<p>Hey fellow Carls, I was recently curious to know more about the notable alumni/ faculties of the Carleton College, so I did some searching over the internet. But when I checked the most common website (Wikipedia), I was really disappointed to see very few notable people associated with Carleton compared to that of other similar LACs. I also checked the articles of many other similar colleges (Williams, Amherst, Middlebury, Swarthmore, Haverford) in Wikipedia, and all of them seem to have a very long list of notable people. In fact, all of them had a separate article (whose link was provided in the main article) that exclusively listed the name of notable alumni/ faculty associated with that particular college, while Carleton had relatively very few people crammed in the main article of the college.</p>
<p>Since my information is based solely on the Wikipedia article, I think the list provided by them is highly incomplete. I mean how could Carleton have merely 60-70 notable alumni while other comparable colleges (established around same time) have over 300?</p>
<p>Could someone please explain me why is this the case? Does Carleton really have so few notable people associated with them? Or, is it just the Wikipedia article that is incomplete? Could anyone provide a more comprehensive list of famous people involved with Carleton? Thanks!</p>
<p>Yes, I agree that it’s vague to define “notable people” and more often than not, it can be disputable. But still, people who have gained a certain degree of success in almost any field (such as academics, acting, business, medicine, law, science, technology, engineering, government positions, presidents, sports, writing and journalism etc) can be termed as being notable. If you would check Wikipedia articles on these topics, you’d know what I am talking about. Almost all other top colleges have at least one Nobel Laureate associated with them, while Carleton doesn’t have any. I am not making any generalizations about Carleton based solely on this, but still it feels quite unsettling to have relatively fewer “notable people” listed in Wikipedia than that of other peer LACs.</p>
<p>From what I understand, Carleton has changed a lot throughout its existence. At one time it had an agricultural school, at another it was used to train soldiers for WWII. My guess is that although it does have a strong history of academic excellence, it was not on the radar for the types of kids who go on to pursue famous careers as much as the schools out East. To some extent, this is still true. Although it does attract many bright kids, they are not necessarily the types of kids who go to pursue fame. Many of them become college professors, lawyers, or other highly successful people, but they tend to be more the academic type, and so often fly under the public radar.</p>
<p>I also know of a lot of notable Carleton faculty and alumni who aren’t on the list (actually, I could probably add some of them to the article since I have an account…)</p>
<p>Here are some more alumni:
Lila Abu-Lughod (74) - current professor of Anthropology/Women’s Studies at Columbia; accomplished author and expert on the Arab world, especially Muslim women’s rights.
Bob Daily (82) - writer and co-executive producer of Frasier, current executive producer for Desperate Housewives
David Welna (80) - congressional correspondent for NPR
Cheryl Klein (00) - American continuity editor for Harry Potter (and one of ten people in the world to see/read the sixth and seventh books before they were released!)
Richard Moss (80) - former director of the U.S. Government’s climate research panel; active IPCC scientist who attended the Nobel Peace Prize ceremony when Al Gore shared the prize with the IPCC.
Jimmy Kolker (70) - previously the ambassador to Burkina Faso and Uganda; Chief of HIV/AIDS department at UNICEF; currently Deputy Director of Global Affairs in the Government’s Department of Health and Human Services.
Michael Armacost (58) - previous president of Brookings Institute, the oldest political thinktank in Washington; former ambassador to Japan and to the Philippines; current Felow at Stanford’s School of INternational Studies.
Dennis Meadows (64) - noted economist and population scientist; author of “The LImits of Growth,” a pretty famous book about the Earth’s capacity to hold humans.</p>
<p>I could go on and on, but this is just what a few minutes of creative googling/research did for me. Nearly all of these people have their own Wikipedia pages, but for whatever reason, none of them are listed on the page. This was ten minutes of work - I’m sure you’d find more. I won’t even start with the professors because I have a paper to write, but I suspect that your answer is partly because many Carleton students do go into law, academia, or business (and end up esteemed or successful, but not widely-known) and partly because they simply aren’t listed on the page. To be honest, I think the page needs a lot of updating.</p>
<p>Wow guys, this is really making me happy. Please keep these amazing names that have not been included in the Wikipedia article coming.</p>
<p>@reesezpiece103, thank you so much for your additions. Please do add more names whenever you are free and have time to do some research. I too think that this Wikipedia article is obsolete and is in a need of some serious updating. </p>
<p>It would be really helpful if anyone of us (with the Wikpedia account and access to the article) would do the honors of updating it, and more preferably adding all these names in a whole new article titled “Carleton College People”. Thanks!</p>
<p>NPR (probably not surprisingly) counts a lot of Carls among its ranks. Along with David Welna - already mentioned (he happened to give a convo just last month in a visit to Carleton) - Martin Kaste is an NPR tech reporter on the national desk, Nancy Cook is a Knight Fellow and associate producer in charge of election web reporting, I’m sure there are many more.</p>
<p>Elsewhere in journalism, one of the biggest national names in the business today is John Harris, Class of '85, co-founder and Editor-in-Chief of Politico.com (and on the school’s Board of Trustees).</p>
<p>John Lavine, a former Carl, is now Dean of Northwestern’s Medill School of Journalism, arguably the best of its kind in the world, and a personal friend in Chicago of Howard Tyner, former decade long Chicago Tribune Editor-in-Chief (who interestingly, after Carleton, headed to Northwestern for a journalism MSJ from Medill :)).</p>
<p>“Now, fans of the ABC hit series “Desperate Housewives” will witness that steely look when Schiller makes his appearance on the series finale Sunday night, courtesy of the show’s executive producer and Carleton graduate Bob Daily '82”</p>
<p>Definitely a new venue for Schiller - certainly didn’t see this one coming. But then, need to see the whole Carl picture - good, bad, ugly, and, apparently, Desperate.</p>
<p>No listed of notable Carls would be complete without mentioning Thorstein Veblen, economist and author of Theory of the Leisure Class, where the term “conspicuous consumption” first appeared.</p>
<p>Between Veblen, Wellstone, and Peter Tork, I think we’re in good company.</p>
<p>There’s also Jack El-Hai, '79, author of “The Lobotomist.” He’s a freelance writer who’s also written for The Atlantic, among other publications.</p>
<p>Emily Barr '80, president and CEO of Post-Newsweek Stations. From offices in Chicago, she will oversee the chain of six stations owned by Washington Post Co. in Detroit, Houston, Miami, Orlando, San Antonio and Jacksonville. </p>
<p>Tom Szentgyorgyi '82, tv writer/producer including Mentalist, Lie To Me, NYPD Blue</p>
<p>Larry Gould (geo prof '32-45, pres 45-62) was the expedition’s chief scientist and second-in-command on Admiral Byrd’s first expedition to Antarctica.</p>