Posted by John Hillman on May 10, 2001 at 22:35:46 from 24.141.236.141 :
Ed Powell’s first substantial publication was on Anomie and Suicide for the American Sociological Review, and I read it along with a few other pieces by Americans such as Mills, Merton, Lipset, and Gouldner when I started exploring Sociology in the early 1960s. That was in the days before the discipline had made any breakthrough in the parochial world of British academe. I was encouraged to pursue graduate studies in Sociology at SUNY/Buffalo whose reputation was then made by Lew Gross as someone prepared to challenge the dominant theoretical paradigms. That was in the days when American academic Departments were largely the creation of their Chairmen. Lew rather quietly encouraged mavericks, at least then, and had taken a bet on Ed because of the ASR article. When I arrived in Buffalo in 1963 the whole Sociology Department seemed to be full of mavericks, whether they be undergraduates, graduate students, junior faculty or those like Ed with secure positions. The Department was extraordinarily well positioned to make a major contribution to the discipline and even a modest one to the reshaping of American society. It was in this environment that Ed flourished, especially in all night parties around the pool at 124 Jewett Parkway, Buffalo’s version of the salon and coffee-house. As he flourished so did the graduate students, virtually all of whom became part of the circle around Ed. Out of that came a journal which he named for us, Catalyst, following Louis Wirth, “For thought is a catalytic agent that is capable of unsettling routines, undermining faiths and generating skepticism.” It expresses Ed’s sense of the responsibility of intellectuals well. Catalyst published some of the most widely read and cited articles in Sociology in the 1960s, but it upset the Department’s establishment. The external image of the Department was being defined by the juniors not the seniors, and when this cleavage coincided with one over the far more explosive question of the war against the Vietnamese the fate of the Department was sealed. Creative tension turned to destructive factionalism. Although many academic careers were put on hold as the anti-war movement consumed so much collective energy, Ed ensured that most of his circle received the support necessary to complete the often painful process of rendering interesting ideas into the cold formalities of a dissertation. In my case that came very late. Editorial work for Catalyst had prevented me from developing some of my own ideas, and in 1984 Ed offered to take over the journal. In explaining the circumstances I sent Ed a copy of my first article which had given me a lot of pleasure. I drove down to Buffalo with the Catalyst files and back issues and we planned to go on and promote the journal at the ASA Convention in Washington. The following morning I indicated I intended to drive down and Ed decided he would come with me. In his rather slow and deliberate fashion it took several hours to cancel his plane reservation, find someone to cover his class, and make arrangements to stay in Washington. By 5:30 we were finally on our way, and for several hours we chatted about Catalyst, Buffalo, teaching, sociology etc. In the middle of Pennsylvania at around 11 pm, Ed suddenly said : “I found your article very interesting; how can we turn this into a dissertation?” As dawn began to break our conversational rambles had produced a thesis proposal. Ed then sold it to the other Buffalo notables at the ASA and ensured that it did not afoul of any other navigational hazard. The experience was so reminiscent of my early encounters : concern for people and ideas, best expressed in conversation and late at night.