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13 AN T I OC H CO L L E G E C L A S S O F 19 6 5 5 0 t h A N N I V E R S A R Y B O O K A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z B E L L A M Y BELLAMY CONNIE [ARENDSEE] THEN AND NOW 4 B.A. Philosophy and Religion 4 Ph.D., English, McGill University Batten Professor of English; Director, American Studies Program FAMI LY 4 Husband, Joe David Bellamy ‘64, deceased 4 Son, Sam 4 Daughter, Lael 4 Four grandchildren ADDRESS 4 538 Lake Bluff Terrace Sanford, FL 32771 CONTACT 416 922-6358 hbrf@ca.inter.net cbellamy@vwc.edu A N T I O C H M A D E M E who I am. It wasn’t a miraculous transforma- tion from one point on a scale to the opposite. Rather it showed me who I really was at the core and al- lowed me to practice being that for four years. It also introduced me to my husband, Joe David Bellamy,who graduated fromAntioch the year be- fore I did. Joe died last summer, but we had fifty years together, two chil- dren, and four grandchildren. We married at the beginning of my senior year, one step ahead of the draft board. After I gradu- ated, I worked and Joe went to graduate school (MFA Iowa Writers’ Workshop). Then he worked and I got a Ph.D. in English from McGill. We became professors of English. Along the way came Lael and Sam who both graduated from Cornell. Lael went on to Emory law school and stayed in Atlanta after she married another Emory grad stu- dent. After Cornell, Sam wanted to play professional golf, so he moved to Orlando.Taking the unhappy dis- covery that he was not the next TigerWoods in stride,he became a fi- nancial advisor and married a native Floridian and graduate of Rollins. When we retired from college teaching, Joe and I wanted to be closer to our children and grandchil- dren.We ended up north of Orlando, on the way to Atlanta.We had spent nearly 20 years in New York State and 20 years in Tidewater Virginia, which were relatively sophisticated places at least on the college cam- puses where I spent my time. So I was unprepared for the political and social conservatism of my pres- ent gated/guarded community (yes, in Florida you have to go there). So I’ve been thinking about myAntioch experience a lot lately, about its val- ues and methods. Antioch showed me how to be the intellectual I al- ways was but didn’t know it. It gave me the model for standing up and speaking out for what is right. I am very grateful. Connie Bellamy is a native of Pearisburg, Va., and has been a member of the faculty of Virginia Wesleyan College since 1992. She taught previously at St. Lawrence University, Clarkson University, the State University of New York and at Mary Washington College. She holds a B.A. in Philosophy from Antioch College and a doctorate in English from McGill University and was previously Managing Editor and Associate Editor of Fiction International magazine. Recently, she co- edited a volume entitled The Lost Saranac Interviews, which includes rediscovered conversations with significant American writers such as Joyce Carol Oates, Russell Banks and Gail Godwin; and she is pres- ently at work on The Plight of the Writer, based on a series of interviews with the Director of the Literature Program of the National Endowment for the Arts. Over the years she has edited a number of vol- umes in a series highlighting excellence in student writing at Virginia Wesleyan. These include: Ode to Friendship and Other Essays, Tropical Landscape: Student Writing at Virginia Wesleyan College, New Student Writing at Virginia Wesleyan College, Reality Check and Other Essays, Dream Child and Other Essays, Woman in Red and Other Essays, and The Making of A Southerner & Other Essays. She is past president of the American Association of University Professors.