Donald "Don" Baier '66 (BardCorps)
Files
Interviewee Role
Alumni/ae/x
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Class Year
1966
Academic Program
Literature
Interviewer
Olive Carrollhach '18
Description
Don Bair ‘66 notes that he came to Bard for literature but while here got involved with political action on campus. He talks about his involvement in political action during his life after Bard in the 60’s, 70’s and 80’s. Don recalls the large part Adolph’s played in the college social life, and how he would go regularly after a day of classes and studying. He remembers the thrill he found in spending time talking with Bard professors. During his sophomore year’s field period, he worked at Southeast Neighborhood House, a social work agency which drew him into his political action work. He remembers the preparation for his senior project, which included reading work by Honore de Balzac which was “the transition for me, thinking about politics more.” He recalls the day John F. Kennedy was shot, with the news being announced in an acting class:
“I was sitting in this acting class, and the teacher was famous for sort of setting up these situations and getting people to react, you know to explore their emotions and everything. And so, one of the other students came rushing into the class and said, ‘The president’s been shot! The president’s been shot!’ And a couple of us just laughed because we were so sure that this was Charlie [the professor], you know trying to get a reaction out of–but you know, class collapsed, and we went up to the coffee shop.”
Keywords
Bard College; Students for a Democratic Society (SDS); Anthony Hecht; Robert “Bob” Rockman; Theodore Weiss; Adolph’s; Partisan Review; Richard Poirier; Susan Sontag; Washington D.C.; Southeast Neighborhood House; John F. Kennedy; Charles “Charlie” Kakatsakis; Honoré de Balzac; Karl Marx; Friedrich Engels
Location
Bertelsmann Campus Center
Interview Date
5-27-2017
Interview Duration
18:09
Recommended Citation
Baier '66, Donald "Don", "Donald "Don" Baier '66 (BardCorps)" (2020). BardCorps -- All Oral Histories. 62.
https://digitalcommons.bard.edu/oral_hist/62
Rights Management
http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
Significant Quote
“I’m in this book club, and the book club decided that they would read some novels of Balzac...I went back and [re]read some of these books…And I thought well, I was right about a lot of this stuff...I went down and got my [senior] project out of the library and copied it and reread it. And I...sat down and wrote a new ending for it because...I had seen stuff that I hadn’t seen before.”