Three Days at Rice

From 1993-97, Steve served as Alumni Governor at Rice University and had a hand in establishing the Baker Institute for Public Policy, a nonpartisan, data-driven policy research organization located on the Rice campus. On Thursday, October 26 we had the pleasure of attending a gala dinner celebrating the first 30 years of this think tank and hearing the views of three former U.S. Secretaries of State.

Henry Kissinger, the 56th Secretary of State, is now 100 and was unable to come, but he sent a video expressing his appreciation for the work of the Institute. James A. Baker, III and Hillary Rodham Clinton, the 61st and 67th Secretaries respectively, were greeted with thunderous applause, while pro-Palestinian protestors confined a safe distance away shouted as loud as they could. Baker is now 93 and it was Clinton’s 76th birthday. They discussed, with great civility and respect, foreign policy issues for 45 minutes with Moderator Norah O’Donnell of CBS Evening News. It was a fascinating evening, as you can see for yourself in this transcript or this YouTube video.

David Satterfield, Director of the Baker Institute, was represented by a video sent from Israel. On October 15, President Biden had appointed him Special Envoy for Middle East Humanitarian Issues. Rice President Reginald DesRoches introduced the program which took place in an enormous tent adjacent to the Institute. There were 83 other tables like ours, each seating ten–840 people in all, plus lots of efficient servers. Food and drink were delicious and plentiful. Here are the family members, including the parents of our dear son-in-law Sean Eidson, and friends we invited to join us.

The next day, Steve, Shelby, and I accompanied our grandson Stephen on a tour of the campus. He’s in his sophomore year at Anderson High School in Austin, where he plays on the golf team. The tour provided helpful insights into today’s college application process. It also gave us the opportunity to view some of our favorite artworks on the Rice campus. Here is “Endeavor Installation” a 9-piece glass work by Lino Tagliapietra in Fondren Library.

As an avid fan of Jaume Plensa’s wonderful works of steel letters or mathematical symbols, I was thrilled to show young Stephen and Shelby Plensa’s “Mirror.” installed for Rice’s 100th anniversary in 2012. Click here to see more Plensa works in other places around the world.

Rice has eleven residential colleges that are the basis of student life; one of them is named after Margaret Roott Brown, where I lived as a senior. Remembering how much fun I had at Brown College’s 50th Anniversary in 2016, I had contacted the current president of Brown, Jae Kim, who invited Steve and me and another Brown President, Ann Patton Greene, to an early dinner at Brown on Friday. We were thrilled to meet the Brown Magisters, the Resident Associates and their families, and four current officers. Brown was all female when Ann and I were there; it became co-ed in 1987. There have been other changes, but creativity and caring remain remain strong. The current officers presented us with dishes and tee shirts imprinted with Brown’s crest. The motto I picked for Brown in 1965 endures: Tende bene, alta pene: Strive well, aim high.

After dinner at Brown we attended a concert by Rice’s Shepherd School Symphony Orchestra with my niece Kate and her husband Willy. Kate has a new position as a transfusion specialist nurse in M.D. Anderson’s hemovigilance unit at the Texas Medical Center. Willy is a video editor and plays steel guitar in a band. I enjoyed showing them the four studios my mother (Kate’s paternal grandmother Patti) had donated to the Shepherd School 34 years ago. We happened to meet Jon Kimura Parker, who teaches piano in Studio 1117. I had heard him play at the Music Teachers Association Convention in Kansas City in 2003. Kate took a photo of us together.

Beyond Rice: on Saturday morning while the two Stephens and Jay played golf with Trey Wilkinson at the Champions Club, Shelby and I visited the Cullen Sculpture Garden at the Museum of Fine Arts and the Rothko Chapel in Houston. It was a beautiful day for discovering art works and a meditation space new to us. This album shows more works in the Cullen Garden.

Saturday afternoon Shelby and Stephen returned to Austin. We four cousins went to the Rice-Tulane football game and dined together at China Garden, the Collinses’ favorite restaurant for 50 years. One last photo sums up for me a memorable weekend: a view from the pressbox at Rice stadium of some of the 54 buildings in the Texas Medical Center, where my brother Joel worked as a neuropathologist for many years and where his daughter Kate works now.