Alumni News—Spring 2013

Tell Us Your Stories about Sister Ann Joachim, OP

The Alumni Office wants to expand its memory bank about Siena’s early faculty. We have dates and titles; but we want your memories—anecdotes and personal stories that help to bring those teaching legends to colorful life. Our first faculty focus is Sr. Ann Joachim.

Here’s what we know now: Teacher of Social Science, 1931-32, ’36-’38; Legal Counsel and Professor of History, 1939-71. Practicing attorney and the first nun admitted to practice law before the U.S. Supreme Court (1936). Known for her demanding oral exams (“If you don’t hear it the first time, there’s no second chance!”). Served as vice mayor and city commissioner in Adrian, 1971-75. Coached basketball. Also a tennis champion and licensed pilot. Fought to keep the Wabash Cannonball rolling up into Adrian.

What can you tell us?

Send your stories and recollections to:
SHU Alumni Office, 1247 E. Siena Heights Drive, Adrian, MI 49221
or email to alumni@sienaheights.edu.

From the Alumni Office:

Outstanding Faculty: The Heart of Siena Heights

Jennifer Hamlin Church Associate VP for Advancement & Director of Alumni Relations

From its earliest days, Siena Heights has been known for the quality and caring of our faculty: demanding and dedicated, wise and wonderful.

In 50 years as a women’s college, from 1919 through the 1960s, Siena teachers were almost all Adrian Dominican Sisters. Alumnae of those decades spoke (and still speak) with awe and affection of professors like Sisters Helene O’Connor and Jeannine Klemm in Studio Angelico; Sister Mary George in the business office; Sister Leonilla in the Little Theater; Sister Miriam Michael in the chemistry lab; Sister Ann Joachim in history class and on the basketball court.

As Siena Heights transitioned into coedu-cation at the end of the ‘60s, men appeared in the faculty as well as the student body. Fr. David Van Horn, who taught art for almost 30 years, was the first male teacher to become a long-time legend of the faculty. In 1979, a young John Wittersheim arrived in Studio Angelico and began teaching metalwork.

From the Alumni Association:

Be Part of this Incredible Time at Siena Heights!

Michael Lane ’05, President, Alumni Association Board of Directors

The night before I planned to write this column, I came home to my New York City apartment and found a card in the mail from SHU English professor Sr. Pat Schnapp, reflecting on what it meant to her to become an Honorary Alumna of Siena Heights at last year’s Homecoming.

Nothing in recent memory has brought such a smile to my face. How appropriate it was—since I was already planning to write about Siena’s effect on me over the past 13 years—to find this card from a long-time faculty member and recent alumni award winner in my mail.

It says so much about the Siena community that, almost 10 years after my graduation, I received a letter from Sister Pat. And that I had dinner recently with Doug Miller ‘74, another recent alumni award winner and chair of the theatre department, while he was in New York. And that, for the past few years I have had a constant online Scrabble game going with my acting mentor, professor and friend Mark DiPietro ’83.

In New York, I meet many people who have had great training in whatever they studied; but when I tell them about my experience at Siena, they grow jealous. Siena Heights is unique in the sense of community it provides, even long after graduation. Years, or decades, after you walked across the commencement stage, you still have a home at Siena. Even if the faces in the halls have changed, you can always stop in or pick up the phone and find someone ready to welcome you with open arms. No matter when you enter Siena, you will, for life, be a member of the community.