1932

The current December 1 issue of Forbes, magazine - we are grateful to Charlie Dudley'29 for sending us a tear sheet - features a piece about Deke Mack ("the big, strapping man from Massachusetts who heads American Natural Gas Co.") and the energy crisis. The article contrasts the gloom in the electric utility industry and Deke's prediction of "a brave new world for natural gas." Detroit-based ANG has huge reserves and exploration interests reaching from the Gulf Coast to Alaska's Prudhoe Bay. And it is ready to go on coal gasification, which is a major long-term hope for meeting the energy shortage - the U.S. having as much coal as Saudi Arabia has oil. His company, says Deke, will spend billions in the next few years (as compared with $20 billion for the entire industry in all of 1950-70) - if it can get the money.

The article is mainly concerned with the difficulties an enterprise like ANG now has in financing new construction to expand capacity, and the "simple but painful" solutions that Deke is propounding. His main - and presumably most controversial - proposal is for a rate surcharge so that the consumer will pick up at least the carrying costs of the construction, and perhaps some of the actual construction bills. The surcharge procedure, Deke argues, would cost the consumer less in the long run than eventual payment through an ultimately revised rate base.

Said Forbes in December: "Deke Mack will be 65 next year, but he doesn't want to retire. He wants to stick around to see how the game turns out. He is hoping that the Government and consumers will pay the bill now, rather than face the consequence in the form of terrible energy shortages and further damage to the balance of payments."

From leader Howdy Pierpont comes the good news that Squire Ben Drew of Vershire, Vt., has consented to be chairman of our 45th Reunion, which, if you hadn't heard, comes in our 44th year out, on June 14-16, 1976. We shall bereuning with the classes of 1930 and 1931. With Ben's taking on the key job, we are off to an auspicious start to an inherently auspicious occasion. Mark those dates!

Thanks to Ed Marks in Washington for a newspaper item reporting the marriage of JimWakelin and Carol Holman at Christ Church in Georgetown in October. We quote from the "Around the Town" notes: "Afterwards Lynn Nicolas the bride's daughter and her husband Bob gave a big wedding luncheon for her mother, whose late husband Capt. Bill Holman died a year ago, and the bridegroom, who was a widower for over a year. Jim is an oceanographer who conducts research for the Navy, the National Geographic, the Department of Commerce, and the Research Analysis Corp. Jim tumbled from almost the first date."

Art Allen, unretired in Hanover, is chairman of the College Trustees Advisory Committee on Investment Objectives, the committee consisting of two alumni, two faculty, and two students. But that's only one of half a dozen or more jobs Art is doing for the Hanover and College community (e.g., running the community fund drive), and we'll have to bring you a more informed report.

Happy New Year!

Secretary, Orchard Hill Road Westport, Conn. 06880

Treasurer, 6507 Atwahl Dr. Glendale, Wis. 53209