1930

Box 96 Green Valley, AZ 85622

If last month's column seemed a little short and choppy it's because the axe fell on my immortal prose, and my legal 600 word allowance was chopped to 475 or so. Paper shortage in Hanover. There were bits and pieces that I couldn't retrieve, but I was able to rescue the following paragraph from the editorial wastebasket.

Some of you whose Sunday papers carry a section called Parade undoubtedly saw the March 1 article about Sigourney Weaver, who seems to grace this column every month. For those who didn't see it I'll quote the opening paragraph: "If heredity counts for anything, Sigourney Weaver might just be the smartest actress in the business. Her dad, Sylvester (Pat) Weaver, used to be the president of NBC, where he launched Today and The Tonight Show, and first thought up the notion of pay TV, which we now call cable. It is often said that Pat Weaver was a man ahead of his time. It might equally be said that his daughter's time is right now."

Thanks to Bob Chittim I have a spare copy for any Sigourney fan (good picture, too).

Celie French thoughtfully informed me of the death on March 6 of Fred Page's widow, Dorothy. Celie and Vivian Cole attended the services in Glen Ridge. Celie reminded me that Fred, Bud French, Shaw Cole, and Jack Wooster had had a home-and-home golf foursome for years. The Woosters missed the service because they were among the many '30s in Florida at that time. I note with interest that Fred and Dot were married June 10, 1930, which must have been the first open date after our commencement. The class sends its sympathy to son Westy '54 and daughter Joan.

Hal Ripley, 1929 class secretary, sent me a notice for the March meeting of the Dartmouth Club of Cape Cod, at which Richard W. Birnie was the guest speaker. Richard, son of our late Walt Birnie, is Associate Professor of Earth Sciences and Director of the Dartmouth Center for Remote Sensing, which is involved in satellite mapping of the earth's surface.

Thirties in the public eye this past month included Fred Tangemen and Ave Raube. Fred was among "over 500" who wrote the Dartmouth Review, commenting pro and con on Safe Sex at Dartmouth. Ave, I see, is secretary of the Ernest Martin Hopkins Institute, headed by George Champion '26. In his spare time Ave also is our class agent, in case you'd forgotten, and I hope you dropped him a line by June 30.

Fran Christmas letter, quoted in the February Thirtyteer, says "For the first time in years we did no travelling." But then"I managed to go to South Africa for three weeks in August." Having spent two years there, I admire what Fran learned in three weeks—"admire," because I agree with his conclusions that sanctions, divestiture, and similar punitive measures are wrong. The greatest influence for progress in South Africa has been the presence of American companies insisting on colorblind employment practices.

As Fran points out, the controversy is not just between blacks and whites; possibly even more difficult to resolve is the intertribal warfare among blacks. He didn't mention the other major schism, between the two principal white racial strains, the conservative Boers, largely of Dutch descent, and the liberals, principally of British ancestry. Incidentally, an article in the March 9 Forbes agrees with us.

Having mentioned favorably both principals, I now hope that great Horn-Raube debate is ended. If by fortunate chance you missed either or both sides, you didn't miss nuthin'.

Greetings.