1961

Attendance of our class officers at the Class Officers Weekend in September at Dartmouth was impressive, as usual, including Bob Conn, Bert Rowley, Dave Birney, Frank Ginn, Ivar Jozus, Dave Armstrong, Hank Eberhardt, Pete Palin, Maynard Wheeler, Ron Wybranowski and yours truly, Vic Rich (MIA were Pete Bleyler and John Wilkins, both out of the country).

Also impressive was the attendance in Oc- tober at our first class mini-reunion under the leadership of Maynard Wheeler, who organized an interesting and enjoyable weekend.

Larry Holden, arbitrator extraordinaire for more than 30 years and often the first choice, was recently selected by both sides to arbitrate the dispute between the city of Boston, Massachusetts, and its police union. Larry, who resides in Lincoln, Massachusetts, has settled more than 2,000 labor-management disputes since 1972, including a stint as chair of the Massachusetts Board of Conciliation and Arbitration for three years during the 19705. For several years he also served as the arbitrator for the National Hockey League, which must have been both interesting and exciting. At Dartmouth Larry starred in both tennis and soccer.

For the 2004 Alumni Fund, Hank Eberhardt, as head class agent, led and pushed our class to contribute $178,406 and increased our class participation from 55.7 percent to 56.3 percent. Our thanks go out to Hank and his assistants, and to those classmates who have donated funds so that our class' total contributions of $6,219,022 during the 43 years since graduation will not go unnoticed.

On December 3 there is going to be a black tie dinner dance in Hanover honoring all of the Dartmouth Alumni Award winners, of which there currently are three from our class of whom I am aware (Ron Boss, Gerry Kaminsky and Vic Rich). In addition, Steve Waterhouse '65, the current chairman of the Alumni Awards Committee, is leading an effort, along with John Walters '62, to complete a book about all of the award winners since its incep- tion 50 years ago, the first winner being Earnest Martin Hopkins in 1954.

The Vermont Institute of National Science (VINS) had its start more than 30 years ago in a dentist's office. That dentist was our own Dave Laughlin, and the results have been a cleaner and more environmentally conscious State of Vermont. VINS currently has 50 staff members, thousands of volunteers and an annual operating budget of $2.1 million.

Word has come through that Betty Castor, the wife of Sam Bell, is running for U.S. senator from the State of Florida and is apparently the leading candidate to replace the retiring Bob Graham. For those of you eligible to vote in Florida, including "snow birds" with residency status, castyour vote for Betty. As you will recall, Sam has a strong political background of his own, having been the former speaker of the Florida House of Representatives.

Finally, our class has decided to enhance and expand its support of the Class of '61 Legacy for the performing arts at Dartmouth College, primarily in the form of all or a portion of the class reunion gift for our 45th reunion. Dave Birney and Oscar Arslanian have assumed the primary responsibility for the task of doubling the current size of the Class of '61 Legacy endowment during the next two years.This effort needs the support of all classmates and the financial support of each individual classmate.

5 Red Ground Road, Old Westbury, NY 11568; victor rich@rsmi.com