Class Notes
David Fuller ’53, J.D. ’56, writes: “I have to thank my older Brother, Everett (Bud) E. Fuller ’45 for sponsoring me as a Sigma Phi Pledge, thus enabling me to enjoy seven years as a Cal fraternity member from 1949 to 1956, and provide a very exciting and fulfilling college experience. Cal at that time was already a premier University, and Berkeley was a great place to live. WWII had ended several years before, but the Cal student body was still filled with many returning veterans anxious to complete their studies, marry, buy a home and start a family. Opportunity was everywhere. The population was poised to work together to rebuild and progress in a peaceful yet vibrant society. There were no riots, looting or similar destructive demonstrations and behavior to speak of. We grew up, played and studied with people of all races with no apparent hate or discrimination. The police and others in authority were respected, and society’s laws, rules and norms were mainly followed. Those who broke the law were for the most part dealt with fairly and held accountable for their crimes. People had differing views but settled them peacefully within the framework of our democracy.
The football team under coach Pappy Waldorf played in several consecutive Rose Bowl games with the help of all American fullback Jackie Jensen. Three of my fraternity brothers were first string starters on the team, offensive tackles Glenn Gulvan and Don Curran, and All American and future 49er linebacker Matt Hazeltine. On the Friday nights before the Stanford game each year there was a huge parade right through downtown Berkeley followed by a big rally at the Greek Theater. The fraternity membership had a wide and diverse spectrum of varied interests, including athletics, student affairs, as well as serious study. There were many social and coed activities, all of which made interaction with fellow members and many sororities an interesting and informative experience. I served one semester as President during my senior year and lived in a special room reserved for that office that came with a big balcony overlooking Piedmont Ave. where you could wave and interact with everyone that passed by below.
I recall several fraternity activities that might be of interest to both current students and those attending Cal over the years since the early 1950s. The first involves a business carried on by a series of members of the my fraternity. It was a “Sandwich Man” route handed down from one member to another over several years whereby night time snacks such as sandwiches, fruit, ice cream and milk were brought into the sororities and fraternities for sale. It provided a pretty good income to pay for any incidental expenses a student might need to cover. In the Spring 2015 issue of the fraternity’s quarterly publication called the “Sig Bear,” an article was published written by the then Sandwich Man describing how he came to buy the business for $50 and listed the members who had owned it before him. He also described the 1930 Model A Ford Coupe and sales equipment with a storage locker over the garage that came with the deal. My older brother, Bud Fuller, while attending Cal acquired the business, including the Model A, and ran it until he graduated the Spring before I arrived at Cal and joined the fraternity. He gave me the business and the car to help me meet my own financial needs, and I went out every night during my first semester as the Sandwich Man. Unfortunately, I also undertook to be the house dishwasher to pay for my room and board and used the sandwich route money to pay other expenses. To my dismay at the end of the first semester I found that the results of my failure to do much studying put me on probation, prompting me to immediately give up the dishwashing job, close the sandwich route, live at my home in Berkeley and pay attention to my studies. That summer I got a job as a playground director at a local grade school working every afternoon, all day Saturday and full time all summer. I held this job for the rest of my undergraduate years at Cal with its steady income and reasonable hours. I kept the Model A for many years before giving it to one of my younger brothers, and have saved a photo of the five Fuller brothers sitting around the open trunk with my brother Bud in the center and myself the last person sitting to his right. I had just reached the ripe old age of 93 when this was written, and was the last survivor of the seven children making up my Fuller family.
A second activity was an engagement custom that I am not sure is still followed as much as it was during my days at Cal. When a fraternity member became engaged, he would announce it and pass cigars for all to enjoy at the Monday Night dinner table where all members were required to attend in coat and tie. After dinner the entire membership would walk to the future bride’s sorority, in this case the Delta Gamma house, and serenade the engaged couple followed by refreshments. No liquor was served, as all alcoholic beverages were banned within one mile of campus including the inside of fraternities and sororities. At our serenade JoAnne Morris, my pinned Sig sister and future wife for seventy years, and I were joined by the fraternity house german shepherd, Sig. I saved a copy of a photograph of the event with us holding the dog that later appeared in a newspaper article announcing our engagement.
The third activity involved the formal dinner dances that each sorority and fraternity held twice a year at a bay area hotel, country or yacht club, where all the men wore tuxes and the women beautiful formal dresses. Live music of the swing era with a generous amount of Glenn Miller and Les Brown pieces were usually performed at these dances, which were preceded by a number of individual private cocktail parties to warm things up with a few alcoholic beverages. I bought a tux for the first and only time of my life to use during my college years to attend these formal events as well the fraternity initiations which required the members to attend wearing tuxes. I even found a photo taken prior to one of these events to illustrate the clothes worn at the time.
I was fortunate to be able to stay three more years at Cal attending Law School, and during that time my wife, now JoAnne Fuller, and I were able to continue to enjoy the fellowship with my fraternity members at many social events. Many of my fraternity brothers became lifelong friends with whom I still maintain contact, and although Pappy Waldorf no longer coaches the Cal Football team, I continue to be a lifelong season ticket holder and attend as many games as I can traveling from my home in Chico, California.”
Joseph Godlewski ’15 published his newest book The Architecture of the Bight of Biafra: Spatial Entanglements with Routledge Press. Based on fieldwork and archival research conducted during his time at Cal, the book examines the intersection of race and the built environment in the region now known as southeastern Nigeria. Enmeshed in the history of slavery, colonialism, and the modern construction of race, the spatial dynamics of the Biafran region have not been geographically delimited. The central thesis of this volume is that these spaces of entanglement have been productive sites of Black identity formation involving competing and overlapping interests, occupying multiple positions and temporalities, and ensnaring real, imagined, and sometimes contradictory aims. As the historian Nnamdi Elleh writes, “This erudite text ruptures the framework of everything we know about architectural and spatial productions in West Africa from the early modern period to the present.” Joseph is an Associate Professor at Syracuse University where he teaches in the School of Architecture and is a Senior Research Associate at the Maxwell African Scholars Union.
Susan T. Ye ’07, an attorney in the San Jose office of Littler, the world’s largest employment and labor law practice representing management, has been elevated to shareholder, effective January 1, 2025. Across its U.S., Mexico and Singapore offices, the firm elevated 28 attorneys to shareholder status. Ye’s practice focuses on representing and advising employers and managers in a broad range of employment law actions in state and federal court as well as before administrative agencies. As an experienced litigator, she routinely defends companies of varying sizes against high-stakes matters, including those involving claims of wrongful termination, harassment, discrimination, retaliation, as well as wage and hour class actions, and PAGA representative actions. Ye has been involved in all phases of legal disputes, including pre-litigation, pleadings, taking and defending depositions, mediation and settlement negotiations, trials, among others. She has also drafted and argued numerous prevailing motions and makes regular court appearances. In addition to her litigation work, Ye has experience providing advice and counsel to employers concerning day-to-day employment issues, including hiring and screening practices, separation agreements, and development and review of company policies to identify risk and ensure compliance. Ye earned her J.D. from the University of California, Davis School of Law and her B.A., cum laude, with Distinction, from the University of California, Berkeley.
Christina G. Cordoza ’85, an attorney in the Walnut Creek office of Littler, the world’s largest employment and labor law practice representing management, has been elevated to shareholder, effective January 1, 2025. Across its U.S., Mexico and Singapore offices, the firm elevated 28 attorneys to shareholder status. Cordoza is a trusted legal adviser to business owners, in-house counsel, and human resources professionals on a broad range of HR and compliance workplace concerns, including leave and accommodation, discrimination, harassment, retaliation, terminations, and wage and hour issues. As a former in-house employment lawyer and general counsel at a number of different companies, involving a broad range of industries such as biotech, healthcare, retail, technology and food manufacturing, Cordoza has the ability to leverage her experience to advise clients on employment-related risk while balancing business realities in an ever-changing legal landscape. Her background also includes designing contingent worker programs, international law and agency claims of all types. Cordoza earned her J.D. from the University of California College of the Law, San Francisco and two undergraduate degrees (economics and history) from the University of California, Berkeley.
Miller Nash welcome Jessica Bernardini, M.S. ’07, to the firm’s environmental team. Bernardini, based in the firm’s Portland office, focuses her practice on providing clients with regulatory advice and representation in energy and environmental law matters. “I’m excited about joining Miller Nash,” says Bernardini. “It’s evident that I have the support of knowledgeable and experienced attorneys who foster a supportive environment for their attorneys to grow both professionally and personally.”
Bernardini’s environmental law experience is bolstered by her more than 10 years of experience as an engineering consultant to private and public entities. Before joining Miller Nash, Bernardini practiced at law firms in Oregon where she focused on energy and environmental matters. In this role, she handled contested cases before the Public Utility Commission of Oregon and the Energy Facility Siting Council. She also completed a secondment at Avangrid Renewables, LLC.
Arnold & Porter has elevated Co-Managing Partner Ellen Kaye Fleishhacker, a distinguished UC Berkeley alum, to Global Co-Chair of the firm. Ellen graduated from the Berkeley Law/Haas JD/MBA program in 1996 and earned her B.A. in History from UC Berkeley in 1989—with high honors and Phi Beta Kappa. At Berkeley Law, she served as Managing Editor of the California Law Review. Now a partner in the firm’s San Francisco office, Ellen has served as Co-Managing Partner since 2021 and is a key member of the Corporate & Finance practice group, co-leading the firm’s investment management transactional practice.
Jate Samathivathanachai ’01 joined Mammoth Biosciences as Senior Vice President of Finance in February 2025. Mammoth is a Berkeley-affiliated biotechnology company focused on leveraging its proprietary ultracompact CRISPR systems to develop potential long-term curative therapies for patients with life-threatening and debilitating diseases.
Epic Universe, the first major theme park to be built in the United States in 25 years opens on May 22, 2025. Steve Tatham ’83 is the executive creative director for Universal Creative of the project. In his role, he leads the creative team and is responsible for all creative execution. His role is define as being the voice and the vision of the project. His role is to ensure that the team delivers on, as he says, the “promise of the premise” and that the creative execution matches the creative intent. He has been with Universal Creative for ten years starting with a four-year stint at Universal Studios Japan in Osaka. Prior to that he spent 28 years at Disney starting at Walt Disney Imagineering, the theme park design entity of Disney, as a set designer in 1987 after completing his masters in architecture at UCLA.
Russell J. Smith ’09 has been elevated to partner, effective January 1, 2025, at the Boston law firm of Casner & Edwards.
Smith specializes in fiduciary litigation, including probate matters, guardianships, conservatorships, will contests, actions to remove personal representatives and trustees, and complaints in equity. Additionally, he has been appointed by the Probate and Family Court as a fiduciary in contested matters, including as conservator and personal representative. At the request of certain clients, Smith also handles domestic relations matters. Smith is a past President of the Boston College Law School Veterans’ Association. He was honorably discharged from the U.S. Marines as a Sergeant.
Margaret Morganroth Gullette, M.A. ’64, internationally known as an age critic and author of prize-winning books about ageism, has just published American Eldercide: How It Happened, How to Prevent It (2024). The University of Chicago Press has nominated it for a Pulitzer Prize and a National Book Award, among others. Katherine S. Newman, Provost and Executive VP of Academic Affairs of the University of California, writes: “With unflinching detail, American Eldercide indicts government indifference and failed regulation during the COVID pandemic. Poignant portraits of real people bring us face to face with individuals who are all our responsibility. This powerful book should be read by anyone who cares about public health, dignified aging, and government accountability.”
Sr. NV Judge Larry Sage ’68 was nominated as one of the 60 “Courageous Judges” by The National Judicial College. The nomination reads: “Retired Judge of the Sparks (Nevada) Municipal Court: Decorated Army veteran who helped create Nevada’s first limited jurisdiction Court on Alcohol & Other Drug Court and the first Native American Driving Under the Influence Victim Impact Panel for the Washoe, Paiute and Shoshone tribes. During three years in war torn Afghanistan, he trained judges and prosecutors. As a peace monitor in South Sudan, he located dozens of child soldiers, later freed.”
Cameron Walker ’99 published her debut short story collection, How to Capture Carbon, with What Books Press in October 2024. She is the author of the children’s book National Monuments of the U.S.A. (a School Library Journal Best Book of the Year), and of the essay collection Points of Light: Curious Essays on Science, Nature, and Other Wonders Along the Pacific Coast. Her writing has appeared in publications including the New York Times, Orion, and Nature.
