1956

Few of us have the chance to get to know the students who benefit from our ’56 class scholarship. I decided to find them and ask for an opportunity to interview them for this column. What a gift that was! I met Ryan Yuk ’09 in the woodworking shop in the bowels of the Hop. We spent an amazing hour and a half looking first at the absolutely beautiful furniture he’s crafting for a Baker Library display in May and then talking over coffee about his Dartmouth experience. His family lives outside Seoul, Korea, the home he has been able to visit only occasionally since coming to live with an aunt in Maryland when he was 13. He therefore determined truly to invest himself in as much of what this school offers as possible. His work-study program requires 35 to 40 hours of work a week, but my how he has used the rest! The D-Plan has enabled him to study in Beijing, China, and in Scotland. The woodworking shop has been a venue to pursue his passion for creating. An English major who had an internship with Lehman Bros., Ryan has already garnered for himself a job in New York upon graduation with Barclay’s, its successor. He is deeply appreciative for the aid our class has provided him and the personal growth his four years in Hanover have given him. I hope some of you get to see his exhibit at Baker Library this spring! Our sophomore scholar is Hillary Mimnaugh ’11. We met on a busy Friday afternoon an hour or so before she was to travel to Bristol, Rhode Island, for a mock trial competition involving 20 or more colleges. This had been a high school interest of hers. Upon returning home she e-mailed me the results: “We qualified for the next round of competitions, which will be held in South Carolina at the end of March. I also received the most outstanding attorney award for my role on the defense team.” Wha hoo wha! She’s a Californian with two years of professional ballet experience while in high school. Discovering that Dartmouth had no ballet program she went to work crafting one, the Dartmouth Classical Ballet Theater. It meant petitioning the powers that be and then working through all the issues of space and time and money and leadership, but she prevailed and has about 20 other students now involved. Not feeling the need to rest, Hillary has applied to be an undergraduate advisor next year and will be pursuing a double major in history and Spanish. These students are terrific!

The painful news came of the deaths of Sam Fry and Stephen Brand. You’ll find their obituaries a bit deeper into DAM.

Ken Wlaschin, director of creative affairs at the American Film Institute has published his fourth book, The Silent Cinema in Song, 1896-1929. It “documents the lost history of songs of the silent cinema.” It’s a treasure for the collector, identifying how one can get these on 78, LP, CD, DVD or on the Internet.

P.O. Box 968, Quechee, VT 05059-0968; (802) 295-8912; stewwood@aol. com