1961

The "Fun in the Sun" reunion in Palm Beach, Fla., on March 13-16 is history. Class President Oscar Arslanian described it as a wonderful, fun-filled, "splendid, splendid" weekend.

The class also honored Mike Murphy for his years of effort to bring the statue of Robert Frost to Dartmouth. A front-page story in the March 5D was distributed that told it all: "Statue of Frost sits and thinks near Bartlett." The D story quoted College architect George Hathorn as saying the spot near Bartlett Tower is an appropriate setting for the statue because "it's out in a natural landscape" typical of what Frost celebrated in his Pulitzer Prize-winning poems. Hathorn said he hopes the Frost statue will encourage more pedestrian traffic in the area east of the Shattuck Observatory. We, and the other classes, can make that happen by making a pilgrimage to the hill a must whenever we're in Hanover.

The class presented a Dartmouth clock to Murphy for "taking the road less traveled," said Oscar, and for bucking the sometimes difficult College bureaucracy to get the statue accepted and placed.

There were other emotional moments at the reunion as well: Stu Sheldon and his wife, Diana, now retired to a Florida boat, celebrated their 34th wedding anniversary in the company of our reuning classmates saying, according to Oscar, that they could think of no better way to celebrate.

It was a weekend of golf and tennis; shopping on Worth Avenue, the men and the women clustered separately; Friday and Saturday lunch by the indoor pool overlooking the ocean; and Friday night at the Royal Palm Dinner Theater in Boca Raton and Will Rogers' Follies; Saturday dinner at the Breakers honoring Mike; and Saturday night dancing to the wee hours as the class virtually took over the Breakers lounge and the one-man band switched to playing '6l requests. The word is that Arslanian and Bob Naegele and Sandy McArt were the dance leaders.

The attendees included many who have made earlier out-of-Hanover reunions, but also included Noel Kuhrt from Wilmington, John "JT" Russell from Kansas, and John Henry from Oklahoma City. At the class meeting Oscar reported that Cleve Carney and Bill Glenn were moving forward with our Chicago reunion, in late April or early May 1998 our fifth out-of-Hanover reunion since our 50th birthday party in Washington in 1990. And following a lively discussion, Oscar said those present voted overwhelmingly to head to Hawaii, Tom Conger country, in 1999.

The Rev. Duane Cox of Los Angeles led our now-patented introspective hour on the topic: "Half Empty or Half Full." As retirement nears, how are we going to contribute to society for the rest of our lives? "From my point of view, everything went like clockwork," said chair Dave Armstrong. Well, not quite. It seems that Dave was delayed getting away from his office on Thursday, and Murphy's clock got there during the delay. Is that clockwork or not?

Bob conn,Bowman Gray School of Medicine, Medical Center Boulevard, Winston-Salem, NC 27157-1015;