Posts tagged ‘Jay Paterno’
Got the New Issue Yet?
If you haven’t already received your copy, our Sept./Oct. issue is surely en route to your mailbox. Among other good stuff in the magazine, you’ll find a feature on nine students who spent the summer interning all over the world. I interviewed the interns for the story—and probably had a little too much fun in the process.
Amy Green, who worked with penguins at the Pittsburgh Zoo, had me in stitches when she detailed some of her not-so-fun (OK, downright gross) clean-up duties in the penguin exhibit. Broadway intern Alex Cadmus and I debated the musical merits of West Side Story vs. South Pacific. Bryan Lemley’s stories about the mystery meat in his Russian bank’s cafeteria were hilarious—“I’d just point at something and pray it came with mashed potatoes.”
But beyond their senses of humor, these students are seriously ambitious; most of them worked 40-plus hours a week while some of their peers were hanging poolside. With that kind of drive, I won’t be surprised if we hear about them again—as alums—in the future. Maybe you’ll even read about them in our pages.
Also in the Sept./Oct. issue:
Plenty of Blue and White in Daytona
Daytona Beach in March—not a bad gig.
Once or twice a year I have a chance to travel to one of the Alumni Association’s 150-some chapters and give members a presentation about The Penn Stater. I talk about what goes into the making of the magazine, share some of our editorial philosophies, show a lot of pictures, maybe talk about some memorable bloopers. Depending on where we are in the production cycle, I sometimes offer a sneak preview of what’s in the next issue as well.
The Lysingers—Jane ’53 and Bill ’54—at the Halifax River Yacht Club just before the banquet.
Last weekend I got to visit the Daytona-Palm Coast Chapter (yes, I know, it’s rough having to go to Florida in March) and be the keynote speaker at the banquet marking their 10th anniversary. What a great place to visit, and what a great group. The chapter was founded in 2001 thanks in large part to the efforts of Joan Adams Fenton ’64, ’65g, ’83g and Jane Grubb Lysinger ’53, each of whom had recently moved to the area and were looking to connect with other Penn Staters. The group quickly took off, and today they hold football-watching parties, do community-service projects, have an annual Derby Days event, and sponsor a scholarship for one Penn State student each year.
Jo Chesworth ’60 of Boalsburg happened to be in Florida at the time of the banquet, and reconnected with Joan Fenton ’64, ’65g, ’83g.
A good-sized crowd—about 85 people—turned out for the banquet at the not-too-shabby Halifax River Yacht Club, and I think about 80 of them had questions for me during the Q&A portion of my presentation. They just wouldn’t stop asking questions about the magazine: questions about the class notes and obits sections, about my editor’s column, about whether there were any stories I regretted doing. (And, no, I’m not going to answer that last one here; you’ll have to come hear me speak sometime to get that out of me!)
It’s always interesting to me to visit chapters in different parts of the country and run into people I know—or people I sort of know, anyway. I met Renie Calkin ’79, a golf pro who I remember as an eastern regional golf champion as an undergrad (she was Renie Kelleher then). I reconnected with Laura Ramp ’94, who once served on Alumni Council—and who did a great job playing piano throughout the evening. And I later found out that the mother-in-law of Jay Paterno ’91 was in the audience.
Laura Ramp ’94 played piano for the event.
And who else should walk in the door but Jo Rider Chesworth ’60, who was associate editor of The Penn Stater for many years? Jo and her husband, Tom ’60, ’69g, ’74g, still live in Boalsburg; they just happened to be in Florida visiting friends and decided to come to the banquet.
I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention how much I appreciated the efforts of Mary Ann Rapp Bunn ’84, who put the banquet together and who has been corresponding with me about the details since last May, and also Rob Walls ’88, who does a great job as chapter president.
I also didn’t mind the 75-degree Florida weather one bit.
Tina Hay, editor
For Jay Paterno, Alabama-Penn State Memories Are Personal
Jay Paterno ’91 is a regular columnist for StateCollege.com, and his latest piece is well timed for Saturday’s game. In it, Jay shares his memories of Penn State-Alabama games past, offers some insights into the similarities between his father and Bear Bryant, and shares a couple of cool mementos from his youth: a letter Bryant wrote him 28 years ago, and this terrific photo of his dad and Bryant taken by his mom, Sue ’62.
I’m off to Tuscaloosa this morning, and technology willing, hope to have a bunch of posts over the next couple of days. Stay tuned.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
Nittany Lions For A Day
Last week marked the fifth annual Penn State Football Fantasy Camp, the four-day fan experience that lets diehard Nittany Lion fans experience life as a (sort of) Penn State football player. I was lucky enough to cover the first camp four years ago as a Penn Stater freelance writer, not long before I joined the magazine’s staff. (For some reason, they’ve still got a picture of me on the camp Website — that’s me in the blue #22 jersey. Nice face, huh?) This year also marked the first annual Ladies X’s & O’s camp, a one-day event that sold out with 50 women, including Kelley Paterno, wife of Penn State QB coach Jay Paterno ’91.
The women arrived on campus Friday morning and got a crash course in football formations, terminology and play-calling, much of it from assistant coach Mike McQueary ’97. On Friday afternoon, they took to the Beaver Stadium turf for a pep talk from Joe Paterno — you can check out the video on the GOPSF.com Facebook page — and a game of flag football, which ended in a 6-6 tie.
Afterward, I asked Gloria Stanulis Spicer ’70 — at 62 the camp’s second-oldest player and a longtime season ticket holder — about her impressions. Her first was how competitive her fellow campers were. “On the bus and at lunch, they all seemed so nice and polite,” she said. “But once the game started? Oh, no.”
The other thing Spicer was left with? What a blast she had out on the field. “It just went so fast — after the game, everybody was like, ‘Can we play some more?’ We really wanted it to continue.” Camp organizers haven’t committed to doing the camp again next year, but if they do, they can count on at least one returnee: Spicer says she’ll be there, and plans to bring her daughter, Meg Spicer ’06, along, too.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
As the College Coaching Carousel Spins Faster Than Ever, a Nod to Sticking Around
I’ve been smirking a bit this week watching the movement among some of the nation’s prominent college football coaches. First Pete Carroll left USC after a wildly successful decade —quite possibly, as Carroll has said, because he found the perfect opportunity to return to the NFL, but also possibly because the Trojans struggled this season, and because the program faces the possibility of serious NCAA sanctions in the near future. Carroll’s replacement at Southern Cal is Lane Kiffin, fresh off a single mediocre season at Tennessee where the program drew NCAA scrutiny for everything from Kiffin’s verbal jousting with rivals to allegations of recruiting violations.
What does all this have to do with Penn State? Thankfully nothing, as a few people in the media have pointed out this week. Wednesday’s New York Times featured a great column by George Vecsey comparing the Carroll and Kiffin drama with the steadiness of Joe Paterno’s tenure in Happy Valley. And today on StateCollege.com, Jay Paterno contrasts his father’s stability with the constant turnover in the college coaching ranks. Good reads both.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
Jay Paterno’s Photo of the Turf
In case you had any doubt about how mucky that field was for yesterday’s Capital One Bowl, Penn State assistant coach Jay Paterno ’91 took a picture after the game. It looks more like a cow pasture than a football field.
Tina Hay, editor
Jay Paterno Is Writing A Column (Again)
Jay Paterno ’91 Lib just posted his first column on StateCollege.com, and the Nittany Lion quarterbacks coach promises to address topics other than football. His debut features thoughts on President Obama’s speech to schoolchildren and his own pre-natal “memories” of the minor controversy surrounding Penn State’s 1968 meeting with Syracuse. As Jay reminds us, it’s not his first foray into writing: In addition to his oft-updated Twitter feed and that book we hear he’s working on, Jay was, briefly, a columnist for the Daily Collegian—almost 20 years ago.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
The Students are Definitely Back
Click on the photo to see a much larger version of this enthusiasm. Photo by Annemarie Mountz.
The State College area has about 41,000 more people in it than it did last week at this time: The students are back. They moved in over the weekend, and classes started today already. (Is it just me, or is that some kind of record for Earliest First Day of Classes Ever?)
Last night the Alumni Association’s student alumni corps, the Lion Ambassadors, put on their annual “Be a Part from the Start” pep rally in Rec Hall. Judging from the photos you can see here, it looks like it was its usual noisy success, complete with Blue Band, cheerleaders, the Lion mascot, and some words from Jay Paterno ’91.
Tina Hay, editor
A Terrific Story from the PSU Football Letterman’s Golf Outing
In addition to his regularly updated Twitter page, Jay Paterno ’91 Lib keeps a blog on which he writes about all sorts of things. My Alumni Association colleague Jayson Jackson tipped me off to Jay’s latest post, a recap of last weekend’s Penn State Football Letterman’s Golf Outing. The bulk of the post is dedicated to the story of Rick Slater ’01 Lib, a former walk-on football player turned Navy SEAL. You can read it here; you’ll be glad you did, and proud to call Slater a fellow Nittany Lion.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
Joe Paterno on Family & Politics
The Big Ten’s annual preseason media days took place a week ago in Chicago, but the guys at the Daily Collegian were holding onto a gem, which they shared yesterday on their PSU Footblog. Titled “A Brief History Lesson With Mr. Paterno,” the post recounts a question one of the Collegian writers (not sure which) asked Joe Paterno near the end of the media session: What did he think of his son (and assistant coach) Jay’s possible political future? His answer, a cool bit of Paterno family history, begins like this:
When I was a kid growing up, a teenager, after Mass on Sunday, my mother would start cooking and all Sunday we sat around and ate. My old man would get a bottle of homemade wine, put it on the table and everybody, all the kids in the neighborhood, would come in. They taste it, sit around and my dad would agitate everybody. ‘What do you think of what Roosevelt is gonna do? What do you think about this?’ He was always trying to get us to think, what’s going on.
Check out the link to read the rest. And for the Twitter-savvy among you, you can follow the Collegian Footblog here, and Jay Paterno’s Twitter page here.
Ryan Jones, senior editor
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