Birmingham, Alabama
One thing that’s amazing about these events we’ve been attending, and the Williams alumni community in general, is that it doesn’t really matter how many people attend, the energy is always high and infectious. Our event in Birmingham was no exception.
Birmingham is an old steel town. According to our hosts, it fashioned itself the Pittsburgh of the South, and though steel is more gone than not, the town still remembers it’s heritage. We heard freight trains rumbling through town at least once an hour while we were there (trains that once would have been filled with steel), and there’s also an enormous cast iron statue of Vulcan, God of the Forge, standing over the city.
God of the Forge
We pulled into town on a pleasant summer evening and made our way to Dram, a new and attractive whiskey bar near the city center. After ordering drinks from our British waiter (a british accent with southern twang is a mesmerizing combination) we were joined by a pair of Williams alums and a Williams spouse.
Steele Marcoux ‘02 and her husband Michael met us first. Steele is from Atlanta originally and played tennis at Williams. She’s thrilled about teammate Alison Swain’s ‘01 success as head coach of the Williams women (two Tennis NCAA Championships in as many years of coaching). Michael went to Washington & Lee University, but has attended enough Williams events at this point that he’s rather partial to the Purple Valley. Work brought them down to Birmingham; Michael is a lawyer and Steele writes for Coastal Living. The dining room of their lovely house, where we stayed, was recently photographed for a magazine Christmas spread. (Perfect timing, no?) We ate breakfast on the swing on the front porch and felt very southern.
Michael and Steele crammed into the Mystery Machine
The second alum we met is an Alabama native. Drees Griffin graduated in ‘06, and he’s returned to ‘Bama to attend medical school at the University of Alabama. When I met Drees I recognized his name, which he attributed to the fact that he sent out numerous all campus e-mails his junior and senior year at Williams. He worked at the Cleveland Clinic after graduating, and found his way back home for Med school (he’s planning on being a pathologist) and the nice weather. Drees took us to “The Original Pancake House” for breakfast. The place was awesome, despite the fact that we each got an order of pancakes and probably had enough food to feed a freshman entry at Sunday brunch.
A post-dinner photo
Meeting Drees, Steele, and Michael was awesome, and they were thrilled to receive their limited edition purple hats. We left early next morning for Atlanta, listening to “Georgia on my Mind,” “Midnight Train to Georgia” and “Why, Georgia, Why?”
The Orignal Pancake House. The pancakes were HUGE!
