A letter from an alumnus about Orgo and Professor Maitland Jones

February 12, 2003

While it more be a more effective teaching strategy, the death of organic chemistry lectures instituted by Dr. Maitland Jones (Subject Matters, February 12) marks the loss of healthy guffaw fodder. Perhaps the real motivation for doing away with large orgo forums is the professor's fear, as he becomes an orgo legend, of suffering the same fate as one of his predecessors.

In the late '70s and early '80s my classmate, William P. Cheshire '82, and I found it a fitting stress-reliever to pay tribute to Dr. Kurt Mislow, our generation's orgo hero, by wreaking an annual havoc upon his class for three year's running (see PAW, May 19, 1980, p9 "Orgo Hijinx" and The Daily Princetonian, March 3, 1981, front page).

Among other things, we managed to commandeer the PA system, interrupt the lecture with prerecorded audio clips including a taped Tigertone rendition of an original tune, "Colored Chalk," and a flasher (wearing his picture); one year we burst into the final exam in wild garb and did a rendition of "Deliverance" on banjo, guitar, and harmonica. I'm sorry to hear future generations are losing this important opportunity.

Tim Cripe '82 MD
Associate Professor
Pediatric Hematology/Oncology
Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center
Cincinnati, Ohio

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