Barbara Petite, class of '76, wrote in to say the WSU magazine uncovered a Coug she never knew she needed. She's right. And she nailed why this magazine matters.
The Spring 2026 issue pulled Catherine Roberts Frasier out of the archives and put her in front of us. A woman most of us had never heard of, doing work that mattered. That is the whole point of an alumni magazine: not just to tell you what the football team did last Saturday, but to show you the threads that hold this place together. Barbara gets it. So does Jeff Hardesty, who wrote in about Gay Selby's "truthisms" still ringing in his ears years later. Those are the connections that don't show up in a box score.
That kind of digging matters more now than ever. Because while we are reading about a woman from our past who gave everything she had, other Cougs are looking forward. A New WSU study: Cannabis ads are shaping how young adults think about sex just dropped, showing how marketing is quietly changing what people expect from intimacy. And A baby's skin microbes might tip off Coug researchers to early allergies, giving parents a potential early warning system. Same university. Same stubborn curiosity. Different generations.
The through line is not a slogan. It is the work. Catherine Roberts Frasier did hers in a time and place that probably did not make it easy. Today's researchers are running studies on hedgehog viruses and infant microbiomes, asking questions nobody else thought to ask. That is not a coincidence. That is Pullman.
Barbara's letter is a reminder that the magazine's job is to find the stories that do not get told anywhere else. We do not need another press release about a ribbon cutting. We need the name of a woman we should have known, and the truthisms of a professor who shaped how superintendents do their jobs. So here is the concrete takeaway: next time you toss the alumni magazine on the pile, flip through it first. You might find a Coug you never knew you needed. And if you do, write in. Barbara did, and now the rest of us know about Catherine.