Renowned New York City based dance company, Complexions Contemporary Ballet returns to Stony Brook University’s Staller Center for the Arts, 100 Nicolls Road, Stony Brook on Saturday, Feb. 5 for a spectacular evening on the Main Stage featuring their two newest full length pieces performed on the same program for the very first time, in celebration of Black History Month. The show starts at 8 p.m
Under the artistic direction of dance Icons Dwight Rhoden and Desmond Richardson, (both former principal dancers with ALVIN AILEY DANCE and star choreographers), COMPLEXIONS will perform two monumental pieces, “WOKE” and LOVE ROCKS”, born out of the current crisis’ we are facing in the world. Through dance, COMPLEXIONS confronts this moment in time and the question of what it means to exist in today’s society and how we connect in spite of it.
“WOKE” is a physical reaction to the daily news. A bold and dynamic socially conscious one act ballet featuring the full company that examines our humanity in conjunction with today’s political climate.
LOVE ROCKS, which also features the full company, is set to the powerful music of Grammy Award-winner Lenny Kravitz. It is a fun, thrilling and moving dance and a tremendous compliment to “WOKE”.
Dancing these two pieces together in the same program is a challenge for the company. Complexions Dance is working overtime through extreme pandemic conditions to create this unique program for the Staller Center as they present it to the University community and greater Long Island region.
Tickets range from $42 to $58. For more information or to order, visit www.stallercenter.com, call 631-632-ARTS or email [email protected].
Major Sponsors are News 12 – Campolo, Middleton & McCormick – Danfords Hotel & Marina – Friends of the Staller Center – Hilton Garden Inn – Island Federal – Jefferson’s Ferry – Renaissance – Stony Brook Medicine – Suffolk County – WLIW – Paul W. Zuccaire Foundation.
COVID GUIDELINES
The Staller Center prioritizes the safety of its patrons, staff and students, and will enforce strict Covid-19 protocols for the Fall 2021 season. At this time, visitors must show proof of full vaccination or proof of a negative Covid-19 test taken within 72 hours of the event (children ages 12 and under are exempt when accompanied by a parent or guardian who meets the requirements). Additionally, each audience and staff member must wear a mask while inside the venue. All audience members will be advised to not attend if they feel unwell, have symptoms of Covid-19 or have recently been exposed to someone with the disease.
With these guidelines, the Staller Center ticket policy for return or exchange of tickets will be liberalized to accommodate patrons who cannot attend due to the above.
ABOUT THE PERFORMER
Complexions Contemporary Ballet was founded in 1994 by Master Choreographer Dwight Rhoden and the legendary Desmond Richardson with a singular approach to reinventing dance through a groundbreaking mix of methods, styles and cultures. Today, Complexions represents one of the most recognized, diverse, inclusive and respected performing arts brands in the World. Having presented an entirely new and exciting vision of human movement on 5-continents, over 20-countries, to over 20-million television viewers and to well over 300,000 people in live audiences, Complexions is poised to continue its mission to bring unity to the world one dance at a time.
Complexions has received numerous awards including The New York Times Critics’ Choice Award. It has appeared throughout the US, including the The Joyce Theatre and Lincoln Center in NYC, The Brooklyn Academy of Music, The Paramount Theatre/Seattle, The Music Center/Los Angeles, Winspear Opera House/Dallas, The Cutler Majestic Theater/Boston, The Music Hall/Detroit, and has toured extensively around the world to venues including The Bolshoi Theater, The Kremlin, The Mikhailovsky Theater, and the Melbourne Arts Center.
The company’s foremost innovation is that dance should be about removing boundaries, not reinforcing them. Whether it be the limiting traditions of a single style, period, venue, or culture, Complexions transcends them all, creating an open, continually evolving form of dance that reflects the movement of our world—and all its constituent cultures—as an interrelated whole.
Together, Rhoden and Richardson have created in Complexions an institution that embodies its historical moment, a sanctuary where those passionate about dance can celebrate its past while simultaneously building its future. In the 27 years since its inception, the company has continued to awaken audiences to a new, exciting genre with their singular approach of reinventing dance and contemporary ballet. Their work has borne witness to a world that is becoming more fluid, more changeable, and more culturally interconnected than ever before—in other words, a world that is becoming more and more like Complexions itself.
With stunning gifted dancers and powerful choreography, Complexions has been hailed as a “matchless American dance company” by the Philadelphia Inquirer. “Companies like Complexions are game-changing: they’re forging a path for what ballet can be instead of what it historically has been.”- The Guardian
The Stony Brook University women’s basketball team (13-2, 4-1 America East) came out strong to pick up a win over New Hampshire (3-12, 0-4 America East), 71-53, on Jan. 16 at Lundholm Gymnasium in Durham.
With the victory, Stony Brook extended its winning streak to four games in a row and are winners of six out of its last seven games. The Seawolves were paced by four student-athletes who scored in double figures to lead the team to their league leading 13th win of the season.
The Seawolves’ scoring was led by graduate forward Leighah-Amori Wool and senior guard Anastasia Warren both finishing with 12 points. Wool and Warren were joined by junior guard Gigi Gonzalez and graduate forward India Pagan each chipping in with 10 points apiece.
Stony Brook took a 29-22 lead into halftime after Pagan made a layup to take back the lead with 6:27 left to play in the second quarter. The Seawolves did not let up as they held the lead for the reminder of the game.
Wool pulled down her 500th career rebound with 7:51 left to play in the third quarter which led to a pass to Pagan who converted a layup to help extend the lead for Stony Brook. The Seawolves’ lead grew to as large as 20 points with 25 seconds left to play.
With the win, Stony Brook improved to 13-2 overall and 4-1 in America East play.
“I’m happy to get a dub on the road. I thought New Hampshire played really hard. It’s not easy to get conference wins — especially on an opponent’s home court,” said Stony Brook head coach Ashley Langford after the game.
The team returned home to Island Federal Arena to face-off against New York foe Binghamton on Jan. 19. Results were not available as of press time.
Town of Brookhaven Councilmember Jonathan Kornreich and workers repair the roof at the American Legion Post 1766. Photo from Kornreich's office
Workers go over what needs to be done. Photo from Jonathan Kornreich’s office
Workers repair the roof at the American Legion Post 1766. Photo from Kornreich's office
Town of Brookhaven Councilmember Jonathan Kornreich helps repair the roof at the American Legion Post 1766. Photo from Kornreich's office
Workers stop to take a photo in front of the post. Photo from Jonathan Kornreich’s office
Workers go over what needs to be done. Photo from Jonathan Kornreich’s office
Town of Brookhaven Councilmember Jonathan Kornreich (D-Stony Brook) has been active in the community for years as a past president of the Three Village Civic Association and a member of the school district’s board of education. However, after being elected into office last year, he had the opportunity to learn even more about the Three Village area.
When he had the opportunity to visit the American Legion Irving Hart Post 1766 in Setauket, he realized the post members needed help with repairs, starting with the roof. Knowing people in the home improvement industry and also the ins and outs of fundraising, Kornreich made a promise to the post members that he would get the roof repaired.
The councilman took the job on as a personal mission and said it wouldn’t require any financial help from the town. The roof was repaired in December with materials donated by Home Depot and anonymous donors sending in money to honor post members including Capt. Hugh P. Sheppard and Korean War veteran Carlton “Hub” Edwards who is treasurer of the post. Thanks to the donations, workers were paid to replace the roof which is just the first step of the post being restored.
Joe Bova, the post’s community liaison, said he was grateful for Kornreich following through on the project and that he never met someone that showed so much kindness and respect.
“I never met someone who says something and actually does it,” Bova said.
Kornreich said he has been intrigued for years by the history of the American Legion post, which was established after World War II by members of the mixed-heritage Black and Native American community who lived in the Bethel-Christian Avenue-Laurel Hill Historic District area. The residents built the post from community members’ contributions including the land donated by Irving Hart’s sister, Rachel.
The councilman said the stories of those who have belonged to the post over the years are also interesting to learn. “When you walk into the post, on the wall, there are maybe 100 photographs of men and women in uniform who were stationed all over the world,” he said.
According to Kornreich and Edwards, a fundraiser will be established in the future for additional interior renovations. Edwards said the post members are grateful for the roof replacement.
“We’d like to thank everyone who took part in the donations for the roof to be completed,” Edwards said.
Kornreich echoed the sentiment.
“I’m so proud to see that Three Village recognizes the cultural and historical importance of this structure, and the people who have been using it for almost 75 years,” he said. “I’m looking forward to the time when this will once again be a thriving and active place our community can enjoy.”
Richard Leakey at the Provost's Lecture Series: "Living Off the Grid with Good Access to Energy and Water". Paleoanthropologist, politician, explorer and environmentalist, Richard Erskine Frere Leakey is chairman of the Turkana Basin Institute (TBI), and Professor of Anthropology at Stony Brook University.
Famed paleoanthropologist, conservationist and SBU professor Richard Leakey leaves a lasting legacy
By Daniel Dunaief
A revered scientist, conservationist, Kenyan, and faculty member at Stony Brook University, Richard Leakey died on Jan. 2 at the age of 77.
Leakey made several significant human fossil discoveries, wrote books and ground breaking journal articles, appeared on the cover of Time Magazine in 1977, and saved elephants and rhinoceros from poaching.
Leakey, who received honorary degrees from numerous institutions including Stony Brook, was also a professor in SBU’s Department of Anthropology in the College of Arts and Sciences and the founder of the Turkana Basin Institute in Nairobi, Kenya.
“I considered him my brother,” said former Stony Brook President Shirley Kenny, who had helped recruit Leakey to join the university and developed a close relationship with him over the course of over two decades. When she learned of his death, she was “devastated.”
The Stony Brook connection
Leakey was visiting Manhattan in 2001 when he met with Kenny and Lawrence Martin, who is the director of the Turkana Basin Institute (TBI). Eager to make a good first impression and “nervous about asking this great, incredible man to come and give a lecture,” Kenny got a manicure before the meal. “He wouldn’t have noticed if I had nails,” she laughed.
When Kenny learned that Leakey was in town to find new leg prosthetics after he lost his legs in a 1993 plane crash, the Stony Brook President asked if he had health insurance, which he didn’t.
Richard Leakey examines fossils at the Turkana Basin Institute.
“Jewish mother that I am, I said, ‘Richard, you have to have medical insurance.’ We arranged for him to be this faculty member at Stony Brook, who came for a certain amount of time each year to give lectures and work with students, to have students work on his digs,” Kenny recalled.
Leakey, who didn’t graduate from college, was proud of his role at Stony Brook and relished the opportunity to teach, several friends and faculty members recalled. Audiences appreciated the opportunity to hear about the most recent discoveries into human origins, especially from someone with Leakey’s world-renowned reputation.
He was just a“spellbinding public speaker,” said Martin, who first met Leakey when Martin was a graduate student in 1979.
“When [Leakey] got an honorary degree, he had two to three minutes to make an acceptance speech,” Martin said. “There was not a sound from the moment he got up. It’s one of only two occasions when the entire student body rose to their feet and gave him a standing ovation.” The other was when famed physicist C.N. Yang received an honorary degree.
Leakey was such a draw that he gave some of his bigger talks at the Staller Center for the Arts, which had to accommodate overflow space for the audience demand.
Patricia Wright, Distinguished Service Professor and founder of a research station Centre ValBio at Stony Brook, recalled how a primate conservation class responded to him.
In his provocative style, Leakey would come in and say something “totally outrageous,” she recalled. The students, who might have otherwise been starstruck and been inclined to write everything he said, felt compelled to speak and would respond, saying, “Wait a second, it shouldn’t be like that.” The class would then discuss a conservation issue with Leakey, which opened up an effective dialogue.
“They loved him because he was so charming and was able to turn their minds around,” Wright said. “I loved those classes and watching him with my students.”
In the world of conservation, Leakey took unconventional approaches that proved effective. In 1989, five years after the landmark discovery of Turkana Boy, a 1.5-million-year-old fossil of one of the most complete early human skeletons, Leakey arranged the burning of 12 tons of ivory tusks in Kenya, signaling that they belonged on live animals.
“We can absolutely say that there are elephants and rhinoceros that are alive today that wouldn’t have been alive if it weren’t for Richard Leakey,” Wright said.
Words of wisdom
In addition to leading by example, Leakey dispensed valuable advice, often over food he prepared specially (more about that in the None of the Above column in this issue).
Leakey “left me with a huge gift, the gift of being confident in what I’m doing, as long I’m doing it with principles,” said Sonia Harmand, Associate Professor in Anthropology at Stony Brook. Leakey urged Harmand not to be “scared of breaking boundaries” and trying something nobody else had tried, she said. “Have faith in what you think you want to do. Never be afraid of being judged.”
Richard Leakey and Joe Biden in 2017 at the Stars of Stony Brook gala at Chelsea Piers. Photo from SBU
Harmand made a significant archaeological discovery, for which she received some skeptical comments. Leakey suggested that she consider such questions a point of pride and a reflection of the value of the work.
“You start to have enemies when you start to be famous and important,” Harmand said Leakey told her. It made her think she should be pleased that people were scrutinizing and criticizing her work.
Wright, meanwhile, appreciated how Leakey gave her the strength to live life the way she wanted. He urged her to put in the time and effort to work on politics and networking.
Several people suggested that Leakey, who battled physical challenges throughout his life without complaint, also inspired them. “He really taught me about courage and strength,” Kenny said. “I had the kind of courage that let me take on paths I didn’t know if I could handle. He taught me physical courage.”
Indeed, Leakey displayed the kind of physical courage and belief in his convictions people typically associate with a character from a Tom Clancy novel.
In 1967, Leakey was on a Kenyan flight that had to divert because of a dust storm. Despite earlier reports that the land in the Lake Turkana region was volcanic, Leakey thought he saw sedimentary rock, which could contain fossils. He rented a helicopter and landed with only seven minutes of extra gas to spare for the return trip. When he got out of the helicopter, he found fossils. He quickly appeared at a National Geographic meeting, where he urged the group to fund the search on the east side of Turkana.
The chairman of the society told him “if you don’t find fossils, don’t bother to come back to National Geographic,” Martin said the chairman told Leakey. The findings were more than enough for the group to continue funding Leakey’s research, including on the west side of Lake Turkana, where he discovered Turkana Boy.
Life-altering contact
For several of those who knew Leakey, the interaction was life-altering.
When he was a high school student in Nairobi, Isaiah Nengo heard a talk Leakey gave about plate tectonics and evolution.
“I was completely blown away,” said Nengo, who is now Associate Director at the Turkana Basin Institute.
As a second-year student at the University of Nairobi, Nengo attended an evolution lecture by Leakey. At that point, he was hooked, deciding to become a paleoanthropologist.
Nengo, whose parents’ education stopped around fourth grade, wrote to Leakey after he graduated from college, not expecting to hear back.
“It goes to tell you what kind of person [Leakey] was,” Nengo said. “This kid from the University of Nairobi out of nowhere writing him a letter, and he wrote back.”
Nengo, who said he heard similar stories from others in Kenya, including some who are currently colleagues at TBI, volunteered for a few months, until he got a fellowship.
He said Leakey helped fund a post-baccalaureate one-year program in the United States.
“The best gift you could get is the gift of knowledge,” Nengo said. “From [Leakey], I got the gift of knowledge, which changed the trajectory of my life.”
Like others who were prepared to change their lives after interacting with Leakey, Harmand had been in a comfortable job at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in France when Leakey suggested she join Stony Brook and the Turkana Basin Institute in 2011. “I’m not sure I would have taken” the job, but for Leakey. The work was only supposed to last a couple of years, but she never left.
“He marked my life forever and my career forever,” Harmand said. “We also had a very deep friendship” that extended to the next generation, as her nine-year-old daughter Scarlett has forged a connection with Leakey’s granddaughter Kika, whose mother Samira is the daughter of Richard and Meave Leakey.
With three daughters, including Louise Leakey, who conducts field research at Turkana Basin institute, Leakey was a strong advocate for women.
Women are “equally capable as men and for him, this was not even a question,” Harmand said.
A passion for Kenya
In addition to being pleased with his connection to Stony Brook University, Leakey, who accepted the ceremonial key to a French city in his first language of Swahili, was a proud Kenyan. He set out to employ, train, include and inspire Kenyans in research projects and encouraged the children of staff members to come see the fossils, Martin said.
Leakey also helped raise money from people who traveled to Kenya to support educational fellowships. He contributed to the construction of maternity clinics on either side of Lake Turkana so women could give birth in safe, sterile conditions with electric light, Martin added.
Kenyans recognized Leakey when he traveled and appreciated his contribution to the country.
“We were driving to his farm, when we got stopped,” Martin said. “Everybody knew him and wanted to shake his hand and say hello. He was a local hero who was seen as a Kenyan doing things for his fellow Kenyans,” Martin said.
Harmand recalled one of the last times she spoke with him; he reiterated his passion for his home country.
Leakey made it clear “how important it is to involve Kenyans in what we do,” Harmand said. “We are training the next generation of human origin scientists in Kenya. He is the son of Kenya.”
A passion for science
While Leakey had a genuine interest in a variety of fields, he was, at his core, a scientist. Nengo called him a “polymath” who knew a great deal about a wide range of scientific subjects.
In one of her final conversations with Leakey, Wright said he took her aside after a meal she described as “exquisite” and asked her about bones she’d found in Madagascar.
The conventional wisdom about human origins in the island nation was that humans had come from Borneo 2,000 years ago.
In the middle of Madagascar, however, Wright had found bones from hippos and birds that had cut marks from humans that dated back 10,000 years.
Leakey told her that she “had to find those people,” she recalled. “You will be letting down all of Madagascar if you don’t find their origins.”
Wright said that conversation, which had its intended effect, was “emblematic of his burning desire to know and to learn about hominid history and the burning desire to collect and assemble pieces of history.”
Birthday presents
Leakey, who gave so much of himself to so many people, didn’t like receiving gifts, Martin said, but he welcomed receiving cheese, wine or cooking tools, including pots and pans.
When Leakey reached his 70th birthday, Martin asked him what he planned to do to celebrate. He had scheduled a sailing trip, but he wasn’t sure if he could pull together a crew. Martin offered to be a part of his crew for a journey that lasted over a week aboard a 38-foot catamaran.
Leakey’s daughters Samira and Louise joined Martin as deck hands, giving Richard Leakey the opportunity to take the helm during his journey along the coast of Kenya near his home in Lamu.
“When he was steering the boat, it was the only time he wasn’t challenged by his disabilities,” Martin said. “He didn’t need his feet. Driving wasn’t particularly easy. When he was sitting in the catamaran, it didn’t heel; it went fast, and he could steer the boat. Watching him, I had the sense that he felt completely free.”
Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. at the Civil Rights March In Washington D.C. in 1963.
During a march on Washington, D.C., back in August 1963, civil rights activist and minister the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. gave a speech that was heard around the world.
“I have a dream,” he recited, “that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. I have a dream today.”
Now, nearly 54 years after his assassination in Memphis, Tennessee, that speech still has clout, and its message is still being spread, but unfortunately King’s children and granddaughter still do not see what he had envisioned so long ago.
The murders of Black men and women including George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Elijah McClain and David McAtee — just to name a few — still continue some five decades after King’s plea for our country to stop its racism, bigotry and hate.
How can we as a society still continue to judge, harass and kill people based solely on the color of their skin? Have we not learned?
This week would have been MLK’s 93rd birthday, and he would be ashamed of what is going on in our country.
When he died in 1968, Black people in America were fighting for their basic human rights. Now it’s 2022 and people of color are still fighting. Fortunately, they’re being joined by many others in the fight.
While the summer of 2020 was one of civil unrest, protests, anger and tears, it was a summer which again started the conversation that enough is enough.
In 2022, we as a society need to continue moving forward — not backward.
MLK’s dream was for children, Black or white, to play happily and peacefully together.
Let us start this new year with his dream in mind. Let us show respect for our neighbors and support causes of conscience. Let us remember the injustices and work to make sure they are not repeated.
We have the ability to succeed better as a society but what it will take is an awareness of injustice and the resolve to root it out.
Anthony Figliola, right, is pictured with his wife, Christine, and children Celine, Siena and Anthony. Photo from candidate
A former Town of Brookhaven deputy supervisor is ready to take on Congress.
Anthony Figliola
As the new year began, Anthony Figliola (R-East Setauket) announced his intention to represent New York’s 1st Congressional District. The seat is currently held by U.S. Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-Shirley) who announced in 2021 that he would not run for Congress and would instead run for New York State governor.
Figliola, who is running for office for the first time, said it’s something that’s been a dream of his for a while. When he heard the announcement that Zeldin decided to tackle the governor’s race, he knew it was time to seize the opportunity to run for Congress. Despite this being the first time he’s running for office, the candidate said Congress is a perfect example of being able to be a citizen legislator.
He said he prayed on the decision with his family and reached out to people he knew in the Republican Party. The husband and father of three said his agenda is families first, and he is concerned about kitchen table issues that affect the middle class.
“I decided that I wanted to jump into this, and primarily because, especially with COVID, seeing the way that this country has been going, it’s really been going downhill, and one of the most glaring issues to me is the impact on the middle-class community,” he said.
The candidate said while he knows the district has always been an expensive place to live, after COVID and the state mandates and shutdown, he talked to various small business owners and realized the difficulty they were having keeping afloat and hiring.
“I talked to a lot of families who, with inflation being at 7%, which is the highest since 1982, they literally don’t have the salary to be able to pay all their bills,” he said. “Some prices are up 50% from where they were last year. Something’s got to give, and people need somebody in Washington that’s going to fight for them and — whether they’re Republican, Independent or Democrat — someone who understands how government works, but also with the same struggles that they have. I was tired of sitting on the sidelines, and I want to be in it, and I want to play.”
Robert Cornicelli, of St. James, has also announced his intention to run on the Republican ticket for Congress. However, the Suffolk County Legislature is currently deciding on redistricting so whether or not Figliola will need to run in a primary depends on redistricting decisions.
Anthony Figliola and family. Photo from candidate
The East Setauket resident said he realized he has big shoes to fill in Congress if he were to win and would work not to lose Zeldin’s legacy of “fighting for the working men and women of this district.”
Figliola said taxes, inflation and gas prices are at the forefront of his mind as he runs for office. Regarding gas prices, he said he believes in opening up oil refineries so the U.S. can export oil to other countries, and in turn, build up the U.S. economy and lower the prices at the pump and inflation in general.
“We are now beholden to overseas foreign governments and foreign conglomerates to tell us how much the cost of gas should be,” he said. “We have to stop kowtowing to our enemies.”
Figliola said if elected he would work to help grow the local economy, while also safeguarding the environment, especially protecting the Island’s drinking water. He believes his experience as an executive vice president of a government relations and economic development business, as well as his time as Brookhaven deputy supervisor, will be an asset.
“One of the things that I’ve done in my career is I’ve worked a lot with sewers and the installation of sewers and building sewer facilities,” he said. “What I think is really important is that we work to find a way to sewer more of Suffolk County in the 1st Congressional District, because it’s going to do two things. It’s going to help reduce harmful toxins and nitrogen and other things that are being put into our drinking water and our waterways. And secondly, it allows us to redevelop and reimagine a lot of our downtowns.”
He said he is also concerned with current COVID mandates where he feels President Joe Biden (D) and Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) are making decisions and not involving all branches of government. While earlier in the pandemic former Gov. Andrew Cuomo (D) was given emergency powers, the current governor doesn’t have the same authority. An example he said is the mandatory vaccinations and boosters from Hochul which he felt were just edicts.
“There’s no checks and balances,” he said. “There was no debate. There’s no review of the issue, the science, who it’s going to impact. It’s just one day Biden or Gov. Hochul says this is how it’s going to be, and if you don’t follow, you’re going to lose everything that you know. And that’s it, and I disagree with that. I’m going to fight passionately for people’s individual liberties and for their freedoms.”
Isaiah Nengo recalled a day years ago when he was working in a field station in Kenya, searching for fossils.
A man who had a tremendous influence on his life was on the way to alter his horizons yet again, although this time the visit would have nothing to do with science.
Richard Leakey, the late founder of the Turkana Basin Institute (TBI) and a famed paleoanthropologist and conservationist, was bringing food from his home on the coast of Kenya in Lamu to the field station.
Leakey “prepared this lobster meal,” said Nengo, who is native of Nairobi, Kenya, and is currently associate director of TBI. “It was my first seafood meal. It was fantastic. I was like, ‘I’m sitting almost 600 miles from the ocean, it’s hot as hell and I’m eating lobster.’ That always stuck in my mind.”
Leakey, who died on Jan. 2 (see a tribute to the Stony Brook legend in this week’s Arts & Lifestyles page B12), left behind a lasting scientific legacy that filled science textbooks of people around the world, while he left an enduring food legacy that filled the stomachs of family, friends, coworkers and colleagues.
People fortunate enough to dine with him shared tales of Leakey’s culinary prowess and refined tastes.
Sonia Harmand, associate professor in the Anthropology Department at Stony Brook, took a long flight with Leakey to Kenya. Leakey had a salmon meal on the plane that didn’t meet his standards.
“He called the staff, and even the pilot came by to say hi because everybody knows about him,” Harmand said. Amid the introductions, he expressed his displeasure with the salmon.
When he returned to Kenya, he wrote to the airline and complained about the food.
As a host, Leakey went out of his way to make sure all of his guests enjoyed the food he purchased, prepared and served.
Harmand said her daughter Scarlett, who will turn nine in February, enjoyed eating at Leakey’s house because he prepared mussels and oysters he knew appealed to her.
“Every time you had a meal with him, he kept on asking if you liked it,” Harmand said.
Harmand also appreciated the unexpected gifts of incongruous foods at TBI. One day, Leakey arrived with ice cream and fresh strawberries.
“We had to eat it quickly,” she recalled with a laugh.
Another long time friend and colleague, Lawrence Martin, the director of TBI, said Leakey had a fondness for some Long Island foods. He particularly enjoyed ducks, as well as oysters and mussels from Long Island’s waterways.
“He said mussels were never as good in the warm water as they were in Stony Brook,” Martin said.
When he first got to know Leakey, Martin said Leakey cooked all the meals they shared, whether they were in Stony Brook or Kenya.
Martin called Leakey a “great chef” and said his late colleague “loved good food and loved going food shopping.”
While Leakey shared important information with former Stony Brook President Shirley Kenny, he also dined on memorable meals.
When they were on their own on Long Island without their spouses, Kenny invited Leakey over to her home for a meal.
After the dinner, he thanked her and promised he would return, providing she allowed him to do the cooking.
Sharing food with Leakey often meant benefiting from his storytelling prowess and his sense of humor.
Kenny and her family went on a safari with Jim and Marilyn Simons, co-founders of the Simons Foundation and supporters of science throughout Long Island.
“At the end of the day, we would sit in a circle and have drinks and [Leakey] would regale us with stories that were absolutely wonderful,” Kenny said. “You can’t even imagine how they made these [incredible] meals when there’s nothing out there to do it with.”
With hyenas howling at night and hot showers created with water heated by the sun during the day, the entire experience was “so exotic and so elegant at the same time,” Kenny added.
Harmand said Leakey didn’t cook with the goal of winning over people, but, rather, to share a connection.
“I don’t think he needed to impress anyone,” Harmand said. “He wanted to please you through food.”
There has been a lot in the news recently about COVID testing. We can request at-home test kits, and the government promises to send them to us through the mail. Also, we can shortly obtain N95 masks, the most efficient at filtering out microbes from the air, from pharmacies and other health centers. Those should be available to us by the end of next week.
Here is a new angle for consideration. Testing thus far has focused on using swabs inserted up the nose. But there is, perhaps, a more comfortable and more accurate possibility: spitting into a tube. “The virus shows up first in your mouth and throat,” according to Dr. Donald Milton, an expert on respiratory viruses at the University of Maryland who was quoted by The New York Times last Saturday. This means that testing saliva or swabbing the inside of the mouth could help identify people who are infected days earlier, some research suggests.
Here are some findings from Dr. Milton and his associates. Three days before symptoms appear and for two days after, “saliva samples contained about three times as much virus nasal samples and were 12 times as likely to produce a positive P.C.R. (gold standard) result. After that, however, more virus began accumulating in the nose …” The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has now authorized numerous saliva-based PCR tests which work well for screening students at schools.
“Saliva really has turned out to be a valuable specimen type and one that has increasingly been advocated as a primary testing sample,” said Dr. Glen Hansen, of the clinical microbiology and molecular diagnostics laboratory at the Hennepin County Medical Center in Minnesota.
Since Omicron “appears to replicate more quickly in the upper respiratory tract and have a shorter incubation period than earlier variants,” if attention to the mouth and throat would be able to detect the virus earlier it would be particularly valuable, according to Emily Anthes, the NYT reporter.
Further, researchers in South Africa, where Omicron was first identified, have determined that saliva swabs of that variant were better indicators of infection than nasal swabs in the P.C.R. tests, although the opposite was true for the Delta variant. But other research studies have had mixed results. As is usual, more research is needed.
There are also other aspects to saliva tests. It is possible that while highly sensitive tests like PCR might identify infection in saliva days earlier, less sensitive tests like the antigen test in the at-home kit, might not. And there are other considerations. What else has passed through the mouth before the test is given? And how will that affect the pH and the result? Also, saliva can be “viscous and difficult to work with,” especially when patients are sick and dehydrated, according to Dr. Marie-Louise Landry, director of the clinical virology laboratory at Yale New Haven Hospital, who is also quoted in the NYT.
In Britain, some at-home tests require swabbing both the throat and the nose. Multiple site testing would seem to offer an advantage. But test manufacturers would have to reconfigure their tests accordingly. Throat swabs need to be bigger. And most importantly, the at-home rapid antigen tests would have to be authorized for mouths or throats, which they currently are NOT. The biochemistry of the mouth is different from that of the nose and may yield a false positive.
Ultimately a variety of test options to meet a variety of situations would seem the best result. For those who have symptoms for several days, a nasal swab might be the choice. Saliva tests might work better for large-scale surveillance of asymptomatic people.
Meanwhile making at-home antigen tests available for everyone is a positive step.
The North Country Peace Group hosted a birthday commemoration for the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on Saturday, Jan. 15, at the corner of Route 25A and Bennetts Road in Setauket. Community members came together to remember King with songs, music and speeches. Photos by Myrna Gordon
“We could not be more excited to announce our captains. There is no greater honor on a team than being elected a captain by your teammates. This group is everything Stony Brook lacrosse is all about, they work hard, are tough, and love playing lacrosse. We are excited to see how far we can go with the leadership of these men,” said coach Gilardi.
McCannell recorded 38 points (19 goals, 19 assists) in 2021 and was tabbed to the All-America East First Team. He was tied for fourth in the America East in assists and ranked sixth in the league in assists per game (1.36). The Orangeville, Ontario native scored a season-high five goals in a 22-8 win on April 24, 2021.
Lowd saw action in all 14 games last season and picked up 39 ground balls, which were the second-most on the team. He recorded 10 caused turnovers and scored his first career goal at UMass Lowell on March 20.
Pallonetti was the league’s Offensive Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year in 2021. He became the first student-athlete in America East history to win the Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year honors in the same season. Pallonetti recorded 55 points (36 goals, 19 assists) in his first season on Long Island. He ranked second in the America East in goals, second in points per game (3.93), and tied for fourth in assists per game.
Sabella had a standout season in 2021 as he was named to the All-America East First Team, America East All-Rookie Team, and America East All-Championship Team. He picked up 23 ground balls and registered 14 caused turnovers.
White appeared in 12 games, recorded eight points, which included three goals and five assists, and picked up nine ground balls. White scored the tie-breaking goal with 6:55 remaining in the third quarter to help lead the Seawolves to a 14-8 win over Bryant on February 20, 2021.
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Stony Brook is slated to play a total of 14 games, seven of which will take place at LaValle Stadium and it is set to host 2021 NCAA Tournament teams Rutgers, Syracuse, and Vermont.
“We are excited to announce our 2022 schedule. We have a very challenging non-conference slate that is designed to prepare us for a tough conference schedule. We are looking forward to the Long Island Cup event hosted at Hofstra this year. It is going to be a great event to highlight Long Island lacrosse as well as great preparation for the America East Tournament,” said coach Gilardi. “With the return of fans to LaValle Stadium, we are looking forward to big home crowds as we have one of the best home slates in recent years highlighted by 2021 NCAA Tournament teams Rutgers, Syracuse, and Vermont.”
The Seawolves begin the 2022 campaign with a pair of home games at LaValle Stadium. Stony Brook first welcomes Fairfield to Long Island on February 12, followed by a meeting with Robert Morris on February 19.
After playing two home games to get the season started, Stony Brook takes part in the LI Cup being hosted by Hofstra on February 25, and February 27. The Seawolves go head-to-head with New York foe St. John’s on February 25, and their opponent on February 27, will be determined following the opening round of the tournament.
Stony Brook returns home to host perennial NCAA Tournament contender Rutgers out of the Big Ten. The Scarlet Knights advanced to the NCAA Tournament quarterfinals in 2021, where they fell to No. 1 North Carolina, 12-11, in overtime. The Seawolves are 6-6 all-time against Rutgers and it will be the first time that they host the Scarlet Knights since March 11, 2016, when they picked up a 15-6 win.
Following the meeting with Rutgers, Stony Brook travels to Providence, R.I. to face Brown on March 12. The Seawolves are back on Long Island for back-to-back home games, first against UMass Lowell in the America East opener on March 16.
The Seawolves then welcome national power Syracuse to LaValle Stadium on March 19. It will mark the second time in history that the teams play each other and the first time that they square off on Long Island. Stony Brook fell to Syracuse last season in the first-ever meeting between the teams at the Carrier Dome. The Orange advanced to the NCAA Tournament last season, where they fell to Georgetown in the opening round.
After the two-game homestand, the Seawolves play four out of their final six games of the regular season on the road. Stony Brook heads to UAlbany on March 26, and then travels to play at Dartmouth on April 5. The Seawolves are back home to play host to NJIT on April 9.
Stony Brook travels to play at Binghamton on Friday, April 16, and at UMBC on April 23. The 2022 regular season finale is a rematch of the 2021 America East semifinals between Stony Brook and Vermont on April 30. Vermont went on to win the America East Tournament and earn the league’s automatic qualifier into the NCAA Tournament where it fell to Maryland in the opening round.
The 2022 America East men’s lacrosse tournament is set to take place from May 5-7, and will be hosted by the tournament No. 1 overall seed. The top four teams from the regular season will advance to the conference tournament.
The Seawolves return All-Conference selections Dylan Pallonetti, Mike McCannell, Michael Sabella, David Estrella, and Austin Deskewicz to their 2022 roster. In addition to being an All-America East First Team and All-Rookie selection, Pallonetti was the league’s Offensive Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year. He became the first student-athlete in America East history to win the Player of the Year and Rookie of the Year honors in the same season.
Under the artistic direction of dance Icons Dwight Rhoden and Desmond Richardson, (both former principal dancers with ALVIN AILEY DANCE and star choreographers), COMPLEXIONS will perform two monumental pieces, “WOKE” and LOVE ROCKS”, born out of the current crisis’ we are facing in the world. Through dance, COMPLEXIONS confronts this moment in time and the question of what it means to exist in today’s society and how we connect in spite of it.
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