1924

A letter not from a classmate but from a Dartmouth son of a deceased classmate, which arrived at about the same time as the biographical material on another deceased classmate, led me to thinking about some of the valued members of the class who will not have the opportunity to attend our great 70th Reunion. I expect that a great deal of the nostalgic talk that goes on at reunions will relate to such deceased classmates. It well might be our last chance to talk with old friends about old friends.

The letter was from John Clark Wheatley '56, son of Pete Wheatley, who never missed a reunion and held every office to which we had the privilege of electing him. Jack writes, "Recently, as I was thumbing through the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine (October '93) prior to discarding it, I reread the Class Notes for '56 and '24. The realization hit me that I have been reading the '24 notes since I graduated and, even though Dad is gone, I still read them and enjoy the news of the people whom I know or know of. Please keep up the good work of reporting and be assured that someone out there is listening."

The material from the Alumni Records Office related to Mony Monahan, a member of the class with a great family of Dartmouth relatives who went on to fame. I just finished writing Mony's obituary, and you will see it in an upcoming issue.

Mony was one of the six Rhode Island boys in the class of 1924 who on a September day in 1920 set off for Hanover. I had not met any of them before. In fact, I had never been to Hanover before. We all went the same way: from Providence on the El to North Station, the train to White River Junction, change again for a train to Norwich, then taking our cumbersome luggage up die hill to Hanover. Apart from the writer, Mony was the last of the group to go. He was a quiet man who had a distinguished business career and a distinguished military career from 1942 to 1946. Quite different in personality from Pete Wheatley, but each of them somebody of whom Dartmouth can be proud.

I shall be thinking of them and many others who have gone. In a sense this reunion is the opportunity to pay tribute to the great majority of our classmates who can't make it.

11 Fox Drive, Narra gansett, RI 02882