Author Archives: Melissa Kean

The immediate problem once we decided to build the new stadium was how to pay for it. Rice was prohibited by its charter from incurring debt (this restriction stood until the early 2000s, when we did one of our periodic … Continue reading →

A loyal reader recently sent me a scan of a Houston street map that was produced by Shell, the kind of map, I think, that you could get at gas stations. I don’t see a date on it anywhere but … Continue reading →

There aren’t a whole lot of pictures of the Bonner Lab, and the ones I do have are almost all of the outside: I’ve only ever seen a couple images taken inside. The first one provides almost no clue to … Continue reading →

I’ve mentioned before that I routinely troll eBay for Rice materials. In the course of this business a couple of weeks ago I stumbled upon something unexpected. There are always a lot of archival photos from various newspapers–mostly sports related–but … Continue reading →

Sometimes when I don’t know where to start I just go all the way back to the beginning. This is Katherine Martha Fischer. We would know her later as Mrs. Drew but here it’s 1944 and she’s a graduating senior … Continue reading →

I found these, undated and otherwise unlabeled, in a packet in a box of things from Space Science. They are hard at work, building something: Maybe working late, with pizza for dinner: I don’t know where they are, what they’re … Continue reading →

I’ve been thinking we haven’t had a good aerial in a while, then I suddenly found two. Both show things that I’m interested in and that have long since disappeared. This first one was sent to me by my friend … Continue reading →

Sorry for the long absence–I was distracted. But I’ve recently been trying to pull together the history of the Rice Quantum Institute, which has not proven to be an easy task. The records are spotty and scattered through several collections, … Continue reading →

Thirty years on campus spent carefully noticing my surroundings have made my experience something like the movie Groundhog Day. So much stays the same that anything different pops out immediately. So a couple of days ago I nearly jumped when … Continue reading →

I have a couple more pictures from the Tsanoff collection that were clearly taken on the same day that we caught young Katherine on the path between the privet hedges. This first one caught me by surprise: That’s little Katherine … Continue reading →