1935
We ask your indulgence, for a moment, to the extent of noting our change of home address; the first time the tribe Gilchrist has moved in a quarter-century, which makes us feel, for the. moment, quite advanced in age and habits of life, quite settled, almost dormant—in fact, completely at variance with the balmy harbingers of SPRING just now giving promise of a rejuvenation certain to come. Bear with us, kind gentlemen, while we regain our equilibrium and return to our usual air of composure and complacency, though the fact remains, gentlemen, it is spring:—spring, "It was roses, roses, all the way," as BobFerry used to recite Brother Browning in Public Speaking while Fra Lippo LippiBonniwell and your own Rabbi Ben Ezra gazed enviously out the window of Dartmouth Row. Ah, me.
GREEN PASTURES .... with fixings bucolic
Spring and the good earth ride strong in one's thoughts when your morning's mail contains something like this:
Believe it or not Ruether is now a farmer—fulltime. The two years at Tuck will at least help keep the a/c's straight. Have the place stocked with pigs, chickens and cows, but have to farm it with horses. We have 92 acres and no sign of help yet, so we'll be pretty busy. But it is real fun and beats the sugar business hands down. If any of the boys want to graze on some good green grass—send them down. Good luck,
Roy Ruether, Upperco, Md.
Black Rock Road.
And may we add that the first applicants for a touch of said turf were Ensign Bankart and this scribe. The old salt and I were scheduled for a journey up to Upperco on last Sunday's bus, but your old Uncle Reg was in a dither of family trouble. And a dither he was entitled to, we're sure, for wife Babs, bringing to a close her long tolerance of our habit of saluting her husband as an uncle, did him of that dubious honor shortly after his brother had made that honorarium a fact—you guessed itfaced with only one alternative, Babs made him a father: Beverly Bankart having arrived on February 27. All hail the Chief!
WESTWARD HO .... report to the nation A letter from Bill Gahagan: I thought you might like a flash on Milium McCarthy IV. He was through here in January as one Sgt. McCarthy, was well taken care of by Texan girls who besieged him for time and a half, made the Press Club here his headquarters and all in all, cut a wide swath in San Francisco. I hear from one of the Texans that he has arrived at his destination, a tropical isle and no more. His job will be to write news stories and be another Richard Tregaskis.
Occasionally I see Dave Smith in WPB here. My own job is now asst. to the regional director of the Office of "War Information here. It is highly interesting work. Best regards.
Which brings us as up-to-date on BrotherMcCarthy as is possible at present. He, Halvorsen, and Sellmer have done it: " 'Round the girdled earth they roam."
We turn to Dave Smith's semi-annual letter (his wife writes me not less infrequently) for coverage on Frank Cornwell and a word or two on Gahagan himself:
The individual is none other than Frank Cornwell, who, believe it or not, came to S. F. last week and even wrote me in advance he was coming. He is or has covered nearly the whole country for The Brown (Buster) Shoe Cos. of St. Louis, of which he is asst. adver. mgr He seemed to be just about the same old Frank—if anything more eloquent in his story telling. We didn't hear about the "Spook" again but there were a number of others. If it isn't already in the record he's married and has a year-old junior.
Enclosed is a copy of an O.E.M. News Letter which I found on my desk this week and appears to be the work of Bill Gahagan. Although I run into Bill quite often I haven't seen him since this came out to check for sure. The last time we saw each other he had just finished a very interesting assignment on the cruiser "San Francisco" for the O.W.I.—He went out to the Golden Gate to meet it as it came in on its return from the Solomons. The news stories he picked up from talking all day to the fellows aboard were amazing as you can imagine. Those boys really went through "HELL."
Dave is District Compliance Chief for WPB, charged with the responsibility of enforcing all the WPB orders and regulations in No. Calif, and Nevada. If you've read many WPB directives lately you'll realize that is something.
SOUTHERN BREEZE .... comfort denied!
Our long, tall, genial friend, now Pvt.George Chamberlain, stands off and reports: I am here undergoing 8 weeks of basic training in Uncle Sam's Army. My address is Cos. D, 11th Bn., 3rd Reg., Fort McClellan, Ala. Ran into Gelof who is in the 21st Bn. here. I'll never believe any stories about the South being warm and sunny!
MERRY-GO-ROUND .... shades of the Copley-Plaza
Someone whose eyes and shears are sharper than our own sends us a picture, very rotogravurish, of Sel Hannah, same captioned "ARMY'S LOSS, SKIERS' GAIN"
Sel Hannah, N. H. bom and bred, former Dartmouth ski team captain, intercollegiate champion and U. S. para-ski troop trainer, is a natural for the Mountain Infantry, but his Uncle Samuel says Sel's big herd of cows at Ski Hearth Farm, Franconia, N. H., come first. So Sel will divide his time this winter between the farm, ski teaching on Cannon Mountain and the three little Hannahs, he and his wife, the former Paulie Lee of Wellesley, are raising to follow their ski tracks.
Carl Spengeman has completed the infantry O.C.S. at Ft. Benning, and is now a 2nd It new addresses: Wally Gage, 1217 Chamber of Commerce, Buffalo Johnny Thomas, 6511 W. Chambers St., Milwaukee Gene Burnkrant, Rt. 1, Box 162, Auburndale, Wisconsin FitzDonnell, 1915 Central Ave., Indianapolis. .... Sgt. Bill Kempf, A.P.O. 957, c/o P. M., San Francisco Henry Buck, 211 East Delaware Place, Chicago (though he's in the Army).... and Cap. Nat Lippman, Vassar Sq. Apts., A-2, Vassar Sq. & Ventnor Ave., Atlantic City, N. J which last doesn't sound like strictly G.I. to us.
Probably due to our hustle to Baltimore just ten days or so before putting this journal, and hence ourselves, to bed last month, there was omitted from that issue the picture" of Bill Riegelman whose article "Letter from the African Front" interested us in the January issue of Harper's Magazine. Our apologies on that score, and here it is this month.
PS. If you get a chance read President Hopkins' address 'Some Aspects of Planning for Post-WarPeace" before the New Hampshire legislative bodies, February 17, 1943. It is exceptionally good: clearly, concisely, and with his usual impassioned reasoning, "Hoppy" once more points the way.
CAPT. ROBERT MORSE '35 Thayer School graduate (1936) now inEngineer Corps, USA.
WILLIAM I. RIEGELMAN '35 AFS volunteer in Libya whose "LetterFrom The African Front" appeared in Harper's, January, 1943.
Secretary, Gates Mills, Ohio Class Agent, 176 North wood Road, Riverside, 111.
