More Shots on the Beach!

I have a few more shots on the Cape Cod Beach.  The summer of 1970 very productive. I had finished a pretty good first year at the University of Kentucky and had accepted three graduate students and three undergraduate research students. The research at Dr. Yankwich’s lab was progressing very smoothly. The summer was great for both Janice and Pan-pan, as well. They were very happy about their summer on the Cape. See more pictures below:

Mother-Daughter Dresses'

Of course, there were a lot of activities on the Cape beside swimming. For grown-ups, we went clamming, fishing etc. Pan-pan did some sand boxing:

Then we had our first Mother-Daughter dresses made, they looked pretty good? Pan-pan was really tired that night!

Daddy came late in the summer!

Since Pan-pan was having a great time at the Cape, Daddy did not want to be left out completely. As soon as the summer appointment was finished at the Urbana campus, he drove 22 hours straight from Urbana to North Truro, only stopping for less than one hour, on the Connecticut turnpike. He did not waste much time in joining Pan-pan to have some more fun.

Cape Cod for Pan-pan

It was customary for Janice to spend her whole summer on Cape Cod since she was young. This was Pan-pan’s first time on the Cape. She had a grand time. They did not waste much time in finding all that she could do there. Beside visiting the beach, she learned quickly where the sand box and the kid swimming pool were, where you could pick the ripe blueberries etc. Of course, there were quite a number of playmates, too. Doug and Laura were both there. She was not only involved with them, she was certainly the center of attention there. Her personality was clearly demonstrated.

Summer Vacation

The summer of 1970 was the first of many summer vacations we encountered during our academic profession. One reason we decided to take a teaching position, as opposed to working in industry, was the flexibility it provided us in the summers. That summer, Janice decided to take Pan-pan to Cape Cod so that she could experience some of what Janice herself had experienced when she was young. The house on the Cape was built by Janice’s parents themselves, after they bought a piece of land with the help of Janice’s Uncle Fran, I will have more on the house later.

Since I had to finish my work with Professor Yankwich, Janice decided to leave me in Illinois while she and Pan-pan went to join her family on the Cape. Not too long after July 4th, they took a small plane and flew to Boston. That way I could devote all my time to my work while they enjoyed the cape. Please notice that they dressed up to take the plane ride and that there was no security check at all!

Mary and George Lowry

We lived in Urbana, Illinois, for a total of five years. Both Janice and I were there for our PhD degrees, in Math and Chemistry, respectively. However, the University of Illinois provided us more than knowledge and expertise in our fields. It gave us many other important benefits for our lives, such as warm friendships and lessons on how to grow up, to adjust to adult life, and to see a bigger world from our limited backgrounds. We visited the Lowry's place on West Michigan Avenue many, many times. We went - not just to participate in after-dance parties and sing some folk songs with George. Janice and I even stayed in their house several times when they were away visiting their family in Texas. George was a tremendous guitar player and folksong singer. He taught us many beautiful songs - we still try to sing them when we can. He was also a teacher in the folk dance group and Mary was his partner in this.

The picture below was taken in their home - the only one we have in our possession with Mary’s sister, who was born with a birth defect and stayed in their home all her life. Mary and George had two boys but they are not in this picture. Their young daughter in this pic, Tina, danced with us often.

July the Fourth Parade

We were in Urbana when July 4, 1970, arrived, and there was a parade on Green Street. It was the first parade Pan-pan experienced. She was very excited even before it started as she somehow anticipated what was coming! As she settled herself on the curb, seriously waiting for it to arrive, we were not sure what her expectation was. She was totally overwhelmed by the variety of exhibits. Like many parades we have seen over the years, the parades were full of US flags and young girls, floats, cars, and horses!

The Chemistry and Physics of Isotopes

This was the title of a Gordon Research Conference in 1970 which I  attended. There were over one hundred conferences in various fields in the three major sciences held each year. At that time, there were quite a number of research groups in the USA which were very much involved in developing new methodology, in finding new frontiers in the field. I was one of the young members in Professor Peter E. Yankwich’s research group. Even though I was teaching at the University of Kentucky, Dr. Yankwich kindly invited me to work at his lab in Urbana for the summer and thus I was qualified to participate in this Conference. While it was common practice for major professors to help their post docs get established and to assist young, former students as they started their careers, it was definitely not a “take it for granted” action. Dr. Yankwich was always very considerate in almost every aspect in assisting his former students, a fact which I need to acknowledge gratefully here. The conference in 1970 was held in Issaquah, WA, which was and is a very nice summer resort. The attendees could therefore discuss the tough subjects in a pleasant and relaxed environment. That was the last Gordon Conference in which I participated. They were getting too expensive for small universities to support. Dr. Yankwich is in both the pictures below, one of which also includes his graduate student, Joe Keller.

Back to Urbana, Illinois

As soon as my spring semester term was done at the University of Kentucky, we drove back to Urbana again, sometime in May, 1970. I wanted to finish up some work I had been doing with Dr. Yankwich while post-docking for him. We stayed with Dean and Maria at their apartment. Later Maria took Deanna to visit grandparents in both Tokyo and Taipei. Dean was finishing up his PhD degree in Chemistry. He was delayed for two major reasons. First, his initial thesis director died in his lab from toxic chemicals he was working on at the time. Dean had to restart his thesis work with another advisor. Then he had problem with his experimental work - it just would not work properly for him. We stayed in their apartment for a couple of months. Then Janice took Pan-pan to visit her parents on Cape Cod. I stayed in Urbana a while and then joined them.

Dean and Maria’s daughter, Deanna, is a few months older than Pan-pan. They played very well together during our first month in Urbana. The lady in the last picture was Pastor Kalkwarf’s wife, Faith. I do not remember if she was visiting us or if we were visiting her.

First Birthday for Pan-pan

While we were astonished at the fast change of Pan-pan’s life, we were quickly celebrating her first birthday. It was hard to believe that she was one year old! Soon after, we moved into our “new” house and she quickly made friends with some older playmates in the neighborhood. She was the youngest one in that section of the new housing development. Everyone tried to take care of her. She definitely took advantage of the situation, demanding an astonishing amount of attention. I remember that we were amazed at how much she got away with! Since we did not stay in that house for very long, we no longer remember anyone in the group below.