Campus Gathers to Celebrate Birthday of Beloved ‘Dr. Seuss’
Ioana Patringenaru | March 2, 2009
How long does it take to hand out 2,000 pieces of cake to UC San Diego students, faculty and staff members to celebrate the birthday of the late Theodor Geisel—also known as Dr. Seuss? Today, the answer was about 20 minutes, as the campus marked the 105th anniversary of the author in front of the Geisel Library. That’s about 20 slices a minute and a slice every 3 seconds.
The Teeny Tiny Pit Orchestra performed in front of a giant inflatable Dr. Seuss birthday cake.
The birthday party featured a giant inflatable Cat in the Hat, as well as music, free punch and cake. Audrey Geisel, Geisel’s widow, was on hand to cut the first pieces of cake along with UCSD Chancellor Marye Anne Fox and Brian E.C. Schottlaender, the Audrey Geisel university librarian. The Geisel Library holds the nation’s largest collection of Seuss’ work, Schottlaender pointed out.
“Dr. Seuss really embodies for us the innovative and creative spirit that is UCSD,” he said.
The author loved to walk in the campus’ eucalyptus groves, Schottlaender added. According to one story, about two decades ago, Geisel and his wife were strolling through campus and saw the library that would one day bear his name. He said this is how he, too, would have designed a library, Schottlaender said.
Also in honor of Dr. Seuss, the chimes atop Geisel Library rang out a new tune written especially for this occasion by UCSD alumnus Kirk Wang and commissioned by Scott Paulson, the UCSD Arts Library and university carillonneur. The work was based on the traditional “Happy Birthday” song, Paulson said. “It has a nice, bouncy feel to it,” the carillonneur explained. It’s also one-minute long—ideal for our short-attention span society, Paulson added.
In addition to that work, Paulson and his Teeny Tiny Pit Orchestra played selections from “The Cat in the Hat Songbook” on unconventional instruments, including toy pianos, drums and a wide variety of noise makers.
But what really got most people’s attention today was the cake. Freshmen Amanda McGinness and Suzanne Batiste had just come from a math class, when a giant Cat in the Hat balloon lured them to Library Walk. They were tucking into slices of chocolate-and-raspberry and vanilla-and-strawberry cake. “It’s a nice change of pace,” McGinness said.
Nearby, a group of Geisel Library staff members had gone for the chocolate cake. In these difficult budget times, it’s nice to see the campus celebrate, said Rosa Longacre, a library assistant.
Chancellor Marye Anne Fox read "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish" to second-graders at La Jolla Elementary School.
Before the cake cutting, Fox read from a Dr. Seuss favorite to second-graders at La Jolla Elementary School at 9:30 a.m., to celebrate both Dr. Seuss’ birthday and the national Read Across America Day. After the reading, graduate students from UCSD’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography gave a presentation about sharks to fifth-graders.
UC San Diego’s Geisel Library is named in honor of the famed author who died in La Jolla in 1991, and his widow, Audrey Geisel. The university received Geisel’s collection of drawings, notebooks and other memorabilia following his death, and, four years later, Audrey Geisel made a substantial donation to support the university’s libraries. In 2007, Geisel made a $1 million gift to UCSD Libraries to establish San Diego’s first named university librarianship, held by Schottlaender.
UC San Diego’s Mandeville Special Collections Library is the main repository in the nation for the original works of Dr. Seuss. The approximately 10,000 items in the Dr. Seuss collection, which includes original drawings, manuscript drafts, books, notebooks, photographs and memorabilia, document the full range of Geisel’s creative achievements, beginning in 1919 in high school and ending with his death in 1991.
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