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FOREWORD
- Oregon State University Press
- Chapter
- Additional Information
ix FOREWORD by Daniel W. Bromley Sidney James Castle, Josie May Tucker Castle, Ross Thompson, Fred Taylor, Merab Weber, Bill Alvey, Walt Bradley, Ed Bagley, Earl Heady, Kenneth Arrow, Ray Doll, Charles Warren, Marion Clawson, James Jensen, Gilbert White, Edward Mason, Charles Hitch, Edward Hand, Carl Stoltenberg, Roy Arnold, Thayne Dutson, Conrad Weiser, John Byrne, Curtis Mumford, Betty Rose Thompson Burchfield. Our individual life history is the cumulative creation of subtle traces left by those whom, quite by accident, we encountered along the way. Nothing is written out for us. Life unfolds as a series of accidents. John Dewey insists that we enter life in medias res—as when one walks into the middle of a movie. Being prepared turns serendipity from a fickle friend into a constant companion. Emery Castle has never been caught by surprise. To have known Emery Castle for 45 years is to have benefited from the great comfort of knowing a man of unrestrained modesty, unrivaled insight, and unequaled kindness. My own father died when I was 19—approximately the same age as Emery when he boarded that train in Wellington, Kansas to become a radio operator on 30 bombing missions over Germany. Life offers us a variety of ways in which serious growing up is urgently required. Some who have had the searing experience of war never seem to forget it—and too many seem unable to let the rest of us forget it either. The true spirit of a person is revealed in the personal memories they choose to convey to others. This is, after all, how we come to know others. I am quite sure that had Emery been able x FOREWORD to provide his editor—and the reader—with a reason for skipping the years 1943-1945, he gladly would have omitted the entire affair. What horrible business to have been obliged to undertake; what anguish it must still incite. On the subject of anguish, those of us from different pasts cannot comprehend the life of Sidney James and Josie May—just doing what parents have always done, only more of it. And from their story one comes to understand the tempered carbon steel inside Emery. The unfolding of a life is a wonderful thing to behold—the decision points, the paths taken and avoided, the nudging help along the way, the careful deliberation of options, the consultation with others. What a joy to have the blanks filled in—graduate school, the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, going to Oregon State University, stumbling onto roses, acquiring professional credibility, gaining skill as an academic administrator (imagine that), mentoring and inspiring many of us to become “like Emery” someday, guiding a respected Washington, D.C. research institute through perilous times, creating and leading an intellectual program to rediscover what is so marvelous about rural America, and then—as could be predicted—becoming the exquisite and consummate caregiver to his dearest Merab. It all fits, and it is so beautifully told. But of course Emery has always been a teacher, and so here we see an example of the clarity of his thought process—and his marvelous ability to explain complex issues, and to connect them together in a coherent way: I favored a carbon tax on fossil-fuel use long before the climate-change controversy arose. I believe our economy and our lifestyles are much too dependent on an energy supply that has been available over time at a declining real cost, a use that assaults humans and the rest of the natural environment, directly and indirectly. I regret the nature of the climate-change controversy, because it is being waged on grounds that may damage perceptions of how scientific questions get resolved in science. Regardless of how it turns out on scientific merit, we may be distracted from thoughtful consideration of a more [35.173.178.60] Project MUSE (2024-03-28 17:19 GMT) A NOTE FROM THE CO-PUBLISHER xi fundamental issue—the interrelation of energy, economic growth, and the environment, with climate constituting only one part of the environment [chapter 7, p. 178]. The journey recounted here differs in such fundamental ways from the standard autobiography. It differs because it is Emery doing the telling . There are no boastful accounts of intellectual or bureaucratic triumphs . Emery never comes out on top. Emery brings people along. He explains, he teaches, he reasons, and he listens. He brings other people to his side. Many with whom he dealt, and this...