Dartmouth Man Par Excellence

"Getting the Best of the Irishman" was the title and the aim of an unusual issue of '23 Skiddoo, oldest class newsletter of the 60-odd which appear periodically to report news and views of classmates to classmates at greater length than space limitations of the Alumni Magazine permit.

Guest editor Dick Kershaw seized the occasion of his temporary position to pay tribute to Sidney J. "Irish" Flanigan, for whom he was substituting, and to Flanigan's more than 20 years of being "the voice of the class."

Of the Skiddoo, Kershaw wrote: "It sparkled with Irish wit; sermonized on the Alumni Fund and the Bequest Program; recounted current problems and progress of the College; carried class membership and fund contributor lists; promoted class reunions, regional dinners, glee club concerts, father-and-son dinners." He then went on to prove it by quoting some memorable passages from the choicest of issues, "the best of the Irishman."

One of Irish's pitches for the Alumni Fund serves well to illuminate his relation not only to the College, but to his fellow men:

"Bricks and mortar and endowment are all that's needed to whip up an average college, but they are the least important components of that nebulous thing called Dartmouth. Dartmouth is built with the devotion and sacrifice which little men like you and me give to a big ideal. It is the sympathetic and tolerant sanctuary of intellectual honesty. It is far bigger than the material and men that give it being. A buck isn't much, but the College is infinitely richer because of the spirit behind that buck. . . .

"There are two ways to be rich ... one is to have much, the other to want little. There is only one way to be generous. It is to give wholeheartedly of what you have in a manner that calls for some degree of adjustment and sacrifice. Anything less is merely a token—a gratuity—a tip. . . . It's hollow and a sham. Regardless of one's station, it is given to all to be generous. But the word self must be shoved far into the background so that the heart will have room to enjoy the real happiness and pleasure that comes only in doing for others—without thought of praise, favor, or reward."

Flanigan, who now divides each year between take Ariel, Pa., and Delray Beach, Fla., is a retired insurance broker, partner in the New York firm of McGinness, Johnston, and Flanigan from 1938 until 1955, when it merged with the Frank B. Hall Company. He was vice president of the expanded company until his retirement.

If insurance was his business, Dartmouth has always been his beloved avocation. As an undergraduate, he was a member of Phi Delta Theta, of Green Key, and Casque and Gauntlet. He wrote the lyrics for a student musical TheSahara Derby, which went on a cross-country tour, and other undergraduate productions. His senior year he was elected Mayor of Hanover in the mock election that was then a rollicking highlight of the student year, running on an appropriately bibulous platform for those Prohibition years.

His service to the College and to 1923 ran far beyond his devoted labors as Class Newsletter Editor. He was president of the Alumni Council for 1949-50 and a Council member from 1947 to 1953. He was appointed to the Trustees' Planning Subcommittee on Alumni Relations in 1958. He has served as Class President, president of the Westchester County Alumni Association, and secretary of the Dartmouth Club of New York. He was a co-founder and effective fund-raiser for Aquinas House, the Catholic student center. He is a servant of his Church as well as of his College; nominated by Cardinal Spellman, he was made a Knight of Malta in 1964 by Pope Paul VI.

In 1963 the genial Gaelic gentleman received the Dartmouth Alumni Award. The citation read in part: "Dartmouth is written on the heart of Irish Flanigan, just as he is close to the hearts of thousands of Dartmouth men."

Sidney "Irish" Flanigan '23.