Preface: On Number 98

Stanford Bronze Plaque 98
in honor of Class of 1998
Stanford's Memorial Quad

There are two Stanford Bronze Plaques 98 in the Memorial Quad at Stanford University.
The first Plaque 98 is located a yard to the right of the front door of Memorial Church, and
is dedicated to the Class of 1898. The first graduating class at Stanford was 1892. Another
Plaque 98 near Building 80 (Dept. of Human Biology) is dedicated to the Class of 1998.
I've used this latter plaque 98 as the cover for On Number 98 since it's fresher and clearer.

As part of my Numbers compilations, pages on "Number 98" were begun on September 18
and completed on October 17, 2019, in honor of Professor Harold A. Scheraga's 98th birthday
on October 18, 2019. He was my doctorate advisor (1963-1970), where I did my doctrate in
physical chemistry of macromolecules. I've been sending him birthday greetings each year.

Best By Number: Who Wore What With Distinction (2006) enabled me to include five football players with uniform #98 (Item #82). Lyle Spatz's SABR Baseball List & Record Book (2007) was consulted for trivia baseball statistics on 98 (#85-87). Mike Meserole's The Ultimate Book of Sports Lists 1998 was consulted for football & basketball statistics on 98.

In section on "98 in Collectibles, Coins & Postage Stamps", #99-110, found 1998 China Panda Gold Coin, 1898 British Gold Sovereign, "Liberty Head" 1898-S Morgan Silver Dollar, and 1898 Coronet Head Gold $10 Eagle Coin. Marvel Comics stamp #98 showed "The Puppet Master". Downloaded #98 Topps cards from Wings, World on Wheels, Look 'n See, and Scoop. U.S. & Canadian postage stamps with Scott catalogue #98 showed Lincoln and King Edward VII & Queen Alexandra. The only 98¢ U.S. stamp depicts Grand Teton National Park. 98¢ Canadian stamps showed 2009 Winter Olympics and 2009 Christmas. Four 0.98 Euro stamps from France were found, and a 98 Centavos stamp from Nicaragua honoring Queen Isabella. My old copy of 1975 Scott Standard Postage Stamp Catalogue was outdated, so consulted 2018 catalogues from Los Altos Library to locate these stamps.

Passages on 98 from my spiritual mentors were typed from their books— #173: Wei Wu Wei's
Asked the Awakened, #174: Paul Brunton's Notebooks, Volume 16: Enlightened Mind, Divine Mind,
#175: Subramuniya's Merging with Siva, #176-177: Seung Sahn's Dropping Ashes on the Buddha
& The Whole World Is A Single Flower, and #178: Swami Chinmayananda's Say Cheese!.

Passages on 98 from poets who taught me include #212: Kenneth Koch, my freshman English Professor at Columbia (1959-60), #216: Robert Bly (Asilomar Retreats 1988-89, San Francisco Mythical Thinking Workshop 1988, Stanford 2008), #217: Kay Ryan (Stanford Workshops 2010).

Last entry #220 Numerology: words whose letters added to 98 shows "Dragon Transformation",
"Evergreen Medicine", "Firefly Reflection", "Insight Nourishment", "Knight Enlightenment",
"Lightning Wanderer", "Mirror Direction", "Philosophy Journey". "Spinning Strawberry",
and "Trinity Marriage". I wanted to have 220 entries since Pythagoras found 220 and 284
to be amicable numbers.

After completing On Numbers 98, went through Items 132-137 (Bible), Items 138-178
(Philosophy & Religion), and Items 179-219 (Poetry & Literature), selecting passage for
the poem "Meditations on 98: Seek on & Look in". The source of each line of this 32-lines
poem is given in Notes to Poem. Enjoyed composing this poem using words from other
writers in essentially chronological order.

Peter Y. Chou
Mountain View, October 18, 2019