Book Review: Gilligan’s Dreams by Dreama Denver

In 1977, Doug Hartline wanted to be an actor but knew his talent wasn’t there so wisely put that behind him and left Bakersfield, California to start his upper division college work at the University of California Davis (UCD) working on a doctorate degree in Applied Mathematics with an emphasis on Physics. In 1982, God pressed it upon his heart to withdraw from pursuing that to spend more time with his family and to engage more fervently with his church. He therefore left his possible teaching career and part time teaching assistant position to begin a career as a University Administrator on his campus and held a variety of management positions there. Following many years at Davis, he spent the last ten years of his educational career as Director of Core Technologies at the University of California Santa Cruz. With his primary focus on information and educational technologies, Doug served on several statewide committees and was Chair of the Business Advisory Committee for the Corporation for Educational Initiatives in California (CENIC) that was responsible for providing high speed networking to most public and private universities, the community college system and K-12 schools throughout California. This labor of love resulted in him receiving the CENIC Founders Award just prior to his retirement in 2017. In all, he spent nearly forty years with the University of California. Although his career was focused on technology and higher education, Doug had many passions he wanted to pursue following retirement. He is an avid life long learner and has refocused his attentions from the sciences to literature, U.S. and World History, music, and the theater arts and now travels nationally and internationally to make what he learns come alive. To borrow from and paraphrase Robin Williams in Dead Poets Society, mathematics and physics was a noble pursuit and sustained Doug’s life, but it is poetry, beauty, romance and love that he finds are worth staying alive for. He is a ballroom dancer and is now learning to play the piano for the first time. As an amateur Hollywood historian, he strives to keep memories of a kinder and simpler age alive by sharing otherwise forgotten films with others and by meeting with stars from yesteryear. In an era of division and discord, he leverages all of these pursuits to show people how much beauty there is in the world if they will simply look for it. His wife of 41 years accompanies him in his travels and together they have two children and three grandchildren. They have had great joy in their marriage and have loved teaching Christian based marriage classes to couples looking to enhance their marriages. Together they realize that healthy marriages are the foundation for healthy families and a hopeful future.