President's Letter  August 2000   

Dear Classmates and Partners:                                                                       

Our 40th Reunion
We broke every record in the book!  Jim Adler observed, ³the spirit started high and grew throughout².   It was a fitting finale for his five years in the saddle as our active and beloved Class President.  Bob Boye¹s ³More Musings² got us reconnected before we even arrived.  Among the close to 400 in attendance (thanks to Dick Griggs and his Attendance Committee) were about two dozen classmates who came to their first reunion ever and left swearing to never miss one again.  Rev. Russ Ingersoll conducted a stirring Memorial Service. Eric and Joanne Sailer¹s food and drink selections were outstanding, John Goyette¹s music was aerobic, Tony Roisman proved a master at the final ceremonies. The Lowers and Dudley Smith oversaw the ritual golf and tennis contests, while Jack Baird¹s and Linda Roesch¹s Literary and Creative Exhibitions provided pleasant diversions.   Dudley Smith and Ken Johansen presented the college with the first ever $2 million plus check from a reuning class. Somehow, between counting heads and dollars, Jay Emery managed to ³tie the knot² with Wendy Carmody!  And our ³Something Entirely Different² Classmate Panels (led by Hap Dunning, Gene Kohn and Tom McBurney) were just that, with standing- room-only despite some 8 AM starting times. Denny Goodman and Ken Reich gathered enough stories and pictures to fill the Class Newsletter and the Alumni Magazine column for months to come. Jim, Spence Morgan and I want to once again thank everyone who contributed to making the 40th such a memorable occasion, especially the attendees!
 
A Look Back....
The Classmate Panels and Town Meeting generated a number of ideas and opportunities for the class to consider as we look ahead, which I¹ll review with you, but first let¹s take a look back at the last five years. At our Class Meeting  Jim Adler distributed a ³State of the Class Report² which is enclosed.  It¹s a must read as it chronicles amazing accomplishments with records set across the board, but most importantly it recalls how much fun we¹ve had as a group in making it all happen. What makes our class truly unique is the breadth of participation in all our activities and the pleasure we¹ve all found in doing things together. Thanks, Jim, for the leadership that¹s continued to make us the benchmark for class greatness; that¹s what we¹ll build on as we set out for our next five years.

...And A Look Forward
The Class Officers you see to the left, with me as president (for my sins), were railroaded through at the Class Meeting. You¹ll note that we have, for the first time, a Webmaster.The web came up a number of times as a key way to do Class communications and Walt Daniels volunteered to bring his expertise to bear. To remind, membership on the Executive Committee is open to all -  you simply have to be willing to help with some of the Class activities, and let one of us know that. Our new E.C. members are Bob Brown, Bruce Eaken, Bill Gould, John Guy, Craig Jameson, Pete Robohm, Eric Sailer and Roger Schaefer. Welcome!  What will we be working on? We¹ve had two broad goals for several administrations: to further strengthen classmate involvement and participation in Class activities; and to further strengthen our Class support of Dartmouth. There seems no reason to change these as our guiding directions, particularly as the ideas that came out of the reunion fit nicely into these categories. Let¹s then look at some more specific objectives.
 
Travel and Adventure
A variety of experiences - from the Arctic Circle to China, from Paris to Havana - led to the observation that we could learn a lot from each other through a travel page in the newsletter or the Class website. Class trips, possibly as part of college-sponsored travel, generated lots of enthusiasm. Alan Danson volunteered to head this effort, joined by Dick Davidson and Woody Fisher; other volunteers welcomed!

Our 65th Birthday Celebration
This is a closely related topic, as there was a desire to select a location that would represent a unique travel opportunity as well. Joe Batchelder and Roger Stephenson volunteered Naples and the West Coast of Florida on the spot, subsequently John Goyette has weighed in with Montreal/Quebec and Dave Bond with Banff/Lake Louise (some like it hot, some like it cold...) and both Chicago and New Orleans have been suggested but without the necessary local sponsor. Given the great time we had at our 60th, there is a movement  afoot for a bakeoff: one spot to celebrate the onset of social security next year, followed by a warm-up 64th in 2002. Given the diversity of ideas and the intensity of feelings, we looked for a dispassionate but firm leader to head the Selection Committee (someone not proposing a sight) and persuaded Alan Danson to fold this in with other travel. The site  nomination process is not closed, nor is the sign-up for volunteers, so let us hear!

Health and Fitness
Based on the extraordinary exchanges that took place at Gene¹s session about  health and life problems and solutions, it was suggested that the website could be used to list common health problems and fitness opportunities, accompanied by names and phone numbers of individuals willing to be a resource for others. If successful this could be expanded to include other classes to increase the skills and experience. Bruce Clark volunteered to help organize the effort. Incidentally, Gene distributed handouts covering  the topics discussed in his panel, and these are available on request.

Community Service
From the range of activities discussed during the Panel, it seems as if almost every classmate is already involved in some sort of community service. The interest in doing more expressed by many adjusting to a changed life-style could give retirement a good name! Again the website was viewed as a way to post both requests for and offers of expertise in specific areas of service, something that was found useful at Tom McBurney¹s session, and Tom will follow up on this. There was also some discussion of a possible Class-wide community service project. Volunteers? Ideas?

Special Class Gift to Dartmouth
At the Town Meeting Jon Richardson proposed the Class establish a Trust Fund as a vehicle for individuals who may wish to contribute to a special gift to the college but not in an unrestricted form, similar to what the Class of Œ53 set up at their 40th reunion to gift at their 50th. Considerable discussion ensued ranging from support for the idea that people need ways to express themselves to the college, through concern that people would be turned off by too many different sources of solicitation, to the suggestion that we separately study both how to have our opinions heard by the college and whether we want to raise a special fund. There seemed to be general agreement on four things: (1) A Class as unique as ours ought to consider a special gift, something different  (2) We ought to decide what that special gift will be before we look at how to fund it  (3) We should consult with the Classes of Œ53 and Œ52 and the college to benefit from their ideas and experience before we make any decisions  (4) If we decide to go ahead, it should be an authorized Class project, with time for classmember input before review and vote by the Executive Committee.
Tom Brock and Jim Adler  have agreed to head a group (to be named) to recommend.

That¹s it for now - quite an agenda. Don¹t miss our 40.5 Reunion at Homecoming 10/27-28!
Sign-up form was mailed and is on the web under Events. See you then - Wah Hoo Wah!

Rick Roesch