Mourning the loss of mentor Jim McConkey

James McConkey at celebration of his 95th birthday in Ithaca, NY. — Cornell Author and Professor Emeritus James McConkey at a celebration of his 95th birthday in Ithaca, New York.

It’s not every freshman writing instructor who stays in touch with a student for more than 50 years, but Cornell University Professor Emeritus James McConkey was one who did…and I was the lucky student.

McConkey was my freshman writing instructor in 1967–I used to go out to his farm to exercise his horses–and he helped me through the student takeover of Willard Straight Hall, from which 130 black protestors emerged–several of whom brandished rifles.

(Jim told me recently that he sat with Dan Berrigan during the Barton Hall Takeover; also counselled University President Perkins–and tried to be a voice of reason throughout all of that). We stayed in touch for some 50 years; he and I held a joint book-signing in the Cornell Store during my 45th college reunion.

I am glad I got to seem him just before he passed away.

In early October, Jim, his son Larry and daughter-in-law Diane McConkey were on their way back from visiting another of Jim’s former students on Northern Maine ( some 9 hours from Ithaca) and invited me to dinner at the Publick House, near Cambridge, , where I live, and where they were spending the night.

At 98, he told a few funny stories about his mother, who lived to 100 at least…and I joked that his social life was better than mine. He was still driving–and told us that he would be driving the ten miles from his farm to lunch with friends several times the next week. He seemed frail–but sounded fine when I called to thank him a few days after our dinner.

Anyway, I’ve posted an obit Larry wrote at http://ithacadiaries.com. The Cornell obit is at https://news.cornell.edu/stories/2019/10/writer-emeritus-professor-james-mcconkey-dies-98 . And here’s a link to tributes from Diane Ackerman, Brad Edmonson and Robert Wilson that appeared in the American Scholar . https://theamericanscholar.org/remembering-james-mcconkey/#.XdMM61dKg2w . —

–Anita M. Harris
Anita Harris is a writer and communications consultant based in Cambridge, MA. Her books include Ithaca Diaries, a memoir and social history of her undergraduate years at Cornell; and Broken Patterns, Professional Women and the Quest for a New Feminine Identity. She is currently working on a creative nonfiction book tentatively titled “Harrisburg,” which is about her experiences founding an alternative newspaper in Pennsylvania, during the trial of the Harrisburg 8.

Back to college; rape culture concerns; Ithaca Diaries update

With students now heading back to college, I’m reminded of my arrival at Cornell University freshman year–when some guys holding a sign “girls dorm” directed us into the parking lot of what turned out to be their frat–AKA “Theta Zoo.”

A few weeks ago (45 years later) some frat guys at Old Dominion in Virginia hung signs outside their frat proclaiming “freshman daughter drop off”..and inviting moms, too. The frat was suspended by its national due to concerns about “rape culture” and the episode made the national news. Is it that some things (young men?) never change…but others do?

Re Ithaca Diaries, I’m pleased that:

Several people I don’t even know called me to talk to me about Ithaca Diaries and how much it meant to them.
The Glen Haven Historical Society held a discussion of Ithaca Diaries in Skaneateles, NY, not far from Ithaca; Organizers Marilyn Reiner Levine and Lauren R. Jastermski turned out to have gone to my high school, tho we had not met. Friends Joyce Carey and Scott Drahos reported a lively discussion.
The long-awaited video of my April reading for the Cornell Club of Boston is now..posted in segments on You Tube . Let me know if you can spot my wardrobe malfunction. Or, better yet, don’t.

Ithaca Diaries has gotten some great reviews!

Historian Carol Kammen writes in the Ithaca Journal, “honest, funny, naïve and wise, and very much of the era. Her diary is about boys, and it is an account of her coming awake politically, socially and sexually….”
Editor Jim Chaisson writes in the Ithaca Times “When you get a first-person account that chronicles the quotidian details of a woman’s daily life, and she juxtaposes them abruptly within the narrative against the headlines of the day—both on and off campus—you experience how innocent these young people were compared to the social changes that were being wrought by drugs, social movements like feminism and black liberation and global politics .” For the record, I did work summers. My parents did not send me to the shrink until sophomore year.

Great if you’d buy a copy on Amazon or Kindle–if you haven’t already– or ask your library to do so. Positive reviews welcome.

And–please follow me on Twitter. Evidently, the only way to get followers is to HAVE followers! @anharris.

Again, thanks to my kickstarter supporters, interns, and the many others who helped bring Ithaca Diaries to life.

Comments welcome!
Anita

Anita M. Harris is the author of Ithaca Diaries, a coming-of-age memoir about college in the 1960s. It’s available on Amazon or Kindle as is a new edition of her first book, Broken Patterns, Professional Women and the Quest for a New Feminine Identity.

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group, an award-winning PR and marketing firm based in Cambridge, MA.

Lincoln MA, Reading: Ithaca Diaries

Last night’s reading in Lincoln went well. People laughed. In the right places.

That’s Neil O’Hara, facilitator of The Write Stuff, my wonderful writers group, in the background. The reading was held held in the beautiful Lincoln, MA, public library, which along with the Lincoln Review, sponsors our group and the occasional public event.

Other readers included Susan Coppack, Mary Ann Hales, Ellen Morgan and Manson Solomon. Here’s a link to the Write Stuff Blog, http://lincolnwritestuff.blogspot.com/ which, in turn, links to this and other write stuffers’ blogs, courtesy of blogmeister Geoff Moore.

Mark S. Hoffman took the photo. Thanks, Mark!

New Cambridge Observer is a publication of the Harris Communications Group of Cambridge, MA. We also publish Harriscomblog and Ithaca Diaries blog.