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Your independent source for Harvard news since 1898

November-December 2022

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Letters

EV’s, Frankfurter, Judaica, pandemic education, and more

President Bacow on critics constructive and otherwise

The Supreme Court case, and articulating Harvard’s core values

The College Pump

Henry Lee Higginson

Henry Lee Higginson

Photography courtesy of the Library of Congress

The inclusive Henry Lee Higginson, and Robert Caro’s productive fellowship

Treasure

Tempera portrait of Egyptian woman

Click on arrow to view full image

Image courtesy of the Harvard Art Museums/©President and Fellows of Harvard College

Harvard Art Museums’ exhibit uncovers paintings’ mysterious origins.

In this Issue

Official portrait of Justice Elena Kagan

Justice Elena Kagan
Photograph courtesy of the United States Supreme Court, Public Domain

Ebbing trust in the Supreme Court, and what to do about it

 

Allison Feaster wearing a green Celtics shirt in front of team championship banners

Allison Feaster at the Celtics’ Auerbach Center

Photograph by Stu Rosner

A basketball star's journey from the Harvard hardwood to the Celtics front office

George Reisner, 1924

George Reisner, 1924

Photograph courtesy of Peter Der Manuelian

Brief life of a pioneering Egyptologist: 1867-1942

Illustration by Paul Garland

Reckoning with inflation and its remedies

Letters

EV’s, Frankfurter, Judaica, pandemic education, and more

President Bacow on critics constructive and otherwise

The Supreme Court case, and articulating Harvard’s core values

Right Now

House with man inside, cooled by an air conditioner

Illustration by Eva Vasquéz

Two new technologies could provide an eco-friendly cooling solution.

Image of Uncle Sam walking away with ladders, leaving a brown hand grasping from a hole in the ground

Illustration by Phil Foster

Documenting the history and scope of federal “reparatory compensation.”

Illustration of a man sleeping as an alter ego surrounded by sheep practices his golf swing

Illustration by Dave Cutler

Experiments using a neuroprosthetic reveal nocturnal motor neuron learning.

Harvard Squared

wintry scene of downtown Vermont's pedestrian shopping zone

Downtown’s snowy pedestrian mall

Photograph by LEXPIX/iStock images

Exploring Burlington, Vermont

glass and steel addition to a traditional brick building that houses the Mattatuck Museum

The Mattatuck Museum, newly renovated, offers a more welcoming entrance to visitors 

Photograph courtesy of the Mattatuck Museum

Connecticut’s Mattatuck Museum

painting of twins asleep on a NYC subway, nestled against their caregiver

Twins (Subway), 2018, by Jordan Casteel

Courtesy of the artist and Casey Kaplan Gallery, New York. © Jordan Casteel

A new exhibit at the Institute of Contemporary Art/Boston

Photo courtesy of @skatekendall

Winter fun in the Boston area

John Harvard's Journal

Harvard College Dean Rakesh Khurana at Freshman Convocation

At Freshman Convocation, above, Dean Rakesh Khurana said, “Veritas is more than just a slogan,”

Photograph by Stephanie Mitchell/HPAC

Convocation and Morning Prayers messages about free speech and fruitful airing of differences

Giang Nguyen

Giang Nguyen

Photograph by Jim Harrison

The HUHS executive director’s public health background prepared him well for the pandemic.

Official portrait of Lawrence H. Summers

The official portrait captures its subject’s “intensity and even restlessness.”

Photograph by Jon Chase/HPAC

Celebrating the twenty-seventh president—and assessing his legacy

A man in a wetsuit helps an astronaut out of an Apollo capsule floating in the ocean

Navy SEAL Jonathan Smart (left) helps astronaut Harrison Schmitt out of the Apollo 17 capsule after it splash-landed in the Pacific Ocean.

Photograph courtesy of NASA

Two Harvard alumni recall a return from the last human moonwalk.

Humorous illustration of campus police seeing late-night daters’ final kiss

Illustration by Mark Steele

Headlines from Harvard’s history

Archon Fung and Meredith Weenick, chairs of faculty and staff advisory committees for Harvard presidential search

Archon Fung and Meredith Weenick

Photograph by Jon Chase/HPAC and courtesy of Meredith Weenick

Presidential search, boat house rebuilding, giant telescope, M.B.A. aid, and more

Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan at Kempner Institute debut

At the Kempner debut, Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan extolled cooperation among the disciplines.

Photograph by John Deputy

Fostering businesses within enginnering and applied sciences, Amazon’s quantum support, and changing concentrations

Defensive lineman Thor Griffith, a junior, celebrating two sacks and a game-high nine tackles against Merrimack

THE MIGHTY THOR: Junior Thor Griffith, who had two sacks and a game-high nine tackles against Merrimack, was one of the mainstays of a defensive line that routinely stifled opponents’ runners and harassed quarterbacks.

Photograph by Dylan Goodman/courtesy of Harvard Athletic Communications

Picked to win the 2022 Ivy championship, the football team got off to a solid start.

Alex Tsotadze, men’s water polo co-captain, in action

Attacker Alex Tsotadze, men’s water polo co-captain, has become expert at exploiting aquatic physics.

Photograph courtesy of Harvard Athletic Communications

Alex Tsotadze’s water polo reads and rips

Montage

A collection of abstract geometric paintings hang above a white couch

Seligson’s “gallery” above her sofa at home

Photograph courtesy of Judith Seligson

Painter Judith Seligson’s creative juxtapositions

John Singer Sargent self-portrait, 1892

The public, self-portrayed Sargent, 1892

Public Domain

A revealing new biography of John Singer Sargent

Celeste Ng

Celeste Ng

Photograph by Kieran Kesner

“Our Missing Hearts” embodies the author’s hope that storytelling can be an agent of change.

Late-winter thunderstorm atop snow in New England, February 2014

A thunderstorm atop late-winter snow in New England, February 2014: just the thing to delight “weather nerd” Matthew Cappucci

Photograph by Matthew Cappucci

Recent books with Harvard connections

Portrait of Kapwani Kiwanga

Kapwani Kiwanga

© Photo Bertille Chéret / Courtesy the artist and Galerie Poggi, Paris

Installation artist Kapwani Kiwanga on power, resistance, and plants

Portrait of John Kenneth Galbraith

DeLong’s analysis resembles John Kenneth Galbraith’s (shown 1965) critique of the “affluent society.”

Photograph by Hulton Archive/Getty Images

A sweeping history of society and the economy in the twentieth century

Alumni

NFL referee Ron Torbert in uniform on the football during a game

Torbert at work, San Francisco 49ers vs. Jacksonville Jaguars, TIAA Bank Field, Jacksonville, November 2021

Photograph by David Rosenblum/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images

A Harvard Law alum puts his degree to work on the field.

Enriching life in the Houses

Honoring the providers of exemplary service and exceptional programming

For outstanding service

The College Pump

Henry Lee Higginson

Henry Lee Higginson

Photography courtesy of the Library of Congress

The inclusive Henry Lee Higginson, and Robert Caro’s productive fellowship

Treasure

Tempera portrait of Egyptian woman

Click on arrow to view full image

Image courtesy of the Harvard Art Museums/©President and Fellows of Harvard College

Harvard Art Museums’ exhibit uncovers paintings’ mysterious origins.