Class of 1878
Dr. and Mrs. H. A. Tarbell of Watertown, S. D., have had the privilege not accorded to many of their contemporaries of gathering all their children and grandchildren under paternal roof. Their eldest daughter, Mrs. R. W. Davis, with her husband and two daughters, paid her parents a visit; Helen, the younger daughter, teacher in West Allis (Wis.) High School, has spent most of her vacation at home, and the son, a practicing dentist, is a year-around neighbor.
Tarbell transmits data of the family of Tracy Sanborn, who died in 1925. Mrs. Sanborn, who was Miss Ida E. Quimby of Lewiston, Me., survived her husband but a few months. Their eldest daughter, Edith, is an assistant professor in Oregon State College. The second, Grace, is Mrs. E. E. Walseth of Clear Lake, S. D., and Ruth, the youngest, is Mrs. R. F. Boetticher of Vancouver, Wash. A son died at the age of 31, before the parents moved to Oregon. There are four grandsons, all Walseths, the eldest a graduate of U. S. Naval Academy; the second, graduate of S. D. State College, now on second year of a fellowship at California Tech., earning a Master's degree in civil engineering; the third (named Tracy after his grandfather) and fourth, seniors respectively in S. D. S. C. and in high school.
Kenaston, writing somewhat dolefully in his 84th year, yet with a minor note of cheer, says he has "worked, as few work,until the wheel is broken, sight failing,abilities gone, but interest never greaterin all good and dislike of all that injures.How glorious the world is, and how weakI am!"
Lane in his 87th year pursues the even tenor of his way, says he is well and active, and teaches German regularly. He even drops into rhyme upon occasion, a talent we did not suspect him of sixty years ago.
Counting the second and third generations of a college class cannot be done with first-rate accuracy unless it is begun before the class baby is fifty-six years old. The early arrivals of either children or grandchildren are eagerly announced, but later ones, say in the second hundred or so, are not such outstanding events and likely not to be so promptly reported to a class secretary. The following enumeration is certainly incomplete and may not be absolutely accurate as far as it attempts to go, but it seems of interest, nevertheless.
Connected with the class at some time during its course were 117 men. To reproduce itself, to say nothing of increasing and multiplying, the class should have had 234 children and 468 grandchildren. Several of the class died early. Including these, 20 did not marry, and of the 97 who did marry 20 had no children; of two others it is not known whether they had. The remaining 75 had 197 children, thus doing a little more than their share, but not compensating for the failure of their fellows.
Of the 75 who had children, 18 have had no grandchildren (as yet, for there is still hope), 11 are not recorded, and the remaining 46 have had 233.
The eugenists indict the College Woman for failure to fulfill her obligations to the race. How about the College Man?
There is, however, something to be said for the quality of the second and third generation, as so convincingly shown by Secretary Smith of '79 in the June number of this magazine, corroborated happily by our own returns. As they say at Rotary, "He's a better man than his father!"
Word has just come of the death of Dr. O. P. Maxson of Stuart, Florida, September 30, following by two days the death of his wife; too late for this month's Necrology.
Secretary, 321 Highland Ave., Fitchburg, Mass.
