1909
My Roommate, Dutch Schildmiller (Cont.)
Are you still there, audience? When Dutch and I moved into Massachusetts Hall at the beginning of our junior year, we acquired more commodious quarters: a living room and a separate bedroom, plus an adjoining toilet and lavatory. Some class! We bought a couple of second-hand beds that fitted along one wall in tandem arrangement, foot to foot. The springs were none too strong, and it didn't help 'em any when we'd come in the room and jump feet first on the other guy's bed. By the end of senior year, my springs touched the floor. It was like sleeping in a hammock.
Old Cap Carter was janitor over to Massachusetts. In my desk I had a self contained tool kit with various gadgets stored in the handle,, such as screwdrivers, files, awl, etc., which could be fitted into the other end of the tool. This was admired by Cap, and when I missed it after returning from a Christmas vacation, I asked him if he knew anything about it. He said, "yes." He was afraid someone would steal it, so he took it home for safe keeping. It was safe, all right, for I never got it back.
Because of his transfer from Cornell and because he had gone out for football the fall of his freshman year there, Schildmiller was ineligible for Dartmouth athletics for a year. During the two years he played football, he was a star at right end. In senior year, he was put out of commission early in the season with a broken collar bone. But he came back to play a brilliant game against Princeton, catching a forward pass to score a touchdown, the lone score of the game and a win for Dartmouth. It was his performance in this game that put him on Walter Camp's Ail-American team, one of the few Dartmouths that had been so named up to that time.
In the interim that Dutch was ineligible for varsity competition, he played on class football, baseball and basketball teams. Junior and senior years, besides football, he was right forward on the vasity basketball team, and played first base on the varsity baseball team.
Men from around our time will remember the baseball scandal that hit Dartmouth our junior year. Practically the whole varsity squad was disqualified, because it was claimed they accepted money for playing summer ball. The only two regulars who came through unscathed were Captain Johnnie Glaze '08, and Schildmiller. Dutch did play ball with a gang at York Beach, Me., but he was paid for performing work around the hotel. It was just a coincidence that he played on the hotel ball team. Starting practically from scratch, however, Dartmouth fashioned a creditable ball club. A heading in the Boston Herald of May 22, 1908, referred to the Nine as "Dartmouth's Great Team," and proclaimed in a main head, "Dartmouth Nine Makes Record With 'Simon Pure' Team."
At the end of the season, Dutch was elected captain to serve the following year. A news story at the time referred to him as "the best all-around athlete in college, having gained the distinction of winning three 'Ds'." It also stated, "Schildmiller is very popular in college and is a member of Psi Upsilon fraternity and Sphinx Senior society."
Among the '09ers who played with Dutch on the various teams, were Knuck Kennedy, Joe Brusse, Jess Hawley, Reggie Bankart, Husky Rich, and Ben Lang in football; Sid Hazelton, Karl Hammond, Art Shoppelry, and Micky McLane in baseball; Ben Lang, Bob Burns, and Phil Avery in basketball.
It Wasn't All Athletics With Dutch
The two years we lived in Massachusetts Hall bring many pleasant memories to Dutch and me. Junior and senior years I served as toastmaster at the Delta Alpha banquets, and Dutch was called on to talk about Dartmouth athletics. I was musically inclined, playing cornet in the college band and guitar with the Mandolin Club. During moments of relaxation we had mandolin and guitar playing in the room, with Rollie Hastings '11, and Danny Watson on the mandolins. Senior year, when Dan was leader of the Club, the three of us worked up a trio that featured Rollie's famous "Wisconsin Rag."
Dutch liked to sing and he liked to "beef," and he was a great kidder. His life in college, however, wasn't confined to athletic pursuits. He took time out for social activities, and romance. One Christmas vacation he visited me at my home in Evanston, Ill. After our return, an item appeared in the Dartmouth Magazine, supposedly quoted from the Evanston Index, my father's newspaper: "G. Henry Schildmiller, Dartmouth's star athlete, who has been visiting his College Roommate, John Roland Childs, (this in big, bold type), returned with his worshiper to Hanover last Sunday. We regret to say that our Beau Brummels were left in the wake of my-boy-John's enormous swath. We are proud to have been so pleasantly splashed."
Looking back over the three years Dutch and I were together, we'll recall our favorite hangout at Burke's tailoring establishment where Pasqual Serafini was manager and Sawny Reagan assisted him during his spare time; the vaudeville show that Charlie Truman and I put on at G.A.R. Hall where Schildmiller, as head usher, double crossed us and started the riot, (he didn't get the five bucks we had promised him;) the hike we took one spring vacation when Schildmiller and George Burns quit at Windsor, Vt., and Rollie Hastings and I continued on to Clare-mont Junction; our close association in Psi U and Sphinx. Neither o£ us could be classified as brilliant students, but we managed to get enough credits to graduate, we made solid friends, and we had fun.
Well, folks, this is the last blast in this MAGAZINE until next fall. Before saying farewell for the current year, let me bespeak your favor for the Alumni Fund of 1957. If you have made your contribution, fine. If you haven't, pray do. And if you feel in your heart that you can add to what you've given, no one will say you nay.
Class Notes Editor, 141 Pioneer Trail, Aurora, Ohio
Secretary, Sandwich, Mass.
Class Agent, A. 21 Walden St., Newtonville 60, Mass.
