1923
Irish will fill you in soon on the many pleasant details of the Princeton game weekend. Suffice it to say accommodations at the new White River Howard Johnson were superb, the weather was perfect, the game disappointing, and the 1923 turnout outstanding. A list carefully compiled by Clarence Goss added up to 59 classmates present in Hanover. Most of us attended the Friday evening nightcap and the Saturday morning class meeting in the Inn's sumptuous Room 101 — with bar yet! A fine roast beef dinner Saturday night, per arrangements by FrankDoten, capped an almost perfect weekend. Plans are now well under way for the selection of an executive committee and a fiftieth reunion chairman and, with the football season as a take-off point, interim class get-togethers are off to a fine start.
Again, Irish will give you the minutiae of Babe Miner's reassuring treasurer's report, Lou Wilcox's class agents report and Truman Metzel's summary of the status of the Bequest and Estate Planning Program. Two other items deserve mention here for purposes of emphasis. Jerry Riley has again invited the class to cocktails and dinner at his home in Cumberland, R. I. The November 23 date had to be changed however since Jerry represented the College on that day at the induction ceremonies of a new president of the University of Rhode Island. A later date for the dinner will be announced shortly. Also I would again remind you that Babe Miner hopes to make the celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of our matriculation a meaningful one. He is very anxious to obtain pictures, clippings, and other memorabilia of those fall days of 1919. Your cherished reminders of that long ago time will be safe in Babe's care. Do send them to him.
Again, a week later, we found ourselves in Hanover for the Brown game — or at least for the first half of it. Except for the flattering score it was a dismal affair with the rain coming down in torrents. Altogether a bad letdown after the Princeton weekend.
Unfortunately the Athletic Association chose the inadequate medium of the Brown game program to thank Gladys and FrankDoten for their many thoughtful and generous gifts to the College, the Medical School, Mary Hitchcock Hospital, the White Church and in particular to the football team. In an excellent article by Ford H. Whelden '25 the Dotens' real and intangible contributions to the success of Dartmouth football were outlined. On the real side are included a new and handsome office for Bob Blackman, an amplified stereophonic phonograph system serving the entire Field House and a complete air conditioning system for the upper floor of the Field House. On the intangible side is the never-ending concern on the part of both Gladys and Frank for the personal and collegiate, as well as the football careers, of their "boys." I do hope that some more generally circulated means will be found to thank them.
Our third successive football weekend took us to the Harvard Stadium. This time we reverted to Princeton game weather and a similar if somewhat mitigated score. You will be glad to know that a sizable 1923 delegation had fifth row, if fifteen yard line, seats. We were right there when Dartmouth made its lone touchdown on a beautiful pass play. By the way if you wives save S and H stamps you can get an excellent auxiliary folding seat for one and a half books. The Caswells and the Rices demonstrated them. They are pretty good on those narrow planks at the Stadium that get harder every year.
From Cambridge we went to Eleanor andIvan Martin's in Marblehead Neck for cocktails and dinner. Sharing a wonderful evening with us were Howie and Helen Bartlett, Chet and Barbara Bixby, Jim Broe and Harriett Maycock, Fred and Madeline Clark, Herb and Bea and Sam and Miriam Home, Karl and Lee Klaren, Edgar and Madelyn Lyle, John and Catherine Read, John and Doris Myers, Henry and Margery Moore, Leon and Mary Sargent, who incidentally were the only 1923 people we saw in Hanover at the Brown game, Bill and Anne Welch, Frank and Gladys Doten, Walt and Vi Friend, and Bill and Dorothy Blake. We were happy to also have with us Walter and Harriett Miller '22.
How many of you remember the Hanover youngsters who at the age of ten or thereabouts went over the old ski jump with impunity and aplomb? I recall particularly Marion Fairfield who is now a busy physician in Nashua, N. H., and Ned Richardson '29, now a New England Telephone Company executive in Boston. Marion's father managed the Inn in those days and Ned's father was Prof. Leon Burr Richardson who taught many of us our chemistry lessons. We dedicated our 1923 Aegis to him. I was associated with Ned in the Telephone Company for many years and came to admire and respect him greatly. It was particularly pleasant therefore for the Martins to invite Ned and his charming wife, Connie, for Sunday morning breakfast. We reminisced about the Telephone Company but more particularly about John Carleton '22 and Dick Bowler '22 and Ned's own ski jumping experiences. Those were the almost unbelievable days of double somersaults with what would now be thought of as incredibly inadequate equipment.
The final treat of a fine Harvard game weekend was a visit to the completely rebuilt and beautiful home of Walter and YiFriend. The Friends are near next door neighbors of the Martins. The wide picture windows of both homes overlook Massachusetts Bay and provide grandstand seats for some of the finest yacht racing on the coast.
From the dedicated hand of Truman Metzel comes word of the Al Emerson bequest to the College. Many of you have known for some time that the amount of this generous remembrance would be considerable. Few of us realized however that the total would come to $1,046,149 - the seventh largest gift in the history of the college with a little more still to come. These few lines merely serve to tell you of the amount of Al's legacy to the College. A later issue of the ALUMNI MAGAZINE will more adequately report the gift and tell you something of the love for the College of the man who gave it.
To two of our classmates - Jim Landauer and Charlie Zimmerman - have come still further honors. The New York Public Development Corporation has elected Jim president and a director. The Corporation was set up by executive order of Mayor Lindsay to expand job opportunities by encouraging industry to stay and expand in the city. Jim is founder and chairman of James Landauer Associates and a former president of the Real Estate Board of New York. Charlie, who is presently chairman of the Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance Company, has been elected president-elect of the American Life Convention, the major trade association of 350 life insurance companies in the United States and Canada. He will become the organization's president at its 64th annual meeting in October 1969.
Up here in New Hampshire the trees are bare, the leaves are piled high and there was a quarter inch of ice on the pond this morning. All of which reminds me that by the time you see these lines the holidays will be just ahead. May they be happy ones for all of you and for all of yours.
Gladys and Frank Doten '23 of Hanover,shown chatting with Coach Bob Blackman at practice, were featured in theBrown Game program as "patron saintsof Big Green football." See class notes.
Secretary, Box 2, Francestown, N. H. 03043
Treasurer, 960 Longmeadow St. Longmeadow, Mass. 01106
Bequest Chairman, TRUMAN T. METZEL
