LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Eddie DeCourcey

TO THE EDITOR:

For all the different things that Dartmouth may be to each of us, she also must be many of the same things to all of us, judging from our fellowship. We all know the well-rehearsed traditions. Only a few of us knew Eddie DeCourcey.

Eddie DeCourcey was trainer of the track team for almost 50 years. He retired October 1 and died a few weeks later. To me Eddie DeCourcey, as much as anything else, is Dartmouth, and I want to share with you his part of what the College means to me.

I do not know Eddie's full history, and am the poorer for it. But perhaps what I can recall of him will tell you something of what he was.

When I came to Dartmouth in 1953 Eddie was tearing adhesive tape with his hands; when I left in 1957 he had been resorting to a scissors for some time. He was a small, bony man, with a bit of white hair, sunken cheeks, and an impish smile. And feeble as he had become, he still walked several miles early each morning, out by the golf course, just as he had for years.

His loyalty - to track, to Dartmouth, to Boston, to this country - was unbounded. Although he was a quiet, shy man, he would regale you, on request, with accounts of races he had seen. He might forget your name from one day's rubdown to the next, but he could describe every step of a race run in the Boston. Mechanics Building 40 years ago.

One day, when I was very much a sophomore, I lay face down on his rubbing table, reading a Boston newspaper. I announced that I thought it was a rotten rag. Eddie just kept rubbing. Then, a few moments later he said softly: "You don't have to read it, you know."

Eddie's job always came first. Many were the races he'd love to have seen, but missed because he was in the training room, helping Doug Brew recover from one distance run in time to go out for another.

On the road, traveling to Boston, Providence, New Haven or Ithaca, we'd stop sometimes for a stretch and then blame him for holding us up when we started again. "Come on, DeCourcey!" we'd holler, and he'd finally appear back on board the bus, smiling broadly and loving it. And wherever we stopped to eat, we'd hoard the sweet rolls for Eddie.

Eddie never made a fuss over a good performance. If a fellow ran a good race, Eddie might say something to him. If he did, it was always quietly. And it meant a lot more that way.

New York, N. Y.

Gratitude to Hoppy

TO THE EDITOR:

If I am not intruding on your editorial policy, may I express the honor and distinction I feel to say that I knew Hoppy when we both lived on the top floor of Davis Hall of Worcester Academy. Hoppy may have grown "anti-pathetic to personalities" as was suggested by one of your commentators, but who isn't. I never liked Gen. Eisenhower as I did J.F.K. and so voted the Democratic ticket.

Hoppy was good to me and helped me translate Cicero's oration, and I made Dartmouth without conditions after two years in a New Hampshire high school and one year in Worcester.

I owe a lot to Hoppy and Worcester Academy, not to say Dartmouth where my grandson and my son-in-law each spent four years.

The only constructive suggestion I offer is that a copy of the ALUMNI MAGAZINE be placed on file in the public libraries from Seattle to Miami, Florida, and that one be sent to all alumni at the expense of the Class Fund if there is any room or desire for expansion. Maybe the New Hampshire Sweepstakes may lighten the overhead of operation.

Newport, N. H.

More than 31,000 copies of the Octoberissue were printed, and well over 90% of allalumni received it. The Sweepstakes has noapplication to the College, nor did the firstrunning do the editor any personal good.

The Undressed Dressed Down

TO THE EDITOR:

Although I am not a Dartmouth alumnus, it is a school I love, and therefore I am delighted to read that my friend Al Foley has come out strongly, as surely someone needs to do, about the shocking state of dress and undress of the New Barbarians ... in short, a certain percentage of your current student body.

There may be some excuse, though I can't think of one, for sloppy thinking... but surely there is none for sloppy dress, as I would assume there isn't a single student in Dartmouth today whose parents can't afford to buy garments to cover him decently.

What in hell are these kids protesting against... parents or soap and water!

I never thought I'd see the day when Dartmouth would have students hardly distinguishable from beatniks.

I do wish Al Dickerson would pass a law requiring a decent respect for both ... parents and soap and water!

Weston, Vt.

Kindness Within the Family

TO THE EDITOR:

You published such a superb issue of the ALUMNI MAGAZINE in October, describing so fully the career of the late President-Emeritus Hopkins, that I have wished to express my deep appreciation to the editors.

As a long-time associate of Mr. Hopkins here at the College I don't see how a better selection of material, both text and pictures, could have been made to give your 30,000 Dartmouth alumni readers a full account of what that truly great and deeply loved person accomplished in his distinguished career, and in. his extensive associations with thousands of Dartmouth men and others.

As a former editor of the ALUMNI MAGAZINE I have some appreciation of the weeks of research and preparation that were undertaken following the Hopkins funeral in Rollins Chapel August 15; and of the thorough care and great skill which went into the writing and layout of those pages.

Hanover, N. H.

Class Numerals Supplied

TO THE EDITOR:

This is to inform you that in the recent issue of ALUMNI MAGAZINE on page 66 the five persons pictured on the Desert Cabaleros Ride are all graduates of Dartmouth College. Bud Brown graduated in 1925 and Fred Fuld in 1940.

Albuquerque, N. M.