University of Chicago news stories on Newser

Nerdiest US Colleges

Sarah Whitmire — Sat, 09 Jul 2011 11:10:05 CDT

While some colleges are known for their sports teams or ability to party, others make time to observe Pi Day (3/14, of course), run scientific studies on campus graffiti, design campus-wide (literally) Rube Goldberg machines, and pump up their students by playing Wagner’s Ride of the Valkyries during finals week....

UChicago Kids Fight Nerdy Image With Casual Sex Site

Nick McMaster — Sat, 19 Mar 2011 07:56:53 CDT

The University of Chicago may be known as a bastion of sexless nerd-dom, but some undergrads are changing that with UChicago Hookups , a website that allows students to meet up for, well, whatever they might have in mind. Entries read more or less like the casual-encounters section of Craigslist: people...

Chicago, Honolulu Battle to Host Obama Library

Matt Cantor — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 10:21:05 CST

President Obama is far more concerned about a second term than his legacy—but two cities are duking it out to host his presidential library, Politico reports. Four groups at the University of Hawaii, in the state where Obama was born, are already hard at work on the matter, hoping...

Whiny Law Prof Quits Blogging After Lament for Rich People

M. Morris — Tue, 21 Sep 2010 18:55:00 CDT

Todd Henderson has quit blogging—just a bit too late to avoid a stint as an internet punching bag. "I was a fool," he writes for Truth on the Market . "I wish I had just stuck to blogging about corporate law and such, but I couldn’t help myself." At issue...

Playboy 's No. 1 Fan? This 44-Year-Old Chicago Woman

Will McCahill — Sun, 07 Feb 2010 05:04:46 CST

One might think Playboy ’s biggest fan is a teen boy getting his first forbidden glimpse—but in reality, it’s a 44-year-old Chicago woman who’s bought every issue for the past 30 years, and keeps a spare apartment just to house the collection. And Peggy Wilkins is proud of her...

Plague Bacteria Linked to Death of Scientist

Jason Farago — Tue, 22 Sep 2009 10:26:09 CDT

A 60-year-old researcher at the University of Chicago died earlier this month from an infection that may have been set off by the bacteria that causes the plague. Malcolm Casadaban was working with a weakened strain of the bacteria that is normally harmless, and the CDC has been called in...

Economist Rose Friedman Dead at 98

Nick McMaster — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 14:34:22 CDT

Rose Friedman, economist and collaborator with husband and Nobel laureate Milton Friedman, died yesterday of heart failure, the Chicago Tribune reports. Rose was the co-author of Capitalism and Freedom and Free to Choose , two foundational texts of the Chicago School of economics. Though birth records from her birthplace in modern-day...

Liberal Bent, 'Empathy' Mark Potential Justice

Gabriel Winant — Tue, 12 May 2009 11:15:37 CDT

In choosing a new Supreme Court justice, President Obama says he wants not just a savvy legal brain, but also someone who can show “empathy.” Diane Wood, his former University of Chicago colleague and a judge on the Seventh Circuit, meets both criteria, the New York Times reports. She’s spent...

For Obama, Justice Must Be Pragmatic

Matt Cantor — Sun, 03 May 2009 09:48:01 CDT

President Obama carries an unusual wealth of Supreme Court knowledge from his days at law school and as a law professor, the New York Times reports, which he'll put to use in replacing Justice Souter. But don’t expect him to go straight for a liberal: Former colleagues and students say...