Tifft Remembrance

We never took a class with Susan Tifft, but she was our teacher in so many ways.

As fellow board members of Duke Student Publishing, The Chronicle’s publisher, she was our mentor.

On a board with big ambitions and few resources, she was our rock, the person we could look to for wise and ethical counsel, clear dissection of a problem and smart, workable solutions.

Once, when we had a particularly difficult decision to make under a tight deadline, we frantically called all her numbers. She was undergoing chemo and we should have left her alone. But we desperately wanted her advice and approval before we took the next step. When she called late that afternoon, we were genuinely relieved to hear her voice and her thoughtful perspective. She acted like she couldn’t imagine why her opinion mattered.

When she left the board last year, we struggled with how to honor one of our longest-serving and most valuable members. We couldn’t exactly retire her number; after all, the words of a powerful writer like Susan resonate forever. Instead, we named what had been an ad hoc training conference in her honor. Once or twice a year, the Tifft Training Conference will bring in Duke alums who are professional journalists to help train Chronicle editors, honoring and remembering the teacher who taught us all so much.

We are honored to be a part of her legacy and to help extend Susan’s human chain of guidance and influence to future generations of Chronicle staffers.

Karen Blumenthal T’81 and David Ingram T’03