Dr. Bill Edgar, 1933-2011

We all likely know that our idols will likely pass on before us.  Whether it’s a parent, teacher, coach, or whoever, odds are pretty good that the person you see as a mentor and a guide in your life is probably older than you.  But I’ll say this… knowing that fact, academically, doesn’t make it any easier to take when it happens.

I got an e-mail this morning telling me that Dr. William Edgar, philosophy professor and long-time director of the Honors Program at SUNY Geneseo that now bears his name, died last week at 78.  Bill and his wife Stacey, also a philosophy professor at Geneseo, changed so many lives in so many ways; my little eulogy here can’t possibly do him justice, but I feel obligated to try.

The first course I took as a member of the honors program in Fall 1993 was HONR 101, “The Nature of Inquiry,” a philosophy primer created and taught by Dr. Edgar.  He took twenty of us — ten new freshmen and ten new sophomores entered the program each fall — under his wing, inviting us to parties at his house and making us a family.  We’d sit in our classroom, a somewhat hidden room on the second floor of the theater building, twice a week in a big circle and discuss life’s great philosophical questions.  We learned about Plato and Aristotle, about Zeno and how you couldn’t really go anywhere, about Descartes, and Hume… about how to think critically and read deeply.

I met the most incredible people through Bill Edgar.  My first roommate, Eric, who went on to law school and now lives in Connecticut with his family… George, the most brilliant mathematical mind I know and a guy who gave me the honor of being the best man at his wedding… Jen, who overcame several unfortunate Honors party-inspired nicknames and became a librarian… Sarah, who helped me through fraternity pledging more than she probably knew… Michelle, Andy, Emil… so many people that impacted my life in so many ways.

He introduced us to Ron Herzman, a brilliantly eccentric English professor who taught the “Critical Reading” honors course the following spring.  To Eileen Daly, a former philosophy major who came back to teach a Symbolic Logic class that I took even though it was a night class, just because she was connected with Bill.  (Full disclosure: it didn’t hurt that she was young and attractive.)  To Stephen Padalino, who took our honors science course on a whirlwind tour of nuclear physics.  To James Willey, a musicologist who taught us what to do if anyone approached us on the street with a loaded flounder.  To Bill Cook, who’s everything you want your history professor to be and more.  Bill Edgar made sure we knew that it was okay to think, okay to analyze, okay to question.

A few weeks into college, I bought train tickets to come home and visit my family; I couldn’t find anyone who was willing to drive me to the train station, and Bill graciously volunteered to take the time out of a fall Friday afternoon to help a lonely freshman get home.

One of our graduation requirements was a two-semester Humanities sequence.  Most folks tried to take the easy way out, looking for a professor who would give the easiest tests or the least work.  Not us; I took both Hum I & II with Stacey Edgar, because I knew she would challenge us and that we’d walk out of there actually learning something.

It was because of Bill’s influence that after September 11, 2001, when I was going through some spiritual and emotional confusion, I turned to the Koran and to the Bhagavad Gita and to Buddhist texts; because I knew that I could read and absorb and learn what made me, and the world, tick.

It’s because of Bill that I have a special place in my admissions counselor’s heart for philosophy majors.  I love when students aren’t afraid to write and read and learn; I wish I’d done more with philosophy as an undergrad, and have toyed with the idea of graduate work.

My mission to you, students, is to find your personal Bill Edgar.  Find someone who will challenge you, who will make you work and think, and at the same time, will respect your words and thoughts and decisions.  It’s tempting to take courses just to get an “easy A,” or just to fill in a graduation requirement.  But really, honestly think about the courses you’re taking and the decisions you’re making in college; you’re here to learn and grow.  Make sure you’re doing that.

We should all be so lucky to have someone in our lives like Bill Edgar; his spirit lives on in me every day of my life.  I can only hope that I have half as much impact on my students here at Stony Brook that he had on me and on all of us.  I’ve reread the e-mail from the president of the college a few times today, and I’ve teared up every time: “He was our philosopher-in-chier, our Socrates.”

Thanks, Bill.