1948

10214 Del Monte Drive Houston, TX 77042

Lack of space last month necessitated omission of an item involving Jack Boggia Jack remembers, one sweltering hot day in August 1953 when he and I happened to run into each other on a busy Boston street next to a gasoline service station. In front of this station an open truck loaded to the gunwales with fresh fish had just turned over. In talking on the sidewalk we both noted that the station at the time was fast losing its attraction to motorists as the fish not so slowly fried in the blazing sun on the sizzling pavement, creating an all-permeating stench. A truly awful situation, the underlying humor notwithstanding. Jack and I concluded that it was perhaps not totally bad, however, when we overheard an awed local spectator near us slowly drawl, "Sure bunches them flies!" Thanks, Jack, for the reminder.

Professor emeritus Dick Bredenberg was recently called back from retirement by his Eckerd College in St. Petersburg to direct a leadership development program attended by every brigadier general of the U.S. Army and by civilians from upper levels of management of many prominent firms here and abroad. Dick writes that he welcomes the challenge and loves the work. His letter also reminisced a bit in remembering that Winnipesaukee canoe trip way back in 1944. On this he recalled that some of the fellows were quietly dozing in their birthday suits in the warm sun, their canoes slowly drifting out among the lonely islands, when three girls in a sailboat sneaked up and surprised them. "I also remember a canoe poling trip up the White River with Ross McKenny. Canoes are much tippier when a person stands in the stern and poles. So many of us had given our watches to Ross for safekeeping. He had about seven of them - all on his left wrist. A wise decision on our parts, as one after another, we all capsized. Last to go was Ross's canoe. Every part of Ross got soaked except for his left arm and hand which he somehow managed to hold high and dry as he plunged into the drink." (Of those who knew him, who can ever forget our marvelous friend, the long since departed C. Ross McKenny, one of the men of the College who made our Dartmouth experience so great?)

While we're talking about the Dartmouth of our day may be an appropriate time to go back to the Wheeler Hall that was so much a part of '48 history in the first couple of years. Tom Davis remembers, for example, that some poor, misbegotten student he can't remember who it was returned to his ground-floor room one winter night only to find it completely and utterly full, from floor to ceiling, with snow! Tom remembers, too, that Russ Carlson and Earl Chambers shared a room on the third floor. The word got around that Earl didn't like snakes. One hot evening, therefore, someone quietly tied a string around a live garden snake and swung it from the floor above through Earl's open window where it landed on his desk where he was working. The reaction, as Tom remembers it, was instantaneous! Tom says he never would have done it if our president hadn't been such a good guy.

One more Hanover incident was brought back to Ted Thornton when he read in this column about John VanRaalte and about Dirk Kuzmier with lanMacartney on Hanover ski jumps. "Mac and I went out to the big jump one Sunday morning, sporting magnificent hangovers. Mac said going off the jump would cure them. I didn't really believe him and I don't know how long I stood at the top of that trestle, looking down the two tracks to oblivion. But eventually I made the move, and once you start down there's not much else you can do. I consider that one of my great achievements in life. Without lan I never would have done it. (And he was right about the hangovers, too!)" Ted and Dolly expected to be in Hanover this winter. One hopes he wasn't too modest to take her out to the scene of his long ago triumph!

Returning to the present, do give BudElliott all the help you can in this year's Alumni Fund. Our help to our old College on the Hill is clearly as necessary now as in the past, deduction or no deduction. If you haven't quite done your part in the past, how about that little extra push this year. In great part the cause is you, Eleazar's sons!

Nifty note from Jay Rutledge in California. Still in the brokerage business in San Francisco with Holt and Collins. He and old roommate Jerry Wensinger still get together whenever Jay's in New York. (These two with the aforementioned Tom Davis were longtime fixtures in Wheeler.) Jay expects to make the '48 40th in '88 - as should we all if we wish to relive some of our fun past in the fun present.

In closing, my humble apologies to our famous '48 American historian at the Smithsonian in Washington, Wid Washburn, whose name I inadvertantly omitted from a recent list of '48s who are natives of Hanover. Wid, as you know, is a preeminent historian of the American Indian who believes that the Indian himself will one day return the symbol to our alma mater.

Need news, gang. A smoke signal or two, please.