1940
Our own Rev. Lawrence L. Durgin rates the kick-off spot this month. Although somewhat tardy, we can report that Larry was installed as the new minister of the Central Congregational Church, Providence, R.I., lale last November. The more than 800 who attended the rites and fanfare numbered among them a list of notables which read like a Who's Who of Rhode Island. Of particular note was the presence of Dr. Roy B. Chamberlin, chaplain of Dartmouth College, whom most of you will remember well from White Church days as an undergraduate. Larry has a big church and a bigger responsibility. I'm confident of your approbation in extending to him a full measure of '40's admiration and support to help inspire him to continued growth in a great calling.
From Chet Garrison comes word that wife Louise presented him with a fine baby boy, named Peter, last November. Chet continues to reap the rewards of his Columbia Master's degree by spark plugging the English department at the University of Colorado. Mean- while, a recent newsflash from the Alumni Records Office announced the award of another post-graduate degree, that of Master of Science in Surgery, to Dr. Hiram H. Belding III, at the University of Minnesota, last December 18. Hi is currently doing his bit for ailing humanity in his post as general surgeon at the Riverside Clinic in the California town of the same name, where he and Nancy also make a home for their two boys and girl.
Gardner Ashley brings us up to date with a note saying that he has been teaching in the Romance Language department at the University of Vermont, at Burlington, for the past two years. Tom George writes that he'll be back home in March from Florence, Italy, where he has been a resident artist during the past year.
Apropos of current tabloid renditions of trial news on U.S. Communists, we quote from a letter received two years ago from PageSmith, who has earned his first year of tenure as history instructor at the Institute of Early American History and Culture, Williamsburg, Va.: "I was amused to see the other day in somebody's old scrapbook (not mine, for I have burned such things) a fine group which included you, me, and William Remington Jr., all 'making democracy work,' in the Sunday New York Times of many years ago. Doubtless the F.B.I, made the connection long ago. Such are the vicissitudes, etc!"
With the great majority of the class already committed and performing on their marriage contracts, engagement announcements are few and far between these days. It is pleasant, therefore, to be able to announce that RoyMerchant, the ex-vending machine popcorn king of Boston, and Miss Julie Conant, of Dedham, Mass., plan to be wed in the spring. Another Vassarite has succumbed to the Big Green wiles - or vice Vassar, I mean versa!
In last month's column we quoted Bob Skinner's well-intended critique of the system which results in the same names appearing repeatedly in this roundup. At the risk of inviting another blast, we pass along the news that one Bob Skinner paced the "grand old men" of Eastern skiing on January 17 to win the U.S. Eastern Senior men's downhill championship at Big Bromley. He's in better shape than I could even pretend to be!
Every so often, someone (not he) sends us a news clipping giving the latest episode in the professional antics of '40's freshman year class president. Most of them are politely factual and even flattering in referring to JackRourke's video reputation. However, the latest flash takes a different though understandable twist, as the following quote suggests:
"We have a new candidate for the title 'king of corn,' namely Jack Rourke. For one thing, Jack is completely unencumbered by talent. And as for originality - well, that's just a word in the dictionary. But he does have one thing - he has brass. And that, we sometimes think, will get you further in radio and television than talent and originality combined. It's getting Jack a cold $1000 a week, according to the terms of a contract he has just signed (last September) with ABC-TV in Hollywood for a five-nights-a-week, half-hour production into which he has thrown all the 'corn' in the radio-TV hopper "
As you may note by the time you read this column, the class newsletter has a new editor. Dave Leake has consented to take over the reins from Dick Bowman's capable hands, and I'm sure that Dave's forthcoming issues of the Indian Drum will do justice to the excellent standards established by his predecessors. Do give him an assist by replying to the class questionnaire which he will be distributing as part of his news-drumming campaign. His address is 560 Keith's Lane, Babylon, N. Y. And make it a point to send in your Alumni Fund gift early this year.
SOUTHGATE B. FREEMAN JR. '40 is co-founder of the new Dartmouth Club of Cody, Wyoming, and is in the lumber business in the Buffalo Bill country.
Secretary, 322 Canterbury Road, Westfield, N. J. Treasurer, 88 North Main St., Concord, N. H.
