1908
A few postcards have drifted back, from the general mailing in December begging for gossip for the scandal column. Most of them say "No news" or Happy New Year, which doesn't help much.
Best letter is from Larry Symmes, who returned Nov. 11 after a month's travel in Germany, Italy, and France. His entire letter is long, but extracts will be of interest, if the MAGAZINE editors are charitable with space after we missed entirely in the January issue. Larry says:
"I returned on November 17 on the Queen Mary, after having spent a little over a month on the Continent visiting Paris, Munich, Vienna, Venice, and Rome. I have an entirely different picture of conditions over there from that which we glean from the newspapers. While I do not agree with the policies involved in the persecution of the minorities, I realize that the man in the street in Germany can hardly be blamed for conditions which he really knows nothing about. The Jewish population in Germany was always very small, about 1% of the total, and therefore it does not show up extensively in any cities except those along the Rhine and in Berlin. Accordingly, the average German goes about his daily work and really knows very little about the things we read of in our newspapers.
"The general feeling in all classes in Germany is that Hitler has done a great thing for the country in lifting it by its bootstraps. They say that everybody is busy, and since the unemployed, if any, are in the Army, there is quite a different attitude toward that phase than there is in this country. Everybody is busy, cities are bustling, food is good, and life goes on for the average man just about the way it does here. Vienna and Austria generally feel quite happy over the anschluss, because they feel the stimulus of the help the Germans have given them, and since everybody has been put to work and gets three meals a day, Austria feels that the situation is far happier than it was before they were taken over. It is difficult for a visitor in Germany, just as it is difficult for the Germans themselves, to realize that they may be swallowing their own tail, that their financial condition is precarious, and that the thing may crack under the strain. And so you find the people (except the Jews) in a happy frame of mind, and not at all concerned because they are in a dictatorship. In fact 90% of the people think that is the right way to live.
"The future will have to decide whether it is or not."
Bill Knight writes that he will try to assemble news from 'OB in the Chicago district, but will need help.
Mike Stearns' address is now 630 Fifth Ave., New York, which, he writes, is the Rockefeller Center Building and he is the head executive of Shelton, Inc. Kendall, Dartmouth '37, is in third year medical work at Columbia, Sandy a senior at Amherst, John at home, and daughter Nancy is happily married and living in New York.
Three 'OB foresters attended a meeting in Concord recently to consider the forest fire hazards expected next summer. They were String Hale, Crosby Hoar, and Harry Rogers.
Ev Marsh writes that his son George, Dartmouth '36, is living three blocks from his parents, and his married daughter Virginia lives six blocks in the other direction, and that Dolly Hilton's daughter Jessida was recently married to a young doctor. Jack Everett reports having lunch with Ev in Chicago in December. The Hiltons live in Glen Ellyn, and Dolly writes that since Marsh moved into Chicago he is more difficult to keep track of. Doubtless true.
The Sam Snow who is shining on the current Dartmouth hockey team is the son of Hal Snow 'OB. He has fooled Coach Ed Jeremiah by proving to be a good forward instead of just a pretty good one.
Chip Farrington's son, Edward Jr., graduated at Hobart College last June and is now in the insurance business in Hartford. Chip sells securities in Connecticut and thinks about Dartmouth and '08, though he seldom reports in person.
Henry Stone reports that Bob Rugg took him to dinner before Christmas when the Massachusetts Bankers' Association dined. Bob, o£ course, is president of the National Rockland Bank in Boston, and says the bank's employees have about the best pistol and revolver team in New England. Henry is in the lumber business with banking as a side line. Or maybe it's the other way around. He's in Haverhill, Mass., where he has been ever since he graduated.
"Life" Greeley at last reports was planning to go South for several months in Florida, but his anticipated winter vacation was depending on his father's health. The senior Greeley was quite ill in December.
Albert Chandler, still teaching at Ohio State University, is author of a book called "Larks, Nightingales, and Poets," which he says has had a fair sale, though there are still a few copies left if you want one.
We won't urge you to buy Honker Joyce's products, he makes and sells supplies for morticians. His postcard says he gets to see many Dartmouth men as he makes the rounds.
A communication from Dana Parkinson describes an extended trip through southern states, and better prospects for people in the Deep South if better timber culture and pulp mills develop. His children are all in school, and the oldest son, Dwight, is now in second year medical school in Hanover.
Pete Cams, out in Omaha, reports he's a granddaddy since August 6. He says he was in New England last summer but found little time to look up classmates, and he hopes to be back this year and do a better job of reuning.
A letter to Larry Treadway from Bert Thwing says his daughter is at N. H. University and his son is planning to attend McGill. Bert said his construction business in Montreal hadn't been so good the past year, but is now looking up, with promise for real profits in '39.
Larry Griswold is reported as gaining slowly. He has had a long illness, and the boys who have seen him at his home in Batavia say that "courage is what he ain't got anything else but."
Jack Clark's oldest son John, Dartmouth '32, is a Nieman Fellow at Harvard, studying higher journalism (if there's any such thing). Second son Alex is a junior at Dartmouth. Both boys are married. Jack reports lunching with John Hinman in New York, and that John has quite recovered from the illness which kept him from the reunion last June.
Art Wyman goes lyric over the newfallen snow (which melted next day), and John Thompson decorates his postcard with a delightful cartoon of the WPA man and his shovel. Wish we could pass it along to you.
Bill Knight was in Hanover early in December, attending a meeting of the Athletic Council and picking the managers for next year's athletic teams. Bill's visit was brief; he headed right back for Chicago as soon as his work in Hanover was done.
Mort Hull toastmastered the initiation banquet of the Theta Delts in Hanover, December 3. Next day, Sunday, he left on an extended trip by motor. Said he was going to Bangor and several other Maine cities, thence to New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, with possible excursions to Gaspe, Newfoundland, and Labrador. Mort's reason for the unconventional winter excursion to the Arctic: he's a candidate for some high office in the International Rotary, and was scheduled to make one or more addresses a day. He says Rotary has some wonderful chapters among the Esquimo. Tat Badger was also at the Theta-Delt dinner, but did not accompany Mort on his subsequent journey.
Pop Chesley is in charge of a series of concerts and entertainments this winter, in Utica, N. Y. It is a hobby, not a business, with him. Main attraction in the current series is the Monte Carlo Ballet Russe. Pop says that he has been the impresario for the Utica series for several years, expenses run annually to many thousand dollars, and so far there has been a small surplus each year, which has been segregated to pay for the deficit that will some time appear. This information was gathered in Ithaca, where Pop, Tat Badger, and the class reporter had lunch together just before the Cornell game. Vietor, the Buffalo plutocrat, was at the game, but we had no chance to do more than wave our program at him.
Art Lewis sends a list of the 58 '08 men who are subscribers to the ALUMNI MAGAZINE; about a third of the class list. He suggests that regional reporters undertake to supply monthly news about classmates in their parts of the world. He also calls attention to the MAGAZINE'S method of pro-rating subscriptions, meaning that if you are not now getting the MAGAZINE regularly you can have it for the remainder of the year. (February to June) for $1.75.
From Hanover
