1958

As this reaches you three of our classmates are training hard to break the age records they set last July in the Prouty, an annual bicycling event held in the Upper Valley to raise money for the Norris Cotton Cancer Center of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center. The multi-event Prouty features rides and walks of varying lengths. Our hardy lads—Gersh Abraham, Dave Bradley and Dan O’Hara—ride the grueling 100-mile Century. Last summer Gersh (born Dec. 1935) became the oldest man to finish the Prouty Century, Dan (April 1936) the third-oldest and Dave (May 1936) the fourth-oldest. Still in second is Dave’s senior law partner Jack Stebbins, who last did it in 1988 at 72 years and 4 months. When they cross the 100-mile line in next month’s ride at 73 Dan and Dave will move up to second and third. Dave, who’s in charge of fundraising for the Prouty, tells me they had 4,000 entrants last year and raised more than $2 million. “I used to be the biggest fundraiser,” he says, “but the past few years I have been beaten by Susan Wright (Jim’s wife), who has a better list than I do.” I recall from the 50th book that we have some other long-distance charity bike riders, including Kit Cowperthwaite, who confronts some serious “hills” out in Colorado.

Speaking of fundraising, thoughts turn to head agent Jack Bennett and the 30 classmates working with him on the Dartmouth College Fund. Their task in the 51st year out and a lousy economy is tough. Do give them—and the College—all the help you can as the June 30 DCF deadline nears.

Scott Pardee wishes the class well from his academic perch at Middlebury College, where we met recently. Scott is using his impressive banking credentials to teach an unusual program of finance courses to liberal arts undergrads at Middlebury. He crams accounting down their throats, teaches them to calculate discounted cash flows, immerses them in foreign exchange and schools them in stock-picking—to the point where they compete with M.B.A.s for summer and fulltime jobs at the big-name firms. The College has given his student investment committee a goodly chunk of its money to run, and they’ve done well with it. This year may not be a great hiring year on Wall Street. But having lectured Scott’s students, including many from abroad, and traded lively Q&As with his investment committee, I suspect his bright young charges will remain in high demand.

Sadly I must report four deaths: Tom Andrews, Raymond Marcotte, Clement Marks and Arch Whitehead. Their obituaries appear elsewhere in this issue—including one for Tom by his former roommate and AD brother Bob Downey. Some of us, including Mel Alperin, Steve Dawkins and I, remember Tom fondly from a freshman year shared on the first floor of Gile Hall—along with Tom and Bob’s other roomie, Bill Manning, whom we were delighted to greet at last year’s 50th.

65 Chapel Road, New Hope, PA 18938; squickel@dartmouth58.org