Gettysburg College was not immune from the giant snowstorm that hammered the mid-Atlantic region Feb. 5 and 6.

Students made the best of the situation, playing football in the snow, digging snow caves, and strolling through the drifts.

Accumulation totaled approximately two feet.

Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences. With a student body of approximately 2,500, it is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania. The college was founded in 1832.

Galleries by Jim Hale, Alyssa Armster-Wikoff, Jen Brennan and Lynn Burke

Contact: Jim Hale, online content editor

Gettysburg College will be open on Monday, Feb. 8, under normal business hours and class will be held as scheduled.

However, due to the significant amounts of snow accumulation, the College's flex time policy is in effect for Monday, Feb. 8. Employees may use vacation, sick leave, floating holiday, or compensatory time for any work missed.

Constitution, Masters, and Stadium parking lots are open. Sidewalks to all buildings are open and steps into buildings are cleared.

Please use caution as there may be patches of snow and ice on sidewalks or steps on campus. Facilities will continue to salt these areas and will be working to remove snow in smaller parking lots.

Gettysburg College has named a new provost to lead its academic division.

Christopher Zappe will start July 6. Zappe is currently dean of arts and sciences at Bucknell University, where he has also been a faculty member in the management department.

"Chris emerged from a rich applicant pool of highly qualified candidates. I am confident that he will have great success in leading the faculty and the academic division of Gettysburg College," said President Janet Morgan Riggs '77.

At Bucknell, Zappe focused on faculty development programming, hiring new tenure-track faculty to implement the five-course teaching load, and reviewing and revising the curriculum of the College of Arts and Sciences.

"I'm truly honored to be invited to join the Gettysburg community as the new provost. I am eager to begin working closely with the Gettysburg faculty, staff, and students later this summer. It is exciting to be joining a community filled with so many warm and talented individuals," said Zappe.

Zappe earned a bachelor of arts in mathematics with honors from DePauw University in 1983 and an M.B.A. and Ph.D. in decision sciences from Indiana University in 1987 and 1988, respectively. From 1988 to 1993, he researched and taught various decision sciences courses in the College of Business Administration at the University of Florida in Gainesville. Zappe taught undergraduate courses in business statistics, decision modeling and analysis, and computer simulation in the department of management at Bucknell University. He has taught advanced seminars in applied game theory, system dynamics, risk assessment, and mathematical economics. He has published scholarly articles in peer-reviewed journals such as Managerial and Decision Economics, OMEGA, Naval Research Logistics, and Interfaces. He has also co-authored innovative texts in the decision sciences, including Data Analysis and Decision Making with Microsoft Excel and Managerial Statistics. His current scholarly interests focus on univariate Box-Jenkins ARIMA forecasting models, mathematical programming models of performance appraisal processes and innovative pedagogies in operations research/management science.

Chris is married to Jeannie Zappe and they have two sons, Matt and Jack.

Journalist Joan Biskupic will speak about the Supreme Court Feb. 11 at Gettysburg College.

The 7 p.m. talk will take place in the third-floor Lyceum located inside Pennsylvania Hall. Biskupic's talk, "Antonin Scalia and the Contemporary Supreme Court" is open to the public at no charge.

Biskupic has covered the Supreme Court for the Washington Post, Congressional Quarterly and recently USA Today for more than 20 years. She is the author of the best-selling biography, "Sandra Day O'Connor: How the First Woman on the Supreme Court Became Its Most Influential Justice," and the recent biography, "American Original: The Life and Constitution of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia."

Biskupic is the co-author of Congressional Quarterly's 3rd Edition encyclopedia on the Supreme Court (with Elder Witt). She holds a law degree from Georgetown, an M.A. in English from the University of Oklahoma and completed her undergraduate education in journalism at Marquette University. Her new book, "American Original," was named one of NPR's top five current affairs books of 2009.

In "American Original: The Life and Constitution of Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia," Biskupic traces Scalia's life from his roots in New York City to his experiences in the Nixon and Ford administrations in order to give readers a sense of his journey to the Supreme Court and the basis for his ideals.

This event is the first in the Eisenhower Institute's Spring Speaker Series at Gettysburg College. Future speakers include Howard Ernst on March 18 and Gwen Ifill on April 8.

Contact: Kendra Martin, director of media relations

Gettysburg College's Sunderman Conservatory of Music faculty soprano Susan Hochmiller, tenor Jeffrey Fahnestock and pianist Scott Crowne will celebrate Robert Schumann's 200th birthday with vocal solos, duets and quartets Feb. 7.

The 8 p.m. performance will take place in Schmucker Hall's Paul Recital Hall located along North Washington St. Schumann's "Spanish Love Songs" and "Spanish Song-Play" provide a glimpse of a 19th century German's view of the sunny and exotic Mediterranean. Selections from Schumann's other vocal masterworks will also be performed. This event is free and open to the public.

A blended presentation of song and talk by Bernice Johnson Reagon with take place Feb. 3 at Gettysburg College.

The event, "Selections from the Autobiography of a Freedom Singer," will take place at 7 p.m. in the College Union Building's The Junction. For more than 45 years, Reagon has been a major cultural voice for freedom and justice; singing, teaching and speaking out against racism and organized inequities of all kinds. The event is open to the public at no charge and is sponsored by Gettysburg College's Office of Intercultural Advancement in celebration of Black History Month.

"These days, I come as ‘songtalker,' one who balances talk and song in the creation of a live performance conversation with those who gather within the sound of my voice," said Reagon.

Founder and director for 30 years of the African American women's a cappella ensemble "Sweet Honey In The Rock," Reagon is also professor emeritus of history at American University and curator emeritus at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History. Her pioneering work as a scholar, teacher and artist have been recognized with the Heinz Award for the Arts and Humanities in 2003, Leeway National Award for Women in the Arts in 2000, Presidential Medal for contribution to public understanding of the humanities in 1995 and MacArthur Fellowship in 1989. She received a Ph.D. from Howard University and a bachelor's degree from Spelman College.

Founded in 1832, Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences with a strong academic tradition that includes Rhodes Scholars, a Nobel laureate and other distinguished scholars among its alumni. The college enrolls 2,600 undergraduate students and is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.

Contact: Kendra Martin, director of media relations

The Brentano String Quartet will perform as part of the Sunderman Chamber Music Concert Series on Feb. 12.

The 8 p.m. performance will take place in Schmucker Hall's Paul Recital Hall located along North Washington St. The group is comprised of Mark Steinberg, violin, Serena Canin, violin, Misha Amory, viola, and Nina Maria Lee, cello. They will perform String Quartet in F-Major, Op. 41, No. 2 by Robert Schumann and String Quartet in C major, Op. 59, No. 3 "Rasumovsky" by Ludwig van Beethoven, among others. The event is free and open to the public.

Since its inception in 1992, the Brentano String Quartet has appeared throughout the world to popular and critical acclaim. Within a few years of its formation, the Quartet garnered the first Cleveland Quartet Award and the Naumburg Chamber Music Award. In 1996, the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center invited them to be the inaugural members of Chamber Music Society Two, a program which has become a coveted distinction for chamber groups and individuals ever since. The Quartet had its first European tour in 1997, and was honored in the U.K. with the Royal Philharmonic Award for Most Outstanding Debut. In recent seasons the Quartet has traveled widely, appearing all over the United States and Canada, in Europe, Japan and Australia.

An exhibition of sculptures, installations and films that reflect issues of race, gender and social policies will be on display Jan. 22 through March 5 at Gettysburg College's Schmucker Art Gallery.

The exhibit, "Maren Hassinger: Lives," coincides with the Central Pennsylvania Consortium Africana Studies Conference on Public Policy in the African Diaspora. An artist's talk and reception will take place Feb. 26 from 4 to 7 p.m. Admission to all events is free and open to the public. Gallery hours are Tuesday through Saturday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Works in the exhibition include "Legacy" (2006), a thirteen-minute video of phrases related to the African-American experience projected onto an archival photograph of former slaves harvesting sweet potatoes. Hassinger questions how contemporary perceptions and racial stereotypes intersect with past American politics. In "Wrenching News" (2008), sculptures composed of twisted pieces of The New York Times, Hassinger provides an examination of how public issues, politics and social problems are dispersed, received and (literally) twisted and wrenched.

Born in Los Angeles in 1947, Hassinger has mounted many solo exhibitions and participated in more than 120 group shows. Her work is included in more than 34 catalogs and in many public collections. Hassinger has performed at the Museum of Modern Art, been reviewed in Art in America, The New York Times and ARTnews and received grants from the Gottlieb Foundation, Joan Mitchell Foundation, Pollock-Krasner Foundation and National Endowment for the Arts. Hassinger is director of the Rinehart School of Sculpture at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore.

More information is available at www.gettysburg.edu/gallery or by emailing gallery@gettysburg.edu or calling 717-337-6080.

Contact: Kendra Martin, director of media relations

A candlelight vigil on the steps of Gettysburg College's Musselman Library honored the memory of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Jan. 18.

"Dr. King's relevance did not disappear with the passage of the Civil Rights Act, his passion did not die with him on the balcony, and the significance of his message did not dwindle after he had a dream," Lawrese Brown, Class of 2010, said in an address to the audience.

"Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. adamantly believed that ‘life's most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others?'" said Brown, who created her own individual major, Writing for Public Policy. (The full text of her speech is below.)

Dozens attended the event sponsored for the second year in a row by the brothers of Alpha Phi Alpha (APA).

The program also included a powerful performance of "We Shall Overcome" by music education major Leroy Smith, Class of 2012, a prayer by campus Chaplain Joseph Donnella, "Lift Every Voice and Sing" led by math Prof. Lynnell Matthews, a reading by APA member Wayne Chang Jr., Class of 2011, and a reading by the Black Student Union executive team, Unique Patterson, Terena McLorn, and Christine Crayton, all Class of 2010.

"We may not be able to mobilize people the way Martin Luther King Jr. did," Chang said, "but I hope we will be able to empower, love, and serve people."

Founded in 1832, Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences. With some 2,500 students, it is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.

Contact: Jim Hale, online content editor

MLK Vigil Speech
Jan. 18, 2010
by Lawrese Brown, Class of 2010

Today, we do not celebrate Dr. King because he was a perfect man; but we celebrate Dr. King because he was a purposeful one. His life was defined by his commitment to a cause greater than himself, and his legacy constructed by his devotion to the struggle of oppressed peoples.  

While Dr. King will always undoubtedly be remembered as a great leader of the Civil Rights Movement, he by no means fought the titanic injustice of oppression and immense atrocity of illicit inequality alone. Great leaders understand that "they light their candles from the torches of the people." It would be a disservice to celebrate Dr. King without recognizing the labor, effort, and actions of those that followed. Though many may go unnamed, we pray their irrevocable resolve and unfaltering faith never go unrecognized.

Dr. King's relevance did not disappear with the passage of the Civil Rights Act, his passion did not die with him on the balcony, and the significance of his message did not dwindle after he had a dream. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. adamantly believed that "life's most persistent and urgent question is what are you doing for others?"  He understood that all men are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality.

We must all heed the responsibility and the call to action in which Dr. King and other leaders have asked. Today as we face new plights of injustice, we need to challenge ourselves to take a stance and encourage ourselves to evolve. Dr. King chose to use non-violence and peaceful protests because he knew combating violence against violence would only fuel the hatred. He said, "Hate at any point is a cancer that gnaws away at the very vital center of your life and your existence." Hatred erodes a man's character and destroys his spirit, it is through love and peace that we evolve.

Coretta Scott King, Dr. King's late wife, too comprehended the capacity of hatred.  She said, "Hate is too great a burden to bear. It injures the hater more than it injures the hated."  Thus, as we continue forward, let us remember that our value is established in our actions and our respect is earned through our honesty. Let our intentions speak of integrity and our expectations keep faith in humanity.

 On Sunday, President Obama spoke of Dr. King and his legacy at the Vermont Avenue Baptist Church.  While delivering his sermon, he took a moment to acknowledge his own failures and the people's disappointment in America's slow economic and political reform. "I know people can feel down about the way things are going sometimes here in Washington. I know it's tempting to give up on the political process. But ... Progress is possible." President Obama understands that in tenuous times, faith may falter and doubts may develop, but just like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  he knows that, "Change does not roll in on wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle. We must accept finite disappointment but never lose infinite hope."

Thank you.

Longtime Gettysburg College Athletic Director Hen Bream is the subject of a new book by history Prof. Michael Birkner.

"For roughly half a century, the name Hen Bream was indelibly linked with Gettysburg College athletics," Birkner writes in Building Men: Hen Bream and Gettysburg College Athletics. "As a student in the 1920s, then during a long tenure as a coach and finally as Gettysburg's athletic director from 1953 to 1969, Bream contributed materially to Gettysburg's impressive record."

A chapter, "‘This Darn War Won't Last Forever': Hen Bream's Boys and World War II" is available online. The book is available in the Gettysburg College Bookstore.

Birkner, a 1972 graduate of Gettysburg College, is its Benjamin Franklin Professor of Liberal Arts as well as a professor of history.

Founded in 1832, Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences. With some 2,500 students, it is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.

Contact: Jim Hale, online content editor

Gettysburg College librarians learned firsthand about the restoration of the gigantic Cyclorama painting at Gettysburg National Military Park.

Musselman Library staff members met with individuals involved in the painstaking three-year restoration process and got a rare behind-the-scenes look at the 19th-century in-the-round painting of Pickett's Charge. During the visit on Jan. 13, 2010, librarians examined the three-dimensional diorama portion of the Cyclorama and were able to crawl behind the painting to examine restoration work up close. 

Founded in 1832, Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences. With some 2,500 students, it is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.

Contact: Jim Hale, online content editor

Posted Jan. 14, 2010

The Gettysburg College women’s basketball team earned its first national ranking in 15 years.

The Bullets were ranked No. 21 in the NCAA Division III poll conducted by D3hoops.com and released on Jan. 12.

The ranking came as the team was off to a program-best season start, with 13 straight wins dating back to last season’s regular-season finale. The squad was one of just six unbeaten women’s teams remaining in Division III.

Complete coverage is at gettysburgsports.com.

The Bullets were scheduled to play Bryn Mawr College (1-10, 0-8 CC) Tuesday, Jan. 12, at 7:30 p.m, and to host ninth-ranked Muhlenberg College (8-1, 6-0 CC) on Thursday, Jan. 14, at 6 p.m. in Bream Gym.

Kate Sweetland-Lambird '10 came to Gettysburg knowing she would get involved with the College's Center for Public Service (CPS). What she didn't know was that community involvement would prove to be a transformational experience, both for her and for children in Gettysburg.

As part of the Heston Summer Experience, a Gettysburg College program that facilitates social justice internships, Sweetland-Lambird took the lead in developing a writing workshop at The Center/El Centro, a community education program in Gettysburg. There, she encouraged children to create poetry and prose based on their own lives, and published their perspectives in a book, "A Collection of Voices."

For the past three academic years, Sweetland-Lambird has been one of 20 CPS program coordinators, who recruit, train, and organize volunteers, and partner with community organizations. Through intensive study and reflection, program coordinators also probe social justice issues and examine social inequity's local and global impacts.

"Kate is a leader because she has combined her Latin American Studies and Spanish major with her study-abroad experience, as well as her time working at CPS," said CPS Associate Director Kim Davidson. "Kate's ability to connect these experiences have supported her passion for social justice and allowed her to develop as a leader with a strong sense of self and the world, making her impact on the community meaningful."

Sweetland-Lambird, who hails from Lake Oswego, Ore., plans to build on her Gettysburg experience by making her career in public policy.

Kate's book, "A Collection of Voices," will be available for purchase in the CPS office.

There are 20 open positions at CPS for Program Coordinators in 2010-2011. Applications are due by February 9. Applications materials for the Heston Summer Experience 2010 will be available soon.

This is the second in a series of videos highlighting leadership opportunities at Gettysburg College.

The Gettysburg College Jazz Ensemble is going on its first-ever winter tour, travelling 900 miles to visit high and middle schools in three northeastern states, including one where a graduate is the band director.

"This is an exceptional group of students who really enjoy playing together," said the ensemble's director, Prof. John "Buzz" Jones of the College's Sunderman Conservatory of Music. "We want to enhance the growing musical reputation of the Conservatory to a broader audience of students, and I think it's important to have our jazz students perform in public as much as possible."

Though the winter timeframe is new, the Jazz Ensemble  is no stranger to touring. Summer tours of Europe took place in 2008, 2002, 1997, and 1993.

The Jazz Ensemble's 2010 Northern Lights Tour includes:

Jan. 10

7:30 p.m., Mansfield Middle School, Storrs, Conn., where John Hart, Class of 2007, is band director. His wife, Katie (MacKellar) Hart is a 2008 graduate.

Jan. 11

10:30 a.m., Brookfield High School, Brookfield, Conn., of which ensemble member Matt Murray, Class of 2011, is a graduate.

3:30 p.m., workshop with music students at Northport High School, Northport, N.Y., of which James Lowenthal, Class of 2012, is a graduate.

7 p.m., concert at Northport High

Jan. 12

10 a.m., Louis Armstrong House and Museum tour, Corona, N.Y.

7:30 p.m., concert at Kutztown High School, Kutztown, Pa., of which Hannah Loch, Class of 2012, is a graduate.

The Jazz Ensemble is an auditioned ensemble of 18 to 22 students. Members study all styles of jazz, encompassing swing, Latin, fusion, bop, and American songbook standards of the Big Band Era. The ensemble has performed at European jazz festivals, opened for noted jazz artists, and hosted renowned soloists.

A jazz combo (Jazz Dispatch), improvisation lab, private improvisation lessons, and two jazz history courses are also part of the jazz curriculum.  Students may elect to earn a B.A. in Music degree with jazz emphasis.

The Sunderman Conservatory of Music at Gettysburg College combines Gettysburg's superb music tradition and its strengths as one of the nation's leading liberal arts colleges. Established in 2005 through a $15.7 million gift from 1919 graduate Dr. F. William Sunderman Sr., the conservatory offers three degrees -- bachelor of music in performance, bachelor of arts in music, and bachelor of science in music education -- as well as a minor in music

Founded in 1832, Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences. With some 2,500 students, it is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania.

Contact: Jim Hale, online content editor

Posted Jan. 5, 2010

Gettysburg College recognized mid-year graduates at a Dec. 17 ceremony.

Families, faculty, and friends gathered in Schmucker Hall's Paul Recital Hall to celebrate the achievement of 30 new graduates.

Prof. Todd Neller, chair of the Department of Computer Science, delivered remarks on behalf of the faculty. President Janet Morgan Riggs, a 1977 graduate of Gettysburg College, welcomed the audience and graduates. A reception followed.

Gettysburg College is a highly selective four-year residential college of liberal arts and sciences. With a student body of approximately 2,500, it is located on a 200-acre campus adjacent to the Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania. The college was founded in 1832.

Contact: Jim Hale, online content editor

Posted Dec. 18, 2009

Photos by Jim Hale