1980

Think of fall, cider, football, foliage, and the fall classic. World Series time the sweet crack of the bat echoes through the park. Yet not everyone is celebrating. Chuck Jarrett sees to that. Chuck is an attorney with the Cleveland law firm of Jones, Day, Reavis & Poge. Each year, he travels to the World Series on behalf of his client, Major League Baseball. Chuck doesn't go to watch the games or take in the splendor. He goes to seize merchandise. In order to protect baseball's license, Chuck confiscates everything from T-shirts to tongue depressors. Echoes of Nurse Ratchit pulling the plug on R. Patrick McMurphy's television just before game one of the '65 World Series. McMurphy carried on, providing his own play-by-play. Chuck's victims may not be so lucky. Whatever happened to free enterprise?

When the quake hit last year, Ben Zuraw was seated at Candlestick Park in San Francisco waiting for game one of the 1989 World Series. A concrete beam teetered perilously over Ben's head. Ben saw his life pass before his eyes starring on the Dartmouth Basketball Team, writing for the Yale Law Review, clerking for the Supreme Court, gaining high political office... but then Ben realized something this wasn't his life. It was Bill Bradley's. Ben survived. He, wife Ann, daughter Lucy, and bulldog Herbie, live comfortably in Peidmont, Ca. Only Herbie was allowed out of the house during this year's series.

One person who wasn't at the World Series this year, at least not in an owner's box, was George M. Steinbrenner, who is now on baseball's inactive list. Jeff Zimmerman '81 (interesting graduates from other classes may be mentioned in this column from time to time) was present at the Steinbrenner hearings. Jeff, an associate at Patterson, Belknap, Webb & Tyler, special counsel to baseball commissioner Fay Vincent, or dered lunch, delivered messages and performed various other essential tasks. He declined to speak on the record about the hearings. He did mention, though, that he is working on a screenplay based on the incident. The title: "Field of Schemes."

Jill Fredston "lives a life of adventure that most people only dream about," according to the August issue of Alaska Magazine. As the snows melt, Jill combines her loves of rowing and wilderness traveling. "Jill's summer rowing odyssies are filled with wild seas, spectacular scenery and heart-stopping moments. She navigates through playing whales and sea lions, steers her small craft through 20-foot swells, drives through the surf onto isolated beaches, and has rowed backward down 2,000 miles of the Yukon River." One question, Jill: how did you see where you were going?

Larry Margerum lives in the Bay Area. Larry is putting his chemistry Ph.D. to use in the research department at Clorox's Kingsford Division, a leading maker of charcoal. One of Kingsford's most successful products is Matchlight charcoal. Lairry tells me he is working on a new product "self-lite." It spontaneously combusts, which is not as far-fetched as you think. According to Larry, several zealous advocates have sued Kingsford claiming that Matchlight caused a spontaneous conflagration. Great ideas sometimes arrive in strange packages.

Talk about bad breaks. Jock Cunningham, a Ph.D. candidate at Yale, lived for two years in Ethiopia, researching his thesis in ecology and anthropology. Just as Jock's work neared completion, war ignited, and his research locale was declared off-limits. He will start his research all over again this fall in Tanzania. Just goes to show, the pen isn't always mightier than the sword.

Jennifer Prugh Buhl lives in Weingarten, Germany, (there's only one Germany now!) with her husband Peter and her two sons, Markus and Matthias. Her sons moonlight as a Greco-Roman wrestling tag team.

By now you are probably wondering how I got this job. There is an explanation. Although Mike Carothers receives sacks of hate mail and an occasional threat, he also has a huge following. When it comes to elections, Mike's coattails are the longest since Uncle Fester's. With Mike as his running mate, Saddam Hussein could have been elected class secretary. Of course, there are those who think that Mike is Saddam Hussein.

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