Farm Report

Quote “It is a really hard job. My joy is seeing good work done, but the drudgery is fund raising. I’m wearing out, and I’m getting out.” -- Physicist Burton Richter, announcing plans to step down as director of the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center after 15 years in the post

NEWS FROM INSIDE CAMPUS DRIVE AND BEYOND Stanford Goes to Hollywood ANIMATED ALUMS: The film on the Disney duo screens in February. You may not know the names Frank Thomas and Ollie Johnston, but you certainly know their work. Longtime Disney animators, they earned credits in many of the studio’s film classics. Thomas, ’33, created the seven dwarfs, Cinderella’s sinister stepmother and the amorous pooches, Lady and Tramp. Johnston, ’35, is responsible for bringing to life the early sketches from Alice in Wonderland and Captain Hook’s henchman, the portly Smee. Now they’re the subject of a feature-length documentary, Frank and Ollie, one of about 10 films to be screened in February at the second Stanford Alumni Film Festival in Los Angeles. “These guys met at Stanford,” says Kaz Brecher, ’96, the festival’s coordinator. “We see these two old men talking about how they came up with the drawings of Mowgli from The Jungle Book. It’s the kind of thing we want to share because of its ties to Stanford history.” The film is produced by Ted Thomas, Frank’s son. Organizers of the L.A. festival received about 25 submissions, including short films by current students and the directorial debut of Dan Pyne, ’76, a screenwriter whose credits include Doc Hollywood and Pacific Heights. At least three members of Stanford Alumni in Entertainment (SAE) previewed each entry. Last year, more than 200 members of SAE attended the festival, says Brecher. Admission is free for members of SAE; nonmembers pay $5. Call 213-856-6284 for ticket information. For Renters, a Deadhead to Be Grateful for HATS OFF: Landlord Levitsky has been a friend to Stanford students for 15 years. Though he has no official ties to Stanford, Rob Levitsky is a hero to many of its students. Each year, he provides dozens of them with something the University no longer guarantees: an affordable place to live within a mile or so of campus. His rents run half the local going rate, with no security deposit required. Levitsky’s 12 houses, like their owner, stand out in tony Palo Alto. Ranging from substantial three-story structures complete with pillars and verandas to modest one-story bungalows, they’re all named for Grateful Dead songs. (A computer consultant, Levitsky used to be the Dancing Bear, resplendent in multicolored flashing lights, at Grateful Dead concerts in the band’s heyday.) For 15 years, ever since he bought Terrapin Station, the first of what came to be called the “Dead Houses,” Levitsky has rented almost exclusively to Stanford grad students and seniors. Former University President Donald Kennedy says Levitsky is “doing a terrific thing for Stanford students.” But why does he bother? Says Levitsky: “This is a beautiful college town, and you can’t have that without college students.” The Iceman Carveth CHAIN SAW PHIL: Evans gives this reindeer a cold shoulder. Equipped with a chain saw, elbow-length rubber gloves and gardener’s kneepads, Phillip Evans can turn a 300-pound block of ice into a swan. Or a mermaid. Or a locomotive -- with dry ice wafting from its smoke stack. Evans, the food production manager for west campus dorms (Lagunita Court, Roble Hall and Governor’s Corner), learned ice sculpting 20 years ago at Cañada College’s culinary school. He worked 14 years as a chef at Westin Hotels in San Francisco, Cincinnati and Boston before coming to Stanford in 1993. These days, he carves his creations, which melt at the rate of about a half-inch per hour, for dorm holiday banquets, campus parties and Hoover House dinners. It’s no sweat for the guy whose New Year’s Eve cherub appeared in the 1979 film More American Graffiti (at a dinner party thrown by Ron Howard’s character). Before carving, Evans meticulously sketches his designs to be sure they will fit within a 5-foot-long block of ice. He does his handiwork behind Roble Hall, where he often draws a crowd. Among his apprentices: Stanford students and other chefs. “I’ll show anybody,” he says. “As long as they have the guts to get out there and get wet.” Photo Laureate Now the J.G. Jackson and C.J. Wood Professor of Physics at Stanford, Osheroff never lost his interest in photography. He used about $19,000 of the Nobel Prize money to buy a top-of-the-line Hasselblad 205 camera. The walls of his office in Varian Labs are lined with images he captured while traveling to scientific conferences around the world. Every year he teaches a course called The Physics of Photography. And this fall, several of his pictures were published in American Photo magazine. Osheroff’s favorite subjects include architecture, landscapes and wildlife. He stays away from portraiture. “I tend to make people very nervous when I take their photos,” says the quick-talking scientist. “It’s just a disaster.” You Can Run but You Can’t Hide RANGE ROBOT: Latombe (left) and doctoral student Hector H. Gonzalez-Banos have been working on the “autonomous observer” (right). Stanford researchers have developed a small mobile robot that not only can take your picture -- it can follow you around. Unlike conventional surveillance systems, which lose objects when they disappear from view, the new “autonomous observer” employs a laser range finder to add depth to images captured by its video camera. Using the resulting 3-D map, the robot can work out a target’s potential escape routes and maneuver to position its camera for the widest possible field of view. In laboratory tests, both human and robot targets found it difficult to escape detection. Computer Science Professor Jean-Claude Latombe says that companies might use the software to improve their closed-circuit security systems. The Pentagon thinks it might be useful for exploring buildings in urban war zones. And surgeons could zero in on key tissues despite obstructions created by people and machines. ‘And Don’t Forget When You Leave Why You Came’ FOND FAREWELLS: Kennedy has compiled his 12 commencement speeches. Do you remember the speech made by Stanford’s president at your commencement? Let’s be honest: most of us don’t. Caught up in the giddiness of the ceremony and the final fling with old friends, students sometimes find it hard to concentrate on the substance. It’s only years later that some alums start wondering what they missed. For those who graduated from Stanford during Donald Kennedy’s tenure as president, a new book may fill in the gaps. Published by the Stanford Historical Society (and available through Amazon.com), The Last of Your Springs is a compilation of Kennedy’s 12 farewell addresses (1981 to 1992), each preceded by a brief history of events that year. To produce those accounts, Kennedy pored over bound copies of Campus Report and the Stanford Daily. The result is a chronicle of the Kennedy era, from the “great books” debate to campus racial unrest to the Loma Prieta earthquake to the indirect costs dispute. Kennedy’s speeches were made in a conversational tone, and he was unafraid to be avuncular. “The delivery of honest adult advice, as long as it springs from authentic caring and has some relevant experience behind it, is a function no teacher should shun,” he writes in the book’s introduction. In fact, he ended each commencement speech with the same piece of advice, a quote from Adlai Stevenson: “Your days are short here; this is the last of your springs…. You will go away with old, good friends. And don’t forget when you leave why you came.”