1965

Early in our sophomore year, I recall having my first conversation with an anthropology major. My thought at the time was "What would anyone possibly do with that kind of major?" Recently, while watching the adventures of a fictional anthropologist in Raiders of the Lost Ark, I remembered by question had remained unanswered more than 20 years. I decided a brief survey of the class of '65 might at last provide a means for all of us to find out what anthropology majors really turn out to be.

The first classmate to be located was Birger Benson, now living in Colchester, Vt. Birger says that on the same weekend he received an anthropology degree, he was commissioned as an infantry officer through the ROTC program. Giving priority to the latter calling, he served two tours of duty in Vietnam and spent his final year of service with the ROTC instructional unit at the University of Vermont. Birger graduated from Harvard Business School in 1971 and worked for a year with a public accounting firm in Hanover. He soon found an opportunity to become the owner and general manager of a manufacturing firm and continued his leadership role with this business until 1978. He subsequently became an assistant professor of finance and accounting at St. Michael's College in Winooski, Vt. He and his wife, Ellie, a former Mary Hitchcock nurse, have three sons and one daughter. They enjoy sailing on Lake Champlain, and Birger says he remains fit enough to have recently received a black belt in karate. As for his major in anthropology, he says that even though it was not his first choice (or even his second), he now views it as a great background for understanding the diversity in the world and recommends it as a foundation for any profession.

Jock Hosmer went from an anthropology degree to two years' service as a military police officer at Ft. Devens, Mass. He then spent a short period of time as the sports information director at the University of New Hampshire before enrolling in the school's M.B.A. program. He became a commercial loan officer with the Manchester Savings Bank in 1970 and remained there until moving to Maine with the Bangor Savings Bank in 1976. He is now in charge of all commercial lending operations with the Boston Five Cent Savings Bank. He, his wife, Anne (Jock claims he rescued her from a career of selling socks in Filene's basement), and their son, Trip, make their home in Marblehead, Mass. Jock, our former class president and current representative on the alumni council, says his selection of an anthropology major was somewhat random. He does credit the wide range of available courses with giving him his first understanding of a liberal education and says it was an excellent preparation for his banking career.

Lew Wheaton was faced with a 1-A draft status after graduation and made a quick decision to enlist in the Navy for five years. After a tour of duty as a sup- ply officer in Vietnam, Lew found a job, not as an anthropologist, but as a writer for the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. Through this experience, he discovered he liked writing well enough to enroll in the Columbia Graduate School of Journalism. After receiving his master's degree, he joined the Associated Press in Richmond, Va. In 1975, Lew was assigned to AP's foreign desk in New York and, for two years, rewrote and edited overseas dispatches for the American press. His next assignments were a year in Venezuela and more than four years in Puerto Rico as AP's chief of Caribbean services. Among the major events he covered in this period were the James Jones massacre and the civil war in Nicaragua. For the last four years, Lew has served as chief of the New York State Bureau of the Associated Press, headquartered in Albany. He says that many of his current duties are not those of a pure journalist but as an administrator of a large organization. His wife, Kathleen, is a data processing consultant and they are the parents of a four year old son, Michael.

Bill Rust has turned out to be one of those rare persons fortunate enough to have an interesting hobby lead to an unexpected career. He says he went to naval OCS after graduation and eventually served aboard a minesweeper off the coast of Vietnam. He was discharged from the Navy in 1969 and became a commercial lending officer with the State Street Bank in Boston. Over a period of several years, he earned an M.B.A. from Northeastern University and was promoted to a vice presidential position at the bank. In his spare time, Bill had become interested in glassmaking and was particularly drawn to Scandinavian glass art. He found that, in spite of strong demand, such works were not readily available in this country. As a hobby, he began acting as an agent for several producers and held his first show in Cambridge, Mass., in 1978. His part-time activities quickly became so successful that he decided to leave his banking career in 1980. Since his nationwide work with galleries left him geographically flexible, he eventually relocated his business to a restored house on the coast of Maine. Bill says he feels his exposure to anthropology may have changed the way he looked at the world and indirectly caused him to end up in a career he' enjoys very much.

[The next issue will see the conclusion of this two-part series dealing with the subject of "Can anthropology majors find happiness in cultures beyond Hanover?" We will explore such questions as "Have any anthropology majors entered the priesthood?" and "Have any anthropol- ogy majors become anthropologists?"]

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