Articles

In a New York City neighborhood, Chinese, Greek, Korean, and Salvadoran families grow plants to get a little closer to the flavors of home. Even when surrounded by asphalt, concrete, and steel, the families continue to garden; they nurture local soil, and they build local culture—as does writer Esther Kim ’12, dreaming of Taiwan.

Tributes to Wellesley alumnae by family and friends

D. Scott Birney died on Aug. 15, 2021, at age 95. Scott joined the astronomy department in 1968, and throughout his 23 years at the College, his good cheer, wry wit, and self-effacing demeanor made the Whitin Observatory a congenial and supportive home to both students and faculty.

Mary Ellen Crawford Ames ’40 passed away on Aug. 17, 2021, following a lifetime of achievement and adventure that spanned 102 years. For 70 of those years, she was an engaging presence at Wellesley as a student, class president, alumna volunteer, personnel director, and as the College’s venerable director of admission from 1969 to 1985.

Miriam Butt ’87, a professor of general and computational linguistics at the University of Konstanz in Germany, chose to attend Wellesley in part because it was one of the only American colleges at the time where she could study both Latin and computer science.

In 2010, Anne Shen Chao ’74 founded the Houston Asian American Archive at Rice University, an oral history collection about the lives of Asian Americans living in the Houston area. “We want to make sure that Asian American contributions are included in the narrative of Texas history,” Anne says.

Peggy Cullen Nicholson ’54 has accomplished a lot in her life: She taught French for years. She served on her town’s board of education. She’s the mother of three. She’s been a lifelong volunteer. And last fall, she rowed in her first race, at the Head of the Charles.

After concluding a national search, the Wellesley College Alumnae Association chose a familiar face to become editor of Wellesley magazine. On Nov. 15, 2021, Lisa Scanlon Mogolov ’99 assumed her new role after 16 years on the magazine staff.

“We’re all in one big stream. Everyone is trying to find a way to be heard,” says Lois Roach, senior lecturer in theatre studies. In Roach’s course THST 106: Speaking Truth to Power, her students learn to speak up while hearing out other perspectives.