my years at UVM, the one place that keeps drawing me back is the Marsh-Austin-Tupper dorm complex, or MAT as it was known.  Some very special friendships started there, my best man in my wedding for example, friendships that after 23 years, and in most cases hundreds or even thousands of miles, remain a very special place in my life. I met my wife of 22 years at MAT and I wasn’t even living there at the time. The memories too will always stay with me. The midnight floor hockey games in the basement lounge of Austin, the pig roasts, "all nighters" in the MAT lounge, the water fights, the Halloween parties dressed up as...well you get the idea. Memories that even time cannot take away.

Thanks for the trip down memory lane.  It was a blast.

Rob Just '82
Liverpool, New York

ROMANTIC VIEW
In 1974, I arrived as a 17-year old freshman from the Northeast Kingdom’s deep woods. UVM’s huge campus and crush of students overwhelmed me, but I soon found Waterman’s cozy basement dining hall, dispensers of cash and smiles in the Bursar’s Office, and wide stone corridors. The small classrooms on the upper floors were haunted not by the rumored ghost but by dedicated professors. In winter, heat rose to the fifth floor where I stood on tiptoe to peek through half-moon windows. The Romance Languages lab had the best view –overlooking Burlington and Lake Champlain. From there, I could see the future.

Kathy Boisse Crosett ’78, G’83
North Andover, Massachusetts

HILLS INSPIRATION
I grew up as a “townie,” one of many professors’ kids living near UVM. Occasionally, my dad would have to do some weekend work in his microbiology lab in the Hills Building, and somehow I was the lucky one of three children invited to go along.  As Dad worked, I was free to wander. Odors of Bunsen burners, wafting chemicals, old wood; the screech of his desk drawer for candy, echoed steps on cracked linoleum; hypnotic koi in the eternal summer of the greenhouse - the Hills Building became my definition of learning. Without knowing, Dad had created a scientist.

Peggy Johnstone Taves ’77
Fairfax Station, Virginia

SINGING WATERMAN’S PRAISES
During the basketball playoffs in March, a Michigan State alum neighbor asked me to sing one of my alma mater songs, and the one that always pops up in my mind is "Ver-mont, my Ver-mont,  my heart yearns for thee...".

So, in keeping with that theme, I have taken some
poetic license to "yearn" for my favorite UVM building:

Waterman, oh, Waterman, my heart yearns for thee
Yearns for the coffee lounge, and the duck pin alley.
Long may we cherish that stately building of old,
Its bustling halls now silent, our memories unfold!

Barb Jones Coussement '51
Wheaton, Illinois

OLD MILL “DORM”
Some of us freshmen women in the fall of 1947 were to have the honor of being the first occupants of the new, modern Grace Coolidge Hall on Redstone Campus. There was only one problem when we arrived on campus: the building wasn’t finished. So we were housed the entire first semester in classrooms in the Old Mill. There were 16 of us in our room, in eight double bunks (each with our roommate to be). We each had an “armoire” closet and a chest of drawers. The next room was the “study” room, with tables and chairs sandwiched between our “bedroom” and the next room, which housed eight girls.

I don’t remember where we kept books, how lights-out was managed, or the two shower stalls for the 24 of us, but we all survived and moving into the cold, damp cement of Coolidge in January was a total luxury.

Valery Worth Yandow ’51 MD ’56
West Brattleboro, Vermont

STARTER HOUSE
It was 1953. We had enjoyed the communal life of the UVM trailer park since our marriage in 1950. Now, graduating, with an 18-month-old child and another on the way, it was time to move on.

Rather than tear down the little house/ticket office at the East Avenue entrance to Centennial Field, UVM agreed it could be moved. So, we bought it, moved it to Hinesburg Road, and pushed the back wall out 12 feet! In spite of flimsy walls, little windows, and tiny closets, our new home seemed luxurious. We had gained hot and cold running water, our own bathroom, a room for each child, and a washer and dryer on the porch.

We appreciated the start this gave us and enjoyed three fun years in that little house.

Betty and Del Borah ’53
Williston, Vermont