Features

As COVID-19 swept the country this summer and fall, Sewanee welcomed students back to campus—and then kept them here—for a full semester of in-person education. Here’s how.

Generations of Sewanee students recall lifelong lessons learned from a legendary geology professor, while a new endowment supporting field education is established to honor his decades of inspirational teaching.

A Sewanee history professor’s archaeological excavation shines a light on a dark corner of local history in which Black prisoners were forced to mine coal without pay in Reconstruction-era Grundy County.

As we continue marking 55 Years of Black Alumni at Sewanee, we celebrate a young entrepreneur who’s helping change the way the world shops for skin-care products.

Fifty years after he became the first Black graduate of the College of Arts & Sciences, Judge Nathaniel “Bubba” Owens, C’70, reflects on a lifetime of firsts.

With fitness, health and counseling services, and the Sewanee Outing Program all housed in one spectacular location, Sewanee’s newly opened Wellness Commons relocates student well-being to the center of campus and campus life.

New University Chaplain Peter Gray starts his dream job with a host of challenges, a family history of activism, and a desire to “make a space for everybody.”

Reuben Brigety agreed to be Sewanee’s 17th vice-chancellor just weeks before the world exploded in crisis. Now, with his tenure starting during one of the most challenging periods in Sewanee history, the global statesman will draw on a world of experience to lead the University.

An alumnus shepherds the unexpected gift of a major plant collection that promises unparalleled learning opportunities for Sewanee botany students.

Through a decade of leadership, an historian presides over an historic period of growth and change at Sewanee.

In the face of an economically disastrous pandemic, Charleston wine distributor Harry Root, C’97, leads a nationwide effort to save independent eateries.

Classics Professor Chris McDonough grapples with the unexpected realities of remote teaching—and tries to remember what day it is.

Psychology Professor Karen Yu wants you to know that your professors miss you. And here are some of the reasons why.

In the fight against a global pandemic, Assistant Professor of Biology Clint Smith’s work has taken him from a research lab in Sewanee to a testing lab in Chattanooga.

While 16 Sewanee students enjoyed a once-in-a-lifetime spring break adventure on the Rio Grande, the world beyond the canyon was changing in ways they couldn’t imagine.

What happens when everybody goes home, but you can’t?

In the coronavirus crisis, a Sewanee English professor, alumna, and mother of a member of the Class of 2020 finds echoes of tragedies past.

With a popular podcast, best-selling books, and hard-earned lessons from her own life, Laura Adams, C’90, has built a loyal following for a kinder, gentler brand of personal-finance advice.

Assistant Professor of Art History Alison Miller closely studies woodblock prints from a fascinating period in the history of Japan and its monarchy.

After five years, a Sewanee-led project to address deforestation, grow coffee, sequester carbon, and provide a brighter future for farmers in Haiti’s Central Plateau region shows promising results.

After more than a century of active forest management, Sewanee teams up with the Nature Conservancy to create a plan for the future of the Domain with an emphasis on biodiversity and resilience.

Mandy Moe Pwint Tu, C’21, wanted to know what it would look like if the University community were represented more broadly in Sewanee’s public spaces. Now, thanks to an art professor and her students, she has an answer.

How do you address an epidemic of homelessness among veterans? To Sewanee student Caiti Berends, the answer was simple: Build a community.

After years of study by Sewanee faculty, students, and alumni, the logs of Rebel’s Rest are giving up their secrets.

James Dunaway, C’17, makes a record-breaking ride through the mountains of North Georgia.

From baking bread to fermenting kimchi, Sewanee Dining’s Food Literacy Project cooks up ways for students to learn more about the origins, health implications, and environmental impacts of what they eat

Bethany Davis, C’07, has used lessons from Sewanee and a lifetime in aviation to become a program director at aerospace leader Gulfstream and one of the few women to reach such lofty heights at the company.

David Johnson, C'19, prepares to travel the world to find ways to help his own country heal.

After the birth of her first child and a struggle with postpartum depression, a singer-songwriter shifts gears.

This summer, a new pavilion will be built in Lost Cove using wood from pine trees that Sewanee forestry students helped plant more than 50 years ago. Current students were involved in every step of the harvesting process, from measuring and selecting trees to milling the lumber. Here’s what it looked like.

At the University Farm, Chris Hornsby, C’19, and his team of hard-working fly larvae are working to change how the world converts food waste to useful compost.

Julian Adams, C’94, dedicates 13 years of his life to telling the story of the courageous sacrifice of a Vietnam War pararescue medic in a major motion picture—starring Samuel L. Jackson and Ed Harris—to be released this summer.

A student investment team looks to do well and do some good with a $2 million portion of the University’s endowment.

In Chattanooga, Charlotte Caldwell, C’05, looks to transform the contemporary-art scene in the Southeast with an ambitious dream and a 75,000-square-foot remnant of the family business.

Inspired by a summer internship, a junior politics major works to enlighten fellow students about the worst humanitarian crisis of our time.

In his latest book, an English professor and former dean of the College considers the spiritual experience of place in American literature and explores how a Sewanee program helps students find their place in a place—wherever that might be.

Sewanee’s home for theatre and dance celebrates two decades of learning by building, creating, and performing.

Tapped as the first female translator of Ovid's Metamorphoses into English verse, Classics Professor Stephanie McCarter takes a hard look at the way sexual violence has been—and might be—portrayed in translations of the myths.

Sewanee theater grad Jordan Craig, C’11, was on the verge of giving up acting. Then the Phantom called.

We asked residents of each of Sewanee’s 19 residence halls to show us the new flags Professor Emeritus Waring McCrady, C’59, designed to represent each hall. View the slideshow below to see the flags and learn the meanings of their designs.

Nearly a half-century after leaving his native Tanzania, Sewanee Art Professor Pradip Malde returned—with a big camera and a Guggenheim fellowship—to document lives affected by a widely condemned but culturally entrenched surgical practice.

Two Class of ’76 alumni explore Sewanee, sports, and cultural history to tell the true story of the 1899 football team in a forthcoming documentary film.

Scientists from around the Southeast descend on Sewanee to survey bat populations and get a look at the kind of ecological research being conducted on the Domain.

Meet a handful of the more than 250 students who spent the sunny season gaining valuable experience in Sewanee-supported internships.

Two Sewanee grads from families steeped in American distillery history find their way, separately, to a conservation effort aimed at protecting the trees needed for the production of some storied spirits.

Thirty-seven years after leaving Sewanee following her freshman year, Jayne Bibb came back to the Mountain as a 56-year-old sophomore. And after earning a bachelor’s degree, she decided she wasn’t done just yet.

Descendants of a slave trading family come to Sewanee to search for their history and find it tangled up with the University’s own painful truth about its founding.

A Sewanee alumnus’s VISTA project grows into a start-up business that offers local residents a welcome alternative to high-interest predatory lending.

Sewanee Professor Jim Peters brings a philosopher’s perspective to an extracurricular passion.

A student’s years-long involvement with a local rural medical clinic fosters deep connections to people and place, and prepares her for a future career.

Students and professors in a variety of disciplines take advantage of Sewanee’s local ecology to engage in water and water-systems research that is as deep as it is wide.

Sewanee’s student investment club notches big returns for the University’s endowment—and for members’ postgraduate employment prospects.

A Sewanee biology professor and her students look to shed new light on an age-old debate—by scaring some tiny fish.

Sewanee’s flourishing civic engagement program reaches beyond the Domain to prove that a crucial part of preparing students for success is giving them opportunities to interact meaningfully with the communities and people around them.

At a Nashville startup, a Sewanee physics graduate and neuroscientist uses big data to find new ways to fight the country’s opioid epidemic.

An intriguing work of art owned by the University and hiding in plain sight inspires a multidisciplinary investigation involving students and faculty in fields ranging from chemistry and classics to theatre arts and medieval studies.

The University Farm explores an experimental aquaponics system to grow vegetables and save water on and beyond the Domain.

When students and community members join Sewanee’s annual herd cull, it’s not just for sport and meat—the hunt helps balance ecological interests and protect biodiversity on the Domain.

Editor Adam Ross staffs the venerable Sewanee Review from a single source—recent Sewanee graduating classes.

A student’s chance meeting with a Kashmiri royal leads to a Sewanee drone research program that’s ready to take off and fly.

As tensions between the United States and North Korea continue to rise, a Sewanee history professor recounts her recent trip to the heart of the Hermit Kingdom.

Exponential growth in the number of career-exploration internships limited to Sewanee applicants helps students find their way from the classroom to the boardroom and beyond.

A Sewanee professor reads the landscape of the South Cumberland Plateau and finds its human history written—in the soil, on the rocks, and under the trees—just clearly enough to be legible.

How a Sewanee history professor became Peru’s first ambassador to Ireland.

A new memoir from Kelly Grey Carlisle, C’98, tells the story of an abandoned baby, a murdered mother, and an unorthodox childhood in a Los Angeles marina.

Professors from two continents team up to survey the health of the Tennessee River—for all of its 652 miles—one stroke at a time.

Former first-generation college student Krissy DeAlejandro, C’01, helps make college dreams come true for thousands of Tennessee students.

How our favorite long hike went from century-old pipe dream to top-line item on every Sewanee bucket list.

Bryn Huntpalmer, C’08, builds a thriving—and profitable—podcast business by inviting mothers to tell their birth stories.

In the days before commencement, we asked 14 graduating seniors to share one treasured object they’re taking with them when they leave the Mountain.

History Professor Woody Register’s deep dive into a noted social reformer’s archive uncovers a fascinating and long-forgotten account of life in a children’s street gang in 19th-century New York City.

A Sewanee professor and her students collect stories about places on the South Cumberland Plateau to compile a rich topography of personal history.

A Sewanee Rhodes Scholar digs into the science to offer a humane road map to reversing global warming.

A Sewanee sophomore sets his sights on the 2020 Olympics.

Informed by her own personal history, Associate Professor of Politics Mila Dragojevic travels the world to examine the conditions that lead to refugee crises, violence against civilians, and genocide.

A distinctly Sewanee mystery begins with a work of art that conceals an older work of art and continues with a deep dive into a little-known episode of mid-20th-century University history.

Assistant Professor of Biology Kristen Cecala and her students are answering questions about how animal species might respond to climate change, one salamander at a time.

By cataloging and preserving the world’s oldest art, photographer Stephen Alvarez, C’87, is providing clues to understanding the human condition at its very origin.

The Sewanee Outing Program takes on a 14,000-foot Colorado peak in subzero temperatures and a massive snowstorm.

Jimmy Hagood, C’78, left the insurance industry to build a Southern specialty-food empire—and to become one of the country’s most decorated barbecue pitmasters along the way.

Inspired by one of its members, a Sewanee fraternity revitalizes a significant campus historic site.

A freshman volleyball player fights through cancer to play the sport she loves at the college she fell in love with.

With new writers and a new look, Editor Adam Ross’s debut issue hopes to find a place on your bedside table.

Biology Professor Kirk Zigler and his students make remarkable finds in the caves of Sewanee and beyond.

As speechwriter and communications adviser to two mayors and co-author of a new book, Michael Cass, C’93, tells the story of the country’s hottest city.

A new Domain initiative shows that a working forest can benefit students, the local economy, and the planet.

From Saturday Night Live to the White House, from Texas to Malawi, producer, activist, and humanitarian Meredith Walker, C’91, is changing the world by being herself.

One Sewanee student’s summer internship places him at the heart of the European refugee crisis.

We asked members of this fall’s freshman class to share one thing they brought to Sewanee to connect them to where they came from. Here’s what they showed us.

Every Sewanee student has a backstory, but few of those tales have the plot twists of Leonce Nshuti’s long and winding road from child refugee to Ivy League postgraduate.

In the final lecture of his distinguished teaching career, longtime Professor of Religion Jerry Smith waxed eloquent on competence, compassion, and “those damn rocks.”

Stephen Carmody looks to the South Cumberland Plateau’s prehistory to test an idea that could help solve a global food crisis: Cultivate the overlooked plants eaten by Sewanee’s ancient Native American residents.

A Sewanee professor and her students are preserving first-century graffiti with 21st-century tools.

Photographer Preston Merchant, C’90, travels to Kathmandu to chronicle Nepalis’ efforts to recover from disaster.

A near-fatal car accident and a botched surgery left Clay Byars, C’97, paralyzed from the eyes down. In a new memoir, he recounts his harrowing journey back from a life trapped in his own body.

In its second year, a University-led summer meal program is a win-win solution, feeding kids and employing dining service workers.

Assistant Professor of Psychology Katie Nelson wants you be happy—and she’ll tell you how to do it.

In the weeks after the U.S.-Iran nuclear deal went into effect, NPR producer Emily Ochsenschlager, C’03, traveled to the Islamic republic to find out what the future holds.

Sandy Gilliam, the University’s first and only full-time Domain ranger, patrols 13,000 acres and teaches all who meet him what it means to really know a place.

Jewlz Davis, C’16, is introducing high school students to new ideas about masculinity—if he can just get them to focus.

Chase Spurlock, C’09, and his biotech startup explore the mysteries of the human genome to provide faster diagnoses for autoimmune disorders.

When Nashville’s top chefs want locally sourced gourmet mushrooms, they turn to two young Sewanee alumni.

One student’s novel research project explores a new growing strategy on the University Farm.

As University Choirmaster Robbe Delcamp prepares to put down his baton, we take a look inside the program he’s built over 37 years.

Behold how good: Sewanee students, faculty, staff, and administrators come together to talk about what it means to live in a diverse community.

A student-led effort to address diabetes in local communities leads to a new academic course and a flourishing outreach program.

Video game designer Brian Reynolds, C’90, makes a career out of interesting decisions.

James Mason, C’07, is one half of The Roosevelts, a Nashville-based duo that is looking to its fans to serve as its record company for the band’s debut full-length album.

Postcards from University Archives depict yesterday’s Sewanee in timeless style.

A LiDAR imaging project provides the most detailed topographical maps of the University’s landholdings ever created, and an invaluable research tool for students and faculty in disciplines from forestry and geology to history and archaeology.

With a distinct sense of style and a willingness to share personal stories, fashion blogger and Instagrammer Bess Pearson, C’18, finds an audience—and a business—online.

You can hardly swing a felis mortuus in Sewanee without hitting a classical allusion. Classics Professor Chris McDonough explicates a few of the more interesting examples—from the sacred to the profane—for your edification and entertainment.

French Professor George Poe and a group of Sewanee students were in Paris on the night of the Nov. 13 terrorist attacks. Here is their story, along with Poe’s thoughts about the future of study abroad in the wake of such tragedy.

Sewanee’s latest Rhodes Scholarship finalist has one eye on the future and one on the Miami Dolphins.

Sewanee students and faculty conducting a pioneering—and distinctly eusocial—study of Haitian ants get some help from a leading expert.

In the wake of the Charleston church shootings, a Sewanee history major finds herself at the intersection of broken history and breaking news, searing pain and soaring hope, unthinkable violence and unimaginable grace.

For the first-ever Farm to Table Fest, residents of Sewanee's Health & Wellness House served up a meal that was super-fresh and hyper-local.

How Kevin Wilson's debut novel made it from Sewanee to Hollywood.

This summer, the field portion of a Sewanee course on global environmental change introduced students to the volcanic history, unique wildlife, and breathtaking vistas of the Land of Fire and Ice.

First-year students in this year's FYP program enjoyed a two-day master class with America's preeminent novelist/poet/environmentalist/farmer.