The Lark: Vol 4, Issue 6, September 2024

Remembering Don Harper

by Cathy Hurst

I was a friend of Don Harper’s for about five years before his death in 2017. I hiked with him in the Wednesday walking group, played Scrabble with him on Tuesday afternoons, and had the pleasure of his enrollment in two of the courses I coordinated.

Today, I’ve been asked to tell you a little bit about Don and especially his involvement in LLC (and, before that, in BCLIR, or the Brown Community for Learning in Retirement.)

I’ll start by telling you about the day I met Don. I joined LLC in the summer of 2012, and I signed up for an LLC-affiliated walking group that Don organized. I had been in Rhode Island only a year and didn’t have a great sense of the state’s geography. When I called Don to add my name to the walking group list, I mentioned that I didn’t really know how to get to the walking location. Then he said to me—a complete stranger—just come over to my house and I’ll drive you!

That’s how I got to know about Don’s kindness and generosity of spirit.

When I was preparing for these remarks, I received excellent input from a number of LLC members, so my thanks to Shirley DiMatteo, Ellen Fingeret, Carol Gjelsvik, Bob Goodwin, Marilyn Kaplan, Sam Ventres, and Sheila Zompa for sharing some of their thoughts about Don with me. Also thanks to the incredible Merrie Lavigne for toiling through the archives to unearth information on Don’s history with LLC.

One of the qualities that almost everyone mentioned about Don was his kindness. Later, after the LLC walking group had merged with Bob Goodwin’s weekly walking group, the walkers once got lost at Pulaski State Park, and some difficult recovery walking was required. One member recalls Don watching out for her to make sure she did not fall and catching her when she eventually tripped. Another member described how Don provided technical help at LLC and would often stay through an entire class (which he was not taking!) to help someone out. When he had been in a class, and someone needed help to get out to their car, he was the first to volunteer.

Another quality of Don’s, that gets a lot of mention, is his willingness to take a controversial stand on an issue. In fact, some might say he really enjoyed taking a contrarian stance and would sometimes do so just to get a discussion going. Only Don would participate in a course on Einstein and argue that Einstein’s mathematics were not well founded and were not original to him. “That’s ridiculous!” was a favorite exclamation of his, and sometimes we needed to say the same thing back to him! But that contrarian stance was often softened by the twinkle in Don’s eye—he had a great sense of humor.

Even when he wasn’t being contrarian, Don was a great conversationalist. One member reports that her discussions with Don were memorable and he was always interested in her views. She recalled after-Scrabble dinner conversations where she would always try to sit next to Don because he was never boring! A friend remembers that he loved learning and shared many new insights with his fellow Scrabble, hiking, and kayaking members during their after-event meals—whether they wanted to hear them or not! Someone who participated in a Providence Athenaeum reading group with him described him as an intelligent reader with a deep moral sense and concluded by saying that “the world needs more gentle contrarians like Don.”

Don was really a model lifelong learner. He was always up for new ideas and experiences. From the LLC semesters Fall 2010 through Spring 2017, Don took SEVENTY ONE LLC courses. And that doesn’t include all the courses he took from the time he joined BCLIR at Brown in 1997 up through the spring of 2009. LLC’s administrator, Merrie Lavigne, estimates that he took well over 100 courses during his tenure in the two programs—a record that is unlikely ever to be broken. Depending on your math skills, you may or may not have calculated that Don’s annual enrollment comes to about 10 courses a year, and he would often be taking four or five courses simultaneously. And he was always well-prepared for class and especially for discussions! He was an eclectic learner, taking courses in theatre, history, literature, art, psychology, philosophy, interdisciplinary studies, and science.

Don also coordinated classes—not as many as he took! but about one a year. The last two he coordinated in 2015 were a course on the “Human Journey,” and a course entitled “Brain Development from Childhood to Old Age (and Back Again?)”

In addition to his course work, he provided an enormous quantity of technical support for LLC. This gets at the heart of why we’re honoring him today. When Don died in 2017, his LLC friends created the Don Harper Technology Fund to honor Don’s history of support for LLC technology.

Back in the BCLIR days, Don took care of the technical equipment for classes—this was before most people did PowerPoint presentations, but there were often slides or movies to project. He carried the equipment around, stored it, and took it out as needed. One member reports that near the end of the organization’s stay at Brown University, the space for classes and storing equipment became very small. As a result, it was quite a struggle for him to do his volunteer job easily, but he never complained.

One member recalls that when she was new to LLC, she always would give an upcoming class presentation to Don on a thumb drive so he could make sure it was correct. Another member reports that when things went wrong technologically in the classroom, it was always good to have him around. “He seemed to know how to fix things and make everything OK,” she said. Another member told me that if you were giving a presentation, and needed help with the equipment, you would hunt for Don in one of the other classes (because he was there more often than he was not!) and he would immediately come to help you out.

And, as if 100 plus courses as a participant, 6 or more courses as a coordinator, and offering LOTS of technical support were not enough, Don and his beloved wife Lynn were among the most ardent supporters of the BCLIR organization. Don served as president of the organization among other volunteer responsibilities. And Lynn chaired the Curriculum Committee in 2008, the year before she died.

In his professional life, Don had worked as an accountant for General Electric and Corning Glass, and later as a teacher at the Alternate Learning Project high school in Providence. He was very proud of that teaching and learning commitment. He continued that commitment into his 20 years in BCLIR and LLC.

I think Don would be really moved to hear that his friends contributed to an LLC technology fund in his name. And happy to hear that those funds have been used to support our organization’s offering of hybrid classes, through the purchase of an Owl camera and a much larger TV screen.

We who knew Don are grateful for the gift of his friendship. And we miss him. Often in the walking or Scrabble groups, someone will say: “Wouldn’t Don love that!” or “That’s so Don!”

When people die, they leave traces of their lives behind in the memories of those who knew them. I like this quote from CS Lewis: “We possess each friend not less, but more, as the number of those with whom we share him increases." I hope that by sharing some of Don with you today you possess a little of his friendship, even if you didn’t know him personally. And for those of you who did know and love Don, I hope you feel your own possession of his friendship has increased.

Though he may no longer be in our classes, his spirit will live forever in our hearts.

Cathy Hurst, Susan Harper Goodwin (daughter of Don and Lynne Harper), and Shirley DiMatteo