Betty
Edwards and David Willis share a joyful moment
during the festivities.the Big Apple —
“parsing verbs together, and nouns they do
decline, all around Manhattan, having themselves
a real good time”— but also her
New-York-style speed. “Betty’s life was
in her car,” joked Sakenfeld, “and that
car was always full of cookies, candy, and juice
for her students. No class ate more often or
better than Betty’s.”
Sakenfeld also
illuminated the career of James Irvine, the
Seminary’s associate librarian for
thirty-two years.
“Most of you
don’t know that Jim is a biblical scholar
with special training in pastoral care,” she
said. “He studied CPE, Near Eastern
languages, and Old Testament before he found that
library science was his true calling.”
Having found that calling, Sakenfeld pointed out,
he kept four head librarians at PTS out of
trouble!
Like Edwards,
Irvine also loved New York’s restaurants and
museums. But he spent summer vacations in a cabin
in the woods, where he cooked over a campfire and
“made friends with snakes,” said
Sakenfeld.
A punster, Irvine
was heralded with a rendition of “Sunny Side
Up”: “Keep your punny side up, up,
laugh until you turn blue.”
Carolyn
Nicholson, a missionary in Iran, a social worker
in San Francisco’s Chinatown, a campus
minister, and a director of Christian education
in several churches before she became the
Seminary’s dean of student affairs, was
known on campus for her warm smile, her
impeccable attire, and her faithful attendance at
chapel. Less well known by students was her
1960s’ passion for Bob Dylan and the
Beatles!
But to Bartow and
Jacks, “Edelweiss” seemed to be her
song.
“Carolyn,
Carolyn, every morning you greet us.
Like a light shining bright,
you look happy to meet us.
Ev’ry day you have Special K
crunchy, never gooey.
And next spring, in Beijing,
there’ll be Special Chop Suey.”
A student of
Chinese writing and culture, Nicholson was off to
China for a postretirement vacation.
McVey completed
the revue with words to and about systematic
theologian David Willis.
She cited his
scholarship and his contributions to the life of
the church in the areas of sacramental theology,
prayer, and Christology. He was founding editor
of two theological journals, president of the
Calvin Studies Society, and a participant in
ecumenical dialogue through the Presbyterian
Church (USA), the World Council of Churches, and
the World Alliance of Reformed Churches. He
considers the “Credo” of Bach’s B
Minor Mass to be the touchstone of his faith
and theology.
James
Irvine holds a small version of the original
watercolor print of Speer Library he later
received.
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He also made his
theological points dramatically, said McVey,
— by uttering sounds like “barf,”
“snort,” and “wheeze.” He was
known to throw himself flat on his back on the
floor of his classroom to illustrate the Fall
from a prone position. To the tune of “My
Heart Stood Still,” colleagues sang:
“We
watched you run around, you danced and spun
around
praising Bach’s B Minor Mass!
Describing Adam’s fall, first you stood up
real tall,
then landed on your back.”
After the
laughter died down, President Thomas Gillespie
presented each retiree with carefully chosen
gifts. For Douglass, who loves to garden and
plans to grow one at her new home in Claremont,
there was a lovely crystal vase. For Cassell, who
enjoyed walking the links of Springdale with his
friend Gillespie, a golf bag and a putter. For
Edwards, a new bicycle to replace one she rode to
class for thirty-eight years. For Irvine, a
watercolor of his beloved Speer Library and a PTS
rocking chair. For Nicholson, a lavender Chinese
jade pendant. For Willis, crystal figurines of
the Nativity.
Dr.
Gillespie presents Carolyn Nicholson with a gift
of Chinese jade.
The retirees had
their opportunity to respond, and most took time
for a serious moment.
They thanked the
Seminary community for work that really mattered.
Douglass spoke for all when she said she had had
the “finest colleagues and theological
students anywhere in the world” at
Princeton. She wished her students “strength
and courage for the ongoing tasks” they
would face.
Edwards realized
aloud that from her first year as a student, when
she “got the last room in Tennent
Hall,” to September 1998, she had spent half
of her life at Princeton Seminary. “That
first day feels like it was yesterday,” she
reflected. “It is my students that have made
it count. They are my letters of
recommendation.”
Perhaps Nicholson
said it best. “Princeton Seminary is about
people,” she said. “Princeton Seminary
is people — faculty, administrators,
students. They are our richest resource. This
Seminary has a treasure chest of people with
abilities; our students go beyond what we can
even imagine for them.”
The evening ended
with benediction and with song — this time a
blues arrangement of “They Are Falling All
around Us” sung by seminarian Carol Ann
North. She sang new words to the tune written by
Sweet Honey ’n the Rock founder Bernice
Johnson Reagon. Words of love for those who were
leaving and of commitment for those who would
stay.
“You’re
not really going to leave us;
You’re not really going to leave us;
You’re not really going to leave us;
It is your work that we do;
It is the hope that you bring;
It is your love that we share;
It is your song that we sing.” 
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