1954

In these times of economic stress, what better way to start a column than recognizing the activities of Our friendly class bankers. These may be tough times for some people, but our monied banker classmates are showing great progress.

Citizens Bank and Trust Company of Providence, R. I., announced in March the election of George Graboys as its president. George joined the bank approximately five years ago as director of its factoring operation and quickly rose through its commercial lending division to a vice presidency and now president. It's been a rapid rise for George.

Congratulations!

Bruce Classon, first vice president of the Bankers Trust Company, B.T., Factoring and Finance Division, was one of the panelists at a recent program of the National Commercial Finance Conference, Inc., a trade association for the commercial financing factoring industry in the United States. Bruce's picture was prominently displayed in a recent issue of the United States Investor/Eastern BankerMagazine. The subject of the panel was "Loan Review Dramatization." While I'm not quite sure what that meant in terms of the conference, it certainly is true that there is a lot of drama behind a lot of bank loans today. As many of you know, Bruce is a recognized expert in the field of factoring, having been involved in it almost since leaving college and being the author of a widely recognized text on the subject.

Another class banker, Tom Sayles, president of a Summit, New Jersey Bank, has apparently been getting a lot of publicity in bank publications. It seems that the Trust Department of Tom's bank sold all of its common stock holdings last fall and invested its common stock portfolio all in gold stocks. As you can well imagine, the performance of Tom's Trust Department has far outstripped that of any other bank in the country, thus getting a lot of recognition for Tom and his Trust Department. I'll bet Manufacturer's Hanover is sorry they ever let Tom Sayles get out of their hands!

Another class banker, Doug Dodge, has been spreading his knowledge around the countryside. We have a notice that he was seen speaking in Maryland in the fall, even though his base of operations is in New York. Doug's topic was an economic forecast for 1975. I wonder if he's been right so far? Doug is senior vice president, Asset Management, of the Mercantile Safe Deposit Trust Company in New York City. He is also a member of the Investment Committee for the Mercantile Bank Shares Corporation.

A few notes from our Far West contingent. Charles Reed writes from Whittier, Calif., that he has been elected a director of the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California. This is a decidedly different direction than Whittier's other famous citizen took!

A new Californian is Dick Page. Dick, Jane and family have moved to 1300 Waverly Road in San Marino which is about as far away from Boston as you can get. Dick has been elected president of Emmett & Chandler Agency and corporate vice president of the Pinehurst Corporation. In this position he will direct Pinehurst's insurance brokerage operations nationwide. The operations Dick will head include Emmett & Chandler with offices in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York and the Herman C. Wolff Company in Indianapolis. Pinehurst operations encompass the insurance services and reinsurance underwriting field. Dick arrives at this position well-prepared, based upon his background as a former second vice president of Traveller's Insurance Company and vice president and general manager of Fairfield and Ellis, a national insurance firm based in Boston. Dick writes that there is a New England latch out at his new address, and he looks forward to seeing and hearing from all classmates in and passing through the area.

Another Californian, Ernie Dahl, writes that he has given up his responsibilities as a dean in the California Junior College System and has returned to the classroom as a counselor/ psychology instructor at the California Community College in Sacramento. Ernie writes that he is most impressed with the growth of the public junior college movement. One can appreciate that growth when he looks at the statistics of the school where Ernie is teaching. That community college alone has 10,000 day and 10,000 evening students. That's a lot of counselling work, Ernie! Well, that completes another month of not-too-creative

writing. Keep writing and another information-filled, intellectually-oriented column will appear again!

Bill Mansfield Ill '54 (r) receives a special commendation for his "distinguishedachievements in international pollution control" from EPA's director, Russell Train.

Secretary, Alperts, Inc. 100 Highland Ave. Seekonk, Mass. 02771

Class Agent, 316 Briarly Dr. Franklin Lakes, N.J, 04717