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To anyone who returned for our 35th a couple of springs ago and sampled the fare arranged by Creight Holden, there could only be a knowing nod of approval over the decision of President Ford to appoint our reunion chairman of '74 to be assistant secretary of commerce for tourism - particularly if "first class."
Creight, who resigned as Michigan's national Republican committee on being named to the U.S. Commerce Department duties, was handily confirmed in the appointment by the Senate and is already on the job in Washington, D.C. - and points around the country. The position, it should be noted, places him in charge of the U.S. Travel Service, which encourages foreigners to see America.
To avoid any semblance of conflict of interest, Creight was reported by the Detroit Free Press to be divesting himself of his various properties, which included the St. Clair River Country Club and golf course, on which he has hosted several members of the Class at various times, as well as Gerald Ford before the Michigan Congressman became President. The same paper reported that Creight sold the St. Clair Inn, which he also owned, to Sinbad's for a cool million. Our reporter for this news was the ever knowledgeable Jack McDonald, who doesn't let much get by him out Detroit way.
The following item confirms the smallness of our world. Recently Dartmouth Physicist Forrest Boley made science news when he became the first person to make an optical sighting of one of the mysterious celestial X-ray sources which have been puzzling astronomers since they were first identified bombarding the earth 13 years ago. He did so, getting both photographic and spectrographic evidence of a surging x-ray star, while working at the McGraw-Hill Observatory operated on Kitt Peak in Arizona by an astronomy consortium composed of Dartmouth, MIT and the University of Michigan.
Talking by phone with Professor Boley about his breakthrough, which created a real stir among astronomers, and specifically asking whether he had any photographs of himself at the telescope, I was told that he didn't but that he'd just had a visit from a Dartmouth man named Joe Dunford, who had taken lots of pictures. It was, of course, our Joe Dunford, who has made a lot of changes since we saw him at Reunion.
As the father of seven-year old twin girls, he decided two years ago to give up the New York scene, where he had for years written and produced documentary films, and follow Horace Greeley westward. He settled in Tucson, Ariz., where he is now involved in commercial real estate and is an active member of the Dartmouth Club there. He had just happened to have gone to Kitt Peak to plan for the dedication this fall of the McGraw-Hill Observatory and to get some pre-event publicity pictures. Working on the dedication of that observatory, with its ties to three institutions, is a natural for Joe. He's Dartmouth, of course; his older son David, now an economist in the U.S. State Department, is a graduate of MIT; and Joe's father was graduated from the University of Michigan.
Another small world bit. George Sheldon, who worked for a while with McGraw-Hill following his retirement from the Army in '67, and then published his own newsletter on international marketing in East Europe, has written a 30 to that endeavor also now.
The reason, he reports, is that he made the final payment (eight year's worth) to Dartmouth for board and tuition for sons, George '70 and John '74. With his oldest daughter Susan having graduated earlier from Dickenson, he figures that he and Jean (Colorado '40) can now concentrate on "converting 18 acres of Maryland into as faithful a replica of New England as possible, travel a bit (including short sojourns to Hanover), garden, fish and keep a fond eye distantly fixed on two grandchildren in Pittsburgh. Theoretically, we are fully retired but seem to be completely and thoroughly busy."
Another '40 who's managed to edge out of the rat race is Chet Berry, who reports that, after 30 years of living in Rochester, N.Y., and doing physics research with Eastman Kodak, he has retired to South Orleans on the elbow of Cape Cod and has "decided to give it a try for yearround living." He lives only about four miles from the summer place owned by Pete and Edie Shedden; they are glad to be neighbors again. Other Forty footnotes: Bob Weil, who has earned the title of Mr. Dartmouth down Alabama way and whose genius idea it was to arrange for the Dartmouth crews to start spring training on a lake near Montgomery, thus starting our eights on their comeback to national contenders, has ended his term as area enrollment director there. But we trust he'll still be keeping an eye out for top prospects for his alma mater - aided by son Robert II '73.
Herb Landsman has agreed to take time out from his executive chores for Federated Department Stores Inc., in Cincinnati to serve on the advisory committee of The Dartmouth Institute, the college's pioneer enterprise providing business executives and professional leaders with a chance to re-study in the liberal arts and sciences from the perspective of maturity and experience with a view to becoming more perceptive leaders and citizens.
In the earth-girdling tradition of Dartmouth types, Powell Holbein writes from Manlius, N.Y., that he has scheduled a trip to Switzerland, Austria, and Germany this month, but is planning to return in time for the Dartmouth-Cornell game in Hanover on November 15.
For friends and fans down Princeton way, the Chinese Mountain drawings by Tom George, made during his trip to mainland China in 1974, will be featured in an exhibit at the Art Museum of Princeton University from October 12 through November 30. The museum announcement described Tom as "the first western artist to study the mountains of Kweilin."
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