The Brown Daily Herald F riday, D ecember 5, 2008
Volume CXLIII, No. 124
Since 1866, Daily Since 1891
Top U. investment managers earn $2.6 million in 2007 Simmons’ pay up 13 percent over 2006
Chief Investment Officer Cynthia Frost topped the list of Brown’s highest paid employees in 2007 with a package of $1,351,639, according to the University’s most recent tax filings. Frost, who oversees the investment of the University’s endowment, took home 55 percent more during that fiscal year than she did in the previous fiscal year, when she earned $871,257, including benefits. President Ruth Simmons earned $775,715 during the same period, an increase of 13 percent from her previous year’s earnings of $689,007. Simmons’ compensation put her solidly above the median salar y of $527,172 for presidents of private research universities in 2007, according to data compiled by the Chronicle of Higher Education, but still below that of some highly paid Ivy League presidents such as Columbia’s Lee Bollinger ($1,411,894) and the University of Pennsylvania’s Amy Gutmann ($1,088,786). Simmons, who in 2006 trailed
Quinn Savit / Herald
Divided ‘Square Roots’ reaches its limit By Stephanie Pottinger Contributing Writer
After a two-year stay on the Front Green, Patrick Dougherty’s “Square Roots” will be dismantled and removed in January 2009. When the University’s Public Art Committee acquired the work in 2006, it envisioned an installation
of no less than one year, but there was “no agreed-upon amount of time” for the sculpture to remain,
ARTS & CULTURE said Committee member and David Winton Bell Gallery Director JoAnn Conklin. Dougherty said he is comfort-
able with the fact that the exhibition of “Square Roots” is nearing a close. He also expressed gratitude for the University’s efforts to keep it up in modified form even after last year’s damage — when the center portion was removed after being hit by a falling tree. continued on page 4
Cynthia Frost $1,351,639 $785, 880
Kenneth Shimberg
Managing Director, Office of Investment
Ruth Simmons $775,718 President
Edward Wing
$525, 488
Andrew Wert
$504,288
Chair, Department of Medicine*
Managing Director, Office of Investment
*Wing is now the Dean of Medicine and Biological Sciences. **Adashi stepped down as Dean at the end of the 2007-2008 academic year.
only Frost in total earnings, was Source: Internal Revenue Service edged out in 2007 by Of fice of Investment Managing Director Kenneth Shimberg, who earned $785,880 for overseeing investments in private equity. Andrew Wert, the managing director who oversees marketable securities for the investment office, earned $504,288. Also among Brown’s biggest continued on page 6
SPOTLIGHT
Scholarship, pulp and nudes in new Hay LGBT collection The Smith Collection won’t be open to the public for about three to four years, Cullen said, because of Known for its eclectic assortment of the time needed to properly catalog holdings — including a 500-volume the material. collection on the history of recreThe library has been specifically ational fireworks and 80 volumes re- collecting gay and lesbian works for covered from Adolf Hitler’s personal almost 20 years, Cullen said, and library — the Hay will add more than already boasts at least 5,000 LGBT4,000 volumes to its gay and lesbian related volumes as well as the papers catalog to form the Ronald Smith of several prominent figures from Collection, named after the gay and lesbian comthe donor. The collection munities. FEATURE includes more than 1,300 The 1991 donation of scholarly works, 2,000 works of fiction the sizeable Katzoff Collection providand 40 volumes of male nudes. ed the John Hay with its first primarWhy did Smith choose Brown as ily gay and lesbian collection. Since the recipient of his collection? “They then, the presence of that collection were willing to take it,” he said. Smith has attracted numerous related donasaid he worried that the Northeast tions, Cullen said. did not have a collection of this sort According to the Hay’s Web site, and “spent several years trying to the Katzoff Collection itself has been find a school or a public library ... that augmented by some 30,000 works of would provide a home for it.” gay pulp fiction from the 1950s and Smith contacted the public library 1960s. The Hay also features a collecin Provincetown, Mass., but he was tion exclusively containing gay and told the library was not equipped to lesbian pulp. It boasts such titles as acquire the collection. Fortunately, 1989’s anonymously authored “ComProvincetown’s librarian was in touch ing Cousins,” released by publisher with an informal network of people Gay Incest, and 1968’s “Those Holinterested in lesbian, gay, bisexual lywood Homos!” by Todd Martin. and transgender (LGBT) materials After receiving the Katzoff Coland was able to direct Smith to the lection, the Hay acquired the PresHay. ton Archives — the papers of John Smith “essentially found us,” said Preston, an author of gay literature, Rosemary Cullen MA’72, American erotica and nonfiction. As a result of literature and popular culture librarian at the Hay. continued on page 4
(FY2007) Includes compensation and benefits
Chief Investment Officer
By Gaurie Tilak Senior Staff Writer
“Square Roots,” Patrick Dougherty’s wooden sculpture on the Front Green, will be dismantled in January.
Brown’s Highest Paid
By Ben Schreckinger Staff Writer
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ARTS & CULTURE
Upright and Locked ‘The Thing About Air Travel,’ written by Max Posner ’11, opens tonight at PW
www.browndailyherald.com
5
CAMPUS NEWS
Courtesy of Susan Asselin
Susan Asselin — aka Mother Mystic — has seen a 50 percent increase in readings during the recent economic woes. She is nearly out of prosperity oil.
Psychics surprised by recession boon By Chaz Firestone Features Editor
Susan Asselin is one of Rhode Island’s most sought-after consultants. She runs a private business out of her North Providence home, sees up to 20 clients a week and has a pedigree including advisers stretching back a century. And
fungi be gone Professor David Cane is working to protect plants from the harmful effects of gray mold
11
OPINIONS
with this week’s announcement from the National Bureau of Economic Research that the United States is officially in a recession, Asselin is full of advice for clients looking to climb their way out of a deep financial hole: “Coffins,” she says, “and a few drops of prosperity oil.” That’s because Asselin consults
A-OK Kevin Roose ’09.5 thinks Brown should just say no to grade deflation — sort of
195 Angell Street, Providence, Rhode Island
with the spiritual realm before she meets with her clients. Asselin — or Mother Mystic, as she is known to those who seek her advice — is a psychic reader, reiki master and connoisseuse of “magickal oils.” And like many in Rhode Island’s spiritual community — including four other local readers who say continued on page 4
Winter Break This is the last issue of The Herald this semester. Check browndailyherald.com for updates. We will resume publication Jan. 21. News tips: herald@browndailyherald.com