Houston
ON THE EVENING of April 15th, the Club held its second annual dinner and election of officers at the Plaza Hotel. The seventeen members present thought it advisable to hold over for another year the 1940 officers, so Ray Smith '18. Dwight Edson '18, and Clarence Sanders '22 will continue in office as president, secretary and treasurer, respectively.
Wives and friends of members, special guests, and visiting alumni brought the turnout to forty-two and made the meeting the most successful since the club was formed a year ago. We were fortunate in having as speaker of the evening, Horton Chandler 'lB, Lieut.-Colonel, 197 th Coast Artillery, who drove up from Camp Hulen, Palacious, Texas for the occasion. Horton's regiment is one of the National Guard units inducted into service last September from New Hampshire and is now busily training in an anti-aircraft division. He gave us a most interesting talk on the life, training, and development of our growing modern army. We have lost two of our small number to this army since Jim Lull and Ellis Gilbert were recently inducted as selectees for training at Fort Sam Houston, San Antonio. Captain J. Hamilton Fish '24, also a member of the 197 th Coast Artillery, accompanied Colonel Chandler, but being a good soldier let his superior do most of the talking.
We were also glad to welcome back to Houston, Doug Fleming 'l7, now of Corpus Christi, and Bill Gibbons Jr. '33 from San Antonio. Other guests included parents of two of our local undergraduates, Dr. and Mrs. White, and their son who has been accepted as a member of the class of '45, and one of our friendly enemies, Jim Smith, Cornell '3l, who, in rebuttal for what was to come, reviewed past athletic victories of Cornell over Dartmouth with special emphasis on their 100% record in crew. After all this speechmaking we con- cluded the evening with a showing of "The Fifth Down" and a beautiful color film of Carnival, especially appealing to many of us who had almost forgotten what a Hanover winter looks like. Alumni present included Nichols '9B, Wayman 'O6, Walker 'O9, McLellan 'l6, Fleming 'l7, Smith 'lB, Chandler 'lB, Edson 'lB, Sanders '22, Fish '24, Chase '25, Head '27, Phillips '2B, Taylor '29, Ferguson '3O, Wilson '3l, Gibbons '33, Maher '33, Bell '35, King '3B, and Safford '4O.
Our bi-monthly luncheons are maintaining a good average attendance and as a special feature at a recent meeting Mrs. Herbert Walker, wife of Herbert Walker 'O9, gave us an instructive talk on the psychology of salesmanship. The club continues to hold its membership around thirty notwithstanding the fact that we have lost by the draft and otherwise several of our active members. H. J. McClellan 'l6 with Humble Oil & Refining Company, Douglass Wilson '3l, instructor at Rice Institute, and Martin King '3B, transferred by the Texas Company from Illinois, have filled the gaps.
Our annual Spring Golf Tournament was held March gth at Memorial Park Golf course with five alumni striving to hold down our Club champion, Sanders. Thanks to a very deep ravine at the seventeenth hole which Sandy explored, Edson sneaked in to win the tournament by one stroke, with Ray Smith close behind. Other prize winners were Sanders, winner of Blind Bogey and low selected four holes, and Phillips who had guessed closest his correct gross score, missing by one stroke only. For the nineteenth hole we adjourned to Sandy's house where Mrs. Sanders had ready for us a delicious dinner. No handicapping was necessary here, and starting at scratch we finished the meal in a dead heat with that satisfied feeling of a most enjoyable day.
