It wasn’t there—the building. It wasn’tthere anymore. The building had beenthere a few days earlier or was it the

day before? Now, suddenly, there wasonly a wall or two and a huge pile of rub-ble. It looked like there had been a cata-strophic earthquake right at that spot. Oran instant, if messy, Greco-Roman ruin.

There had been a fence around Ducey Gym—orwhat used to be called Ducey Gym—at ClaremontMcKenna College for quite some time. But it was stilla shock a few weeks ago when, turning onto SixthStreet, I saw that the large gymnasium that had beenthere for decades was gone. Poof!

No more.History. A memory. A picture.I knew that the lovely swimming pool at Scripps

College where I spent hundreds of happy summer af-ternoons was also a memory and had been for manyyears. But it was still weird, if not a shock, when, notlong before Ducey Gym disappeared, I ventured ontothe northeast portion of the Scripps campus to wherethe pool used to be and found myself surrounded by at-tractive residential units. There was a small waterfall,lending to a nice, resort-like vibe, but there was defi-nitely no swimming pool there.

Not only did I know that the pool was long gone, Iknew that another swimming pool had been built notfar from the site, as part of an impressive athletic facil-ity, with well-groomed fields and a handsome building.Still, it was a jolt seeing this all up close and realizingthat the old pool really wasn’t there.

It was even more of a jolt a few years ago when Isaw that the pool at Harvey Mudd College, where Ialso spent a fair amount of time, especially after the oldScripps pool was closed, was replaced by a large build-ing. I’m not even sure when it was gone—it seemed tohappen overnight—and I still have a hard time not pic-turing the pool, rather than the building, standing outalong Twelfth (now Platt) Street. Maybe this is becauseI grew up hearing my father talk about swimming there

every day at noon, rain or shine, when he taught there.Now the really remarkable thing is that when I was a

very young child, before going to the Harvey Muddand old Scripps pools, my family would go swimmingat a pool at CMC, which used to be where Ducey Gym(now) was.

On the same visit—when I saw what was where theScripps’ pool used to be—it was nice to see that thegarden with the wall on which departing graduateshave painted messages over the years still exists on an-other part of campus. Some of the messages date backto the 1920s and 1930s.

And it is nice to see that, even with the old pool notthere and with the new housing units and the new ath-letic facilities, Scripps is still arguably the loveliest ofthe colleges in Claremont, with its gardens and court-yards and Mediterranean architecture. This isn’t to saythat there aren’t plenty of very pleasant spots on theother campuses.

The wall at Scripps with the class messages from thelast 80 or so years is a reminder that the colleges arestill here, still carrying out their noble mission, still avital and integral part of Claremont. This weekend,with all the commencement exercises and speeches andproud parents and friends, and with another group ofstudents writing on the wall after spending a critical,enriching part of their lives here in Claremont, is like-wise a reminder of this.

As the wall and the graduations show quite elo-quently, this is the case even as Ducey Gym has beentorn down, even as a major new science building (orcomplex?) is going up at Pomona College, even asmuch of the Harvey Mudd College campus is different.Even as dorms change, even as swimming pools andbuildings disappear, even as there are areas of the cam-puses that are unrecognizable or are becoming unrec-

ognizable (whether eventually or over a weekend), stu-dents keep coming and students keep going with theirlives shaped and forever changed by their years here.

These changes tend to be for the better, as with nicerhousing or with improved laboratories. No doubt theyare a big part of why the students keep coming. Nodoubt they are a critical factor in the colleges’ missionand renown.

Whether or not they are for the best, these changesare sometimes not easy. I still miss the old Scripps poolwith its cozy garden-like setting and mosaics and, as Isaid, can’t quite believe that the Harvey Mudd poolwhere my dad swam for decades is gone.

Another uneasy change at The Colleges is the retire-ment of Leonard Pronko after teaching for an incredi-ble 57 years—longer than my life—mostly in thetheater department at Pomona College. This surelyisn’t a change for the better but, as was noted at anevent two weeks ago, there is great gratitude that hewill still be in Claremont and still with an interest in thetheater program at The Colleges.

I wrote here in the fall that Mr. Pronko is all but alegend at Pomona College, if not in Claremont. He isbest-known for his expertise in and direction of Kabukiproductions. For most of my life in Claremont, I havebeen aware of his work in the theater department,which began a few years after his arrival at Pomona,and also included many works by European play-wrights like Ibsen and Faydeau. That he will no longerbe doing this is something of a jolt. I find it strange andsad.

But the celebration earlier this month was entirelyappropriate. Mr. Pronko was elegant and eloquent evenas he said that demonstrating Kabuki “is too hard onmy knees,” in joyful conversation with Thomas Leab-hart, another longtime faculty member of the theaterdepartment, and Sam Gold, a 2011 Pomona Collegegraduate who was taught and directed by Mr. Pronkoand Mr. Leabhart and who has gone on to do theaterwork all over the world. It was another reminder of thecomings and goings that are very much a part of TheColleges’ ongoing, vital work.

Claremont COURIER/Friday, May 16, 2014 6

observerobserver

Changing as hey stay the sameBy John Pixley

DEMYSTIFYING SUSTAINABILITYpage 9

“Make it good, Helen. We’re on prime time.”