1916
Once again (and in recent months it has been all too often) I have the sad duty of extending the sympathy of the Class to the family of a deceased classmate, - the family of Edward Howland Lawson, known affectionately to all as Tom Lawson, who died on March 12 near his home in North Wilmington, Mass. That was the day of a big snowstorm. Tom, who apparently had not been feeling well, started for work against the advice of his wife. He took a cab to the station, boarded the train, but became ill, and died before the train reached the next station. I have a newspaper picture of Tom taken less than two years ago on the occasion of his retirement from Stone and Webster after more than thirty years with that engineering firm. After wishing him, through these columns, many years of rest and relaxation your reporter had word from Ken Ross that Tom had no idea of resting nor relaxing, and that he had accepted a position with the Charles T. Main Co., consulting engineers of Boston, and was busily engaged on the St. Lawrence Seaway project. What a shame that Tom did not live to see the grand opening of the Seaway to business on April 25.
Charlie Jones writes me that he and Ruth are planning a trip to Europe this summer. Nine days to Genoa, with stops at Gibraltar, Palermo and Naples. Then overland to Rome, the Italian Riviera, Innsbruck, Salzburg, Vienna, Munich, Lucerne, Paris and returning on the same ship from Cannes. What an itinerary! One time on his way back from Europe on a fall Saturday afternoon in mid-Atlantic the public address reported apologetically that it could not get the Ohio State-Michigan game on the ship's radio, but only the Dartmouth-Princeton game. Charlie wants especially to see Rome and Naples again, but remarked that after seven years of Latin at Dartmouth and elsewhere he couldn't even read the dates on Roman monuments. He added, "J0^nny K. Lord would have had a fit at that." Ode to Ruth and Charlie upon their return: We are fully aware that our youth has been spent, Our get-up-and-go has got up and went. But we don't really mind, for we think, with a grin, Of all the nice places our get-up has been.
Jim Coffin tells me that Sam Cutler and Art Conley have agreed to head up our 45th Reunion. Sam will be the overall boss and Art will look after the New York end. The appointment of a couple of very able leaders, I calls it. Many of us will not be around to celebrate our Golden Fiftieth, so all should make every effort to be there at the Forty-fifth.
In shutting up shop for the summer your correspondent wants to report on some men in the Class who have been under the weather. Dave Shumway is making steady progress, is home from the hospital, and says that after a period of four to six weeks' recuperation he will be as good as new and ready for another 64 years. Pee Wee Marble, who has been hospitalized with angina, is making a good recovery. Rog Evans had called by to see him and reports that he must take it easy for a couple of months. A good chance, Pee Wee, to try out your famous Cushing chair. Dan Dinsmoor is getting over a cataract operation. Jack English had a fine letter from him, written in longhand, believe it or not, even though he was wearing a Lone Ranger black mask, with only the tiniest slits to permit a minimum of light. In a letter to Stirling Wilson Dan said that with Dan Lindsley back in Sierra Madre and Ruby McFalls in La Jolla he hopes that Carl Eskeline and he can get some additional '16 company on their occasional visits to the Coliseum to watch the Dodgers or Pacific Coast football. Stirling Wilson went to the Jacksonville Naval Hospital on Easter Sunday for an examination, came home, wrote a Balmacaan Newsletter, went back to the hospital for an operation, and nine days later returned to Ormond Beach. Soon thereafter he flew out to Birmingham to judge a Barbershop quartet contest. He wrote subsequently that he was flying to Boston that week to drive with Alec Jardine up to Hanover for the Class Officers Meeting. What a guy! - the living embodiment of Mike Murphy's famous dictum that a team (or a guy) who won't be beaten (or kept in bed) can't be beaten (or kept in bed). And this applies also to those other courageous laddies mentioned above.
By the time you read these lines you will have been solicited in the Capital Gifts Campaign. If any of you have a feeling of remorse at not having done right by the old College now is the time to make amends with your capital gift. Remember that unless you have ideas of emulating old man Methuselah this will be the one and only opportunity to make a capital gift to Dartmouth in your lifetime.
As we put this edition to bed (I think that is the correct newspaper parlance) I wish for the Class all the amenities of the Good Old Summertime, and extend many thanks to everyone who has sent me the wherewithal to make these notes possible, especially the old faithful, - Jack English,Dick Parkhurst, Rog Evans, John Ames,Dutch Doenecke, Stirling Wilson and GeorgeDock, to name only a few. More power to you all.
As I was about to mail these notes to Hanover I received an airmail letter from Carl Eskeline, written April 27 and telling me that Louis Bell had died very suddenly in a restaurant in Santa Barbara that day. I am sorry to add such a sad postscript to these notes.
Class Notes Editor, 7 Swarthmore Pl., Swarthmore, Pa.
Secretary, Box 1998, Ormond Beach, Fla.
Class Agent, Box 151, Sagamore, Mass.
