1897

I want to write a few words about the new effort that the College group has asked me to undertake in a minor way. This is in connection with the Bequest Program. First let me tell the '97 classmates about the gathering in Hanover on September 11 and 12 this year. A group of men twenty and more years out of College were invited guests of the College, having a series of conferences, starting on Friday with a reception in the Inn parlors. President and Mrs. Dickey, some of the Trustees and wives, a number of professors and their wives, and a group of older and middle-aged alumni, some with their wives, made up the party.

It was an orderly well-run coming together of the classes represented by one of each of its members. After the reception-.the whole group dined in the Inn and after dinner we assembled in the Sanborn Wing of the Library, for our first meeting this year of the Bequest Chairmen.

Here with the College Committee, the outline of activities of the effort to largely increase the College Endowment Fund was quietly and systematically interpreted.

There was in the setting forth of this program a very orderly statement of methods, goals and results already reached. There was no sign of boastful or hoop-la-type of drive tactics. The room was most comfortable, the reports given in quiet tones, and throughout a calm, sound approach to the method of seeking for the College its share of gifts from the alumni and friends of the College.

A second meeting was held on Saturday morning when there were reports and suggestions by men in various classes, and a sum-up by the College Group who were working on the program. Various forms of gifts suited to the giver's means and acceptable to the College were quietly described and a report of the favorable results already obtained left all of us feeling that this program is suited to the College aspirations to go forward and of its possibilities of reaching a worthy goal. The details carefully set out in a brief, clear outline by President Dickey will be available to all of our classmates and members of the families of our classmates. The small snowball which started to roll up a year ago is already reaching proportions of size to warrant assurance of bigness. The funds made available to the College have grown to more than double the total for the previous year.

To share with the College without undue sacrifice by us o£ the older classes is part and parcel of the method outlined. Here is one yardstick kind of a gauge of what might be readily available from an estate: to capitalize a gift, say of $25 annually to the Alumni Fund, would require $625 as a bequest, which would continue an equal income in perpetuity on a fair basis of 4% earnings thus carrying on our class support of the College after we drop out.

At the dinner meeting at the Outing Club on Saturday afternoon President Dickey talked to us on the strangely pertinent subject of institutionalism, using this strong, long word with a carefully studied use of its meaning to support the larger aspects of usefulness of the College in the long future ahead.

The feeling I had as a result of these conferences held at the College in the quiet period just before the classes gathered for the new year is one of assurance that the forward look is on a sound basis and is being guided with care and calm confidence. Friends of the College will gladly share in this building up of the power of the College to serve in the future with enlarged capacities in harmony with its long heritage.

I would like each of you to think about something for the College. Several of our classmates have already made generous gifts and others have indicated a wish to do the same thing.

Secretary, Treasurer and BequestChairman, 114 State St., Bridgeport 3, Conn.