Many students of introductory biology and animal behavior will well remember Professor Ted Sargent who is retiring December 1998.  Ted earned a B.S. degree from the University in 1958 and, after receiving a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin in 1963, returned to the University as an Assistant Professor in Zoology.
Ted looks back wistfully at his long association with the University. During his undergad years, Ted's favorite teachers included Physics Professor Bill Ross who convinced Ted that physics could be interesting and useful to a naturalist. English Professor Sid Kaplan taught Ted a special appreciation for American authors like Melville. Ted also fondly remembers his honors thesis advisor Professor Larry Bartlett, a fanatical bird enthusiast who passed on some of that enthusiasm to Ted. Another professor Ted reveres was Bill Nutting, "a real nut" in the best sense of the word.  
Asked to recount his finest hours at UMass, Ted unflinchingly responded that mentoring his students was his greatest joy. Two of his shining examples are Deane Bowers, "who will always be a butterfly", and who became a Professor of Biology, and Debbie Schlenoff, who was "brilliant - no one smarter-"; and whose "thesis made a lasting impact on her field and who then went on to become a successful mom of four kids".
Ted clearly has a reverence for good teachers.  His favorite model of teacher/professor was Dave Klingener who commanded the respect of his discipline as well as the hoards of students who passed through his Comparative Anatomy course. Ted urges that any further growth of the Biology Department be through addition of colleagues with the passions for organisms and teaching that he saw in his idols.  
In retirement, Ted will return to perusal of the nature literature, the love for which was nurtured by Sid Kaplan.  Several books are in progress.  One is a "Words on Birds" theme that catalogs the voluminous literary allusions to nature which are becoming difficult for us to comprehend as their subject matter (e.g. the passenger pigeon) has been erased from our memorable experience.  Another work in progress is based on Elaine Goodale, child poet of the Berkshires, whose nature poetry helps us understand our New England heritage.