1953

An old Advertising Hall of Fame headline for Listerine said, "Always a Bridesmaid, Never a Bride." Not so for the great class of '53. We weren't left at the starting gate in the 35th Reunion Sweepstakes! We took it all! Consider this! Consider the same player winning MVP honors in the Super Bowl, the Stanley Cup, and the World Series all in one year! Consider winning five straight Grand Slam tennis events, plus turning a triple play and winning a trifecta all in the same season. Well, that's what your class did. Consider this! We broke the all-time record for 3 sth Reunion attendance by classmates. We broke the alltime 35th Reunion record for total attendance. We smashed the all-time record for the reunion dollar gift. We had yet another Trustee elected. We had a classmate receive the coveted Alumni Award, and we raised over $6,000 as a gift to the new Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center. The only thing we didn't finish first in was the decoration of the tent, but as a generous '54 said, "We had the pennants, but you had the people!"

But don't think that any of this was easy. Both '54 and '55 gave us a ran for our money. In terms of attendance, Dave Siegal's group turned out 149 classmates to annihilate the old record of 122. And, of course, we weren't alone as there were 274 of us to break the old total attendance record of 243. But the record-smashing world heavyweight title went to Ron Lazar's group, which raised $753,053.53, breaking 1952's old record of $552,054 by nearly 50 percent. And that makes '53 the only class to hold two reunion giving records at the same time! Talk about "Legacy of Leadership"! We don't talk it, we do it. When the College comes to us, they aren't talking in the wilderness ... they are talking to a smooth lazar-sharp organization that can produce. And they know that. That's why they chose Andy Sigler, CEO of Champion International Corp., to be a Trustee of the College in the Dick Lombard, Bob Douglass, Bob Henderson succession. With Andy's election, we have set a modern Dartmouth record for the most Trustees from one class. And add to that the fact that deserving Fred Whittemore became the seventh '53 to receive the Alumni Award, a category in which we lead the classes of our decade, well, you begin to get an idea of the magnitude of the week that was. And last but certainly not least, the consensus was that chairman Dick Cahn's reunion was the best ever! Some week! As one Blunt administrator said, "If we could just package the '53 loyalty, expertise, and talent the College could ran itself!" Or as gracious Bill Breed '52 said, "'53 is just unbelievable."

"The Legacy of Leadership" baton has been passed to Don Goss, president; TomBloomer and Ron Lazar, VPs; Fred Carleton, secretary; Jack Zimmermann, treasurer; Norm Carpenter, newsletter editor; David Halloran, head class agent; DonSmith, mini-reunion chairman and Alumni Council representative; and Jack Newton, bequests. "Fifty-Three Out!" DCG for

K-Ross, P.O. Box 436, Lebanon, NH 03766