1941

After recently celebrating the 60th anniversary of D-Day I was led to reminisce about the same era in Hanover and 'round the girdled earth. A random group of '41s agreed to share some memories of this period, as follows:

Downey Gray: "I remember sitting in the living room of the old Phi Delt house in October 1940 when the first draft drawing was done. We all wondered who would be the first to go and earn the $30 a month paid to privates. Several years later in godforsaken places in the South Pacific being tied up alongside another ship, I often ran into a classmate or Dartmouth man. Those were days I would never want to go through again, but I wouldn't have missed them for the world."

Dick Hill: "I was in my second year of Tuck when the war started. Within days the Navy arrived and offered all of us commissions as ensigns, subject to our successful graduation. We were directed to go to Boston for a physical exam several days later. I received a telephone call requesting me to return to the medical office. 'Why?' I asked. 'There is something wrong with your Wasserman test,' was the reply. Needless to say, I rushed back to Boston quaking and trembling. 'What's wrong?' I asked. 'We dropped your specimen on the floor and we need a new blood sample,' was the reply."

Jim Eckels: "Robin Robinson tried courageously to make calculus a bright and delightful learning experience for me. But in every day of trying I would understand a bit of what he was doing at the upper left corner of his big blackboard, but became more and more lost as he marched happily to the lower right corner. He was good enough to give me a D, but I always thought that it was largely just because I came to class.

George Clabaugh: "Jim Rogers, my college classmate, and I crossed paths in Leyte Gulf in the Philippines in WW 11. He was in the Seabees and I was at a naval operations base there. I was so happy to see him again at our 60th reunion. Jim has since passed away."

Colonial Park Club, 4730 Bee RidgeRoad, #163, Sarasota, FL34233