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T.N. Vail History Recorded in Georgia
 The postcard above was brought into the president's office by LSC alumna Lorraine Petterson '71, who came across the marker while on a trip to Jekyll Island. The postcard has been scanned and enlarged and the resulting photo has been framed. Look for it, along with a transcription of the plaque, in the Vail museum. Thanks to Mrs. Petterson for bringing her find to the college.
The text of the plaque is transcribed below.
Georgia
1776
Theodore N. Vail, New York, President of the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, participated in a memorable telephone ceremony January 15, 1913 – January 25, 1913 while recuperating from lameness at Jekyll Island. In order that President Vail might participate in the long circuit call from Jekyll to Washington, New York, and San Francisco, a thousand miles of cable were run to the island.
Dr. Alexander Graham Bell was the chief figure in the New York call with Thomas A. Watson, assistant to Dr. Bell, at the San Francisco terminal. President Woodrow Wilson in speaking to Mr. Vail at Jekyll, said “Hello, Mr. Vail!” “Who is that?” (Mr. Vail) “This is the President. I have just been speaking across the continent.” “Oh, yes.” (Mr. Vail). “Before I give up the telephone, I want to extend my congratulations to you on the consummation of this remarkable work,” replied the President of the United States. It has been said that Bell created the telephone and Vail created the telephone business.
Mr. Vail visited Jekyll Island during different seasons in two yachts - The Speedwell and The Northwind.
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Clambake 2008
Above, Professor Jim Bozeman and guest check out the silent auction at Clambake 2007.
About 100 years ago, hired hands on the T.N. Vail farm could count on an end-of-summer clambake at the Vail Hill estate where they worked, put on by their employer as a thank-you for all their hard work during the busy summer months. Honoring Vail’s tradition, Lyndon State College has continued to sponsor an August clambake for more than 20 years, using the funds raised for scholarships. The LSC Foundation, which sponsors the accompanying silent auction, also funds scholarships and special projects and programs at the college.
This year’s T.N. Vail Clambake and the LSC Foundation Silent Auction will take place at the college August 17starting at 4 p.m. and will be located on the softball field, just north of the Vail building, due to construction-related issues on the rugby field. Mike Flynn, LSC Class of 1970, will serve as MC, and the student speaker will be Bonnie Paris, a 2008 LSC Business Administration and Graphic Design graduate and the first recipient of the T.N. Vail Clambake Scholarship.
A number of local businesses support the Clambake dinner each year and this year include silver sponsors J.A. McDONALD, the Community National Bank and FairPoint Communications. Other sponsors are Flek, Inc., designer of the Clambake invitation, and Calkins Portable Toilets. NorthCountry Federal Credit Union and Parkway Realty also offered support for the event, in addition to the many donors to the silent auction.
For more information or to reserve your space, contact Jenny Kempton Harris at 626-6458.
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Fors in Florence
Sheila Fors and her husband, Martin, a singer with the North Country Chorus, flew to Europe the day after she retired in June, where the chorus gave five concerts. The group sang in Rome, Florence, Ravenna, Verona and Venice, and they visited other Italian cities and sites as well, including the World War II U.S. cemetery near Ravenna. Following the one-day trip, Sheila and Martin spent 10 more days with their son near London.
Above, the couple makes the popular stop at Il Porcellino in Florence, which may look familiar to most NewsNet readers. The figure stands just outside a semi-open air Mercato Nuovo, also called the Straw Market, which has occupied the same site since it was built in the mid-1500s. Il Porcelliino was created in 1612.
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Exercise Science Recognized
Lyndon's Exercise Science Department has been recognized once again by inclusion in the National Strength and Conditioning Educational Recognition Program.
According to the NSCA web site, acceptance into the ERP means that an academic institution's educational program has met, and continues to meet, educational guidelines recommended by the NSCA. Recognition is good for three years. As a member, Lyndon will receive an annual listing in the Strength and Conditioning Journal, CSCS or NSCA-CPT examination discounts, a searchable listing and link to Lyndon's program on the NSCA's web site, permission to highlight NSCA recognition on LSC materials, increased exposure through the NSCA's publications, web site and other NSCA materials and free institutional vacancy postings on the NSCA's Career Services web site.
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President Carol A. Moore was a guest faculty member at the HERS Bryn Mawr Summer Institute in Bryn Mawr, Penn., June 30. She taught a section on Strategic Planning along with Tullisse A. Murdock, Ph.D., chancellor, Antioch University and Lucille H. Sansing, Ph.D., president, Argosy University/San Francisco Bay Area Campus. HERS offers intensive residential professional development experiences for women in mid- and senior-level positions in higher education administration.
Professor Philip Parisi presented two papers at Strathclyde University in Glasgow, Scotland, during the week of July 28 at the 33rd International Conference for Improving University Teaching. This year’s theme was "Transforming Higher Education Teaching and Learning in the 21st Century." Professor Parisi's papers dealt with student-controlled learning and self/collaborative student assessment.
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Make Way for the LSC Ducklings
 While the Library Pond ducklings rarely use the sidewalk (as they do in the famous children's book), they can be seen sunning on the grass or swimming in the pond most days. The ducklings are about half-grown now and are a pleasant addition to summer at LSC. And this year, the weather has been designed to suit them to a T.
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Professional Update
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Three Granted Tenure and Promoted
Lyndon State College President Carol A. Moore announced faculty promotions and the names of those who were granted tenure at the end of the academic year. Tenured faculty are those whose employment at the college is ensured except in unusual circumstances and recognizes that the faculty member has achieved the required standard of excellence in teaching with substantial scholarly and professional activity and significant service to the College and community. At Lyndon, 32 out of the 58 full-time faculty are tenured, or 55 percent.
Earning tenure this year were Associate Professor Kelly Glentz Brush, Library Director and Associate Professor Garet Nelson and Associate Professor Elizabeth Norris. The same three were also promoted from assistant to associate professor.
Glentz Brush teaches in the Visual Arts Department. She came to LSC in 2002. She earned her BFA at Kansas City Art Institute and her MFA at the University of Kansas. Nelson has been at Lyndon since 2001 and holds a BA from the University of South Florida, an MEd from the University of Arkansas and an MLIS from the University of South Florida. Norris has taught music in the Department of Fine and Performing Arts at LSC since 2002. She holds a BM (bachelor of music) from Illinois State University, an MM (masters of music) from Indiana University and a DMA (doctor of musical arts) from the University of Kansas.
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Met Alum Activities
Professor Bruce Berryman reports news from several Meteorology alumni, following a visit from Jeremy Davis '00. Brian Whitley '00 has moved to the private sector and now works for Weather Routing, Inc. Trevor Bevens '00 has moved from Ocean Routing to Fleet Weather, and Allison Penney '95 also left Ocean Routing. Dina Freedman '01, who has been working in television, has become a teacher.
Davis is still forecasting for yachts for Weather Routing, Inc., and recently had a "business trip" that consisted of a short cruise on a large yacht along the Mid-Atlantic coast.
A hobby of Davis's has gained him quite a bit of attention. Starting years ago, he has collected photos and information on what he calls lost ski areas. He told Professor Berryman that the book started as a “write something about history” type of assignment in Allen Yale’s LSC GEU history class ten years ago and then just grew and grew and grew. Also, he said he found out by reading ski magazines that, unbeknownst to him, a writer in one of the magazines had coined a new word: “NELSAP” (a verb), usage: when a ski area goes out of business, it’s been NELSAP’ed. For more information about lost ski areas (there are a few local ones included, such as one that once occupied President's Hill and another at the former Lincoln Street School in St. Johnsbury), visit Davis's NELSAP web site.
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LSC Intern Works with Country Thyme Vermont
 Kay Courson, owner/operator of Country Thyme Vermont in Derby, is doing what she loves.
Kay’s husband had a military career, so the family moved a great deal, but when their son hit high school age, they moved to the Derby area so he could attend North Country Union High School. NCUHS offered some special programs in which he was interested (he is now at Johns Hopkins studying biophysics.) It was not long after they had moved to Derby that Kay saw a lifetime dream loom on the horizon, when Country Thyme Vermont, an established local gift shop, came up for sale.
She purchased the business and kept it in its original location until she ran out of space, then moved to a large house nearby. Any visitor will see that space can always be an issue, though, as the large Victorian that is now home to Country Thyme is chukka-block full, from floor to ceiling, in all the open kitchen cupboards and on free-standing shelves in every room. “We moved in the building [previously a private home] without making any changes to it,” Kay explains. The first floor is gifts, the second floor contains a break room for staff and a well-stocked fabric room with about 550 bolts, geared for quilters, and the third floor is storage. Even the break room is full of extra baskets (see below, photo with Kay Courson), which are very popular when filled and wrapped during the holidays.
The pleasant aroma that greets shoppers at the door comes largely from the homemade Country Thyme Candles, made on the second floor and sold on the first floor. The apothecary candle, for instance, comes in 37 fragrances.
So what is Kay doing as an iWOW participant? It’s all about inventory, she says. While the business is generally profitable, cash flow can be a problem, nothing unusual in the Northeast Kingdom economy. To solve that problem, Kay applied and was accepted into iWOW and is working with Lyndon iWOW intern Robert Thompson, a Business Administration major from Concord, and Professor Rodney Jacobson, who is supervising the internship.
The goal of the iWOW project in general is to help Derby and Newport businesses prepare for the influx of big box stores, usually represented by WalMart. Kay holds the less common opinion on this eventuality, however. “I am not worried about WalMart coming in,” she says. “In fact, we need a big box store here to keep local residents from driving to Littleton to shop every weekend when a lot of what they need is right here.”
What really matters in a WalMart environment, she goes on, is to be sure you have a well-managed and well-run business and that you offer what WalMart does not. Often that is quality and service, something with which Kay is very familiar. It would be easier, she says, to make up holiday baskets in advance, for example, but people often have special requests that she prefers to honor. That makes her product unique.
To deal with the cash flow issue, the Country Thyme iWOW team is sure that a point-of-sale system will help a great deal. Kay says she wants to eliminate unnecessary ordering, something she has done in the past because she cannot be sure exactly what she has in storage. A point-of-sale system will monitor what comes in and what goes out, so that a look at the computer will answer such a question. Her goal is a page taken from the WalMart book – just-in-time ordering.
Robert’s internship ends this summer. He and Professor Jacobson have studied the way that Country Thyme operates and evaluated what changes could bring improvements. By the end of this internship, he will have studied various point-of-sale programs from which Kay will be able to select. With some luck that her local buyers remain loyal, as they have over the past 10 years, and by learning a new program, Country Thyme should be able to leave cash flow issues in the past.
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LSC Breaks Ground for Student Activities and Academic Space
Groundbreaking for Lyndon State College’s newest addition is scheduled for August 12 at noon. Parking will be available in the new Vail lot, which is now in its final stages of reconstruction, and all are invited to attend. The ceremony will take place in front (west side) of the Vail Center.
Space for student clubs and activities has been at a premium at Lyndon for a number of years, and, with growing enrollment recently, academic space is also needed. This building project, approved by the Vermont State Colleges' board of trustees last year, will provide instructional and faculty office space and space for academic programs that are increasing in size and technological complexity. Its multipurpose student activity space will meet a range of cultural, entertainment, academic and social needs for the Lyndon student body.
In addition to student activities, three academic programs will move to the building when it opens next August – Meteorology, Exercise Science and Business Administration. Meteorology, an area where technological advances are made at a fast pace, will gain laboratory space, a new research area, updated equipment, a recording room for students to practice their broadcasting, an observation deck and space for the Lyndon Institute for Applied Meteorology, which sponsors research and educational programs online.
Business Administration, which currently shares the Harvey Academic Center with Visual Arts and the Recreation Resource and Ski Resort Management departments, will occupy the entire second floor of the new building. This new space will provide a professional business atmosphere in which students and the department can carry on their consultations with and presentations to area businesses with which they work, such as those involved in the iWOW (Incubator without Walls) program. iWOW businesses from the Newport/Derby area are working with Lyndon students and faculty to streamline their business models to position themselves in the most favorable competitive stance in regard to potential big box stores that may come to the area.
Perhaps gaining the most from the move will be Exercise Science. This growing area, which in the past focused on physical education, now serves a growing number of students in a field of expanding opportunities. Along with the B.S. in physical education, Exercise Science now offers degrees in pre-professional athletic training, strength and conditioning/health and fitness, sports management, sports medicine and a self-designed program. This area has grown so fast that the college has been hard-pressed to find adequate appropriate space, and a few of the classes have been held for some time in a converted racquet ball court.
Dean of Administration Wayne Hamilton estimates construction costs at $10 million. The money comes from a Vermont State Colleges bond and will be repaid with student fees over the next 30 years. Even though Lyndon is part of Vermont’s public higher education system, state funding is too low to fund the improvement and growth which are necessary to offer Vermont students the education they deserve. Fund raising is also underway, and naming opportunities are available. Fund raising will provide all of the $1.5 to $3 million dollars needed to equip and furnish the building. For more information, contact Dean of Institutional Advancement Bob Whittaker at 626-6427.
Architect for the project is Smith-Alvarez-Sienkiewycz of Burlington, and H.P. Cummings of Woodsville, N.H., will be construction manager. Cummings also served as construction manager for the Rita Bole Complex construction. A reception will follow the ceremony in the student center on the second floor of Vail.
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Kascenska and Ummer Summit Kilimanjaro
 Above, John Kascenska and Chris Ummer hold a college banner on the summit of Mount Kilimanjaro last month, following an eight-day climb.
When Associate Academic Dean John Kascenska and a friend picked a Mount Kilimanjaro climb for an adventure in 2005, John did not plan to make the trek an annual event. But that is what it has become, and he and Athletic Director Chris Ummer returned from a successful climb the last week of July. This was Chris’s first Kili climb and John’s fourth. Chris has previously done a lot of climbing and especially likes Mt. Washington at 6,288 feet, and he has cycled several high passes, including the Wyoming Cloud Peak Skyway, a 64-mile route that reaches 9,660 feet.
John and Chris are in great physical shape, and that is important, but, as John points out, being in top shape is just the first step. “Altitude is the great equalizer,” he explains. On this trip, only two climbers had to turn back due to the effects of altitude. Kilimanjaro is not a technical climb; in fact, it has been called the world’s highest walkable mountain, so climbers do not use ropes or special climbing equipment or oxygen, as do those on Everest and others. There is little that can be done to prepare for the altitude, so climbers rely on a slow pace with an appropriate number of days for their bodies to adjust.
The fact that Kilimanjaro is walkable should not suggest that it is an
easy climb. To begin with, planning is complicated. John put this and
previous climbs together with Rick and Celia Wilcox, owners of
International Mountain Equipment and the International Mountain
Climbing School of North Conway, New Hampshire.
At 19,340 feet (5395 meters), Kilimanjaro took John and Chris through five climate zones on their way to the top, from rainforest to arctic environments; temperatures can range from 85 degrees to below zero. On this climb, John said they experienced night-time temperatures in the teens. During Project Kili in 2004, project organizer Professor Cathy DeLeo said that among that group of young climbers, the ones who had the most difficulty were those unaccustomed to cold weather.
Few escape the effects of altitude, the major challenge on the trail. Sleeping becomes difficult, breathing can become labored due to the low oxygen levels, and a general feeling of unwellness can rob hikers of their energy. “The better shape you are in aerobically, the better off you are,” John says. And, in addition to the altitude, some people, often from warmer climates, are not prepared for the cold.
Physical training beforehand is critical. Both John and Chris run, cycle and hike year round, so a climb like this does not require a change in lifestyle. Also, John and Rick and Celia Wilcox make sure there is plenty of preparation at the hotel before starting the trek, and they plan in time for acclimatization on the trail. Prior to heading out, they talk about what to expect on the climb, how to cope with problems, how the altitude can affect the body, and they do an equipment and gear check, too. The guides attend this pre-climb session, explaining their roles, what can be expected of them and what they expect of the climbers.
Meals are complete and well-balanced. Breakfast and dinner are hot meals, and lunch is typical trail food (sandwiches and fruit). John says there is quite a bit of fresh food, which is carried in from other trails along the route.
On John’s two earlier climbs (2005 and 2006), the group made its final camp at a site about eight hours from the summit. This required climbers to nap after dinner until 11 p.m., head out at midnight in the dark and coldest part of the day and summit early in the morning. After an hour or so on the summit, they would head back down for one more night on the mountain, by which time they would have been up for about 16 hours in harsh conditions.
Chris got to enjoy the fruits of John’s past three summit climbs, when the group, for the second time, extended each day’s climb and made final camp in the Kibo crater at 19,000 feet, just two hours from the summit. (Kilimanjaro is a dormant volcano, but the craters still emit volcanic gases). John says “this makes for an easier eight-day climb” compared to previous trip itineraries.
Kili is a carry in/carry out park, and John says it is fairly clean, although you can see signs of use on the trail. Mount Kilimanjaro National Park web site reports that approximately 15,000 people attempt the climb each year, and about half of those are successful.
Next month’s NewsNet will carry this story from Chris Ummer’s point of view and will include reports and photos from their three-day African safari. Click here for a small selection of John's Africa photos
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