Saying Goodbye to a Beloved History Professor, Marjorie Lamberti

Author: Lindsey Whitton

Marjorie Lamberti, Charles A. Dana Professor of History, is one of the most memorable members of the Middlebury College faculty. She is a world-renowned scholar who is well published and often speaks at professional conferences. She is an inspired teacher who anticipates her discussions with students with great excitement and gently guides students to think historically and to form their own opinions.

Most importantly, however, Lamberti is a remarkable person who has enriched the lives of thousands of members of the Middlebury College community during almost four decades of service to the College. This spring Lamberti will retire, but her colleagues and legions of students past and present will never forget her charisma, her commitment and her kindness. Travis Jacobs, Fletcher D. Proctor Professor of American History, said that Lamberti "has earned the respect of students, alumni and colleagues during her impressive career at Middlebury College."

Lamberti grew up in New Haven, Conn. She attended a public high school with a college preparatory academic program that "prepared students extremely well for college," she said. She matriculated to Smith College, where she was inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa Society. She continued her education at Free Universit in Berlin and at Yale University.

Lamberti began teaching at Middlebury in 1962 and she has been at the College "happily ever since." She has taken "quite a few" sabbaticals throughout her tenure, however, which included fellowships at the Institute for Advanced Study at Princeton, and the Woodrow Wilson Center.

She is an expert in German history and the history of Europe Jewry, a specialization that was inspired by many of her former teachers. "In my education," Lamberti said, "I had the good fortune to be taught by refugees from Germany and Italy." These "individuals are extraordinary," she continued. She began to study German in high school and has had a passionate interest in the culture ever since. She personally knows many of the historians in her field and facilitates lively debates in her classroom over different historians' arguments. Jacobs commented on his admiration for "how she has devoted herself to her students and teaching while at the same time she has established a fine record as a scholar."

"She is a world-renowned expert in her field," President John McCardell agreed. "And she has brought great credit to Middlebury through her publications and her involvement in the wider world of scholarship."

Lamberti began teaching classes in Dana Auditorium with large enrollments. She was the teacher of the foundation course The Formation of the Nation-State in Western Europe, and was one of three professors who taught Revolutions in the Modern Era. She also taught two courses on the history of Europe in the 19th and 20th centuries. McCardell remembered this period in Lamberti's teaching career. "For many years she taught a heavy load in the History Department," he said. "Generations will recall being simply transfixed by Marjorie's classroom presence — a combination of dynamism, expertise, focus, and eloquence that merits the overused term 'unique'."

Associate Professor of History Jim Ralph '82 was one of her students. "I first met Marjorie Lamberti when I took her class on the making of the nation state in the spring of 1979, my freshman year at Middlebury," he said. "She lectured in Dana Auditorium. The class filled the hall, and she kept us enthralled with her dynamic and thought-provoking lectures. Each was a gem — well argued and expertly presented."

In the 1990s she switched her teaching style to reflect her more narrow specialization, offering classes on the history of Germany and the history of Jews in Europe. She continued to volunteer to teach an intensive writing first-year seminar every year because, she commented it is a wonderful way to get to know first-year students. "It is also a way of keeping my own writing skills sharp," she said. "I love teaching first-year seminars!" Lamberti, despite her expertise, continues to work on her own distinct prose style. She still appreciates the art of writing, which she has always enjoyed immensely.

"When I joined the faculty a decade [after having taken Lamberti's class as a student] Marjorie was as enthusiastic a teacher as ever," Ralph said, "and she has remained so over the last years of her tenure here." Her classes are very interactive, and she allows her students to "set the agenda" for many discussions. Students comment on aspects of the assigned readings that interested them most, while she elaborates, encourages and writes their comments on the board. When everything pertinent has been aired, she numbers the comments in the order that they should be discussed and asks the class if they are happy with this agenda. When everyone has agreed, the class discussion begins.

She is always encouraging and kind, and compliments students often on their insight and perception. "It has been both a pleasure and an honor to have had Professor Lamberti during her last semester here at Middlebury College," current student Anna Kasupski '04 said. "Her enthusiasm and extensive knowledge of the material taught have provided me with a truly valuable learning experience."

Over the course of the last decade "Marjorie has continued to be a true force in the classroom," McCardell commented. Though her teaching style has changed from the traditional large lectures many alumni may remember, she is a wonderful facilitator of small seminar discussions. "Teaching is not simply working in the classroom," Lamberti is careful to note. "It is important to engage in a dialogue outside."

Her dedication to, and passionfor her students and their education has not gone unrecognized. Last year, Lamberti was the recipient of the Faculty Appreciation Award from the Student Government Organization. Despite the numerous distinctions she has achieved over the course of her career, it was this honor that has meant the most to her. "This is something I will treasure," she said, "because it is from the students."

Middlebury students' academic interest, motivation and capabilities, Lamberti noted, have not changed over the years despite monumental changes in facility and in the size of the applicant pool. There is a "larger reservoir of young talent" from which current Middlebury students are chosen, but she remembers classes from the '60s, '70s and the '80s "where students were also critical thinkers and very engaged."

"Middlebury has always had a large number of talented, gifted, intelligent students," she said. "My classes in earlier years were also very exciting and there was a dynamism in those classes just as there is today," she notes. "The student body was strong then and it is strong now." Lamberti is familiar with thousands of alumni since for years her classes were fairly large. "Whenever I meet alumni I am stunned at their accomplishments," she said. "It is extraordinary what they have done!" Invariably they remember her also: her vibrant presence in the classroom, her dedication for her chosen profession and for her selfless commitment to her students.

Her career at the College will be celebrated this spring with two parties, one hosted by Jacobs, the other by McCardell. Jacobs, who joined the History Department one year after Lamberti, has described her as "a terrific colleague."

Lamberti will continue to live in the Middlebury area after her retirement and said she looks forward to seeing students and her former colleagues. She sees herself going forward as a scholar. She has already published three books, and written sections of numerous others, but she plans to embark on a new project, a study of refugee scholars from Germany and Italy. She will research and write about "this migration of knowledge across the Atlantic," that initially inspired her field of study many years ago.

"I am
leaving a department with such strong leadership," she said. "In the past few years the history department has lost some of Middlebury's finest teachers but yet we have recruited such a strong younger generation that there is still a department, in my view, that is one of the strengths of Middlebury." She praised that younger generation of history professors as exceptional teachers and contributors to the college community.

"I will miss teaching," she said. "It has been such a rich life! It has been a life in which all of my dreams have come true. Sometimes I can scarcely believe that so many opportunities have come my way! I am happy and I feel this joy so deeply."

"Marjorie is one of the most talented and committed members of our faculty," McCardell commented. "She will be difficult to replace, impossible to replicate. I know I speak for her colleagues as well as her present and former students in thanking her for her selfless and distinguished service to Middlebury over a long and remarkably productive career."