1970

I have some interesting news this month about a few of our classmates that I am happy to share with you. This will just about exhuast my stock of information, so, as always, I would appreciate your dropping me a line and letting me know how things are going.

I have word about Mac Crosbie. Mac and his wife live in Rockbridge County, which is in West Virginia, just southwest of Lexington. They share about 160 acres of mostly forrested land with three other families. The Crosbies have built their own home, which is nestled in the middle of a hemlock and hardwood forest. I certainly would agree with Mac's view that they are fortunate to live in such a beautiful place. The families on the property follow the teachings of Kirpal Singh, an Indian saint, and are vegetarians. They are working toward being as self-sufficient as possible, which includes tending large gardens. Mac works part time at the library of the Virginia Military Institute, spending the rest of his time doing landscaping and carpentry; his wife is a nurse at the hospital in town.

Our classmate Richard Kenney has just won the prestigious Yale Series of Young Poets Competition. His manuscript, The Evolution of the Flightless Bird, was selected from among 853 entries in this year's competition. The manuscript will be published next spring by the Yale University Press. James Merrill, a distinguished poet and a new judge of the annual contest, said in describing our classmate's work: "Richard Kenney has much to say and says it splendidly. His broad learning flashes with temperament, braidings and eddyings of thought. This book moves like a river in a country of ponds and fountains." Rick and his wife Mary currently reside in Chapel Hill, N.C. His poems have appeared in numerous magazines, including the NewYorker, the Atlantic Monthly, the CarolinaQuarterly, Poetry, and numerous reviews. The Yale competition is open to American writers under the age of 40 who have not previously published a volume of poetry.

In the last column I promised I would have further word on Wally Ford's new position as executive director of the State of New York Mortgage Agency, which has a portfolio of approximately $1 billion. It insures mortgages for construction and rehabilitation of housing, including multi-family dwellings, as well as of commercial projects throughout the state of New York. Wally's job is to ensure that appropriate fiscal and management controls are undertaken. It also entails marketing responsibility, letting people know what the mortgage agency can do. Involved with this aspect of the job are significant lobbying efforts in both Albany and Washington.

After Dartmouth, Wally went to Harvard Law School and began practicing in New York, where he served as president of the Harlem Lawyers' Association and was the head of NOVA (New Opportunities for Voter Action). He also served as executive vice president of an investment company, Amistad Dot Venture Inc., which provided capital from private sources for the start-up of minority-run small businesses.

The Spring 1983 issue of Tucker, a publication of the Tucker Foundation at Dartmouth, had a long interview with Wally, in which he made a number of interesting points. I think most of us would agree with him that "we could not spend four years at Dartmouth and know all that we needed to know how to prepare ourselves to go into the real world." He stressed the importance of the use of one's college years as a time of questioning and challenging, looking at life from a different perspective, urging today's students that if they don't achieve that during their Dartmouth years, they may end up at 26 as uptight individuals who really never have done anything "... except prepare for the apparatus, which is there anyway."

Finally, I promised news of the wedding of Dennis Jolicoeur and Cate Smith, which took place on August 27 at their 1799 house on Main Street in Chester, N.H. Chester is a charming New England village and Dennis and Cate's house is an elegant Federal-style house which they have furnished with period pieces. The wedding was held under a tent decorated with beautiful summer flowers and set up on the front lawn. A 20-pound lobster was used as a centerpiece for the luncheon that followed. The guests were able to enjoy a string quartet followed by traditional square dancing with the Chester Volunteer Fire Department in attendance. It was truly a lovely afternoon and a number of classmates besides myself were able to join the couple in celebrating their marriage. . Among those present were Dennis's brother, Marc Jolicoeur, and his wife Jackie, Bob Payne, ChrisMarshall and his wife Janina, Mark Arnold and his wife Fran Gedney, and Earl Zubkoff.

Dennis and Cate should have, returned by now from their honeymoon in Europe. Dennis will be back at work heading the publishing operations in which the family has interests, including the Manchester Journal a weekly New Hampshire newspaper, Business New Hampshire, a monthly magazine, and the Lighthouse Press, web offset printers.

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