1984

Taking advantage of being back up at Dartmouth (for a six-week seminar on literary theory) to Blitz the Alumni Magazine about the lack of '84 Class Notes these past months I made the fatal mistake of tentatively offering to help out our class secretary, Amy lorio.. .And so you all have acquired a new half-time class secretary, and I have to put pen to paper! Happily I have also profited from my trip to Hanover to catch up with some classmates and thus have news to pass along.

Mark Hansen and his wife, Jennifer Hancock Hansen '85, live in West Lebanon with their four children; the latest addition, Timothy, arrived in November of last year. Mark continues his career as a C.P.A. and financial advisor with his own firm in West Lebanon, and is much involved in New Hampshire Republican politics. Jennifer teaches voice and sings professionally in and around the Upper Valley.

On my way up to Hanover I got to visit one of Mark's old roommates, another financial type, Paul Graham, and his wife, Beth Russo Graham '86. They continue to live outside of N.Y.C., where Paul has taken a position with ÜBS Asset Management, a division of Union Bank of Switzerland, after many years at Value Line. Despite our long conversation over dinner I wasn't sure exactly what it is he does for ÜBS, except that it involves regular trips to Zurich and Hong Kong. Images of Swiss bank accounts and briefcases handcuffed to wrists were dispelled during a last-minute, pre-deadline phone call when Paul explained that he is a small cap stock portfolio manager. Beth has been working for Nynex, most recently working on a broad-band interactive TV project, but is taking a rest this summer awaiting Labor Day, and the birth of their second child.

Speaking of world travel and arcane expertise, Peter Wolcott combined his Dartmouth computer science degree and Russian studies into a Ph.D. on Russian computer systems! He has just finished his first year as an assistant professor of information technology at the University of Nebraska-Omaha where, he tells me, his last project involved studies on "U.S. highperformance computing export control policy." Studies which, it seems, played a role in last year's U.S. policy changes. Soon Silicon Valley will be lobbying in Omaha not D.C.! In a less academic vein, Peter and his wife, Ellie, have two girls Elisa 4 and Lena 1 1/2, and have recently discovered, as he put it, "the joys and tribulations of home-ownership." Another easterner transplanted to the Midwest, John Van Aalst is doing his residency at Case Western Reserve Medical Center in Cleveland. We chatted on the phone a couple weeks ago, shortly after the birth of his and his wife Cindy's third child, Rachel.

I too have a new job in the Midwest (but no children!) having, like Peter, just finished my first year as an assistant professor of French at the U. of Missouri-Kansas City. I'm doing the usual prof thingteaching, going to conferences, and worrying about publishing enough to get tenure. Given the summer weather in K.C. I was delighted to be in Hanover this summer, even if it did get me into this job! In between seminars and reading in Sanborne we climbed Moosilauke, swam in the river...serious nostalgia. But if you don't want to hear about my return to Dartmouth ad nauseum, or about my research on the heroine in medieval French texts, (I would like this column to count as a publication!) you will have to provide me with news—via e-mail (kkrause@cctr.umkc.edu) or phone (816-753-3987) or even snail-mail.

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