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“It was awful—it was crude. But it worked,” Dana Bourgeois ’75 said with a humble chuckle while speaking of the first guitar he built. Today, however, Bourgeois, 69, is a luthier with nearly fifty years of experience.
As an Associate Professor of History and Chair of the Russian Department at Bowdoin, Professor Page Herrlinger has been a vibrant member of the Bowdoin community since 1998. She earned a bachelor’s from Yale University and her master’s and doctorate from the University of California, Berkeley.
We are the children of loving, emotionally abusive parents who could not break the cycle of abuse. We are the children of immigrant families who constantly question the meaning of love and what the dictionary definition of emotional abuse is.
When I tell people at Bowdoin that I’m from Tampa, Fla., the three most common responses are: “Do you like football?” “My grandparents live in Sarasota” and “Oh wow … how do you like that?” The first always has something to do with Tom Brady, the second with Florida’s large population of the elderly (even though Sarasota is very cool), but the third could go many ways.
On most social media platforms, it’s easy to curate an image—regardless of whether or not it represents one’s real life. On BeReal, however, this is not the case. The app, created in 2020 by French entrepreneur Alex Bareyatt, recently gained traction in the U.S.
From the shores of Puerto Rico to the crowded subway platforms of New York City, the McKeen Center for the Common Good sent students across the United States to volunteer and learn about social issues throughout the country over spring break.
The humble pub trivia game may be a lighthearted, spontaneous event for most Bowdoin students, but the game is a regular—and very serious—part of the week for the Bowdoin Quiz Bowl team. “I think [Quiz Bowl] is a vehicle to test your knowledge and advance your intellect, not to be the smartest people around,” Avery Ellis ’23, one of the team’s leaders, said.
The Bowdoin Pines is a quaint trail on the edge of campus that provides access to nature only minutes from dorms, classrooms or whichever Brunswick spaces you most frequently occupy. With no need for driving or a long hike, this trail offers accessible tranquility amongst a tree that has become a symbol for Maine, and in many ways, Bowdoin itself—the pine.
Civil Rights Movement comes to Bowdoin, students participate across nation From March 7 to March 21, 1965, thousands of nonviolent civil rights demonstrators marched from Selma to Montgomery, Ala. Led from Atlanta by Martin Luther King Jr.
On the weekend of February 10, the Board of Trustees officially promoted nine faculty members from assistant to associate professors, which grants them tenure at the College. The shift goes into effect on July 1, 2022.
Today I wrote an entire page of notes with the date “February 9, 2020” at the top of my notebook. With 20-or-so minutes left in my class, I realized that it was, in fact, the year 2022 and not 2020.
I don’t know who needs to hear this. Maybe just myself. So to whomever I’m writing for, I hope this finds you well. I hope what I say brings you comfort or insight. At the very least, I hope you know you are not alone.
For Mason Daugherty ’25 and Phillip Spyrou ’25, rummaging for a OneCard while in line for Thorne is a distant memory. Instead of grabbing their wallet, phone or lanyard, these students have everything they need right in the palm of their hand—literally.
With fake cigarettes in-hand, New York accents engaged and full-body vagina costumes donned, seniors Gita Kant and Lola Motley took the stage last fall in a sketch about sexual health before an overflowing Kresge Auditorium. After almost two years of Covid-19 restrictions, Purity Pact’s end-of-semester show marked a milestone in the return of campus comedy.
Assistant Professor of Economics Jessica LaVoice joined the College community in 2020, and her impact is already felt across campus. LaVoice first became interested in urban economics when she noticed how segregated and distinct her hometown of Springfield, Mass.
Since the College reopened to students in late August 2020, students, faculty and staff have undergone rigorous testing for Covid-19 twice or even three times each week. While walks to the testing center—once Morrell Gymnasium and now Farley Field House—are ingrained in the collective conscience of the College community, what happens to Covid samples after they are collected remains a mystery to most.
Chef Ali Waks Adams likens Willie and Chet’s, her pop-up restaurant, to the spontaneous, ephemeral excitement of having a crush. “A good dinner can take away some of the outside bad stuff,” Waks Adams said. “It’s temporary, it’s a panacea—but it’s a beautiful one.
With Valentine’s Day in the rearview mirror, students have been reflecting on the most recent romantic phenomenon to sweep campus: Datamatch. The online matchmaking service, run by Harvard University students, arrived on campus for the first time last week.
If you embark on just a 10-minute drive from campus, you may stumble upon the ecological and historical gem that is Skolfield Shores Preserve. After around five minutes of walking on the preserve, you will be met with a view of the ocean.
Instead of spending their weekends at Urban Outfitters or Salvation Army, four students on campus have turned to knitting needles, sewing machines and “floofers.” These students—a small but passionate cohort—have turned to sewing for various reasons but remain united by their love of the craft.
“We all hate home,” declared Phlip Larkin in his poem “Poetry of Departures.” Written in his inimitable and characteristically lugubrious style, it was this idea that rang in my mind as I spent some weeks over winter break pondering what home is and how cruel, challenging, but ultimately vindicating it can prove to be.
“What are y’all sorry about?” Following my first semester as a Polar Bear, I nearly bawled after seeing a cowboy hat at the Memphis International Airport. That flamboyant hat, paired with muddy cowboy boots and a raspy Southern drawl was enough to make me break out into song.
Known for his iconic takeover of the Bowdoin Class of 2025 Instagram page this past summer and for assigning readings on masturbation that were featured on students’ Snapchat stories on his first day at Bowdoin teaching “Sociology of Sexuality,” Assistant Professor of Sociology Theodore Greene has cemented his reputation as a unique professor on campus.
Tucked away alongside a consignment shop, hotel and Vietnamese restaurant, Flip, Maine Street’s new brunch spot, is open for business. “What does Brunswick need? What does Brunswick want? It was breakfast!” owner Mike Jerome said. “There was no place to sit down and get a Bloody Mary and breakfast without having to go across the bridge to Topsham.” The brunch bar opened on Christmas Eve of last year, taking the spot of Benchwarmers, a long-standing sports bar and pub.
At many institutions, and at Bowdoin in particular, professors’ personal lives are far more intertwined than we might expect, and their partners are closer still—sometimes even in the classroom next door. Within Bowdoin’s faculty and staff there are many couples, with some occupying neighboring offices and others situated on opposite ends of campus.
“This story, in a funny way, begins in Paris,” remembered Robert H. Edwards, President of the College from 1990 to 2001. Now 86 years of age, Edwards sat upright at his spotless dining room table in his farmhouse near Wiscasset, Maine.
After a fifty-one-year tenure at Bowdoin, DeAlva Stanwood Alexander Professor of Government Christian Potholm ’62 retired from the College at the end of last semester. A prolific scholar in the field of warfare, as well as both African and Maine politics, Potholm’s teaching career at Bowdoin started in 1970, just as the College first admitted women, and concluded during a tumultuous era for the college caused by a global pandemic.
For many prospective students going through the college application process, traveling to Brunswick can often be difficult, impractical and expensive—especially with the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite Bowdoin’s virtual tours and online information sessions, it can be difficult to replicate the College’s atmosphere through the confines of Zoom.
Bowdoin students have all received that email sent from Bowdoin DBMail: “You have a(n) item(s) ready for pick up at the Bowdoin Mail Center.” From here, schedule permitting, students make their way over to Smith Union, wait in a meandering line, recite their ID number, flash their OneCard, smile at the mailroom worker as they grab their package et voilà: a parcel of the student’s own.
While on-campus students began the spring semester adjusting to Zoom classes, grab-and-go meals and chilly January temperatures, over 100 students studying away this semester were dusting off their travel guides and practicing their “Bonjour!” or “Ciao!” as they packed their suitcases for the next four months.
Characterized by his amiable strolls across campus and his preference for 12-point single-spaced Times New Roman font, Professor Allen Springer has become a staple of the Government and Legal Studies department at Bowdoin. Boasting a spectacular record of 45 years teaching at the College, he has maintained a steadfast reputation as an articulate teacher in each and every class he looks over.
For most students, breaking out of the Bowdoin bubble may mean hiking with the Bowdoin Outing Club or taking a weekend trip to Portland with friends. For Andrew Kaleigh ’24, however, it means something different: a foray into state politics.
Donna Sciasia describes her life in three distinct periods. First, as a child on the prairie growing up during the Great Depression. Second, during her marriage when she led the life of a military dependent. And third, when she was a librarian at Bowdoin for almost 25 years.
We were far up the tree, so far above the ground and so quiet. The two of us had started to scale that tree—a massive birch that overlooks the garden plots. I had tapped out fifteen feet off the ground, but my climbing companion clambered up another twenty feet over my head.
One day this past spring, I decided to dust off my old Nintendo DS and pop in “Professor Layton and the Curious Village,” the first installment in a six-game series about Hershel Layton, a gentlemanly archaeology professor in London, and his young apprentice, Luke, who solve puzzles and mysteries together.
Being offered the “aux” is one of those unnecessarily frightening experiences. Sure, it’s an opportunity to share your personal music taste with the world—but that’s not always a boon. You might simultaneously agree with the notions that music being “good” or “bad” is purely subjective, but also that our music taste is a display of identity—so why is one’s personal music taste vulnerable to criticism?
Hello, all. I wanted to provide some specific guidance on ways to stay calm during this final stretch of the first semester. After this, winter break is upon us! Blessed sleep! Blessed Netflix! Until then … For the current situation, I drew the Major Arcana card of Judgement.
The holiday cheer was palpable last Friday night as Randy Nichols, executive director of the office of safety and security, paid Howell House a visit to tell holiday stories and spread the spirit of the season.
As a challenging semester comes to a close, Counseling and Wellness Services and the Rachel Lord Center for Religious and Spiritual Life will invite Western Buddhist monk Gen Khedrub to campus in an effort to help students navigate stress before exams.
With our final push to the end of the semester and reading period quickly approaching, I figure that we need an easy dish to make for this week. So, let’s head back to the Mediterranean, make everyone’s favorite carb and spice things up a little bit with a sauce inspired by the world’s oldest profession!
In the weeks before Thanksgiving break, students and faculty registered for classes for the Spring 2022 semester. For every student, the timing of next semester’s classes was a consideration. Some students grappled with interfering class times, while others chose carefully-curated schedules.
Instead of saying goodbye to high school friends, packing up his childhood bedroom and buying decorations for his dorm room before coming to Bowdoin, Elijah Dumdie ’25 was trading in his army-issued uniform for a gray L.L.
Editor’s Note, Thursday, August 25, at 7:15 a.m.: Another student from the Class of 2022 contributed to this column, but their name was removed from the by-line for extenuating circumstances. If concerned, please email orient@bowdoin.edu. Yes, it’s us: the Love Doctors.
For Visiting Assistant Professor of English Zahir Janmohamed, good literature serves as a vessel for ambiguity. Janmohamed aims for his students to explore the texture, contradictions and uncertainties of their lives through text. “I’m not really interested in certainties, and I’m also not interested in cleverness,” Janmohamed said.
The Bowdoin community has faced unimaginable challenges this semester, and while everyone processes hardship differently, “Polar Pause,” the extended Thanksgiving break this year, has provided students and faculty with additional time and space for rest and reflection.
First and foremost, allow me to preface this article with a word of caution: this is a personal dialogue. In the process of writing, I concluded that this submission was going to be nothing more than a way for me to organize my thoughts—a process for me to take what was crammed into my mind and place it onto paper.
The frost is here, at last. When I step out to go to class, I’m greeted with a blanket of ice on the grass, the trees and my bike seat. Thankfully, it hasn’t come too late.
Hello, friends. My heart is with each one of you, in your joy and in your pain. I hope you have had the time, space and people to process your emotions with. Your grief, confusion, anger and self-doubt—your feelings—deserve to be honored, to be held gently and with tenderness.
Each Friday since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, a group of Brunswick residents gather on the town green on Pleasant and Maine Streets, armed with signs calling for world peace. Initially conceived of as a protest to urge the United States government not to retaliate in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, the group has continued to convene every Friday at 5:00 p.m.
Every year, my Halloween costume has something to do with my hair. I’ve kept my super-curly hair cut just above my shoulders since middle school, which is the prime length for costumes such as a mad scientist, a lion or a bush.
Did you know that in the 12th century, doctors prescribed those with illnesses broth made from bone marrow and chicken fat? Truly, the more things change, the more they seem to stay the same! Soup is one of the least time intensive and most low effort big-batch meals that humanity could come up with.
Driven by his observation of the high personal and academic standards to which Bowdoin students, faculty and staff are held, Chris Dehney ’24 seized the opportunity to bring Peer Counseling, a peer-based counseling service, to campus this semester.
This Saturday, I met John Trumper. If you read my previous column, then you are familiar with Rudy Horowitz, who is a good friend of John’s, as they both live in the Highlands, a community for elders near Bowdoin.
There I found myself, in an unfamiliar land, surrounded by familiar faces. After an eventful day of getting lost on the subway, missing breakfast and facing near (phone battery) death, it’s easy to see why I found a certain respite in fresh New York City bagels and conversation with high school friends.
I grew up in Orono, Maine. To anybody who’s actually from Maine and has knowledge of the local geography, Orono is in central Maine. That’s the truth. However, I still tell fellow Bowdoin students that I’m from “northern Maine” because people from the West Coast typically think that anywhere north of Augusta is just an outcropping of moose and deer-filled wilderness.
Though I read last week’s Bowdoin Student Government minutes, I’m not going to write about the Board of Trustees. I’m also not going to comment on the one to two percent of our endowment invested in oil and gas companies, which, if you do the math, means that Bowdoin invests between 25 and 50 million dollars in the world’s foremost fossil fuel giants.
For Senior Class President Carlos Campos ’22, providing students with a platform to share their stories in a safe, inclusive, creative space is a priority. His new project, “People of the Global Majority,” a student-run publication supported by Bowdoin Student Government (BSG) and its president Ryan Britt ’22, aims to give a voice to historically marginalized students on campus.
Every Wednesday night, tucked away in the corner room of the Sexuality, Women and Gender (SWAG) center, a group of students meet to discuss one thing—masculinity. The group, aptly named Healthy Masculinities, focuses on the culture surrounding toxic masculinity on campus in an effort to redefine what it means to be masculine.
Enduring the stresses of the pandemic last school year, Paul Russo ’23 needed to de-stress and wanted to give other students the opportunity to do the same. Combining his love of poetry with a need for community, Paul formed the Nightingale Society, a club meant to foster vulnerability and connection for poets on campus.
As the leaves change and the air cools, another fall tradition is returning to campus: “OUTouber.” The month-long celebration, hosted by the Bowdoin Queer Straight Alliance (BQSA) and the Sexuality, Women and Gender Center (SWAG), consists of a series of events throughout the month of October honoring National Coming Out Day and LGBTQIA+ acceptance.
Hello all, Today, I’m going to try something different: I want to intentionally select a card instead of drawing one from the deck. What came to my mind were two figures of the Major Arcana: The Hermit and The Hanged One.
I love pasta. Maybe not as much as my roommate (shout out to Diego, @lordofpasta on most platforms), but as both an ex-lineman on the football team and a current Italian, pasta is the fuel that keeps me going.
Editor’s Note, Thursday, August 25, at 7:15 a.m.: Another student from the Class of 2022 contributed to this column, but their name was removed from the by-line for extenuating circumstances. If concerned, please email orient@bowdoin.edu. So you’ve been getting down and dirty with one of your fellow polar bears for a few weeks, but your relationship is now going one of two ways: 1.
Rudolph “Rudy” Horowitz is a 92-year-old Holocaust survivor, architect and grandfather. This past week, I met Rudy at his home in a retirement community called The Highlands, which is just a fifteen-minute bike ride away from campus.
I’ve never been good with apologies. As ashamed as I am to admit it, I used to view apologies as the very end of the long journey that is personal growth. In my mind, becoming a better person would always play out just like in the movies—a sappy apology and a sweet conclusion as the credits roll.
To me, the hardest part about dancing has been trying to find my purpose, my why: figuring out how to find meaning in my movements beyond how they feel on my muscles or how they look in the mirror.
We are obsessed with growth. It was pointed out to me last week how normal it feels to hear about a 57 percent return rate on Bowdoin’s endowment, which pushed the number up into something astronomical for an institution of our size.
Brunswick’s Pleasant Street has a magical new addition: Raven & Crow, a metaphysical supply shop and espresso bar. The business opened its doors on August 23 and, almost two months later, has firmly established itself as a community center for pagan religious groups and magical practitioners.
Editor’s Note, Thursday, August 25, at 7:15 a.m.: Another student from the Class of 2022 contributed to this column, but their name was removed from the by-line for extenuating circumstances. If concerned, please email orient@bowdoin.edu. The moment we’ve all been YikYakking about has finally arrived (no, it’s not the true story about what happened with Randy Nichols the other night).
Hey, you! I hope the past week has been going well and that you’re feeling more settled into the campus rhythm. Let’s get straight into the cosmic advice. For the current situation, I drew the Six of Cups.
Bread: it’s a scary subject. There is so much that can go wrong during the process of making it—enough that many bakers stay away from it entirely, never again attempting to battle the yeast. So yeah, it’s a pretty tough part of anyone’s culinary arsenal.
At 6:35 p.m. Thorne dining hall was abuzz with students checking their email, screams were heard on the first floor of Hawthorne-Longfellow Library and FaceTimes were ringing in as the Bowdoin Marriage Pact released the initials of the ideal match of each student who participated.
Content warning: This article contains descriptions of child sexual abuse One day, my sister and I were playing in the woods. I followed after her every step of the way. I was looking for fairies, she was hunting for bugs.
Despite living in Chamberlain Hall for three months last fall, I had never been on campus before this year. Sure, the caricature of the person that I desperately tried to be was there, flat-ironing her poor hair to death.
Most people in our community are very busy. Perhaps so busy that they wonder why they decided to become busy in the first place. ‘What Matters in the End?’ is a column that will highlight the stories of elderly people and hospice patients in Brunswick to glean what matters to them in the end.
Please take the vegetables. I’m serious: please take the sweet peppers, please go home with kale, haul the chili peppers back to your dorm room, carry potatoes in your backpack, please just take one more tomato.
Although the COVID-19 pandemic has limited Bowdoin students’ ability to form and foster connections in the Town of Brunswick, Saul Cuevas-Landeros ’23 is still determined to create opportunities for students to engage with the community. This year, Cuevas-Landeros is co-leading Bowdoin Central Mentoring, a Joseph McKeen Center for the Common Good program dedicated to mentoring students in the Brunswick area.
When Anneka Williams ’21 started her first year at Bowdoin, she never expected to write a book during her time at the College, let alone co-publish one with someone nearly 60 years her senior. However, Williams, who is currently pursuing a Master of Science in Climate Change at the University of Copenhagen, did just this.
Editor’s Note, Thursday, August 25, at 7:15 a.m.: Another student from the Class of 2022 contributed to this column, but their name was removed from the by-line for extenuating circumstances. If concerned, please email orient@bowdoin.edu. Many of us were at home for longer than expected over the past year or so.
Picture this: you’re trying to impress someone you really like by treating them to dinner. It could be your parents, that guy on the floor above you, Doug from the Moulton dining staff or even your grandma!
Mike Ranen usually starts his morning by checking the College’s COVID-19 test results around 6 a.m.. The results of those tests will dictate the course of his day. On a good day, Ranen can balance his job as the Associate Dean of Student Affairs and Director of Residential and Student Life, as well as his role as the College’s COVID-19 Resource Coordinator.
While I was studying back home in Thailand, my morning routine was taking a driving lesson taught by my grandpa. I would drive through the streets of suburban Bangkok, surrounded by electrical poles holding up black cables that tangle more viciously than your previous romantic situation.
I have a good friend who’s no longer a good friend. We’re no longer on speaking terms, and I don’t know how much longer this will be the case. Even though we only met last September, they became one of my closest friends, and I became one of theirs.
A chipmunk is stuck in the greenhouse; I must’ve surprised it when I wandered through yesterday. I left the door open so they could find their way out, and upon opening the door, I saw one of the garden’s human neighbors taking a pleasant stroll through the rows.
They say you never forget your first (-year roommate). For Wilder Short ’22, Brett Thomas ’22, Josh Lin ’22 and David Bombard ’22, this is especially true. What began as a standard first-year roommate assignment has grown into four years of cohabitation, friendship and amateur rap tracks.
Greetings, everyone, and welcome (back) to campus! I hope you’ve all been safe, happy and settling in well—and I hope you’re excited, because Nora’s Tarot Vibe Check is back and better than ever for another semester.
After a disjointed year on (and mostly off) campus, the Class of 2024 returned to campus this fall as sophomores. Having experienced an atypical year at the College, the class is still expected to step into leadership roles within the community.
The Office of Inclusion and Diversity is spearheading a new program this semester designed to educate student leaders in promoting social justice and equity. The eight-session Social Justice Leadership Institute incorporates elements of past student workshops and campus-wide dialogue initiatives.
For Justis Dixon ’23, the summer wasn’t spent going to the beach or relaxing in his home, rather, it was instead spent in an office in Topsham contributing to the Common Good. Over the summer, Dixon and a handful of other Bowdoin students participated in the Bowdoin Public Service (BPS) Maine Government Summer Fellowships which aim to give Bowdoin students hands-on government experience by pairing them with local governments in Maine.
One of the most valuable relics of my childhood is a baseball I received at Fenway Park back in 2011 during a game between the Boston Red Sox and the New York Yankees. Even better, this ball was fouled into the stands by none other than Big Papi himself, David Ortiz.
Last March, during its 218th academic year, the College sent the student body home for the first time in institutional history. In the midst of every major world event from 1794 to present day, Bowdoin felt that it had the ability to maintain the safety of its students, faculty, staff and surrounding community.
Content warning: This article contains descriptions of substance use disorder and violence. I remember staring at the ceiling of some waiting room of some hospital that I can’t remember the name of. I had spent the previous night riding with my uncle down from Cleveland, Ohio to Johnson City, Tennessee.
The Pinky D’s food truck, a mishmash of black and white checkers complemented by pink racing stripes, is nearly as colorful as the meal served out of it: poutine. The dish, a staple in Canada, is made of thick-cut fries topped with piping hot gravy and cheese curds, making it the perfect late night snack for hungry Bowdoin students.
Assistant Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry Kana Takematsu follows the sunlight and wants Bowdoin students to do the same. “I’ve always been interested in light,” Takematsu said. Back in her grad school days at the California Institute of Technology, a guest lecturer in geology took Takematsu’s inorganic chemistry seminar on a field trip to a natural science museum.
Following a programming series for ‘international students week,’ the International Student Alliance (ISA) organized a celebration reflecting on a bittersweet year, which took place at 30 College on Thursday afternoon. While the celebration was an uplifting and recreational event, many international students also voiced frustrations and concerns in response to the uncertainties that lie ahead.
I think often of my walk back home from my bus stop after school when I was younger. I was often shaking in fear, with my eyes stinging with tears at the thought of what I might come home to—either an empty, quiet trailer to finish my homework, or an angry, drunken mother who would take her frustrations out on me and disrupt the rest of the evening.
Drawing in hungry Bowdoin students with fresh and mouthwatering sushi rolls, the Mr. Tuna food truck has quickly become a staple of the Bowdoin foodie’s diet. The truck offers an array of sushi roll options of every style and flavor, satisfying customers no matter their personal taste.
If you are like me, you were taught at an early age that the largest organism on earth is the blue whale. Well, get ready for your mind to be blown: we were taught a lie.
It’s internship season. Handshake-scrolling, interview-scheduling, rejection-coping internship season. Around this time ten years ago, Marguerite Mariscal ’11 was also searching. After graduation. she landed a short-term position with Momofuku, a startup culinary brand led by famed restaurateur David Chang.
The Lemont Block, a four-story historic brick building on the corner of Maine Street and Pleasant Street that has been an iconic part of the Brunswick skyline for over 150 years, is about to have a new chapter added to its storied history.
