Senior Club Secretary Retires

Employing his customary flair for the timely, President Dickey joined what proved perhaps the most surprising evening in the 80-year history (1881-1961) of the Northern California Alumni Association. The advance billing for this, the annual dinner-business meeting at the University Club on April 6, gave no hint that the overflow attendance was in for a shock unequalled since the earthquake of 1906. But since this "big date" takes on a coloration of dates, the recital tends to the chronological.

Going back 35 years, few of the few present at the annual March 11, 1926 business session realized that they were witnessing the advent in Dartmouth fellowship of one who was destined to become the preeminent club secretary that Dartmouth College has produced. Surprising as history has proved that election, an equal if not greater surprise was the announcement that Basil "Abe" Lincoln Winslow '20, soon to bow from business cares, was also resigning the secretaryship. In brief, the name of San Francisco's Mr. Dartmouth no longer would be the benediction at the close of the letters and reports that had sustained Dartmouth alumni for 35 arduous years.

If, for the world at large Abe Winslow was "the man to see" upon arrival at this port, he was also the man who for years, almost beyond the memory of the oldest alumnus, had labored unceasingly; at first revivifying half-atrophied arteries, and then, through thick and thin, sustaining the vigorous flow of the Dartmouth spirit within the North California alumni body.

This cheerful, unflagging dedication was not for a decade, not for two decades, not for a generation's span. It was for 35 years, and, ever to his own amazement, a rolling up of a record brilliant in its subtlety, and with enlistment and re-enlistment renewed without quibble or question.

And this in the region that has its Land's End, farthermost from the fountain-head of inspiration, a seaport ingrained with the spirit of trade upon whose contrary currents and tides men come and move on, much as the merchant ships on its far-flung kaleidoscopic bay.

What was the good of such devotion? The good of it is that today at this center, due more to Abe Winslow than any other man, there is an ability to enfold controversy in compromise, coupled with guided fanaticism. For there can be no great achievement without a degree of fanaticism and Winslow has harbored it. The words "see Winslow" became the shibboleth for the old guard, the open sesame for the newcomer. In all this he stimulated the ingrained Dartmouth preference for team spirit rather than individual brilliance. This, indeed, was only the other face of a perennial willingness to accept competence in place of perplexing genuis. Gifted with the power of sympathetic perception and understanding, he almost unconsciously expanded his field of endeavor and influence.

As a natural concomitance of his office he was an outstanding advocate and interpreter of the College's aims. Not that he believed the College could do no wrong. He could by jest convey a serious suggestion. He was as anxious that the career advisers of seniors urge the top men of the class to come to San Francisco as the College was eager that the best of California youth infiltrate Hanover Plain.

Here is another whose daily life enhances the name and fame of Dartmouth. In his extended vicarship of Pacific Telephone Company's Bay Area Employees' Benefit Committee he has gained the esteem and affection of thousands. His series of model alumni address catalogs reflect his almost unique gift for instant recall by name and department of some 2,000 retired-on-pension employees whose financial relations with his company is his concern.

Such duties can be, at times, the type to try men's souls. It is real work. Yet when someone wondered how he could swing that job and also find time to fulfill every request from Hanover, he was asked, "After you got the added Thayer School degree in '21, did you go directly from Dartmouth to the telephone company?", his smiling reply was, "O, no; for a couple of years I WORKED!"

The framed citation from the club presented Abe by former Alumni Council President Guy Wallick '21 recited the esteem and love of his fellows and epitomized their obligation in the words, "His the unmeasured gift - our's the reward."

Messages reflecting the widespread alumni respect and approbation included wires from Leon I. Rothschild '24 for Los Angeles, George Stoddard '18 for New York and Sid Hayward '26 for the College.

President Dickey in a glowing summary of Abe's equable and unvarying cooperation, concluded by presenting for the College a handsome watercolor of Old Dartmouth.

Preceding the dinner, conferences of the zone enrollment workers and the class agents were addressed by National Enrollment Committee Chairman John Willetts '40 of Milwaukee and John Dodd '22, chairman of this year's Alumni Fund, a vice-president of N. Y. Tel. Co. They also briefly presented their messages as post-prandial speakers.

President Dickey keyed his address to the fundamental problems confronting higher education in America. He emphasized the ever-increasing acceleration of obsolescence of knowledge and the resultant growing prevalence of ignorance. This led to a most interesting behind-the-scenes view of the intense competition by educational institutions in recruitment of the exceptional modern scholarteacher for their faculties.

Officers elected for the Northern Californiaand Nevada Alumni Association are: President, William S. Clark '42; Vice-Presidents,William J. Montgomery '52 and Peter H.Zischke '52; Treasurer, Carlton J. Ward '32;Secretary, Eugene P. Carver '50; and AssistantSecretary, O. Paul Webb '39.

For no few reasons, the most thunderousof welcomes during the annual roll-call ceremony greeted Warren C. Kendall '99, eldestguest and registering from far away Sarasota, Fla.

"Abe" Winslow '20, San Francisco club secretary for 35 years, receives testimonials from President Dickey (top) and Guy P. Wallick '21, representing the alumni association.

"Abe" Winslow '20, San Francisco club secretary for 35 years, receives testimonials from President Dickey (top) and Guy P. Wallick '21, representing the alumni association.