Category Archives: Around Town

Personal posts — some social justice (Not in Our Town), some faith-related (Princeton United Methodist Church), some I-can’t-keep-from-writing-this

Ann Yasuhara

Around Town, Faith and Social Justice, Memoir, , ,

 

Yasuhara June 1 2014

Ann Harris Yasuhara, 82, died at her home in Princeton, New Jersey, on Wednesday, June 11. A logician and computer scientist, she was known for combining her Quaker faith with action focused on peace, social justice, racial equality, and the environment. Her life balanced her love for the sacredness of all life, the compassionate concerns of a Quaker activist for the world and the local community, her delight in music, gardening, and art, and her generosity to friends and family.

Born on March 8, 1932 in Madison, Wisconsin, her parents were Julian Earle Harris (a French language educator at the University of Wisconsin who received the Legion of Honor) and Elizabeth Marshall Harris, a sculptor. She studied cooking and fashion design in Paris, attended Swarthmore College. and earned bachelors, masters, and PhD degrees in mathematics from the University of Illinois.

In 1970 she and her husband, Mitsuru, settled in a cozy little house and garden in Princeton and pursued their vibrant interests in mathematics, music, and art. Ever adventurous, they traveled widely, including regular trips to visit his family in Japan. Perhaps her favorite place was her garden.

In 1972 she joined the new department of computer science at Rutgers University, where she was an associate professor; she supervised the PhD theses of Frank Hawrusik, Venkataraman Natarajan, and Elaine Weyuker. Ileana Streinu, now the Charles N. Clark Professor of Computer Science and Mathematics at Smith College, remembers Ann’s classes on Recursive Function Theory and Logic and her textbook. “It was an exquisite topic, beautiful mathematics that Ann was conveying to generations of graduate students. In a department with only a few women on the faculty, she was a model to look up to. With grace and generosity, she touched my life and the lives of many students like me.”

Ann Yasuhara belonged to the living tradition of Quaker spirit-led peace and justice activists. Unflagging in her resistance to war and violence, she studied the philosophy and  methods of non-violent resolution of conflict with George Lakey, the noted Quaker peace activist. In turn, she led many training groups and action activities.

Within the Society of Friends (Quakers) she served terms at Princeton Friends Meeting as Clerk of the Meeting and clerk of the committee on peace and social concerns. She also served on committees in Philadelphia Yearly Meeting, an association of 103 Quaker meetings.

Most recently she enthusiastically supported — and went on protests with — the nonviolent direct action group, Earth Quaker Action Team (EQAT), which works to end mountaintop removal coal mining.  On her 79th birthday she protested on a strenuous mountain climb in West Virginia mining country. In January, just before she was diagnosed with cancer, the Philadelphia-based group honored her as one of its outstanding “wise elders.”

“Ann was a leader in the Quaker faith and an inspiration to all of us. She set the bar very high and gave us confidence to fight for a better world,” says Janet Gardner, a documentary film maker with the Gardner Group and a member of Princeton Friends Meeting .

Within the Princeton community, she helped found Silent Prayers for Peace, which keeps silent vigil every Wednesday in Palmer Square. She was a founding member of the Latin American Legal Defense and Education Fund (LALDEF) . As a founding member of Princeton’s Not in Our Town (NIOT), an interracial, interfaith social action group committed to racial justice, she was instrumental in creating programs that honor and support youth of diverse backgrounds. She also teamed with the Princeton Public Library to develop, through NIOT, thought-provoking community discussions on race, white privilege, bullying, and the environment. Her work withstudents was notable. She was a volunteer tutor, supported Committed Princetonians (a mentoring group), and served on the Minority Education Board of Princeton Regional Schools.

In 2010 Ann was featured in a U.S. 1 article about retirees who are making a difference.

She is survived by Mitsuru Yasuhara, her husband of 49 years; her godchildren Josue Rivera-Olds, Grecia N. Rivera, and Julio R. Rivera; cousins including ​Sarah Rogers Pyle Sener (Pikesville, Maryland), Jan Marshall Fox, J. Laird Marshall, Nancy Marshall  Bauer (Madison, Wisconsin), Jane Marshall (Birmingham, Alabama), Richard H. Marshall (Toronto, Canada), James R. Marshall (Gardnerville, Nevada), and Barbara Figge Fox (Princeton, New Jersey) and their families.

Interment was at Forest Hills cemetery in Madison, Wisconsin. A memorial service will be held on Saturday, July 5, at 2 p.m. at Princeton Friends Meeting. Donations in her memory may be made to any of the many charities she supported and/or to Princeton Friends Meeting, 470 Quaker Road, Princeton NJ 08540. For a list of the charities she supported, click here.

(This post is based on the obituary that appears at Kimble Funeral Home. Also it is on the Town Topics website. Photo by John Kelly was taken on June 1, 2014).

 

 

 

To Publicity Chairmen: Make it Easy

Around Town, Business, Faith and Social Justice, , , ,
kiwanis
With Robert Bullington, president of the Kiwanis chapter

Today I had a delightful lunch with the Kiwanis Club of Trenton at Leonardo’s II. The program chairman asked me to offer tips that would help this nearly 90-year-old chapter publicize the Times-Kiwanis Camp Fund, founded in 1955 in partnership with the then Trenton Times.

My 10-minutes talk focused on war stories, PR successes and failures, everything from the New Jersey State Button Society show to a Congo mission trip by Princeton United Methodist Church on behalf of UFAR. Titled “Make it Easy: Ask ‘How High,'” the talk focused on how to encourage donors to give, editors to print press releases, and individuals to leverage their connections.

Does anyone else want these tips? Have talk, will travel.

 

Debtors Prisons Here?

Faith and Social Justice

St_Briavels_Castle_Debtors_Prison

Debtors prisons in the U.S.? Surely not.

Yet investigations by NPR say that courts nationwide are sending the indigent to prison because they can’t pay court fines. Click here for a story by NPR’s Joseph Shapiro.

Surely not in Princeton.

But I saw how it might possibly, just maybe, happen. Last year I went to traffic court and watched people present their sad stories to the judge. “Pay your fine before the end of the day,” was the threat, “or you go to jail.” No money? no credit card? “Call some friends,” was the advice.

I didn’t stick around until the end of the day to see if anybody ended up in the hoosegow. And traffic court judges probably do need to use harsh threats for deadbeats. They are within their rights to do that. According to NPR, it is left up to the judge to figure out who has the money to pay and who is just crying poor.

So small a matter as a speeding ticket or a parking ticket is no problem for me, but could be a very big problem for someone struggling to pay rent. If you could pay your parking ticket right away, your court costs didn’t double. If you could pay a lawyer, you might get the traffic ticket charges reduced. If you couldn’t, you might lose your job because you can’t drive.

A judge in a Philadelphia suburb, according to WHYY Newsworks reporter Emma Jacobs, is unfairly targeting the poor , sending people directly to jail without the opportunity to get a lawyer. Click here for the story.

I don’t know whether our local judges — in Princeton, in Mercer County, in New Jersey — are sending vast numbers of people to jail for their inability to pay traffic court costs. I don’t know that any of our judges are making prejudiced decisions. (Full disclosure: Through Not in Our Town Princeton, I support the Princeton/Trenton campaign against what was labeled The New Jim Crow by Michele Alexander. Statistics show that black people go to jail for offenses for which whites go free.)

I do know that on that day in traffic court, the drivers of color were the ones having trouble paying the fines. The judge was not going easier on the white drivers — it was a classic case of the “rich get richer and the poor get poorer. ”

At least New Jersey does not charge its inmates for room and board. Click here for a state by state survey of fees.

NPR continues its coverage this week in Morning Edition and All Thing Considered.

(Image:  mid-Victorian depiction of the debtors prison at St Briavel Castle courtesy of Wikipedia Commons)

 

 

 

 

Ponder on the N-Word: May 23 and 24

Faith and Social Justice, ,

“Our dysfunction around race, racism and the N-word not only reflects our inability to collectively deal with nuance, it also shows how our creative energies are diminished because of this fiction called race.”  DSCF7019 poster cropped

So says Rhinold L2014 ponder posteramar Ponder, who has a two-day exhibition of art, poetry, rap, and music, The Rise and Fall of the N-word: Beyond Black and White, at the Carl Fields Center next weekend, Friday and Saturday, May 23 and 24. In addition to Ponder’s paintings, the show includes poetry, rap, a DJ — and logos he commissioned from artists around the world, pictured above.

For details click here.

Ponder says this world needs a public language and environment to honestly and productively discuss the issues of race.

Such an environment does exist in Princeton, I believe. Cosponsored by Not In Out Town and the Princeton Public Library, a forum called Continuing Conversations on Race and White Privilege is held on first Mondays at 7 p.m. at the library, October through June. These forums offer a friendly and confidential place to talk about important but often controversial subjects. The next Continuing Conversation is June 2.

Small Treasures and Where to Find Them

Dance and the other arts, , ,

BUTTON_MAY14(2)

Have talk, will travel. Current fave topic:  the world’s smallest antique, buttons.

Carol Meszaros and I will  talk about button collecting at the Lawrence Library on Thursday, May 8, at 7 p.m.  Everybody will have a “hands-on experience” and get to take some buttons home.

Another chance to learn about, and acquire button treasures, is at the New Jersey State Button Society show and sale to be held this Saturday, May 10, 9 to 4. It is at the Union Fire Company on River Road in Titusville, admission $2.

Carol, on2014 4 26 carol NancyBriggsMoss Alice Cruser the left in this picture, is looking through the button jars of Nancy Briggs Moser and Alice Cruser, who attended a talk we  gave at Kuser Farm Mansion last month.

For the Thursday talk, the headquarters branch of the Mercer County Library system is just off Business Route 1 on Darrah Lane. You can also get there from Princeton Pike.

If you have always wondered about your grandmother’s button jar, join us!

Eisgruber Bleeds Orange?

Around Town, Business,

President-Elect Chris EisgruberChristian Eisgruber, the new president of Princeton University, speaks at the Princeton Regional Chamber lunch on Thursday, May 8, at the Forrestal Marriott.

Raised Catholic, he recently discovered that he has Jewish heritage, and now describes himself as a non-theist Jew.

Another intriguing factoid: he used to teach a seminar on the Supreme Court and I’ll bet he has a strong opinion about the Court’s ruling on affirmative action. One of his missions as provost was to increase diversity on campus.

He’s the first president in 25 years to be an alumnus of the university: he is Class of 1989.

It was Jo Butler versus Bernie Miller and Sue Nemeth in the Democratic primary debate for Princeton Council, staged by the League of Women Voters. Click here to see and hear the dialogue.

My neighbor, Shane Farrell, emailed me about events showcasing Andrew Zwicker, running for Rush Holt’s Congressional seat. Fortunately, today’s issue of U.S. 1 tells me what I need to know about him. Click here.

Tonight, Wednesday, April 30, at 7:30 p.m. he will be at Princeton University’s Whig Hall Senate Chamber speaking with the Princeton College Democrats and the American Whig-Cliosophic Society of Princeton.

Tomorrow, Thursday, May 1, 7 p.m. he will be one of the candidates at ACLU primary debate at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Princeton. Registration is encouraged: Click here.

Other events are mentioned in the U.S. 1 story.

Zwicker’s opponents include two formidable women: Linda Greenstein and Bonnie Watson Coleman. But — like Holt, he is a product of Princeton Plasma Physics Lab. He is indeed a rocket scientist.