1940

An avocation gained, or reinforced, at Dart- mouth has been turned into nearly a lifetime of fun and service by Bob Niss out Milwaukee way.

Bob, who is now convalescing from a serious and somewhat disabling illness, reports he is "grateful" to be still in the game of life but does miss all the activity that has been so much of his life, both in his several business ventures and particularly his skiing adventures.

Since World War II, when he was an instructor in skiing technique, mountaineering, and survival to a mountain infantry unit, he has been a kind of Milwaukee messiah of skiing. At the Snowstar Ski Club, he and his volunteer aides were soon teaching 1,500 kids each Saturday at ski areas within driving range of Milwaukee and taking them on skiing overnights. He even shepherded as many as 100 to 200 youngsters to the Rockies for western spring skiing each year. He also taught regularly in the metropolitan parks program, and all these activities earned him national recognition, as he became president of the Milwaukee Ski Clubs Council, a director in the central division of the U. S. Ski Association and owner of the Sunburnt Ski Area only 40 miles from Milwaukee. He has had to give up his physical activities now and is conducting his business affairs through managers, but he sounds in good sprits and continues to enjoy visits from his many Dartmouth friends.

On another front, and stemming from another avocation (that of bibliophile), Jack Little has embarked on a campaign of his own - the strengthening and invigorating of The Friends of the Dartmouth Library with some "young" blood from the Class of '40.

As an executive committee member of the Friends, Jack discovered that only four other classmates were formally members of that highly special group: Gordie Wentworth, JohnMcDonald, Phil McCoy and Harry Howard. This became a cause for concern to Jack, a book collector of renown in his own right, because he noted that most of the membership of the Friends of the Library is among the "older" classes.

"If we don't get some young blood in from the classes of the 40's and 50's," he said, "this valuable enterprise could dry up in a few years." So Jack is looking for fellow Forties who feel, as he does, that "the library is the core of the College and calls for special support."

The Friends were started in 1938, ("our time," Jack recalls) by the late Herb West whom most of us knew, I suspect, among a group of library and book buffs serving essentially as "literary dectectives" ferreting out for possible Dartmouth acquisition rare volumes, manuscripts, diaries, letters, books, pamphlets, or collections which might, in West's words then, "throw light on the cultural history of this or other countries." In the years since then, members of the Friends have been annually adding to the quality of the Dartmouth collections by acquiring and giving to Dartmouth rare publications which in their aggregate would be priceless.

Jack himself is the contributor some years ago of a book Librarian Edward Connery Lathem has called "one of the jewels in the library's crown." That was a first edition of Wordsworth's Sonnets autographed by the author with an inscription to a lady friend and including two unpublished sonnets added on the flyleaf by Wordsworth in his handwriting. He discovered it at a Southhampton book dealer's who had found it among a random collection of books stored in an attic that he had bought for $20.

So, if you hear from Jack, give an ear. He'll be beckoning you into a fascinating world and a most rewarding avocation, certainly for yourself and hopefully for Dartmouth as well.

Howie Tallmadge happily reports that his own love of nature is amplified in his son, John (Dartmouth '69) who last fall took time off from his graduate studies in comparative literature at Yale to lead a seminar on "Literature and the American Wilderness" while simultaneously climbing Mt. Katahdin in Maine in what he called "a literary pilgrimage." Young John is doing his thesis on "Studies in the Literature of Exploration" while also writing a book on his own climbing in the Sierra Mountains. Meanwhile, Howie is convalescing from what he says is a minor leg operation and looking ahead to retirement at their summer home on Lake Waramaug in Washington, Conn.

In a surprise, but generally applauded move, Frank Whalen resigned in April from his position as N.H. Health and Welfare Commissioner and was immediately sworn in at his old job, State Insurance Commissioner. Frank was reported in newspaper accounts to have been fed up "with the frustrations" of running the large and complex health and welfare department while trying also to deal with federal interventions and requirements. It was also recognized that, as state insurance commissioner, he would bring authority and balance to the then upcoming insurance rate hike hearings.

This is the time of the annual club dinners across the land, and attending the Boston dinner, to hear President John G. Kemeny talk were Al Rosenthal and Bill Mercer, who reported that it was the first time they had seen each other since graduation, (even though they've been jousting in recent years over phone rates), with Stet Whitcher and Joe Burnett. For those who might also have wondered how Sherwood Burnett acquired the nickname Joe, I pass along the story he told me at the dinner: It all started with a pantomime he used to do in high school of the comic strip boxing hero, Joe Palooka.

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