1990

Ten years after entering Dartmouth Dave Wilson has finally returned to his hometown with a new bride. He and Christine Mease were married in September in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Dave notes that they had both moved from the farthest point southwest (California) to the farthest point northeast (Nova Scotia) in the summer of 1996. Class of '9os in attendance included Eric Browne, Tom Haines, Rich Byron, Rob Norris, Earle Allen (with Carina Wong '92), Ray Sozzi, Rick Dunham (who introduced the newlyweds), Jim Wilhelm, Tim McAdam, and Tim Alford.

"Representation from south of the border was so good, in fact," writes Dave, "that we had to convince the Canadian officials that old War of 1812 hostilities were not about to resurface. Professor Shewmaker ('History 24: Foreign Relations of the U.S. to 1865') would have been proud of our diplomacy." Dave is currently working as a partner in a venture capital fund in Halifax and moonlighting in a family petroleum and heating equipment company. He welcomes Dartmouth visitors, so "blitz" him at .

In October Seung-hee Lee left home in Kensington, Md., to participate in a Global Volunteers service program in the town of Areola (pop. 564) in the Mississippi Delta. She was involved in community improvement projects ranging from painting a new fire station to renovating jail cells to teaching French in the local middle school. Her free time opportunities included cat-fishing with a local woman in her late '70s, sampling fried catfish, hush puppies, and sweet potato pie, and touring a local cotton gin. She particularly enjoyed getting to know the local people including the "prison-release inmate who helped with the work, an unexpected friendship." Having spent two years with the Peace Corps in Gabon, Seung-hee noted that "a lot of African culture has filtered into and been retained by this African-American community." Examples she listed include "young mothers, 14 years old; cotton picking, work at 5:30 a.m.; loud music in makeshift bars; and mosquitoes, insects, and catfish."

John Aronsohn e-mailed me from New York with the news that he and Meg Devine are engaged. Here are the actual words of our venerable former class secretary: "Yes, it's really true. We got engaged on July 4 in Hanover. I proposed in the middle of the Green, and she accepted. A little taken by the moment, I first got down on two knees, then corrected myself. We will be married May 16, 1998, in Rye, N.Y. at the Coveleigh Club. Meg's still working for Corporate Decisions Inc. (now part of Mercer Management Consulting) in Boston. She'll be moving to New York City in early 1998. I'm a first-year at Columbia Business School. What I've learned this fall is to appreciate Dartmouth; Columbia makes Dartmouth look like a country club. Now I know why you have to get a tetanus shot before matriculating at Columbia there's an imminent danger of the springs in the chairs piercing your bottom. On more than one occasion I've heard the dean of the business school, Meyer Feldberg, begin his public addresses with a boastful proclamation of the school's 'New York Advantage. This is not Hanover, New Hampshire.' It sure isn't. [At orientation he added: 'This is not Evanston, Illinois.']"

Speaking of Evanston, as part of my master's program here at Northwestern, I recently took a class composed mostly of undergraduates. On my way to the class one afternoon early in the term, I bumped into one of my new classmates. We exchanged first names and chatted as we walked. We discussed the class, the professor, and various goings on at the university. I found out that he was a sophomore history major interested in teaching. Then he asked me, "Are you in a sorority?" A beaming grin spread across my brain as I coyly replied that I was actually a graduate student. "Wow," was his lone response. I was giggling in my mind the rest of the way to class, quite pleased that I could still be taken for an undergraduate. When we arrived at the classroom door, the class before ours had just let out, and the professor was gathering her papers to leave. She looked up at me as I walked in and asked, "Are you teaching the next class in here?" wondering if I would be needing the overhead projector.

My giddy grin faded into a furrowed brow. I spent the rest of the day wondering if I really looked old enough to be mistaken for a professor. Such is life on the 29- to 30-year-old cusp.

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