University

PRAISE FOR SPRING GARDEN COLLEGE CAME TOO LATE It's too bad that the recent editorial praising the efforts of Spring Garden College came upon its demise. In fact, it is ironic that your paper, and others, seemed to suddenly become aware of this 141-year-old Philadelphia institution as dirt was being tossed on its coffin. As a teacher, coach and director of athletics at the college, I was aware of the problems that eventually spelled the end of what, someday, will be recalled fondly as a treasure.

EYEWITNESS NEWS anchor Susan Barnett is leaving CBS 3 and the CW Philly. Barnett has been at CBS since 2006, anchoring the evening newscasts since 2008. She anchored the 5, 6 and 11 p.m. broadcasts on CBS, and the 10 p.m. broadcast at the CW Philly, along with co-anchor Chris May . Her contract expired in March. "I have decided to not renew my contract with the stations at this time. I am incredibly thankful for having been a part of the CBS Philly family, but I feel that this is the right decision at this time," Barnett said in a statement yesterday.

It was an evening out that college students Leslie Pope and John Wagner will long remember. Not only did they get what they called lousy service, they got handcuffed and arrested. All over a $16.35 tip. They were with a half-dozen friends at the Lehigh Pub in Bethlehem last month, so the establishment tacked what it called a mandatory 18 percent gratuity onto the bill of about $73, according to reports. Pope and Wagner refused to pay. "You can't give us terrible, terrible service and expect a tip," said Pope, a 22-year-old Moravian College senior who's a Pottsville native, according to the Lehigh Valley Express-Times . They had to find their own napkins and cutlery while their waitress caught a smoke, had to ask the bar for soda refills, and had to wait over an hour for salad and wings, they told NBC10.

U.S. Sen. Rand Paul (R., Ky.) said in Philadelphia on Monday that he was trying to rally Americans to join a class-action lawsuit against President Obama's controversial telephone and Internet surveillance programs revealed last week. But when asked whether Edward Snowden, the National Security Agency contractor who leaked the existence of the top-secret programs, should be praised or prosecuted, Paul replied, "I don't know if I have an opinion of what exactly you do. " Paul is seen as a 2016 contender for president, and he pounced on the news that the NSA was collecting phone records from millions of Americans and had direct access to user activities at major Internet companies.

5:39 p.m.: Golfers can reign over rain With a heavy rain beating down on the media tent, officials said Monday evening that they didn't think a doomsday scenario would happen with the weather conquering the best golfers in the world. "It's 10,000 to one we would have to have happen," said Mike Davis, executive director of the U.S. Golf Association. "It is maybe the best draining course I've ever seen. " The hole that was of greatest concern was the 11th, said Merion golf course superintendent Matt Shaffer, the lowest point on the course, and where where two creeks meet.

Twelve minutes into her audition at prestigious Roosevelt University in Chicago, pianist Karina Kontorovitch's worst nightmare came to pass. She couldn't remember what to play next in Dmitri Shostakovich's Prelude and Fugue No. 15. So she went back a few measures to redeem herself, only to get stuck in the same spot. Very upset, she thanked the panel and walked out. A year later, after getting into Northwestern University's Bienen School of Music as a graduate student, she was introduced to a "little orange pill" that she says helped launch her professional career.

If Darwin could juggle . . . That seems to be the premise behind Cirque du Soleil's show Totem , now playing on the Camden waterfront. I don't know why it's called Totem . The press information said the narrative is about evolution; I actually couldn't find much of a narrative, despite the fact that it was written and directed by the avant-garde French-Canadian actor/director/filmmaker Robert Lepage. But narrative aside, Cirque du Soleil is always fun in a circusy way - trapeze artists, jugglers, acrobats, clowns - and it's great that it's back in the Big Top, the signature blue-and-yellow Grand Chapiteau, after several years at Temple University's Liacouras Center.

The FBI is investigating Pennsylvania Supreme Court Justice Seamus P. McCaffery over fees his wife received for referring clients to personal-injury law firms, The Inquirer has learned. The investigation is examining 19 referral fees paid to Lise Rapaport, the justice's wife and his chief aide for most of the last 16 years, according to several people with direct knowledge of the investigation. In March, The Inquirer reported that Rapaport received an $821,000 referral fee in 2012 after a Philadelphia law firm successfully settled a multimillion-dollar medical-malpractice case.

A man trying to get rid of bedbugs from his Woodbury home accidentally set it on fire Tuesday, injuring himself and a firefighter. Gloucester County spokeswoman Debra Sellitto said firefighters responded to the house on the unit block of Penn Street just before noon to find the second floor on fire. The homeowner, a male who was not named, had apparently been trying to eradicate the bedbugs from his house using a home remedy that included a space heater, hair dryer, and heat gun to "heat" the bugs out, Sellitto said.

Frank Nofer, 71, of Spring Mill, a celebrated graphic artist and watercolorist who designed a Philadelphia logo for the American Bicentennial, died Thursday at Keystone House in Wyndmoor. His representational watercolors are included in prominent private and corporate collections. In 1995, the Philip and Muriel Berman Museum of Art at Ursinus College honored him with a one-man retrospective exhibition. For 25 years, Mr. Nofer operated a graphic-design studio in the Old City section of Philadelphia, where he did advertising for pharmaceutical companies and amassed many awards.