Did you ever look back at your school years and wish that you had been in the class of a certain teacher? Mr. Finch is featured in volume 11, number 3, and this triggered a string of memories that make me wish that I knew the guy a little better.
One was when I had a journalism assignment to "take some pictures of the foreign language department". I was a student of French, and Mr. Finch taught Spanish... but he was in the office when I wandered in there wondering "what in the heck am I going to do about this". With some trepidation, I asked Mr. Finch if he had any ideas, and he immediately went into the language lab, opened up the console, exposing switches and wiring, and made a wonderful pose acting like he was trying to figure out what was broken...
He could have said "go away, I'm busy"... he could have played like he was reading a Spanish dictionary, but that wasn't his style. I didn't even know the guy, but he thought up one of the most fun and interesting pictures I took at Cubberley.
This sort of playfulness should have given me a clue, but it wasn't until year later when I read Wendy Lesser's "The Amateur", where she described the many facets of this wonderful guy, that I really thought "that would've been a neat teacher to study under".
Check out the article "Mr. Richard finch: artist, fencer, linguist", and also, especially if you remember this guy, go read Wendy's book. One of these days I'll figure out how to put one of those links in here that gives me a nickel if you go buy the book from amazon, but it's too late tonight.
I also should upload the picture of Mr. Finch in the language lab... later. (here it is April 2008 finally...)
One was when I had a journalism assignment to "take some pictures of the foreign language department". I was a student of French, and Mr. Finch taught Spanish... but he was in the office when I wandered in there wondering "what in the heck am I going to do about this". With some trepidation, I asked Mr. Finch if he had any ideas, and he immediately went into the language lab, opened up the console, exposing switches and wiring, and made a wonderful pose acting like he was trying to figure out what was broken...
He could have said "go away, I'm busy"... he could have played like he was reading a Spanish dictionary, but that wasn't his style. I didn't even know the guy, but he thought up one of the most fun and interesting pictures I took at Cubberley.
This sort of playfulness should have given me a clue, but it wasn't until year later when I read Wendy Lesser's "The Amateur", where she described the many facets of this wonderful guy, that I really thought "that would've been a neat teacher to study under".
Check out the article "Mr. Richard finch: artist, fencer, linguist", and also, especially if you remember this guy, go read Wendy's book. One of these days I'll figure out how to put one of those links in here that gives me a nickel if you go buy the book from amazon, but it's too late tonight.
I also should upload the picture of Mr. Finch in the language lab... later. (here it is April 2008 finally...)
