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A group from Bloomington, Indiana takes a tour of the Stanford University d.school in November 2022. Courtesy Alain Barker.

In this week's Around Town column, read about siblings reuniting, an electricity milestone and a Stanford student's book deal.

STARR STRUCK ... Palo Alto and its newest sibling city, Bloomington, Indiana, have many things and people in common: Tara VanDerveer, Stanford University's legendary women's basketball coach who hooped it up for Indiana University as a student; the renowned physicist Douglas Hofstadter, who took the opposite route and graduated from Stanford before becoming a professor at Indiana University; and Palo Alto City Council member Vicki Veenker, a former Hoosier who spearheaded the "sibling city" program that brought the two cities together. Earlier this fall, Veenker moderated an author talk with Hofstadter that took place in Bloomington and was simulcast at both cities. At one point, Hofstadter was asked by an audience member about how to maintain humility while moving into the future. He responded by making the case for humanities education, which he suggested fosters international unity and humility. He lamented the recent cuts to humanities departments in universities across America and the renewed emphasis by colleges on STEM (science, technology, engineering, math) courses. He argued that the country should be trying to instead preserve LAMP, an acronym he coined that includes literature, art, music and philosophy. "That should be what we should be trying to preserve," he said during the Sept. 7 event. "STEM is dehumanizing in many ways." The next joint event took place this Sunday, Nov. 12, and focused on the topics of race and belonging. The conversation focused on another person that the two cities have in common: former Stanford University president and notorious eugenicist David Starr Jordan, whose name was struck from a Palo Alto middle school and replaced with Frank S. Greene. "Both communities faced similar issues dealing with the legacy of David Starr Jordan and the renaming process," Veenker said.

A new all-electric heating, ventilation and air conditioning unit is lifted by a crane during its installation process on the rooftop of the Peninsula Conservation Center in Palo Alto on Jan. 25, 2023. Photo by Magali Gauthier.

OUT OF GAS ... For decades, the Peninsula Conservation Center has been known mostly for the eco-conscious nonprofits that fill its spaces, a list that currently includes (among others) Canopy, Acterra, and the Sierra Club Loma Prieta Chapter. Now, the building itself is taking on some of its tenants' personality. On Nov. 2, Mayor Lydia Kou came by the center at 3921 East Bayshore Road to help the nonprofits ceremonially flip the "off" switch on natural gas. The move came shortly after the 53-year-old center replaced its traditional gas-fired space heaters with Bryant heat pumps, making it the first existing commercial building to achieve this conversion to all-electric infrastructure, according to Phil Bobel, who serves as vice chair at the Peninsula Conservation Center board. (Several buildings in Palo Alto, including the headquarters of the Weekly's parent company at 450 Cambridge Ave., have been all-electric since their inception.) The center is not done with adding environmentally friendly infrastructure, Bobel said. Next on the list: replacing two older electric-vehicle charger ports with six more modern ports. He noted that a city of Palo Alto rebate program will fund about half of the $85,000 project.

FROM NEWSROOM TO PRINTING PRESS ... When former Stanford University President Marc Tessier-Lavigne stepped down earlier this year, it was then-Stanford freshman Theo Baker who was partially behind it. Baker wrote a series of stories for the Stanford Daily, the school's student newspaper, calling into question the validity of research that Tessier-Lavigne did prior to becoming president at Stanford. But now, the youngest-ever George Polk Award winner is on track to publish a book about his experiences, according to Page Six. Baker, whose parents are Susan Glasser, a staff writer at the New Yorker, and Peter Baker, the chief White House correspondent for the New York Times, signed the book deal with Penguin Press according to Page Six. Baker's book will be titled "How to Rule the World: Yacht Parties, Culture Wars and the Downfall of a President at Stanford," according to Deadline. Warner Bros and producer Amy Pascal who has also produced several Spider-Man movies won the rights to the book, Deadline also reported.

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Around Town: siblings reunite, an electricity milestone and a ... - Palo Alto Online