1952

A Dartmouth "class baby" is the first child to be born to a graduate member of the class. The '52 class baby is James C. Leiter 111, M.D., who will become 50 years old on December 27.

"Jay," as everyone calls him, has such a thoroughly Dartmouth pedigree that it will blow your mind. The son of Boots and Brud Leiter, he was born at Mary Hitchcock Hospital 10 months after his parents' marriage.

Jay graduated from Dartmouth, class of '75, but says that this was not the result of undue pressure from his father.Jay simply liked the outdoor life that Dartmouth offered. He went on to graduate from the Dartmouth Medical School and promptly returned to it to teach and do research.

We called Jay up to chat. A very pleasant guy, he's now a tenured professor, married with two kids and very happy living in Woodstock. As if the Dartmouth connections shown above weren't enough, his mother has re-married to our classmate Jim Churchill, thus giving our class baby a Dartmouth '52 father and step father! Told you that would blow your mind.

An e-mail from Steve Mandel, our reunion giving chairman, tells that 84 percent of the class contributed to our 50th Alumni Fund. This is the largest contribution percentage ever given by any reunion class and won for us a $100,000 challenge gift contributed by an anonymous donor, presumably a '52, for exceeding an 80 percent participation goal.

Most of our '52 classmates have by now retired from their working careers. Everyone seems to keep busy, of course, but some continue to occupy themselves with retirement versions of their old professions—because they continue to like it, one supposes.

Among these is Bob Lord, who retired three years ago as a Pittsburgh church choirmaster-organist after a wide-ranging and distinguished musical career. Now he and Martha travel a lot but wherever they go there seems always to be a recital or a concert for Bob to play. Recently they made their annual trip to Great Britain, where Bob played in the same church where his organist great-grandfather had once played. And after our 50th reunion memorial service, at which Bob played, he was asked by Howie Van Valzah to give a pair of concerts in Howies hometown, Batavia, Illinois, which brought Bob to Illinois in early November.

In a similar retired bus drivers holiday story, Bob Mattox wound it up in 1992 at the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, where one of his various specialties was research on raptors, which are birds of prey such as hawks and falcons. Eventually Bob and Joan moved to Boise, Idaho, where they love the outdoor life. Bob has established the Conservation Research Foundation, which does research on raptors, sponsors books on the field and supports a research fellowship. Bob describes himself as a busy and happy man doing what he loves to do. Keep in touch!

189 Mountainside Road,Mendham,NJ 07945; (973)543-4044; dexotex@paol.com