Leland sent this note about the plates and mugs 10/3/10:
Good idea, Lee and David, to put the plates and stories on the web. Cornelia and I believe the plates and mugs, on and hanging under shelves over the breakfast room benches (first there was one shelf over each bench, then there were two -- Cornelia remembers only one), were all from their 2 annual math meetings. Granddaddy belonged to the Mathematical Association of America (teaching oriented) and the American Mathematical Society (research oriented). The meetings were usually held on college/university campuses. AMS meetings were always just after Christmas. I remember seeing them off on the train for some of these AMS meetings. When I was close to my PhD, they took Cornelia and me along for the AMS meeting in Chicago. This gave them an occasion to reminisce with us about their honeymoon in Chicago. And for me to embarrass everybody by stepping on the Lake Michigan ice and breaking through. They took me to their honeymoon hotel, which was nearby, where my trousers were pressed dry.

On the cabinet wall of the breakfast room, they had some plates relating to their sons. There was a small one from Univ of Edinburgh for us. Maybe UGA and Duke as well. Maybe UT for Loren. Maybe Air Force for Cooper.

David, you will be getting an email invitation to a Williams/Tyler event in Atlanta on Oct 14. If that coincides with your quick trip, perhaps you could go. Loren and Susan were there for the one previous such event.

Leland

Carolee followed up with this later in the day:
Thanks all for doing this. What wonderful memories in the room that the plates adorned. The senorita or waitress serving meals Sunday dinners of alphabet cereal (too sweet a cereal to be served at home) Cookies with pecans and cookies with sprinkles Drawers that slide out and down with cutlery The grandkids being around the table

But then when I think of the plates and all of the those universities, they were an early subtle entre into the world of colleges. As were our trips to the math department.

BTW, I vote for one shelf of plates.
Love to all,
carolee

And then Cooper passed this along:
I remember the two shelves over each bench. I also remember the "food fight" in the breakfast room among the grandchildren under the aforementioned double shelves while the "adults" tried without success to have a quiet meal in the dining room.
Cooper