[00:00:00] Speaker A: Time was when an American about to go abroad would be warned by his friends or the guidebooks not to drink the water. But times have changed and now a foreigner coming to this country might be offered the following advice.
[00:00:17] Speaker B: If you visit American City, you will find it very pretty Just two things of which you must beware don't drink the water and don't breathe the air. Pollution, pollution. They got smog and sewage and mud.
Turn on your tap and get hot and cold running crud.
See the halibuts and the sturgeons being wiped out by detergents. Fish gotta swim and birds gotta fly but they don't last long if they try. Pollution, pollution. You can use the latest toothpaste and then rinse your mouth with industrial waste.
Just go out for a breath of air and you'll be ready for Medicare. The city streets are really quite a thrill. If the hoods don't get you, the monoxide will. Pollution, pollution. Wear a gas mask and a veil Then you can breathe long as you don't inhale Lots of things there that you can drink but stay away from the kitchen sink. The breakfast garbage that you throw into the bay they drink at lunch in San Jose so go to the city See the crazy people there like limes to the slaughter they're drinking the water and breathing the air.
[00:02:05] Speaker C: Hello, K Squid listeners. This is Ronnie Lipschitz. As many K Squid listeners undoubtedly know, Tom Laird died this past July at age 97. The next 45 minutes are dedicated to his memory, his satire, his wit, and those who knew him while he was at UC Santa Cruz. We'll get to music, bio and reminiscences in a bit, but first I'd like to explain the rationale for this tribute.
Tom taught math and Theater at UCSC from 1972 to 2001 and visited the campus many times thereafter. I was startled to discover his presence when I arrived at UCSC in 1990. I didn't know him well, but well enough to be recognized whenever I greeted him in passing. There were many others on campus in the area who knew him well and many of whom, alas, went before him. We'll hear from a few of his friends and colleagues who are still with us.
Before I play our first interlude, I might note that Tom put all of his songs into the public domain in 2020 or 2022, so they are available for all to hear and download.
Tom wrote on a variety of topics, but he was always at the end, a scientist. Here are two science related songs for many years now.
[00:03:20] Speaker A: Mr. Danny K. Who has been my particular idol since childbirth, has been doing a routine about the great Russian director Stanislavski and the secret of success in the acting profession. And I thought it would be interesting to adapt this idea to the field of mathematics. I always like to make explicit the fact that before I went off not too long ago to fight in the trenches, I was a mathematician by profession. I don't like people to get the idea that I have to do this for a living.
I mean, it isn't as though I had to do this, you know, I could be making, oh, $3,000 a year just teaching.
Be that as it may, some of you may have had occasion to run into mathematicians and to wonder therefore how they got that way. Here, in partial explanation perhaps, is the story of the great Russian mathematician, Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky, who made me the genius.
[00:04:22] Speaker B: I am today, the mathematician that others all quote. Who's the professor that made me that way?
[00:04:28] Speaker A: The greatest that ever got chalk on his coat.
[00:04:31] Speaker D: Who?
[00:04:32] Speaker B: One man deserves the credit, one man deserves the blame. Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky is his name.
I am never forget the day I.
[00:04:43] Speaker A: First meet the great Lobachevsky. In one word he told me secret of success in mathematics.
[00:04:49] Speaker B: Plagiarize, plagiarize.
Let no one else's work evangerize.
Remember why the good Lord made your eyes so. Don't shade your eyes, but plagiarize, plagiarize, plagiarize. Only be sure always to call it, please research.
And ever since I meet this man, my life is not the same. And Nikolai Ivanovich Lobachevsky is his name.
I never forget the day I'm given.
[00:05:18] Speaker A: First original paper to write.
[00:05:20] Speaker B: It was an analytic and algebraic topology of locally Euclidean metrization of infinitely differentiable Riemannian manifold.
[00:05:26] Speaker A: Boy, this I know from nothing.
[00:05:32] Speaker B: But I think of great Lobachevsky and I get idea.
I have a friend in Minsk who has a friend in Pinsk, whose friend in Omsk has friend in Tomsk with friend in Akhmolinsk. His friend in Alexandrovsk has friend in Petropavlovsk, whose friend somehow is solving now the problem in Yepo Petrovsk. And when his work is done, haha begins the fun. From Yepo Petrovs to Petrovlovoks by way villi skin Novrosys to Alexandrovs to Akmolins to Toms to Oms to Pins to Minsk. To me the news will run. Yes, to me the news will run.
Then I ride by morning and night and afternoon and pretty soon my name in Yevo Petrovsky's curse when he finds out I publish first and who made me a big success and brought me wealth and fame. Nikolai Ivanovich Novochevsky is his name.
[00:06:27] Speaker A: I'll never forget the day my first book is published.
Every chapter I stole from somewhere else.
Index I copied from all Vladivostok telephone directory.
[00:06:40] Speaker B: This book. This book was sensational.
[00:06:42] Speaker A: Pravda, Pravda, Pravda se gil bilka rally kegdatr pr' nyom placha. It stinks.
But Izvestia, Izvestia said yay Dukuda Sansari dyotpeskom. It stinks.
Metro Golvin Moskva bought the movie rights for 6 million rubles, changing title to.
[00:07:03] Speaker B: The Eternal Triangle with Brigitte Bardot playing part of hypotenuse.
Who deserves some credit and who deserves the blame? Nikolai Ivanovich Lomachesky is his name.
[00:07:26] Speaker A: And what is it that put America in the forefront of the nuclear nations? And what is it that will make it possible to spend $20 billion of your money to put some clown on the moon? Well, it was good old American know how, that's what.
As provided by good old Americans like Dr. Wernher von Braun.
[00:07:54] Speaker B: Gather round while I sing you a Werner von Braun. A man whose allegiance is ruled by expedients.
Call him a Nazi, he won't even frown.
Nazi schmatzy says Wernher von Braun.
Don't say that he's hypocritical.
Say rather that he's apolitical.
Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down? That's not my department, says Werner von Braun.
Some have harsh words for this man of renown, but some think our attitude gratitude should be one of gratitude. Like the widows and cripples in old London town who owe their large pensions to Wernher von Braun. You too may be a big hero once you've learned to count backwards to zero in German or English. I know how to count down and I'm learning Chinese, says Werner von Braun.
[00:09:04] Speaker C: Tom was something of a wunderkind. He arrived at Harvard at age 14, got a bachelor's degree and remained an on and off grad student in math at Harvard and Columbia until 1965. He never completed dissertation and eventually became a college math teacher for good, primarily in political science departments at Harvard, MIT and other places.
1965 was also the year he stopped performing in public. When someone later asked why he quit, he supposedly replied, political satire went out of date when Henry Kissinger won the Nobel Peace Prize wise words for today.
I spoke with a few folks who knew Tom while he taught at ucsc, including math professor emeritus Tony Tromba.
[00:09:47] Speaker E: Well, I came to Santa Cruz in 1970. Actually, they offered me a job when I was professor at Stanford in 1968, but I turned them down. I had a sort of. They invited me for a talk, and it looked a little kooky for me. I was, for a conservative Stanford professor, wore a coat and tie and that sort of thing. But ultimately I resigned from Stanford and came to Santa Cruz. I came in 1970 and I was very impressed with a lot of the views of some of my faculty, of the faculty, very committed to education, improving education and experimentation and that sort of thing.
And in 1972, I was put on the Cal Fellowship committee. And at Cal at that time, we had artists. We had Mary Holmes, who was a painter. Jasper Rosen considered himself a painter, and we had sculptors and that sort of thing. And I guess Kenneth Tiemann knew Tom Lehrer from Harvard. Everybody there knew Tom Lehrer, and Tom must have known him. But he approached him and mentioned the possibility of joining the faculty.
And Kenneth felt that he was not appropriate for Crown, but he'd be more appropriate for Cowell in the humanities and theater and so on. And he was proposing a course in musical theater, and he wanted to teach a math course, actually. And so that was brought to the committee. And neither Jasper nor Sig, neither of them had heard of Tom. And I had heard of Tom. And I knew he was a big deal. And he was very famous, actually, in certain circles. And I actually knew some of his music. I'm not quite sure whether I had the album yet. Can't quite remember when I bought. That was the year that was. But in any case, I convinced him that this was. He was a great talent and he would be great for Cowell. And they both agreed. And so we hired Tom and he came and was an enormous success.
And before he knew the fact that I was on the hiring committee in the early years, I actually auditioned to be in his class.
I was not a singer, but I thought, well, you know, one of my dreams of being an opera singer. But he was an enormous success. That course was tremendous. And he taught several math courses for us. Tom was very professional about teaching. He was a professional teacher.
And although he was very famous, that's not how I experienced him. We were colleagues. We had lunch together. He was ultimately in the Department of American Studies. John I. Tom. Peter Scott was another friend of Tom Lara's. We had lunch. He was Very quick witted, a lot of fun to be around, a wonderful colleague.
And we all had interesting discussions from time to time.
So Tom used to tease me that I'm a much more natural entertainer than he is.
He said that he.
Which was rather extraordinary. And perhaps if you go back and look at the videos of his performances, you can see that it's correct. He. He would have light shining on him. He didn't want to see the audience.
He was very uncomfortable in facing a crowd where he said, I embrace the crowd because I'm a very outgoing crowd person and a more of a performer. Which is probably correct, at least in my early years. So that was another tidbit that I found interesting about him because he did so many performances in nightclubs and shows around the world. So. But by the time he came to Santa Cruz, I think he was done with that and he settled. He lived on East Cliff Drive.
He loved Santa Cruz. He looked forward to coming every year.
He had a whole coterie of friends here. He loved the faculty. He loved participating in Young Santa Cruz. And I think for many people, you know, the campus changed. And then I think there came a point with, I think it was around 2000. Tom was very upset and bitter that they insisted on a major review of his performance before they could continue him. But he said, look, I've been here, you know, 30 years now. What, what more are they going to find out about me? And so he refused to be reviewed. And he said, I just, you know, and. And by that time he was getting rather old. So he said, I've had it. But he continued coming back and the last I saw him was at the Crow's Nest. I can't remember the date. Maybe it was 2019, before the pandemic. And that was the last I saw him. But we had several email exchanges over the years, as he did with other faculty. And that's really my, you know, my recollection of Tom Lehre. I have a wonderful guy and a good friend and a great colleague.
[00:14:54] Speaker C: Lair was hired as a lecturer in American studies.
Well, he certainly studied America. Perhaps he also understood it.
[00:15:03] Speaker A: What with President Johnson practicing escalatio on the Vietnamese and then, then the Dominican crisis on top of that, it has been a nervous year and people have begun to feel like a Christian Scientist with appendicitis.
Fortunately, in times of crisis like this, America always has its number one instrument of diplomacy to fall back on. Here's a song about it.
[00:15:36] Speaker B: When someone makes a move of which we don't approve, who is it that Always intervenes UN and OAS they have their place I guess but first send the Marines we'll send them all we've got John Wayne and Randolph Scott Remember those exciting fighting scenes to the shores of Tripoli but not to Mississippoli what do we do? We send the Marines for might makes right until they've seen the light They've got to be protected all their rights respected Til somebody we like can be elected Members of the Corps all hate the thought of war they'd rather kill them off by peaceful means Stop calling it aggression Ooh, we hate that expression we only want the world to know that we support the status quo they love us everywhere we go so when in doubt, send the Marines.
[00:16:39] Speaker C: Lehrer was assigned two math classes. The nature of mathematics and mathematics in the social sciences. During the early 1970s, Tom wrote musical pieces for the Electric Company on PBS.
Something like Sesame street for older kids. I was around 20 when the show was on, but I remember liking it very much. Here's a song written for that show.
[00:17:02] Speaker B: Counting sheep when you're trying to sleep Being fair when there's something to share Being neat when you're folding a sheet that's mathematics When a ball bounces off of a wall when you cook from a recipe book when you know how much money you owe that's mathematics how much gold can you hold in an elephant's ear when it's noon on the moon Then what time is it here?
If you could count for a year would you get to infinity or somewhere in that vicinity?
When you choose how much postage to use when you know what's the chance it will snow when you bet and you end up in debt oh, try as you may, you just, just can't get away from mathematics Tap your feet keeping time to a beat of a song While you're singing along Harmonize with the rest of the guys yes, try as you may, you just can't get away from mathematics.
[00:18:30] Speaker C: There's a video online in which Tom performs several never recorded songs for what appears to be a math class. Here was one that should appeal to those of you who didn't like calculus.
[00:18:42] Speaker F: I hope you can hear this over the piano. I can certainly hear it. That's great. So Bob Ossman called me to see if I would dig out some of the exhume some of the old math songs from the old old days. So I came up with four. And one more recent one.
I first intersected with Cap in the summer of 1943.
I took two courses from him at Harvard he was then, let's see, it was 54 years ago, so he would have been 26 and I was 4.
And one of them was algebra, which as I recall, I may be wrong, but I don't think you could call it algebra then, because that was like a high school subject, like civics, but they called it higher algebra or in the case of Berkhof and Maclean, modern algebra. So I think now they have postmodern algebra, I think. I haven't kept up with that. So anyway, that didn't lead to any songs.
For one thing, nothing rhymes with algebra, does it? Is there anything that rhymes with algebra? I've never been able to find one, but there's a challenge.
Think about that tonight.
But the other one was freshman calculus, and that did lead to a song which is here somewhere.
It was set to a tune which fortuitously enough is this is the definition of the derivative. And the tune, fortuitously enough is called There'll Be some changes made 1923.
You take a function of X and you call it y.
Take any X0 that you care to try.
[00:20:24] Speaker B: You make a little change and call it delta X.
[00:20:27] Speaker F: The corresponding change in Y is what you find next. And then you take the quotient and.
[00:20:32] Speaker B: Now carefully send delta X to zero. And I think you'll see that what the limit gives us if our work all checks, is what we call DY dx.
It's just DY dx.
[00:20:52] Speaker C: Tom also taught a class called the American Musical, in which he explored classics like My Fair Lady, Guys and Dolls, Camelot and the King and I. Admission to the class was highly selective. Students had to audition and only 15 were accepted each year.
It was a very popular class and apparently had a deep impact on those who took it. UCSC alum Courtney Potter reported on Facebook that taking his musical theater workshop was not only a highlight of my college career, it informed the trajectory of my life.
I continue performing and I stand on so much I learned during that brief, incredible time in his orbit. Here are a couple of reminiscences from Jim Clifford, Emeritus professor of History of Consciousness.
[00:21:38] Speaker D: Well, just a couple of vignettes.
Memories of Tom Lehrer the the first was had to do with the course he taught at UCSC on American Musical Comedy, which was an insanely popular course, so I thought I should check it out. I went to the first meeting. The room was overflowing with students, many of them sitting on the floor, and Tom basically did introductory remarks and sort of practical things about the class. Do's and don'ts In a. In a busy class and so, you know, don't come in late etc and no cell phones to worry about back then. But at the end, he added one thing. At the end of it all, he simply said, deadpan and loud, babies will be strangled.
So that was pure Tom.
And the other vignette comes from a birthday party held for Billy Harris. Some of you may know Billy was the longtime department manager. We called him something else back then for history of consciousness. And she was very theatrical and she bonded with Tom Lehrer. They were great friends. So Tom came and played at her birthday, which was held. This was in the late 1980s. It was held in the public room of Piedmont Court.
And they had a big grand piano there. So Tom sat down at the grand piano and we gathered around the grand piano and we had been supplied with songbooks, which were the first two verses of many songs. Many familiar. Some sort of familiar songs of the great American songbook running from early 20th century right up till now. And Tom was sitting at the piano and there was someone sitting next to him who fed him the music of each song. And he played non stop for maybe two hours. And there was never more than 10 seconds or 15 seconds of time between each song. As soon as he finished one, the next music went in front of him and his hands on the piano just kept going. And we all sang.
And, you know, and it was familiar songs like, you know, you are my Sunshine and Home on the range, up through, you know, Gersh, the Gershwin's foggy Old London Town and various other jazz standards up to Rogers and Hammerstein, many of their songs and songs from that period. And Tom just kept on playing and completely wore us out. You know, we would take breaks and go replenish our wine glass. He did not stop.
And it was kind of amazing. And what I retain up from it is wonder at his piano playing, which was so dynamic and so accurate and so perfect and he could just modulate from one song to the next. Very different tunes, different arrangements, seamlessly without stopping. And this incredible, incredible energy that, that he had to go on like that for all those songs. It was really an astonishing performance. I'll never forget.
[00:24:56] Speaker C: Did you sing any of his songs?
[00:24:57] Speaker D: Oh, never, never, you know. You know, I'm sure, you know, he. He swore that off completely back when Henry Kissinger got the Nobel Peace Prize. He said that there was no room for satire anymore because it was.
Was the. It was the real. Now that's a story often told, whether it's true or not. I Don't know.
[00:25:23] Speaker C: Here's a bit of melodrama.
[00:25:28] Speaker A: Now I'd like to turn to the folk song which has become in recent years the particularly fashionable form of idiocy among the self styled intellectuals.
You find the people who deplore the level of current popular songs, although I admit they do seem to be recording almost anything these days. Have you heard Sessu Hayakawa's record of Remember Pearl Harbor?
The same people who deplore the level of current popular songs and yet will sit around enthralled singing Jimmy Crack Corn and I Don't Care or Green Grow the Rushes O, whatever that means.
At any rate, for these elite I. I have here an ancient Irish ballad which was written a few years ago and which is replete with all the accoutrements of this art form. In particular, it has a sort of idiotic refrain, in this case Rickety tickety Tin, you'll notice, cropping up from time to time, running through, I might add, interminable verses. The large number of verses being a feature expressly designed to please the true devotees of the. Of the folk song, who seem to find singing 50 verses of on Top of Old Smokey is twice as enjoyable as singing 25.
This type of song also has what is known technically in music as a modal tune, which means, for the benefit of any layman who may have wandered in this evening that I play a wrong note every now and then.
[00:27:03] Speaker D: I think.
[00:27:06] Speaker A: The song though does differ strikingly from the genuine folk ballad in that in this song the words which are supposed to rhyme actually do.
I really should say that I do not direct these remarks against the vast army of folk song lovers, but merely against that peculiar hardcore who seem to equate authenticity with artistic merit and illiteracy with charm.
Oh, one more thing.
One of the more important aspects of public folk singing is audience participation. And this happens to be a good song for group singing. So if any of you feel like joining in with me on this song, I'd appreciate it if you would leave right now.
[00:27:54] Speaker B: About a maid I'll sing a song Sing Rickety Tickety tin About a maid I'll sing a song who didn't have her family long not only did she do them wrong she did every one of them in them in she did every one of them in One morning in a fit of pique Sing ric a ti ti k a ti tin One morning in a fit of pique she drowned her father in the the creek. The water tasted bad for a week and we had to make do with gin with gin we had to make do with gin her mother she could never stand Sing Rickety tickety tin her mother she could never stand and so a cyanide soup she planned the mother died with a spoon in her hand and her face in a hideous grin A grin, her face in a hideous grin she set her sister's hair on fire Rickety tickety tin she set her sister's hair on fire and as the smoke and flame rose higher Danced around the funeral pyre Playing a violin.
[00:29:09] Speaker C: Playing.
[00:29:09] Speaker B: A violin she wetted her brother down with stones Rickety tickety tin she wetted her brother down with stones and sent him off to Davy Jones all they ever found were some bones and occasional pieces of skin of skin, Occasional pieces of skin.
One day when she had nothing to do Sing ric a ti ti k a ti tin One day when she had nothing to do she cut her baby brother in two and served him up as an Irish stew and invited the neighbors in, he invited the neighbors in and when at last the police came by saying Rickety tickety tin and when at last the police came by her little pranks she did not deny to do so she would have had to lie and lying she knew was a sin, A sin.
Lying she knew was a sin.
My tragic tale I walk prolong Rickety tickety tin My tragic tale I won't prolong it if you do not enjoy my song Give yourselves the blame if it's too long.
You should never have let me begin Begin.
You should never have let me begin.
[00:30:32] Speaker C: Tom seems to have had a particular fondness for satirizing the atomic establishment of the 1950s and 60s. Perhaps it was his short stint at Los Alamos in 1952, or his job with Baird Atomic in 1953 and 1954, or his stint with the National Security Agency while in the army from 1955 to 1957.
At any rate, nuclear deterrence was an easy target, especially when it entailed a German finger on the button.
[00:31:01] Speaker A: A considerable amount of commotion was stirred up during the past year over the prospect of a multilateral force known to the headline writers as mlf.
Much of this discussion took place during the baseball season, so the Chronicle may not have covered it, but it did get a certain amount of publicity, and the basic idea was that a bunch of US nations, the good guys, would get together on a joint nuclear deterrent force, including our current friends like France and our traditional friends like Germany.
Here's a song about that called the MLF Lullaby.
[00:31:43] Speaker B: Sleep, baby, sleep in Peace may you slumber no danger lurks your sleep to encumber. We've got the missiles. Peace to determine and one of the fingers on the button will be German.
Why shouldn't they have nuclear warheads? England says no, but they all are sore heads. I say a bygone should be a bygone. Let's make peace the way we did in Stanleyville and Saigon.
[00:32:23] Speaker A: Once all the.
[00:32:24] Speaker B: Germans were warlike and mean but that couldn't happen again.
[00:32:30] Speaker A: We taught them a lesson in 1918.
[00:32:34] Speaker B: And they've hardly bothered us since then so sleep well, my darling the sandman can linger we know our buddies won't give us the finger Heil. Hail the Wehrmacht. I mean the Bundeswehr. Hail to our loyal ally Mlf. We'll scare Brezhnev I hope he is half as scared as I.
[00:33:14] Speaker C: Here are a couple of more songs about the bomb.
[00:33:17] Speaker A: One of the big news items of the past year concerned the fact that China, which we call Red China, exploded a nuclear bomb, which we called a device. Then Indonesia announced that it was going to have one soon and proliferation became the word of the day.
Here's a song about that.
[00:33:38] Speaker B: First we got the bomb and that was good because we love peace and motherhood. Then Russia got the bomb but that's okay cause the balance of power is maintained that way. Who's next?
France got the bomb but don't you grieve because they are on our side. I believe China got the bomb but have no fears they can't wipe us out for at least five years. Who's next?
Haven. Indonesia claimed that they were gonna get one any day. South Africa wants two, that's right One for the black and one for the white. Who's next?
Egypt's gonna get one too Just to use on you know who and so is Israel's getting tense Wants one in self defense the Lord's our shepherd says the psalm but just in case we better get a bomb who's the next?
A Luxembourg is next to go and who knows, maybe Monaco we'll try to stay serene and calm When Alabama gets the bomb who's next?
[00:34:54] Speaker D: Who's next?
[00:34:54] Speaker A: Who's next?
[00:34:57] Speaker D: Who's next?
[00:35:09] Speaker B: When you attend a funeral it is sad to think that sooner or later those you love will do the same for you.
And you may have thought it tragic not to mention other adjects Tibbs to think of all the weeping they will do. But don't you worry no more ashes, no more sackcloth and an arm band made of black cloth Will someday Nevermore adorn a sleeve for if the bomb that drops on you Gets your friends and neighbors too There'll be nobody left behind to grieve and we will all go together when we go what a comforting fact that is to know universal bereavement. An inspiring achievement. Yes, we all will go together when we go we will all bake together when we bake There'll be nobody present at the wake with complete participation in that grand incineration nearly free billion hunks of well done steak we will all fry together when we fry we'll be French fried potatoes by and by There will be no more misery when the world is our rotisserie yes, we all will fry together when we fry.
[00:36:39] Speaker A: We.
[00:36:39] Speaker B: Will all char together when we charge and let there be no moaning of the bar Just sing out a tea diem when you see that icy beam and the party will be come as you are we will all burn together when we burn There'll be no need to stand and wait your turn when it's time for the fallout and St. Peter calls us all out we'll just drop our agendas and adjourn and we will all go together when we go Every Hottentot and every Eskimo when the air becomes uranious we will all go simultaneous yes, we all will go together when we all go together yes, we all will go together when we go.
[00:37:39] Speaker C: Here are some reminiscences from one of Tom's friends at ucsc.
[00:37:44] Speaker D: Okay.
[00:37:44] Speaker G: Hi, I'm Rusty Frank and I live in El Segundo, California now. But I was a student at UC Santa Cruz. And one of the highlights of my time there was getting to know and becoming friends with Tom Lehrer. And I basically got to know him not through his class, because I auditioned for the class so many times and never got in it.
And I actually finally got in it. And the year I got in it, I couldn't do it because I was doing an internship in San Francisco. So there you go. But anyway, so I was that. I was the super fan of his American Musical class. But we became friends because when I came to UC Santa Cruz, I was one of these people who was a Tom Lehrer fanatic. My family grew up with his records. I was dying to meet him. I walked into his office one day and as a freshman and said, oh, hello, I'm such a fan of your records. And he just turned around and gave me this stare down and saying, that was a long time ago.
And that's when I learned the hard Lesson that he was not interested in talking about those days of his songwriting career and that he was in the now, and let's talk about other stuff. So I later got to know him. So maybe just a month or two later, when I found out I still wanted to become friends with him, and I found out that he liked tap dancing and old Broadway shows, musicals. And so I was already a seasoned tap dancer. And so I found out that there was a tap class on campus at another call I think was at College 5, and he was taking it. So I went over there. Now, I didn't need to take a tap. A beginner tap class, but the. The day I showed up, the teacher didn't show up.
So people knew I could tap dance, and so they asked me if I would teach the class. So I. I taught the class that day. And then somehow, very quickly, Tom and three others. Two. Yeah, three others approached me about doing a tap class at Cowell College. And Melanie Mayer was one of them. So. And Catherine Sturek and Brian. I can't remember his last name, but there were four in the class. And me and I taught this class. We just taught. I taught it in the little lounge at Cowell College, and we had so much fun. So that was the beginning of our beautiful friendship. But we really felt that we were a great balance, Tom and I, because I love movie musicals and he loved Broadway musicals, and there was a Broadway musical and a movie musical that crossed over, and it was the Coconuts with the Marx Brothers. And we both loved inner rhyming. And there's a great inner rhyme in the song.
And it goes down among the mangoes where the monkey gangos. You can see them do the monkey doodle doo. So we both love that inner rhyme. Down among the mangoes where the monkey ganga. So he only taught in the winter quarter, and then he would go back to Cambridge. Well, so this was the first class where he came back for the. The auditions for his American Musical class. And it was. The room was packed. Packed. It was at the Stevenson Lounge. Packed. You couldn't walk through the room. And I had a manila envelope for him. He was across the room, and so he saw me, and we waved. And I held up this manila envelope which I'm holding right now for the listeners. And I shook it. And then suddenly he has a manila envelope, and he's raised and he's shaking it. So we're making our way, clawing and climbing over this room full of students. We hand each other our matching middle envelopes, looking at each other. Now, this is strange. We open up and pull out the identical piece of sheet music to the monkey doodle doo.
So that's how connected we were.
So I just feel so honored to have known him. And one time in the other story is I was in New York and met up with him there, and he took me to see a Broadway show together, and we stood in front of the George M. Cohan statue on Times Square and then went to the show, and it was on the 20th century and Imogene Coco was in it. So we had a great time.
And I have the pictures to prove it. Anyway, I just again, feel so lucky that I knew him and he was just such a great guy. And every single year on my birthday, he would call, wish me a happy birthday.
And then he also, once he stopped making phone calls, he would send an email. So I have years and years, decades of happy birthday messages from Tom. Oh, the other thing, there's one more thing is that he, you know, always would love to do these little math equations. And one time he said, oh, Rusty and Melanie. Melanie I had Melanie Mayer. And I had the same birth date, not same year, but the same birth date, February 25th. And he said, I just figured it out that this year on your birthday, we're going to be 100 years old.
And so he wrote us a song called guess who's 100 years old today.
My favorite line is, not very many will reach their centennial. So I'm proud to say that we are 100 years old today. Hooray.
[00:42:34] Speaker C: It's probably fair to say that Tom was also a student scholar of human psychology, which he poked so much in so many of his songs.
[00:42:44] Speaker A: And now, may I have the next slide, please?
Carried away there. It seems that most of the songs that you hear these days on the radio, played by the disc jockeys, apart from rock and roll and other children's records, tend tend to be motion picture title songs. Apparently, producers feel that we will not attend their movies unless we have the titles well drilled into our heads in advance.
Of course, we don't go anyway, but at least this way they make back on the song some of what they've lost on the picture.
With the rise of the motion picture title song, we have such hits of the past few years as the Ten Commandments, Mambo Brothers, Karamazov, Cha Cha, Incredible Shrinking Man, I love you.
I'm sure you're all familiar with these, but a few years ago, a motion picture version appeared of Sophocles Immortal Tragedy, Oedipus Rex.
This Picture played only in the so called art theaters. And it was not a financial success.
And I maintain that the reason it was not a financial success.
You're way ahead of me.
Was that it did not have a title tune which the people could hum and which would make them actually eager to attend to this particular flick. So I've attempted to supply this. And here then is the prospective title song from Oedipus Rex.
[00:44:44] Speaker B: From the Bible to the popular song, there's one theme that we find right along.
Of all ideals they hail as good. The most sublime is motherhood.
There was a man though, who it seems once carried this ideal to extremes.
He loved his mother and she loved him. And yet his story is rather grim.
There once lived a man named Oedipus Rex. You may have heard about his art complex. His name appears in Freud's index because he loved his mother.
His rivals used to say quite a bit that as a monarch he was most unfit. But still in all they had to admit that he loved his mother.
Yes, he loved his mother like no other. His daughter was his sister and his son was his brother. One thing on which you can depend is he sure knew who a boy's best friend is. When he found what he had done, he tore his eyes out one by one. A tragic end to a loyal son who loved his mother.
So be sweet and kind to mother now and then. Have a chat, buy her candy or some flowers or a brand new hat. But maybe you had better let it go at that or you may find yourself with a quite complex complex and you may end up like Oedipus. I'd rather marry a duck billed platypus than end up like a latipus rat.
[00:46:21] Speaker C: Tom was born into a secular Jewish family. He once wrote that his family's relationship to Judaism had more to do with the delicatessen than the synagogue. After Vatican ii, he wrote the next tune, which had nothing to do with his faith, whatever that might have been.
[00:46:37] Speaker A: Another big news story of the year concerned the ecumenical council in Rome, known as Vatican ii.
Among the things they did in an attempt to make the church more commercial was to introduce the vernacular into portions of the Mass, to replace Latin, and to widen somewhat the range of music permissible in the liturgy. But I feel that if they really want to sell the product in this secular age, what they ought to do is to redo some of the liturgical music in popular song forms. I have a modest example here. It's called the Vatican Rag.
[00:47:20] Speaker B: First you get down on your knees, fiddle with your rosaries Bow your head with great respect and genuflect Genuflect Genu.
[00:47:29] Speaker D: Fleck.
[00:47:34] Speaker B: Do whatever steps you want if you have cleared them with the pontiff Everybody say his own Kyrie la is on doing the Vatican right Get in line in that processional Step into that small confessional they're the guy who's got religion I'll tell you if your sin's original if it is, try playing it safer Drink the wine and chew the wafer 2, 4, 6, 8 time to transubstantiate so get down upon your knees Fiddle in your rosaries Bow your head with great respect and genuflect Genuflect, genuflect Make a cross on your abdomen when in Rome do like a Roman Ave Maria Gee, it's good to see you getting ecstatic and sort of dramatic and doing the Vatican Arise.
[00:48:37] Speaker C: I think we have time for one more.
[00:48:48] Speaker B: There's atimony arsenic, aluminum, selenium and hydrogen and oxygen and nitrogen and rhenium and nickelodemium neptunium, germanium and iron Amberetium, ruthenium, uranium, europium, zirconium, lutetium, vanadium and lantham and osmium and astatine and radium and golden protactinium and indium and gallium and iodine and thorium and thulium and thallium there's yttrium, ytterbium actinium, rubidium aborum, gadolinium, niobium, iridium and strontium and silicon and silver and silicon invisalthromine, lithium, beryllium and barium Isn't that interesting?
I knew you would.
I hope you're all taking notes because there's going to be a short quiz next period.
There's holmium and helium and hafnium and erbium and phosphorus and francium and fluorine and terbium and manganese and merkelithin and magnesium dysprosium and scandium and cerium and cesium and lead Praseodymium, platinum, plutonium, palladium, promethium, potassium, polonium, metadalum, denisium, titanium, tellurium and cadmium and calcium and chromium and curium there's sulfur, californium and fermium, berkelium and also mendelevium, einsteinium, nobelium and arca Cryptryptoniadradon, xenons and con Rhodium and chlorine carbon, cobalt, copper, tungsten, tin and sodium these are the only ones of which the news has come to Harvard and There may be many others, but they haven't been discovered.
[00:50:15] Speaker C: I hope you've enjoyed this tribute to Tom Lehrer. If you'd like to know more about Tom and his music, you can find resources and
[email protected] TDH7N8D9 I have time.
[00:50:31] Speaker A: For one more here. This one is a little song dedicated to the Boy Scouts of America. We seem to have a convent here tonight.
The Boy Scouts of America those noble little bastions of democracy and the American Legion of tomorrow. I would like to state at this time that I am not now and have never been a member of the Boy Scouts of America.
Their motto is, as you know, be prepared. And that is the name of the song.
[00:51:06] Speaker B: Be Prepared.
That's the Boy Scout's marching song. Be prepared as through life you march along Be prepared to hold your liquor pretty well don't write naughty words on walls if you can't spell Be prepared to hide that pack of cigarettes don't make book if you cannot cover bets Keep those briefers hidden where you're sure that they will not be found and be careful not to smoke them when the scoutmaster's around for he only will insist that they be shared Be prepared, be prepared that's the Boy Scout's solemn creed Be prepared and be clean in word and deed don't solicit for your sister that's not nice Unless you get a good percentage of her price Be prepared and be careful not to do your good deeds when there's no one watching you if you're looking for adventure of a new and different kind and you come across a Girl Scout who is similarly inclined don't be nervous, don't be flustered don't be scared.
[00:52:22] Speaker D: Ra.
