1943
As you undoubtedly know, the three storms that have hit us here in New England made our area look like the middle of winter on the campus at Hanover. We have been surrounded by so much snow that I have felt somewhat like the carnival ice statue - strong and willing but unable to move an inch. Even though spring is here according to the calendar, it is difficult to believe. As a tried and true North Indian I should not mind it, but at the age of 35 it is no longer somewhat beautiful to see,' but only damn wet and uncomfortable.
The news this month has been plentiful and should make a warm spring greeting to you all. The first letter comes from Norm.Askey, 11725 S.W. 69th St. So. Miami, Fla., and I will let you read it for yourselves.
"Have just finished reading the ALUMNI MAGAZINE and decided this was the night! To finally drop you a note. I did write Bill Baker upon coming down here over a year ago, but that was my last effort. To bring you up to date:
"Minni, my wife, and I have been down in the Sunshine State for two years now, moving from Charlotte, N.C., where we were married in October '53. I am with American Radiator & Standard Sanitary Corp. and was fortunately appointed sales manager of the Miami sales office in December 1954. We are the proud possessors of two children, Stephen, age 17 months, and Barbara, age two months! No more in 1956. Bought a home last May and it looks as though we'll be here for quite a while (I'm not complaining).
"By the way, Doc Proctor called the day Barbara was born. Didn't talk to him but was informed he was down here from Winter Haven, Fla., on a buying trip. He's a big shoe man, I understand. My better half has been asking me to write this for months, so this is it. Good to see Jack Halliday's smiling face in the ALUMNI MAGAZINE. As you can imagine, there is quite a large group of alumni, especially during the winter months. Would like to extend an invitation to any of the '43s who should be fortunate enough to travel to South Florida to "come see us, heah" (expression picked up in the real South — N. Carolina).
"Glad to see we will have a news letter again and hereby promise to contribute to Stan Priddy's great effort. Best to you, Doc, and say hello to Koo Delany if you see or hear from him."
Tom Morgan, who has been so long in Africa and Italy and whom I happened to bump into in N.Y. while attending the theatre, has the following to say:
"I imagine that one of your chores is to put out one of those columns informing the class members about their brethren, so here is more grist for the mill. Having been pretty much out of touch since the war I better start from the beginning. Came prancing home from the wars with an Atlantic Theatre ribbon blazing on my breast (Key West Campaign, Battle of Biscayne Blvd., Battle of Times Square). I immediately threw myself and my separation pay into what I chose to call "specialty foods." Basically this is the business of buying it in big bottles and putting it in little bottles dressed up with a gold label for sale to what they call delicacy shops. I eventually got tired of a diet of my own exotic delicacies and made myself available to the business world.
"The Company decided they could use my peculiar talents in Europe, so in 1950 Morg found himself back in the Eternal City, from whence he had originally brought that dolce far niente to the hills of Hanover. It wasn't long, though, before Pepsi sent me to spread the gospel in deepest darkest Africa.
"Flying down to Kenya for the first time I pictured it all in my mind's eye: a place peopled with remittance men, white hunters, Ava Gardner, lions, elephants, rhino, Ava Gardner. A place where one wore shorts and a cork helmet, drank gin'n bitters, and where the ominous throb of a tom-tom pervaded the African stillness, etc., etc. I spent five years following the trails of Delamere, Livingston, Brazza, and even the monumental Stanley, but the remittance men had apparently gone home; the white hunters turned out to be little more than glamorized forest rangers; the lions were a contented old bunch who let you gape at them from a car if you drove ten miles out of Nairobi; and no Ava, not anywhere. Found plenty of gin'n bitters though.
"For the Vital Statistics department, I must mention that we are now four. While wandering through the Congo, I met a delightful Belgian mademoiselle. Her piquant demeanor and speculating eye should have warned me that she had a yen to travel, but I was soon contentedly munching bon-bons in my cage. Lottie and I were married in Leopoldville in 1952. We have since increased our baggage allowance with the arrival of Thomas Brynmor Ill, born in New York, and Bruce Evan, who disrupted carefully laid plans by greeting the world in Nigeria instead of in Paris as planned.
"We are now somewhat settled in Rome again, for a breather, anyway. We can be contacted c/o American Express Co., Rome, should anyone want a quick trip around the ruins."
Don McCorkindale has been appointed general manager of the Chase & Cooledge Co., inHolyoke, Mass. Don is married to the formerLouise Friedrich and he has been active in Republican politics in that area. Capt. BradMorse, who is chaplain of the Portsmouth Air Force Base, has been quite active as a speaker for women's organizations in New Hampshire. Jim Dinsmoor has left the world of the living and has married Kay Sawyer in Laconia, N.H., and they will be making their home in Bloomington, Ind. Dick Kimmel has been appointed administrative assistant at the Cyclone Fence Company. Dick is a member of the Cleveland Council on World Affairs and the Cleveland Chamber of Commerce, and with his wife Jane and two children will move to Waukegan, Ill.
Mel Fenichell proudly sends along a blueribboned card announcing the birth of Stewart Beyo on February 25. Tom Gerber, who is doing so well as a Boston newspaper writer, stopped by at the Hanover Inn for a brief visit.
Tomorrow night it will be my pleasure to attend the dinner at the Boston Club for Class Officers and because the meal is free I shall be there with my eating clothes on. If anything startling comes of this I shall pass it along at our next conclave. Please don't forget what I told you in the last column; if anyone attends a dinner or a meeting take notes as to who was there and pass them along to me.
I now would like to say goodby with the words from an old song - "When the bed springs break down I'll see you in the spring."
Richard Kimmel '43 has been made administrative assistant to the vice president and general manager of the Cyclone Fence Department of American Steel & Wire Division ofU.S. Steel Corp.
Secretary,314 Commonwealth Ave. Boston 15, Mass.
Class Agent, Lend Ter., R.F.D. 1, Glastonbury, Conn.
