Dartblog

While the French élites may have earned a reputation for anti-Americanism, the broad mass of people here seem endlessly fascinated by the U.S.A. — and the streets of Paris are filled with momentos large and small to the close historical relationship between the countries. George Washington’s statue stands at the center of the prestigious Place d’Iéna.

Note: The dedication on the base of Washington’s monument reads:

Given by the women of the United States of America in memory of the friendship and fraternal assistance offered by France to their fathers during their fight for independence.

Needless to say, these words were drafted at a time when there was a different sensibility about gender relations and women’s role in history.

The Valley News weighed in yesterday with a well scrubbed article on the hazing scandal at the College. Regrettably, the article is not on-line. It begins as follows:

Another public relations headache for Dartmouth College is making waves around the Internet this week after a scathing editorial in the student newspaper alleged that one student’s “dehumanizing” hazing experience is the norm, not the exception at Dartmouth fraternities.

How curious that a reference to PR makes the story’s lead. One would think that the physical and mental health of students would figure somewhere in the paper’s take on hazing. Later on, the paper noted SAE President Brendan Mahoney’s view of the situation.

Brendan Mahoney, student president of Sigma Alpha Epsilon, has roundly denied all allegations against his fraternity, and the college administration says that while they take Lohse’s claims seriously, there is no evidence or corroborating witnesses to back them up.

To my mind, even though we are only in January, Mahoney wins Dartblog’s Pinocchio Award for 2012 and the Kim Administration walks off with the Ostrich Prize. Geez, even yesterday’s D has an editorial entitled “The Importance of Accuracy,” in which it roundly states that it corroborated the information in Andrew Lohse’s column (as Dartblog did before printing the initial version of Lohse’s piece):

To publish a column that levels such serious allegations against any institution without taking the time to corroborate such accusations is an affront to the principles of integrity widely cherished by responsible journalists. We did our utmost to confirm that The Dartmouth would not, in publishing this column, be giving voice to patently false claims against both a campus fraternity and the administration. Ultimately, a number of changes had to be made to the original draft after new information came to light.

It was not a desire to shelter Sigma Alpha Epsilon fraternity or the College administration, but rather our responsibility to corroborate facts that led to a delay of several days between our receipt of the column and its publication.

Nobody is coming out of this whole thing looking good. That’s for sure.

Note: There was no reference again yesterday to the hazing scandal in the Dartmouth in the News digest from Public Affairs. This omission marks the first time in my memory that the digest has omitted a story about the College that appeared in the Valley News.

A longtime Dartblog reader — a Dartmouth-trained psychiatrist — shares some thoughts on the pressures and obligations of members of large institutions:

Mr. Andrew Lohse ‘12, the author of the column on hazing in the Dartmouth Greek system, says that he has learned that “good people can do awful things to one another - for absolutely no reason.” How true!

There are two classical social psychological studies which bear this out, if it needs bearing out. One was by Stanley Milgram, a psychologist at Yale in the early 60’s who conducted an experiment in which “subjects” were told that they had to apply electric shocks to “students” who were trying to learn a task when errors were made, on the argument that the shocks helped the “students” learn. It was all bogus and there were no shocks, but the “subjects” believed that they were administering intense shocks to the “students.” All in the name of “help.”

The second experiment which comes to mind is the Stanford Prison Experiment conducted by Philip Zimbardo in 1971. Stanford students were assigned to be either “guards” or “prisoners” in a setting in the basement of the Stanford Psychology Department. The study went on for several days, during which the “guards” behaved extremely abusively to the “prisoners.” Zimbardo is a brilliant guy.

You can Google these studies to read about them. Needless to say, they were never repeated. The lesson of these experiments (not to mention circumstances which occur in political or military settings) is clear. Institutions have a clear responsibility to protect those for whom they have a significant measure of responsibility from physically or psychologically harmful consequences of sanctioned activities which occur under their purview.

I hate to say this, but, were I Mr. Lohse’s parent, I would be talking to an attorney. That might get the administration’s attention, if more reasoned approaches do not.

Note: My correspondent might also have referred to the Asch conformity experiments (no relation to me) in which subjects in an experiment at Swarthmore were cajoled by peer pressure into conclusions that were patently wrong. Only 24% of subjects refused to ever conform to the obviously incorrect, prevailing opinion; all the other subjects gave into pressure to provide a wrong answer at least once in a series of tests.

Addendum: A Letter to the Editor today in The D opines: “Simply put, if you are sick of swimming in a pool of feces, get up out of the pool and walk away.” The above psychological research shows that in many instances, this action is more easily advocated than done. The world is a great deal more complicated than the author of this letter understands or will admit.

When the government sees a problem, its reflex is to create a committee; when the administration is worried about students, hey, let’s have a forum. Wesley Schaub has called yet another one.

I can’t quite see what is going to happen there that hasn’t happened a great many times before. And ol’ Wes sure seems tentative in his below e-mail, doesn’t he? Especially for events that are clearly in contravention of state law.

To my mind, the answer lies with the freshman class. Tell ‘em that they have it in them to stand up to hazing. They should do so as a group. And if they don’t, there will be a real price to pay. If the manly virtue of resisting peer pressure isn’t enough for them — with a dash of fear thrown in — they should know that nobody wants to kiss someone who has been drinking ass beer and eating vomelettes.

By the way, where is global health expert medical doctor President Kim in all of this?

–––- Forwarded message –––-
From: Wesley W. Schaub
Date: Thu, Jan 26, 2012 at 1:48 PM
Subject: Hazing Forum
To: “Wesley W. Schaub”

Hello everyone,

With everything happening around the hazing allegations I wanted to offer you the opportunity to attend a forum on hazing. I want to revisit what hazing is and discuss ways for to evaluate current practices. This will not be a discussion on current events, but a forum to help your group change to avoid problems in the future. The meeting is Monday at 3pm in Paganucci Lounge. Again this meeting isn’t required, but current and newly elected presidents and new member educators may want to attend. My hope is that the discussion will revolve around what constitutes hazing and how to create positive change.

Wes Schaub
Director, Greek Letter Organizations and Societies
Dartmouth College

Dartmouth’s Office of Public Affairs sends out a digest each day with news about the College, alumni, faculty, and pretty much anything pertaining to the College that has been mentioned in the press. Yet somehow, Andew Lohse’s much quoted piece about hazing, and the many internet news sites that have referred to it, didn’t make it on there today.

How come? The piece has now been picked up by Gawker, The Huffington Post, IvyGate, The Daily Caller, Business Insider, Jezebel and Ricochet.

Bill Clinton’s famous imprecation to his erstwhile paramour, Monica Lewisnky, to “deny, deny, deny” their relationship, seems to be the basis for the administration’s strategy in dealing with Andrew Lohse ‘12’s allegations about fraternity hazing. In the D’s news story today that accompanied Lohse’s revised column describing hazing practises, Kim administration Chief of Staff David Spalding denied seeing photographs of hazing when he and Associate Dean of the College for Campus Life April Thompson met with Lohse, and SAE President Brendan Mahoney ‘12 denied that hazing practices took place at the frat.

Err… almost. In fact, Spalding was quoted as saying that “he did not recall seeing photographic evidence of hazing in a November 2010 meeting with Lohse.” Did not recall? Geez. That’s a Watergate expression that means ‘I don’t want to lie here, but I sure ain’t going to tell the truth, so I’ll use the I don’t recall expression.’

Sheesh. Funny enough, Spalding is far more assertive in affirming that “Lohse did not present him with videos of alleged hazing incidents.” That’s a real denial.

As for the images, I wrote to Andrew Lohse ‘12 to ask him about whether he showed images to Spalding at their meeting. He replied affirmatively (means yes) and he immediately sent me the below e-mail to April Thompson, which he wrote several months after his November 2010 meeting with Spalding and Thompson.

From: Andrew B Lohse
Date: Mon, Feb 21, 2011 at 2:23 PM
Subject: Follow Up?
To: “April D. Thompson”

Hi April,

Just wanted to follow up with you and check in on the status of the
project you mentioned regarding hazing that you had wanted my input
on. It’s been a while since our last phone conversation, and I was
wondering if there were any updates from the last few months.

A link I received from a friend today made me think of the situation
we were discussing; I’m sure you’ve seen this—

http://www.annarbor.com/news/parent-university-of-michigan-fraternity-hazed-pledges-sigma-alpha-epsilon-suspended/

The story really got me thinking about the hazing and substance abuse
issues we had been talking about/working on. In this Michigan case it
seems like a very small piece of information resulted in an actionable
change. It really got me thinking of the kind of change we could
create given the vast information we have at our finger tips. With the
wealth of details, facts, images, and emails I gave to you and Vice
President Spalding, I’m sure that you—especially with Dr. Kim and his
public health focus at the helm—have put together some really great
projects to start addressing the issue at Dartmouth over the last few
months. I hope I can still help. I’m sorry I haven’t gotten back to
you sooner, but last we talked it seemed like you already had
something in the works and would reach out to me soon, and I’ve been
busy working and planning a long backpacking trip (which I am on now).

In December, we (Jordan Osserman, Aimee Le, and myself) had flirted
with the idea of going to the press with our story. We talked
extensively with a reporter at the Boston Globe who was very
interested to run with the story “Dartmouth College administration and
globally lauded public health expert president negligent in massive
hazing and substance abuse culture despite entreaties by victimized
students”, but I ultimately told her to kill it because I have a lot
of faith that the administration can make a real change and will step
up to this problem in our community with creative ideas from Dr. Kim
and all of the Deans. Again, like I said in the fall, I really hope I
can help in the process…

Best,
Andrew [Emphasis added]

As for SAE President Brendan Mahoney ‘12, his denial had even more finesse than Spalding’s. As The D reported, “Mahoney also said he had not personally experienced any of the hazing practices described in Lohse’s statement.” What the heck does “personally experienced” mean? That he didn’t personally…

…swim in a kiddie pool full of vomit, urine, fecal matter, semen and rotten food products; eat omelets made of vomit; chug cups of vinegar, which in one case caused a pledge to vomit blood; drink beers poured down fellow pledges’ ass cracks; and vomit on other pledges…

Did he know that it was being done? Did he see it? Did he order it? Again, Lohse says that Mahoney was an integral part of the fun in their pledge year in 2009. And I have received e-mails from other SAE members confirming that such practices regularly occurred.

One would hope that the D’s reporter would polish her skills at cross-examination in order to ferret out facts — especially when dealing with people who would prefer to play semantic games rather than tell the unvarnished and complete truth.

Addendum: Despite Dean Johnson’s efforts to cover the College, Wes Schaub’s supposed anti-hazing campaign consisted of no more than the annual, toothless “please don’t do this” effort. By all reports, hazing throughout the College continued unabated over the most recent terms.

At Dartblog’s request, Andrew Lohse ‘12 has described his discussions regarding hazing with College administrators and their reactions to his information.

On Tuesday November 16th 2010 at 1:00 pm I met with David Spalding and April Thompson in a conference room at Collis to discuss fraternity hazing. I brought with me to that meeting a dossier of fraternity hazing and substance abuse related information — including at least one picture of SAE pledges very obviously about to be hazed (I had others but am not sure if I had them with me at the time or showed them to those present. One was stored my cell phone), and one picture showing myself leaning over a fellow pledge vomiting in a trash can following pledge meetings hazing.

I spoke from an outline of points I had prepared about my own experiences and my observations and research about these practices in Dartmouth social life. I described to Spalding and Thompson the vast majority of Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s pledge term hazing. This was a very hard conversation to have, given the levels of shame, embarrassment, and guilt I experienced for being involved with such processes, and the fact that I still had friends in that organization and was still considered a “suspended” member.

When I passed across the table to Spalding the said image of imminent hazing, an image of the pledge class standing in front of a table holding more than 550 cups of beer and explained that hazing experience — which was certainly not as bad as the kiddie pool from sink night — I registered Spalding’s expression as being aghast, even white faced. He remarked that he had never seen or heard anything like that before. Spalding’s statement to The Dartmouth that he “does not recall seeing pictures” during this meeting is evasive and inaccurate.

The meeting concluded with Thompson and Spalding promising that action would be taken in regard to the said hazing, as that fall’s pledge term was well under way. I reiterated that at the time I wished to remain anonymous to protect myself from what would most likely be bitter retaliation (as I myself had seen in my own much-regretted experiences of May 2010 with Phil Aubart and the SAE “DartCoke” event). They made protecting my anonymity a priority, a fact I appreciated.

At that time I had not entertained the notion that my anonymity would handicap their efforts in any way. Researching similar cases at other schools, I have never found that a student wishing to remain anonymous delegitimized either his experiences or a university’s ability to investigated and end abusive practices.

On Tuesday, November 30th 2010 at 1:42 AM, I followed up with April Thompson regarding our meeting and regarding the imminent “hell night” hazing to be held on December 1st 2010. I had not heard from her since our meeting. She soon responded about a forthcoming Hanover Police “sting”. I wrote a lengthy email suggesting that such a “sting” might not be the best way of addressing the issue, as it might only produce a small change in the system (one fraternity’s derecognition) and not across the board change, as SAE is not the only fraternity to employ abusive hazing practices. Further, I suggested that such a “sting” might in fact create sympathy for the Greek system.

At the time of that discussion, I was not aware that, as The Dartmouth reported on January 25th 2012, “Administrators also discussed plans for “Hell Night,” the culminating event of pledge term, with the then-president of SAE to ensure that the event would not violate the College’s hazing policy, Spalding said.”

This statement reveals that Spalding spoke with SAE prior to the “sting”, thus informing them of the scrutiny they were unknowingly under. Obviously, due to that communication, the fraternity altered its plans and the element of surprise was lost. It is obvious that such a turn of events would compromise the “sting” and not produce an accurate revelation of the practices.

In an email on Monday, February 21st 2011 at 2:23 PM, I followed up with Thompson, further referencing the pictures that were displayed in the November 16th meeting. I wrote: “With the wealth of details, facts, images, and emails I gave to you and Vice President Spalding, I’m sure that you—especially with Dr. Kim and his public health focus at the helm—have put together some really great projects to start addressing the issue at Dartmouth over the last few months.” Thompson did not respond to my message. No such plan was outlined.

I followed up again on Saturday April 16th 2011 at 6:23 AM, asking Thompson what updates she could relate to me about President Kim and Spalding’s assumed action to address the hazing issue. Thompson did not respond to that message either.

In July 2011 two members of Dartmouth’s SAE chapter attended a national or regional meeting where they were confronted by an administrator for the fraternity’s national organization regarding the hazing information I assume that they received from April Thompson. I had a conversation with a fraternity brother who expressed fear over the fact that national was aware of the house’s hazing practices. The fraternity held a meeting to discuss how to move forward regarding hazing since the next term would be a pledge term (the summer is not a pledge term). I felt falsely optimistic at that point that change could be achieved from the inside. I had a conversation with a fellow ‘12 brother, who was skeptical about whether or not hazing “built brotherhood” on this point.

On Monday July 11th, 2011 at 4:18 PM I emailed April Thompson expressing this optimism, and expressing that it seemed like the “backchannel” discussion could have forced a change. No change occurred and the rituals continued unabated that fall. I left the College on October 31st for a medical leave.

All of the emails referenced in this statement were sent to The Dartmouth as a part of corroborating the story and Op-Ed of January 25th 2012. They were aware of all of this information when they printed those reports.

While the campus seems focused on the HazMat scandal, life continues unabated in other parts of the College:

From: Sexperts Sexperts@dartmouth.edu
To: CAMPUS-EVENTS@listserv.dartmouth.edu
Date: Jan 24, 2012 at 6:29 PM
Subject SexTalk: Condoms and Lube: WEDNESDAY 4:15

This winter, The Sexperts bring you another awesome workshop in our SexTalks series!

SexTalk: Condoms and Lube
Wednesday, January 25, 2012
4:15pm in Collis 101
~ Open to everyone ~
Sponsored by the Sexperts!

Condoms and lube used properly reduce the chance of getting HIV/AIDS by 85-95%
Condoms and lube used properly reduce the likelihood of unwanted pregnancies to as low as 2%

But Condoms and Lube can also be FUN!
Neon, studded, ribbed, flavoured, glow-in-the-dark, personalised….
Warming, sensation-enhancing, cooling, yummy…

Come try out different types of condoms and lubricant with the Sexperts! And perhaps even win a few of the unusual kinds!

Thought of the day (from a concerned student):
“Condoms are cool, but you can’t put a condom on your heart, baby.”
(ie: It’s not all about the plumbing. But if you DO use the plumbing, wrap it up first)

Also, there may be food.

Dean of the College Charlotte Johnson has just sent out the below message to the College community.

Who are the players in the unfolding HazMat scandal?

Andrew Lohse: Lohse ‘12 is a controversial figure on campus. His columns in The D are written in a colorful, fluid style (actually, they are far more cogent than the first draft of the column that this space published yesterday), and the pieces generate reams of commentary. He has published columns in the Harvard Crimson and the New York Daily News, and one of his recent columns was noted by the NYT Dealbook, the Atlantic, and other publications. However, Lohse is better known for his arrest in the spring term of 2010 for cocaine use, and the subsequent allegation that he harassed the fraternity brother who reported that students were using illegal drugs in the public space of their frat. Does having the whistle blown on him disqualify Lohse forevermore from being a whistleblower himself? I think not. One might even conclude that Lohse learned something from his past experience, and taking an example from the student who went out on a limb to denounce the drug use, he has decided to become a whistleblower himself.

The Administration: My mailbox is full of comments referring to the Catholic Church and Joe Paterno. While the College did hire a new GLOS (Greek Letter Organizations and Societies) director, Wes Schaub, in the summer of 2011, Schaub’s efforts against hazing have been tepid. Visible Greek wear, most notably Alpha Chi’s red siren baseball caps, has been banned during pledge period, but beyond that, nothing has been done publicly, and little has been done behind the scenes. When Lohse met to discuss rampant hazing over a year ago with President Kim’s Chief of Staff David Spalding ‘76 and April Thompson, Associate Dean of the College for Campus Life, they promised to bring his information (as confirmed by videos and pictures) to the attention of President Kim. At that time, Kim, who has shown no lack of energy on the national stage in publicly combating binge drinking (he has just returned from a meeting of his Collaborative in Texas), had various options open to him. To this writer’s mind, he should have assembled Greek leaders and read them the riot act: We are aware of these dangerous practices, they have to stop now, we will ferret them out if they continue, and students will be permanently separated from the College and houses permanently de-recognized if they occur again. But a quick search of The D shows no evidence that President Kim said anything about hazing in 2011. In fact, one has to think that he and his administrators wanted to cover up Lohse’s allegations. That’s not leadership as I understand it.

The D: Ah, The D. Much derided on campus for terminal blandness (yesterday’s paper included a hard-hitting report on Chinese Lunar New Year celebrations, the College’s ongoing sustainability efforts, and an extended obituary for an alumnus who had little involvement with Dartmouth after graduation), The D needs to play a role in improving the College. Sunshine is the best disinfectant, as Justice Brandeis wrote, and The D should start to conceive of itself as more than a re-packager of the College’s press releases. As for the paper’s handling of Lohse’s column, as I wrote yesterday, the Editors should have published it after the usual vetting, without passing it around to various other parties.

Dartmouth Students: For a great many undergrads, Lohse’s piece was not news at all. Tales of “ass beers” and “vomelettes” have been making the rounds for years on campus. With over 60% of upperclassmen in Greek organizations, the number of students in, ummm, contact with hazing practices must be high. How long has this kind of thing been going on? Chris Miller ‘63’s The Real “Animal House”: The Saga of the Fraternity That Inspired the Movie (2007) doesn’t leave a lot to the imagination regarding his own experiences, but it seems that today’s students have tried to go above and beyond. As to why nobody before Andrew Lohse went public in describing hazing rituals in all of their unsanitary and degrading glory, well, it is a shame for the College (and for past victims, however willing, of this abuse) that we have had to wait for him.

The Class of ‘15: Will the Class of 2015 submit to the usual initiation rites? Or will its members who join fraternities and sororities do so with a higher sense of what it is to be a member of a Greek organization?

Erratum: This post originally noted that Wes Schaub had been hired in the summer of 2010. That information was incorrect, as shown by the D article to which it was linked.

Gawker and other media outlets have now picked up Andrew Lohse’s piece on fraternity hazing.

Sources inside The D have leaked to Dartblog an upcoming column that is sure to cause a storm of controversy. Andrew Lohse ‘12, who has been mentioned several times in this space (here, here and here), has submitted a column to The D that describes ongoing fraternity hazing practices in, shall we say, down-and-dirty detail.

Of greater interest — in American life, the cover-up stands as more sinful than the crime itself — is the fact that Lohse met with senior members of the Kim administration over a year ago to decry the fraternity hazing culture, and the administration did little or nothing in response.

Furthermore, it seems that The D, upon its recent receipt of Lohse’s column, immediately shared it with others, and it has found its way into the hands of various professors, fraternities — and the Kim administration, which has moved strongly into damage-control mode. While The D is soon going to publish an edited version of Lohse’s piece, it has also planned to print various responses by other parties alongside it, possibly including a fraternity’s reaction and interviews with administrators. It goes without saying that one of The D/administration’s tactics will be a direct ad hominem attack on Lohse.

Herewith an early version of Lohse’s column that seems to have been diffused quite widely now.

Telling The Truth

We attend a strange school where our president, one of the world’s foremost public health experts, has shown an alarming reticence regarding what can only be described as a public health crisis of the utmost importance: the endemic physical and psychological abuse culture that occupies the heart of Dartmouth’s Greek-life community. President Kim’s sterling credentials in public health are fundamentally at odds with his administration’s refusal to crack down on the pervasive hazing, substance abuse, and sexual assault culture that dominates campus social life.

I understand these problems because I myself have endured them. If I were to fully enumerate all of the dehumanizing experiences my friends and I have survived here — experiences that were ironically advertised to us as indispensable elements of the “Dartmouth Experience”— I would have too few words left in this column to adequately explain how the Kim administration has systematically failed us by refusing to address this crisis. So I’ll just fill you in on a few of them.

Among my many experiences as a fraternity pledge, I was: forced to swim in a kiddie pool full of vomit, urine, fecal matter, semen, and rotten food products; forced to eat an omelet made of vomit; forced to chug cups of vinegar until I was afraid that I would vomit blood like one of my fellow pledges did; forced to inhale nitrous oxide; degraded psychologically on a daily basis; forced to drink beers poured down a fellow pledge’s ass crack; vomited on regularly, and encouraged to vomit on others.

As a pledge, I ceased to be a human being; instead, I became a “whale shit”. In the process, I, my fellow pledges, and all pledges since, have been trained to treat Dartmouth women with about the same respect with which we treated ourselves: none.

One fellow pledge shared with me once that he was so troubled by his experiences that he spent six months in counseling dealing with their emotional and psychological effects. He then became a pledge trainer himself, seemingly unable to break the cycle of abuse he had been so tortured by. One of the things I’ve learned at Dartmouth, one thing that sets a psychological precedent for many Dartmouth men, is that good people can do awful things to one other — for absolutely no reason. There is an intoxicating nihilism at the center of our culture, one which fraternities try to downplay under the pretense of plausible deniability. The sad truth is that my experience is not the exception, but rather the norm.

The administration is fully aware of what goes in in our basements; I know this because I have had frank conversations with several high-level administrators. This column should not be a surprise to Dr. Kim, since it was with one of his Vice Presidents and one of his Deans with whom I initially met and shared the troubling, graphic story of my experience as a Dartmouth man, replete with pictures, text, video, and dates, times, and places of future acts of hazing. This Vice President vowed that the information I provided him would cross Dr. Kim’s desk, and assured me that something would be done about it. Either it did not, or the administration realized that to act would require a courage they lacked - courage that is required of all college administrations under New Hampshire state law.

Dr. Kim, I have a question for you: what will it take for you and your administration to decisively address hazing, sexual assault and substance abuse? If one student speaking out isn’t good enough for you, what is?

It has now been over a year since I shared this information with the College administration. In November 2010, Keene Sentinel columnist Elayne Clift wrote a piece entitled “What Do We Have To Do To Get The High Out of Higher Education?” which discussed in graphic detail Dartmouth’s hazing and abuse culture. Clift’s column garnered an evasive, platitude-laden response from then-Dean of the College Sylvia Spears, entitled “Dartmouth Takes Drinking Seriously”. Spears chose only to discuss alcohol policy and did not at all engage with the graphic descriptions of hazing laid out in Clift’s column.

The administration could not fully discredit Clift’s allegations for one very important reason — I had already given them the exact same information. It is a small college, but there are those of us who feel the need to tell the truth about it.

Andrew Lohse ‘12

Addendum: If The D were a more professional news organization, the news department would keep itself separate from editorial, and vice versa. To diffuse Lohse’s column beforehand, and allow the administration ample time to prepare multiple responses to it, goes flat out against the ethical traditions of American journalism.

The problem with Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs is not what it is, but what it isn’t: as a quick tour d’horizon of Steve’s life, it covers the highlights, but the book lacks the texture and analysis that would leave us with a better understanding of one of my heroes. In 1981, Tracy Kidder* wrote The Soul of A New Machine; he devoted 320 pages to a description of the year-long effort by the team that developed the Data General Eagle minicomputer. Yet Isaacson, due to obvious limitations of time and space, gives us only a few pages each on the creation of the Apple II, the Mac, the 1984 commercial, Pixar, the Apple Stores, the iPod, iTunes, the iPhone, the App Store, the iPad, the iCloud, and the structure of Apple, Inc. itself. Yet each one of these achievements was a revolution in its area, and each one alone has the makings of a fascinating book.

In addition, Isaacson unfolds his narrative in chronologically linear manner — the book at times seems to be an “as told to” autobiography. Isaacson spends little time on themes like the reasons for Jobs’ brilliance at innovation, his politics, his reading habits regarding life and technology (though a good number of books are mentioned en passant), and the many subjects that Steve discussed with the great men and women who seemed to make their way to him.

Particularly compelling, however, are the brief descriptions of otherwise accomplished business executives who failed to understand Jobs’ ideas and creations when first shown them:

● Though Apple’s salesforce was thrilled by the now-iconic 1984 commercial, after the Apple Board of Directors viewed it for the first time, “Most of them thought that it was the worst commercial they had ever seen,” according to John Sculley, who ordered the company’s ad agency to sell of the Super Bowl slots that had been reserved for it.

● When Jobs proposed creating Apple Stores, his Board was dubious, to say the least. “I’m scratching my head and thinking that this is crazy,” opined Director Art Levinson, CEO of Genentech. As a sop to Jobs, the Board approved the initial creation of only four stores.

● Disney’s CEO Michael Eisner was oblivious to the merits of Finding Nemo. He wrote: “Yesterday we saw for the second time the new Pixar movie Finding Nemo, that comes out next May. This will be a reality check for those guys. It’s okay, but nowhere near as good at their previous films. Of course, they think that it’s great.”

● Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer put down the iPhone: “It’s the most expensive phone in the world. And it doesn’t appeal to business customers because it doesn’t have a keyboard.”

● Similarly, Microsoft’s founder, Bill Gates did not understand the iPad: “I still think that some mixture of voice, the pen, and a real keyboard — in other words a netbook — will be mainstream… It’s a nice reader, but there is nothing on the iPad I look at and say, Oh, I wish Microsoft had done it.”

Throughout the book Isaacson notes Jobs impatience, bluntness and downright rudeness. Ideas can be “crap” and people “bozos” or worse. But, to my mind, Jobs redeems himself somewhat when faced with a person of equal energy and creativity, as Isaacson describes in this lovely anecdote:

For the iPhone, the original plan was for it to have a plastic screen, like the iPod. But Jobs decided it would feel much more elegant and substantive if the screens were glass. So he set about finding a glass that would be strong and resistant to scratches.

The natural place to look was Asia, where the glass for the [Apple] stores was being made. But Job’s friend John Seeley Brown, who was on the board of Corning Glass in Upstate New York, told him that he should talk to the company’s young and dynamic CEO, Wendell Weeks. So he dialed the main Corning switchboard number and asked to be put through to Weeks. He got an assistant, who offered to pass along the message. “No, I’m Steve Jobs,” he replied. “Put me through.” The assistant refused. Jobs called Brown and complained that he had been subject to “typical East Coast bullshit.” When Weeks heard that, he called the Apple switchboard and asked to speak to Jobs. He was told to put his request in writing and send it by fax. When Jobs was told what had happened, he took a liking to Weeks and invited him to Cupertino.

Jobs described the type of glass that Apple wanted for the iPhone, and Weeks told him that Corning had developed a chemical exchange process in the 1960s that led to what they dubbed “gorilla glass.” It was incredibly strong, but it had never found a market, so Corning quit making it. Jobs said he doubted it was good enough, and he started explaining to Weeks how glass is made. This amused Weeks, who of course knew more than Jobs about that topic. “Can you shut up,” Weeks interjected, “and let me teach you some science?” Jobs was taken aback and fell silent. Weeks went to the whiteboard and gave a tutorial on chemistry, which involved an ion-exchange process that produced a compression layer on the surface of the glass. This turned Jobs around, and he said he wanted as much gorilla glass as Corning could make within six months. “We don’t have the capacity,” Weeks replied. “None of our plants make the glass now.”

“Don’t be afraid,” Jobs replied. This stunned Weeks, who was good humored and confident but not used to Jobs reality distortion field. He tried to explain that a false sense of confidence would not overcome engineering challenges, but that was a premise that Jobs had repeatedly shown he didn’t accept. He stared at Weeks unblinkingly. “Yes, you can do it,” he said. “Get your mind around it. You can do it.”

As Weeks retold the story, he shook his head in astonishment. “We did it in under six months,” he said. “We produced a glass that had never been made.” Corning’s facility in Harrisburg, Kentucky, which had been making LCD displays, was converted almost overnight to make gorilla glass full-time. “We put our best scientists and engineers on it, and we just made it work.” In his airy office, Weeks has just one framed momento on display. It ‘s a message Jobs sent the day the iPhone came out: “We couldn’t have done it without you.”

Isaacson concludes with the observation that history will put Jobs in the pantheon with Edison and Ford. He’s right. We are all lucky to have been alive with Steve.

*Kidder is known on the Hanover Plain as the author of Mountains Beyond Mountains: Healing the World: The Quest of Dr. Paul Farmer, in which President Kim is mentioned. (Kim is first noted on page 100, and overall he is referred to 44 times in the 312-page book).

Addendum: Dartmouth alumnus Pete Volanakis ‘77, T ‘82 joined Corning in 1983 and he was President from 2007 until his retirement in 2010. He is now Strategic Advisor to Chief Executive Officer Wendell Weeks. Corning has produced a wonderful video about gorilla glass.

When we walk with the kids through Paris, we point out the places where historical events of moment occurred. On June 23, 1940, Adolf Hitler toured the city, stopping at Trocadéro to gaze at the Eiffel Tower. How many of today’s tourists understand that they are standing in a spot once occupied by Germany’s dictator?

It has been a full month now since this space reported on the exploding costs of the Hanover Inn’s renovation. At last report, the College was going to shell out $41.6 million to redo the 1966 facility. By any professional measure, that’s an astounding figure, but coming as it does in the midst of the College’s budget restructuring, it really leads one to question the administration’s basic competence. To put the cost of the Inn work in some perspective, $41.6 million is almost half the College’s annual net income from undergraduate tuition payments.

And where has The D been in all this? Not a word. The College’s paper of record has been too busy doing softy reports on things like MALS, Dartmouth’s adult education program. In that piece, the writer never bothered to ask why 100+ adult students are taking up space in Dartmouth classrooms alongside undergrads, and why we keep on with a program that a few years ago had an acceptance rate of 84%.