1932
Yesterday (March 5) I took my son Michael to see the christening ceremony for the PanAmerican Stratoliner "Clipper America," just about to start on regular world-wide service. Vice-President Barkley spoke to a large group of invited guests from what is known as "official Washington" (I had received my ticket from a New York friend, however). Margaret Truman did the actual christening by breaking a bottle on the plane's nose and splattering it and herself with an unidentified bubbly substance. Later we watched the maiden flight with seventy-five of the invited guests, and afterwards we walked through the luxurious cocktail lounge and spacious passenger area on the upper deck of the plane. We heard all kinds of well deserved remarks about the last word in comfort, the diminishing size of the world and the genius of American engineering and productive ability. Then we climbed back in our trusty but ailing 1935 Ford convertible coupe and returned home to a very good dinner served right in our own dining room, which stays on the ground at all times (even when the roof gets raised slightly) and encompasses a fairly small world, but there are those who love it.
What does the foregoing have to do with news of the Class of 1932? Why, nothing, actually, but I always like to start off with something a little different from the cold impersonality of the newspaper clippings I receive with gratifying regularity. They are so lacking in a homely touch. I couldn't start this column with anything, however, from any of you, because this month I have received no, repeat no, communications from classmates. In passing on what I received in the form of clippings I shall continue to try to be a little provocative, in the hope that I can provoke someone into a response. I realize that I take some risk in doing this, as evidenced by the Letters to the Editor section of the March issue, but for lack of better material I'll take the chance.
I reported some time ago that Tom Dublin had been appointed executive director of the National Health Council of New York City. Tom had been a professor of preventive medicine and community health at Long Island College of Medicine. I now have three clippings about his new duties, and will try to summarize them. The Council has a membership of 23 agencies, both voluntary and governmental, in the public health field, and is said to be a "planning center and clearing house" for agencies fighting tuberculosis, mental disease, cancer, epilepsy and other human ills. The council is said to have "adopted a broad program which seeks to stimulate the provision of adequate public health services of high quality for all the population of the U. S." Its current program emphasizes the enlistment of more active participation by the public in partnership with professional workers in the field of public health, helping local professional and citizen groups in their attempts to bring about full-time professionally staffed health departments in the many parts of the U. S. where they are not adequate. The Council has received a grant of $225,000 from the Rockefeller Foundation to be used in strengthening the public health movement in the U. S. There is no doubt that Tom's training well fits him for the new job. He received a doctorate in public health at Johns Hopkins after finishing Harvard Medical School, and for a while did research work at Rockefeller Institute, primarily "in the immune mechanisms of pneumonoccic pneumonia." He served for a while as a field epidemiologist for the N. Y. State Department of Health. After I had studied all this in the clippings the one sentence that stuck in my mind was this com- ment on the fact that both Tom and his father are leading figures in the public health field: "Father and son disagree somewhat on strategy, but they share a genuine desire for a healthier America." In these days of heated controversy over the issue of prepaid medical care (or is it socialized medicine?) that sentence is intriguing.
In the course of my first job in Washington I had occasion to make a fairly deep study of the health program of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, in which Dr. Louis I. Dublin, Tom's father, plays a large part. It demonstrates the importance to life insurance companies of improving the health of the general public and incidentally of their own policy holders. It is not surprising, therefore, to read that Belden Lee Daniels, who is the associate general agent in Harrisburg, Pa., for the State Mutual Life Insurance Cos., has been named general chairman of the Central Pennsylvania Heart Association's fund raising campaign. A worthy cause is fortunate when it can find a leader whose other interests coincide with those of the cause. In accepting the post, Bo is quoted as saying, "For the first time in the history of the American Heart Association the need for a campaign at county levels has been realized, and should be accepted as a community responsibility. Heart disease is the nation's greatest health problem. Almost 600,000 Americans die annually of heart diseases and medical scientists backed by the American Heart Association are constantly looking for better ways to prevent heart disease and better methods of treating its victims." Incidentally, just to stimulate correspondence, I wish that any of you fellows who serve on committees to raise funds for service and research on polio, tuberculosis, cancer and so forth would send in anything you can add to Bo's second sentence.
Joe Byram's activities in the field of public service continue to make news. Don't forget that he has a full time job as trust officer at the Mechanics National Bank of Worcester, Mass. Outside of that he is a member of the City Council from Ward 10. Now he has announced his candidacy for the Plan E City Council, a nine-member body having responsibilities with which all you fellows from Worcester are presumably fully familiar, as the Worcester Gazette does not bother to explain further. In any event, Joe, in announcing his candidacy, is reported to have said that he believes that his business experience and service as a member of the City Council have given him "a knowledge and training in my. nicipal affairs which will be needed in helping make Plan E a success. If elected to the Plan E Council I shall work for honest, economical city government under an able and fearless city manager." The article also indicates that Joe is a Republican, has two children, is chairman of the Economics Club membership committee, adjutant of Devens Post 282, Am. Legion, director of the Worcester Civic Music Association, treasurer of Camp Fire Girls of Worcester, and vice-president of Worcester Citizens Committee of Displaced Persons. From another clipping I learn that he is also a vestryman of the All Saints Episcopal Church. All this is staggering to me, with all the trouble I have in merely attending a Dartmouth lunch once a week, a P-TA meeting once a month, and Cub Scouts meetings even less often. I've been exploring the thought that it's the third child that changes everything; each one after the second counts for three. But that couldn't be the answer, because, for example, George Hahn, with five of his own children and a nephew and niece in his home, still participates in enough outside activities to run Joe By ram a close race. (See Class notes for February, 1948.) How is it done, fellows? Maybe I can get better answers from a few wives.
Whether or not they divert us from outside activities, the class is still reporting blessed events. Mr. and Mrs. Herman S. Goodman have announced the arrival on January 16, 1949, of Harry Marks Goodman, and Mr. andMrs. Ellis B. Jump have made known the arrival of Ley ton Endicott Jump on January 9, 1949, for which they have our congratulations. If he's the first, I urge them to keep on at least to three, for the pleasures of the third are real and certainly cannot be appreciated until added to the first two. After that, I keep silent for I know not whereof I speak.
Secretary, 3909 North sth St., Arlington, Va.
Treasurer, 607 Front St., Hempstead, N. Y.
Class Agent, 3448 81st St., Jackson Heights, L. 1., N. Y.
