4.13.17 Hillsdale Collegian by The Hillsdale Collegian

Truck ignites in Finish Line parking lot A man woke up to flames surrounding his truck parked in the parking lot of the Finish Line restaurant at 6:30 a.m. Saturday. A6

Birzer Bandana drops new album Professor of History Brad Birzer recently released a progressive rock album with British musician Dave Smith. B1

Campus coffee culture A.J.’s Café and Jitters Coffee Cart, Hillsdale’s two sources of caffeination, each has its own distinct culture. B3

Christ Chapel benefactors Jo and Jack Babbit, College President Larry Arnn, Board of Trustees President WIlliam Brodbeck, and Chief Administrative Officer Rich Péwé break ground in honor of the beginning of construction of Christ Chapel on April 6 in Phillips Auditorium. Breana Noble | Collegian

Michigan’s oldest college newspaper Vol. 140

Issue 25

13 April

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College celebrates Christ Chapel groundbreaking By | Breana Noble News Editor Snowy and windy weather did not stop Hillsdale College President Larry Arnn from shoving a spade into dirt for the groundbreaking of Christ Chapel on April 6. Arnn, the chapel’s original benefactors, and members from the college Board of Trustees turned over soil from a makeshift ground, as faculty, students, and other donors congregated in Phillips Auditorium immediately following spring Convocation to celebrate the beginning of the twoyear construction of the $28.6 million chapel. Between songs of hallelujahs from the chamber choir, Arnn said today, the education debate treats students as “factors of production” but that schools need to train them as what they are: “immortal souls created in the image of God.” “Something is lost,” Arnn said. “It has to be recovered. This chapel will be the single most visible act of restoration and recovery that we will commit in a physical sense. It is a

Food fight: Student Fed approves CHP request By | Emily Blatter Collegian Reporter After a contentious debate, Hillsdale College’s Student Federation voted 14-4 to allocate nearly $7,000 from its surplus fund for Centrahallapalooza at its April 6 meeting. The $6,858.21 is covering half the cost of food — the other half coming from the Student Activities Board’s own fund — which SAB members said they hope will purchase more and better options. “Time after time, when we survey students after each Centralhallapalooza, the most surveyed thing people wanted to see more of was quality of food and amount of food,” SAB Event Coordinator senior Shelby Phillips said. Last year, Student Fed gave SAB $6,214.99. The amount this year is coming from the federation’s surplus accumulated over several years, since the group has already spent its $10,000 discretionary budget. “This is seven tenths of the budget that we get per semester,” Student Fed Junior Rep. Brendan Noble said. “That’s a lot of money, and we’re running a deficit. And the surplus, at this rate, if we pass this, we’ll run out in three semesters, which will be before sophomores graduate.” T h e See Fed A2 Follow @HDaleCollegian

statement about something higher from which we take our dignity. Today, that is so often called bigotry, but it is not. It is love.” Although the construction on Christ Chapel has begun, the college is still working to raise $4.6 million for construction and fees, $4.5 million to endow scholarships and a faculty position for a sacred music program, and $1.75 million for the operating endowment. Hillsdale has already raised $24 million in cash and pledges, as well as an additional $3 million for the chapel’s two organs. Arnn said since he arrived at Hillsdale, his master plan for campus has included a chapel. With moldy classrooms and dated architecture, the college, however, needed to focus its resources toward other projects, Arnn said. He said he was waiting for someone who would bring the chapel to the forefront. That was Jack and Jo Babbit. On a visit to Hillsdale in 2013, the couple asked if the college had a space in which students could worship. After seeing the small chapel in the Knorr Student Center, they offered to

help build a new one, donating $12.5 million. “They took us to a room that reminded me more of a wine cellar than a chapel,” Jack Babbit said. “You could maybe fit 20 people in it.” Christ Chapel will be 27,000 square feet and hold up to 1,350 people. In addition to serving as a sacred space, the building will offer room for the college to hold Convocation, music performances, and large lectures. “God’s been working his blessing to allow us to have the thoughts, but, most of all, we see how everyone has responded to add their talents, their money, their time,” Jo Babbit said. “We’ve all come together for the glory of God.” Duncan Stroik, the architect of the project, said he was grateful to have designed Christ Chapel, which was inspired by colonial American churches, St Paul’s Cathedral in London, and Oxford University. He said the greatest challenge was designing a space that could fit nearly all of the students and still feel comfortable holding a few hundred. “There’s really nothing bet-

ter than doing a college chapel, because we know people are going to use it and they’re going to use it well,” Stroik said. “It’ll be used for centuries, and they’re going to come back and appreciate this wonderful chapel, Christ Chapel, your chapel.” Students who attended the groundbreaking said the ceremony made them more excited about the chapel. “It was interesting hearing the architect and what it meant to Dr. Arnn,” freshman Nate Gipe said. “I approve of all the work and money they’re putting into it.” Freshman Jenna Wiita agreed: “I saw that their hearts are in the right place.” Freshman Samuel Musser said he is grateful for the Babbits and the work the college is putting into the chapel. “I appreciate it’s for the glory of God and Jesus,” Musser said. “We see the construction, and sometimes it’s hard to have faith in what you can’t see.” But, freshman Helen Potter said: “We’ll be grateful, when it is done.”

Centralhallapalooza

Robert Abisi and Nick Shanholtz of Lost Kings will perform at Hillsdale College on April 29 for Centralhallapalooza. Facebook

Lost Kings to perform at SAB’s space-themed CHP By | S.M. Chavey Features Editor There’s 16 days left in the “Countdown to Launch” until students are “blasted off into outer space” — the theme for this year’s Centralhallapalooza on April 29. According to the Student Activities Board, the outer-space theme naturally fits the event, which will feature bounce houses and neon colors, black lights, and futuristic decorations to set the stage for the Lost Kings, a DJ duo known for electronic dance music, remixes, and mashups. “We went country, alternative, what do we have left?” SAB Director Anthony Manno

said. “We do cover bands for music, when everyone has their Garden Party and President’s personal taste, we’re always goBall, and you listen to top 40, ing to get criticism, so just by trying new genres and very diverse artists over the years, that’s how we’ve addressed that best.” Rather than a grand reveal of the headlining artist, students can expect daily spacethemed giveaways in different areas around campus, during the week leading up to the event. Lost Kings has reached No. 5 on Spotify’s Top Ten most viral tracks for a week, and the group appeared at Billboard’s Hot 100 Festival. Since 2014, the Los Angeles-based duo has and they all have elements of g a i n e d EDM. With something like populari- See CHP A2

“We’re creating a social environment where things can happen and people can have fun.”

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Professors say chapel reaffirms Christian heritage By | Brooke Conrad Collegian Reporter

Christ Chapel will be the newest chapter in Hillsdale College’s long affiliation with Christianity. Provost David Whalen told The Collegian earlier this semester the college has always been Christian and the purpose of the chapel is to “make explicit what is too often implicit.” A group of Free Will Baptists established the college in 1844, because they wanted to create a place for the education of the clergy. The college dropped this affiliation in 1918, because of tension with the denomination over the college’s acceptance of black students. The college switched to an American Baptist affiliation but eventually dropped all sectarian ties in 1962, after a lack of financial support from Baptist churches. The administration attempted to keep the

disassociation covert, however, and did not allow The Collegian to report on it at the time, according to a 2001 Collegian article. In 1964, the college also ended mandatory chapel attendance. The earliest available record from 1856 says students were required to attend chapel every day of the week and twice on Sunday, but over the years, that requirement lessened as student attendance waned, eventually decreasing from five or six days a week, to four, to three, to two, and then finally to twice a month. Although a few students suggested positive reasons for mandatory chapel attendance in early Collegian issues, several students published more critical or satirical pieces, arguing the chapel was unnecessary and had become a place only for sleep or last-minute studying. “I heartily believe chapel

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Suspects charged in Barron homicide By | Thomas Novelly Editor-in-Chief After a week of DNA testing, interviews, and investigation, authorities said they arrested a man and a woman on Sunday believed to be responsible for the recent murder and disposal of a Hillsdale man’s body. Police identified the suspects in Jeremy Barron’s death as Jay Scott Clark, 40, of Bryan, Ohio, and Ashley Diane Hoath, 27, of Hillsdale. A group of Amish boys riding their horses through the woods near the intersection of Dimmers and Gilmore roads in southern Hillsdale County discovered Barron’s body on April 2 and contacted the sheriff ’s department. “I want to make it real clear to the residents of our community,” Hillsdale County Sheriff Tim Parker said during a press conference Monday, “we firmly believe that these two individuals are fully responsible for the murder of Jeremy Barron and that there is no additional threat to our community at this time.”

According to a press release, Clark is being held in prison and faces numerous charges including homicide-open murder, carrying away/disposing of corpse, felon in possession of a firearm, concealing the death of an individual, and possession of methamphetamine. Hoath is being held as an accessory after the fact to homicide-open murder as well as lying to the police in a criminal investigation. Hillsdale County court documents obtained by The Collegian show that Barron was killed by a .45 caliber revolver. According to records from Mitchell Research Center, the latest murder in Hillsdale County was in October 2009 when James McKinney shot and killed James Harper in Jefferson Township. McKinney was sentenced to life in prison. Hillsdale County’s chief assistant prosecuting attorney Megan Stiverson said during a public press conference on Monday that she hopes

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GOAL Program holding school-wide food fundraiser for Haitian students

Fed from A1

Finance Committee recommended that Student Fed give SAB only $6,214.99, the same amount of money it received last year. “The committee was unanimous in its thought that the Student Fed should not allow Centralhallapalooza costs to continue rising,” said sophomore Ross Hatley, Student Fed treasurer and Finance Committee chair. Other federation members, however, said Centralhallapalooza is important enough to the entire student body to justify taking from its surplus.

“The most surveyed thing people wanted to see more of was quality of food and amount of food.” “This is the type of thing that actually infuriates the student body,” Student Fed Junior Rep. John Gage said. “If your average student on campus was in here, they’d be like: ‘What the heck are they talking about, that they’re cutting money from Centralhallapalooza?’ Let’s be honest, if we’re here to represent the student body, the student body wants as much money to go to CHP as possible. That’s just true.” Student Fed also unanimously allocated $1,000 to Alithea, the Christian apologetics lecture series club, to bring Greg Koukl, Stand 2 Reason Ministries founder and a Christian author, to campus on April 24 to discuss his new book. The money will pay Koukl’s honorarium, said sophomore Katarina Bradford, Alithea founder and president. “I know it’s a really big amount, but I have some good news,” Bradford said. “Hopefully we won’t need to request funds next year, because Alithea currently is in contact with a potential permanent donor.” Cecil B. Day Foundation chairman Woody White, who sponsors Christian apologetics clubs at colleges across the nation, has taken an interest in Alithea, Bradford said. His donations could render future aid from Student Fed unnecessary.

CHP from A1

ty, publishing remixes for artists such as Imagine Dragons, Vance Joy, Echosmith, and Rihanna. During their performance, a screen behind them will display lights and videos, fitting into the futuristic theme. Senior Bridget DeLapp, SAB media officer, said the board catapulted off the criticisms and successes of previous years in deciding the theme and attractions. “At the end of the day, you can only control the opportunity, not the reaction,” DeLapp said. “We’re creating a social environment where things can happen and people can have fun. I think that’s our goal. Even in the media campaigns, it’s all about opportunity. We’re there for you; you just have to go and take it.” Social media campaigns will not only be the best source of information about giveaways, but they themselves will be giveaways: The potential grand prize is free catering for a CHP pre-party. Using #Apollo1844, students can post about what they would do with their last day or hour on Earth before being blasted into outer space at CHP. Other attractions at the event include a neon rock wall, a trampoline with a bungee, and a blowup laser tag arena that students can use even if it rains. There’ll be even more food than last year: a fry bar with tater tots and sweet potato fries, lots of ice cream, a popcorn bar, cake pops, and, Director of Student Activities Ashlyn Landherr said, “hundreds, maybe even thousands” of chicken tenders.

A2 13 Apr. 2017

By | Thomas Novelly Editor-in-Chief

Mindy Belz, senior editor for World Magazine, spoke at Hillsdale College on Tuesday about covering Christian persecution in the Middle East. Madeline Barry | Collegian

Two Hillsdale College students have partnered with the GOAL Program in an effort to pack and provide more than 20,000 meals for school children in Haiti. After a January trip to the Caribbean island, senior Jessie Fox and junior Zack Schultz said they were inspired and moved by the need for food and resources in a country plagued by natural disaster and poverty. “People just don’t really know about the need,” Schultz said. “This January, I went back to Haiti with Jessie, and we were so excited to come back with a way to get campus involved.”

Schultz and Fox said they want to maximize campus involvement and education for causes in Haiti by holding a campus-wide meal packing event and fundraiser on April 22 from 10 a.m. to noon. Schultz said they need to raise $6,000, enough money to supply a whole school with food for a year. A spokeswoman from Numana, the group that organizes the meal packing and shipping to Haiti, said she is excited to see Hillsdale hold an event. “On a good day, Haiti can only feed 55 percent of its population,” spokeswoman Morgan Bolander said. “With the recent Hurricane Matthew, that number has dramatically reduced. Thank you, Hillsdale, for stepping up and being a

part of feeding the hungry.” GOAL Program Director Alexis Garcia said she’s glad Schultz and Fox organized an event that incorporates the entire student body. “It’s a great way for campus to get together,” Garcia said. “We’ve never had an event of this scale for a charity event. It’s going to be awesome.” Schultz said it only costs 30 cents to provide a meal for a child, and he said he hopes students will make a small sacrifice for a big cause. “We see a quarter and don’t think much of it,” Schultz said. “But that’s almost a meal for a kid. And that could be the only meal that kid can actually count on in Haiti.”

Covering the ‘infidels’: Keller crowned Miss Congeniality at D.C. cherry blossom festival Mindy Belz discusses Christian persecution -Compiled by Nicole Ault As a senior editor and writer What are the dangers of for World Magazine since 1986, going to these countries as a Mindy Belz has reported from reporter? countries around the world, foI’m often asked, “Were you cusing on war and persecution afraid?” And the honest anin the Middle East. She is the swer is no. It’s not that I’m a author of “They Say We Are Infi- brave person; it’s just that this dels: On the Run from ISIS with is not the thing that makes me Persecuted Christians from the feel afraid. I find that it’s the Middle East.” On Tuesday, she same things that worry me spoke at Hillsdale College about here that worry me there, like her experiences as a journalist getting lost or having a driver covering international persecu- that doesn’t show up. I do try to tion and the refugee crisis. take precautions. But once I’m What inspired you to focus in a situation and I know that I on Christian persecution in have this job to do, I don’t think the Middle East? a whole lot about it. I think it’s When I first started doing usually after the fact that you international reporting, the realize, yeah, that was probaMiddle East was the last place bly pretty dangerous. I was in I wanted to focus; the language Mosul in Iraq in February, and is different, the culture is dif- you’re hearing airplanes overferent, the food is different — head and guns in the distance and there’s a lot of conflict, so and shelling, but the thing that it seems like a forbidding place. you realize is that the people 9/11 was really a catalyst; then there are living with that every it just seemed like we couldn’t day. They’re living with it all ignore the Middle East. What the time, so when you’re there kept me going back was meet- on the ground, you realize this ing the people. It’s a place of is normal life for them, so you amazing hospitality, amazing shouldn’t be afraid. Usually the people who are very resilient people that I’m reporting about and very religious, almost in are in much more danger than their DNA. It’s been drawing I am at that given moment. me back to keep telling those How has reporting in these stories. areas shaped you as a person What is it like interviewing and as a journalist? refugee children? Having a bigger perspective It’s really challenging. Yes- on the world helps you to put terday, I was in a school in De- everything in perspective. A lot troit that has predominantly of our political squabbles and refugee children. They still in debates almost seem immature many ways are traumatized; I in comparison to what people realized I had to be really care- are living with as a result of poful and considerate of that and litical decisions. It’s been realall that they’ve been through, ly discouraging to me the way trying to find out their sto- that refugees have been talked ries without reopening a lot of about in this country and potrauma. This is their safe place, liticized over the past year and and they don’t want to keep go- a half. It’s disheartening and ing over that. I think it is the tragic to me, because I’ve seen children that get me. You see the situations and tragedies just what an incredibly chal- that these people are coming lenging and tragic story theirs out of. You don’t leave your is, because they’re old enough homeland, unless you are truly, to have really absorbed and truly desperate. “Refugee” has will always remember what come to be a suspect term, and they’ve seen. Some of these we have so historically been kids have seen their parents a country that has welcomed and siblings killed. One had those people. I think there’s a his brother killed right beside real desire to turn inward and him in a bombing. I never protect what we have, and we dreamed that this was the kind know that historically that of thing I would be covering, doesn’t work out well and biblibut it is what’s happening. If cally that doesn’t work out well. there’s anything that sort of We can protect our security haunts me or disturbs me, it’s without having to denigrate these kids, and the ones who refugees. It makes me heartsick are old enough to understand to see what other people live that what they’re seeing and with in other countries. That’s living through is not what life a huge way my perspective has should be. been shaped by what I’ve seen and done and where I’ve been.

By | Nicole Ault Collegian Reporter Princesses don’t always have it easy, as participants of the Cherry Blossom Princess Program, held last week during the National Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington, D.C., found out. Long days full of meetings with foreign dignitaries, receptions, a grand ball, and reading to kindergarteners was exhausting — but well worth it, senior Monika Keller said. Sponsored by the National Conference of State Societies, the Cherry Blossom Princess Program is an annual cultural and professional development program for 19-to-24-year-old women, according to the pro-

Senior Monika Keller won Miss Congeniality during the National Cherry Blossom Festival in Washington, D.C. on Friday. Monika Keller | Courtesy

Chapel from A1

should be abolished,” student Robert Patneau ’37 told The Collegian in 1934. “I would rather use my time for breakfast.” Associate Professor of History Darryl Hart said at many colleges, such as Yale and Harvard universities, where the administration changed chapel attendance from a mandatory to voluntary activity, religion has often returned later as an academic discipline. Hart said it would not be unusual for a college to reaffirm its ties to Christianity through a particular denomination, but Hillsdale’s case is unusual since it is nonsectarian. “I think Hillsdale is going in some very uncharted waters,” Hart said. “That may be dangerous, or that may be an easy

gram’s website. Young women can apply to represent their states or territories in the program, and if chosen as princesses, they participate in the week-long event in Washington, D.C. “It was such an awesome week,” said Keller, who represented Washington, her home state, in the program. “It definitely is a crazy week, and you have to learn to be flexible and understanding, but it’s a great mix of events and opportunities.” At the grand ball on Friday, Keller was named Miss Congeniality and presented with a sash and flowers, she said. Before the ball, the princesses had voted on who should receive the title. Keller said she was humbled and surprised to receive the award. Senior Mariah Hardy, who’s Keller’s little sister in the Chi Omega sorority, said she wasn’t surprised. “Monika is a natural leader,” Hardy said in an email. “She acts with integrity and treats others with respect. Monika is giving and inclusive and will go out of her way to make someone feel like they are part of the team.” Keller, who is interning for the Senate Finance Committee for the Washington-Hillsdale Internship Program this semester, said she found out about the program when she came to Washington, D.C. and decided to apply. Part of her interest, she said, came from her Japanese roots: Her mother is from Tokyo, and Japanese traditions have played a role in her upbringing. “I’ve always had an inter-

sail. I don’t know.” College archivist Linda Moore said although the college did receive funding from the Free Will Baptist denomination during its affiliation, students did not have to prove affiliation with the denomination to attend. Educating the clergy was a common goal of many colleges during the 19th century, Hart said, and Hillsdale’s curriculum included Latin and Greek, specifically to help students fulfill the requirements for becoming ministers. Nevertheless, students were not required to become ministers, Gilbert said, and the degrees varied from business, to engineering, to politics, to many others. “From the beginning, the college had a lot of religious goals,” Gilbert said. “As time went by, they added lots of

est in Japanese culture and in Japanese-American relations,” Keller said, noting that every summer, her family would attend a Japanese festival in Seattle, which has a large Japanese community. The cherry blossom trees in Washington, D.C. were a gift from Japan, and the program celebrates the relationship between the two countries, Keller said. This year, 41 princesses participated in the program, Keller said, along with three international princesses from Japan, Russia, and the Philippines. Although the women are called princesses, the event is more like an ambassador program than a pageant, Keller noted. “We’re all representing our states and territories and participating in relational events,” she said. Each day was packed from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. Events included a reception at the Japanese ambassador’s residence, an evening at the Russian Cultural Center, a visit to a sustainable food and agriculture farm at Woodlawn Plantation, and a behind-the-scenes tour of the John F. Kennedy Center of the Performing Arts. On Friday night, the princesses attended the grand ball — featuring sushi chefs flown in from Japan — and on Saturday, they rode in floats at the National Cherry Blossom Parade. Keller said she would recommend that other Hillsdale women apply for the program. “I highly, highly encourage it,” she said. “It is such a blast and definitely memorable. You learn a lot, too.” things, but the college remains loyal to the original idea. It has a moral basis, which runs back to the original years of the college.” Thomas Burke, dean of humanities and the philosophy and religion department chairman, said to him, the chapel reaffirms the college’s religious heritage and its founding not only as a liberal arts college but also to promote Christianity. “One of the discussions in Western thought is the relationship of faith and reason, and Christianity, in part, is a pursuit of that discussion,” he said. “We sometimes forget how thoroughly imbued Western ideas are with theological ideas. To me, the chapel simply represents the fact that we take our Christian heritage as seriously as we do our intellectual heritage.”

Wash. Free Beacon EIC selected as fall Pulliam fellow By | Nic Rowan Collegian Reporter

Washington Free Beacon Editor-in-Chief Matthew Continetti will visit Hillsdale College next semester and teach on conservative journalism. “Many prominent figures in the conservative movement were writers and editors,” Continetti said. “The class will take a look at the greatest thought from conservative thinkers.” Director of the Dow Journalism Program John Miller said Continetti, who is a former intern of Miller’s at the National Review, was chosen as the 2017 fall Eugene C. Pulliam

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Distinguished Fellow in Journalism for the Dow Journalism Program because of his prowess as an opinion journalist. He will teach a one-credit course called Classics of Conservative Journalism on Oct. 16-23. “He’s really flourishing at this moment in his career,” Miller said. “He’s turned the Free Beacon into one of the liveliest and most interesting places for political discourse.” Students enrolled in the course will read pieces from writers such as William F. Buckley, Charles Krauthammer, and Patrick Buchanan. Continetti said he hopes to show how this legacy extends to the next gen-

eration of writers. “The purpose of the course is to give students a sense of what good intellectual journalism looks like, how to write it, and how to get it placed,” he said. In addition to teaching the seminar, Continetti will deliver a speech open to the general campus audience about the importance of conservative journalism. Continetti became interested in journalism himself as a student at Columbia University, where he wrote opinion pieces for the school paper, the Daily Spectator. He did not become a reporter, however, until

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his senior year. “I remember Spencer Ackerman, who was working at The New Republic at the time, gave me this piece of advice: ‘If you really want a job,’ he said, ‘you need to learn how to report,’” Continetti said. Upon graduating Columbia in 2003, Continetti joined the Weekly Standard, where he worked until becoming the Editor-in-Chief of the newly launched Washington Free Beacon in 2011, an online newspaper that features original reporting and investigative pieces.

Matthew Continetti, editor-in-chief of The Washington Free Beacon, will teach a course at Hillsdale College in the fall. Matthew Continetti | Courtesy

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A3 13 Apr. 2017

New sailing club picking up speed with first competition In brief: By | Jessie Fox Sports Editor If the idea catches wind, Hillsdale College may add sailing to its list of club sports next year. Juniors Pearce Pomerleau and Jacob Weaver — the co-founders of the club — plus two other Hillsdale students competed in the Laker Showdown in Holland, Michigan, on April 1-2, sailing 20 races total and placing 12th. There will be an informational meeting on Tuesday at 7 p.m. in the Formal Lounge for interested students. Pomerleau and Weaver said their desire to start the club stems from their love for sailing and the idea that other Hillsdale students would, too. “Our goal is a two-part goal,” Weaver said. “The first is to get students interested in and involved in sailing and teach them to sail and really promote the sport. The second portion would be to develop sailors in a way that will allow us to compete in different competitions in the Midwest and hopefully at the national level one day.” Pomerleau and Weaver both have a history with sailing and independently were working to start a sailing club on campus, when a mutual friend connect-

ed them, Pomerleau said. Since then, the two have worked together to spread awareness and measure interest levels on campus. “We’ve been stumbling on more and more people who enjoy the sport of sailing or would like to know more,” Weaver said. “It’s really a lifelong sport. It has a very broad appeal, especially to the students of Hillsdale.” So far, the club has nine experienced sailors lined up to compete next semester, including one incoming freshman. “That’s not including all of the incoming freshmen we don’t know about,” Pomerleau said. Weaver said he wants the team to compete in six or seven regattas in the Midwest Conference Sailing Association next semester. First, the club will need to find a faculty adviser and apply to be an official club sport. The men plan to practice on Lake Baw Beese using the boat Weaver bought and fixed up when he was 16 years old. “I read a book, tossed it on the water, and hoped for the best,” Weaver said. Pomerleau said he comes from a sailing family and has competed since he was 5 years old. When junior Lucas Blatter,

By | Jordyn Pair Assistant Editor It’s an unusual sight on most campuses, but a common one in Hillsdale’s dorms: posted visiting hours noting when opposite-sex students can visit the women’s and men’s dorms. Despite 90 percent of schools housing students in coed dormitories, according to a study in the Journal of American College Health, Hillsdale College maintains its single-sex dorms.

“We’re not telling the students where to live and how to live, but we’re teaching them the fundamental principles that will bless their lives,” Associate Dean of Men Jeffery Rogers said. “We’re learning and growing here. It’s a process, and it’s beautiful to watch.” Hillsdale has three men’s dorms and eight women’s dorms, in addition to the Suites. All of them are single-sex, except for the Suites, where a men’s wing and women’s wing are separated by key

Online courses unveils Western Theological Tradition

By | Nolan Ryan Collegian Freelancer

Freshman Ben Dietderich and juniors Pearce Pomerleau, Lucas Blatter, and Jacob Weaver competed in the Laker Challenge April 1-2 in Holland, Michigan. Jacob Weaver | Courtesy

however, competed with Weaver and Pomerleau, it was only his second time sailing. “Two days prior to the competition, I had no idea the sailing club was a thing at all,” Blatter said in an email. “We went out to Baw Beese, and Jacob taught me the ropes — no pun intended. Second time I ever sailed was in competition, and it was definitely different. Way more pressure, all these rules I didn’t know about, some of the teams were super intense about it, too.” Hope College and Grand Valley State University co-hosted the Laker Challenge, draw-

ing 10 schools to compete in the regatta. Hillsdale placed 12th of 13 teams. “We did really have low expectations,” Pomerleau said. “It’s a really great community. We met so many wonderful people from other schools who were really welcoming to the idea of Hillsdale having a team.” In the 1940s and late 1950s, Hillsdale College had a competitive sailing club. In the spring of 1980, Hillsdale students set sail once again and again in 1995. For more than a decade, however, Hillsdale has stayed off the water.

Weaver said he’s excited about the prospect of Hillsdale joining the collegiate sailing community. “This is not just a random sport,” he said. “This is an established tradition at colleges across the Midwest, and we have access to Baw Beese, we’re in a prime location as far as regattas go. We’re a little landlocked here, but we’re a doable distance from every major school in our conference except Wisconsin and Minnesota. The club is not just about competition; it’s about understanding what sailing is and enjoying the sport itself.”

Hillsdale among the few without co-ed dorms

(Back) Sophomores Theresa Boyd and Andres Torres play cards with (front) sophomore Morgan Channels and freshman Ben Boyle in Simpson Residence. Hillsdale College is in the 10 percent of colleges that do not have co-ed dormitories. Madeline Barry | Collegian

swipes. Each dorm also has restricted in-room visitation hours for the opposite sex. Women’s dorms allow in-room visitation from 7 p.m. to 11 p.m. on Tuesday evenings, noon to 1 a.m. on Friday and Saturday evenings, and 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. on Sunday. Men’s dorms have similar hours, except they allow women on Wednesday and not Tuesday. Administration cited the college’s Christian mission statement as well as practical reasoning for maintaining single-sex dorms. “Young women are getting to learn about themselves, and you want to learn it in a sisterhood not with a brotherhood mixed in,” Rogers said, adding that men would have to “change who they were to accommodate females in their space.” Rogers also stressed the growth and bonding that takes place in the dorms, saying having mixed-gender dorms would be a distraction. Dean of Women Diane Philipp said it is part of the school’s responsibility to provide a lifestyle free of distractions associated with co-ed housing. “I have had conversations

with many students five, 10, and many years after graduation, and they share that their residence-hall life with their male friends and girl friends without the distraction of coed housing was one of the best experiences of their time at Hillsdale,” Philipp said. But the decision to prohibit co-ed dorms has become a disgruntlement for some students who claim that a college promoting self-government while simultaneously imposing restrictions on students and dorming is contradictory. “It’s not that we don’t trust the students,” Rogers said. “Trust is not the issue.” Freshman Luke Grzywacz, who lives in Simpson Residence, said while he would support the idea of a mixed-gender dorm, he understands having single-sex housing. His problem, rather, lies with visiting hours, he said. “Limiting the visiting hours pretends that college students don’t stay up with people who are not the same gender as them past midnight,” Grzywacz said. “We’re a college that promotes individual responsibility, but we don’t trust our students to interact with each other in a private setting without having some sort of draconian visit-

ing-hour rule in place. It’s kind of absurd.” Others, however, said the rules communicate a commitment to the college’s mission and beliefs. “In today’s day and age, with a lot of confusion about gender roles and men and women, it’s a really clear statement of what we believe in,” said senior Griffith Brown, a Simpson resident assistant. “We come to study and to learn, and part of having the single-gender dorm that way is to focus on that goal.” Junior Emily Barnum, head resident assistant in Olds Residence, agreed having separate dorms for men and women raises Hillsdale as an example to other colleges. “I think Hillsdale College bears a unique and vital role in America today as a bulwark of tradition and conservative values,” Barnum said in an email. “We have many eyes on us — those who agree and those who don’t. I think one challenge we face in the ’Dale is to live out on campus the ideals that we champion in the classroom.” And those ideals, it seems, are here to stay. “Most colleges are co-ed; we’re different,” Rogers said. “We’re still going to hold steady. That makes us Hillsdale.”

Hillsdale professors, students disagree with GOP teacher quotas By | Anders Hagstrom Senior Writers A proposed law in Iowa would require universities to hire a similar ratio of conservative and liberal professors, but Hillsdale College faculty and students said such a policy would not be conducive to a liberal arts education. The legislation, SF-288, would prevent Iowa’s three state-run universities — the University of Iowa, Iowa State University, and the University of Northern Iowa — from hiring new professors if the new faculty member would “cause the percentage of the faculty belonging to one political party to exceed by ten percent the percentage of the faculty belonging to the other political party.” The state senator who proposed the anti-partisanship legislation, Republican Mark Chelgren, said in February he hopes it would prevent universities from becoming spaces without free speech. In 1990, 42 percent of America’s college professors identified as “liberal or far left,” more than double the 19 percent who identified as “conservative or far right,” according to a study published in the Washington

things to know from this week

-Compiled by Jordyn Pair

Post. Since 1990, liberal dominance on campuses has grown steadily, with liberal professors making up 60 percent of faculty members in 2014, while conservative professor presence had fallen to 12 percent. The combination of liberal dominance on America’s campuses and violent protests like those at Middlebury College, where a professor sustained minor injuries while escorting a guest lecturer, and the University of California, Berkeley, where demonstrators against Milo Yiannopoulos speaking on campus caused $100,000 in property damages, were enough to lead lawmakers in Iowa to consider legislation to curb partisanship in higher ed-

ucation institutions. As the rest of America’s schools continue to slide left, however, Hillsdale College’s faculty has remained largely conservative, and this is most likely due to the college’s hiring process. While Associate Professor of Politics John Grant calls the hiring test proposed in Iowa “problematic,” Hillsdale has one of its own. “I think it’s a very bad idea to ask people, ‘Are you a Republican; are you a Democrat?” Grant said. “It kind of goes against the whole point of liberal education where you have to be interested in the pursuit of truth above all – not primarily committed to a partisan position.”

While Hillsdale does not require faculty candidates to reveal their political leanings, it does require them to comment on the college’s mission statement, a document which binds the college to “our Western philosophical and theological inheritance,” of which the document claims the American Founding is the “clearest expression.” Senior Amelia Stieren said she supports the college’s requirement. “I think it only makes sense that Hillsdale would want its faculty to support the mission statement,” Stieren said. “But no law should require universities to turn away qualified candidates just because of their

political leanings.” Senior William Persson, a member of Hillsdale College Democrats, agreed, saying that so long as students are required to sign the Honor Code and comment on the mission statement, it makes sense that faculty should have a similar process. “While I think it might be beneficial to have more politically diverse faculty in some departments, a good liberal arts education doesn’t depend on the politics of the professor,” Persson said. “It’s an issue that every college faces, but it certainly shouldn’t be sorted out by a law.”

Change in U.S. professors’ political affiliations Grace DeSandro | Collegian

Trump sends mixed foreign policy messages President Donald Trump said he has no further plans of involvement in Syria, despite ordering an airstrike last week. Trump, however, did send an aircraft carrier and its battle group into North Korean waters. He also tweeted that North Korea is “looking for trouble.”

NASA puts the Earth up for adoption NASA is putting 64,000 sections of the Earth up for adoption for free. The 55-mile wide sections are assigned randomly, but adopters will have access to individualized scientific data about their section. NASA hopes to have all the sections adopted by Earth Day, April 22.

Fight or flight: United passenger said he’ll sue David Dao, the United Airlines passenger forcibly removed from a flight Sunday, announced he would fight back in court. The 69-yearold doctor was one of four passengers removed from an overbooked flight. Dao was dragged off the plane, after he refused.

Louisiana offers drive-thru prayer on Good Friday A Louisiana church is offering drive-thru prayer service this Good Friday. Since the church is located next to a busy highway, one minister said, it helps with outreach for commuters. More than 100 drivers participated last year.

Hillsdale College’s Online Courses released the first lesson for its newest course, the Western Theological Tradition, on Monday. This is the 19th course being offered online, providing non-students the opportunity to get a taste of what students learn from Hillsdale’s curriculum and faculty. It is free for the public to access at online. hillsdale.edu. “Theology is part of the college core curriculum and also a central theme of the college’s original Articles of Association,” Matt Bell, director of programs for external affairs, said in an email. “This course was chosen, as all courses are, to further the mission of the college. Hopefully, the course will give people a small taste of what our core course is like.” Bell said the course will include filmed lectures from Humanities Dean Thomas Burke, Assistant Professor of Theology Jordan Wales, and Assistant Professor of Religion Donald Westblade. College President Larry Arnn introduces the lectures, Westblade said. He said the course helps participants understand the nature of Christ and the trinity and other human truths. “Theology, in its focus on God, is oriented on ultimate ends and therefore addresses questions fundamental to every other discipline,” Westblade said. “What we think about God reflects and influences what we think about everything else: to recognize that our greatest happiness lies in imitating God’s delight in doing others good and to conceive even government as a servant of its citizens’ needs and not as a despotic entity that citizens must serve.” Freshman Zachary Palmer took Western Theological Tradition in the fall, and he said it gave him and understanding of events and the ideas behind them. “You get a broad understanding of church history, which you don’t necessarily get in Western Heritage,” he said. “It’s a good way to broaden your understanding of the Catholic Church and the origins of the Protestant Church.”

Douglass dedication set for May 12 By | Breana Noble News Editor

With just under a month until the unveiling of the Frederick Douglass statue, the sculpture’s mold is ready. The dedication ceremony for the project that was announced in 2014 will take place in Kresge Plaza on May 12, Chief Staff Officer Mike Harner said. Until then, the statue is being casted and will then travel from California, where award-winning sculptor Bruce Wolfe lives, to Michigan via truck, Wolfe said. “The sculpture is in the foundry, and the waxes have been poured, and Bruce has adjusted them, before the bronze is poured,” Wolfe’s wife, Linda, said in an email. The sculpture’s concept design depicts Douglass at the height of his oratory power, around 1863, when he first visited Hillsdale College. The 7-foot-tall statue of Douglass will stand across Kresge Plaza from President Abraham Lincoln, where groundskeepers have placed a cement circle in preparation for the installation.

Detroit Children’s Hospital passes inspection Detroit Medical Center’s Children’s Hospital passed an early April federal inspection, officials announced Tuesday. The news brings all Detroit Medical System hospitals into compliance for the first time since September, when an investigation into dirty surgical instruments began.

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Winning the judicial battle

Losing the legislative war By | Noah Weinrich

Supreme Court nominee

Special to the Collegian entirely from consideration.

Last Friday, the Senate confirmed the most qualified nominee of our generation to the Supreme Court. But in the process, the Senate shredded any remnants of decency and process it had left. The Senate began hearings for Judge Neil Gorsuch on March 20, but Democrats decided to filibuster his nomination. Then, last Thursday, the Republicans pulled the “nuclear option,” changing Senate rules to allow a simple majority to confirm a Supreme Court nominee. The Senate swiftly confirmed Gorsuch the following day. Make no mistake, Gorsuch deserves the seat. He represents everything great about the American judicial system. His qualifications are impeccable. He graduated from Columbia, Harvard, and Oxford, with Truman and Marshall scholarships along the way. He’s worked hard his whole life for what he’s gotten. And contrary to the Democrats’ attempts to politicize him, Gorsuch understands a judge’s job. In a speech on the legacy of the late associate justice Antonin Scalia, he said, “judges should be in the business of declaring what the law is using the traditional tools of interpretation, rather than pronouncing the law as they might wish it to be in light of their own political views.” That impartiality won Gorsuch unanimous confirmation to the Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals from the Senate in 2006 — including from Sens. Obama, Clinton, Biden, Schumer, Leahy, and others. His record boasts hundreds of opinions which brought together judges from the left and the right on the 10th Circuit. And none of his opinions before the Supreme Court were ever struck down — not an easy record to politicize, but many tried. Gorsuch is remarkably even-keeled, especially for a follower of the sometimes caustic Scalia. He’s got the temperament, credentials, and experience of a Supreme Court justice — what more could the people ask for? Merrick Garland, if you’re a Democrat. Last year the Republican majority in the Senate blocked Garland from both a confirmation hearings and a vote — a historically unprecedented step. It marked the first time the Senate blocked a

Though the Republicans protested that an outgoing president shouldn’t be allowed to make a nomination, Obama had eleven months left in his term — hardly a lame duck. Democrats threw a fit, and not without cause. The Republicans blocked a Supreme Court nominee on explicitly political grounds, laying the precedent for the Democrats’ own actions in 2017. Garland was a poor hill for Republicans to die on. They had a clear majority, and that’s all a Supreme Court nomination needs. Garland never would have made it past committee. But Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell and the Republican Party decided to stick it out for the rest of the year, citing trumped-up precedents like “the Biden rule.” More than a poor political move, it was a poor gamble. True, it paid off in the end. But if Hillary Clinton had won, she would have nominated a judge much more liberal than the moderate Garland — let alone Gorsuch. In any case, the merits of the Republicans’ case for blacklisting Garland are debateable. But Democrats’ opposition to Gorsuch is indefensible. If they truly believed that a majority in the Senate could not block a candidate, then how could a minority block a candidate? If Gorsuch had real flaws, the Democrats would have had a case. But he didn’t. Their opposition was pure theater, and they knew it. They did what the Republicans had done a year before, but worse. Instead of realizing two wrongs don’t make a right, they drove the Senate into the ground. Once a place of civility and deliberation — sometimes — the Senate has stripped its own powers. Starting with former Senate majority leader Harry Reid in 2013 and continuing with minority leader Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell today, the body has abandoned its former distinction. And that’s something to be mourned. Judge Gorsuch is an impeccable jurist, and his confirmation is cause for rejoicing. But the proceedings last week represent the bottoming out of a long decline in the American legislative process, thanks to the tactics of both sides in the Senate. Mr. Weinrich is a junior George Washington Fellow studying politics.

The opinion of the Collegian editorial staff

Throngs of eager high school students found themselves without a place to sit during a visit day Wednesday, trotting meekly behind their ambassadors with Hillsdale folders and plates of food. We’ve all wandered in circles in the lunchroom, sipping from a cup of water, scanning tables furtively for an empty seat. On Mondays, it’s hard enough to find somewhere to sit down at lunchtime, let alone find a spot next to one’s friends. And on visit days?

Good luck with that. But student ambassadors shouldn’t be the ones wandering through the cafeteria with prospective students in tow. We don’t need to make prospective students feel any more awkward and nervous than they already are — if Hillsdale College wants to put its best foot forward to impress these potential students, then the admissions office should start reserving a few seats or tables on visit days. Sure, the lunchroom can

get pretty crowded on Mondays and there isn’t a lot of room to spare. Sure, the admissions office might irritate some students by putting up those bright yellow “Reserved” signs on a few square or round tables. But it shouldn’t be too much to ask students to give up a few seats for prospectives. If a student ambassador takes the time to reserve just one small square table, she will make the lunch experience so much more relaxed for her prospective students,

because they will have a guaranteed place to sit down. Don’t we want to give those brilliant but terrified high schoolers a favorable impression of our school? We want them to love Hillsdale as much as we do, so let’s make sure they feel welcome. We can start by telling the admissions office, “Hey, feel free to reserve a couple seats or tables for prospectives. We know the lunch scene can be crazy.”

Growing, graduating with Hillsdale is beautiful Outsiders can attempt to By | Luke Robson understand; we all see the Special to the Collegian wandering parents who are College is beautiful because the ever so eager to catch a glimpse community it creates can exist of what exactly it is that we are under no other circumstances. undertaking. We each know a When students come together hometown friend that searched at Hillsdale, the campus initiates for Hillsdale on Google in hopes them into a wonderfully new of finding out what exactly it is environment — each class brings that we keep talking about when a sort of communal rebirth that we go back. But these people is allowed ever so rarely in our can’t grasp it in the same way that lifetimes. Each year, Hillsdale grants us the opportunity and privilege to make it our own. Just as the graduating class before ours shaped the college, so we too shaped it. I hope that the classes to come will treat it with the love and care which I hope can be recognized in myself and we can, just as Kansans could not quite understand what it’s like to my peers. Each class lends the college grow up in California no matter its own characteristics, and each how hard they might try. Without entering into student makes an immediate and visible difference, forming Hillsdale completely and taking a place that is familiar yet ever- part in its traditions, its history, changing. While many alumni and its future, one will never come back and feel the changes understand it fully. Whether that have taken place in their we have enjoyed our time here absence, they feel familiarity and or not, our time here will never leave us. Hillsdale impacted comfort as well. We as students add to a place us permanently. This impact is only we can truly understand. something that only we are privy

to, it is something that we will enjoy for the rest of our lives, something that we can come back to in the future and see others obtaining for themselves. When we go out into the world, our experiences here will be shared and understood with those who have also come from this place. When you meet an alumnus who graduated long ago, you will share a

"At Hillsdale, we become something more than ourselves. This school is now part of who we are, and who we will continue to be."

dispersed, and the classroom where we vigilantly fought the battle against sleep (while we may have lost many battles, we have now won the war). This school is now part of who we are, and who we will continue to be. Hillsdale in particular has this effect on its graduates. This institution worked for nearly two centuries to set itself apart from other places of higher education. Other schools possess their own unique traits as well, but presently few are as truly unique as this place. While some resent this fact, we must appreciate it nonetheless. For many of us it is something sweet, but even if we think it bitter there is still good to be found in our singularity. I, for one, am exceedingly grateful for the opportunity and experience this place provided me. I hope that you are as well, for it is something that is now inescapable, no matter how hard we may try. Take the time, look back, and hold it all again dearly before you must let it go. We are all Hillsdalians now, and that’s something beautiful.

special connection through the Hillsdale tradition. You are both from Hillsdale, you both can revel in and enjoy that fact even if the rest of you have as much in common as oak trees and moon rocks. At Hillsdale, we become something more than ourselves. We are also the school in which we are educated, the dorm where we met our freshman year roommate, the dining hall where Mr. Robson is a senior studying plans were hatched and rumors economics.

Turkey’s march toward Erdogan’s authoritarianism By | Jacob Thackston Special to The Collegian as the supreme leader – à la Iran – of Turkey. These constitutional While Americans fret about the amendments would, among potential for authoritarianism in other things, abolish the the form of President Donald position of prime minister, Trump, the Turkish people face remove parliamentary oversight a referendum this Saturday over the executive branches of with the all-too-real potential government, allow the president to enable and legitimize a truly authoritarian president in their to affiliate with a political party, abolish military courts, and de own nation. After an attempted military facto allow Erdogan, elections coup last July, President Recep permitting, to rule Turkey until Tayyip Erdogan took drastic 2029. Needless to say, these action to strengthen his grip on left opposition the nation. In the immediate provisions parties scrambling to prevent aftermath of the coup, his the passage of this referendum. administration had more than 6000 people arrested, among Though he is technically them many journalists and unaffiliated with any party, military officers. Three months Erdogan calls the shots in the later, more than 30,000 people ruling Justice and Development had been arrested, and roughly Party (AKP), which proposed 100,000 civil servants had been the current reforms and is only either dismissed or arrested. In 13 seats short of a three-fifths that same time span, more than majority in parliament. Between 160 news outlets were shut down the president and the parliament, those in favor of a ‘yes’ vote in this by Erdogan’s government. Turkey has been in a state- referendum are accused of doing declared state of emergency whatever is necessary to suppress since then, which in itself those who oppose them. A grants Erdogan additional prominent nationalist politician powers beyond his ordinary opposed to the referendum had constitutionally-limited duties. the power cut off during a rally But, evidently, Erdogan wants at a hotel whose owner is close more. On Saturday, the Turkish to Erdogan, an opposition MP people will vote on a series of was arrested for supposedly constitutional amendments that blasphemous tweets from 2010, would all but establish Erdogan a union head who called on

W By Joel Haines citizens to vote ‘no’ was shot at, and two women handing out flyers were publicly attacked and told that they were undermining the state. Meanwhile, a popular photo on Turkish social media shows Erdogan, his allies, a Turkish flag, and a child on one side underneath a “yes” banner, and shows opposition leaders, the head of ISIS, and an American flag on the other side underneath a “no” banner. -Erdogan’s rhetoric has been no softer than the actions of his supporters. He has compared those who vote no to terrorists, called Germany out for “Nazi practices” when German officials shut down Turkish political rallies over security concerns, and accused the Netherlands of “massacring” 8000 Bosnian Muslims in 1995, an attack perpetrated, in actuality, by Bosnian Serbs. Turkish citizens abroad – some three million of them – are allowed to vote in the

referendum, but Turkey allows no postal votes, so Erdogan’s government has been canvassing votes across Europe as well as setting up polling stations in those areas, many of which have already voted. Despite all this pressure, until just recently polls were predicting a ‘no’ vote in the referendum. But that margin fell from 58-42 in January to 51-49 in late March. But the latest polls have Erdogan winning a narrow race, a margin no doubt aided by the constant fear of arrest, loss of job, and what opposition parties describe as foul play by the AKP. Turkish democracy hangs on a knife’s edge, and something — whether this referendum passes or not — is likely to push it off that edge in the not-too-distant future. Mr. Thackston is a senior George Washington Fellow studying philosophy and politics.

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Trump can use the Syria crisis to restore the Constitution By | Michael Lucchese Assistant Editor

On the morning of April 6, the United States launched 59 cruise missiles at the the Assadregime controlled Shayrat Airbase, in a direct response to a chemical weapons attack the regime committed against rebel forces. Approximately nine Syrian soldiers died in the strike. This attack — which Congress did not approve — brought a troubling reality to the forefront of political discourse: These days, it seems the president possesses nearly unlimited war-making powers. This past century, the executive branch of our government swallowed up the war-making powers the Constitution assigned to Congress. Ultimately, the way our Constitution has been undermined both violates our political principles and our ability to conduct a sound foreign policy. In Federalist 69, Alexander Hamilton drew an important distinction between the British monarchy and the American republic by outlining the war powers of the president. This power “would amount to nothing more than the supreme command and direction of the military and naval forces,” Hamilton said, “while that of the British king extends to the declaring of war... which, by the Constitution under consideration, would appertain to the legislature.” By granting Congress the power to declare war and set aims, the Constitution ensured that the people would govern even the country’s foreign policy. The Founders meant our representatives in Congress to debate the relative merits of military action before the country jumps headlong into war. We the people were meant to determine the national interest, not the unelected bureaucrats who advise the president. Military theorist Carl von Clausewitz argued in his masterwork, “On War,” that a conflict would quickly descend

into a quagmire with no good outcomes if it lacked clear policy goals. "The strategist must define an aim for the entire operational side of the war that will be in accordance with its purpose,” he wrote. “The aim will determine the series of actions intended to achieve it." The recent missile strike shows exactly how the country forgot both Clausewitz’s warnings and Hamilton’s wisdom by standing idly by while the imperial presidency took upon itself powers originally given to Congress. Many in the media have noted this strike on Syria seems to distance President Trump from the isolationist campaign promises. On Twitter and in the debates, he frequently condemned Hillary Clinton’s interventionist foreign policy ideas, particularly in relation to the civil war in Syria. But now, he seems to embrace some of these very policies. "Regime change is something that we think is going to happen,” Trump-appointed U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley said in a Sunday interview about Syria policy. “All of the parties are going to see that Assad is not the leader that needs to be taking place for Syria." In spite of this apparent change in positioning, however, White House aides tried to portray the attack as consistent with campaign promises. “I think the Trump doctrine is something that he articulated throughout the campaign, which is America’s first,” White House press secretary Sean Spicer said during a briefing Monday. “We’re not just going to become the world’s policeman running around.” To an outside observer, it appears the White House does not have clear policy goals when it comes to Syria. President Trump acted decisively when he ordered the strike, but now it seems like confusion and miscommunication engulfs the one branch of government the Founders intended to act with the most energy and force.

It may be totally against the national interest to become even more engulfed in Middle Eastern wars. The American people hated the disastrous Iraq War, and many foresee an equally dangerous situation in the complex Syrian civil war. Prudence may dictate that we avoid sectarian conflicts and refuse to put American lives and treasure on the line again. Or, it very well may be in the national interest to force regime change in Syria. The proliferation and use of weapons of mass destruction could destabilize an already volatile region, pushing the entire world closer to military conflict — not to mention the humanitarian concerns associated with the Assad regime’s use of sarin gas. Military action and regime change may also very well be necessary to stem the powergrabs hostile countries like Iran and Russia make in the region. The Constitution gives us a way to determine which of those options is best. The people’s representatives in Congress should debate all sides of the issue candidly, and come to a conclusion by voting on our behalf. After Congress gives President Trump’s military action specific, well-outlined goals, he should energetically and relentlessly pursue those goals and achieve victory in Syria. Foreign policy offers President Trump a serious chance to fulfill his inauguration address’ promise of “transferring power from Washington, D.C. and giving it back to... the American People.” The so-called “deep state” and executive agencies should not determine in secret whether or not we go to war. Only Congress has that power, even if the last several presidencies ignored that fact. President Trump ought to respect that when considering military action in the future. Mr. Lucchese is a junior studying American Studies and journalsim.

We can all learn from Trump’s courage Wikimedia Commons

By | Ben Dietderich Collegian Reporter Stupid, provocative, oafish, and dangerous — leftists in the media used those words and more to describe Ronald Reagan during his presidency. Six years later, those words seem an awful lot like those critics use to describe President Donald Trump. When you have a 7-foot bronze statue of the man staring down at you on the quad, it’s easy to forget that Reagan was human. He faced stark criticism and protests during his administration, largely because he dared to dramatically change the way America dealt with the threat of communism. Reagan, unlike his predecessors, disagreed with both the strategy of containment and the more relaxed strategy of détente, arguing “the West will not contain communism, it will dismiss communism.” Reagan refused to back down from what he knew was “evil,” even when contemporary media accused him of warmongering. As a result, his courageous action paved the way for the fall of the Soviet Union. At the dedication of the Ronald Reagan statue at Hillsdale College in 2011, Cambridge historian Andrew Roberts gave a speech titled “Reagan’s Moral Courage,” in which he told Hillsdale students, “it takes tremendous moral courage to resist the overwhelming tide of received

opinion and so-called expert wisdom and to say and do exactly the opposite.” Donald Trump is not Ronald Reagan. He is his own man with his own faults, but his decisive bombardment of the Syrian airbase was certainly courageous. For the past five years, a brutal dictator with no regard for human life murdered men, women, and children. Despite the use of weapons of mass destruction on civilians and the influx of millions of refugees fleeing Assad’s tyranny, no one else in the West decided to challenge the destructive regime. While it’s natural to express fear over getting involved in another messy war, far too many have forgotten the courage necessary to rebuke those who commit crimes against humanity. Red lines exist to prevent the most inhumane acts of violence from occurring, like those described in the Geneva Convention regarding chemical weapons. As we learned one week ago when Assad again chose to gas his own people, red lines only work when we enforce them. Even worse, accommodating the hostile Assad regime may encourage other antagonists in the region and beyond. Whether we like it or not, the decisions our leaders make affect conflicts all around the world. Only after President Obama’s failure to enforce the red line in Syria did Russian president Vladimir Putin

invade the Crimean Peninsula. American weakness encourages hostile nations to violate international law. Criticism of Trump’s decision comes from all sides. Many Americans still remember the Iraq War and the resulting Middle Eastern mess. However, shooting 59 precise target missiles at an airfield does not compare to trying to bring democracy to a war-torn country. President Trump’s missile strike has nothing to do with nation-building; rather, he reminded the entire world that the United States is back in the business of fearlessly standing for our own national principles. When we look at the statues of Hillsdale’s statesmen, it’s easy to forget the risks they took and the criticism they received in the aftermath. Yet, courage is doing what’s right despite the risk and criticism— Trump’s response to the Assad regime’s crimes embodies that. Even though the chapel’s construction may prevent us from walking by the Ronald Reagan statue for the next two years, we should not forget why we honor him. In turn, we ought to recognize others who display and embody in ourselves an ability to make decisions not out of fear, ease, or popular pressure but rather by doing what’s right and just. Mr. Dietderich is a freshman studying the liberal arts.

Let women pick their professions: Feminism is still about choice By | Kristiana Mork Collegian Reporter Recent economic forecasts left Australia with a warning: End extended stay-at-home motherhood or face economic decline. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, a transgovernmental group tasked with measuring international economic growth, concluded in March that Australia would face a labor shortage if mothers with school-aged children did not join the workforce. Daily Telegraph columnist Sarrah Le Marquand agreed. It’s time, she argued, to ban stay-at-home parenting for school-aged children. “Only when the tiresome and completely unfounded claim that ‘feminism is about choice’ is dead and buried (it’s not about choice, it’s about equality) will we consign restrictive gender stereotypes

to history,” she said. In light of a decadeslong push for women to eliminate the stereotypes Marquand referenced, the columnist’s exhortation for actualizing workplace equality should come as no surprise. What is a surprise, and an encouragement, is the pushback she received from those around the world who still value women’s freedom to choose whether to enter the workplace. Following Marquand’s logic, if women should be equal but fail to achieve equality themselves, then society should help them realize it. This logic underpins the approach of many international leaders, who seek to inspire young women to consider leaving marriage and the home to pursue equality in the workplace. On International Women’s Day last month, U.N. Women executive director Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka delivered a speech advocating

increased exposure to maledominated careers. “Across the world, too many women and girls spend too many hours on household responsibilities — typically more than double the time spent by men and boys,” she said. “We must construct a different world of work for women. As they grow up, girls must be exposed to a broad range of careers, and encouraged to make choices that lead beyond the traditional service and care options to jobs in industry, art, public service, modern agriculture and science.” More astonishing however, are the voices raised against Marquand’s proposition. “Right on cue, hysteria ensued with commentators from coast to coast howling in indignation at the very idea that the uppity OECD would insinuate Australia might have a tiny bit of a problem with our female participation rates,” Marquand wrote.

Talk money to me: Avoid luxuries on small salaries By | Kate Patrick Financial Columnist You just landed your first job, but it’s not paying very much and you know you’re going to have to budget your money carefully over the next few years. Make the most of your salary with these tips. Don’t eat out. You’ve probably heard this one before, but it deserves repetition. It’s tempting to eat out three to four to even seven nights a week when you’re in a new city with a new job, and it’s easy to rationalize it by telling yourself you’re “being social” — but don’t do it. A regular habit of eating out could mean dropping anywhere from $50 to $150 a week just on meals, when you could save hundreds of dollars yearly buying groceries and eating in. Don’t want to sacrifice your social life? Invite friends for

a homecooked meal, or find free weekend activities. Don’t buy into the lie that eating out means you’ll make friends faster — all that’ll get you is a panic attack at the end of the month when your bills are due. Drop a few subscriptions. Do you really need Spotify Premium? Do you really need Netflix and Hulu? Spotify Premium is $10 a month, so that’s $120 a year — and if you’ve got Netflix and Hulu or anything else, you could be spending close to $300 a year or more on entertainment. If you’ve got a lower-end entry level salary, you might want to cut at least one of those subscriptions until you’ve figured out budgeting your money and paying your monthly bills. Even if you can actually afford all those entertainment subscriptions,

try a couple months without them. You can always add them back later. Avoid unnecessary “grownup” purchases. Sure, having a TV would be nice, but you’ve got a laptop. Don’t drop a few hundred dollars just because most other adults have them. If public transportation is available, don’t buy a car — especially if you’re moving to big cities like Chicago, D.C., or New York. You won’t have to pay off a car loan, pay for car maintenance, car insurance, or parking. (Your budget will thank you later.) Those are just a few examples, but if you’re moving out, start thinking about what you actually need to live and avoid the luxuries for now. Ms. Patrick is a senior studying history and journalism.

A member of the hysteria, Australian television personality Ben Fordham, said reading the article made him furious because of the positive impact his wife has had on their two children after deciding to leave television herself. “What that does to her career trajectory as far as work-life is concerned, is so hard. I cannot imagine what that would be like for me, and then I think about the impact on our children that it’s had having her home. I mean, what’s more important? There will be no economy if there are no future generations.” Not only do stay-at-home mothers contribute to raising the next generation, they also contribute to communities. “The stay-at-home mothers I know are there, and they’re helping other mothers,” Vanderbilt University professor of law Carol Swain said. “They volunteer at the schools, they are the monitors on the field trips, some of them are taking

care of their parents. They’re actually contributing a lot to the communities.” American author Suzanne Venker also argued, that contrary to Marquand’s assumption, most women do not care about equality in the workplace. “As long as women with children put family first, feminists’ utopian vision for gender equality — where 50 percent of women hold top corporate and government positions right along with men — will never be achieved,” Venker wrote. “The mistake is thinking most women care. The research shows, unequivocally, that they do not.” In the face of federal initiatives and feminist leaders telling women what to do with their lives, it is a pleasant surprise to see women, and men, who are still willing to voice arguments in favor of women’s choice to join the workplace. Perhaps, the “howling”

ultimately proves that women reject the notion that equality ought to be defined and achieved for them, rather than proving they don’t value it. If women have the intellect and the capability of equality in the workplace, as Marquand suggests, shouldn’t they be capable of achieving it for themselves? So keep up the hysteria, mothers and fathers and believers in workplace freedom. Your voice is a relief because it means women will not be condemned to an engineer’s office just as they will not be condemned to a nursery. Your voice means that if women achieve equality in the workplace, it will be by their own hands and merits — not because of expectations thrust upon them. Ms. Mork is a senior studying politics and journalism.

Students entitled to respond to college decisions Dear Editor, The idea that a college owes no consideration to the opinions of its students is just as dangerous as the nowpopular idea that it should cater to their every whim. I have kept this belief of mine in relative silence throughout the last year and a half, within which Hillsdale College undertook some significant endeavors without gauging the thoughts of students or faculty. Last week, however, I was truly disheartened when I saw a piece in the Collegian written by Jenna Suchyta entitled “The College Pursues its Mission with a Chapel. We Should Too.” Suchyta makes the claim that the students of Hillsdale College (who are the reason for the institution’s existence, lest we forget) are not entitled to any kind of representation in the decisions made

about the future of our school. Her next argument, however, demonstrated a misunderstanding of Hillsdale College’s purpose. In an effort to illustrate her point, she compares the students of this institution to nothing more than customers at a commercial megastore. Glossing over the offense that Hillsdale might feel at being portrayed as a Walmart, the argument is preposterous. One does not become a “Walmartian” by stopping off to buy snack food and bottled water for one’s dorm-room refrigerator. One does, however, become a Hillsdalian by partaking in the school’s enriching educational tradition. We have all heard President Larry Arnn’s iconic refrain at fundraisers, orientations, and parents’ luncheons: “College means partnership.” Our school claims that, as

students here, we have joined the institution as partners, not subjects. We have become a part of a community for the rest of our lives. The students of this school have a vested interest in its future, and they are more a part of it than harried customers who thoughtlessly flow in and out of automatic doors. We are not here for the benefit of the faculty, the administration, or the donors. They are all here because they believe in forwarding the mission: to benefit the students by furnishing us with “a literary, scientific or theological education.” This school is meant to prepare us for self-government, but can it do that without allowing us into the conversation? Sincerely, Pearce Pomerleau

City News

A6 13 Apr. 2017

www.hillsdalecollegian.com

A diagram highlighting the areas in the Hillsdale Library that need repairs. Mark Maeier | Courtesy

Council approves project to re-paint Hillsdale Library By | Nic Rowan Collegian Reporter The Hillsdale City Council passed a motion to repaint the Hillsdale Community Library at an April 3 meeting. “A while back they had some vandalism and graffiti on the building, and they had to cover that up,” Finance Director Bonnie Tew said at the meeting. “They began to look at the building and realized that it has not been painted since it was done. The building is over ten years old and there is a need to protect the exteri-

or.” Library Board President Mark Maier reinforced these claims and said most of the necessary repairs are age-related. “In addition to some spots where the paint has faded a good deal, there are also several places where the walls were in need of repairs,” he said. Maier also said vandalism has been a problem ever since the library building was finished. “If you walk along the alley side of the building you can see where people have vandalized the wall,” he said. “There are

also numerous spots where it looks like someone was shooting the wall with BB guns.” Hillsdale resident Jack McLane said he wished the library would also spend the money on a bicycle rack. “You can literally ride your bike up to the building and leave it there,” he said. “I would rather have a rack than a big sign that says no ‘bicycle riding in the parking lot.’” The project is expected to cost the library $13,325. City Manager David Mackie said the decision to repair the building came entirely from the library board.

“This comes out of their own funds, so this is not general fund monies,” he said. At the meeting, Councilman Adam Stockford opposed the project. “I don’t know how in favor I am of painting the library and spending that much money on it, but if we’re going to hire someone, I know Steve Wisner is an excellent craftsmen and very affordable,” he said. The library has since awarded Wisner’s company, Steve the Painter, the contract. A timeline for the project has yet to be set.

Lack of funding prevents lake water testing By | Josephine von Dohlen said. “Having it being the head water to a stream make its simCollegian Reporter pler to know what is going into the body of water, but also a With warmer temperatures little more difficult to monimoving in, students gravitate tor.” towards Baw Beese Lake, loAccording to Rippke, Sandy cated 3.8 miles from campus, Beach has not been tested by in search of a safe haven from the state since 2004. campus. “Sandy Beach did meet reThe one problem: no one quirements back in 2004, but it knows if the water is safe, since is difficult to draw conclusions the water has not been tested on what that is like today,” she at the state level within the said. past decade. As far as Rippke is aware, Jeffrey Surfus, an environ- monitoring is often conducted mental quality analyst at the by the local health department. Michigan Department of En- But the Branch-Hillsdale vironmental Quality, monitors Community Health Agency discharges to surface water currently lacks the funding through the National Pollutant and staffing to conduct any Discharge Elimination System. such water testing. “We just don’t have the re“We do not do any testing sources to do this type of mon- for any of the beaches in our itoring anymore,” Surfus said. counties,” Paul Andriaachi, “In the past we used to do a lot Environmental Health Direcmore routine monitoring to tor said. “It’s one of those procheck the health of the water.” grams that we do not have the The question of the water funding to be able to support.” quality at Baw Beese arose When asked what the pubwhen Lime Lake was reported lic should do to ensure the to have traces of e-coli. Where- safety of their beach waters, as Lime Lake doesn’t have a Andriaachi said that people public beach, Baw Beese does should swim at their own risk. — Sandy Beach. “There just isn’t the funding “At this point I would say or the staff,” he said. “It would that there are no plans to test be nice, but there’s just never the water soon,” Surfus said. enough funding.” “Given the makeup of the Due to a lack of governmenDEQ, this type of testing is not tal funding, the monitoring of what happens on a consistent the lake can be put in the hands basis.” of private citizens through the Molly Rippke, Aquatic Bi- forming of lake associations, ologist Specialist at the Mich- for which funding and grants igan DEQ, observes monitor- could be acquired. ing of lakes at the Michigan “Citizens can get involved state level. with lake associations that can She, too, could not find any take up the act of monitoring data showing recent testing the water,” Surfus said. done on Baw Beese. “We don’t have any data on e-coli there period,” Rippke

Bob Taylor leaves behind legacy of compassion and love of music By | S. M. Chavey Features Editor After many years of teaching, playing music, and evangelizing in Hillsdale, Robert “Bob” L. Taylor died at home on March 27 from a heart attack after a brief illness, less than a month away from turning 73. “I used to say he was like a happy puppy — he was always cheerful, always had a smile,” his wife Sharon Taylor said. “I very seldom saw him down. He just was very cheerful, positive, outgoing, and he met friends wherever he went. He loved to talk, he loved to tell jokes, he loved life.” A people-person, Bob Taylor was known for his storytelling and warm personality. After retiring from Lenawee Christian School in 2010, he continued to perform with the Rifner Brass Quintet — which he helped found — and the Hillsdale Wind Symphony. He also served as an elder at Pine Ridge Bible Church and attended Equip Ministry on campus each week. “He was a renaissance man, and liked a little bit of everything. He had passions in life, and his passions were his love of his God and his love of his family and his love of music. Almost everything Bob did revolved around one of those areas,” Sharon Taylor said. Bob Taylor first began playing trumpet in high school band, inspired by a trumpet trio that visited the school. He

earned his bachelor’s degree from Houghton College, his Master’s from Indiana University at Bloomington, and his Doctorate in music from the University of North Texas. He then taught music at Fort Wayne Community Schools for 32 years before moving to Adrian, Michigan, to become a music teacher at Lenawee Christian School. Junior Madison Moore has known him ever since he taught her music in fourth grade. “He was really great about meeting students where they were at. He worked really hard to be invested and to make sure we knew what we were doing,” Moore said. “He was definitely a warm personality, looking out for people and trying to keep connected with people and making sure they’re actually okay and not just appearing okay.” When Bob Taylor earned his Doctorate in music performance while teaching, Moore said the entire school celebrated. Though most of his music students weren’t going on to pursue music as a career, Taylor still wanted to give music to them “to help them deal with life,” according to Wind Symphony Director Robert Livingston. “He was compassionate, loved the kids. He wanted them to grow as people as much or more than he wanted them to grow as musicians,” Livingston said. Even after retiring, Bob Taylor continued to teach col-

lege students in private lessons as well as help coach other instrumentalists in Wind Symphony. “He was just the nicest guy. If he ever needed to correct someone in the section, he was always so nice about it. He loved working with kids, and some of his grandkids played songs on their instruments,” senior Shaine Timmins said. She plays in Wind Symphony with Bob and Sharon Taylor since her freshman year. To many students, it’s not just “Bob,” it’s “Bob and Sharon” — whether it be travelling together with their grandchildren or simply attending Equip together. “One thing that was definitely emphasized at his funeral was that he was very passionate about the family and having strong families and being a good father to his children and his step children and being a good husband. He definitely taught that to a lot of guys he discipled in Equip,” senior Leah Hickman, an Equip leader, said. He lived that principle out in Wind Symphony rehearsals, always carrying Sharon’s trumpet in for her. “One day there’s a downpour outside and Sharon comes in with this big black umbrella, totally dry. Bob comes in after her totally soaked and carrying all of their stuff,” Timmins said. When Steve Briix, pastor of Pine Ridge Bible Church, came to Hillsdale, he said

the Taylors adopted him and his family, opening up their home during the holidays and spending time with them throughout the year. “He really loved people and he wanted people to really know Jesus,” Briix said. “He wanted people to walk with Jesus, not just as something they said but something they really understood in their lives. He loved meeting with people individually, talking about life and their struggles and their troubles and helping them to follow Christ in those ways.” In one instance, Bob and Briix traveled about an hour to Albion College for Intervarsity. Bob met a young music major who wanted to discuss religion, and after a long conversation with her he asked her when her next recital was. A month later, Bob drove back to Albion with his wife for the recital, only to find the girl hardly even remembered who he was. Despite having met the girl only once, Bob wanted to be sure to show her his support. “That was the kind of guy he was. He really cared about people and wanted to show interest in them and encourage them, especially in their walk with the Lord,” Briix said. Bob served as an elder as well as the choir director at Pine Ridge. He always had a book suggestion about Christianity or the family, and he read about hymns at length. “He was always reading things about music: how this

Bob Taylor passed away after many years of teaching and evangelizing. Thompson Geesey Funeral Home | Courtesy

hymn originated or that hymn, he knew all the background. I imagine if you could just throw a hymn out, he could tell you who wrote it, what the circumstances were surrounding it, and what inspired them to write it,” Briix said. The Wind Symphony is brainstorming memorial ideas. Though details are still undetermined, they are considering creating a memorial fund scholarship. “We’re thinking we want to do something that will last longer than a few hours at the funeral,” Livingston said. The scholarship might fund students taking private lessons, attending music camp, or winning a high school concerto

competition.” The funeral was well-attended, a testament to his character, according to Moore. “Friends from high school, people from the college, and some people who I haven’t talked to in years from a lot of different areas made the drive out for the funeral because he was that important of a person to a lot of people and definitely left his mark on the community,” Moore said. Bob is survived by his wife Sharon, children Scott Taylor, Brenda (Douglas) Loveberry, and Bowdee Nolin, eight grandchildren, and two brothers. He was preceded in death by his parents.

Truck erupts in flames at Finish Line By | Kaylee McGhee Assistant Editor

A 2008 Ford F-150 erupted into flames in the parking lot of the Finish Line Family Restaurant. Facebook

The Hillsdale Fire Department responded to a vehicle fire at the Finish Line Family Restaurant on April 8 at 6:34 a.m. after a 2008 Ford F-150 burst into flames. Firefighter Corey Burke said his team arrived on the scene three minutes after receiving the initial call and found the truck and a nearby tree engulfed in flames. The cause of the sudden fire is still unidentified, according to Burke. “We’re trained to stay remotely calm and look for any possible human hazards,”

Burke said. “The tree on fire made the situation look a lot worse than it was, though.” According to Burke, a local resident had parked his truck in the parking lot of Finish Line while waiting for his friends. He reclined his seat, dozed off, and woke up to flames coming through the windshield and windows. “It was quite a bit of excitement to start the morning,” Lisa Slade, the owner of Finish Line, said. The fire department arrived soon after the resident called 911, and used foam and water to smother the fire. Burke said it took his team under 30 minutes to put out the fire, due to the quick response of the fire

department’s part-paid firefighters. “We only ever have one full-timer on duty at a time,” Burke said. “But we had eight part-pay fighters show up. They’re a great back up team.” After the fire was extinguished, Slade said the rest of the day seemed a bit off. “People were buzzing,” she said. “You wouldn’t think there were so many people out and about, but there were.” Burke said the event was the perfect opportunity to put his team’s training into action. “It was nice to see a quick response from our guys, and we are thankful that everyone went home safe,” he said.

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Strawberry popcorn spreads domestic violence awareness By | Jessie Fox Sports Editor When Tami Brackman created a Facebook page to spread awareness about domestic violence, she named it Seed of Hope. At the time, she had no idea the seed would be strawberry popcorn. “My kids and I had been in a domestic violence situation for a long time, and I had left, and went back, and left, and went back, and finally I was able to see the light, so to speak, and get out of it,” Tami Brackman said. “I wanted to do something, and at that moment I really believe God put a vision on my heart to do something and create a different kind of healing. He put the idea in my mind about a self-sufficient farm.” Tami Brackman said it was all in God’s plan for her to meet Hank Brackman, who had recently planted a jar of strawberry popcorn seeds he found in his parents’ basement. “I got divorced and lost everything I ever had. I was starting all over pretty much. I was down to the bottom of the bucket,” Hank Brackman said. “I used to walk everyday, and I didn’t have nothing, I didn’t know what I was doing, so I would pray to God for something. I had a little farm and I wanted to do farming. It was something I always liked to do.” Hank planted a few rows of strawberry popcorn, and, after a summer of hard work, it finally grew, and he picked every cob by hand. Hank and Tami brought their two ideas together to form Seed of Hope Strawberry Popcorn — a popcorn grower and supplier based in Hillsdale with a mission to spread awareness about domestic violence. “I remember the first year my dad said, ‘What are you going to do with all of that popcorn?’ and I said, ‘I’m gonna sell it, Dad!’” Hank said. “Things come together and it’s amazing. It’s God.” Last summer the Brackmans planted three acres of

strawberry popcorn, and this summer they plan to grow even more. Strawberry popcorn is an heirloom seed which, when popped, is small, crunchy, and nearly hulless. According to Seed of Hope’s website, strawberry popcorn has 350 times more antioxidants than white or yellow popcorn. The name comes from its small, red ears which resemble strawberries — not because it tastes like strawberries. Seed of Hope sells its popcorn in jars online and at craft shows in Jackson, Adrian, Coldwater, and the Hillsdale area. “We get a lot of people who come to our booth and see strawberry popcorn and ask, ‘What is that?’ They’re curious. They want to know, and so they try it and they go, ‘Oh that’s really good!’ and what they do is they sniff it and say, ‘Does that taste like strawberry to you?’ and it’s funny to watch,” Hank said. Tami said craft shows are the perfect place to educate customers on domestic violence. “We reach a whole different audience than what Domestic Harmony might reach,” Tami said. “They’re going to pick up the popcorn and it might be somebody who would never stop by that booth, and all the sudden they’ve been educated.” The Brackmans have big dreams for the future of their business: Tami said she’d love to allow domestic violence survivors to work with Seed of Hope while they acclimate back into the community, and Hank said he’d like kids to visit the farm on field trips. For future and past successes, however, the Brackmans give all the credit to God. “It’s really all a God thing. The way things have happened — you can’t make this kind of stuff up,” Tami said. “Looking back, I was filled with doubt and God gives me the name Seed of Hope, of all things that it could ever be, and the seed happens to be a seed of popcorn eventually.”

City News

A7 13 Apr. 2017

The Westminster chimes were installed in the Hillsdale County Courthouse tower in 1910. Flickr

After two decades, Westminster clock at Hillsdale county courthouse strikes again By | Thomas Novelly Editor-in-Chief After being silenced for more than 20 years, the sounds of the Westminster chimes from the Hillsdale County Courthouse can be heard once again. Last month, facility director for Hillsdale County Randy Finley and his crew climbed more than seven flights of stairs and ladders to the top of the clock tower to install new electric relays for the chimes. As a result, every hour on the clock plays the same tune as the church of St. Mary the Great in Cambridge. “We got the old clock working again,” Finley said. “It’s been broken for over two decades. We had a bid from a clock tower repair firm for more than $6,000. But we did it ourselves for $45. People like it, everyone seems to enjoy the chimes.” The Westminster chimes and the courthouse clock itself have a more than 100 year history in downtown Hillsdale. Shortly after the dedication of the current courthouse in 1899, residents in the town thought it would be the perfect place for a clock. According to newspaper articles and primary source documents provided by the Mitchell Research Center, the clock was donated by William

W. Mitchell — a two year attendee of Hillsdale College — in 1910. In a pamphlet celebrating a 75-year rededication and renovation of the clock tower, Mitchell’s original comments and thoughts on the project were printed. “The town should make tender of a clock and chime of bells to be placed in the tower of the courthouse for the use of the people of Hillsdale County,” the pamphlet said. Sometime in the 1960s, however, the chimes stopped. While primary source documents are vague in pinpointing a date or concrete reason as to why the chimes stopped, an article in the News Advertiser in 1985 stated that it was due to a judge who found them annoying and disruptive to his courtroom. “A former circuit judge was behind getting the four bells disconnected,” the article said. “They were too loud for his liking.” Due to harsh weather and lack of use, the bells eventually fell into disrepair. The capital campaign headed by the Hillsdale Historical Society and other benefactors aimed to bring back the chimes and do a complete renovation including cleaning and sandblasting the foundations and beams, removing outdated electronics, and installing new motors for

the chimes. By the fall of 1985, the Omega Tower Clock Corporation had completely renovated and reinstalled the chimes. The clock, which played chimes every 15 minutes, and then the full Westminster chime on the hour, brought joy to many people in town. The pamphlet passed out during the dedication in 1985 printed testimonies of numerous people who remembered it from their youth in the early 20th century. “Marna J. Playford recalled visiting her grandfather who was County Sheriff at the Old Jail Building at the ‘Courthouse Square,’” the pamphlet said. “She would listen to the chimes every 15 minutes. Being able to hear them again will bring back many happy

memories of visits with her grandparents.” But bad luck, much like the clock, struck again. While Finley said he couldn’t pinpoint the exact time the chimes stopped working again, he knew it was at least two decades since residents stopped hearing them. Until recently, residents would not hear the Westminster chime on every quarter or full hour, instead hearing just one chime every hour. Finley said he was happy to bring some history back with his staff. “It’s a good feeling to have the chimes back,” Finley said. “It’s even more special when your department can accomplish a task like this, something outside of their usual day-to-day activities.”

The renovated chimes hanging in the clock tower. Thomas Novelly | Collegian

County Fairgrounds to host beer and wine festival By | Chandler Lasch Collegian Reporter

LEFT TO RIGHT: Ashley Diane Hoath and Jay Scott Clark, the duo arrested in connection with the death of Jeremy Barron. HCSO | Courtesy

plex said they frequently saw Clark. Crystal Ewers has lived in the apartment complex for more than three years, and has lived right next door to Hoath for the last couple months. Ewers said she thought the two suspects were close. “I thought they were a couple, maybe lived together or something,” Ewers said “He was around here all the time. She was a fine neighbor, but she was in and out quite a bit.” According to court documents, she also worked at the Burger King in Hillsdale. Brian Palmer, Hoath’s manager at

Homicide from A1 Clark and Hoath will be found guilty. “The police have been working non-stop on this,” Stiverson said. “I’m very confident in the evidence and in the investigations that have been done in this case that we will have a successful outcome.” Hoath lives close to downtown Hillsdale. Her apartment, located off of Cherry Tree Lane, is less than two miles from Hillsdale College’s campus. Neighbors in Hoath’s com-

the Burger King, said she only worked there for the ten days prior to her arrest Sunday. “She was on her shift here this past Sunday, and then the police came in and asked to speak with her,” Palmer said. “She went out for her break to go talk with them, and then she didn’t come back. It wasn’t until I read it in the paper the next day that I knew what was going on.” Palmer said despite her being their for a little over a week, she was a decent employee minus occasional tardiness for her shifts. Sheriff Parker said that

there will be a probable cause hearing on April 19 and a preliminary examination hearing on April 26 for both Clark and Ashley Hoth. Parker said he was proud of his staff ’s diligent efforts. “I’m proud of my staff for taking a cold homicide and making arrests within a week,” Parker said in an interview with The Collegian. “But the staff is still working to finalize the investigation. This investigation has not stopped as a result of the arrest. We are still conducting interviews, processing evidence, and we are continuing the investigation.”

It may be the first event of its kind in Hillsdale County, but the upcoming beer and wine festival is slated to be the most popular around. The event, titled “The Most Popular Beer and Wine Festival on Earth,” will be held on May 6 at the Hillsdale County Fairgrounds in the Merchants building. “We will be having about 150 craft beers and wines,” Hillsdale County Fair manager Mark Williams said. “There hasn’t been an event like this in the county before, to my knowledge. It should be a fun event.” The festival will serve as both a fundraiser for the fair and a chance to have some fun during the off-season, according to Williams. Pre-sale tickets are available for $25 a person or $30 on the day of the festival. They are limited, since the fair will only be selling 1,000 tickets. Tickets can be purchased at the fair office, Hillsdale Market House, or online. Each ticket includes ten samples of beer or wine. Additional samples will be available for purchase. While the list of beers and wines is still being finalized, Williams said he hopes to have at least a partial list on the fair’s website and Facebook

page next week. “We do have a winery called Fingertips and also Cherry Creek will be there,” he said. “We’re working on other local brewers and winemakers to attend the event. There will be a combination of regional and national craft beers, and local and national wines. We may have some international wines.” Janet Smoyer, who runs the kitchen at Cherry Creek, said the winery generally provides a variety of wines at events like the festival. Usually this includes one of their most popular wines, the Cranberry Passion, which is described by their website as sweet and delightful. “Typically we bring Summer Breeze, a semi-sweet white,” Smoyer said. “Or a rosé, or Old Schoolhouse Red, which is a dry red. But people kind of equate us with the Cranberry Passion.” Visitors will be able to purchase more than alcoholic beverages. The festival will have food trucks, mainly from local businesses, and Biggby Coffee. The Donut Hut will also be open for the event and to the public. In addition, a DJ will provide entertainment. Williams said there is a possibility that the event will host live entertainment as well.

Faith Van Havel becomes first at Hillsdale Academy to attend Air Force Academy By | Lillian Quinones Collegian Reporter Faith Van Havel will trade her Hillsdale Academy uniform skirt for a blue suit when she begins her freshman year of college this August as a cadet at the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Van Havel achieved an historic first for Hillsdale Academy by becoming their first graduate to attend the Air

Force Academy. Van Havel was also accepted into the United States Military Academy, but her love of flying and family legacy with the Air Force made the decision to don the wings an easy one. “I think it’s a necessity for people to commit themselves to service, either to the community or military, and I chose the military. I want to fly post-graduation and there are more opportunities to do that in the Air Force rather than

West Point,” Van Havel said. Military service has been a part of Van Havel’s life since childhood through the example of her parents. Like his daughter, Jeff Van Havel was the first student at his high school in Morenci, Michigan, to be accepted to the Air Force Academy and retired from the Air Force as a Lt. Col. after 22 years of flying as a fighter pilot. He met Faith’s mother, Theresa Van Havel, on an Air Force base where she was en-

listed in the Air Force Nurse Corps. “I think Faith is going in with her eyes open and that she knows the risks and rewards. It’s about service. I think she’s really impressed with all the stories that we shared of our experiences in the Air Force and wanted that for herself,” Jeff Van Havel said. At Hillsdale Academy, Van Havel applied herself to the rigorous academic load along with three sports, playing bas-

ketball, volleyball, and competing as a sprinter in track for all four years. “Faith’s a go-getter. There is no challenge that she won’t apply herself to do well in. We told her to work hard because the things taught at the Academy aren’t given freely,” Theresa Van Havel said. In the classroom, Van Havel met the standards of the Air Force Academy where the average GPA of an incoming cadet is 3.88.

“Faith is a very bright young lady and a very humble young lady. As a student those two attributes made her a joy to teach. She’s also a very tough young lady, not mean or rough. That’s also key to her success,” Ken Calvert said, Headmaster of Hillsdale Academy. She plans to major in civil engineering at the Air Force Academy to pursue her love of architecture after serving as a pilot.

A8 13 Apr. 2017

www.hillsdalecollegian.com

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Softball

Baseball SATURDAY, APR.

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Findlay

10 02 Hillsdale

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09 02 SUNDAY, APR.

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Upcoming Apr. 14 vs. Saginaw Valley - 2:00 PM vs. Saginaw Valley Apr. 15 vs. Saginaw Valley - 1:00 PM vs. Saginaw Valley

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Golf 31st-Peter Beneteau-75 Apr. 9 93rd-Liam Purslowe-79 Purgatory Regional 93rd-Joe Torres-79 1. Grand Valley 93rd-Logan Kauffman-79 2. Saginaw Valley 100th-George Roberts-80 18. Hillsdale

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Apr. 8 Hillsdale-4 Walsh-5

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Apr. 15 at Walsh - 1:00 PM Northwood at Walsh

By | Joshua J. Paladino Collegian Reporter

Results

Hillsdale

9 Saginaw Valley

Upcoming Apr. 14 vs. Findlay 2:00 PM

MONDAY’S GOLF TOURNAMENT CUT SHORT DUE TO RAINSTORM

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it takes to compete and keep the team in the game.” When the two teams returned to Simpson Field the next day, the Charger bats took three innings to return to life. Findlay took a 3-0 lead in the top of the third, but, starting in the fourth, the Chargers pushed across 11 runs in their final three at bats. Boerst, Ring, Walts, and Wiskur — who earned honorable mention GLIAC Player of the Week honors — all hit home runs in the game, while freshman Dante Toppi drove in two runs and Hites added one RBI of his own. Jeff Burch started the game, allowing five runs — four earned — over 5.1 innings, while striking out three. Junior Phil Carey finished the effort, allowing two earned over the final 1.2 innings, sealing the 11-7 win. Lottinville said the performance of the pitching staff on the weekend freed up the

Northwood Apr. 14 at Lake Erie - 3:00 PM at Lake Erie

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Apr. 19 vs. Wayne St. - 2:00 PM vs. Wayne St.

Baseball from A10

Hillsdale

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Apr. 21 2016 GLIAC Championships at Nashport, OH

offense and allowed for the weekend’s outburst. “Playing with a lead lets you do so many more things,” he said. “It means even if you put up a zero one inning, nobody has to panic, because you know your guy is going to go out there and shove the next inning.” With the sweep on the line in game four, seven separate Chargers recorded hits, including two home runs from Wiskur and one from both Boerst and Lottinville on the way to a 9-5 victory. Wiskur and Lottinville each drove in four runs in the effort to punctuate stellar weekends, which included 10 RBIs for Lottinville. Freshman Andrew Verbrugge started the game for the Chargers, allowing three earned over 6.1 innings. Redshirt freshman Joe Hamrick, sophomore Tanner Sizemore, and Toppi threw the final 2.2 innings, allowing only two unearned runs. The Chargers have emphasised fostering a desire

to compete and in picking up their teammates in recent weeks. Verbrugge said the level of energy in the dugout was important to the team’s success against Findlay. “As long as we are staying positive in the dugout and cheering each other on, we tend to do better,” he said. “When we get down on ourselves, we tend to slack off in the dugout, and that can really bring down the team. This weekend helped a lot with building our confidence.” The Chargers will host the Saginaw Valley Cardinals this weekend, for doubleheaders on both Friday and Saturday, before hosting Wayne St. for a doubleheader next Wednesday. “[Saginaw] has started to play better as of late, after a slow start,” Theisen said. “There are no easy conference games.”

A rainstorm ended the Purgatory Regional Tournament on Monday after the Hillsdale College golf team had nearly finished the round. Junior Logan Kauffman was on the 16th hole when the weather ended play. “We were bummed about the rainout because we were playing well,” Kauffman said. Since rain cut short the competition, only the first day’s scores were counted and team finished 18th out of 28 teams. Freshman George Roberts said he was on the 18th hole when the weather signals buzzed.

“The rain delay cancelled out Monday’s round, which was annoying as we were all playing slightly better,” Roberts said. “There was sun with some wind one minute, and then the next minute the storm put the course underwater.” Sophomore Liam Purslowe, junior Joe Torres, and Kauffman each shot 79. Roberts came in one stroke behind them with an 80. Kauffman said he played poorly off the tee, but his putter saved his score a few times. Roberts had the opposite problem. “I played poorly. I’m just struggling with the putter right now,” Roberts said. “I will be working on putting: changing some posture issues and

ball position.” On April 9, the Chargers shot 312 overall at the tournament in Noblesville, Indiana. Grand Valley State University scored 285 to win the tournament. Sophomore Peter Beneteau led the team with a 75 on Sunday, which tied him for 31st as an individual. The team will play the GLIAC Championship, the last regular season tournament of the year, from Friday, April 21 until Sunday, April 23 at The Virtues Golf Club in Nashport, Ohio. “We are ready to go out and win conferences,” Kauffman said.

Members of the Hillsdale College men’s golf team practice at the driving range last fall. John Quint | Courtesy

TENNIS REACHES .500 IN CONFERENCE AFTER 1-1 WEEKEND By | Scott McClallen Collegian Reporter Hillsdale College men’s tennis team split weekend matches on the road, reaching 4-4

in conference play. The Chargers toppled Walsh University 5-4 Saturday afternoon then dropped a 5-4 decision to Tiffin University on Sunday. Hillsdale split singles play

Junior Dugan Delp was a No. 4 singles winner 7-5, 4-6, 6-4 on Sunday against Tiffin. Zoe Hopkins | Courtesy

against the Walsh Cavaliers, but won two doubles matches to overcome the tenth-ranked team in the Midwest region. Freshman Charlie Adams picked up a hard-fought No. 2 singles win 7-6, 2-6, 6-2. Adams teamed up with sophomore Justin Hyman for a No. 1 doubles win 8-6, stretching their doubles win streak to nine. Freshman Milan Mirkovic won at No. 3 singles 6-0, 6-1, and paired with freshman Julien Clouette — a No. 6 singles winner 6-3, 6-1 — to win at No. 3 doubles 8-4. Walsh is the fourth regionally-ranked team the Chargers have defeated this season. “We made strides to be third in the conference, but our progress is a huge jump from last season,” head coach Keith Turner said. “We went from one conference win to four, and we are gaining a lot of recognition for it.” Clouette said Charger tennis has improved in every way since last season. “We’ve had better results against every team we’ve played,” Clouette said. “There’s no doubt we’ve improved with our new freshmen.” The Chargers fell to Tiffin University 5-4 on Sunday evening.

Hillsdale was swept in doubles play for the first time since pre-spring break lineup changes, but the Chargers fought back to win four singles matches, three of which required a third set. Adams picked up a No. 2 singles win 6-3, 6-1. Mirkovic won at No. 3 singles 1-6, 6-1, 6-1. Junior captain Dugan Delp was a No. 4 singles winner 7-5, 4-6, 6-4, and sophomore John Ciraci won at No. 5 singles 6-2, 5-7, 7-6. “I’m happy the way we fought back after doubles to finish strong,” Turner said. Charger tennis has not been shutout since February, and has come within a point from beating some of the best GLIAC teams. Nine of the Hillsdale’s 19 matches this season have ended in a 5-4 score, showing the fierce competition in their schedule. “We are happy, but we know we could be better,” Clouette said. “We still have the GLIAC tournament to prove to the other teams that we can beat them.” The Chargers will face Findlay University on Friday afternoon, their final conference match before the GLIAC tournament. “If we beat Findlay, we

should finish fifth in the conference,” Turner said. “They have strong players, so we will

have to come out fired up for our last home match.”

Sophomore John Ciraci defeated his Tiffin opponent at No. 5 singles on Sunday 6-2, 5-7, 7-6. Zoe Hopkins | Courtesy

A9 13 Apr. 2017

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WOMEN’S TRACK COMPETES IN KENTUCKY AND OHIO By | Jessica Hurley Collegian Reporter

This weekend, the women’s track squad split up again between Western Kentucky University and Ohio Wesleyan University. Head coach Andrew Towne said he thought the team put up a solid performance. “I thought, for the most part, we did a good job,” Towne said. “There were several highlights across the board, even though we didn’t have our full team competing. It was a really good week for us.” At the 2017 WKU Hilltopper Relays, the 4x400 relay team of senior captain Allison Duber, juniors Tori Wichman and Ashlee Moran, and freshman Lorina Clemence took third. Their time of 3:45.87 met the provisional standard and they are currently ranked 10th in the nation. According to Duber, the presence of Grand Valley’s relay team — which was the national runner-up in the indoor season — put the Hillsdale squad in the mindset to compete. This, combined with the excellent weather in Kentucky, set them up for an exceptional performance. “We were just ready to race,” Duber said. “Pretty much all of us PRed that day, but I know all of us can run faster. We ended up running a 3:45.8, which is a great time to run at this point in the season. It makes us really excited for what we can do this year.” Unfortunately, 3:45.87 will not qualify the team for the national meet. Duber said they will likely have to run near 3:43 to make it to nationals. Still, the team is confident.

“Our mindset going into outdoor is that we are a team that deserves to be at nationals,” Duber said. “We know we can be a podium-finisher team. We just need to instill that confidence within our team. We’re not trying to get anything done each week — we don’t have to do anything each week. We’re just going to let it happen.” Towne said he was happy with the performance, but not surprised by it. “That’s just who we are,” Towne said. “In indoor, we struggled a little bit — it was just a weird year. By all means, I was happy with what they did this weekend, but I also feel like that’s who they are. It’s something they can put down any time they want to.” In the pole vault, senior Alex Whitford tied for second and met the automatic standard with her jump of 13 feet, 6.5 inches — her personal best by almost a foot. Whitford is now ranked second in the nation and is guaranteed a spot in the national meet. “I wasn’t really expecting it. Going into the meet, I felt pretty centered and we had a tail wind. It all felt good, but I didn’t realize it felt that good,” Whitford said. “I know we have been working on technique in practice, and that part is coming together little by little. I didn’t expect it to happen all at once.” Whitford said she was excited after she first cleared her previous personal record of 12 feet, 7.5 inches. She fed off of the energy of her competitors and teammates while Towne helped her remain cool and collected. Meeting the automatic mark has always been

Whitford’s dream, and she said it’s surreal that she has finally achieved it. “I’ve been praying about it a lot, because it’s an interesting place to be in,” Whitford said. “It’s so easy to take success and not build off of it, and I don’t want to do that. I’ve been listening to what my coach has to say about building on the process, because the process isn’t over just because I reached a big height. I’m just really thankful for everything that has happened.” Towne said Whitford’s weekend success is a result of her hard work. “She has worked really hard,” Towne said. “I’m happy for her to break through. She’s a good example of being open to her potential and the idea that maybe she can be even better. I’m of the opinion that she’s just getting started.” In the indoor season, Towne mentioned that this year is a transition year, especially for the women’s squad. Only two meets into the outdoor season, that transition phase may be coming to a close. “I think we are absolutely progressing. We’re beginning to sort out who we are,” Towne said. “Everyone is becoming increasingly comfortable with their roles. That’s why we’re starting to see some really good performances.” The Chargers will be hosting the Border Battle this weekend. Towne described the meet as small and quick, but good, with only five teams in attendance. For some Chargers, this will be their first chance to compete this season. For others, it will be a break from traveling, Towne said.

Senior Ty Etchemendy competes in hurdles at the 2017 Winter Opener this indoor track season. Evan Carter | Collegian

Men’s track continues to make progress in weekend competition By | Evan Carter Web Editor

Junior Fiona Shea hands the baton to junior Ashlee Moran during last year’s Border Battle. Hillsdale will host this year’s Border Battle this weekend. Anders Kiledal | Collegian

Men’s track captain Ty Etchemendy took another step toward his goal of qualifying for the outdoor national meet in all three of his events this past weekend with solid performances in the triple jump, 400-meter hurdles, and the 4x400-meter relay. The senior jumped 14.68 meters in the triple jump and ran a provisional-qualifying time of 53.45 seconds in the 400-meter hurdles. He didn’t run the 4x400 relay at the Hilltopper Relays in Bowling Green, Kentucky, but ran part of last week’s 4x400 relay at the Texas Relays in Austin. “I wasn’t super happy with how everything went, but I made good strides towards what I’m trying to do,” he said. “This weekend was actually kind of difficult because they weren’t running triple jump very efficiently and I ended up only having five minutes after triple jump

to run the 400 hurdles.” Etchemendy believes surpassing the school record of 15.04 meters in the triple jump and running a sub-52 second time in the 400-meter hurdles are both attainable by the end of the season. In addition to praising Etchemendy’s performance from the past weekend, head coach Andrew Towne highlighted sophomore Nate Eldridge’s 48.9 second time in the 400-meter dash. “[This past weekend] was another opportunity to improve,” Towne said. “We have a home meet this weekend, so we have another shot at it.” Other notable performances at the Hilltopper Relays were sophomore Nathan Pando’s 22.63 second time in the 200-meter dash, the 4x100 relay team’s 41.85 second performance, and Junior Daniel Čapek’s 41.42 meter throw in discus. Athletes who didn’t travel to the Hilltopper Relays this past weekend traveled to the

Marv Frye Invitational in Delaware, Ohio. Junior Luke Miller’s second-place finish in the pole vault was the highlight of the men’s performances at the meet. Miller’s vault of 4.13 meters was about a quarter-meter off of his personal best, but he was still pleased with his effort. “It’s a little disappointing, because it’s not as high as I feel I should be able to go, but it was nice to get something started for outdoor,” Miller said. “Pole vaulting is such a finicky event — it’s easy for one little thing to be off that affects your entire performance. Especially with the mental aspect of it.” This Friday and Saturday the track team will host the Border Battle, its first outdoor home track meet of the season, at the Ken Herrick Track in Muddy Water’s Stadium.

CHARGER CHATTER: ALEX WHITFORD but did not expect it to be that big. That was a really exciting time. I actually jumped three different heights over my meet, so it was very exciting to have that final breakthrough, definitely. And now you’re ranked second in the nation. What was your reaction to that?

Senior Alex Whitford is a pole vaulter for the women’s track and field team. She is a marketing and management major and is pursuing a minor in Spanish. Whitford earned a personal record over the weekend at Hilltopper Invitational at Western Kentucky University vaulting 13 feet 6 inches, ranking her second in Division II. What was it like for you to PR by about a foot this weekend? For the past three years for track, I’ve been kind of stuck at the same height. About 12’6” is about where I’ve been jumping my whole career, and so, I’ve been hoping for a PR

It’s really exciting. I’m usually barely squeaking into nationals or not qualifying at all, and so, to have an autoqualifying mark for nationals is very exciting going into the rest of the season. It kind of opens up some opportunities to focus on technique and less on making bars to qualify.

my teammates, I think that’s helped to clear the pathway mentally, so I can do the things my coach tells me to do. What was that new mindset you brought with you this year?

This year, I think, just a lot of trust in my coach and trust in God that he’s going to carry me through. Just that whatever happens is supposed to happen for a reason and that I’m not going to change it no matter how much I stress about it or how much I worry. I’m just more open about it and less scared, I think.

How have you grown since your freshman year?

Freshman year, you had an injury. How did that happen and how did you move forward from there?

My first few years as an athlete at Hillsdale, I’ve had some physical roadblocks, but also a lot of mental ones. Some injuries set me back a couple of months, but the mental setbacks then with just not believing in my training, not believing in my abilities, or letting outside factors muddle my focus. I think those definitely have been struggles that, going into this year and having a new mindset with help from my coach and

I actually had two different injuries. In my freshman year, I fell from the top of my pole to the ground, broke my foot in three places. That was the day before nationals my freshman year. That was a very tough mentally, and it put me out of track for about two months just with therapy and being immobile. I was out for all of outdoor season and coming back in the fall, I was just still very mentally scared to jump because that’s what I did to

get hurt and also just mentally feeling like I couldn’t do things I had done before I got hurt. This past year, my junior year, I tore my meniscus in January, which was a smaller injury, and I got surgery right away, and I was only out for a couple of meets. But I think it set me back training-wise. I wasn’t as strong or as fast. However, I think just a lot of my coach understanding how the body works and how to fix those things and change how I lift and how I run in order to prevent more injuries has helped a lot. Since you are returning to the Chargers to compete for a fifth year next year, what are your goals? I kind of get to do the thing most Hillsdale students wish they could, which is to do track without the school part. I’m very excited to see what track looks like without the side distractions. I guess goal-wise, it’s tough to say. Our school record is very high, because there was a professional pole vaulter here before me, but I would love to get as close to that as I can and to see what is my full potential. I just don’t know yet and to foster some more relationships on the team, to be the grandma

on the team with some other fifth-year girls. It’s going to be really fun, just being more of a mentor. How did you get into pole vaulting?

It’s kind of a funny story. I did gymnastics, when I was younger, very competitively, loved it and spent 20-25 hours a week doing it and traveling. Got to freshman year of high school and had a huge growth spurt. I’m 5’9” right now, and that’s way too tall for a gymnast. I just kind of felt like Shaquille O’Neal on a balance beam. It was not working out. My mom and I had a lot of conversations and decided it would be best to be done with gymnastics. I don’t think a lot of people know gymnastics and pole vaulting are very similar. But I started with diving first, which is also another sport that falls into that triad of athletics. I did diving, liked it, and then moved to track because I liked running, but I definitely did not want to try pole vault because it looked terrifying. I was like, “Heck no.” I had some friends and a coach who just kept pushing. That first time we went out onto the field, it was a rainy, muddy day, and we were just sticking the pole in the mud

and hoisting ourselves over not very high at all. We were just running around and having fun with it. I think that lighthearted, exciting, fun aspect of the sport was what drew me in. I was obviously hooked from that day. I’ve been doing it since my sophomore year of high school and have enjoyed the close-knit community of pole vaulters because it is such a small sport as well as just the fact that the thrill is really addicting. Do you have any pre-meet rituals? My coach has this book called “From Beginner to Bubka,” and Bubka is a worldchampion pole vaulter. This isn’t something that I’ve done for a long time, because I don’t typically do anything pregame, but me and one of my teammate, Kathryn Bassette, were reading through the book and how to approach these things, just getting really technical with it — kind of a Hillsdale way, I think, reading about a sport. That was really fun, and I think we’ll continue it in the future. It put us in a good spot. — Compiled by Breana Noble

Charger

Ty Etchemendy has successful weekend With three solid performances, Etchemendy took another step toward nationals. A9

Charger Chatter: Alex Whitford Learn more about the pole vaulter who’s currently ranked No. 2 in Division II. A9

Men’s tennis beats northwood then falls to tiffin The 1-1 weekend means the Chargers are 4-4 in GLIAC play. A8

Zoe Hopkins | Courtesy

13 APR. 2017

Evan Carter | Collegian

Breana Noble | Collegian

CHARGERS SWEEP FINDLAY, FALL TO WAYNE STATE By | Stevan Bennett Jr. Assistant Editor

This past week, the Hillsdale College baseball team went 4-2 against two of the top pitching staffs in the GLIAC. After taking all four games from the Findlay Oilers over the weekend, the Chargers dropped two games to the Wayne State Warriors on Wednesday, moving them to 8-10 in GLIAC play. Game one against the Warriors — who are ranked No. 3 in the Midwest region, according to D2BaseballNews. com — was a heartbreaker for the Chargers. After Wayne St. opened up scoring with two runs in the bottom of the first, the Chargers replied with five runs over the next three in-

nings, including a three-run home run from senior Ethan Wiskur — his fourth of the week — and an RBI single from sophomore Colin Boerst. This gave the Chargers a 5-2 lead, which they carried into the bottom of the sixth inning. Wayne St. stormed back in the sixth and seventh, pushing one run across in the sixth, before stringing together five hits in the seventh to score three runs and secure the walk-off victory 6-5. “Those ones are always tough to lose — when you think that you’ve got ‘em, but they slip through the cracks — but you have to get over it and get onto the next one,” head coach Eric Theisen said. Sophomore Will Kruse started the game, throwing

six innings of three-hit ball, in which he allowed three earned runs, while striking out five. “Will Kruse had an incredible outing on short rest,” Theisen said. “We needed that. That was big.” The Warriors carried their offensive momentum from game one into game two, scoring five runs in the first two innings. Hillsdale was able to pull within one run in the top of the sixth, thanks to an RBI single from sophomore Donald Ring in the fifth and RBI singles from sophomore Chris Ackerman and junior Ryan O’Hearn in the sixth. From this point on, however, the game belonged to the Warriors, who scored eight runs in their final three at bats,

Senior Ethan Wiskur hit four home runs this weekend: three against Findlay and one against Wayne State. Sarah Klopfer | Courtesy

sealing a 13-4 victory. Despite the lopsided final score, Theisen said the game was closer than the scoreboard indicated, given the large first inning and the late explosion from the Warriors. He also commended freshman starter Kolton Rominski for recovering from a tough first inning to get through 5.1 innings. Theisen said free bases hurt the Chargers, who committed eight errors on the evening. “We gave a good team too many freebies,” he said. “They’re a regionally ranked team, and we can’t afford to give a team that good freebies and still have a chance to win.” The Chargers will see Wayne again next Wednesday, when they host the Warriors for a doubleheader to finish out the season series. Theisen said, however, the team’s focus is on the weekend series against Saginaw Valley. “We have to take care of Saginaw,” he said. “We aren’t going to worry about Wayne St. until the Saginaw series is over. We kind of look at it as two separate series against Wayne.” The back-to-back losses to the Warriors came on the heels of a tremendous weekend against the Findlay Oilers. Entering the weekend, the Oilers’ pitching staff had an ERA of 2.92 and had allowed only 14 home runs. After the Chargers blasted 10 home runs in four wins, the Oilers’ team ERA had inflated to 3.90. “It was huge,” Theisen said. “In college baseball, the regular season is the playoffs to make the postseason. The top six teams make the tournament, and we talk about not necessarily competing with other teams, but with the .500 mark in conference, because every year the sixth place team seems to be around that .500 mark.” The barrage started in game one. After three hitless Charger innings, sophomore Dylan Lottinville opened the floodgates with a grand slam. O’Hearn and Junior Alex Walts each added two RBIs in the game, while Lottinville drove in one more of his own, bringing the final to 10-2. “We did a great job the second and third time through

Sophomore Dylan Lottinville hit two homeruns and drove in 10 runs in the weekend series against Findlay. Sarah Klopfer | Courtesy

the order of making adjustments and learning from our first at bats,” Theisen said. Lottinville explained what he saw as the key to the Chargers offensive explosion. “Going into it, we had the mindset of ‘OK, this is statistically the best pitching staff in the conference, so we need to lock in and have tough at bats,’” he said. “And it was just a mentality thing, to make sure that every one of us had really good quality at bats from the beginning of the games.” As has become routine, Kruse took the ball in game one, setting the pace for the weekend. He threw all seven innings, allowing two runs — one earned — on eight hits while striking out the same, which earned Kruse honorable mention GLIAC Pitcher of the Week honors. Game two provided no reprieve for the Oilers. In the bottom of the second, Waltz

put the Chargers on the board with an RBI single, then O’Hearn drove in two more with a double. Throughout the rest of the game, sophomore Colin Hites tallied two RBIs, while Lottinville, Boerst, and sophomore Donald Ring all drove in one. Ring’s RBI came on a solo home run in the third. The Charger pitching staff was fantastic in the 9-2 victory. Rominski started the game, hurling 6.1 innings, allowing two earned and striking out five. Senior Joe Chasen and sophomore Josh Leymaster combined to throw the final 2.2 innings, each allowing one hit and no runs. “Our younger starters are learning, and they’re improving,” Theisen said. “Obviously, consistency is the name of the game, and they’re young, but those guys are learning what

See Baseball A8

Softball ranked second in GLIAC after 3-1 weekend By | Madeleine Jepsen Assistant Editor Though the Chargers softball team’s six-game winning streak ended over the weekend, the team swept the Northwood Timberwolves and split with the GLIAC-leading Saginaw Valley Cardinals for a 3-1 weekend. Hillsdale held Northwood to five innings in game one, taking an early lead and a final score of 10-1. The Charger scoring started in the top of the second, when freshman outfielder Victoria Addis drew a walk. A two-RBI single by freshman catcher Sydney San Juan scored sophomore second baseman Amanda Marra, who reached on an error, and sophomore left fielder Katie Kish, who walked. The Chargers answered a solo home run in the bottom of the second with two home runs of their own in the top of the third. Freshman shortstop Sam Catron had a three-RBI home run, scoring Addis and Kish, and then Marra followed with her first collegiate home run. A San Juan single, which scored junior first baseman Haley Lawrence, and a single from senior center fielder Bekah Kastning scored sophomore outfielder Carly Gouge brought the score to 9-1. The

final run of the game came from Kish off a Catron single. In the circle, freshman pitcher Dana Weidinger got the win for the Chargers, striking out eight of the 19 batters she faced over the game’s five innings. In game two, the Timberwolves took an early 5-1 lead after 1 1/2 innings. Three Charger runs in the first three innings and almost four innings of work from freshman pitcher Erin Gordon, however, kept the Chargers competitive. “We just battled back, and the team had the feel that we were going to battle back,” head coach Joe Abraham said. “It’s hard in this league to come back and win if you’re down 5-1, but we managed to do it.” The breakthrough came in the bottom of the fourth, when Kastning’s double scored junior third baseman Jessica Taylor. A sacrifice fly from junior catcher Kelsey Gockman brought home senior designated player Cassie Asselta, and a groundout from Addis sent Kastning home. A Catron double scored Kish to conclude the four-run inning. In the end, the Chargers were able to come back for a 7-6 win, completing the sweep against Northwood. “It was really nice to sweep Northwood, because we have

not done that in a very long time,” Gockman said. “Usually, they’re one of those teams that’s really similar to us in the rankings.” On Sunday, Hillsdale faced Saginaw Valley State University and opened game one on a strong note with nine runs in the top of the second. “It was a combination of us doing well and them making some key errors that helped us score,” Gockman said. In that inning, Lawrence, Kish, Gordon, Taylor, freshman shortstop Julia Huebner, Gouge, Kastning, San Juan, and Marra all scored. “Everyone contributed,” Gouge said. “There wasn’t one person who wasn’t doing something great hitting-wise, pitching-wise, or in the dugout. Everybody was so up, and it was like we were unstoppable.” Freshman pitcher Alexis Newby started the game with three shutout innings, and Weidinger got the win in four innings of relief work. Though the Cardinals scored three runs in the bottom of the fourth, runs from San Juan and Gouge in the fourth and seventh innings contributed to the final score of 11-3. Though the Chargers began game two with a 2-0 lead, Sag-

inaw’s six runs in the top of the third, followed by three more runs later in the game, brought the score to 9-4. “It was a lot of unfortunate hits, right to people, and they pitched their ace, so it was a little harder,” Gouge said. “We did hold them down pretty well, and scored a few runs to begin with, but we didn’t end up finishing that.” Over the course of the weekend, Kish went 8-for-12 with two walks, Kastning went 7-for-16 at the plate, and Asselta reached base eight out of 12 times after going 4-for-4 in game two against Northwood and getting hit by four pitches. “Those three really sparked our offense for the weekend,” Abraham said. “What we got this weekend was a lot of clutch hitting performances and a lot of great execution on offense, which we haven’t always had this year.” Hillsdale, now 8-4 in the GLIAC, will face Lake Eerie University and Walsh University in away doubleheaders this weekend. “I think we’re all doing a lot better than we expected to do coming in with such a young team,” Gockman said. “It’s really exciting to see us do this well, and just the promise of doing well in the years to come.”

Junior Katie Kish went 8-for-12 this weekend at the plate. Sarah Klopfer | Courtesy

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B1 13 Apr. 2017 Grace DeSandro | Collegian

Birzer Bandana ties together science fiction, apocalyptic lyrics, and British prog-rock By | Mark Naida

Collegian Reporter

Theology, intellectual rock, and the liberal arts — these are three main elements of the debut album by Birzer Bandana, a collaboration between progressive rock musician Dave Smith and Hillsdale College Professor of History Bradley Birzer. Birzer provided the concept and lyrics, and Smith wrote the music for the seven-song progressive rock album “Becoming One,” which was released on Spotify, Bandcamp, and iTunes March 18. Progressive rock seeks to combine the formal elements of classical music while also embracing the eclectic side of rock and roll music, according to music critic Lucas Biela of progarchives.com. “Rock bands like the Rolling Stones wanted to show pure emotion in their music. Prog is a more intellectual genre that shares ideas,” Birzer said. Birzer said he used minimalistic and imagist lyrics to relate Christian ideas and a philosophy of the liberal arts without being too obvious or preachy. “I didn’t want someone to think this was Gospel Rock,” Birzer said.

Birzer Bandana has never even met face to face, and yet the duo was able to produce a full length album with music that engages with the genre of science fiction while also contemplating more traditional themes like the liberal arts and the incarnation of Jesus Christ. “One of the things that first drew me to Dave was his voice. He doesn’t have a huge range, but I love how earnest his delivery is,” Birzer said. The two men struck up a correspondence over email after Birzer began listening to Dave Smith and Dave Curnow’s joint progrock project Salander more than five years ago. Based in Durham County, England, Smith and Curnow have produced six albums together and have developed a small but loyal cult following. Smith, who goes by the stage name “Dave Bandana,” is British but recently relocated to the Canary Islands, where he performs professionally. A well-rounded musician, Smith plays bass, guitar, drums, synth, piano, organ, and mellotron on the album. Despite the incorporation of many different instruments, Smith still made the vocals a primary element of the album. “It was a different way of

working for me,” Smith said. “On the plus side, I got my own way over every musical decision because there was no one to tell me different, but maybe not all of them were correct ones. On the downside, I like feedback but I knew that Brad was happy for me to make the musical decisions.” Impressed by what he heard, Birzer began an email exchange with Smith that became a strong friendship.

Birzer said he never thought it would blossom into a creative partnership, but when Smith approached Birzer with the opportunity to write a concept and lyrics for an album, Birzer could not refuse. Despite Birzer’s statement that he “has no experience with composition or musical talent,” Smith found his lyrics challenging and engaging. “I sat and read and re-read the lyrics for a couple of days

Birzer Bandana’s album was released in March. Birzer | Courtesy

By | Madeleine Jepsen Assistant Editor

Father John Misty’s new album provides unexpected entertainment By | R. Michael Burns

On the fourth track of his debut album, “Fear Fun,” Father John Misty croons, “I’ll never leave the canyon, ’cause I’m surrounded on all sides / By people writing novels and living on amusement rides.” With his latest release “Pure Comedy,” he is still languishing in the canyon, but he has gotten some perspective on what is really at stake in the insidious entertainment complex of popular culture. Father John Misty, the alias of former Fleet Foxes percussionist and solo artist Josh Tillman, has released three albums over the course of five years. During this half-decade, he has become one of the most divisive figures in indie music. He is reviled by those who see him as a pedantic and ironic “hipster,” and he is lauded by those who consider him a selfaware postmodern prophet. With his first two releases, he wore two notable hats: the sardonic wit and the honest romantic. On record, he kept his sarcasm and tenderness separate. “Fear Fun”’s moments of romantic self-expression (namely “O I Long To Feel Your Arms Around Me” and “Everyman Needs A Companion)” are masquerades for cynical commentary on popular attitudes towards love. His 2015 sophomore album, “I Love You Honeybear,” is uncompromisingly concerned with how Tillman can show “true affection.” In the downtime after the second album, he engaged in several on- and off-stage shenanigans: covering Taylor Swift’s “Blank

Space” in the style of the Velvet Underground on YouTube, stealing crystals from a boutique shop in Los Angeles, and ranting at a New Jersey music festival for 15 minutes about the Republican Convention. All of this served as buildup, in the minds of Father John Misty fans, for a third album that would be as asinine as an artist — who appears shirtless and drowning in the music video for Lana Del Rey’s “Freak” and smokes all-natural American Spirit cigarettes religiously — could possibly produce. But when “Pure Comedy” was released on April 7,

humans provoke themselves to suffering: by letting tyrants rule them, submitting to an organized religion, and rejecting the love of another person. The only recourse in life is the sheer acknowledgement that it is as vacuous as we think it may be: “And what’s to regret / For a speck on a speck on a speck / Made more ridiculous the more serious he gets?” The waxy vinyl sound of “Birdie,” the soaring string section of “Two Wildly Different Perspectives” and “In Twenty Years Or So,” and the melodramatic piano of “When The God Of Love Returns There’ll Be Hell To Pay” all combine to form a “listenable” album. Entertainment, strictly speaking, it is not; every song is chockfull of attacks on politicians and religious fanatics, and the album is punctuated by two songs exceeding ten minutes each. A front-toback listen leaves the listener winded, not only because it is a 75-minute album, but because it forces the listener to confront their environment. It even forces the listener to confront the device they are using to listen to Father John Misty’s latest release, while they are busy “bedding Taylor Swift / Every night inside the Oculus Rift.” “Pure Comedy” is in no way a retread of previous albums, though the thread of ennui that runs throughout was first laid by Tillman on “Bored In The USA.” It is a project removed from the Father John Misty character almost entirely — there is no facade of irony

“And what’s to regret

For a speck on a speck on a speck Made more ridiculous the more serious he gets?” fans received a very different form of “entertainment”: a fatalistic diatribe against hypocritical figureheads. In reality, Tillman proclaims, the comedy of human error and bad luck stops for no one. It seems that this was the balladeer’s goal all along. According to a lengthy essay sent to his fan club that served as an announcement for the album, Tillman reveals that the album is a story about a “species” whose “brains prove to be remarkably good at inventing meaning where there is none.” The opening title track reveals further that this species is man, as Tillman sings, “The comedy of man starts like this / Our brains are way too big for our mothers’ hips.” From there, he lays out all manner of ways in which

Smith’s friend Olga Kent, cuts through, placing the listener into a scene of “Deadly, deadly heat,” as the lyrics read. The album concludes with “Incarnate,” which begins with a simple chord progression on the piano as Smith gradually layers his voice over the lyrics. One voice sings: “The flesh becomes the word / the image is the whole.” Two voices harmonize: “Alone, free, unique, free.” And a third voice breaks through between the harmonies: “The errors, hell / the fire, purgation / the man is free.” The album then dances away with a soaring guitar solo, bringing the listener through desolation and into freedom. Birzer Bandana already has another album in the works. The duo are planning their next project, which will focus on combining science fiction and progressive rock even more closely. Birzer said the next album will have a clearer narrative arc centering around three men in a starship. “Becoming One” seeks to edify and affirm the unity of the human person. As Birzer writes in “3 to 1”: “Colors shift, forms form, / Shades shade / Colors color / From three to one / Becoming whole.”

Knecht connects cows, chess, and musical cognition

Father John Misty’s new album was released last week. Facebook

Collegian Freelancer

to get a feel for the concept and the world it was set in,” Smith said. “The lines were short and very staccato with lots of word repetition.” Once he found his footing in Birzer’s apocalyptic, theological lyrics, Smith began writing music to fit the setting. “I then set about creating some soundscapes either using keyboard sounds or guitar until they became something I liked,” he said. “It was then a case of editing them into song form then adding the other instruments and finding a tune to fit the lyrics.” Birzer said one of his main impetuses for the album was a seed which had been germinating in his mind for a while after a visiting speaker expressed pride in having identified 18 facets of his personality. Birzer thought this wasn’t the point. The album begins in desolation, as Birzer writes in the preface to the liner notes which “A Canticle for Leibowitz” by Walter M. Miller Jr. provide the opening scene, but “everything that followed came from my own love of vast, deserted, and broken landscapes.” The opening track, “Awash,” prefaces the project with a wall of sound as guitars seem to fill the recording until a violin, played by

See Misty B2

Human short-term memory only has a capacity for five to seven items — like the digits of a phone number — yet expert musicians can learn and retain music they may have heard for the first time only a few minutes ago. According to Professor of Music Melissa Knecht, these feats of memory involve the musician’s schema, the framework of experience to which he or she compare the new music they encounter. Knecht shared her insights into musical cognition in her April 11 presentation, “Cows, Chess, and Musical Expertise,” as a part of Mossey Library’s series on faculty research. This schema, based on the

extensive musical patterns they have previously played and listened to, allows them to remember new music in relationship to what they already know. “When musicians memorize music, they rely on structure for their memory, and the details fit into that structure,” Knecht said. “Rather than memorizing every chord or note, we build up a framework within which many different sounds fit, a kind of mental template which can accommodate a large number of musical pieces.” Just as a schema for a birthday party might include cake, candles, balloons, and singing the “happy birthday” song, a musician’s schema is based on the chord progressions and

patterns found in the music of their culture. Expert musicians also use a skill known as “chunking” to remember a sequence of notes in groups, rather than as isolated, individual notes. “As humans, we do this all the time,” Knecht said. “We’re always searching our brains for the most relevant category.” For example, Knecht said the first thing that pops into many people’s minds when asked what cows drink is milk, though cows drink water, because of the categorical organization of the information. As a demonstration of the importance of schema and chunking in music cognition,

See Knecht B2

CULTURE CORNER What music do you jam to while you’re studying? Compiled by Alexis Nester

Kayla Stetzel, senior: I’m easily distracted by sounds so I don’t usually listen to music while I study, but if I do it needs something repetitive and soothing. I discovered Black Sands’ “Bonobo,” and it is literally one of the most relaxing and entertaining albums, not distracting or overbearing. For more menial work or writing for fun, I listen to Philip Glass for classical music ... I listen to “Goldfisch” by Kolsh whenever I finish a paper. It’s a victory song. George Roberts, freshman: It depends what I’m studying. I listen to hip hop or RnB for science courses. For English, I tone it down a little bit to some jazz type of music. Don’t judge me.

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Kiara Freeman, freshman: I listen to “Howlin’ for You” by the Black Keys whenever I need to be passionate about my work. Usually I listen to it when I need to do chemistry because it makes me work harder. Brad Birzer, professor of history: When I’m writing, I almost always put on the most involved progressive rock possible — generally Big Big Train, The Tangent, Yes, or Rush. The complexities always help me think in broad terms. When I’m grading, it totally depends on my mood. If it’s a melancholy (because of topic, not student ability!) essay, I might put some Beethoven or Mendelssohn on to cheer me up. But, normally, I grade to rock or jazz. Courtesy My treat is that after grading, say, 5 or ten tests or essays, I watch a few minutes of someone — usually Porcupine Tree or Marillion or Rush — in concert. Then, back to grading.

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B2 13 Apr. 2017

on campus this week . . .

The Tower Dancers worked with the physics department to create the choreography for their recent concert. Elena Creed | Courtesy

Seniors in the spotlight: Tower Dancers share their perspective on their final dance performances By | Scott McClallen Collegian Reporter

Science and choreography fuse in final concert of season By | Philip H. DeVoe City News Editor The Tower Dancers’ 2016-17 season came to a close this weekend after their annual concert, which featured a dance set to music taken from radio beams of pulsar stars. Director Holly Hobbs said she was extremely proud of the dancers, choreographers, costume designers, and everyone else involved. “I thought it was a wonderful show,” Hobbs said. Hobbs, who choreographed the “Cosmic Resonances” and “Carmina Burana” dances, credited an extra week of rehearsals and expressive costume design as two of many reasons for the show’s success. “I really feel the extra week made a difference for the dancers and choreographers,” Hobbs said. “They were able to take more time with their work, step back from it, and make changes.” Costumes for dances choreographed by Hobbs and Jillian Hopper were designed by Bryan Simmons, but Ria Harju designed costumes for dances choreographed by students — seniors Sara Pezzella and Mikel Eatough and junior Sarah Elizabeth Casebeer. “Harju did an amazing job matching the theme to the design of the costume, and it made the dance more accessible to audiences because it painted such a clear picture,” Hobbs said. “Cosmic Resonances,” the first dance of the evening, was one dance that emphasized visual expressiveness. Set to music composed from tones based on radio pulsar emission, “Resonances” featured dancers

Knecht from B1 Knecht compared memorization of professional violists from the Chicago Symphony to novice violists from a high school symphony. Knecht used a computer program to generate eight-note sequences which varied in similarity to a Telemann violin concerto. The musicians heard the sequence of notes and were then asked to play it back from memory. The experts significantly outperformed the novices when the sequences most resembled the progression of notes found in the concerto. Note sequences which lacked similarity to the original concerto, however, prevented both the novices and experts from successfully replicating the sequence. Knecht said these results suggest the expert’s musical schema sets their memory apart from that of a novice. “Novice group learns more by rote, while experts remember patterns which make sense within harmonic systems they had experience with,” she said. Similar studies have also been done in other fields such as spelling, chess, physics, and math. For exam-

Misty from B1 which distances the singer from his audience. “Total Entertainment Forever” proclaims that there are “No gods to rule us / No drugs to soothe us / No myths to prove stuff / No love to confuse us” — and that this is the consummation of all entertainment. While the Father John Misty moniker playfully poked fun at the absurdity of consumer culture on previous albums, this record is Tillman’s most unfiltered and sincere response to cultural vapidity yet. The album’s grandiose approach does not produce an alienating effect, placing Tillman high above the masses. On the contrary, it is profoundly human

imitating the stars themselves. Some dancers held flashlights, and a projector displayed celestial images associated with the sounds. “Taking a scientific idea and abstracting it into movement was just very rewarding, and something that I’d never attempted before,” Hobbs said. “It was sort of a fun exploration for me.” Pulsars are neutron stars that emit a beam of radio waves from their poles. Since the star itself spins on an axis, the beam has a lighthouse

“Choreography is all about taking an idea and distilling it to an essence, which allows me to choreograph about anything. Each dance sort of evolves, and ... it helps propel you in the future.” effect, seen from the Earth as regularly repeating pulses. The bursts are predictable, and follow, for the most part, a set period of time. One pulsar’s wave, for example, reaches Earth every 1.37 seconds. The music comes from Dawn Erb, an Associate Professor of Physics at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, who used the audible expression of a pulsar’s radio beam as the inspiration behind several musical compo-

sitions. One such is “Lighthouses II,” the musical piece used in the Tower Dancers concert. Assistant Professor of Physics Timothy Dolch, who was a technical advisor for Hobbs on the pulsar dance, said he first discussed the idea of setting Erb’s music to the Tower Dancers after a talk on finding beauty in academic fields. “I really loved the dance,” Dolch said. “It was very dark and otherworldly, like the music is and like pulsars are; it was just so intriguing.” Dolch explained that parts of the dance, like pairs of dancers interacting with one another, accurately reflected the real-life nature of pulsars which helped synchronize the science of pulsars with the art of dance. “Choreography is all about taking an idea and distilling it to an essence, which allows me to choreograph about anything,” Hobbs said. “Each dance sort of evolves, and when you have that sense of wonder about a topic, it helps propel you in the future.” Eleven dancers are graduating this year, and senior Tower Dancer Corianna Baier, who danced in “Resonances,” as well as “Femininity” and “Out of Ash (Excerpt),” said she will miss the troupe after leaving Hillsdale. “As a senior, the show was exciting but bittersweet,” Baier said. “The rehearsal process was long, but I, and all the other seniors, loved every second of it because we knew it would be the last time we rehearsed for a show. This year was extremely dynamic and each piece was unique and beautiful in its own way. It was a great show to have as my last.”

ple, master chess players were able to replicate board positions from memory when the patterns were similar to those found in the games they had just watched, whereas novice players struggled to remember. When the board patterns did not resemble the games, both novices and masters struggled to replicate them. “The results of these studies indicate what makes an expert unique is the extent, quality, and availability of their schema,” she said. Junior Delaney Lehmann, a student of Knecht, said the concepts of schema and chunking have helped in her musical studies. “This is definitely something that Dr. Knecht integrates in my violin lessons, frequently helping my analyze technically difficult passages of music by looking at the basic relationships between notes,” Lehmann said in an email. Another student, senior Stevan Lukich, said in an email that learning about the subconscious associations made by the brain was interesting to compare to his conscious thoughts while practicing music. “Overall, her talk did a great job of breaking into parts something that’s really complicated and not straightforward — all the elements

of a great musician — and gave me some interesting new ways to think about music,” he said. A large part of building an expert’s schema is his or her experience with many different patterns of information, which comes with practice. Many studies have shown that 10,000 hours of practice is required for mastery of a subject, Knecht said. “In study after study of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice skaters, chess players, master criminals, what have you — this number comes up again and again,” she said. She also said factors such as varied levels of motivation or natural dexterity can help account for differences in student aptitude for new skills. The more a person cares about a task, she said, the more neurochemicals are associated with the memory. “The students will attach neurochemical tags to each aspect of the memory that label it as important,” she said. “The sounds of the piece, the way they move their fingers, all these will become part of the memory track they will encode as important.”

and relational. When Tillman sings about “dancing ’round the flames” of an America in upheaval like “a king on cocaine,” he is giving the most visceral account he can of his experience as a frustrated citizen. In one of the more subdued moments on the album, “The Memo,” he lays bare the daily routine of any well-groomed citizen: “Oh, caffeine in the morning, alcohol at night / Cameras to record you and mirrors to recognize.” There is no pretense to “Pure Comedy” — it cannot present itself pretentiously. What is so inane and yet so important as self-reflection? Tillman has broken from the persona he imposed upon his earlier music, and with both hands free from ego-stroking, he holds the mirror up to his audience. Alongside this

judgment, however, he offers a final consolation in “In Twenty Years Or So” that — with the understanding that human existence is simple, ordinary, and terrible — the listener and Tillman himself can transcend life’s absurdity: “There’s nothing to fear.”

Father John Misty expresses himself at a performance in 2014. Wikimedia Commons

The curtain may have fallen on their time with the Tower Dancers, but their potential has just begun to be unveiled: Three seniors share their perspective on their final dance performances and the program’s progress in their time as Tower Dancers.

Dani Morey on direction and diversity Senior theater major Dani Morey praised Tower Dancers director Holly Hobbs for her creativity the past two years with music. “Last year Holly’s modern dance piece was to letters being read — there was no music. It was so beautifully executed, and worked well with the lighting and projections. It was very stunning.” Morey said she appreciated experiencing Assistant Lecturer in Dance Jillian Hopper’s creative process in planning “Auspex,” Morey’s favorite dance. “She’s new here, and didn’t know the dancers or what she was working with,” Morey said. “Watching her craft the dance to fit us, and taking her time to fit the right music and combination of people and movements she wanted to use was inspiring.” Morey compared her experience in theatre to performing as a Tower Dancer. “In theater, you are feeding off of other people, seeing how they respond to you, and giving back and forth,” Morey said. “In dance, it’s much more personal. You are experiencing the dance, and opening yourself up and being vulnerable for the audience, but it’s not so much give

Morey | Courtesy

and take — it’s all you. It’s great being able to leave it all out there. Morey said their extra technical week and the student choreographers and costume design brought the best performances she had seen. “This was the strongest performance I’ve seen here,” Morey said. “The diversity of having four student choreographers and student’s designing the costumes made it so much more visually stimulating, and the subject matter was so varied. Each of the dances were so different, and had the flair of its choreographer.”

Leah Hickman on collaboration and choreography Senior Leah Hickman said she enjoyed the extra props used in Hobbs’s dance. “They projected hubble telescope and space images on the back screen, and the dancers held flashlights to mimic stars,” Hickman said. “It was cool working with the flow of the pulsars because there wasn’t an actual beat, so you had to be aware of the other’s movements, and use breath cues to signal the other dancers.” Hickman said her favorite dance with the Tower Dancers was “Out of Ash” by Matt Farmer, a visiting choreographer from Hope College. “It was very athletic, it involved good classical music, and used the best music in American history, which was ‘Appalachian Spring’ by Aaron Copland,” Hickman said.

Hickman | Courtesy

“Even though it was modern music, there were still parts with the whole group dancing together, which looks powerful on stage.”

Lauren Melcher on teamwork and hard work Assistant Professor of Physics Timothy Dolch and Hobbs discussed the math and dance collaboration for 30 minutes before Friday’s performance. Senior Lauren Melcher said as a science major, she appreciated the unique collaboration of physics, dance, and University of Wisconsin faculty member Dawn Erb, who wrote the pulsar music. “It was neat we got to collaborate with another department and college,” Melcher said. “You don’t typically see science and dance together. It’s a very unique perspective. I think if you have an open mind, it can be really unique, interesting, and beau- Melcher | Courtesy tiful.” Melcher said the dancers rank have to work hard to achieve certain Saturday’s performance as the best of goals, and I’m not a typical dancer.” the weekend because they had fixed Melcher said the dance departmistakes and weren’t as fatigued as ment’s enhanced, individual focus on Sunday. creates a strong dance program. Melcher said that dance has “Our faculty is incredible. They played, and will continue to play, a care about developing every dancer big role in her life. and their abilities and talents as in“I’ve danced since 8 or 9 years old. dividuals, not just as the whole class,” I’ve always been a pretty creative, art- Melcher said. “The faculty will focus sy person even if I’m a science ma- on each person, and give them tips jor,” Melcher said. “I use it as a form and goals to work toward.” of expression and exercise. It’s also taught me discipline. You definitely

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B3 13 Apr. 2017

Caffeinating and cramming By | Brendan Clarey Assistant Editor

How one former Hillsdale student surrendered it all By | Breana Noble News Editor Sung by Christians locally and around the world for generations, the words of “I Surrender All” have inspired many, from Rev. Billy Graham to talk-show host Oprah Winfrey, since a former Hillsdale College student first wrote them down. Judson Wheeler van DeVenter, a student in Hillsdale’s commercial and telegraph department from 1874-1876, according to college archivist Linda Moore, wrote the hymn “I Surrender All” as he struggled between continuing a career in art or moving into full-time ministry. In 1891, van DeVenter found himself arguing with God. He wanted to continue as a public high school art teacher and supervisor in Pennsylvania. Despite being an active member in his Methodist Episcopalian church and participating in evangelistic meetings, van DeVenter felt God was calling him to do more. His friends encouraged him to pursue a career in ministry. But he resisted. “All to Jesus I surrender,/ All to him I freely give;/ I will ever love and trust him,/ In his presence daily live.” Van DeVenter grew up on a small farm in Dundee, Michigan. Although born in a Christian household on Dec. 5, 1855, he did not become a follower of Jesus Christ until he was 17. He attended Hillsdale with his older brother, Virgil, who graduated in 1879 with a degree in literature, but Judson van DeVenter did not obtain a diploma. He did take art and music classes, however, and could play 13 instruments by the end of his life. In 1880, he married and had two sons and a daughter who died at the age of 20. After his wife died in 1924, he married a pianist and music teacher in 1925. Van DeVenter’s own musical talents would end his struggle with God after five years, as he began full-time ministry, sources said. While leading a meeting at the Ohio

Sailor from B4

look at me funny,” Handel said. “My advisor was like, ‘You already have a degree in economics from Hillsdale College, and you want to do this. Are you sure?’ But I’m sure.” At The Great Lakes Maritime Academy, Handel will learn how to pilot ships, launch lifeboats, and navigate either by GPS or by the sun and stars. For at least 300 days, she will train on commercial vessels on both the Great Lakes and the ocean. At the end of three years, if she passes the Coast Guard licensing exam, she will become a certified third mate,

home of national evangelist George Sebring, he wrote the words of “I Surrender All.” “For some time, I had struggled between developing my talents in the field of art and going into full-time evangelistic work,” van DeVenter said, according to hymnologist Kenneth Osbeck in “101 More Hymn Stories.” “At last the pivotal hour of my life came, and I surrendered all. A new day was ushered into my life. I became an evangelist and discovered down deep in my soul a talent hitherto unknown to me. God had hidden a song in my heart, and touching a tender chord, He caused me to sing.” “I surrender all,/ I surrender all,/ All to thee, my blessed Savior,/ I surrender all.” In 1896, evangelist song leader and vocalist Winfield S. Weeden put the words to music and the song was published in a book of hymns called “Gospel Songs of Grace and Glory.” Since then, van DeVenter’s song has appeared in hundreds of other hymnals, and its title is on Weeden’s epitaph. Van DeVenter evangelized throughout the United States, England, and Scotland, visiting art museums along the way. He also had his own radio program called “The Gospel in Song and Story.” Van DeVenter published 60 more hymns, but “I Surrender All” remains the most wellknown. In the 1920s, van DeVenter taught as a professor of hymnology for four years at the Florida Bible Institute, now Trinity Bible College. After retirement, while still living in the community, van DeVenter frequently returned to the Bible Institute to visit with students and conduct singalongs, according to David P. Bruce, executive assistant to Billy Graham, the uncle of Hillsdale Professor of English John Somerville. Graham met van DeVenter and helped to take care of him. “We students love this kind, deeply spiritual gentleman and often gathered in his winter home at Tampa,

Florida, for an evening of fellowship and singing,” Graham recounted in “Crusade Hymn Stories,” by Cliff Barrows. Graham said van DeVenter was influential on his ear- Judson Wheeler van DeVenter, a previous Hillsdale lier preach- student, wrote the famous hymn “I Surrender All.” ing and was Wikimedia Commons present at the time of Award and a Golden Globe in his death on July 17, 1939, in 1986. Tampa, Florida. Michael Hawn, who has “And I’ll never forget just written about van DeVenter before he went to be with and is a professor of church God, barely audible but we music at the Perkins School could hear it, he sang, ‘All to of Theology in Texas, said Jesus I surrender,’” Graham “I Surrender All” continues said in May 1958, according to resonate with audiences to the Billy Graham Evange- through its repetition and listic Association. “He went clear message of submitting to be with Christ with a smile to God’s will. on his face, looking forward “Every congregational to seeing Christ.” song we sing starts with Van DeVenter returned someone’s witness to God’s home for burial in Dundee’s grace or leadership or whatMaple Grove Cemetery, and ever in their lives,” Hawn Graham carried on van De- said. “Different traditions Venter’s story by populariz- interpret that differently, but ing “I Surrender All” at his this song particularly spoke revivals. to a lot of people in that era. “All to Jesus I surrender,/ I think the ‘I Surrender All’ Humbly at his feet I bow,/ is key in that it was a strong Worldly pleasures all forsak- time for foreign mission in an en,/ Take me, Jesus, take me evangelical context...What now.” did it mean to surrender all? Recorded by many artists It meant being totally open to since then, the song earned God’s will.” pop singer Deniece Williams The song continues to ina Grammy Award for Best spire many today, even at van Female Soul Gospel Perfor- DeVenter’s alma mater. mance in 1986 after she did Senior Jared Eckert wrote her own rendition of it. a song he calls “Majesty,” Country singer Faith Hill which he said is about reperformed “I Surrender All” membrance and its response on “The Oprah Winfrey — surrendering. Toward the Show,” prompting Winfrey end of the song, he includes to share how the song had the chorus of “I Surrender brought her comfort when All” as a refrain. she believed she lost an audi“It’s one of those songs tion to play a role in the 1985 that every time I hear it, it film “The Color Purple.” Af- always shakes me,” he said. ter running around a track “Every day, I’m trusting God. singing “I Surrender All,” I’m still learning this lesson she received a call from di- and failing and growing... It rector Steven Spielberg, who takes a daily effort of surrentold her that she had gotten der.” the part, which earned her nominations for an Academy

according to the Great Lakes Maritime Academy website. Then she will be out on the water, coping with the unpredictability of nature, sorting out machinery problems, and maintaining the cargo. Depending on where she works, she could also face political tensions and problems involving pirates. “You are working in an inherently hostile environment. The sea is not a safe place,” Handel said. “You have to be able to react like a leader with the safety of your men in mind. And I want that. I want to be worthy of it.” Handel will also be working amidst some of the most beautiful sights in the world,

according to Associate Dean of Men Jeffrey Rogers, who served in the Navy for 26 years. “Just being insignificant — that ship was huge — but in the ocean, it was a speck, and I was below a speck,” Rogers said. “Something about going off to the high seas gives you an awesome perspective of just who the heck you are.” Not all of Handel’s career will be terribly exciting, however. In fact, some days risk being dreadfully boring when she is in the middle of the ocean and not working, she said. “You have to learn to keep yourself busy, but I’m an only child and home-schooled, so

Recollections from alumni By | Jo Kroeker Opinions Editor

Moving Mossey “When we were on campus, there were 400 students in total,” Dorothy Messinger said. It cost $350 a semester. The library was one very small room, and Bob Messinger’s senior year, the college enlisted all the students to carry books from the old Mossey Library to the new one. The day of the change, it poured. Bob Messinger said they were walking on wet plywood, and if they weren’t careful, they would’ve slipped, with all those books. Baseball isn’t all black and white. David Armstrong was the only left-handed pitcher on the baseball team, thenknown as the Dales. He’s a self-proclaimed “pro-traveler and pro-eater, but not a great player.” He remembers piling into monstrous station wagons with five or six other players and all their gear and driving all the way down South for week-long baseball tournaments. On one such trip, the team

traveled to an all-black school in Georgia. J.J. Simmons, the only African-American on Hillsdale’s team — as well as a co-captain for both baseball and football — suddenly turned to his teammates and cracked a joke: “Now you know how I feel.” “It was the funniest thing,” Armstrong said. Sporting a cream suit and a braided salt-and-pepper beard, Simmons just did a jig (momentarily forgetting his cane) and flashed a toothy grin. Here lies “The Hut.” Long live pinball. On the bus tour, David Armstrong ’67 recalled hearing alumni exclaim “Oh, the Hut used to be there!” The College Tavern, fondly nicknamed “The Tav,” and later renamed “The Hut,” was the social hub in those days, a cottage house by Mary Randall Preschool that “probably did more business than the student union,” Bob said. Dorothy remembers pinball machines, shuffleboard, sandwiches, and pop. Armstrong remembers it as a hub of social activity: “Everybody was always there, it was always busy, there were

always cars parked in front of the library.” The Peacock, an anonymous Collegian columnist during the 1960s, wrote on April 18, 1962 about a controversy between the union and the Hut, in other words, between the independents and the Greeks. He expressed hope that the Hut would last because students need an independent gathering place, but more importantly, there are too many stories and traditions to let it die (matches were free, too). By 1966, the Hut was torn down and the union reigned champion of social activity. The lean, green, teetotaling dean. Harold Munn, the associ-

I can do that,” Handel said. “But there will always be challenges and new things you have to face. I’m not anticipating boredom.” Handel said she doesn’t know where she will go after graduating. She might serve in the Great Lakes or in international waters. Either way, she won’t be working at a desk, she will be traveling the world and pursuing adventure. “It’s not what your average bear does after college,” Handel said. “It’s not typical, but we were not trained to be typical here at Hillsdale College, so I guess I’m just fulfilling my education.” ate dean of Hillsdale College during the ’60s, was better known as “the green dean” because he always wore a green suit. But he also ran for president of the United States three terms in a row: 1964, 1968, 1972, representing the Prohibition Party. (“Prohibition at Hillsdale College, can you believe it?” Director of Alumni Relations Grigor Hasted said.) His teaching career at Hillsdale began in 1939, as an associate professor of education who also taught American Heritage. He then became the associate dean at Hillsdale College, in addition to being the executive of four Michigan radio stations.

Twenty one alumni from the classes of ’57 and ’67 returned for the alumni reunion last week. Douglass Coon | Courtesy

Amid the unceasing pressure of deadlines given by professors convinced theirs is the most important class, papers stacked up from procrastination, events for clubs, fraternities, and sororities, and meeting with friends, there is one constant: coffee. Coffee is often a lifeline, especially toward the end of the semester, for students whose spirits are broken and their bodies tired, and the coffee communities on campus can replenish student energy as well as lift their spirits. Jitters Coffee Cart and A.J.’s Café are the only oncampus coffee joints, and they do their best to keep students caffeinated whenever they need a fix. Their cultures, however, are starkly contrasting. Jitters is only open in the morning and early afternoon, and its location in Lane Hall means that it tends to get rushes in between classes. “It’s kind of a hot-andcold thing,” senior Jitters student manager Joel Haines said. “We don’t have as much to maintain here, so there’s definitely more stretches of time when everybody’s hastily going about the business of maintenance and upkeep, and we go from that to about 30 people in line. We have 10 minutes to make 15 drinks, which is nuts, but I kinda like it. It’s like this fun little buzz. It’s like a quick sprint.” But he said the downtime in between the class period rush is also a lot of fun. “We work in pairs and the space is so small, we’re in such close proximity that it forces us to get to know each other,” Haines said. “I think the downtime is what helps friendships grow,” Assistant (“to the”) Student Manager junior Lydia Seipel said. Last semester, Haines held a traditional feast for his student workers featuring bacon, apple-cinnamon pancakes, White Russians, and more. “The managers typically throw a dinner, of sorts, for the employees just to bolster and enrich this community. We’re all like-minded people here. We all really love coffee. Jitters used to be super, super hipster. We’re not as much hipster, we’re more just normal folk but still appreciate some Mumford and Sons,” Haines said. “I feel like not everyone necessarily falls into the hipster category, but every single person I think has a streak. Just like a hint of it you, know? Not too much,” Seipel said. Besides the hipster vibe, Jitters also has a lot of character in the art on the register and the walls. “There’s a lot of art, again, it’s like little flairs of personality or artistic streaks. It’s not always our primary focus over here, but for some reason, a lot of us have random artistic abilities,” Seipel said. “I just feel like everyone here is very comfortable with who they are.” And in this environment, people who otherwise like separate things enjoy making coffee together in a close-knit environment. “It’s a very comforting place… It never feels like work. I come here on my off times, and I would even step in. There have been times when I’ve stayed over,” Seipel said. “It’s like a little sanctuary from schoolwork,” Joel said. A.J.’s and Jitters share a

culture of students who love their work. While Jitters is only open in the first part of the day, A.J.’s is open from 7:30 a.m. to midnight most days. Employees prepare and serve food and ice cream as well as coffee drinks. “I think we have a lot more busyness going on just because we offer a lot more things than Jitters does, Jitters is more laid-back and they have the music and the really good coffee, and we have good coffee too, but it’s just a totally different kind of atmosphere,” sophomore Assistant Student Manager at A.J.’s Makenzie Self said. “But with food and ice cream and milkshakes and everybody doing something at every moment, I think it makes for a slightly more fast-paced environment. You have to be really energetic and welcoming all the time.” Self said she really likes interacting with customers and with the same employees who have the same schedule all year. She said she knows exactly which drinks to make for regulars and when to leave room for cream. One of the specific aspects of A.J.’s is the customer of the week award, formerly employee of the week. “When people find out that they’re customer of the week, they’re like, ‘No way!’ It’s really fun,” Self said. This week, however, the customer of the week is a hamster named Cervantes. A senior employee really wanted her pet hamster to receive customer of the week before she graduated, Self said. Self is not the only one who thinks it’s a great time. Junior A.J.’s employee Colette Peterson has worked there since

A.J.’s Café and Jitters Coffe Cart each have unique work cultures. Brendan Clarey | Collegian

the first week of her freshman year. She ordered a latte and asked if they needed help, and they did so she was hired. “It’s a lot of fun. I really like it because it’s a good way to interact with people and wind down after doing a bunch of school work. It’s technically a job, but it’s so much fun.” When asked what Hillsdale would look like without A.J.’s, Peterson responded, “A lot of sleep deprivation.” She added, “A.J.’s has a really good community in the union especially. It’s a really great place to go to study. It has that coffeeshop atmosphere that I think for me is really productive.” Both Self and Peterson agree that A.J.’s is a central part of the Hillsdale experience. At Jitters, Haines and Seipel have found a special family that allows them to express their artistic side. So wherever students get coffee to fuel their late night studying or replace the sleep they should have gotten a long time ago, the coffee will be there for them and the specific coffee cultures on campus that go along with them. Either way, they are a part of one of the unique cultures on campus.

A.J.’s Café and Jitters Coffee Cart offer an assortment of coffee-based beverages. Colette Peterson | Courtesy

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A siren song of seafaring life Senior to become Merchant Marine mate By | Julie Havlak Collegian Reporter Tens of thousands of ships crisscross global waters, and four years from now, senior Margaret Handel will be working on one of them. After graduating from Hillsdale, Handel won’t be getting a Ph.D. in economics as she once thought. She will be studying to become a third mate in the U.S. body of commercial ships called Merchant Marine. Handel’s knew she didn’t want to sit behind a desk after graduation, so her curiosity was sparked when a friend mentioned his interest in the Merchant Marine. She looked up starting salaries and began exploring the industry. “The more I learned about the Merchant Marine, the more that I realized that it fit what I wanted out of a career,” Handel said. “It offers me a chance to explore the world while developing leadership skills.” It also offers her a chance to travel the sea. “Ships are fascinating,” Handel said. “Everyone should watch documentaries about them. As an economist, I am fascinated by the ability we have to move stuff around the world so easily, cheaply,

quickly, and safely. This is honestly exciting for me — I get to be a part of this amazing economy and amazing movement around the world.” She will be the first Handel to pursue a career in the Merchant Marine. “It’s not a thing which ran in my family, not even a little bit,” Handel said. “The seafaring life has not uttered its siren song for them yet.” So when she broke the news to her parents, she said they did not see it coming. “I called them and said,

‘Mom, Dad, I’m not going to grad school. I’m going to get a degree in Merchant Marine transportation, and join the Merchant Marine.’ There was silence on the end of that line,” Handel said. As a college graduate and a female, Handel is not the average student of the Great Lakes Maritime Academy. She is not, as she puts it, normal. “Not even a little. The administrators of the new school

See Sailor B3

At the alumni reunion this past week, alumni swapped memories from their time at Hillsdale and caught up on what has happened since. Jo Kroeker | Collegian

Two love stories and a comic: Alumni walk down memory lane By | Jo Kroeker Opinions Editor

Senior Margaret Handel (left) will enroll in the Great Lakes Maritime Academy after graduating from Hillsdale. Margaret Handel | Courtesy

Parks of the hills and dales Mrs. Stock’s Park offers Tuesdays in the Park, a series of free public concerts during June and July. Abigail Liebing | Collegian

By | Abigail Liebing Freelance Writer Spring has arrived and as the weather warms up, parks are the perfect place to spend a day in the sun. Hillsdale has some really beautiful parks, all just a few minutes away from each other and from town. According to Michelle Loren, director of Hillsdale’s recreation department, the most popular parks are Sandy Beach, Owen Memorial, and Waterworks Parks because they are on the waterfront and offer a variety of things to do. Sandy Beach has sand volleyball, a basketball court and picnic area while Owen Memorial and Waterworks Park are good places for fishing and picnicking. Mrs. Stock’s Park, another popular park, offers Tuesdays in the Park, a series of free, public concerts during June and July. Stock’s Park is small, but with a pond in the middle, a small stream

bordering the park, and some shady trees, it makes for a peaceful afternoon. “This park has seen 13 years of renovations. The park boasts national awardwinning gardens, a pond and island, and a lighted pavilion,” Loren said. Lewis Emery is another park just a few minutes away from Hillsdale College’s campus. Situated on several small lakes, Lewis Emery Park is a beautiful spot. The paths that go through woods run by a small stream, above the shore, and the trees make the paths somewhat secluded and quiet. Lewis Emery is also a great place to get in a little fishing and enjoy the sun on the lakes. “My favorite park is the Lewis Emery Park because of all the lakes, and the paths in the woods are well groomed,” senior Faith Liebing said. Hillsdale offers a variety of outdoor activities and beautiful places such as Fields of

Dreams, a park for baseball and soccer, and the neighborhood parks Cold Springs and KeeKoose. Hillsdale also has plenty of beautiful places to walk, jog, or bike. Linda Moore, public services librarian at Mossey Library and a Hillsdale local said, one of her favorite activities on a nice day is simply “walking through Oak Grove cemetery,” even though it’s not a park. “My favorite park would actually be the walk along the bike path to Sandy Beach. It’s peaceful and the views are lovely,” Moore said. Hillsdale can also boast in the history behind its parks. “There is a lot of history that goes along with most of the parks in the city. So not only do they provide a wide variety of recreational offerings, but they hold stories about families, industry, and Indian heritage that are the framework of our wonderful city.” Loren said.

Sixteen alumni from the class of ’67 and five from the class of ’57 gathered on campus last week for the alumni reunion: a week of cocktails, dinners, and tours. Art Robell ’57, Dorothy Olsson Messinger ’57, and Robert “Bob” Messinger ’54 sat together on couches on the upper level of the Dow Leadership Center, reminiscing and quickly discovering that during and after Hillsdale, they led parallel lives. Robell originally wanted to become a Roman Catholic priest. He even went to school six days a week to prepare for the priesthood until two events transpired that would change his plans and lead him to Hillsdale. First, God told him in a dream he would marry a woman named Sandra (“This is a terrible dream,” he said, understandable for someone planning to become a priest) and second, he got recruited to play football for the University of Michigan. In a meeting with a UM adviser, however, Robell was told that since he came from a parochial environment, he wouldn’t like the campus culture or many of the women. The adviser instead recommended his own alma mater, Hillsdale. “Long story short, Monday I was on a Greyhound bus for Jonesville,” Robell said. He’d join the football team as a defensive end and knock a player out on his first collegiate tackle. Orientation day, the first girl he met was Sandra “Sandie” Sherk, ’54. After the tour, a buddy of his nudged him and made an appreciative comment about Sherk. “Sorry, she’s already taken,” Robell replied. He looked up at the ceiling and water rimmed his eyes before continuing his story. “She was a senior, I was a freshman. She robbed the cradle,” he joked. They married June 23, 1956, and had three boys. She died July 30, 2014,

after 58 years of marriage. As he told his story, Robell began tugging on a necklace below his shirt. Finally freeing the chain from its hiding place on his chest, he showed us his wedding rings, commemorating 25 and 50 years of marriage. “I lost both soon after she died,” he said. While doing the wash one day, he decided he’d better check the pants pockets, even though he had already checked them before. He found both rings. Robell slipped one on his finger but when he swung his hand down, it fell to the ground: “That’s how much weight I lost,” he said. He’s worn them around his neck ever since. Robell and Sherk’s story was not the only love story of the weekend. Bob and Dorothy Messinger’s was strikingly similar. On a dare from his Delta Sigma Phi brother, Bob Messinger, a senior and baseball player, asked Dorothy Olsson on a date the April of his senior year. The date, unlike Bob Messinger, didn’t come out of left field, since both of Dorothy’s roommates at the time were dating Delta Sigma Pis as well. June 25, 1955, a year and three months after their first date, Bob and Dorothy Messinger married, and the fraternity brother who dared Bob to the date was best man. They had three girls. (“Isn’t that amazing,” Robell interjected, overwhelmed by the near parallels in anniversary dates and children. Dorothy Messinger just winked.) Robell referenced his impressive children and grandchildren frequently. The alumni were grandparents happy to recount the success stories of their children, like Janet Mallett ’57, the mother of Jef Mallett, the artist behind the nationally syndicated column, “Frazz.” The comic strip, which began in the 2000s, follows a high school janitor and unexpected role model and appears in 200 newspapers worldwide, including the Los Angeles Times, Seattle Times, Chicago Tribune

and Detroit News. Jane Mallett reads it everyday, and swears she learns something new from it every time, from discussions of race to obscure lunar eclipse factoids. “He’s been drawing comics since before he was born,” she joked. “That’s how he got through school, drawing comics, not following directions.” Janet Mallett’s eyes lit up when she talked about Jef and his comic strip, and she deflected questions about herself, finding ways to circle the conversation back to her children and grandchildren. “I’m nothing more than a mom and a grandmother,” she said. Wearing a white sweatshirt appliquéd with instruments, she described her duties as a grandmother: To make, box, and ship roll-out cookies for every major holiday — St. Patrick’s Day, Easter, Thanksgiving, and Christmas — to children eagerly waiting for the next shipment, and to knit mittens for every Christmas. For any readers of “Frazz,” the perpetuallyknitting grandmother should sound familiar — because it’s her. The mittens stopped coming for Christmas following one comic in which Frazz receives only one mitten for Christmas and an IOU, prompting her to do the same in real life. Since many of her children migrated to warmer climates, Jane Mallett now knits mittens for Native Americans living on reservations in South Dakota.) During her collegiate years, Jane Mallett spent her time in the Old Fine Arts building studying organ and violin, playing organ at College Baptist Church and violin in the orchestra, and accompanying the choir and solo vocalists. She even guesses that’s where she met her husband Gordon. After getting married, she became a special education teacher and left the profession of teaching music to her husband. But she said her biggest accomplishment is being a mom. “It’s OK,” she said, with a satisfied smile. “They make it all worth it.”

Christina Dressel and Molly Andrews By | Thomas Novelly

Christina Dressel — A.J.’s Café

Molly Andrews — Jitters Coffee Cart

What do you wear to stick out in your uniform or to make it unique? A.J.’s Café — Christina Dressel: My nametag that says “Christina.” It’s one of a kind. Jitters Coffee Cart — Molly Andrews: Usually some jewelry, a sweater on occasion, chunky glasses, and — of course — great music to jazz up the work environment.

What’s your go-to fashion out of uniform? CD: Black pants and a blue polo. MA: Lots of layers. I want to feel like I’m in pajamas. I’ll pair a shift dress with comfy tennis shoes and a jean jacket. It’s PJ-chic. What drink on the menu best describes your style? CD: Anything hot. MA: An Americano, it’s straightforward and requires no thought.

What does the A.J.’s/Jitters uniform mean to you? CD: It means that I can afford more beer than I could yesterday. MA: It’s paradoxically a sign of our independence. We cling to that blue polo because it is what makes us free. Thomas Novelly | Collegian

Thomas Novelly | Collegian

What is your personality put in a snack? CD: Chicken tenders ‘cause I’m always out of it. MA: Coffee is a snack. It’s either really energetic or it’s “the cry of desperation.” It’s versatile, like my style.