Valentine’s Day marks the middle of February and the excitement of warming temperatures, but it is most known for its celebration of love. On Saturday, you could see young couples strolling down Middle Path hand in hand, bouquets of roses being gifted and partners dancing together at WKCO Prom. But the importance of love extends beyond just our student population. Many professor couples have made a home together here at Kenyon. Hear from three of them about their love stories, silly anecdotes and advice for young couples. 

Leslie and Madeline Wade, associate professors of physics, have been teaching at Kenyon since 2015. They initially met as sophomore physics majors at Bates College in a linear algebra class. “One of our mutual friends got a study group together that was him and the two of us. … Then we were in lots of physics classes together after that,” Madeline Wade explained. The two started dating by the end of their sophomore year. Nearing graduation, they both wanted to pursue physics Ph.D.s and applied to several of the same programs in an attempt to stick together. “We both went to the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee campus and studied gravitational wave physics there,” Madeline Wade said. They got married soon after starting graduate school and welcomed their first child, Ruth, now 11 years old, right before they had to write their dissertations. “My parents watched Ruth while she was a little baby. We drove out … to New Jersey for a week, where my parents were, and [they] fed us and did our laundry,” Leslie Wade explained. “We just sat in the basement and wrote for like a week straight,” Madeline Wade added, laughing. 

When applying to jobs, there was only one position open for a physics professor at Kenyon. Although only Madeline Wade received the offer, the couple was able to negotiate the position and split it between the two of them. “We’re very grateful to Kenyon to open that up for us,” Leslie Wade explained. “It also is a reduced teaching load, which is nice so we can pick up our kids from school.” 

This year, the Wades are co-teaching both of their classes together. With their personal and professional lives completely mixed, they are always together, but they love it. “A lot of folks will ask us how we’re both married and colleagues, but … solving physics problems together is something we’ve done for a number of years now. … So that’s just natural,” Madeline Wade said. Being together for over 20 years, they both agreed on the importance of putting your partner first, despite hardships. “If this is a person you intend to spend a long time with, then that needs to become something you value. It’s not always going to just be easy, and you’re going to have to make intentional choices to prioritize your partner,” Madeline Wade shared. “People in your life will pressure you in a certain way and I was glad that we prioritized our relationship and our family,” Leslie Wade added. 

Associate Professors of Political Science David and Lisa Leibowitz, otherwise known by students as Hebowitz and Shebowitz, similarly met in college, but not in the traditional way. “We started dating in graduate school. She was an undergraduate of mine at the University of Toronto, where I taught for a year, then I went to Michigan State University and lo and behold, she shows up as a graduate student,” David Leibowitz explained jokingly. Lisa Leibowitz added, “Not for that reason, although I did like your classes.” 

After getting to know each other for a number of years, they discovered their many shared interests and similarities. It wasn’t quite so easy to begin dating, however. “Attitudes were different then. We had to go to the chairman of the department and I had to say, ‘There is a graduate student I would like to date.’ The agreement was reached that I could date Lisa, but I couldn’t grade her work.” David Leibowitz explained. “Yeah, so I actually got what I think was worse grades,” Lisa Leibowitz pointed out. “I would have given you an A. He gave you an A-minus because he decided he had to be especially severe so it didn’t look like she had an in,” David Leibowitz added. 

David Leibowitz began working at Kenyon in 2003, but Lisa Leibowitz wasn’t hired as a professor until three years later. “There was this thing known as the dangling spouse problem,” David Leibowitz explained. “Kenyon is unusually good. … If they don’t try to make offer opportunities for spouses, marriages break up, so our being able to stay together was probably the result of earlier marriages falling apart.”

Affirming the Wades’ advice, David Leibowitz cautioned, “It’s hard, really, to maintain a long-term relationship,” to which Lisa Leibowitz interrupted, “How would you know that, I’m so easy!” “I’ve had girlfriends before you,” David Leibowitz said. “Oh, right, that’s right. Okay, those women,” Lisa Leibowitz agreed. But most importantly, the Leibowitzes agreed on the importance of having central common interests, which is what brought them together in the first place. “If [people] like each other, but have fundamentally different interests in life, it seems to me that in 90-plus percent of cases, they’ll inevitably move apart … [if] they’re interested in the same thing that sustains throughout a lifetime,” David Leibowitz said. 

James E. Michael Playwright-in-Residence Wendy MacLeod ’81, teaching in the drama department, and Associate Professor of Art Read Baldwin ’84 likewise met in college, at Kenyon in fact! “We met in an intensive French class, doing one of those ‘Où est la biblothèque?’ dialogues together,” MacLeod wrote in an email to the Collegian. 

However, it wasn’t until after graduation that they started dating. “I was renting a house in Arlington, Virginia, with an art friend … and we invited Read to a party we called a ‘happening’ because there were performances,” MacLeod explained. “I did a feminist strip tease during which I danced while putting clothes ON.” Shortly after this party, MacLeod and Baldwin began dating. “We had what turned out to be a first date, going to the mall on July 4 where we saw literal and figurative fireworks,” MacLeod added.

For them, working at Kenyon together means bonding over shared students: “Read and I would sometimes have students in common. Josh Radnor ’96 [known for playing Ted Mosby on How I Met Your Mother and his film “Liberal Arts”] went from Read’s painting class to my playwriting class and was struck by the difference between the concentrated intensity of the art students and the extroverted silliness of the drama students,” MacLeod shared. 

When asked about advice for young couples, MacLeod wrote that beyond a partner, “Your friends are your most important relationships at Kenyon, and if you take your classes and extracurricular activities seriously, you can tee up an interesting life,” to which Baldwin chimed in, “I might just say that you can tee up a WONDERFUL life. The college years can be a magical time of intellectual and personal growth. … Try to enjoy every minute!”