I repeated two Illinois visits from year's past on my way from Louisville to the Cooperative Congregational Studies Partnership annual meeting this week in Chicago. About a dozen years ago - while still in the midst of finishing my dissertation - I wrote a dozen or so friends of mine from my middle school in Gainesville (Westwood, where my mother once taught) and was able to reach most of them. The only one I ended up visiting was Robert Kennedy (with whom I had had a complicated friendship in Gainesville), who was married with three kids in suburban Chicago. Both Robert and wife Liz work at the Fermi national research lab - with its kind of supercolliding superconductor (in fact, Liz technically works for the one other colldier project, in Europe, in Cern, Switzerland - that the movie "Angels and Demons" recently featured). Botht of them are scientists, but Robert is now a manager and Liz writes software. The Kennedys oldest is 18 and about to go to college. When I visited 10 years ago onliy the youngest, then four or five and now in middle school, was there. I visited with Robert (pictured above) and Kathleen and a little with their two oldest in their huge far western suburban home for about 3 1/2 hours. One of the funnest things was looking through their pictures - on a 2-pound Mac Air - from an incredible set of trips they'd taken in the past few MONTHS to Amsterdam, the Caribbean, Prague, and elsewhere. Pictured below is Liz showing us some of the pictures.
Liz and Robert - who send us Christmas letters each year - posed outside on their deck, overlooking a golf course.
On my way to and from their house, I drove past the Fermi lab (entrance pictured below), which 10 years ago - when they lived in a smaller house, but closer to work - they toured me through the lab.
Five years ago I visited - in her Evanston (IL) (in the Chicago north suburbs) Presbyterian retirement home apartment - my former dissertation committee chair, Louise Tilly. Louise and her then husband, Chuck Tilly, arrived at my graduate school, ia couple of years before I did, in the mid-1980s. They inserted themselves in the Sociology department, where they brought a somewhat new historical and empirical bent, and started a new Historical Studies program. Eventually I was in both of these programs, and half way through my time in New York I was the student advisor for historical studies, where Louise, as chairperson, was my boss. I also took several classes with her (as well as from Chuck). Immediately before my arrival at the New School, Louise had apparently suffered some behavorial health problems. During my time there, she served as president of the American Historical Society, and - later on - Chuck left her. The two of them had four children, who were grown (except the youngest was a student at New School while I was there.) Chuck was also a looiming presence at the New School because he brought in large research grants that got people jobs and had a reputation for being able to help get people teaching jobs. Together they essentially ran the Center for the Studies of Social Change, a fourth-floor research center located a couple of blocks from other New School buildings. I had an office there for several years. Both Churck and Louise were smart and hard-working. I got along even better with Louise, who I found less intimidating. I also asked her to chair my dissertatin committee, a group that involved lots of smart, nice people with expertise in areas connecte with my topic (the abortion conflict) who I figured - correctly - would nevertheless give me advice but otherwise leave me alone. For better or worse, they did so - since I ended up spending some seven years on my dissertation (in one way or other). Louise was diagnosed with Alzheimer's as I was finishing up and - after having troubles at a dissertation defense two months before mine - unusually, bowed out of my committee with two days to go, and colleague Jose Casanova stepped in. Louise nevertheless had clearly read some of my draft and gave me some feedback which I took to heart during revisions (and kept in mind for possible book revisions). In the late 1990s, before my defense, Louise had retired, and I attended a historical studies conference in her honor at the New School. Later she moved to the Chicago area, where her other daughter (Laura) lived. In 2004 when I was wrapping up my time teaching down state at Western Illinois University, I drove to Evanston to have lunch with her. Gone were most of her books in her small apartment, but she was otherwise mainly herself at lunch (although at the last moment she forgot I was coming). To my discredit - after coming to Chicago every year for the past five years for the Cooperative Congregational Studies Partnership meetings - but usually trying to combine these with the sociology profesisonal meetings - I have not visited either the Kennedys or Louise Tilly. Skipping the meetings this year, I contacted her children and arranged to have dinner Sunday night - after racing back from the Kennedys and stopping to buy flowers for her and her daughter's family also - at her daughter and son-in-law's house. Arriving, it was clear Louise was having trouble carrying on a conversation. She'd have a thought but by the time she was talking she wasn't able to remember it (that was my intepretation), and she wouldn't know what to say or she would say something that was hard to follow that didn't seem to be related to anything else. I've talked with people with brain injuries who sometimes talk in a stream of consciousness where you have to fill in the blanks about how they got from one thing to another. This wasn't exactly like that. On the one hand, this was very sad. On ther other hand, Louise still had some of her grace, sense of humor, and spunk. I would say she was maybe somewhat less inhibited than usual - as Grandma was sometimes in her last year or two - as I believe she started to say things (some not so nice) at times that she wouldn't normally have said. I got to the beautiful old Evanston house a little later than I had intended. After small talk and appetizers, we moved to the dinner table. Laura (pictured below), a lawyer whom I don't think I ever met), sat at one end.
On my way to and from their house, I drove past the Fermi lab (entrance pictured below), which 10 years ago - when they lived in a smaller house, but closer to work - they toured me through the lab.
Five years ago I visited - in her Evanston (IL) (in the Chicago north suburbs) Presbyterian retirement home apartment - my former dissertation committee chair, Louise Tilly. Louise and her then husband, Chuck Tilly, arrived at my graduate school, ia couple of years before I did, in the mid-1980s. They inserted themselves in the Sociology department, where they brought a somewhat new historical and empirical bent, and started a new Historical Studies program. Eventually I was in both of these programs, and half way through my time in New York I was the student advisor for historical studies, where Louise, as chairperson, was my boss. I also took several classes with her (as well as from Chuck). Immediately before my arrival at the New School, Louise had apparently suffered some behavorial health problems. During my time there, she served as president of the American Historical Society, and - later on - Chuck left her. The two of them had four children, who were grown (except the youngest was a student at New School while I was there.) Chuck was also a looiming presence at the New School because he brought in large research grants that got people jobs and had a reputation for being able to help get people teaching jobs. Together they essentially ran the Center for the Studies of Social Change, a fourth-floor research center located a couple of blocks from other New School buildings. I had an office there for several years. Both Churck and Louise were smart and hard-working. I got along even better with Louise, who I found less intimidating. I also asked her to chair my dissertatin committee, a group that involved lots of smart, nice people with expertise in areas connecte with my topic (the abortion conflict) who I figured - correctly - would nevertheless give me advice but otherwise leave me alone. For better or worse, they did so - since I ended up spending some seven years on my dissertation (in one way or other). Louise was diagnosed with Alzheimer's as I was finishing up and - after having troubles at a dissertation defense two months before mine - unusually, bowed out of my committee with two days to go, and colleague Jose Casanova stepped in. Louise nevertheless had clearly read some of my draft and gave me some feedback which I took to heart during revisions (and kept in mind for possible book revisions). In the late 1990s, before my defense, Louise had retired, and I attended a historical studies conference in her honor at the New School. Later she moved to the Chicago area, where her other daughter (Laura) lived. In 2004 when I was wrapping up my time teaching down state at Western Illinois University, I drove to Evanston to have lunch with her. Gone were most of her books in her small apartment, but she was otherwise mainly herself at lunch (although at the last moment she forgot I was coming). To my discredit - after coming to Chicago every year for the past five years for the Cooperative Congregational Studies Partnership meetings - but usually trying to combine these with the sociology profesisonal meetings - I have not visited either the Kennedys or Louise Tilly. Skipping the meetings this year, I contacted her children and arranged to have dinner Sunday night - after racing back from the Kennedys and stopping to buy flowers for her and her daughter's family also - at her daughter and son-in-law's house. Arriving, it was clear Louise was having trouble carrying on a conversation. She'd have a thought but by the time she was talking she wasn't able to remember it (that was my intepretation), and she wouldn't know what to say or she would say something that was hard to follow that didn't seem to be related to anything else. I've talked with people with brain injuries who sometimes talk in a stream of consciousness where you have to fill in the blanks about how they got from one thing to another. This wasn't exactly like that. On the one hand, this was very sad. On ther other hand, Louise still had some of her grace, sense of humor, and spunk. I would say she was maybe somewhat less inhibited than usual - as Grandma was sometimes in her last year or two - as I believe she started to say things (some not so nice) at times that she wouldn't normally have said. I got to the beautiful old Evanston house a little later than I had intended. After small talk and appetizers, we moved to the dinner table. Laura (pictured below), a lawyer whom I don't think I ever met), sat at one end.
One thing we talked about eventually - among all of us - Louise didn't say that much while eight of us - including two of her grandchildren there and a visiting couple - was the death of Louise's former husband - and Laura's father, Chuck, a year or so ago. Laura told the story about how - after a memorial service near New York City's Columbia University, where Chuck ended up teaching - they had tried to take Chuck's ashes to the Hudson River, where they were going to illegally spread them. But the West Side Highway and bad weather intervened, and they finally spread them in Riverside Park nearby. She said her father was not a sentimental person. Chuck had at least one book he was trying to work on during his final months when he was battling yet a fourth form of cancer. Laura's brother, Chris, an economist, is trying to finish it. Chuck also tuaght classes through the fall a year and a half ago. I saw him last two years ago this week, when the sociology meetings were in New York City. Louise, Sarah, and I talked more again after dinner, still at the dinner table.
Sarah brought out a photo album of pictures that spanned Louise's ancestors through recent years. Louise's long-term memory wasn't atrocious - although Sarah wasn't slow to correct her mother when she thought Louise remembered something wrong. As Churck's career got going, the family had moved a lot - even taking two boats to France in the 1960s. The bulk of the final half an hour at the house was taken up by - like at the Kennedy - talking about their photos, which - again - was fun. (Beforehand, I had brought out a few pictures I had brought with me. I showed them pictures of my family- including Frisco, who everyone think is cute - and then pictures of New School folks I saw last summer. Louise recognied some of these latter folks, but not others - probably recognizing more people who looked more like they did 15 years ago when we were all at the Center - and those she knew better at the time.) But then - at least Sarah, Louise, and I were tired. And it was late for Louise (and, frankly, me) to get back home. Sarah and her husband got Louise into their car and left for the retirement home. Having gotten some directions, I drove around Evanston a bit (where I'd stayed before Thanksgiving 1981), and then drove to the rental car place, and then took two shuttles and checked into the hotel. It was a bit arduous and I had a headache by the time I got to my room (all the more so because of staying up late the night before). But I was glad to have visited these old friends in the Chicago suburbs.
Sarah brought out a photo album of pictures that spanned Louise's ancestors through recent years. Louise's long-term memory wasn't atrocious - although Sarah wasn't slow to correct her mother when she thought Louise remembered something wrong. As Churck's career got going, the family had moved a lot - even taking two boats to France in the 1960s. The bulk of the final half an hour at the house was taken up by - like at the Kennedy - talking about their photos, which - again - was fun. (Beforehand, I had brought out a few pictures I had brought with me. I showed them pictures of my family- including Frisco, who everyone think is cute - and then pictures of New School folks I saw last summer. Louise recognied some of these latter folks, but not others - probably recognizing more people who looked more like they did 15 years ago when we were all at the Center - and those she knew better at the time.) But then - at least Sarah, Louise, and I were tired. And it was late for Louise (and, frankly, me) to get back home. Sarah and her husband got Louise into their car and left for the retirement home. Having gotten some directions, I drove around Evanston a bit (where I'd stayed before Thanksgiving 1981), and then drove to the rental car place, and then took two shuttles and checked into the hotel. It was a bit arduous and I had a headache by the time I got to my room (all the more so because of staying up late the night before). But I was glad to have visited these old friends in the Chicago suburbs.
-- Pery
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