1974

This month's column finds me with an unexpected abundance of '74 news from around the country. Most notable is Thurlow "Ted" Tibbs, who generously donated the cream of his nationally acclaimed collection of ninteenth and twentieth-century African-American art to the Corcoran Gallery in Washington, D.C. According to the Washington Post, Ted has been accumulating art works since graduation, and his collection includes paintings, photographs, and sculptures by artists such as Henry O. Tanner, Addison Scurlock, and Aaron Douglas. Although I have not had time yet to view his collection, I plan to do so some time this fall and will report to y'all on my experience in a forthcoming DAM column.

Give a rouse for Lafayette College physics professor Lyle Hoffman, who bagged the $2,500 Mary Louise Van Artsdalen Prize for outstanding achievement in faculty scholarship this past spring. I have Lyle and his wife, Kathy, listed as living in Easton, Pa. Retired DCR dee-jay Bob Bauman has also won an academic award known as the Civilian Instructor of the Year Award for his superior abilities as a teacher. A former faculty member at Kansas State University, Bob is currently a Russian history specialist at the Command and General Studies Institute in Leavenworth, Kans. He has been to Russia a grand total of 15 times, including his undergraduate stints at Leningrad University during sophomore and junior year. Bob, I expect you, your wife Celia, and your three kids to come and keep your '74 comrades warm at the 25th. And we'll be sure to ice the Stoly for you!

Our now-fabled former Green Key President Jack "Jet" Thomas has recently seen the fruits of his entrepreneurial labors out in Busch Land. As you might recall, he orchestrated one of the most improbable (and wildly successful) events in Dartmouth history during junior year, namely a night of roller derby in Alumni gymnasium for Green Key Weekend. (I helped.) Now Jack's company, Royal Vendors, which he started way back in 1987, has come to be an international role model for electronic bottling distribution and management. Jack has confided that he got many of his ideas from Lester of the now-defunct Pat and Tony's. In any event, congratulations to Jet for his recent award from the St. Louis Business Journal as its 1996 Entrepreneur of the Year. Rumor has it that a Royal transadantic pipeline from the Guiness brewery to Hanover is in the works for 6/99.

Reading the latest edition of "Fu's Illustrated" reveals that Freddie Fu has been busy keeping an eye on his son Gordon '99 and his now-famous Web page. You can enter this hilarious inner sanctum by clicking through . Gordon can instantaneously and simultaneously bring you up to date with what's going on (a.k.a. "hot") in Hanover. Chief Agent Pfaff will be pleased to see hot links to the Dave Matthews Band, which backed up the Dead on their last tour. Gordon's wallpaper is a soft shadow of a magnetic resonance image of someone's midbrain, so go figure! Good to know that the collective Dartmouth consciousness is moving up the brainstem.

Sorry about the medical joke...Freddie, bring Hilda and Joyce to help keep the rest of us in line at the 25th, please. My current projects include attempting to re-master my accordion, which I abandoned at age 16 (can you blame me?), learning both Irish and JAVA language, reading Milton Friedman and Nora O'Brien, and traveling to Ireland to visit friends and fabulous Irish golf courses. (As you read this, I'll be teeing off the first at Royal County Down up in Newcastle, Ulster.) How about yours??

Don Casey, Suite 203, 6565 N. Charles St., Baltimore, MD 21204-6875;