1918

Your happy surprise, Eighteeners all, over the May column, its matter, its manner, and its dual - no, tandem - authorship, you'd have been readied for in April issue if the editorial staff hadn't killed my announcement of the welcome prospect - in order - it's their obsession - in order to save space. Later, when said staff first glimpsed on May proofsheets Gene Markey's prose sketches of geriatric classmates' woes in hibernal Florida, followed by Howie Park's 'steen stanzas of Pow-Wow verse, editorial blood-pressure soared. "It's of length to paper a room!" and out came blue pencils and scissors. Before using them, though, they had to read.... That did it: relaxed them to chuckling benignity. Their pencils pocketed and their scissors sheathed, they smilingly voted "Stet." Inaudible to them but heard by me was a relieved cheer from Rollo, at whose behest I wired the collaborators "It stands." Also I expressed to them my gratitude for the respite they'd given me, a month's freedom from responsibility for this column....

Balmy April weather this morning. I'm shooting, you see, for a record: to get copy for my final, June, column on the editorial desk well before the May 5 deadline. Hence my proud mention of balmy April weather. But, in the words of Robert Frost, "You know how it is with an April day/When the sun is out and the wind is still,/ You're one month on in the middle of May./ But if you so much as dare to speak,/A cloud comes over the sunlit arch,/A wind comes off a frozen peak,/ And you're two months back in the middle of March." Have I dared perhaps too often to speak of April? A calculated risk. It's 70 degrees in the shade today, and on the campus lightly-clad students have been playing Softball, flying kites, shying frisbees forth and back and forth again. But if anyone has a yen to hurl snowballs, I can supply him with ammunition from my woods in Vermont. Which reminds me.... In Norwich on the front door of one wellkept Main Street residence still hangs a Christmas wreath. Until about a week ago it didn't look absurd. Doesn't now, really. "There is a sumptuous variety about New England weather that compels the stranger's admiration," Mark Twain put it. "In the Spring," he went on, "I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of twenty-four hours." Well, that's rather fun, but RF made the point better. And I must remember you'll be reading this in June, when, one hopes, but you can't tell, these particular weather observations may not be — to employ the vogue word - relevant.

In this my final column I ought to try to do at least some of the things I have earlier left undone.... Here goes.... But expect no ordered unity. .. . Last fall's letter from Phil Nordell '16 telling how Florimond became our Duke has not yet surfaced on my desk; but I had got Ellen's permission to share it with you, and when it turns up, as it surely must, I will. Perhaps via the "Roar." ... During the college year just ending, James Newton, the neatly bearded 1968 valedictorian, spoke here again. This time under the auspices of the Society of Friends, whose faith is the one into which he was born. He appeared in the auditorium we remember as "A" Dartmouth Hall. I regretfully was unable to attend, and so with special eagerness I looked next morning for the story in the Daily D. The report was favorable. Well attended, it said, and interesting his account of conditions in Cuba, where he had been working, observing, interviewing. ... About him one word more. In his class's list of contributors to the 1969 Alumni Fund appears his name. Which refutes some prophets....

Which reminds me to insert, on behalf of Baron von Kapff, what will be when it appears a last-minute plea to remember the 1970 Fund.... No. Correction: Not on behalf of our understanding George, but of our College.... Bob Fish writes me on 23 April: "This morning's Wall Street Journal says Princeton and others aren't meeting their alumni fund quotas. But I suspect we'll come very close to the $2 million goal." Cheers! With his usual courage Bob adds he's soon to undergo "some non-emergency surgery ... and I hope to enjoy walking out as much as the Apollo 13 astronauts did their getting back. I appoint you a member of my mission control."

Les Granger also writes, after months of heretofore unexplained silence, that Asian flu nearly finished him. It washed out his third and long-planned final globe-encircling jaunt as a past president of the International Council on Social Welfare. After weeks of slow convalescence, he's "back now to 156 pounds, which is exactly what I weighed as an unpromising and unsuccessful scrub on the Big Green Football Squad in 1915!" Les is a brave and happy man still. He dwells presently, and will, we take it, for some time at 6411 Congress Drive, New Orleans, La. 72126.

From Dwight Sargent we demand explanation of his impersonating one Julius A. Rippel '23 in the photograph allegedly portraying the latter receiving a Heart award. See the March DARTMOUTH ALUMNI MAGAZINE, p. 55. Can there possibly be two men that handsome? And so nearly identical twins? If it's not you, Dwight, here's hoping you feel as well as your double looks....

As I was searching back for that picture of Dwight - very well, of Rippel '23 if you insist - I thumbed first through the April issue and paused when I chanced to turn up what I think is my favorite of the pictures taken at Mr. Kemeny's inauguration. If you would be cheered, and if you would be assured about a number of values in family life - you specify them - gaze again at the joyous faces of the three Dickey children in the snapshot taken at the moment their mother was receiving her surprise honorary degree.

Ed Garvey is jubilant. He writes on 25 April: "I have just been voted into the Golden Eagles, a group of pioneer naval aviators, and I will attend a reunion in Pensacola, Fla., 30 April to 4 May. Transportation down, quarters at N.A.S., and return here to Washington are provided by the U.S. Navy. How about that?"

On April's final Saturday, with scheduled crew races on the too-turbulent Connecticut at the last minute postponed, the care and feeding of coeds became their Dartmouth hosts' main problem. Already planned picnic lunches supplied nutriment. But the care? Interpret it fun for all. Those who cared and those cared for had it in a big way: the boys tossed the girls in blankets! No, I am not making this up. See a spectacular photograph of the sport on the front page of Monday's (27 April) Valley News. I merely report the episode for whatever significance my gray-haired classmates may discern in it.

Finally we must sadly note the continued thinning of our ranks.... A last salute to Al Sibbernsen, who died peacefully on 20 March. Then Donald Robinson on 5 April, and Jay LeFevre on April 26. Each name evokes memories we gratefully cherish.

Secretary, Elm St., Norwich, Vt. 05055

Class Agent, Lower Troy Rd., Fitzwilliam, N. H. 03447