The Harvard Crimson :: Special Packages

OPINION
A note from the Editorial Board
By SAHIL K. MAHTANI and BRIAN J. ROSENBERG
The Harvard of 1981, as revealed by The Crimson’s editorial pages of that year, was marked by affairs that may seem anachronistic today; yet they are relevant still. As movements for women’s rights and gay rights gained prominence in the student psyche, a concerted attempt at minority enfranchisement within the Harvard Faculty gained steam. Ineffectual government was also on the forefront of student thought, as students became disillusioned by the newly-created Student Assembly as well as the tepid politics of the Democratic Party. That Harvard seems prone to a glacial pace of change is manifested in an excerpt on the creation of a new Literature concentration. And lastly, Harvard’s efforts at land development yielded controversy at the Sumner Road apartments, a story that bears no small similarity to the recent dispute over the Charlesview apartments in Allston. George Santayana’s old adage comes to mind, that “those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.” If there is any solace here, it is that the eminent philosopher was, through and through, a Harvard man.

Our Traditions

After the Deluge

CHUL Ducks

Small Step for the K-School

Some Things Never Change

Literature at Last

PROFILES
Susan Faludi
By ALLISON A. FROST
Monday, June 05, 2006 4:22 PM
On June 2, 1986, Newsweek magazine reported that college-educated women over 40 were more likely to be killed by a terrorist than to get married. America was facing a “man shortage,” the article said, citing new research by two Yale University sociologists and a Harvard economist. The results of the study, which were received with a flood of attention, perplexed Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and feminist Susan C. Faludi ‘81.

Melissa Scott
By DORIS A. HERNANDEZ
Monday, June 05, 2006 4:23 PM
One could say that well-known author Melissa E. Scott ’81 fell into science-fiction writing. Scott first encountered the genre after a gym-class incident that left her with a broken arm and a gig as a library monitor. “I’m not the world’s most coordinated human being,” she says. A precocious child who learned to read at three, Scott recounts becoming immersed in thrillers while at the library. “From then on, I was pretty much hooked,” Scott says.

Robin Worth
By ADITI BANGA
Monday, June 05, 2006 4:24 PM
From her worldwide travels to various jobs, Robin M. Worth ’81 has never been one to shy away from new adventures. She has backpacked through Europe and Asia and has volunteered in rural Ethiopia at a school and health clinic. But these experiences have been marked by repeated returns to Harvard, a place that gave her opportunities this native Texan might not have had. “I was always aware of how different my life would have been had I not come to Harvard,” she says.

Penny Pritzker
By MADELINE W. LISSNER
Monday, June 05, 2006 4:25 PM
Penny S. Pritzker ’81 could have sat back and reveled in her life as a member of the multi-billion dollar Pritzker dynasty. Instead, the girl who once told classmates that she just worked at a hotel behind the front desk—casually failing to mention that her family owned the chain—has made a name for herself, distinct from her family’s. This Hyatt heiress founded and runs the luxury retirement community series Hyatt Classic Residence, serves as president and CEO of Pritzker Realty Group, chairs the board of the credit reporting company TransUnion, and sits on the Harvard Board of Overseers. Forbes magazine ranked Pritzker number 89 on its 2005 list of 100 most powerful women.

Suzy Welch
By KATHERINE M. GRAY
Monday, June 05, 2006 4:27 PM
When Suzy R. Welch ’81 falls in love, she falls hard. As an undergraduate working at The Crimson, she discovered her love for journalism. As a graduate student at Harvard Business School, she discovered her love for business—its potential and problems. And as editor of the Harvard Business Review (HBR), she discovered her love for Jack F. Welch. After a lunch together, which in her words “was the longest in the history of mankind,” and dinner later that evening, Jack and the future Mrs. Welch realized their relationship was a romantic one. The next day, she called her boss Walter Kiechel ’68, editorial director of Harvard Business School Publications, to tell him that he should pull the article she had written on Jack Welch. Four months later, she resigned.

Carlton Cuse
By REED B. RAYMAN
Monday, June 05, 2006 4:28 PM
A. Carlton Cuse ’81 wishes he were as cool as the smooth-talking, straight-shooting character Sawyer on the ABC hit TV show “Lost.” Then again, he did help create the character. “He’s as cool as I wish I was,” Cuse jokes. As the co-executive producer of the popular show, Cuse is one of a handful of people who know the well-kept secrets behind the mysterious island on which the show is set. The former Harvard varsity rower has been involved with the show since its very early stages and has won several awards for his work. But Cuse’s huge success with “Lost” is just one stage in an illustrious career in entertainment that has led to the creation of several other popular television shows and that was born while he was still an undergraduate living in Eliot House. ‘YOU CAN GET PAID TO DO THIS?’ Cuse arrived at Harvard from the Putney School in Vermont as a pre-med, but he soon realized his calling was elsewhere.

Alice Randall
By APRIL H.N. YEE
Monday, June 05, 2006 4:29 PM
Twenty-five years after Alice Randall ’81 graduated from the College, her daughter Caroline will join Harvard as a freshman. She considers the girl her finest piece of work. Randall has plenty else to brag about, from her controversial parody of the Reconstruction classic “Gone With The Wind” to a country song that made her the only African-American woman to pen a chart-topper. But even in these creative efforts, she examines motherhood and what it means to be a daughter. Randall will deliver the Radcliffe Day speech Friday morning in Memorial Church. Friends praise her for her “effervescent” personality, which has made her a leader in her class. ‘I’LL CRY FOR YOURS’ Though Randall was born in Detroit, raised there and in Washington, D.C., and schooled here at Harvard, she’s a Southerner at heart. Her father’s family is from Alabama, and she moved to Nashville shortly after graduating from the College.