Once in a while, someone comes along who has clearly figured out why he or she was placed on this planet. Madison resident Bob Trupin is a great example.

Bob is on the board of directors at the Schiller Shoreline Institute for Lifelong Learning (SSILL), which operates out of the Madison Senior Center and the Guilford Community Center. This program is best described in its mission statement: SSILL's "primary mission is to offer meaningful, intellectual programs to area adults who share a love of learning and would enjoy a few hours of intellectual stimulation and socializing...Our objective is to offer college-level classes without concern for credit, grades, or prerequisites. However, no previous level of high school or college education is required to participate. All we require is your interest and enthusiasm."

Bob joined the board about a year after SSILL opened its doors around 2007.

"I went when I saw what they had to offer," he says. "I went to an open house there and I started talking to the people and they were very nice. I wanted to get involved, so Paula [the late Paula Schiller] made me the head of publicity just like that."

Bob wrote a column, "Handle on Sports," for the Shore Line Times for several years, and his "little bit of background in writing" was good enough for her to hand him the publicity reins, he says.

Schiller was one of SSILL's founders, along with the Madison and Guilford foundations. After she passed in 2010, the rest of the board named the program, which was then simply known as the Shoreline Institute of Lifelong Learning, after her.

Bob has more than a little background in writing and publicity. He worked for the New York Knicks in its publicity department in the late 1960s, and has an MBA from New York University (NYU)'s Graduate School of Business and an M.S. from Fordham University.

SSILL offers about 30 programs a semester. Bob taught a course on the psychology of sports a few weeks ago.

The programs are geared toward seniors, Bob says, because of the time of day and frequency with which they're held (Mondays to Fridays, usually in the mornings), but are open to anyone who has a schedule allowing attendance.

Sports, Sculpture, and Sleepaway Camps

Bob's interests and talents seem disparate, but he's found ways to play them off one another. He took up sculpting about 20 years ago and mostly creates clay figures, including sports figures and dancers.

He says, "I was living in Westport and there was a great sculptor there, Stanley Bleifeld, who did The Lone Sailor monument for the Navy Memorial in Washington, D.C., so I learned a lot from him. Peter Rubino is also a terrific teacher."

Bob began teaching sculpture to kids and at different places during the summer, including Yale's summer school for high school kids, Brown University, and different places on the shoreline. Starting this month, he will teach at the Madison Senior Center.

"I like the ongoing, creative, and hands-on aspects of sculpture," he comments. "Sculpture is very interesting because you find out about yourself when you sculpt. There's a saying in sculpture that you never really finish. In a lot of ways I enjoy teaching even more than actually sculpting, because you're not as personally involved. You can step back and see things."

Bob comes from a different background than most. He grew up in Mount Vernon, New York, and for most of his life, up until about 1998, he helped run children's sleepaway summer camps.

He explains, "One was in Salem, Connecticut, and one was in Monticello, New York. My family owned the camp in Connecticut and ran it for 38 years-Camp Trupin on Gardner Lake."

He then served as executive director at Kutscher's Sports Academy in Monticello from 1976 to 1998.

"Sports have always been a big part of my life," Bob says.

As a Yale undergrad he was an all-Ivy League basketball player and a draft choice of the Knicks in 1965. He coached and taught in New York City. After college, he attended grad school at NYU and got an MBA in management and behavioral sciences and worked for the Knicks while in graduate school. He taught at Friends Seminary in Manhattan, and was basketball coach and athletic director there.

"All this time I was involved in my family's camp until 1974 while doing these other things," Bob adds.

He still follows basketball (LeBron James is his favorite player and "whatever team he's on is my favorite team") and has turned his love of sport and his love of psychology into some serious knowledge about the psychology in sports, from how to get players to work as a team to dealing with the pressure of competition to how participation in sports can affect a player's life overall.

Bob and his wife, Kathy, a registered nurse who retired from Yale-New Haven Hospital this year, have three children. They met toward the end of Bob's 20-year residence in New York City while she was working at New York Hospital. They lived in Westport for 12 years, and have lived in Madison for the past 13 years.

Their daughter Liz works for a veterinarian and does a lot of volunteer work. Their daughter Samantha is a dietician and works for a Veterans' Association hospital. She taught a nutrition course at SSILL last year. Their son, Jake, lives in Astoria, New York, and works in advertising.

"I have three cats, three dogs, three chickens, and three kids," Bob quips.

SSILL: A Program Like No Other

Some upcoming programs offered by SSILL in fall 2014 include topics ranging from the Blood Type Diet, hobbies and retirement style, past lives, healthy joints, understanding mental illness, an art tour of The Griswold Inn, and an eyewitness account from the Soviet Union and World War II.

The latter program illustrates the caliber of speakers the SSILL board is able to schedule.

"Walter Wolog is 89 years old," according to the program. "He and his twin brother were born and grew up in Russia. Their father was executed by Stalin, and they both were sent to forced labor camps in Germany...Walter will offer a fascinating talk about his life in Russia, living under Stalin and Nazi occupation."

"SSILL is a very unusual program," Bob says. "It's probably the best value for its money on the shoreline or anywhere. To join for $35, you can get a variety of courses. You sign up for them, and you can get, over the course of the year, maybe 60 courses and movies.

"We have about 300 members and one of the great things about it is, besides the intellectual stimulation, it's very good socially for meeting people because you see the same people over and over again."

Courses aren't stereotypical, weeks-long college classes.

"When I say a course, most of them are one-time presentations," Bob says. "They're about two hours long, but some of them are series. For example, one course called Exploring the Ancient Egyptian Book of the Netherworld meets six times."

From joint health to Egyptian mythology, shoreline residents can learn about almost anything they want without worrying about GPA or final exams.

To learn more about SSILL, visit www.ssill.org.

To nominate someone for Person of the Week, email Melissa at

m.babcock@shorepublishing.com.