1934
The variety of '34 achievement continues to astonish and delight this writer, who is beginning to suspect, 35 years after the fact, that there may be one or two other avenues of self-expression.
Take Sam Carson. The Toledo (O.) Trust Company did just that - according to the "Temperance (Mich.) Bedford Courier" of December 17 - naming him fourth president. Sam joined the Bank as a director in December, 1967, becoming executive vice-president January 1, 1968. He had previously served as a director of the First National Bank of Toledo, and before that had achieved outstanding success as a General Agent of the Aetna Life Insurance Company.
Then there's Barriss Mills, properly lauded in Bill Scherman's March 5 News-Letter for his recent "Epigrams from Martial, a Verse Translation." My recent puzzled query ("I thought you were a prof, of English, Bar, not Latin or Greek") elicited a quasi-epigrammatical answer.
I am in English [Bar wrote on February 24], but I also like to translate, so I put my Freshman Greek and rusty Latin to work, on the assumption that the only way to bring poetry over from one language to another is to jump in and try to swim. Prof. Stearns was very kind in his ALUMNI MAGAZINE review of the Martial book; I hope others are equally so. But even if they aren't, no one can take away the fun I had making the translations.
Otherwise, I go on teaching all kinds of things here at Purdue, year after year, writing a little when I can, making a lot of stoneware pots (more fun, even, than translating), increasing the handicap of our departmental bowling team, and watching our four boys grow up. My wife lola is a painter and potter, so there's always something going on at 915 N. Chauncey Ave. [West Lafayette, Ind.].
There's also Dr. Jay (James H.) Skiles Jr., who came through, on February 26 with a long-awaited report on his voluntary tour of duty last summer on the hospital ship "Hope." Here it is, verbatim:
In August last year, I, along with about 30 other volunteer physicians, arrived in Colombo, Ceylon, to begin a tour of duty on the S.S. Hope, of the People-to-People Health Foundation, of Washington, D. C. When we left two months later, we all agreed that it had been one of the most rewarding experiences of our lives, and that we as volunteers in the program had probably benefitted more as donors, than had the Ceylonese, as recipients.
The Hope is a World War II hospital ship, formerly the Consolation, which was taken over from the U. S. Navy and refitted by Project Hope in 1960, in an attempt to indoctrinate certain underdeveloped areas of the world in more modern, progressive medical and dental care. The ship is sent out at the invitation of a specific country for a period of one year, and in previous tours of duty has gone to Indonesia, South Vietnam, Peru, Ecuador, Guinea, Nicaragua, and Colombia. The nurses, technicians of various types, the ship's crew and four or five doctors serve full-time, with only about 30 of the volunteer doctors rotating for two month periods.
The program is largely one of education, with the doctors, nurses and ancillary personnel working with counterparts in the Ceylonese medical community. The ship itself is a modern hospital installation of 130 beds, with very good operating rooms, laboratory and X-ray facilities, and the best nursing care that I have ever seen. In addition to duty on the ship, we spent a large part of our time working with the local doctors in the hospitals in Colombo. Our teaching programs were designed to upgrade the medical care in Ceylon with the hope that the medical community will be more self-sufficient when the ship completes its tour of duty.
The program is almost exclusively financed by private contributions, and the annual cost of operation amounts to about $5,000,000. This figure is put in its proper perspective when one is made to realize, as Norman Cousins stated in the Saturday Review, that it is less than the cost of one jet bomber!
Jay's specialty, by the way, is obstetrics and gynecology, which he practices in Oak Park, Ill. Further news of the O.B. world was made back in December, by Dr. H.(Harry) John Mellen, attending physician in obstetrics and gynecology at St. Peter's Hospital, Albany, N. Y. Harry was reelected chairman of the Hospital's medical staff.
Fred Rath, on the other hand, continues making history. The one-time ambulance driver, military intelligencer, and authority on historical preservation is responsible - said the "Geneva (N. Y.) Times" of January 6 - for the daily operations and administration of the program of the New York State Historical Association at Cooperstown. Fred, vice-director of the association, was chief speaker at the sixth annual meeting of the Seneca Falls Historical Society on February 1.
Space this month permits only a thank you to Fritz Mosher, who was gracious enough to prepare, for this column, an excellent summary of his latest book, "Democracy and the Public Service," and to Fran Ford, who sent me a thoughtful, and thought-provoking, letter on various Dartmouth matters. Mosher summary and Ford letter will be excerpted next month.
As stated above, the variety astonishes me. Any spare cots, Ted?
Secretary, Apt. 1-B, 333 East 55th St New York, N. Y. 10022
Class Agent, 22 Thoreau Rd., Lexington, Mass. 02173
