Kenneth Tompkins

Blogging 40 Kenneth Tompkins

Here are 44 essays that chronicle the writing of Reaching 40, a history of Stockton University published in 2011.

These essays were triggered by an issue, a problem, an incorrect assumption in telling the history of the University. For example, we wondered how many of the original faculty were still living? The issue seemed to be easily solved - look them up on line in the comprehensive resources offered for such research. So we chose one early faculty member named Stan Leavitt. We searched on his name, found a few such named persons, and then eliminated all of them. We never found Stan! The result of that search is Essay 10.

The essays, ten years after the publication of Reaching 40, still seem significant in that they provide insights into how we thought about the history of the College, the personalities who taught here, the issues we faced or ignored, the changes that were made and the insistence that the unique qualities of the institution deserved preservation.