Wirtz’s Inspiration Lingers
Lori Sonnier ’94 painted this scene some 25 years after taking a photo during a visit to Pitt Ranch with Professor Bill Wirtz.
When I picked up the Spring 2021 issue of PCM, I was sad to hear that Professor Bill Wirtz had passed away. I took several classes with him while I was at Pomona, and the field trips we took to Pitt Ranch and the Granite Mountains were some of the most memorable experiences of my academic life at Pomona. I really enjoyed Professor Wirtz’s classes and appreciated how knowledgeable he was about so many plants and animals.
After Pomona, I went on to study ecology in graduate school and work in corporate environmental management for a decade. Around 2009, when I had three sons ages 5 and under, I stopped the corporate environmental work to focus on my family. At that time, I began taking painting classes and I really enjoy landscape painting. This oil painting is called “Spring Renewal.” I painted it from a photo that I took in Spring 1992 on a field trip to Pitt Ranch with Prof. Wirtz’s class. While we were there, the hills around the ranch looked beautiful as they were covered with poppies and lupine. I snapped a bunch of photos with my camera during that trip and decided to paint from them 25 years later. It’s a nice memory of Pomona.
—Lori Sonnier ’94
Austin, Texas
The Boy and the Bobcat
What amazing bobcat images in the recent issue of PCM by David Lonardi, your 12-year-old campus neighbor. Taking good stop-action shots of a fast-moving subject with a high-power telephoto lens is not easy, and he got it. We have a budding photographer in our midst.
—Austin Wertheimer, M.D. P ’03
Brookline, Massachusetts
Another Look at Ved Mehta
I noted a typo in the obituary for Ved Mehta. He was in the class of 1956, not 1952, the year he would have entered Pomona College. I was in the class of 1957 and knew him, sharing at least one history class where the professor deferred to him and often asked him to comment. Some years ago, during a visit to the Century Association in New York, Ved’s club, he said to me, “Andrew, how nice to see you again.” I believed I was being seen by him.
—Andrew Hoyem ’57
San Francisco
Mark Wood: An Appreciation
Pomona College and so many of us will miss Mark Wood’s stellar career at the College producing award-winning, enticing and magnificent issues of PCM. I can’t imagine a person who could fill his shoes! He brought the publication to high levels never before dreamed of. His national recognition for the publication has not gone unnoticed by any of us in the Pomona community and beyond. I’m deeply grateful for all that he has done to enhance the lives of alumni and current community members as, with each issue, we broaden our understanding of the College, its people and the work that goes on at Pomona.
Bravo!
—Marylyn Pauley ’64, P ’87, GP ’21
Trustee Emerita
Ketchum, Idaho