April 2012 - Alumni News - Williams College

CLASS NOTES
she was born, the first baby born
to a member of the Class of ’44.
Right on!
Herb Bell keeps in touch
with family at Chapel Hill and
Charleston and avers, “I still
drive some, but my vision is not
great.” That comment evokes
Milton’s sonnet on his blindness—remember?
“—that one
talent which is death to hide, lost
from me useless—.”
Marty Oberrender favored
me with an Xmas card with
a photo of their cute (Sorry!
That’s the only word for it!)
retirement house in addition
to their unfairly (to the rest of
us) handsome grandchildren.
A granddaughter Eliza Noyes
was accepted to Williams. How
to go!
John Royal has died, a resident
of Haskins, N.Y.
Milt Prigoff’s email, a la Paul
Revere, is signed “Special
Agent,” so I shall be careful to
use the correct appellation. He
laments the decline and fall of
the U.S. and alludes particularly
to Detroit, which is outside the
“close”: Grosse Point. Yes—but
Milt. Chrysler, which has a
plant a few miles down the main
drag into town from us, has
just announced plans to make
another line of cars at that plant
(Jefferson-North), which means a
lot filled with 1,000 cars at a time
(a beautiful sight) awaiting transshipment,
all of which means
more jobs and steady work. The
auto show is in progress as I
write, and it holds great promise
for the industry this year. Never
mind that our previous mayor’s
prison term is about up—brace
yourself—and the owner of the
international bridge to Canada
is in jail for contempt of court.
Yes, the Ambassador Bridge here
in Detroit is not an international
bridge. It is privately owned.
That, too, is the subject of great
controversy and swirls around
whether to build a second bridge,
and, if so, its ownership. Stay
tuned.
1945
Frederick Wardwell
P.O. Box 118
Searsmont, ME 04973
1945secretary@williams.edu
The October minireunion
produced a very pleasant time for
the six classmates and three wives
who attended. Presentations by
recipients of our class fellowship
program were greatly varied and
intellectually very interesting.
10 | Williams PeoPle | aPril 2012
Nine students described their
several weeks in foreign countries
studying everything from the rise
and fall of squash in Pakistan to
Palestinian graffiti, memories of
WWII in Japan, domestic abuse
in Egypt, discrimination of Afro
descendants in Central America
and more. Yanie Fecu ’10, this
year’s Florence Chandler Fellow,
spoke of her year’s study of the
power and purpose of choral
music, and it was remarkably
interesting. This all took place
Friday afternoon and was followed
by a dinner out at a new
place, name now forgotten, but it
was very social and good in every
way including the mathematical
issues in determining who was
to pay for what and how much,
since the bill, not small, was
oversimplified and designed for
debate.
Saturday a.m. was taken up
by a fine lecture put on by the
college on how our converging
interests in South America are
affecting our foreign relations
and the p.m. by a football
game against Tufts in which
Williams barely prevailed. Fred
Scarborough and wife Gay had
the whole group for cocktails
and dinner after the game, with
a class meeting, the telling of
stories and reminiscences of some
good and some sad times—all
in front of a lovely fire in the
fireplace. In attendance for most
of all this were Gil Lefferts, Mary
and Stu Coan, Ed Bloch, Dave
Goodheart, Dick Morrill, Gay and
Fred Scarborough and Ann and
Fred Wardwell.
Ed Bloch, wife and daughter
had just returned from China
in time for our mini after a
remarkable two weeks there.
His trip was more or less to pay
penance for having his Marines
shoot up a Chinese village while
simultaneously cooperating with
but disarming Japanese troops,
all immediately after the Japanese
surrender. Apparently his guys
didn’t shoot straight, for he was
given a hero’s welcome, asked
to speak at two universities and
several clubs and was overfed at
several dinners. After some 66
years of feeling guilt, he was on
top of the world.
Stu Coan is delighted to report
that the dizziness that led to a
fall was not a stroke but was
simple vertigo, and that he has
now improved enough to put the
cane aside.
Annette, daughter of June
Bremer, widow of Bill, wrote that
her mother plays bridge twice a
week, takes classes in politics and
film and lives at 5 Wood Lane in
Locust Valley, N.H. Annette and
husband visit weekly and find
their stories of Cambodia very
interesting to June.
Bud Edwards apparently never
slows down. He reports playing
tennis twice a week, swimming
in the Bowdoin college pool three
times a week and, given reasonable
weather, using his motor
and sail boats. He and Sue have
kids all over, and they all seem
just fine.
Harold Gilboard says life is great
in Laguna, Calif., and that he is
not getting back to New England
very often. One supposes he likes
to get a tan.
Sad last-minute news that Gil
Lefferts’ wife C.C. died in early
January. She was a great addition
to the group, and I think the class
will sorely miss her enthusiasm
and cheer at Williams events.
Strother Marshall excused his
difficult handwriting as being a
function of a stroke, but he is
living alone, albeit with help. He
thinks California is the place to
be and loves the weather most of
the time.
Mary Elizabeth McClellan,
widow of Bruce, wrote just before
Christmas that her mother-in-law
advised that every Christmas is
different and that you have to
decide what not to do. She has
many kids and grandkids, really
too many to enumerate here, but
they are writing books, teaching,
camping and doing about everything
you can think of. Mary Liz
and Bruce went to Lawrenceville
in 1950, he as headmaster, and
now she has been voted an
honorary member of the Class of
1960 there, so she can attend a
new 60th.
Pete McNerney reported from
Lincoln, Mass., that Newt and
the Tea Party drove him to distraction,
but the book The Great
Disruption by Paul Gilding is a
must-read for your children and
grandchildren and that it ends
on a somewhat optimistic note
and a very important message.
He has a self-published book
just coming off the press, based
on his years of journal keeping,
and he claims that those
who have looked at it are very
complimentary. His daughter
Caroline ’85 helped with some of
the grunt work.
Art Nims and Nancy have quit
DC and moved to the retirement
community of Fox Hill
in Westwood, Mass., and he
says he loves being fully retired.
Daughter Lucy and family live
nearby in Needham.