And the Bride Wore Green

MANY ALUMNI COME BACK TO CAMPUSBECAUSE THEY LOVE THE PLACE.OTHERS RETURN BECAUSE THEY LOVE EACH OTHER.

IT WAS A DAZZLING JULY AFTERNOON IN HANOVER when my soon-to-be-husband Jay Matson '91, convinced me to hold our wedding at Dartmouth. ♦ Actually, it wasn't so much Jay as Dartmouth itself that persuaded me. We were back in town for the marriage of Julie Amstein '92 and Jason Cillo '92. It was one of those perfect summer days when the campus is at its best: sunny but not too hot, clear blue skies, gentle breezes and lush green lawns carpeting the campus. ♦ Having some free time before the ceremony, we strolled around Hanover. Seeing the sophomores there for the summer, tossing frisbees on the Green and reading Shakespeare under shady trees, my mind flooded with memories of my own years at the Big Green. "How can we get married any place but here?" I wondered. The alternatives paled in comparison: A summer wedding in hot and sticky Washington, where we lived? No way. Hanover easily won out. Turns out we were far from alone in our desire to get hitched in Hanover. Each year, several dozen alumni and their intendeds return to campus to say "I do" at Rollins Chapel, the Roth Center for Jew- ish Life and Aquinas House, Dartmouth's Catholic parish—and that's not counting those who exchange vows at other houses of worship in the area. Still others opt for outdoor venues such as the Bema or the Baker Library lawn, while Dartmouth Outing Club members favor the Moosilauke Ravine Lodge. ♦ "People come back here because it harkens back to a very wonderful time in their life and they want to build on that," says Rabbi Edward Boraz of the Roth Center. "I often refer to Dartmouth as living in Shangri-La: The air is clean, the campus is beautiful and there is a certain New England quaintness to it that lends itself to the communal intimacy of a wedding."

Boraz has performed about three wedding ceremonies a year since he arrived at the College in 1998. He is hopeful that some day he will marry a pair of alumni." Every rabbi is secretly a matchmaker," he jokes.

The statistics suggest Boraz's chances are quite good. A growing number of Dartmouth men and women are marrying each other these days. Among the 25,429 living alumni who graduated from Dartmouth since 1976—the first class to include women as freshmen—2,548, or about 10 percent, are married to another alumni. That's 1,274 Dartmouth couples.

"I remember as a student, particularly senior year, I was really close with three other women friends, and we used to talk about what it was going to be like later in life when we got married and had kids," recalls Christen O'Connor '87. "We thought, well, you had to marry someone from Dartmouth, because no one else would understand everything we had been through. There is that desire to share that experience and those memories because it is such an intense time of your life."

As it turned out, two of the four women, including O'Connor, married Dartmouth men. She was married to Dan O'Connor '88 by the Rev. John McHugh at Aquinas House on Homecoming Weekend in 1989. "It was a great excuse for our friends to come back for the wedding, but it was also kind of strange," she says. The reception took place during the football game, so the DJ broke in often with updates on the score.

Among others Dartmouth has brought together in holy matrimony are Tom Repczynski '91 and Ann Rosamond '91. While Dartmouth Dining Services is known more for providing workstudyjobs than romance, it managed to introduce Tom to his true love. Ann, a fellow DDS worker, first laid eyes on him in the basement of Thayer Hall as he ladled coleslaw. "I was wearing a baker's hat and white bib and jamming to music and I didn't realize Ann could see me dancing from out in the hallway," he says.

Two years later, in the spring of 1991, after Sunday brunch at the Hanover Inn, Tom led Ann on a romantic stroll across campus. He proposed against the backdrop of Occom Pond—and professor John Rassias, who was conducting one of his famously dramatic language classes outside. "So Ann has this vivid memory of Professor Rassias jumping all over the place and waving his arms while I was proposing," Tom laughs.

Rich Mazzola '90 was also determined to propose at Dartmouth. In November 1992, Chrissy Kirkmire '90 flew in to Bostons Logan Airport to spend Thanksgiving with Rich at his parents' home. Rich greeted her at the gate, wearing a new suit and holding a dozen roses. Outside, a limousine waited. Rich, her boyfriend since sophomore year, explained the red carpet treatment was in celebration of her 24th birthday that day. Caught up in conversation with Rich, it took Chrissy a while to realize their destination was Dartmouth.

Once in Hanover, they walked around the deserted campus, empty of students home for the holiday. As Baker s tower clock struck midnight, at the center of the Green, where the pathways converge, Rich dropped to one knee and proposed. "It was so beautiful," says Chrissy. "There was snow on the ground, and Dartmouth Hall was all lit up. It was a great way to be proposed to, because that was where we had fallen in love, and it seemed to be the most appropriate place to commit to each other."

After the proposal, acceptance and months of planning comes the ceremony—and the party. A Big Green theme colored the big day for Drew Reynolds '90 and Nell Wilson '91. The bridesmaids wore green gowns, and groomsmen donned green cummerbunds and bow ties. Green and white flowers and linens decorated tables dubbed "Streeter" and "Mid-Mass" after Dartmouth dorms. About 50 of the 200 guests were Dartmouth alums—including classmates of Nell's dad, Tom Wilson 53—who joined together for frequent and loud renditions of the alma mater and other Dartmouth songs.

The Episcopal priest from Nell's hometown who married them, the Rev. John Branson, also happened to be the son of an alumnus, John Branson Jr. 33. As a gift, the priest presented the couple with a wooden, arrow-shaped sign engraved with the letters "DOC" and "Moosilauke Summit Trail." It was also scrawled with the signatures of his father and some classmates, who had been afraid they would not survive after being stranded on Mount Moosilauke in a snowstorm in 1931. The sign now sits next to Nell and Drew's wedding album.

For some, the "Dartmouth family" that beckons them back to New Hampshire has a double meaning. When Christina Stearns' 87 married in Hanover, she followed family traditions as well as Dartmouth ones by holding a ceremony in the same church as her parents, the Congregational Church, better known as the "White Church" near Baker Library. Chrissie's mother, Tina Stearns, is the daughter of former Dartmouth president John Sloan Dickey '29. She had met Stewart Stearns '54 on the campus tennis courts while she was a freshman at Hanover High School and he was a freshman at Dartmouth. In 1958 the Stearnses were married at the White Church. When their daughter Chrissie married Mike Drescher '87 at the same site several decades later, the officiant was the Rev. James W. Crawford '58, former col- lege roommate of Mikes dad, Phil Drescher '58. "Hanover is a very special place for both of our families and for many of our friends, so it was an obvious place to convene and where we thought many of our friends would be willing to return," says Chrissie.

Dartmouth weddings run the gamut from the small and informal to the large and elegant. At interfaith Rollins Chapel, weddings have ranged in size from intimate gatherings to others with several hundred guests "and all the pomp and veils," says the Rev. Gwendolyn King, the College chaplain. One of the largest weddings, with some 350 guests, also featured the most high-profile guest: the King of Jordan. King Abdullah II served as best man at the wedding of George Faux '84, his former roommate at Deerfield Academy. While the Hanover Inn staff was used to the presence of U.S. Secret Service officers—who often accompany presidential candidates during primary-season trips to the Granite State—they were surprised to see bomb-sniffing dogs on the leashes of Jordanian security staff check out the premises before the rehearsal dinner.

More informal couples—typically former Dartmouth Outing Club members—can be found up at Moosilauke's Ravine Lodge, which hosts a half-dozen ceremonies each year. "It has a pretty strong cachet with the outdoor group," says David Hooke '84, assistant director of outdoor programs and a former DOC member. "This place is just home to a lot of people and they really connect with it. It is a remote place, far away from the cares of the outside world and steeped in history."

After square dances and Salty Dog Rag lessons, guests sit down at picnic tables to dine on the spread prepared by the lodge crew: soup, bread, salad and a simple entree. The cost is a wedding-industry bargain: $15 per person.

Not every Dartmouth couple meets during their years at the College. Indeed, although Jay and I had several good friends in common and overlapped in Hanover for three years, we never met on campus. As undergrads he was down on the river with the rowing team while I was submerged in Robinson Hall working for TheDartmouth. And then in Washington, where we each lived for six years, we never happened to attend the same alumni functions.

We finally met at a friends party, just six weeks before I was moving away to Cambridge, Massachusetts, for grad school. Our host, Wendy Vanasselt, a Smith '91 who spent her junior year at Dartmouth, introduced me to Jay. Our Dartmouth bonds helped us as we got to know each other while living 500 miles apart. A year later we were planning our marriage ceremony at Rollins and our reception at the Quechee Club in Vermont, site of many a past sorority formal for me. Our planning jaunts to Hanover became a fun way of making up for our lost years at the College.

We learned that the best thing about holding a wedding in Hanover is the sense of small-town hospitality. Jay and I found a variety of College offices helpful in answering questions and connecting us with wedding-related services in the area.

From the Colleges Public Programs Office we purchased a stack of brochures listing area hotels and restaurants and mailed them out with our invitations. A call to the music department put us on to Marcia Cassidy, the Colleges small-ensemble coordinator, who eventually led us to a brass quintet from the Vermont Symphony Orchestra. An electronic query with the Student Employment Offices Temp Job Blitz Bulletin Board helped us find student bartenders for the rehearsal dinner. It's also a great way to find students to watch guests' children or to help set up and clean up after parties. And my former visual studies professor,john Sheldon '74, served as our photographer. We even bought our wedding bands at Designer Gold—owned by Paul Gross '73— in Hanover.

Perhaps the most important aspect of Hanover hospitality occurred when we realized during the rehearsal at Rollins that we had forgotten to bring our marriage license from home. It was 4:25 on a Friday afternoon and the Hanover Town Hall was about to close. While Jay ran to fetch our driver's licenses and other identification, I raced to the office on Main Street. There, deputy town clerk Betty Messer kept the office open late to help us replace the license so it would be legal when we tied the knot the next day.

A few weeks after our honeymoon, we received a postcard with a picture of Rollins Chapel and a handwritten note from Messer congratulating us on our marriage. Ah, only in Hanover.

At the center of the Green, as Baker s tower clock struck midnight, he dropped to one knee and proposed.

MEG SOMMERFELD is an assistant editor at the Chronicle of Philanthropy in Washington, D.C.