1933

We had a talk with Spence Furbush, one of the elders of Somersworth, N.H., recently. Spence left us after sophomore year and transferred to Bates, where he received his B.A. Before retirement, his commercial activity was in the insurance business, where he operated his own agency in Salmon Falls as well as Somersworth. He has been a director of the Salmon Falls Bank and senior deacon of the First Parish Congrega- tional Church. He served as a sergeant in the air force from 1943 to 1945. He sounded in good form and said he devoted substantial time to "stirring up mischief." He spoke warmly of his days in Hanover and especially the festive hours passed in South Fayerweather with his roommate, Jack Manchester.

When we called to visit with WalterBezanson, his wife, Gail, said that he had gone off to teach his weekly course, so we knew that he was one of the active '33ers. Talking with him next day, we learned that he gives this course (currently on William Faulkner) at the Boston Center for Adult Education, where his students are members of the general public interested in culture. This activity is the current stage of his extensive career in education in which, after a session in his father's Boston print and old bookshop and receiving a Ph.D. at Yale, he taught at Dartmouth, Yale, Harvard, and Rutgers and lectured at Ghent, Brussels, Rome, and Nice as well as countless other locales here and abroad. His field is English letters with a particular emphasis on Melville, whose Moby Dick has fascinated him since Kenneth Robinson's course in American literature. He also remembers warmly his English honors course with Sidney Cox. After losing his first two wives to cancer, he has again married, and he and Gail live in a town house in Brookline convenient to the Green Line trolley. They plan to return to Hanover for Reunion in '98, although he maintains he is "not 65."

We have received a note from Elizabeth Dowling thanking the class for the memorial book donated to the library in Bill's memory. She enclosed a lovely testimonial letter, including excerpts contributed by each of their children, which was read at his memorial Mass and was a moving tribute to their father.

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