1949

Topcoats will be back in the closets once more here in the Northeast by the time you read this and the quiet cold will have set upon us. And it's more the pity that we can't play reporter instead of historian, but putting this MAGAZINE to bed on time calls for strict deadlines to which we are tied. Perhaps you have wondered why you might read in December, as you are about to, that the 1949 Annual Fall Weekend, on October 9 and 10 was the best ever. Figure it out. Our writing deadline is the fifth of the month preceding publication. Thus material on the weekend could not be written up before the December issue. My whole family might even be able to get in and out of our bathroom during that length of time, but these are the facts and we must understandably live with them.

To be sure, the Class fall weekend was perfect in every way. The attendance was good but might have been better had room accommodations been easier to obtain. We shall try to facilitate next year's get-together (Brown Game weekend October 14-16) but if rooms can be obtained we'll have to have your reservations early to hold them. MikeMcGean did a bangup job of lining up rooms for us all months ahead, for which we were all most appreciative, and then after M.C.ing Dartmouth Night he was decked by a virus. The big news out of Hanover is that Mike has been appointed to the post of Secretary of the College by the trustees. Congratulations are extended on behalf of the entire class to you and your lovely Lois.

Friday night many of us arrived in time to enjoy Dartmouth Night festivities in the new Leverone Field House, followed by a wonderful buffet dinner at the Hanover Inn. Mike read telegrams of congratulations and good cheer addressed to President Dickey from Dartmouth Clubs all around the world, and Tom Clarke, captain of our undefeated football team, exhorted the team to "Puff the Quakers" on Saturday. The Penn team almost upended us, thanks to myriad fumbles, but we managed to slip by them to preserve our undefeated record. This Clarke is a fine boy. Those of you who were at reunion may remember that he worked for the class over that weekend. He is not only very bright and well-spoken but has been playing inspirational football all fall with a leg injury. After seeing the enormous freshman-built bonfire, I was convinced that these boys had appropriated every B. & M. railroad tie north of Boston. Undergraduate Dean Thad Seymour and his charming wife Polly hosted his classmates and their wives Friday evening at their home and this gesture meant a great deal to all of us. It's a pretty wonderful feeling to come back each year not as a stranger but more as a returning member of the family, when you have the likes of the Seymours and McGeans to make you feel this way.

The Gold Pick Axe Award Committee of Proom, Becker, and Rooke made a very popular selection in Bob Zeiser as the recipient of the fall award. Bob unfortunately could not be present, due to illness in the family. I had the great pleasure of presenting the award and remarked how fitting it as to honor the man who has devoted the sixteen years since his graduation to cauterizing, transfusing, and binding up both our real and imaginary wounds until today 1949 is truly a class with strength and stature in the alumni community. Burt Proom's well-written words follow:

In our infinite wisdom, the Class of '49 elected you as Class President in your Senior Year, and you have guided our destiny for sixteen years. Upon graduation, you took on the responsibilities of Class Secretary and served until 1958. At our Fifth Reunion you were elected Chairman of the Class, and held that position until June 1965. Among your many accomplishments in office, the following stand out: (1) Initiation of Annual Fall Meetings of the Executive Committee in Hanover. (2) Establishment of the Gold Pick Axe Award. (3) Institution of a Memorial Book Program. (4) And finally the first place finish of the Class of '49 in our Green Derby in the 1964 Alumni Fund Campaign.

Your illustrious career in office culminated with your selection as the Class Chairman of the Year in May of this year.

Back home on the Shores of Narragansett Bay, you were elected President of the Dartmouth Alumni Association of Rhode Island not once but twice - thus breaking a Club tradition. For your fine efforts and successful leadership, you were named by the College as Club President of the Year in 1963.

No doubt, due in large part to your early training as a brother in Beta Theta Pi you entered the Insurance Business as an Agent upon graduation - and somehow, perhaps due to your later training as a member of Casque and Gauntlet (or maybe as a wrestling letterman) you managed to work a Hooked Rug Business into the act.

It seems more than fitting that your Class should now recognize your many contributions and name you its "Man of the Year." And, indeed we do at this time, present the Gold Pick Axe Award to Robert Hunter Zeiser, the '49er of whom we say with pride "He was a Classmate of ours at Dartmouth."

After writing in the November column about Lee Bronson's generous offer of a special rate to Forty Niners at his Rustler Ski Lodge in Alta, Utah, it occurred to me that many of us might have the inclination but not the wherewithal nor the time to get there. For the eastern skier what's wrong with Cannon Mountain? We have a photograph of your roving reporter getting the word from Zeke and Peggy Straw on the merits of New Hampshire skiing. Zeke spends the week days counting money as executive vice president of the Manchester Savings Bank, but come Friday he, Peggy, and the four children are off to a ski shack seventeen miles south of Cannon Mountain on Route 3. It's an old one-room schoolhouse with a blue door and the year 1873 over the door. Now I'm not saying that they can put you up for the weekend, to be sure, but I know they'd love to greet any classmates who passed by and would delight in showing off their attractive place.

From Milford, Mass., comes the good word that Roy Lovell has been named business manager of the Milford Daily News. He is also advertising manager, a position he has held for almost ten years. Roy has been extremely active in local affairs, and he and his wife Lynn have three boys and three girls ranging in age from two to twelve.

Next month we'll play "You Were There" at the Princeton-Dartmouth struggle for what promises to be the Ivy League football championship. This is the big one, the annual trip to see if we can muddy and bloody up the tiger.

Zeke and Peggy Straw '49 tell the ClassSec (c) where to head off ... for skiing.

Secretary, 15 Twin Oak Rd. Short Hills, N. J. 07078

Treasurer, 530 East 86th St., New York, N. Y. 10028