1957

The 50th wedding anniversaries accumulate but Dick and Barbara Handy, now living on Maine’s mid-coast, approach No. 54. Dick remains the “enthusiastic flower gardener” he’s become since retirement. Has anyone been married longer?

When we graduated there were no New York Mets, but J.C. Parkes was the team’s physician from 1974 to 1991. J.C. died in 1999 from an ailment described by his daughter Jacqueline Parkes as “somewhere between Lou Gehrig’s disease and Parkinson’s.” In an effort overseen by Jacqueline every major league team will raise awareness and research money for Lou Gehrig’s disease at its July 4 game as part of Major League Baseball’s commemoration of the 70th anniversary of Gehrig’s “I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth” speech.

John Harrison’s book, Redefining Stuttering: What the Struggle to Speak Is Really All About, is avail- able for free download at www.mnsu.edu/comdis/kuster/Infostuttering/Harrison/redefining.html John runs public speaking workshops and does private coaching in San Francisco. “Not bad,” he says, “for someone who grew up with a chronic stuttering problem and was petrified to speak in front of people.”

In “November” Calvin K. Towle writes, “The wind ruffles the tops of the trees / The way thoughts ruffle the top of my mind.” The poem appears in his new collection, Poems for Everyone, from Vantage. Has anyone published a book, play, poem or essay in recent years? Or is there one you’re working on? Send word to the notes so classmates can become your readers.

Class of ’57s active in Dartmouth clubs: Mike Tomkins serves on the executive committee of the Dartmouth Club of Central Massachusetts and Hanny Mason, out in the heartland, is treasurer of the Dartmouth Club of Iowa. Jack Stempel is one of two co-leaders of the Dartmouth Fort Worth Alumni Club. Jack writes about the pride he and his fellow club members take from the number of young men and women they “nurture and send to Hanover.”

A group of classmates and their families gathered in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, on February 6 for a memorial service for Wayne Kakela. Wayne was well known in the area as a rancher, sculptor and filmmaker, among other callings. The ’57s included John Donnelly, Doug Brew, Ron Roth, Don Saunders, Pat Pascoe, Bob Adelizzi and Chic Winslow, who spoke on behalf of the class. Adz concluded, “Wayne’s memorial reminded me again of the diversity of our class and the breadth of its accomplishments.”

At his 80th birthday celebration Robert Frost listened to encomiums from America’s most important poets. When he finally rose to speak he cast his eye around the room and muttered, “I hope you haven’t praised me because I’ve survived.” But that was Frost. In hard times we seek out the kind of reassurance that steadies us—maybe something praiseworthy in one another. As the days lengthen and spring draws us outdoors, please take a moment to speak through the notes to this sympathetic audience of many decades’ duration.

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