Thayer School

Well, the first week of February brought the long, and eagerly awaited, thaw. The stretch of 30-plus days of subzero weather was broken by a steady rain that washed some of the three-inch, armor plate ice off the streets of Hanover, and exposed the debris everywhere. The debris is more extensive than usual, for the ice storm of December, the worst in decades, dropped a multitude of tree limbs and branches to add to the usual bottles, beer cans, and cups deposited near dormitories - the local solidwaste problem. Now, with more rain, the student, faculty, and administration workers are unable to pack enough snow on the center-of-campus statue to keep up with the melt.

Last month this column neglected to mention John Dodd D'22 as both a Thayer School and Tuck School Overseer. Mr. Dodd, retired vice president of the New York Bell Telephone Co., is a key figure in the continuing Tuck-Thayer planning on programs and facilities. Bill Macurdy '57 came to Hanover in January from Bell Labs in New Jersey to talk to prospective employees. Bill stopped to see Larry Scammon'57, a V.P. with Humphreys Corp. in Bow, N. H., mentioned in last month's column. This is the rapidly expanding company Merle Thorpe '53 has organized to develop and put to work exciting avant-garde science and technology in the area of plasmas and high temperature cutting and coating. Andy Daubenspeck, Thayer Ph.D. candidate, has received word that Chris Miller '67 has received orders from the Corps of Engineers, U.S. Army, to go to Germany!

Prof. J. J. Ermenc has returned from his 1969 fall term leave. He spent the time in preparing five volumes of readings on various phases of technological development and in editing transcripts of interviews he has had with men involved in some of the great technological achievements of our times. The modest statement of Joe's recent work was provided by him. A more complete report will show that Professor Ermenc is carrying out some real pioneering work on the development of technology with emphasis on innovation, opportunity, and the effect of creative environments. This work has gained serious recognition, locally and internationally; we hope a book or two will be available shortly.

The annual meeting of the AAAS, held in Boston in December, included sessions entitled "The Sorry State of Science - A student Critique." Mark Tuttle '66 was chairman of two of these sessions: "The Misuse of Science and Technology" and The Technologist in His New Habitat." Mark, who is now a candidate for the Ph.D. at Harvard, can supply the interesting particulars. Assistant Secretary of Commerce Myron Tribus presented a paper on "Education for Innovation" in a major session on Innovation at this same AAAS meeting.

The flurry of activity on the North Slope Alaska following major oil strikes along the Arctic Ocean coastline has claimed the attention of Joe Gilchrist '51. He was promoted recently to Chief, Pipeline Division, of Bechtel Corp. and as a result is now responsible for the proposed pipeline across northern Alaska for gas and possibly oil. One possible route crosses an area of coastal plain in which your reporter spent the summer of 1953 and again in April 1955. Joe's career with Bechtel since graduation has been mainly in hydroelectric development, so, to better understand his new job, he returned to Thayer to take a fresh look at his student project which dealt with permafrost and associated engineering problems. Most readers are aware of the trial run of the Manhattan through the Northwest Pas- sage last summer to test the possibility of tanker transport of oil from Alaska. The Hanover-based Cold Regions Research and Engineering Lab (CRREL) had five men on the Manhattan performing scientific tests and advising on ice conditions. Don Nevel, one of the CRREL men, is a Ph.D. candidate at Thayer School.

Prof. George Taylor has heard from a very busy Martin Anderson '58 that when Arthur Burns became Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, Marty was appointed by President Nixon to serve as Special Consultant to the President for Systems Analysis. His office will study and evaluate new and existing programs, and work with the domestic affairs staff in presenting policy alternatives to the President. Emphasis will be placed on identifying the options available to the President, determining the costs and benefits of these options, and using cost-effectiveness analysis to evaluate the probable effects of alternative resource allocations. Martin was Director of Research in the 1968 Nixon presidential campaing and since then had been acting as deputy to Arthur Burns, counsellor to the President.

Brian Walsh '66 is deeply involved in the experimental city of Columbia, Md., between Baltimore and Washington, D. C. He presented a paper, "A Dynamic Land Use Allocation Model" last October, at the Annual Symposium of the Association for Computing Machinery in New York City. Brian's work on the model, which involves "the application of computers to the problems of urban society," was carried out for The Rouse Company which conceived and created Columbia, Md.