1970

When the history books are written, Bill Clinton will have to share the spotlight for 1992 with Peter Bradstreet. Pete won election last spring by an easy margin to a vacant judgeship in Steuben County, N.Y., proving that Republicans have a chance if spoilers like Ross Perot will only stay away. His term on the bench runs until the year 2000. Such steady employment is highly desirable when one must contend with five offspring.

Pete graduated from the University of Colorado School of Law in 1973 and returned soon thereafter to his hometown of Bath, N.Y. He's been a partner there with the firm of Bradstreet, Madigan and Wallace, specializing in family law matters, and considers these issues his main motivation for seeking the judgeship. In recent years, Pete served as president of Central Steuben United Way, chair of the local chapter of die American Red Cross, and most recently as a member of the Maverling Board of Education. Since Bill Clinton brings us hope from Hope, we'll assume that Pete's humble origins in Bath signify that he's squeaky clean all around.

Queen Elizabeth had a really rotten year, and to make matters even worse she missed a chance to shake hands with Doug Morton. It seems Doug joined the Royal Society of Arts, a British professional group, way back during our undergraduate years. Things move slowly in the British Empire (what with pedigree checks and all), and only recently he began receiving invitations to the Society's various royal events. So he and Suzanne dutifully undertook the making of the royal rounds: an awards ceremony at Windsor Castle hosted by Prince Philip, the Queen's appearance at the Library of Congress, etc., etc. The Mortons were so busily engaged at the latter event chatting it up with Ted Turner and Jane Fonda that her royal highness just couldn't work her way into the conversation. All you royalwatchers can get the rest of the scoop from Doug directly by contacting him at Datatape Inc., a Kodak defense-related subsidiary in Pasadena, Calif., where he serves as vice president of operations. I'd tell you more myself, but I try to keep this column at least half a cut above the tabloids.

Finally we're happy to report Mary-Clareand Mike Molony's recent successes in the pet food and supply business. According to a recent article in Inc. Magazine, the couple personally conceived the hot new concept of a business exclusively devoted to such a market, only to learn that others before them were already failing at it very nicely, thank you. Undaunted, the Molonys bought the name and a few assets from one such faltering company, discarded irrelevant product lines, and re-emerged stronger and energized.

That was in 1986, and within five years six stores operating under the P.T. Morgan name out of headquarters in Arlington, Va., marked sales at nearly $6 million. Business acumen aside, Mike reports that it was a great idea to retain the name of a 99-year-old company. "An old company that has a person's name on it gives people a warm fuzzy feeling," he says.

Just goes to prove that everything old is new again. That's certainly a notion of increasing comfort to all of us as the years fly by.

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