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New dean, renewed dean
Janel Mueller, the William Rainey Harper professor in English
language & literature, will succeed Philip Gossett as dean of
the Division of the Humanities. Richard Saller, the Edward L. Ryerson
distinguished service professor in history, has been appointed to
a second five-year term as dean of the Division of the Social Sciences.
A gaggle of Guggenheims
Seven University faculty have received 1999 Guggenheim fellowships:
Neil Harris, historian; Robert Hooper, visiting lecturer in art;
David Jablonski, geophysical sciences professor; Ketan Mulmuley,
computer scientist; Robert Nelson, art historian; Bruce Winstein,
physicist; and Wu Hung, art historian.
Medical milestone
The American Gastroenterological Association has honored Joseph
B. Kirsner, PhD’42, the Louis Block distinguished service professor
in medicine, with its distinguished educator award, recognizing
Kirsner’s achievements during six decades of teaching. The
award was one of only two major honors in his field that the 89-year-old
Kirsner had not yet received. The other honor—for which he
is not eligible—is the Joseph B. Kirsner Award from the American
Digestive Health Foundation.
Historic collaboration
With a $145,000 award from the Library of Congress/Ameritech National
Digital Library competition, the Regenstein Library will work with
the Filson Club Historical Society in Louisville, KY, to create
a virtual library: “The First American West: The Ohio River
Valley, 1750–1820,” a collection of maps, manuscripts,
letters, and books about the region.
A Pulitzer for poetry
Poet Mark Strand, professor in the Committee on Social Thought,
won the 1999 Pulitzer Prize for poetry for the collection Blizzard
of One (Alfred A. Knopf, 1998), his ninth book of poetry.
Celebrated books
Martin Marty, PhD’56, the Fairfax M. Cone distinguished service
professor emeritus in the Divinity School, received the U of C Press’s
1999 Gordon J. Laing Award, recognizing the faculty author, editor,
or translator whose work has brought the greatest distinction to
the Press. Marty was recognized as author of Modern American
Religion, a four-volume chronicle of 20th-century American religion
and faith. The fourth volume is in progress.
The smell of success
Martha McClintock has been named the David Lee Shillinglaw distinguished
service professor in psychology. McClintock studies the relationships
among mind, behavior, and the functioning of the neural and endocrine
systems.
Saluting new Americans
Ron Huberman, a Chicago police officer and dual master’s
degree graduate student in the School of Social Service Administration
and the Graduate School of Business, was awarded a 1999 Paul and
Daisy Soros fellowship for new Americans. Huberman, born in Tel
Aviv, Israel, became an American citizen in 1982.
Searching the heavens
Physics Nobel laureate James Cronin, SM’53, PhD’55,
and University of Leeds researcher Alan Watson are leading 250 scientists
from 19 nations in a project to locate the source of rare, powerful
high-energy cosmic rays. They’ll use the Pierre Auger Observatory’s
site in Argentina, now under construction, and its second site,
planned for Utah.
Academic all-stars
Five University faculty members—historian Bruce Cumings;
psychologist Martha McClintock; Romance languages & literatures
professor Thomas Pavel; medicine and molecular genetics & cell
biology professor Craig Thompson; and ecology & evolution professor
Wen-Hsiung Li—were elected to the American Academy of Arts
and Sciences. Economics professor Lars Peter Hansen was selected
as a member of the National Academy of Sciences.
Top teachers
Five professors received 1999 Quantrell Awards for excellence
in undergraduate teaching: psychologist Bertram Cohler, AB’61;
Milton Ehre, professor in Slavic languages & literatures; geophysical
scientist Susan Kidwell; Michael LaBarbera, professor in organismal
biology & anatomy and geophysical sciences; and historian Moishe
Postone, SB’63, AM’67.
Broken records
This year, U of C graduate students broke last year’s record
number of Fulbright-Hays doctoral-dissertation research abroad fellowships
by garnering 19 of the 75 awards distributed nationwide for the
1999–2000 academic year. It was the 13th year that Chicago
students have received the largest number of fellowships in the
competition.
Centenarian Phi Beta Kappa
The University’s chapter of the Phi Beta Kappa Society celebrated
its 100th anniversary this spring. Chicago’s first Phi Beta
Kappa executive committee included William Rainey Harper and Harry
Pratt Judson.
Combating cancer
Janis Burkhardt, assistant professor in pathology, received a
$278,600 grant from the National Institutes of Health to study how
lymphocytes, a type of traveling immune cell, aim toxin granules
at cancer cells.
Service from the senator
The University conferred its William Benton Medal of distinguished
public service on Paul Simon, former senator from Illinois, this
spring. The award honors individuals whose public service improves
the field of education.
Star journalism
The American Astronomical Society’s high-energy astrophysics
division has named its new prize for science journalism after late
U of C physicist David Schramm, regarded as the founder of the field
of particle astrophysics.
Smart Museum renovation
The University’s Smart Museum of Art closed April 19 for
an extensive renovation of the museum and a reinstallation of the
permanent collection. The $2-million project will provide an education
study room; more spacious special exhibition galleries; more extensive
displays of modern, contemporary, and Asian collections; and a thematic
presentation of rotating selections from the collections of antiquities
and Old Master works.
Honored with degrees
Historian Pierre Briant received an honorary doctor of humane
letters degree at the second session of the 456th convocation, as
did philosopher Bernard Williams, while physicist Daniel Tsui, SM’63,
PhD’67, a 1998 Nobel laureate, received an honorary doctor
of science degree.
Recognizing promise
Three U of C mathematics professors and one economics professor
received 1999 Alfred P. Sloan research fellowships. Steven Levitt,
associate professor in economics, and Benson Farb, Matthias Schwarz,
and Shankar Venkataramani, assistant professors in mathematics,
were recognized for their work’s intellectual promise.
Medical moves
In July, cancer specialist and professor of medicine Richard L.
Schilsky, MD’75, became associate dean for clinical research
in the Division of the Biological Sciences. Nicholas J. Vogelzang
has been named the first Fred C. Buffett professor of medicine and
director of the University of Chicago Cancer Research Center.
Different direction
Bill Michel, AB’92, who was director of the Reynolds Club
and oversaw its recent renovation, has been appointed Deputy Dean
of Student Services for Sevelopment and Student Sctivities and Assistant
Dean of the College.
Critical acclaim
Emeritus music professor Charles Rosen has received the world’s
largest annual cash prize for literary criticism, the Truman Capote
award. The award, administered by the U of Iowa Writers’ Workshop,
recognized Rosen for his work Romantic Poets, Critics, and Other
Madmen.
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