Martin Eisenstadt’s Blog

For those of you who didn’t see it in the comments buried below, we feel we owe it to Thomas Callahan to showcase his explanatory note in full:

Tom Callahan ‘84 here with a clarification:

My old man (who died in 2006 after a long bout with Alzheimer’s) used to refer to his former professor by name with an aphorism something like, “You know what Rosenstock-Huessy used to say…” and then would say something about fate and being aware that you don’t know how your life will unfold. My six living brothers and sisters can all attest to Dad’s references to R-H, but none of us can remember the exact words that had stuck in my father’s mind. I never knew how Rosentock-Huessy’s name was spelled, and I always thought his first name was Rosenstock and his surname was Huessy. I even googled various misspellings of his name one time but to no avail. Then I came across Hart’s article. Now I had the guy’s name (I thought - didn’t know that Hart misspelled it too), and I was able to find a philosophy web site and a few samples of his writing (still didn’t pick up on the misspelling). For the alumni profile, I used the citizen-education quote rather than my poorly remembered paraphrase of my Dad’s paraphrases of what R-E used to say. So–Hart definitely did not lift his quote from me; it is thanks to Hart’s article that I could track down more information about my father’s favorite philosophy professor. No plagiarism intended by me - just wanted to quote Prof. R-H accurately while capturing the spirit of my father’s aphorisms. I don’t think my late father or the late professor would mind. Indeed, the late professor would probably be more concerned if I misquoted him with a memory shrouded paraphrase. Finally, any mistakes are entirely mine, not Ms. Birzen’s. I provided that passage to her.

Regarding Phi Delt, Gig Faux was VP when I was President of the house. He was if anything even more instrumental than I in bringing Phi Delt back into the good graces of the College at the time.

Best regards,

Tom Callahan ‘84

So there you have it; mystery solved. Kudos to Callahan for responding so forthrightly. As we’d heard, he’s an honorable, patriotic man. As you can see, this also clears Birzin and Jeffrey Hart (as far as the quote goes, yes, but his attitudes on Jews vis a vis his support for Obama is still troubling - especially given Obama’s speech today about the Rev. Wright and Barack’s own crazy white Grandma. I guess that makes Hart the nutty Judeo-fetishist uncle in New Hampshire)