Hey to the young alumni of the class of 1994! I’ve been wondering when a group shifts from a young-alumni cohort to the “seasoned” variety. Is there a middle step or do we just fall from a cliff from young to—something else? According to my quick Google search, young alumni definitions vary widely from institution to institution. Some schools are really stingy with their grace period; after five years, you’re no longer a young alum at Trinity College in Connecticut.

Others are more generous; University of Illinois says young alumni are under 40.

Some are so specific that you almost wonder why this is a thing; Swarthmore College draws the line at 14 years.

Dartmouth seems to be a little more vague than other schools. The College website refers to young alumni at five, 10, and even 15 years out. In that case, we’ll take the squishy ambiguity and continue calling ourselves the young alumni of the class of 1994 until the first classmate says, “back in my day” at our 30th reunion.

Mark your calendar for our 30th reunion: June 13-16. You will not want to miss it! Jen Suhie Hagelston and Samantha Stoddard are heading the reunion planning committee. Jen promises “a rocking time with great food, drinks, nice swag, live entertainment from our very own ’94 bands, and surprise guests.”

To build the hype, your class officers have been connecting classmates throughout the year. After a fall packed with mini-reunions planned by Rebecca Wahl Scott, we’re using Evergreen Connections to collect fun facts about each other. Have you seen the new series of interviews featuring fellow classmates? Pete Moore interviews Tim Wetherill in a fabulous first installment. If you haven’t submitted your Evergreen Connection survey or seen the interview, now is the time to plug into the action. Submit your survey (or let me know if you need a new link) and follow “Dartmouth Class of 1994” on Facebook and Instagram.

Are you still on the fence about reunion? Maybe you would enjoy taking in all the campus changes and updates since the last time you visited. Come see renovated Dartmouth Hall and get a peek at the new Hop under construction. Alternatively, cast a wider net and combine Hanover with a broader New England family vacation (Acadia National Park, anyone?). Boston is always a wonderful stop in summer. There are some pretty perfect college campuses to tour in the Northeast if you have high schoolers in tow.

I truly hope to see you in June. I’ll have my D’94 L.L.Bean tote from a reunion ages ago slung over my shoulder. Remember to bring your vintage Dartmouth gear for the photo ops.

Did you notice that there is no new news in this column? That’s because you haven’t sent me any. Please drop me a line with your update.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

As I draft this column many of you are returning home from Dartmouth Homecoming Weekend or enjoying mini-reunions around the country. It’s fun to see the pictures and hear the stories that continue to unite us 30 years later. These October connections are only the opening act to the huge headliner coming in June, and you can have VIP, all-access passes. Our 30th reunion will be in Hanover from June 13-16, and you won’t want to miss it. Mark your calendars now and keep your eyes out for registration information.

In the run-up to our 30th reunion you can expect to hear more details from Jennifer Suhie Hagelston and Samantha Stoddard. Both Jen and Sam are professional reunion planners and have chaired a multitude of events through the years for our class. With such veterans at the top, they will build a strong team and plan a special campus experience. Please consider joining their reunion committee; reach out to Jen at jenniferhagelston@gmail.com.

Last note about reunion, please make sure you share any updates in your contact information to alumni records at alumni.records@dartmouth.edu. We want to make sure we have your correct information so you don’t miss out on class news and registration deadlines.

In other class news, Andrea Fiorentino Liebross is the author of recently released She Thinks Big: The Entrepreneurial Woman’s Guide to Moving Past the Messy Middle and Into the Extraordinary. From her homebase in Indianapolis, Andrea is a certified business and life coach, mother of two children and two giant Leonberger dogs, and wife of Robert H. Liebross ’91. Andrea specializes in empowering female entrepreneurs, sidelining the drama in business, and inspiring breakout progress and tangible accomplishments. You can catch her advice on her engaging podcast, Time to Level Up.

Ken Davis was in Phoenix to play in the Sophie’s Day Golf Tournament, an annual tournament organized by Tony Lee to benefit the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Tony hosts the event to honor his daughter, Sophie, and her successful battle against myelodysplastic syndrome. Ken and Tony caught up with Alison LeBoeuf and Colleen Linehan Haskell during their time together. Ali is living in Palm Springs, California. Colleen’s daughter is in her second year at Dartmouth, playing lacrosse and having a wonderful experience. I’m looking forward to seeing all of you in just a few months at reunion and hearing which of you four is really the best golfer. I’ve heard some tall tales but holding off on final judgment for your verification and facts.

Please remember to send your news for the next column, consider volunteering for our reunion committee, and (if you haven’t already) complete the Evergreen Connections survey. I’m looking forward to hearing from you.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hello, classmates! The countdown continues toward our 30th reunion. Thanks to our many classmates who have joined the reunion planning committee! There is always room for more volunteers, and we invite you to jump into the fun of reconnecting. If you have a few hours to help between now and June 2024, send an email to 1994dartmouthreunion@gmail.com to sign up.

As we think about all the reasons we love Dartmouth and consider our favorite moments, I’ll continue to toss out a “This or That” to gauge informally some of the preferred places, tastes, and times of our collective college experience. In the last column I asked whether you preferred Hop fries or Hop half-baked cookie bars. In my admittedly unscientific research, the resounding preference for Hop fries is clear. Case closed!

Consider now which iconic seasonal festival or time you loved most during your time at Dartmouth. Was it Homecoming, Winter Carnival, Green Key, or Sophomore Summer? It’s hard to pick just one, when every season is beautiful in Hanover, and every weekend saw connections and community strengthen. Alas, you may only pick one. Please reach out and let me know your vote.

In other news, Tim Wetherill shared an update on his career. After practicing medicine as a general and trauma surgeon for many years, Tim moved to Blue Cross Blue Shield, where he led utilization management transformation and responsible incorporation of artificial intelligence (AI) in medicine. Most recently, Tim joined startup Machinify as the chief clinical officer. Machinify works to apply AI to healthcare to improve quality, safety, and cost for patients and consumers. I may be preaching to the choir, but Tim has demonstrated perfectly the importance of combining liberal arts education with STEM focus to be impactful in our changing world.

I also bring the sad news of the death of Alfred W. Patetta on June 18. Al came to Dartmouth from New Jersey after growing up in Kenilworth. He was an active member of Sigma Alpha Epsilon and worked at the radio station WDCR/WFRD. Although Al majored in government, he had an ease with world language, fully engaged in the language departments and language study abroad opportunities at Dartmouth, and remained fluent in Italian throughout his life. He was also a wiz with investments. He spent the first several years of his career in Dallas as an equity trader for Coastal Securities. After an early retirement, he managed his own and others’ investments after moving back to his hometown of Kenilworth. Throughout his life he remained an active parishioner, devout Catholic, enthusiastic Dartmouth alumni interviewer, and long-time supporter of the National MS Society. He enjoyed exercise, loved his dogs, and devoted quality time to his family and friends. Al is survived by his daughter, Francesca, and sister Melissa Patetta.

Please remember to send your vote to my inbox and consider volunteering for our reunion committee. I’m looking forward to hearing from you.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, classmates! In anticipation of our 30th reunion in June 2024 I’m inviting you to share what you’re most excited to do and see on campus. I’ll collect your thoughts and share a David Letterman-style “Top 30 Things to Do During Our 30th” list through the course of the year in this column. In addition, I’ll ask you to weigh in on various Dartmouth-themed “this or that” options.

For the first question, I ask which did you prefer from the Hop: Hop fries or the Hop’s half-raw chocolate chip cookie bar? I live in a house divided. My husband, Ken Davis, has been underbaking chocolate chip cookies to this day because of his love for the Hop bar and his fearlessness of food-borne illness. To me, the Hop fries were a culinary highlight of our dining options on campus. Let me know what you think.

In terms of updates, class president Justin Sadrian shared that a group of 17 Dartmouth ’94s and their significant others celebrated their 50th birthdays last summer with a Caribbean vacation. Justin wrote, “Jeff Goldfaden did a fantastic job organizing the trip to Jamaica. Logan Johnson even arranged for Don Husky, an up-and-coming reggae artist, to put on a private show. Other classmates who were there included Derek Braddock, Todd Carlson, Brian Eller, John Faubert, Matt Feeley, Ethan Frechette, Adam Grossman, Scott Mansfield, Jason Pollard, Dave Rissmiller, Ari Rosenberg, Andy Ruckh, Ryan Spayde,and Mike Thurlow.”

I learned that Andrew Smith has published another novel. His newest book, titled The Pilot: Planet Gallywood #2, is a sequel to The Final Season. In a Venn diagram, Andrew’s Planet Gallywood series sits somewhere between The Truman Show and Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. Stay tuned for a third book in the series in the coming months.

I look forward to hearing from you and including your update in the next column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s! We’re in the early stages of reunion planning for our 30th celebration, and we need your ideas and help. All are welcome to participate to the extent your schedule allows. To learn more, please reach out to our class president Justin Sadrian at 1994dartmouthreunion@gmail.com.

Ildiko Shinkle Neilsen wrote to me about her beach weekend on Nantucket, Massachusetts, with Beth Donohoe Cook, Kiley Barnhorst MacDonald, Pamela Kunz, Karen Staib, Julie Lane,and Juliana Chittick Tiryaki. Ildi writes, “We had a great time biking, sitting on the beach, eating lobster, and hanging out at the fire pit. We laughed a lot about old memories, discussed current situations with work and family, and shared some hopes for the future. It was a beautiful weekend.”

Ildi continued to give a CliffsNotes-style update on her beach-bound buddies, and I will attempt to do the same. Beth teaches at the University of Massachusetts Amherst School of Public Health & Health Sciences. She and her husband, Todd Cook ’93, have two daughters and live in Wellesley, Massachusetts. Kiley is a trust and estates attorney in La Jolla, California, and has three children, including a daughter who is a Dartmouth ’25.

While I’m hoping never to need Pam’s professional help, she serves Yale Medical School and Yale Cancer Center as the director of gastrointestinal oncology. She and her husband, Jeff Kwan, Med’01, have three sons and spend their free time on the baseball field. Karen is a litigation partner focused on franchise law at the Hartford, Connecticut, firm of Shipman & Goodwin. She and her husband, Ben, share two sons. Julie works as an elementary and middle school reading teacher in Watertown, Massachusetts. She and her husband, Matt, have three children and live in nearby Newton. Juliana and her husband, Can, have two sons, and operate their firm of Tiryaki Architectural Design in Cohasset, Massachusetts. Last, but certainly not least, Ildi is currently working as a career coach at Harvard Business School. Ildi and Kevin Neilsen live in Wellesley with their two children.

Thank you to Andrew Plumridge for sharing some fun stories of recent accidental and purposeful connections with classmates. Andrew shares, “I run into Art Zweil fairly regularly; we were both at Boston Private Bank until recently. In addition to our wives having been college roommates at Smith, our first-born daughters are both there as well, so Northampton, Massachusetts, is a regular destination.” Last year the Plumridges took the all-too-familiar “college decision road trip.” Lo and behold, at one Pennsylvania college, Andrew saw Steve Costalas and family (Steve’s son is now a first-year at University of Colorado - Boulder.) Then, in Ohio, he caught up with Jon Newton and family. Andrew attended his high school reunion at the Menlo School in Palo Alto, California, where he reconnected with classmates Greg Alden, Keri Gleason Elmquist, and Harley McAllister. Keri sang the national anthem at the homecoming game (and was superb). Andrew stayed at one of Greg’s hotels, The Stanford Park Hotel (which was wonderful). Harley has eight children with wife Abby. Andrew had dinner with Katy Horner Kobal, her husband, Rob, and son Drew. Katy is an assistant district attorney for Alameda County, California. Katy’s son Jeff is a Dartmouth ’26. Andrew also caught up with Paul Morf, who continues to practice trust law in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, while raising three daughters. Andrew and his family are still living in Sharon, Massachusetts, where they have been since 2007.

I enjoyed reading so many snippets about classmates. Please share your brief note for the next magazine.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, class of ’94! Keep reading, because I’m getting right to the updates.

Dawn Matthews has lived in central Vermont since 2004. She moved to the area to work on Howard Dean's ill-fated presidential campaign, but stayed, and has practiced law for the last eighteen years as a public defender focused on prisoners' rights, post-conviction, and appellate work. She lives in East Montpelier with her husband, Peter Kopsco, sons Noah and Bram (15 and 13, respectively), and the family dog, Blue Ivy, a 75-pound sheepadoodle.

Sheila Bassiri Ahmed also shared news. Sheila lives in Walpole, Massachusetts, with her husband, Rizal Ahmed ’92, and their four children. Lindsay (21) is a senior at the University of Oregon in the architecture program, Tyler (19) is a sophomore at the Isenberg School at University of Massachusetts, and their younger two, Joey and Ryan, are high schoolers. Sheila writes, “I left my career in 2002 to raise my children but recently went back to work full time as the senior vice president of operations at the Service Council. I am an avid volunteer, serving as the longtime president of the board of directors for the Natick-Walpole VNA and as a district enrollment director for Dartmouth admissions for the past decade. I was also the first Dartmouth alumna to join and serve as president for the Dartmouth Women’s Club of Boston (an organization very dear to my heart), which was established in 1930 by wives of Dartmouth alumni and continues to grow its scholarship fund for current Dartmouth students. It is now a resource and community for mothers of first-year students from the Boston area. I recently went to Hanover to enjoy Riz’s 30th reunion and feel blessed to have kept in touch with so many close Dartmouth friends.”

In closing, I share the sad news of a classmate’s death. Schuyler Wheelock Henderson passed away unexpectedly on November 21, 2022, in New York City. Schuyler was born in New York City, raised in London, and returned to the United States to attend Dartmouth. Schuyler was the English major who was a regular at 4 p.m. Sanborn tea. While an undergraduate student he also engaged in a language study abroad program in Italy and spent his off term working in Romania at an orphanage for severely disabled children. He was awarded Dartmouth’s Lombard Public Service Fellowship to work with Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity in Kolkata, India.

Schuyler moved to Chicago, where he worked with refugee populations and attended the University of Illinois College of Medicine. Drawn to those marginalized populations he had served through the years, Schuyler wanted to support these communities in a different capacity. He found his way to NYU Hospital for a residency in adult psychiatry.

For the next 20 years, he devoted his life to working with patients at Bellevue Hospital and within the public mental health system. His continued leadership and impact through fellowships are too numerous to name; he published extensively, predominantly in the area of child and adolescent psychiatry. He was a gifted instructor at the NYU medical school and a bright, motivational practitioner. He is known for championing vulnerable populations with empathy and respect. He also completed his master’s in public health from the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health. Schuyler was certainly a student of life and for life, yet he never lost sight of what brought him fulfillment: sharing his love of literature with his older children, Neko and Sunhie; cooking for friends; and spending time with his wife, Kate, and young daughter, Hattie.

Drop me a line, and I’ll share your news with our classmates in a future column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s. I’m writing this column as 2022 comes to a close. Collectively, we had a pretty exciting year as we reconnected with classmates, developed our careers, and even turned 50 (or 51, for some). By the time you’re reading this, we’ll be just more than a year away from another shared experience—our 30th reunion! Mark your calendar and start making plans now to come in June 2024.

Thanks to Amy Nevin, who kindly rallied her friends to send me updates, so I have lots to share. Beginning with Amy, she is a practicing pediatrician in Pittsburgh. She spent the majority of her clinical career helping to start a new federally qualified health center branch, where she became a leading advocate for housing and lead exposure. Most recently, Amy has widened her expertise to include behavioral health therapy and psychopharmacology, while also overseeing peer-support programs for Type 1 diabetes at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh. Apparently, instead of sleeping, she also serves as the national director of pediatrics at a dynamic public health startup, Wellness Equality Alliance. Amy writes, “We had great success vaccinating folks at the Mexico-Texas border against Covid-19 and are now expanding into other areas! I oversee a diverse and dynamic national task force of community health workers. Leadership of this organization includes a fun group of energetic, creative thinkers in medicine, pharmacy, and nursing.” Knowing Amy from our Tri-Delt days, I know she is the fun, energetic, creative hub of this important group!

Martha Kiddoo Krieg has spent most of her time since leaving the Granite State in the Mountain West. After 12 years in Vail, Colorado, and another 11 years in Truckee, California, Martha now lives in Park City, Utah. She teaches elementary school “here and there between powder days” and enjoys spending time with her family on and off the slopes.

Liz York lives in Tunbridge, Vermont, with her husband and two children on a small, diversified organic farm where they grow produce and raise livestock. She writes, “I take my lumps volunteering for the town government there. To quote Homer Simpson, ‘Did you know that so-called “volunteers” don’t even get paid?’ ” Oh, Liz, how well we can relate. We are grateful for civil servants such as you!

Suzie Fromer has embarked on a couple of new professional ventures during the past several years. She writes, “I had a lot of fun growing my Etsy jewelry business and stretching as a jewelry maker during the pandemic. I had a lot of ‘high concept’ pieces that really took off (including a Lone Pine Dartmouth necklace that is being sported all over campus), but I’m thrilled to announce I’ve also taken on a new part-time job. After participating in my local Repair Cafe as a volunteer jewelry fixer, I couldn’t pass up an opportunity to get more involved with the larger movement in my area.

“I recently joined Repair Cafe Hudson Valley, which is under the umbrella of the nonprofit organization Sustainable Hudson Valley, as its Repair Cafe coordinator. Repair Cafes are a wonderful resource that help people fix their beloved but broken items while also reconnecting with their neighbors or meeting new ones. So now in addition to traveling all over the Hudson Valley, New York, and beyond doing free jewelry repair and helping out in other ways at the many cafes in the area. I’m also doing PR and grant writing and am always looking for new ways to spread the Repair Cafe love.”

Please drop me a note with your update!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s. I have lots of nuggets to share. Please keep reading!

Ally Hyun Rich provided us with a nice update. Ally moved to Cleveland in 2018 BC (before Covid) with her spouse and children. She is counsel with Squire Patton Boggs, where she works with the white-collar and government investigations groups. Given the state of affairs, she is likely finding herself awfully busy.

Ally writes, “At our 25th reunion Lauren Campisi Smit and I reconnected and we’ve hung out a few times, both pre- and post-March 2020. Lauren is a doctor with the Cleveland Clinic practicing family medicine. Last fall I was in Miami, where I got the chance to meet up with Matt Feeley, who is currently the deputy chief of the healthcare fraud unit for the U.S. attorney’s office based in Miami. It was so lovely to see Matt after so many years and we joked that both of us have lived away from our respective home states ever since we graduated yet we are still devoted to our hometown teams.”

When traveling to San Francisco for a conference, Ally also connected with Brian Buenneke, who has been with Pantheon Partners now for more than 20 years.

Ally shared another connection from the same trip: “At one of the conference events Neil Smith and I saw each other across a crowded bar and we both stopped dead in our tracks. Neil is a partner in the Boston office of K&L Gates, where he practices in the white-collar group, which he joined after a number of years working for the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in the enforcement division. It was fun to catch up with him and we even managed to impress and horrify some of his colleagues when we were able to warble out the first few lines of the alma mater (hat tip to tequila and cigars).”

It comes as no surprise that Ally is looking forward to our 30th reunion and will be ready to give a rouse with a will. I can’t wait to join her!

I close with heartbreaking news of the death of classmate Thanalakshmi Subramaniam. “Shimi” made a mark wherever she went. After growing up in Singapore, Shimi moved to the United States to attend Dartmouth, where she was a leader in the arts and the community. Shimi majored in drama and women’s and gender studies, was a member of Casque & Gauntlet and Panarchy, and was a Tucker fellow.

Shortly after graduation she moved to San Antonio, Texas, where she dazzled the city with her fiery compassion and iridescent talent. She joined the Jump/Start Performance Co. and built an independent performance career featuring every kind of dance you could imagine, from hip hop and hoop to belly dancing and pole dancing. She loved merging her love of movement with her advocacy for people of all identities. After marrying her beloved Oscar Alvarado in 1997, they lived in a converted former bar that quickly became a popular venue for performing artists and shows such as It Came from the Lounge and the Miss Southtown Pageant, an all-gender beauty pageant with great local culture.

Friends describe her as a fighter for social justice, art, women, people of color, and general righteousness. She was known as a beautiful and graceful dancer, a mentor to the youth she taught, an inspiration to those she fought for, and a bold co-conspirator to those she befriended. Shimi was hit by a car in San Antonio and died on December 2, 2020.

Thank you for sending me your news. From the emails I’ve received, it sounds as though you’re finding meaningful ways to celebrate and enjoy this milestone year. In the next several columns I will keep sharing updates.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s! Thank you for sharing your news with me during the past few months! I have several interesting stories and nuggets to pass along.

Amy Nevin emailed me about a Seattle celebration for Deb Hafermann Brandt and shared a handful of fantastic photos. A slew of Dartmouth ’94s convened this past May to ring in Deb’s milestone birthday with a 1980s icon-themed 50th party, crazy costumes, live music, and loads of familiar faces. Amy writes, “The evening kicked off with live music featuring fellow Dartmouth bandmates Jim Lewin ’93 on drums and vocals, Jeff Olson ’95 on guitar, and Deb on keyboards. Deb’s local band, featuring Aly Ryder Burks ’02 on vocals, then took the stage to finish out the epic night.”

Amy shared some pictures of the charismatic group sporting some impressive costumes. Solid Gold dancers included Sheila Bassiri Ahmed and husband Riz Ahmed ’92, Jane Eckels, Sarah Power Berglund, Liz York, Martha Kiddoo Krieg, and Darcey Forbes Bartel. Other party goers donned other garish 1980s trends, such as leg warmers, acid jeans, big hair, and neon colors.

Amy enjoyed reconnecting with lots of classmates and Dartmouth alums from other classes. She shared that “also rocking out in attendance were Jeff Battema, Dawn Matthews, Stacy Smith Branca, Jen Suhie Hagelston, Randy Tennant, Liz Berger Friedman, Jordan Friedman, Marion Shonn Dorer, Jen Dirksen Archer, Katie Bain Eskridge ’93, Bill Bunker ’90, and John Murchinson ’91. All look forward to bringing their electrifying moves to the dance floor in Hanover at the next reunion.”

I learned that classmate and renowned sports and entertainment attorney Tyrone Thomas has recently joined Holland & Knight as a partner in its Washington, D.C., office. Tyrone came to the firm from Mintz Levin, where he was a partner in the sports and entertainment practice. Tyrone’s name is nationally recognized in both collegiate and professional athletics, and he represents and advises executives on employment, consulting, and executive compensation agreements. He is a legal analyst for cross-industry news outlets such as The New York Times, ESPN, Forbes, Bloomberg, Sports Illustrated, The Chronicle of Higher Education, Sports Business Journal, and University Business.

Keep me in the loop with your news, and I’ll continue to pass the information to our classmates.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, fellow ’94s! How’s 2022 feeling so far for you? It’s a big year for many of us. Those who were not already 50 are hitting that milestone birthday this year. For me, big birthdays are a fun excuse to see old friends. Before you read too much into that comment, I truly mean long-standing, enduring friends, not friends of an advanced age!

My husband, Ken Davis,and I recently met up with Gwin Pitman Teasdale and Elissa Slovik Gaies in Denver to celebrate Gwin’s 50th birthday. Looking youthful and stylish to be sure, we met at a trendy Denver hot spot recommended by local entrepreneur Kathryn Murray Dickinson, who was traveling with her husband and unable to join. Lorien Albala Saumier and Anne Jeffers Weber also joined for the weekend at Gwin’s home near Boulder. We had plenty of laughs reminiscing about Dartmouth and our various exploits. Looking back, it didn’t feel as though our Dartmouth years were as long ago as they really are. How are you celebrating and reconnecting with Dartmouth friends around 50th birthday celebrations?

Andrew Smith released his debut science fiction novel, Our Lady of the Artilects, which hit several Amazon bestsellers lists. Writing as Andrew Gillsmith, he captured an interesting perspective of the sci-fi world that critics describe as part artificial intelligence, part spirituality, entirely thought-provoking, and impossible to put down. Andrew lives in St. Louis, Missouri, with his wife, Cheryl, and two sons.

Please drop me a note and let me know what is spinning in your world. I look forward to sharing your news in the next column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s! As class secretary, I wanted to share the sad news that our classmate Gillian “Jill” Feldman Higman passed away on January 24 after an extended illness.

As many of you remember Jill, she greeted friends with a huge smile, her bouncy, curly hair, and signature enthusiasm. Jill came to Dartmouth from Lincoln, Rhode Island, and she immediately joined the equestrian team and served as a football manager. Katherine Maguire remembers Jill as her fellow football manager, confidante, partner in crime, and irreplaceable friend.

Jill’s intellectual curiosity took her first across Europe, armed with her love and skill for global languages, for two study-abroad experiences, and later to the Duke University Fuqua School of Business. While at Fuqua Matt Hergott, Ken Davis,and I spent lots of time with Jill, recounting Dartmouth memories and making new ones through classes, dinners, corporate recruiting, and a few bottles of Opus One.

After earning her M.B.A., Jill returned to Deloitte in Chicago and dove into the challenging work of strategic consulting. Her career in healthcare strategy started at Deloitte before moving to the Aetna group, where her keen insights were invaluable throughout the turbulent changes in the healthcare sector. Jill married Coast Guard Lt. Cmdr. Daniel Higman in April 2004 in Bermuda, and the couple welcomed daughter April Rose in May 2005. By this time, the family was settled in the picturesque seaside community of Cape May, New Jersey. Throughout Jill’s life, she embraced her passions for people, Dartmouth, and horses with unbridled enthusiasm. She greeted old friends with a bounce, smile, and hug. She remained an active Dartmouth volunteer, serving as an alumni admission interviewer and the district enrollment director for her area. She continued to work with horses by supporting horseback riding for disabled children and working on equine rescue. Jill is survived by Daniel and April as well as her parents, Susan and Stephen Higman ’68. You may find a full obituary at dartmouthalumnimagazine.com.

I also received an update from Monserrat Kim, spouse of George Kim, who died in May 2019 after his battle with cancer. She has been working on a project in his honor.

Montserrat shares, “In dealing with our loss I looked for ways to help other families in a similar situation. One area that I found lacking was services and communication about cancer for children with sick parents. To address this, I created My Dad and the Dragon, a children’s picture book that honestly describes what it is like when your father is diagnosed with cancer through the allegory of a cancer dragon. Cameron, the main character, openly shows family life, fears, and joys to young readers.”

One hundred percent of profits from the sale of this book will be donated to social service organizations that help children with sick parents. You can check out this beautifully illustrated book at whenadragoncomes.org/love-george for a free digital copy.

My last update comes from a press release announcing the selection of Brad Baca as the 14th president of Western Colorado University. A Colorado native, Brad came to Dartmouth as a first-generation college student and majored in government. After returning to his home state, Brad earned a master’s in public policy from the University of Colorado-Boulder. He established strong relationships with Colorado lawmakers and colleagues in higher education to become an effectual and impactful leader. Prior to his presidential appointment Brad served as the executive vice president and chief operating officer for Western Colorado University. Congratulations, Brad!

That’s it for this column, and I welcome your update any time.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s. I have a few bits of news to share with a common thread—children who are graduating. Yes, many of us have children reaching educational milestones, from elementary moving-up ceremonies and high school graduations to (gulp) college graduations.

As you may recall, classmates Cameron Matheson and Aleise McCann Matheson were married shortly after college, and perhaps they were even the first in our class to tie the knot within weeks of our June graduation. As goes life, they are already happy parents of a college graduate! They watched their eldest daughter, Daria, graduate from Wake Forest University last summer—with the ceremony delayed 16 months due to Covid-19. It sounds as though this recognition may be coming two years late, but congratulations! To think, at the time, I was bitter when our Dartmouth graduation was moved inside due to threatening rains that never came. Only in recent years has that minor inconvenience seemed almost forgettable compared to the rigmarole of commencements today. In additional news from the Matheson-McCann family, Aleise sold her Irish dance studio several years ago, and she has been spending more time with their younger daughters—who, judging from Facebook, seem to be deeply involved in the performing arts. Cameron is an attorney and shareholder at McGonigle, PC.

Lai Heng Foong is a doctor and specialist who works at different hospitals throughout Sydney, Australia. She has recently been appointed as the chair of the New South Wales emergency department community of practice for Covid-19 response. She regularly speaks at health symposiums and is a contributor to the Australian Journal of Paediatrics and Child Health. Aside from work, she is also a proud mother, whose eldest son, Sebi, graduated from high school in December. (Fun fact: As it turns out, Australian schools operate on a calendar year and hold graduation in late fall, rather than in May or June.)

Last, I must thank my favorite, reliable, anonymous source, whom I affectionately think of as my own ‘Deep Throat,’ for these and many other newsy nuggets. You know who you are, and I am going to be nominating you as our next class secretary!

Please share updates, your graduation memories, or news of your own graduates for a future Dartmouth Alumni Magazine column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s! One of the upsides of serving as class secretary is receiving an unexpected email from a classmate. It’s easy to get into the daily delete-next rhythm when cruising through the unsolicited solicitations and general junk mail typically littering my inbox. When I find a personal note from a classmate tucked among the nonsense, it makes my day.

So, my thanks to Kelvin Leung for making my day back in early November and for sharing much of the news you’ll read in this column.

Jed Kaplan, professor of earth sciences at the University of Hong Kong, led a geological and geomorphological boat excursion to a national park in Hong Kong for the local Dartmouth club. He has led similar trips for the Royal Geographical Society of Hong Kong, and recently Jed used his expertise to entertain and teach his fellow alumni and family. Kelvin shared an insight about Hong Kong, noting that although it is known primarily as a metropolis, it has a few national parks. As one of the trip attendees eloquently described it on social media, “The granite of New Hampshire found its way into Hong Kong’s igneous rock formations this afternoon—super educational and enjoyable geological tour led by professor Jed Kaplan!”

David Cohen is currently a law professor at Drexel University. He coauthored a book titled Obstacle Course: The Everyday Struggle to Get an Abortion in America, which has been selected for an honorable mention for the 2021 Adele E. Clarke Book Award. Congratulations, David!

Maggi Leung has recently been appointed as professor of international development studies at the University of Amsterdam. She earned her Ph.D. from Bremen University in Germany and taught at various universities in Hong Kong and Germany before moving to Amsterdam with her German husband and two sons. I appreciate Kelvin’s commentary alongside the updates. He writes, “For the record, [Maggi and I] are not related—except that we both have New Hampshire granite in our muscles and our brains.”

Shoshana Leis has taken a path less traveled by, and it has definitely made all the difference to her communities. She is currently serving as a rabbi of two separate synagogues. “Rabbi Shosh,” as she is called by members of her congregations, has navigated the dual duties by leaning on her Judaic core values, which include a commitment to justice in leading her congregations through current issues from polarizing politics to the social and emotional health of young people to community diversity. She also habitually reaches out to other religious leaders for mutually applicable methodologies that she can utilize to support her congregants. Shoshana lives in upstate New York outside of New York City with her husband, Rabbi Ben Newman, her two sons, and two dogs.

Please send me your news to share with classmates in the next Dartmouth Alumni Magazine.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

I have two bits of news, hot off the presses (literally) to share with you.

Under “Don’t Judge a Book by Its Cover”: Wendy Tamis Robbins released her first book this past May. The Box: An Invitation to Freedom from Anxiety chronicles her journey to finding freedom from anxiety, obsessive compulsive, and panic disorders that started when she was just 6 years old. She included stories about her time at Dartmouth, when she struggled with depression and suicide ideation. The book became an Amazon No. 1 bestseller in August in four categories: mental illness, depression, stress management, and self-esteem self-help. While still practicing law as senior counsel at Holland + Knight, she has added coaching, corporate wellness speaker, and mental health advocate to her resume. She lives with her husband and his two teens in Marblehead, Massachusetts. You can find more about Wendy’s mental health journey and her articles, podcast appearances, and services at wendytamisrobbins.com. Since I’m pretty podcast crazy, I’m looking forward to the Pretty Panicked Podcast, which Wendy is launching in 2022.

Author and business owner Thatcher Wine has written another book, The Twelve Monotasks: Do One Thing at a Time to Do Everything Better. Thatcher shared that this book “combines my personal experience with research into neuroscience, productivity, and mindfulness. As I navigated a number of challenges in recent years—cancer, divorce, parenting, and managing a small business—I thought a lot about where our attention goes and how to control it. The book provides a clear path for everyone to re-learn how to do one thing at a time (instead of all the tech-enabled multitasking we tend to do) in order to become more productive, less stressed, and happier.”

I’ve been mining a few more updates that I can’t wait to share, but they are not quite ready for this column. How’s that for a cliff hanger? Please send me your verified, vetted updates and stay tuned for more class news in the next issue of the alumni magazine.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s! I’m light on news to share, but at least the piece I have is good.

Classmate Amy Candido was featured in one of our columns back in 2018, and now, thanks to a press release from her new firm, we have an update. Amy continues to practice intellectual property law, protecting some of the biggest names and ideas in the technology sector. Recently she joined the trial and intellectual property litigation practice as a partner in the San Francisco office of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. Amy represents clients including market leaders and innovative disruptors, regularly speaks as an expert at conferences, publishes on a wide range of intellectual property topics, and litigates antitrust and complex commercial matters. Congratulations to Amy, as she continues to wow as one of the Daily Journal’s “Top 100 Women Litigators in California.”

While Dartmouth Alumni Magazine generously allows our class column up to 650 words per issue, I’m sadly out of news. Still, there are many disregarded words, just wasted, floating out there, wanting to be used to tell your story. Please contact me with your update for the next column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 03755; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi classmates! When my inbox is empty of news, I must use my investigative tool kit to troll for news to share; thank you, Facebook and LinkedIn. Luckily, I mined some good news and professional accomplishments to share about Matt Feeley. Matt earned his law degree from Boston College and master’s in international relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. After clerking with the U.S. Court of International Trade, he practiced law in Miami, specializing in international and anti-corruption law for many, many, many years. (It’s been a good many of those since we graduated.) He now serves as special assistant U.S. attorney at the U.S. Department of Justice. Matt also authored an article on anti-corruption that was recently published in The International Lawyer.

Just when I thought our Class Notes would have to end here, I received an update from Kelvin Leung. Thank you, Kelvin! He is living in Hong Kong and involved with the Dartmouth Club of Hong Kong, through which he reconnected with Jed Kaplan.Since graduating from Dartmouth, Jed weaved his way across the world. He earned his Ph.D. in plant ecology from Lund University in Sweden and worked throughout Europe for almost two decades. (As I said, it has been many, many, many years.) Now Jed is serving as an earth science professor at the University of Hong Kong. While I am not able to include the photo that Kelvin shared with me here in this column, you can picture a snapshot of two handsome, spry, young men holding up a faded, creased, well-loved memento of years gone by: “The Freshman Book 1994.” Kelvin and Jed, please bring that decrepit relic to our next class reunion!

Kelvin also shared some exciting news about his friend and our classmate Pankaj Dugar. While Pankaj has had numerous impressive tech accomplishments, he is more recently known as the father to future Dartmouth class of 2025 superstar Akhand. Welcome to Dartmouth, Akhand! As Pankaj is used to handling big things, as evidenced in his prolific career in big data analytics, he will handle his son’s big move to the East Coast from their home in the San Francisco Bay Area with his usual aplomb.

As life ticks back to a new normal, many of us will be ushering in rather momentous birthdays during the coming year. Please keep me and your classmates posted on how you celebrate the big 5-0 and send your more ordinary news too. No news is too big or too small to share with your Dartmouth friends.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 03755; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, 94s! I have lots of news to report and not too many words to do it all justice. That’s enough preamble; let’s get straight to it!

Classmate Erika Katz adds to her media presence with an Instagram Live show. She continues to offer practical and purposeful parenting advice through TV appearances, write her multi-dimensional blog, and spotlight important moments and people who make those moments happen. Just a few months ago Erika interviewed fellow ’94 and New Yorker Dan Garodnick as a featured guest on her show. Dan served for 12 years as a New York City councilmember and now acts as president and CEO of the Riverside Park Conservancy. Dan’s love for his hometown of New York has led him to a career in service to his beloved city. Recently, he recounted the struggle to defeat America’s biggest real estate transaction and preserve middle-class communities in his former district. His book, Saving Stuyvesant Town: How One Community Defeated the Worst Real Estate Deal in History, was released this past April to five-star reviews on Amazon.

Ozy media has named Sonya Dyhrman as a “breakthrough scientist you need to know.” As yet another New Yorker, Sonya has been educating some of the finest minds at Columbia University (we all know where the very finest minds can be found), where she serves as a professor of earth and environmental sciences. As a marine biologist and microbiologist, she is pioneering work to decode the tiniest interactions in microbes and understand their significant ramifications on the global food chain. She shares her passion for marine life and the entire oceanic food chain with younger students through her development of ocean science literacy initiatives for physical and virtual classrooms.

As a final news bit, I may have accidentally tricked a more modest classmate into providing an update. Brigid Pasulka spent years living and traveling in Europe before moving back to Illinois and settling into a career in writing, as both a teacher and a novelist. For the past 11 years Brigid has been running a writing center at a magnet high school in downtown Chicago. She helps hundreds of students draft and polish their personal essays for college applications. She has even offered to provide advice to any classmates or classmates’ children who might want some guidance in the college essay writing process, an offer that comes at the perfect time for those who have rising high school seniors. Brigid has used her experiences living throughout eastern Europe in her novels. As a sneak peak, her forthcoming novel is set in 1980s East Germany; her next project will be about the underground in a Soviet-controlled Ukraine.

Happy summer to you! I’ll be waiting for your update!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 03755; lauradavis723@mac.com

A little birdie told me about a bird enthusiast in our class. This nugget of news from an unnamed classmate led me on an online gawking tour of some of the most beautiful wildlife photography I’ve had the privilege to see. Classmate Paul Morf may not have started photographing birds and other animals as art; in fact, he simply snapped photos of birds and insects as a reference so he could identify them later. However, these newly discovered talents in photography, as well as his deliberate efforts to focus deeper onto his subjects, morphed (yep, I went there) into a passion for capturing everything from the extraordinary species in the Galapagos to ordinary migrations of birds. On his website he notes that nature photography is “transformative” because its expression is interactive and alters the artists as well as the viewer. While Paul still views himself as a “hobbyist,” you will appreciate his artistry. Although I didn’t hear about this news from Paul, I hope he will share any news from his home in Ely, Iowa. Check out his website at Morfsylvania.com.

Mark Giordono shared an update from life in 2020 as, like many of us, his professional and personal life blurred and mutated over the past year. Mark is featured in a recent business article, where he discusses how he used his various life experiences to adapt in the work-from-home science experiment as vice president of development and alumni relations at the nonprofit For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology (FIRST).

If any of you have children involved in the FIRST Lego League or FIRST Robotics competitions, you’re familiar with the widespread, STEM opportunities that FIRST provides for extracurricular exploration for students. Throughout this past year, in improvised workspaces and remote learning, Mark was uniquely positioned as a male executive in a primarily female organization to view and approach the organization’s mission. Seeing his coworkers as caregivers as well as professionals gave him new insights.

A self-described “bleeding-heart do-gooder,” Mark has a heart for service, as exemplified in his Peace Corps work in western Africa. Additionally, after graduating from MIT’s Sloan School of Management, Mark has worked in both the private and public sector. Mark lives in the beautiful college town of Corvallis, Oregon, with his wife and three children.

That’s all the news. Please send me an update for the next column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 03755; lauradavis723@mac.com

When I’m looking for more class news for our class column, I can always rely on our class president Deme Navab Taleghani for an update. I’m glad I asked this go-around—or our Class Notes section would be empty! The National Herald, a weekly Greek-American publication, recently featured Deme in a lengthy article about her upbringing in Iran and then in the United States as a Greek-Iranian immigrant, her work as a financial journalist and budding author, and the importance she places on family and civic responsibility. No doubt delighting the College alumni relations department, Deme speaks of her Dartmouth experience in glowing terms and of her continued devotion and service to our beloved College. The feature is a riveting read, and I’m surprised how much I learned about Deme even after knowing her for many years. I highly recommend it.

Please send me your news for our next class column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Ln, Brentwood, TN 03755; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, fellow classmates. As we look ahead to a new year, I posed the following question on the “Dartmouth College Class of 1994” Facebook page: What do you plan to do in 2021 when Covid is no longer a limiting factor?

More than 25 classmates chimed in with variations of “We want to be around people!” As Aleise McCann Matheson writes,she wants to “have friends over. Lots. All the time.” We are looking forward to visiting family and traveling freely. We miss live music and movie theaters, and we especially miss enjoying these moments with each other. If you missed the Facebook postings, here’s a recap of your classmates’ plans for 2021.

Tony Lee keeps it simple and heartfelt with plans to visit family and Dartmouth friends. Katherine Zalios Maguire will take her children to Florida and Greece to reconnect with family. Debra Hofferman Brandt plans to reinstate weekly family dinners with her parents.

Shannon M. Sullivan mentions travel abroad—her family plans to “actually use our passports” to connect with extended family and friends in person. Lots of us want new stamps in our passports, too. Julia Caputo Stift wants to see her son living in Canada, Kathleen de Riesthal wants to connect with her husband’s family in Spain, and Nina Cook Silitch wants to “get back to the Alps—my old stomping grounds.” Colleen Linehan Haskell and Kelly Bell Lytle should book seats together, because they’ll go anywhere in Europe.

Jordan Frank looks forward to the good old days of going to a movie theater. Remember that? It seems like ages since we’ve shared popcorn, let alone air, with other cinephiles. Others miss live performing arts, from Broadway shows to their children’s school choral concerts. Aleise McCann Mathesoncan’t wait for her daughter’s show choir performances and competitions; she is even willing to chaperone the group on a chartered bus trip.

Katy Hayes wants to go out to dinner with family and friends beyond the shadow of a pandemic. I concur because I don’t want to wash any more dishes. Kelly Lytle mentions lingering over good drinks and conversation at a cocktail bar, an activity that gets an “amen” from many corners of our class. While my husband, Ken Davis, never goes on Facebook, if he even has an account, I know he would choose to go to the Nashville Whiskey Festival, which is lively, crowded, and delicious.

We have some classmates who still love the sweaty dancefloors and miss the mosh pits. In 2021 Ian Cameron will be heading to an “awful bar in Williamsburg or Bushwick” for late-night dancing, along with other movers-and-shakers Alison LeBoeuf, Maggie Lockwood, and Shannon Sullivan.

The fitness aficionados are looking forward to big races and opportunities to be out in nature. Ruth Maria Marmaril wants to “surf warm, turquoise waters with people who don’t speak the same first language.” Kristin Grosser Tufo, Charis Connell Taylor,and Nina Cook Silitch are looking forward to running—anything from 5ks to qualifying for the Boston marathon. Mike McClure has his sight set on a half-iron man competition.

Our class feedback wouldn’t be complete without a nod to the place common in all of our heart, and this time our classmates are looking forward to visiting Dartmouth as parents. Gates Bryant would like to go to a fall parents’ weekend in Hanover to visit his son and Kelly Lytle is up for a trip to visit her son, Richard. Sara Bone Dyett wants to see her son, Jack, “play Big Green football.”

The written and unwritten wishes and intentions for 2021 are numerous and ambitious, but I am ever hopeful that by 2022 we’ll have collectively checked these adventures off an inspired, metaphoric to-do list. Send me an update on your progress for the next column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 03755; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, class of ’94. I hope this newsletter finds you well—well, as well as can be expected (sigh). Depending on where you live, you may be working from home or masked-up in a 50-percent-capacity office. You may have children learning virtually or going into school, also masked-up in a 50-percent capacity. Whatever is swirling in your world right now, it probably doesn’t feel normal. A year ago phrases such as “masked-up,” “50-percent capacity,” “hybrid-learning model,” “toilet paper shortage,” “quarantine vs. isolation vs. exposure,” and “Zoom-Zoom-Zoom” weren’t even in our vocabulary, much less our Class Notes!

As I wind down the final days of summer and pen this article, I am indeed masked-up, functioning at 50-percent capacity, in some vague hybrid shell of myself, feeling a need to hoard paper products from the grocery, and completely and thoroughly Zoom-fatigued. Absolutely, things are better—and hope they are with you as well—but I just miss seeing dear, dear friends from Dartmouth!

While Zoom fatigue is real, it’s still the lifeline that keeps businesses, family, and friends connected. After imploring my husband, Ken Davis, to appeal to his fraternity brothers for news, blessedly, a couple took pity and shared their news from their corners of this bizarre, altered world.

I heard from Tom Boldt, who lives in Santa Monica, California, with his wife, Alanna, and beautiful, 5-year-old daughter Caia, “the Etruscan goddess of women and the hearth.” Other than “sanitizing surfaces like we’re suffering from OCD,” he reports that he and Alanna are still practicing acupuncture and Asian medicine. Tom writes, “I hope you can include one of my favorite parts of quarantine, which has been reconnecting with the Alpha Chi Alpha ’94s—your hubby included. I’m sure he’s told you all about it, but it really has been special. Talking with these guys has reminded me of why we were friends 26 years ago.”

Have you heard about Tony Lee’s and Alison LeBouef’sachievements on behalf of the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society (LLS)? These two impressive classmates and longtime friends have raised an amazing $272,416 in just 10 weeks for the LLS, setting a new Arizona state record. For the past nine years they’ve been volunteering for this great cause, largely in honor and memory of Greg Ferris. The importance of the LLS mission hit closer to home for Tony when his daughter, Sophie, was diagnosed with myelodysplastic syndrome in 2015 and underwent treatment. Five years later, Sophie is well, Tony serves as the chair of the LLS board of trustees Arizona chapter, and he was named its Man of the Year 2020. This year 30 classmates contributed to Tony’s LLS campaign. If you’d like to learn more about LLS, reach out to Tony or Alison.

The Arthur L. Irving Institute for Energy and Society at Dartmouth recently announced the newest member of its advisory board as none other than classmate David Yeh. Since graduating from the College as a double major in biology and Asian studies, David has been making a lasting footprint in global finance, innovation, and the Obama White House. Today David is a managing director at 3x5 Partners, a top-quartile venture capital firm investing in health and environmental solutions. In Dartmouth’s press release regarding his recent appointment, David said, “My four years at the Big Green set me on my path to be an environmentalist, public servant, and investor. I am honored to return 26 years later to help fight the existential challenge of our time, the climate crisis, by advancing affordable and sustainable energy for all.” You’re making us proud, and we’re excited to hear about your next undertaking!

Please send me updates and news to share in the next column. Be well.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, class of ’94. I have two bits of exciting news to share with you. During the past few months good things have still been happening beneath the overriding arc of alarming headlines, and I’m happy to share them with you below.

Pam Kunz has recently moved into a new leadership role at Yale School of Medicine as the leader of gastrointestinal cancer programs. This new position brings Pam and her family to New Haven, Connecticut, from the Palo Alto area in California. Pam joins the Yale team from Stanford University School of Medicine, where she has served as the director of the Stanford neuroendocrine tumor program and leader of the endocrine research group. Prior to both completing her clinical and research fellowship in medical oncology and serving as chief resident in internal medicine at Stanford University, she graduated from Dartmouth Medical School in 2001. Pam’s professional accomplishments are impressive, but I will always remember Pam’s supportive ear and warm smile for her many friends and fellow Tri-Delts. Congratulations and welcome back to the East Coast, Pam!

Congratulations also go out to Elizabeth Cook Donohue,who was inducted into Dartmouth’s Stephen F. Mandel ’52 Society in April. For those of you not familiar with this honor, the Stephen F. Mandel ’52 Society recognizes alumni volunteers who provide distinguished service and visionary leadership for the Dartmouth College Fund. As many of you know, Beth has been an active Dartmouth volunteer for years and an extraordinary class fundraising leader. As a class, we are fortunate to have Beth in this position! Year after year she is constantly willing to serve; she generously gives her time, heart, and energy to the College on behalf of her classmates; and she demonstrates her savvy abilities by meeting and exceeding lofty goals set by the Dartmouth College Fund. Beth deserves the College’s recent recognition and honor, as well as our class’ thanks! Cheers to Beth!

Please send me updates and news to share in the next column.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Greetings, fellow classmates, from one shelter-in-place home to another. I hardly know what to write in a column such as this one, especially since I’m writing it in April, but you won’t see it until the end of June. Who knows what will happen during a two-month period, and I’m certainly not going to hazard a guess. For the past six weeks I’ve been hunkering down in the greater Nashville area, following the news, thinking about friends, and reevaluating the importance of community support.

The value we place on community is one thing that most Dartmouth alumni have in common. The strength and dynamism of our community remain top reasons students choose Dartmouth over other fine colleges and universities. Even in the midst of this crisis, we still find ways to connect to this strong community in ways we didn’t imagine when we were new arrivals in Hanover back in September 1990.

Like many of you, Zoom has become a lifeline and necessity in work and fun. Just yesterday I connected with classmates Elissa Slovik Gaies, Marlyse Haward, Kelly Bell Lytle, Lorien Albala Somier, Gwin Pitman Teasdale,and Anne Jeffers Weber. My husband, Ken Davis, meets up for Wednesday Alpha Chi meetings, albeit virtually and 30 years later. There will be 10 to 20 brothers checking in with smiles and stories from all over the country, but I’ve yet to hear the promised singing from the boisterous crew. Ken confessed that, while he loves catching up with these guys, my friends’ conversations seem more intellectual and insightful. My response was, “Well, naturally.” (This is an invitation for a rebuttal!)

Seriously though, it’s easy to make time for a quick virtual happy hour in lockdown, but I am increasingly thankful for the energizing and hopeful connections and the solidarity of my Dartmouth community. I’d love to hear stories about how you are connecting with Dartmouth friends and groups during these weeks and months. I know some of you have time to share a story or two with me.

Stay safe, stay well, and stay connected to your Dartmouth friends.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

At this stage in life, many of us are moving beyond the weekend jetsetter persona or sticky-hands phase of life and settling into a more permanent place and reclaiming-space-from-plastic-toys phase. Luckily, beautiful magazines and Pinterest boards provide easy inspiration for home projects. Fellow classmates also provide vision, with their experiences and professional work. Jill Porter recently renovated the Adirondack home of classmate Catherine Ross Haskins. Catherine and husband Taylor Haskins own a beautiful home on picturesque Lake Champlain.

After graduating from Dartmouth Jill went on to earn a master’s in architecture at Harvard University in 2000. She also studied at the New York Studio School of Drawing, Painting & Sculpture. Jill’s works run the gamut from modern residential to large-scale urban planning projects. See Catherine’s home and Jill’s finished product featured on Dwell.com.

That’s all I have. Want more news and updates? Then, send me yours!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, class of ’94. Let’s jump right into three nuggets of news.

This past year, Harvard University Press published the newest book by classmate Sarah E. Wagner. The book, What Remains: Bringing America’s Missing Home from the Vietnam War, has been part of Sarah’s life for more than a decade, with her research beginning back in 2008. According to the publisher, Sarah worked “closely with veterans, members of the military, policy makers, and forensic scientists, as well as families and loved ones of the missing.” Through the portraits of several veterans and their families, as well as the work of forensic scientists seeking to identify remains, Wagner explores the ongoing toll of the Vietnam War.

At heart, Sarah is a social anthropologist who is nothing short of an expert in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the United States, and the effects of war. Her interests and expertise have guided her throughout her career, which includes earning a Ph.D. at Harvard University, beginning in her current position as an associate professor of anthropology at George Washington University, and, of course, tackling her research and writing on important and weighty cultural issues.

Suzie Fromer sends an update of her latest endeavors, many of which are rifts on interests from her Dartmouth days. She writes, “I’ve actually recently returned to jewelry making after a long hiatus; back at Dartmouth I worked for four years as a student teaching assistant in the Clafin jewelry studio in the basement of the Hop. Pretty sure I’m not allowed to have an acetylene torch in the house, so I’ve gotten into beading as a less risky jewelry endeavor, and I’ve recently even opened up my own Etsy shop, LittleHookCo, www.etsy.com/shop/LittleHookCo.”

Suzie’s update includes so many projects and causes that I feel shamed by my own lazy life! She has crafted a line of awareness jewelry pieces for causes such as food allergies and autism pride; volunteers at a local repair café, where her free repairs keep things out of the landfills; chairs the board of the Irvington, New York, farmers market; and helps organize sustainability initiatives with action, such as compost collection and carting. What is she not doing? She is no longer writing this column bimonthly (which she did faithfully for 10 years)!

I received an update from our class contact at Dartmouth Alumni Magazine with exciting news about Matthew Zavod. After serenading the throngs as a member of the Dartmouth Aires, Matt studied medicine at Thomas Jefferson University. Now Matt is not only a practicing otolaryngologist and plastic surgeon in Woodland, California, but also a children’s book author. Dr. Ridiculopickulopot and the Shot by our very own Doc Zavod was published in October 2019. The book helps ease the anxiety of the dreaded “shot visit” that parents and young patients know all too well. Matt uses the humorous story to relieve children’s trepidations by showing them that doctors and shots need not be feared. Congratulations on the adorable and helpful book, Matt.

Now that a new year and decade are solidly underway, I invite you to share a brief overview of the past decade or even the anticipated events of the next decade. Either way, aim for a several-sentence snapshot of life, longer than a tweet but shorter than a soapbox Facebook tirade. Send them to me, and we’ll all enjoy reading the news in the next iteration of Class Notes.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Happy new year, class of ’94!

I received one piece of alumni news from the College, about classmate Randall Akee. In a recent article on the College website, Randall is featured as a one-time liberal arts undergrad who has gone on to make his mark as an influential faculty member of color. Randall is an associate professor at the University of California, Los Angeles in the department of public policy and American Indian studies, and he is currently spending the year at the Brookings Institution in Washington, D.C., as a fellow in economic studies.

Randall has had a distinctive career, one that showcases the interdisciplinary nature of a liberal arts education, such as he received at Dartmouth. After graduating Randall worked on several American Indian reservations and with Canadian First Nations and Pacific Island nations and he worked in economic development for the state of Hawaii. He has conducted extensive research on the political and economic factors affecting race and ethnic mobility and education attainment. Additionally, he has taught students in the classroom, sharing his insights and encouraging deepened thinking.

He completed his Ph.D. at Harvard University in June 2006. Prior to his doctoral studies Randall earned a master’s in international and development economics at Yale University.

If you’d like to read more about Randall, you will find the article about him and other Dartmouth alumni who are now influential faculty of color at various universities around the country at https://sites.dartmouth.edu/alumnisymposium/alumni-bios.

Please send your updates to me. I need your news!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Fall is in full swing, both in Hanover with students settled into the life and rhythms of the trimester and in our hometowns across the globe. This fall is my first back in the South in almost 20 years. While I am enjoying it tremendously, it doesn’t quite meet the quintessential autumn ideal of Hanover in October. You can’t beat Hanover’s colors, the brisk morning air on your way to “the 9” that was way too early (why did you sign up for that one again?), the games on Saturday at Memorial Field, the sounds of the band having a blast (no pun intended) and boosting Big Green spirit, the feel of oversized Dartmouth sweatshirts, the smells of a blazing bonfire, and the early darkness of shortening days. Fall is absolutely the best term in Hanover. If you have a different opinion, please share it with me. I’d love to include some of your memories and insights in seasonally appropriate submissions.

Classmate Thatcher Wine continues his pursuit of his passion of reading, books, and libraries as the founder of Juniper Books (for more on him, see page 60). Thatcher writes, “The Dartmouth libraries feature very prominently in my path to becoming a bookseller and library designer.” And now Thatcher is adding “author” to his illustrative entrepreneurial career with his first book, For the Love of Books. Thatcher’s work during the past two decades has made his library designs and beautiful book binding the envy of any bibliophile and made covetable gift lists in many magazines, such as Oprah, Elle, and Vanity Fair. Perhaps a wish list item of your own for this year?

I also received an update from Eden Abram, whose lifelong love of animals led her to St. Augustine, Florida. Anyone who knows Eden remembers her talent as an equestrian and lover of all animals. I remember visiting her Wisconsin home and seeing her ease with farm animals and her beloved dogs alike. After several years at Berkeley and about 15 years in New Hampshire, Eden and her husband, Jethro, moved to St. Augustine, where they run Another Chance Ranch along with Eden’s parents, Pam and Steve Abram ’66. Their farm sanctuary specializes in senior and disabled dogs and any abused, neglected, or exploited domestic animals. You can follow Eden’s worthwhile efforts on social media or through www.anotherchanceranch.org.

I close with the sad news of George Kim’sdeath in May of this year. George was a member of Alpha Chi Alpha and was rarely seen without his cheese lid. I remember spending lots of time with George in his Mid-Mass dorm room during Sophomore Summer, when he was roommates with my now husband, Ken Davis. While at Dartmouth George enjoyed his foreign study program experience, double-majored in history and economics, earned the distinction of Presidential Scholar, and dabbled in the Robert Burns Society.

George is survived by his wife, Montserrat, and daughters Kerala and Nola. Montse is collecting stories about George—all kinds of stories, older or newer, meaningful or routine, funny or sad, wholesome or even the not-so-much—to share with her children as they grow older. Would you please take a few minutes to share these? I will gladly facilitate the connection.

I continue to look in my inbox for your updates with a little trepidation, a lot of anticipation, and always elation. Please send them!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

This class column comes to you on the heels of our 25th class reunion in Hanover. By all accounts it was a blast, full of quality time with dear friends and big fun with the larger groups on the Green. Class president Deme Navab Taleghani sends this update after the weekend: “We had a record-breaking 300 classmates make it back to Hanover to celebrate our 25th reunion. People traveled from all over to be a part of this incredible weekend. Classmates reconnected with old friends and made some new connections, and we were reminded just how magnificent Dartmouth is and what a special place it holds in all our lives. Thanks to the dedication of the reunion planning committee, which was led by dynamic duo Jen Susie Hagelston and Samantha Stoddard and included Shelia Bassiri Ahmed, Jordan Stern, Kristin Siuda Rosenbaum, Christina Dowding Nicholas, and Catherine Adams Stanzler. Their contributions made this the best reunion yet. Thank you, Jen and Sam, for an incredible and action-packed weekend. We appreciate and value your determined work and service to the College.

“We had two riveting ’94 panels: the writers’ panel, which included Christine Carter, Brigid Pasulka, Jonathan Good, and Lisa Kocian, and the entrepreneurs’ panel, which included Alison Andrew Reyes, Lisa Cloitre, Steven Norall, and Trevor Burgess. Our class dinner on Baker lawn was magical, only superseded by the culminating celebration with the Dartmouth Idol all-stars and spectacular fireworks. We capped off the evening dancing and rocking it out on the dance floor until the wee hours of the morning. Thank you all for making this weekend unforgettable. We missed all those who couldn’t make it back but look forward to seeing everyone at our 30th reunion in 2024.”

In other class news, the American Academy of Microbiology elected Sonya Dyhrman as a new fellow in the prestigious and oldest life science organization. After graduating from Dartmouth she earned her Ph.D. in marine biology from Scripps Institution of Oceanography. She now serves as a microbial oceanographer at Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory and as an associate professor at Columbia University.

Please send your stories from reunion and updates of summer fun. Also take a minute to check out our class Facebook page; there are some fantastic pictures from reunion you’ll want to see!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

As our reunion approaches, I write this update, knowing that by the time you hold the Dartmouth Alumni Magazine in your hands you will have been to campus, visited your favorite old stomping grounds, caught up with old friends, and shared new connections. Please tell me the highlights of your time in Hanover! What stories can you share from the long weekend? We want to relive the nostalgic and happy reunion through your anecdotes and news through the coming months.

Sadly, the only news I have received is not welcomed news, but nonetheless you should know of the death of fellow classmate Christine Susie Wu. Tina, to friends, embraced the granite and mountains of New Hampshire from her own Smoky Mountain hometown of Knoxville, Tennessee. After earning her undergraduate degree, she returned to her roots and eventually to her hometown to earn her Ph.D. in psychology in 2006 from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. She became a beloved professor, described by students as “the best” and “an all-time favorite” on a school Facebook page. After a lengthy battle with cancer, she passed away in February. Surviving Tina are her beautiful son, Benjamin, husband Paul LeBel, sister, brother-in-law, and parents.

I invite you to share memories of Tina with me so I can include them in the next column and on our class Facebook page.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Do you remember walking across the Green on a beautiful late spring day and seeing alumni run into each other? They would stop right there, hug and back-slap, and make up for lost time. Their huge smiles, wise eyes, and expressive faces hinted at their rich, interesting, and much-lived experiences. Their smile lines, gray hair, and class-of-60-something nametags screamed that they had graduated a few decades earlier. They looked happy to be home, they looked full of stories, and they looked old. Well, friends, we are the new set of old folks about to descend upon campus with our own connections to make and stories to tell. I can’t wait to see all of you old hags in just a couple of weeks at our epic reunion.

Class president Deme Navab Taleghani sends this update: “Please join us for our 25th reunion up in Hanover from Thursday, June 13, to Sunday, June 16. If you haven’t registered yet, no problem. You can still register online at http://alumni.dartmouth.edu/reunions/class-1994 or in person at our class tent when you arrive.

“Reunion highlights will include a private group tour of the newly renovated Hood Museum just for ’94s, an architectural walking tour of campus, navigating college admissions workshop for families, and panels featuring ’94 artists, writers, and entrepreneurs. We will cap off an amazing weekend with a class dinner on Baker lawn for the 250th celebration of Dartmouth.”

Not only is there time to register for reunion, but there is also time to contribute to our class gift. Every single gift, no matter the size, is a vote of confidence for the education we received and the experience we value. Our gift will support financial aid for Dartmouth students and support Dartmouth’s continued commitment to enroll brilliant students, talented athletes, visionary entrepreneurs, gifted artists and humanists, bridge-builders and change-makers, regardless of their ability to pay tuition. Reunion head agent Beth Donohoe Cook shared that classmates have already contributed enough money to support more than 50 Dartmouth College Fund scholars at $50,000 each. How many more students can we support together with our gift before the end of reunion? If you’d like to make your commitment today, you can give at dartgo.org/D94.

In other news, I heard from Mike McClure. Mike and his wife, Valerie, are living the dream, as is their son, Ryan. Ryan will join the class of 2023 at Dartmouth! Mike writes, “It will be fun for me to relive my college years through Ryan’s eyes. Being the big skier that he is, it seemed that a nonnegotiable requirement in a college was that it owned its own ski mountain.”

Mike has lived in the Minneapolis area since graduating and has been at Verint Systems for close to 15 years, in sales of customer engagement solutions. His part-time “dad” jobs include shuttle driver to various sports practices and youth baseball coach for 13 straight years. Though he claims his win-loss record isn’t stellar, he earns points for showing up.

He shared bits about classmates as well. He met up with Deb Connell Nagorka last year when he was in Tampa, Florida, on business. They enjoyed reliving the glory days of working at Thayer Dining Hall. He caught up with his freshman-year, South-Mass neighbor Chris Greene in December. Chris even showed up for lunch wearing his ’94 jersey. Chris, please wear your jersey to reunion! I’m impressed that you have it and that it still fits!

As always, I welcome your news and updates.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hi, ’94s! As you look forward to longer, warmer days ahead, remember to mark your calendars for our 25th reunion at Dartmouth from June 13 to 16. You will be invited to register for our 25th reunion online, so please be on the lookout for a link coming to you soon!

In the meantime, if you are still interested in contributing your time, talents, and resources to our class and the College, we welcome your input! Please contact our class president Deme Navab Taleghani or me if you would like to join the planning committee.

I have only received one bit of class news, but it is good news to share. The Jewish Sports Heritage Association (JSHA) is honoring Jay Fiedler with its first annual Lifetime Achievement Award. In the JSHA press release, we are reminded that, after Jay’s record-setting career at Dartmouth, he went on to play 10 seasons in the NFL, many of those years with the Miami Dolphins. The JSHA notes that one of its goals is to ensure that “the deeds of the past shall inspire the achievements of the future.” With his academic achievement, personal character, and on-field accomplishments, Jay is an inspiration to all aspiring young student-athletes. Congratulations on the well-deserved honor!

The next update will come to you in two months from my new hometown. As I type, my family is moving from Pennsylvania to Tennessee. My husband, Ken Davis, and I would love to see you in Nashville, Tennessee, whether you’re there to give your music career one more shot or just enjoying the fun with family and friends. Y’all let me know if you’re in town, and don’t forget to send me your news to share with classmates!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 520 Meadowlark Lane, Brentwood, TN 37027; lauradavis723@mac.com

In just more than six months we will meet in Hanover to celebrate and reminisce about our years at Dartmouth College. If you haven’t marked your calendar, stop here! Pick up your device of choice and block out June 13-16 on your calendar. We want you to be part of our 25th reunion!

Now that you have appropriately saved the date, there is still a lot that needs to happen during the next six months. A snow-covered campus needs to thaw and burst with shades of green; days need to lengthen so we can linger under our class tent; you need to contact your friends and make a plan to meet up in June; and you need to register for reunion! Registration will be online later this winter and early spring. You will be invited to link to the registration page electronically.

Reunion co-chairs Jen Susie Hagelston and Samantha Stoddard welcome your help and input in planning day or evening events. If you are interested in volunteering, contact me or class president Deme Navab Taleghani at demetra.taleghani@gmail.com. During our reunion we will also vote on a new slate of class officers. Anyone interested in a position and to find out about exciting ways to re-engage with fellow classmates, other Dartmouth grads, as well as the College, reach out to Deme for more information.

During the next six months you can work on sharpening memory recall with a class-favorite challenge, Flashback Fridays. Deme will continue sending these fun, adorable, and somewhat regrettable pictures of classmates through email on Fridays. If you are not receiving these and would like to, please let me know so you can be added to the class list.

Are you too excited to wait until June to reconnect? You’re in luck! We have several mini-reunions planned for 2019 in various cities, such as Miami, San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, and Boston. As the exact locations and dates are finalized, we will share them with you through email and Facebook. If you would like to plan a mini-reunion in your city, please contact Catherine Adams Stanzler at catherine@stanzler.net. She will help you make that happen.

If you like the friendly competition of Flashback Fridays and don’t want to wait until June, then you are going to like this new challenge. Class leaders are running another competition for the person who attends the most mini-reunions leading up to our 25th reunion in Hanover in June. The rules are straightforward. You must send Deme or Catherine a photo from each of the mini-reunions you attend. The classmate who attends the most mini-reunions will win the grand prize of (drum roll) a free admission ticket to reunion and, perhaps more importantly, bragging rights.

Stay tuned for more updates and news in two months.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Congratulations to Kate Novack on her documentary film! Kate directed and produced The Gospel According to André, whichmade its debut at the Toronto International Film Festival last year and opened nationwide in May. Her film tells the emotional story of tastemaker André Leon Talley, a black man who grew up in a segregated Southern community where he would have been the last person expected to set fashion standards for women across the country and world. Yet Talley’s influence in style at Women’s Wear Daily, W,and Vogue magazines made him an unexpected trendsetter and a prominent voice and editor in magazine publishing. Kate captures Talley’s legendary persona and captivates her audience with impeccable storytelling pace. Can you tell I liked it? The film is available to stream through several services.

I caught up with Christie Cameron Zawtocki after I heard she had been honored by the Charlotte Business Journal as a “women in business” award recipient. The business journal recognizes 25 women who have made a difference in their workplaces and are blazing trails for other women. Christie shares that she is currently a principal engineer and shareholder at Hart & Hickman, the largest environmental consulting firm in Charlotte, North Carolina. She writes, “I’ve been living in Charlotte for the past 12 years with my husband, Geoffrey Zawtocki, who works in the commercial real estate industry. We have two amazing kids, Stephanie (13) and Jason (12), who keep us busy with their many school activities and sports. Stephanie is a passionate soccer player (following in her father’s footsteps) and Jason is an avid golf player with dreams of playing on the PGA tour one day.” Perhaps Dartmouth will consider recruiting early, early, early decision students for the golf and soccer teams?

I’ve also received more news from screenwriter Jana Friedman Brown on her film project, The Divide. The independent drama-Western has been enjoying a successful festival run. It earned distinctions, accolades, and honors at the Albuquerque Film & Music Experience, Illinois International Film Festival, and WorldFest-Houston for best feature film. Actors Luke Colombero and Perry King both won awards for acting in a crowded field of independent films. With all the recognition her film is receiving, Jana modestly writes, “I am most proud of the support the film is getting from the Alzheimer’s Association. The Divide is the story of an aging rancher suffering from the onset of Alzheimer’s and trying to reconcile with his past and with his estranged daughter.” The Divide will continue its festival run in the fall. Visit www.thedividemotionpicture.com to find news and information on future screenings in your area.

That’s all the news for this issue of Dartmouth Alumni Magazine. The next issue could feature you as we move toward our 25th reunion in less than a year. Just send me a note, and you’re in!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

No matter how many years pass since we graduated from college (almost 25, but who’s counting?), I still regard the year on a school calendar rather than the traditional calendar. Maybe it’s my constant craving for summer vacation, maybe it’s keeping the master calendar for my family with school-aged kids, but regardless, August feels likes an ending, and September feels like a fresh start.

What “fresh start” lies ahead of you? Consider sending me your news, as you read through the updates of your classmates below.

Len Mead is sporting a new job these days. He reports: “After seven years managing the content at Comcast SportsNet New England (home of the Celtics among other things), I had the opportunity to shift west and become general manager of NBC Sports Northwest (home of the Trail Blazers among other things). My wife, Amanda MacMillan ’95, and three kids are still in Littleton, Massachusetts, and I’m doing the world’s worst commute. I fly home to Massachusetts most weekends, then hop on an early Monday morning flight out to Portland, Oregon.”

As long as Len is making that commute, he is making the most of his time on the West Coast and is catching up with a few Dartmouth alums. He hosted Jeff Buehler at a Blazers’ game, and he spent a weekend in Seattle with long-time friend Mike Gardner and his wife, Jenn, and their two children. Calling other West Coasters? Reach out to Len!

Honor Sachs shares her own westbound story. Honor writes, “Well, everything is signed, and the ink is just about dry, so I think it’s safe to share my news: After five wonderful years with an amazing faculty here at West Carolina University, I am moving on. In the fall I’ll be joining the history faculty at the University of Colorado, Boulder. It will not be easy to leave my WCU colleagues, who are among the hardest working people I’ve ever had the privilege of working with. But I am also excited to join a new group of incredible scholars at Boulder. I will be in North Carolina one more year as a fellow at the National Humanities Center before I head out west. Life came at me fast this year, and I am excited and grateful to have a year off to finally write this long-gestating Coleman family book and to embark on a new professional adventure. Thanks to all who helped along the way!” We are looking forward to reading about your next chapter—both literally in your next book and figuratively in a future update in our Class Notes.

Matt Feeley sends news of his interesting and recent career change. After 16 years in private law practice, he has accepted the appointment to serve as an assistant U.S. attorney in the Southern District of Florida. He writes, “I am assigned to investigate and prosecute healthcare fraud cases. As you might imagine, we have quite a bit of that in south Florida. I would be happy to connect with any classmates who might find themselves passing through Miami.”

Keep the news coming!

Laura H. Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Welcome, summer! At last, long days, warm evenings, and refreshing cocktails on the porch are here after the lingering, drab winter. As you read this picture yourself back at Dartmouth, on the Green, throwing a Frisbee, walking Rip Road, recounting memories with a roommate in front of Mass Row, and reconnecting with old friends under our class tent. One year from now we will be celebrating our 25th reunion doing these very things!

In a quick message from class president Deme Navab Taleghani, she says, “Start saving airline miles and bring the whole family. The 25th reunion is just us, like Sophomore Summer. Reunion co-chairs will be the dynamic duo of Jen Suhie Hagelston and Samantha Stoddard. In order to make this reunion special and spectacular, we need volunteers to help out on the reunion committee. The more the merrier. Also, since it’s a reunion year, we need to vote on a new slate of class officers. Anyone interested in a position and to find out about exciting ways to re-engage with fellow classmates, other Dartmouth grads, as well as the College, please contact Deme at demetra.taleghani@gmail.com.”

I heard some news from the City of Brotherly Love that Dartmouth’s own Dana J. Ash has been named the head of the 70-attorney products liability and toxic torts practice division at Duane Morris LLP. In Dana’s road to big-time attorney in Philadelphia, he attained his law degree from the University of Pennsylvania. He has extensive experience in the medicolegal world and has represented clients in state and federal courts across the country. Congratulations, Dana!

Across the country another classmate is making a name for herself in the courtroom. Amy Candido attended the University of Chicago Law School after Dartmouth. Eventually, she “settled” (no pun intended) in San Francisco, where she practices patent and intellectual property law as a partner at Quinn Emanuel Urquhart & Sullivan LLP. Quite the superstar, she has litigated numerous high-profile technology lawsuits across the country, representing both plaintiff and defendant. Maybe you’ve heard about the complex case regarding Waymo, Uber, and self-driving cars? Amy is intimately involved. Legal magazines have named Amy one of the nation’s five top “Intellectual Property Rising Stars” and one of the top 100 women litigators in California.

I received an update from Jana Friedman Brown, and I wanted to share her exciting, splashy news. Jana shares that after seven years of hard work, she is finally seeing her first screenplay come to life on the big screen. She provided this blurb: “The film I wrote, The Divide, has so far been made an official selection of Worldfest-Houston, the Arizona International Film Festival, and the Albuquerque Film & Music Experience. The Divide also earned honors for best Western and best first-time screenwriter from the Los Angeles Film Awards. I have worked with director/actor Perry King to make The Divide a reality. Set in northern California, the film tells the story of Sam Kincaid (“King”), an aging rancher with a failing memory, his estranged and independent-minded daughter, Sarah, and Luke, a migrant ranch hand who finds himself in the midst of a family in crisis. For more, visit www.thedividemotionpicture.com.”

When I asked Jana what’s next for her, she added, “I have another screenplay in development and am working on editing my first novel.” Best of luck to you, Jana!

Keep the news coming!

Laura H. Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Our reunion committee is coming together! Class president Deme Navab Taleghani sends this message: “We have at the helm the amazing all-star, power team of Jen Suhie Hagelston as reunion president and Samantha Stoddard as reunion treasurer. Remember it’s just us at our 25th reunion from June 13-16, 2019. No other classes in our cluster. Solo mio. Sophomore Summer all over again. We need more people to join our committee to plan an amazing reunion.” After the last Class Notes, a few classmates have stepped forward to volunteer—thank you! Please consider being part of this pre-reunion reunion.

I heard from Heather Wick, and she sends an update of the blissful life in Vermont. After graduating from Albany Medical College in 1999, she began an anesthesia residency and completed a year of internship. As Heather puts it, “Working 120 hours a week was not for me, so I quit.”

After working for a contract research organization managing global clinical trials and then for a management consulting firm in the healthcare division, she moved back to Vermont to be near her family. Heather explains that finding a career niche and paying off medical school debt can take a while. Eventually, she became a recruiter in the healthcare industry, working on a nationwide basis. She writes, “I have been doing this for six years now and own my own company. I have two employees and couldn’t be happier. We focus on executive-level positions in the long-term-care industry. Life in Vermont is great. I work from home so I have no commute. Even if I did, traffic is minimal.” Personally, I couldn’t be more impressed that Dartmouth helped provide the well-rounded, liberal arts education that served as a foundation for an impressive career that spanned medicine, business and human resources! And, no commute or 120-hour weeks? Sign me up!

A little birdie told me that Adam DeWitt was recently named president of GrubHub. Interestingly, GrubHub has announced its partnership with Taco Bell and KFC to provide delivery of these favorites, joining White Castle on the list. As with Heather Wick, Adam’s liberal arts education at Dartmouth and time in Hanover served as pivotal inspiration in his career. Apparently, EBAs’ midnight deliveries made a lasting impression. Every Alpha Chi Alpha brother is thanking you, Adam!

Another birdie passed on an update on Trevor Burgess. Since graduation his career has taken him from Monitor Co. to a lengthy stint executing initial public offerings at Morgan Stanley. After serving as the president and CEO of C1 Bank, he now acts as chairman of TRB Development, a diversified company that includes residential real estate development and consulting. In addition to his knowledge of financial markets, he is apparently quite a technological guru and holds four patents. He recently made financial headlines with a new venture into flood insurance through Neptune Flood. After spending about a year traveling much of the world with his husband and daughter, I bet Trevor has even more stories to share. Trevor, we hope to see you at reunion next year!

And, on that note, we come full circle, back to our reunion. Let me know if you will join our reunion committee, and please send updates and news about yourself (or your friends) to be featured in the next issue. Otherwise, I’ll be consulting the birdies for news!

Laura H. Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hello there, fellow classmates! As you move out of the winter doldrums with the first suggestions that sun and spring are imminent, please consider setting some time aside on April 4 to reconnect with Dartmouth and your favorite classmates. April 4 is the 94th day of the year and an opportune time to pause and reflect on Dartmouth and the people who have made its memory so special. And, in that vein, I invite you to consider joining our 25th reunion planning committee. It’s hard to believe that our reunion is coming up in just over a year. From personal experience, I can assure you that being part of the committee requires a modest time commitment, literally five to 10 hours during the course of the year. Here’s another baiting point: You can plan one aspect of the reunion—such as a dinner or afternoon family activity—with a fellow ’94 classmate, dividing the time commitment and using the planning as an excuse to connect with a good friend. For one of previous reunions, Kelly Bell Lytle and I planned an EBAs dinner and late-night snack. I spent more time talking with Kelly than actually required to make the arrangements with EBAs. Please consider this opportunity as a chance to reconnect and give back. If you are interested, reach out to me or Deme Navab Taleghani, our class president.

I heard from Johnny Jones, who writes, “I just want to say hello and wish everyone well! I am working in Maryland at a regional tutoring company, PrepMatters, as director of quality assurance. In 2015 I married Rachel MacKnight, BU ’99. Later that year she gave birth to our son, Zachary. Rachel is also a tutor and has contributed to the production of many of our organization’s materials.” Thank you for checking in, Johnny!

Adam Lipsius released a film in 2017 called Amy & Sophia, which was met with rave reviews at the Denver Film Festival this past year. This coming-of-age, fantasy drama tells the story of scarred teens, Amy and Sophia, who meet seemingly as opposites but help each other come to terms with their own abuse and loss. The film implements a new technique using watercolor animation, and this innovation creates a “visually stunning magical break-through” in Adam’s creation. For those of you who know Adam, it’s not surprising that he is pushing the envelope with his wit, heart and vision.

As you start making plans for this upcoming summer and possibly the holiday season, why not consider a trip back to New England to stay at the Von Trapp Family Lodge? CNN recently featured classmate Sam Von Trapp and his family’s Stowe, Vermont, resort. The resort just celebrated its 50th year of operation in January, and Sam has been instrumental in the resort’s modernization. If you visit the Von Trapp Family Lodge, you’ll not only be treated to the expected picturesque snow and skiing in winter, but also the unexpected summer mountain biking trails, glorious morning fog (that Maria herself enjoyed when she lived here) and the outstanding culinary options with a bierhall and farm-to-table, refined dining. 

Please send updates and news about yourself (or your friends) to be featured in the next issue.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

What an amazing comeback! Who doesn’t love a turnaround story, featuring a come-from-behind victory, and on Homecoming of all days? For those of you who weren’t in Hanover for the epic game, the Big Green was behind 21-0 against Yale at halftime. Our team fought back to a 28-27 victory and even scored a nail-biting touchdown in the last minute of the game. Of course, I immediately thought of our own victorious classmates, who led the football team to three consecutive Ivy League championships. These classmates made Saturdays in the fall a time to come together and develop a deepening sense of school spirit and pride—so thank you to our football-playing alumni!

One of my favorite memories from our first year at Dartmouth, aside from those home football games, is hanging out in the Richardson dorm with new friends and lounging in the halls hearing each other’s stories. Freshman year would not have been as memorable and meaningful without Malik Franklin. Arriving at Dartmouth from San Jose, California, Malik has now gone full circle and lives in the Bay Area in Oakland, California. After Dartmouth he pursued a career in banking and then earned his M.B.A. at Tuck. Now he has settled into life as a husband, a father to son Balin (age 12) and business owner of Northbridge Investments, a real estate investment and advisory firm. He still serves as a real estate venture partner for a local private equity firm and I’m sure he is still throwing the football around with his friends and Balin.

Jen Collins Cross is also a Bay Area resident, and she writes to let us know about her recently published book, Writing Ourselves Whole: Using the Power of Your Own Creativity to Recover and Heal from Sexual Trauma. Jen offers writing groups for sexual trauma survivors, and her book is based on works that have grown from these groups. Jen explains, “The book is a collection of essays and creative writing encouragements for sexual trauma survivors (and others!) who want to risk writing a different story for their lives.”

Jen’s book has received positive reviews from Eve Ensler, author of The Vagina Monologues, and Ellen Bass, poet and coauthor of The Courage to Heal, among others. Also of note is Jen’s recently published essay, “The Story of a Common Girl,” which speaks in part to her experiences at Dartmouth while still a victim of sexual abuse. Check it out!

Please continue to share your updates by emailing me at the address provided.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Welcome winter solstice and all that goes with it! Darker nights and slushy streets seem like a small price to pay for cozy sweaters, skiing and a new year. Here’s to happy and healthy holidays.

This issue of updates is a bit thin, but it’s still worth the quick read! I hear the news through a mutual friend that Steve Rebel welcomed a son to the family in the past several months. Congratulations and enjoy the little bugaboo!

I wanted to direct you to a “newish” initiative at Dartmouth called the Dartmouth Founders Project. The concept is simple: Entrepreneurs can plan to support the College through their future successes. In an era of technology-driven innovation, many of us are making a mark on the world through entrepreneurship and now our business determinations and prospective accomplishments can benefit the College we love.

Some of our classmates have been instrumental in the formation and growth of the Dartmouth Founders Project, and they are “founders” themselves—Matt Niehaus, Steve Norall, Alison Andrews Reyes and Jeff Yasuda. If you have questions about the initiative, these are some of the folks to ask.

And at the mention of Jeff Yasuda, you (and your teenage children) will find it interesting to learn that his company, Feed.fm, is making (sound) waves in the digital music market. In a recent Forbes article, his company is commended for finding a niche in promoting and marketing sales for both musicians and retailers through targeted playlists to match the retailers’ images. Have you ever been shopping with your teen at American Eagle? I have. And let me tell you, the music makes your children linger and, not surprisingly, you buy more the longer you are there. While Jeff’s ingenuity and analysis is much more complex and intentional, I can vouch for its effectiveness.

While our 25th reunion is still more than a year away, it’s not too early to mark the dates on your calendar: June 13-16, 2019. Plan to be there. Our class president Deme Navab Taleghani writes, “It’s just us, like Sophomore Summer, but better. No classes just pure fun. Start saving your air miles and plan. We are also looking for classmates to help out on the reunion committee.” Jeff, would you consider stepping in as our reunion DJ, mixing nostalgia with your savvy? Other interested classmates can contact Deme or me, and we’ll get the ball rolling.

Please send along news you have, and I’ll share it in the next issue. Thanks!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Greetings, fellow classmates and welcomed summer air! This winter our classmates have been busy with research, innovation and adventure.

Sarah Wagner is an associate professor of anthropology at George Washington University. As a social anthropologist who has brought together ethnographic studies, military research and forensic science, she is quick to offer kudos for her early inspiration. Sarah writes, “I credit Dartmouth’s classics professor James Tatum with opening my eyes to the possibilities of interdisciplinarity and to the themes of war and memory in his beautiful book, The Mourner’s Song.”

Sarah’s interesting and worthy work was awarded an acclaimed Guggenheim Fellowship this year. Sarah writes, “With the generous support from the Guggenheim Foundation and my university (George Washington University), I’ll be on leave next year, writing the book, tentatively titled Bringing Them Home: The Identification and Commemoration of Vietnam War MIAs. In 2012 I was fortunate enough to participate in a U.S. military recovery mission in Vietnam; the excavation resulted in the identification of two service members. The story of that recovery and what it has meant to surviving relatives and their larger community is central to the book, which seeks to explore how advances in forensic science affect modes of national remembrance.” Congratulations, Sarah!

Dan Popa has used his interdisciplinary Dartmouth studies during the past couple of decades to push innovation. As a professor at the University of Kentucky at Louisville and the head of Next Gen Systems, a robotics research group, Dan is developing an inspiring application of robotic technologies to improve quality of life for the world’s aging population. Dan describes these robots as “nursing assistants, helpers for nurses and patient sitters.” While not designed to replace nurses, the care-bots can literally sit with a patient, speak with the patient and complete simple tasks—such as taking blood pressure or grabbing a remote for the patient. Believe it or not, they can also snitch on a patient who is doing things he or she shouldn’t, such as getting out of bed. It is incredible that Dan’s care-bots could be available within the next decade in hospital settings. Then, who knows the implications and applications for home care? You may be ordering one for your mother or father from Lowe’s or Amazon as a birthday gift before our 35th reunion.

The last bit of news is one of the most harrowing winter stories I’ve heard. Tim Wetherill, who came to Dartmouth from Philadelphia, now lives in the Helena, Montana, area. That in and of itself is a harrowing winter story, but it doesn’t stop there. He and his 15-year-old son were enjoying a day of cross-country skiing when they were caught in an avalanche. The two were thrown, and luckily Tim’s son was “only” buried up to his chest and able to access his cell phone. As Tim explained in his email, “I suffered six broken ribs, a collapsed lung and a lacerated liver.” Leave it to a surgeon to be technical. In layman’s terms, they were just plain lucky to be alive! Tim leaves the story with a bit of a cliffhanger, writing, “still deciding if I’ll ever backcountry ski again.”

As you bask in the June sunshine, linger in the longer days and read these interesting bimonthly morsels of news from friends, I hope you’re motivated to share your own tidbits with our class. Drop me an email and I’ll include your update in the next issue.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

This past spring we held multi-city mini reunions in L.A., N.Y.C., D.C., Boston and San Francisco. Deme Navab Taleghani attended the Boston mini-reunion, where Samantha Stoddard, Jeremy Warhaftig and Beth Donohoe Cook were in attendance.

Erika Katz Abramson sent a teaser for the upcoming September 26 release of her newest book, Coach Parenting: Raising Teenagers with Advice from Pro Football’s Greatest Head Coaches.

Erika writes, “I got the idea for the book when I asked my 16-year-old son to pick up his shoes from the living room at least four times. The shoes remained where he left them a day later. The following week I went to his varsity game. After the game Coach told him to pick up his sneakers and those of three of his teammates. Those sneakers were in his hand in two seconds. What was Coach doing that I was not? How did he get my son to work as a team, behave respectfully and follow direction? I wanted to know.”

Erika researched and interviewed some of the greatest influences in football, and she features Dartmouth football coach Buddy Teevens ’79 and former classmate and NFL quarterback Jay Fiedler in her book.

The last bit of news I have to report comes through the grapevine, but it seems timely to share. Dan Garodnick is the N.Y.C. council member representing the 4th District in Manhattan (which includes the United Nations, Times Square, Trump Tower and more) and has been in this position for the past 11 years. Remember when Dan was our fearless class president for all four years at Dartmouth? He humbly credits some of those experiences at Dartmouth with shaping him for a career as a public servant with a problem-solving attitude.

Most recently, Dan has been busy with the negotiations around reopening 56th Street near Trump Tower after it was closed to traffic for security reasons and the rezoning of East Midtown, as well as many other important projects.

I’m out of news, but you’ll find a winter holiday update in the next issue. I’d love to include your update! Please send it along.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Hello, fellow classmates! I’m right in the middle of a busy admissions season at Lafayette College, where I am a part-time admissions director. It’s inspiring to read the stories of high school seniors about to embark on the mind-opening experience of college. I’m lucky to be reminded daily of the important life-shaping role college can play and my own transformative college experience at Dartmouth. How awesome would it be to go back to Dartmouth as a student for just a few days, knowing then what we know now?

I received an update from advocate Suzie Fromer, who has worked tirelessly on behalf of those suffering from life-threatening food allergies. She and her son, Danny, were featured on Fox News in N.Y.C. in December on Good Day New York. Suzie spoke about oral immunotherapy (OIT), an innovative treatment focused on retraining allergic patients to tolerate moderate amounts of allergens by eating them daily. She has been overseeing Danny’s OIT, which has involved introducing mere milligrams of peanuts to his diet daily, as tolerated. Painstakingly slowly, she has increased the amount of peanuts he eats over months and, as of her update, he eats 12 peanuts or 1 tablespoon of peanut butter every day with no ill effects. Doctors hail this break-through as a potential life-saver for those who suffer from anaphylactic allergies, as Danny does, as well as generally freeing people from the fear and stress associated with extreme allergies. Kudos to Suzie for her relentless research and courage to try new approaches! Success stories are all over the news, and she welcomes anyone to contact her with questions if you are considering similar treatments. If you are interested in watching the news spot, as it was filmed live, here is the link: www.fox5ny.com/good-day/228481362-video.

Class officer Justin Sadrian recently returned from his annual Dartmouth guys ski weekend in Vail, Colorado, with a hearty group of ’94s. He writes, “This year included Jeff Goldfaden, Brian Eller, Matt Niehaus, Todd Carlson, Matt Feeley, Derek Braddock, Logan Johnson, Jason Pollard, Mike Thurlow and Ari Rosenberg. A bit older and certainly grayer, but trying to convince ourselves that we’re still 20-something. This year included skinning up to the top of Vail after the mountain closed and skiing down in the dark.” I have a feeling it included more than that!

Thank you for the updates! I’m all out of class news for now. Please keep the news coming or you’ll tear open the next issue and find this column depressingly empty.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

I spent a weekend in Denver last month and I reconnected with several Dartmouth ’94s. Gwin Pittman Teasdale hosted the weekend in her Louisville, Colorado, home. I joined friends Lorien Albala Saumier of Wilton, Connecticut; Kelly Bell Lytle of Asheville, North Carolina; and Anne Jeffers Weber of Austin, Texas, to reconnect. Lorien has left corporate life behind to foster good vibes in those around her—as a mother, advocate, yogi and meditation leader. After a recent stint as the culinary assistant for renowned Provençal chef Susan Loomis, Kelly prepared a slew of gourmet bites. We soaked up the fresh mountain air and caught up on more than just sleep.

One evening Sarah Thomas and Kathryn Murphy Dickinson joined in the fun. Sarah and husband are raising their darling toddlers in Denver, and she shared that she had been in touch with many various Dartmouth ’90-somethings, including her own brothers, of course! For Kathryn, 2016 has been a banner year. She has been enjoying the life of a newlywed. Additionally, using her experience in the beauty industry and M.B.A. education, Kathryn has launched her own good-for-you beauty retailer in Denver. In 2016 she expanded her brick-and-mortar presence, and a plethora of products are available on her online store as well. Check out the healthy indulgences and necessities at www.aillea.com.

I recently received some exciting news from the alumni office about fellow classmate Zola Mashariki. After earning her law degree from Harvard Law School and spending more than 15 years at Fox Searchlight Pictures in production, Zola became the executive vice president of original programming at BET in 2015. Just this year The Hollywood Reporter named Zola as one of the top female executives in Hollywood. Thanks for the “entertaining” update!

Lisa Cloitre shared exciting baby news! As the secretary in charge of class notes for her Tuck class, she empathized with my need for news and sent an update. Lisa writes: “My first son, Christophe Yves-Alexandre Cloitre, was born in Boston on October 2, named after his uncle and grandfather. It was a long journey filled with the love and support of many to become a single mom, and we are very grateful for the outpouring of love around Little C’s arrival, especially from those within the Dartmouth and Tuck communities. We’re looking forward to our first trip to Hanover, which will certainly be the first of many!”

Finally, I want to apologize to classmate Matthew Babcock, a professor at University of North Texas-Dallas and author of Apache Adaptations to Hispanic Rule, for misspelling his name in the last column. My mistake is a terrible distraction from Matthew’s tremendous work in his field and impressive accomplishments.

As this issue of Dartmouth Alumni Magazine hits your mailbox, Winter Carnival will be just a couple of weeks behind us. Please send a report if you were there! It would be fun to hear about the continued traditions that brighten the long New Hampshire winters.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Welcome 2017! With the season’s first snowfall, shorter days and clear blue skies, I’m reminded of returning to Dartmouth after a much-needed break, ready to start the winter term. Can you believe we haven’t headed to Hanover to hear “the crunch of feet on snow” for 23 years?

I heard some interesting news about beverage expert and classmate Dominic Engels. He recently became the CEO of Stone Brewing after years as president of POM Wonderful. While he may not have known that the food and beverage industry would play a dominant role in his future career, he did have the right educational foundation. Dominic says he has been using his German culture and society major and his German foreign study abroad (FSA) experience since Stone Brewing has a significant presence in Berlin, Germany. Perhaps Dominic could work with the German department to coordinate a “field trip” for the next cohort of FSA students. Dominic lives in California with his wife and three sons, ages 7, 11 and 13.

Matthew Babcock is an assistant professor of history and program coordinator of the department of social sciences at University of North Texas-Dallas. He specializes in U.S. history, focusing on the history of North American borderlands, American Indians and the colonial Southwest. He joined the faculty in 2010 after teaching undergraduate and graduate history courses at Stephen F. Austin State University and working as a research associate in its center for regional heritage research. Before that he earned a Ph.D. in history from Southern Methodist University in 2008 and an M.A. in history from the University of New Mexico in 2001.

After years of education, teaching and research, Matthew wrote his book, Apache Adaptations to Hispanic Rule, which was recently published by Cambridge University Press. The book is part of their studies in North American Indian history series, in which Dartmouth professor Colin G. Calloway has also published. Matthew writes, “The book reinterprets Southwestern history before the U.S.-Mexican War through a case study of the poorly understood Apaches de paz and their adaptation to Hispanic rule.” Matthew says that thousands of Apaches settled near Spanish presidios in a system of reservation-like settlements, stretching from Laredo, Texas, to Tucson, Arizona. His research showed that these settlements “constituted the earliest and most extensive set of military-run reservations in the Americas and served as an important precedent for Indian reservations in the United States.”

In closing, I share the sad news of the death of an inspirational classmate, our valedictorian, Kamala Devi Dansinghani. To call Kamala a gifted student is an understatement. She was the first female valedictorian to graduate with a 4.0 from the College, and USA Today counted her as one of the top 20 students in the country. We will all remember her moments of genius in the classroom and insights in her valedictory address at our Commencement. Kamala went on to earn her M.D. and M.P.H. from Harvard Medical School and worked for two years at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. Her beautiful legacy can be seen and heard through her two lovely daughters, Arya Vasant (10) and Soraya Vaishali (8). She is also survived by her mother, brother and sister-in-law.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com
 

Nicole Carrier has the granite of New Hampshire in her muscles and her brains! She returned to New Hampshire for her M.B.A. at Tuck and has continued to live and work in our cherished state. What started as a love of craft brewing more than 15 years ago, coupled with her business acumen and love of community, has grown into a successful and delicious business. Throwback Brewery has won a “Best of N.H. Award” for its excellence in farm-to-table brewing and has been featured in Food & Wine magazine as one of the “50 Amazing Nanobreweries in 50 States.” While Throwback Brewery beers are available all around New Hampshire, you can visit the brewery, farms and gastropub at its coastal North Hampton location.

In this politically charged election year I would hesitate to bring anything controversial to our class notes, but this nugget is unusual and unexpected, invites discussion and has already been featured in traditional news outlets. Doug Cameron has co-created and collaborated on the Trump Hut that has been moving from Trump Tower to other Trump properties and then throughout the country. Made in Mexico from 96 raffia hula skirts, the hut not only looks like Trump’s famous hairdo, but also reportedly symbolizes the “potential wealth inequality of a Trump presidency.” Doug and the distinctive “luxury” hut have been featured on NPR and CNN and in many written outlets, including Huffington Post and Gothamist. You can follow the roving political statement during the next few months on Facebook and Twitter at @TrumpHut.

Congratulations to two classmates on their academic research and newly published books. Honor Sachs is an assistant professor of history at Western Carolina University and has recently published Home Rule: Households, Manhood, and National Expansion on the Eighteenth-Century Kentucky Frontier. In addition to working on her book and teaching, Honor writes regularly about gender, slavery, history and memory for Huffington Post and History News Network. Nihad Farooq coincidentally is also an historian, and she is an associate professor of American and Atlantic studies and the director of undergraduate studies in the school of literature, media and communication at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Her new book is titled Undisciplined: Science, Ethnography, and Personhood in the Americas, 1830-1940.

In closing, I share the sad news of the death of Greg Ferris in July. Greg had many, many friends at Dartmouth. His friendly nature, Southern smile and outgoing personality set others at ease and drew new classmates to him. All who knew Greg will miss not just his warm personality, but also how he made them feel. With Greg there was no small talk. He wanted to know what was really going on and asked the probing questions that started meaningful conversations. Knowing Greg helped you know yourself better.

He is survived by his beloved wife, Sarah, and the apple of his eye, daughter Arden, as well as his mother, sister and sister’s family. Many of his fellow Alpha Chi Alpha brothers and friends through the years gathered in Houston, Greg’s hometown, to honor the warm, deeply caring friend.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Even 20-plus years after graduating I still feel the anxious flutter of the coming school year in late August. No year sits quite so indelibly in my mind as 1990—the year we began our time together at the College on the hill. With freshman fall on my mind, and I hope yours now too, consider sending me a special fall quarter memory. I’d love to share your stories or news with the class.

Erika Katz-Abramson shares an update. She is a parenting expert and the spokesperson for Invisalign Teen. She is frequently featured on Access Hollywood Live, Inside Edition and Fox News and has written an online parenting guide, which can be found at unbraceteenconfidence.com. As a parent to both a teenage daughter and son, she is deep into the trials and tribulations of parenting teens and tweens. Thankfully, she is helping spare other parents the trial-and-error approach!

Harley McAllister and his wife, Abby, recently returned from Dominican Republic, where they were missionaries at a Christian school teaching math and science to local children. As Harley puts it, they “went down there with three boys and came back with a fourth, adopting a young Dominican boy named Isaac who was in need of some pretty serious heart surgery. Everything went well, and he is an absolute bundle of energy and personality.”

The big family lives in Spokane, Washington, and they all enjoy the abundant outdoor activities in the surrounding area. In fact, upon returning to the United States, they spent two months visiting many of the national parks and were inspired to write e-book guides on making the most of the adventure when visiting the parks with children. As Harley writes, “I never figured I’d be any kind of author with my engineering background, and I’m sure my Dartmouth English professors would be even more surprised!”

While Harley’s “day job” is more typical given his engineering background, he and his family still plan their summer vacations to national parks and have a few more guidebooks in the works. If you’re interested in checking out the McAlister guides, you can find them on Amazon.com or at nationalparkswithkids.com, and then more widely in fall of 2017 in paper edition.

On a much more somber note, I report to you the loss of a fellow graduate of the class of 1994, Charles J. Trieloff. Known to friends and family as Jen, he spent his time at Dartmouth as an active leader in Dartmouth Players and the Marching Band, a beloved Sigma Nu brother and a leader in the scenery shop of the Hopkins Center. Who can forget Jen’s distinctive Lennon-esque glasses or trend-setting beard? Who can remember being lifted in his company by his smile and chuckle? Jen was a remarkable person who has been described as “having no enemies, only friends.” Those who knew him at Dartmouth can vouch for that sentiment.

After graduating summa cum laude, Jen earned a master’s of fine arts from University of Wisconsin. He served for years as scenic director, properties master and visiting artist at numerous theaters. The awards and recognition he received during his years in theater at the College were only the beginning of his distinguished and acclaimed career ahead.

Of all of Jen’s accomplishment, he most treasured his family. Jen and his wife, Deb, have two children, Jennings and Rachael. Our heartfelt condolences go out to Deb, Jennings and Rachael on the loss of your beloved father and husband and our dear classmate.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Happy summer, ’94s! I fondly remember our Sophomore Summer, drifting down cool rivers on lazy, sunny days, eating “healthy” Collis sandwiches on the Green and studying on the grassy knoll outside of Dartmouth Hall. I hope this summer update finds y’all happy and healthy and reflecting on warm Dartmouth memories as well.

Hunter Buckner kindly responded to my email and offered an interesting post-Dartmouth story. He serves as president of Clutch Communications in Dallas, where he lives with his wife, Robyn. Robyn is a graduate of the University of Alabama and I like her already—roll Tide! They have three children; Luke is 11, Ford is 14 and Tabitha is 16. Hunter notes, “The boys have already professed a strong desire to play football at Dartmouth when their time comes. It’s all part of a selfish ploy to give me an excuse to visit Dartmouth with greater frequency.” Hunter stays in touch with fellow Dartmouth alumni, many of whom were fellow football players, and he even traveled to St. John this past winter with Sue and Dave Schumacher ’95, Kristin Kuroda Boran ’97 and Chris Boran ’95.

I was thrilled to hear from Jennifer Chan, my first-year roommate, and read about the amazing road she has taken since graduating early from Dartmouth. After teaching biology at St. Paul’s School in Concord, New Hampshire, Jen moved to Canada for medical school at McGill University in Montreal. She completed her residency in anatomic pathology and her fellowship in neuropathology at Harvard University. She spent several years practicing and researching genetics and neuropathology at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, Brigham & Women’s Hospital and Children’s Hospital. Currently, she and husband Eric are at University of Calgary, where she continues her practice in neuropathology, studying brain development and brain “tumours.” Jen admits that she has become very Canadian since she now writes tumor with the added “u” and says “eh.” If you’re ever up in the Great White North, check in with Jen, Eric and their two daughters, Harmony and Aurora, eh?

Speaking of neuroscience, Frieda Polli’s company, Pymetrics, has made headlines recently for its leading-edge business model. Pymetrics is transforming the hiring process, using new technologies that assess specific characteristics of job applicants through neuroscience games rather than the traditional self-reported, question-and-answer approach. I was impressed to read a Berkshire Hathaway report highlighting the innovation and recent investments made by Mercer and other organizations. Perhaps we can convince Frieda to bring some of her neuroscience games and analysis to our next reunion?

Matt Berkhold also kindly answered an email from me. He shares that he is living in his hometown of Cozad, Nebraska, with his wife Anne (Gibson) ’97. In fact, they recently celebrated their 20th wedding anniversary—congratulations! Matt is running his family’s diversified agricultural business, growing alfalfa and corn, both conventionally and organically. He also runs an alfalfa dehydration plant, making alfalfa pellets, which are marketed under the name Alfagreen Supreme and are used in animal feed. Anne runs a beef finishing lot, and I invite you to check out her blog site, FeedyardFoodie.com. They busily zigzag around the area, taking their three daughters from cross country or swimming to speech club to even more club and sport practices. I hope the admissions office is reading these updates; the Berkholds plan to visit Dartmouth this summer as Ashley (16), Megan (13) and Karyn (11) begin thinking about college plans.

Please send me your updates and plans for fall! I’ll be back with more news in two months.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

I have some good news to share from our class officers. Class president Deme Navab Taleghani shares that our class will sponsor a research project for a current Dartmouth student in the upcoming year. Annelise Brinck-Johnsen ’17 will be traveling through England researching human rights through 19th-century British literature. This opportunity for both Annelise and the class of ’94 supports our mutual love for Dartmouth, a common quest for knowledge and our continued drive to pursue our passions with purpose. Good luck to Annelise!

Speaking of continuing education, I have updates from our very own classmates who have made education their lives’ work.

Stemming from his interest in his undergraduate minor of women’s studies, David Cohen continues researching this important issue as a law professor at Drexel University’s Thomas R. Kline School of Law. He coauthored an award-winning book, Living in the Crosshairs: The Untold Stories of Anti-Abortion Terrorism. He and his coauthor were featured on Fresh Air with Terry Gross on NPR in December. The book has been touted as a top feminist book in 2015 and certainly a starter of thought-provoking, lively conversation.

Martha Douple Tomeo made a leap this past year from the lower 48 to Alaska, where she is the librarian at Tri-Valley School in the Denali Borough School District in interior Alaska. Her two children are students at the school, as well, and they are enjoying the breathtaking, natural beauty of Alaska. Somehow, another ’94 landed at the Tri-Valley School; Dan Polta is the district superintendent. With these two in cahoots this school is the luckiest district in Alaska, if not the whole country!

Lynn Webster has been an inspirational teacher in Massachusetts since earning her master’s in early childhood education from Wheelock College in Boston. She continues to be the kindergarten teacher students never forget and was just recently named teacher of the year for her school district. Congratulations, Lynn!

I finally have a complete update on the exotic life of Katherine Osborne Valdez.She has worked (off and on) for the U.S. Agency for International Development since 2004. Her husband, Pablo Valdez, is with the U.S. State Department. As you can imagine, these positions led to a number of posts abroad: Peru, Indonesia, Chile and now Mexico. Katherine writes, “We are loving living in such a vibrant city, which has the added advantage of being close to family and friends in Houston and Austin, Texas. We’ll be living in the heart of Mexico City until summer 2018 and truly welcome visitors.” If you’re up for an adventure, join Katherine, Pablo and their two daughters!

Katherine notes that she reconnected with classmates Martha Douple Tomeo, Michelle Moore Fortier, Marcie Mitre Levin and Anne Jeffers Weber via a virtual book club for their middle school daughters. This innovative idea is a great blueprint to encourage alumni reconnections. Perhaps other classmates have similar ideas to share? Please let me know so I can share an inspiring idea with fellow classmates. Keep your updates rolling into my mailbox. I may be reaching out to you, as well. Kindly respond!

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

I posed a question on our Dartmouth94 Facebook page back in December: “What are your favorite Dartmouth traditions and winter memories?” The common theme was clear; Dartmouth’s tight-knit community and close friendships are front and center in each story.

Personally, I always welcomed the spontaneous study breaks in early December as we crammed for exams, had snowball fights on the Green and went sledding on freshman hill after midnight.

Pherabe Kolb shared one of her memories: “I had never seen snow before I went to Dartmouth, so I remember standing in the street in front of Mid-Mass my freshman year with my tongue out to catch the flakes.” Pherabe also fondly remembers the big Christmas tree on the Green.

One alum, who shall remain anonymous, remembers walking out into the snappy, biting morning air and having her nose hairs freeze. After quickly running into her dorm bathroom to check her face in the mirror for unwelcomed nasal discharge, she realized that she was experiencing something altogether new and perplexing. After growing up in the South, she had never experienced this disconcerting and unpleasant phenomenon.

My husband, Ken Davis, remembers “studying” in Sanborn Library with varying degrees of success and enjoying tea at 4 p.m., which quickly led to an excuse for an early dinner in the winter months (the sun sets ridiculously early in Hanover in December!).

Elissa Slovik Gaies enjoyed studying in the 1902 Room of Baker Library, though admittedly there was “more food and talk” than actual studying. “Since books were open, it counted as time spent studying.” I would roll my eyes, but she must be on to something. Dr. Gaies graduated from Harvard Medical School years ago and clearly managed to get some studying done. Elissa now lives with her family in Ann Arbor, Michigan. Though work is demanding, it may be her daughters’ competitive gymnastic schedule that keeps her the busiest. Abbie at 15 years old and Taylor at 11 years old are both devoted, competitive gymnasts.

Anne Jeffers Weber remembers our “reduce-reuse-recycle” mugs. She said that we were ahead of our time as we toted these mugs to Collis for refills. The mugs were trendsetting, but perhaps a bit unsanitary. I remember trying desperately to rinse mine with the hot water valve before a refill.

In other news, Demtra Navab Taleghani, Darcey Forbes Bartel and Elizabeth Donohoe Cook took a trip to Hanover in November to be the featured speakers for the annual Link Up dinner, which focuses on connecting women in the Dartmouth community.

Gwin Pitman Teasdale and her family have been enjoying the fresh air in the Denver area since she graduated from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. Gwin is currently working with Deloitte Consulting. She has two adorable, towheaded boys; Coleman is almost 12, and Brandon is 9. Gwin would love to see any classmates who happen to be in the area.

Gwin also reports some exciting news about Kathryn Murphy. Kathryn wed Rudge Dickinson on June 14, 2015. Truly, a wedding is an excellent reason to miss our amazing reunion weekend! Jennifer Bishko, Britt Speyer Fleming, Sarah Thomas and Gwin were there to celebrate the important day with Kathryn and Rudge.

Please send me your news, updates or status-quo reports to share in the next issue of Dartmouth Alumni Magazine.

In the meantime, here’s to the hope for winter’s quick and quiet end, to the warmth of fond college memories and to the possibilities of your next trip to Dartmouth College.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

 

Happy Winter Solstice, fellow ’94s! I’ve heard from a few classmates that this December promises a flurry of travel, frenzied schedules and new opportunities. This description may not sound like news, since it could probably be any of us during any given week this month! However, as it turns out, our classmates are up to notably more than the typical holiday madness and end-of-year commitments.

Cynde McInnis embraced a cross-country trip in the Whalemobile at the end of 2015. As many of you may remember from our years at Dartmouth and from a recent feature article in Dartmouth Alumni Magazine, Cynde has a passion for whales, dating back to age 8. Pursuing her interests and blazing a career path, she is now program director for whale-watching programs and has created the Whalemobile as an educational tool for children’s school programs. This fall she has been taking her Whalemobile from Pittsburgh through the Midwest and down to Texas to share a hands-on experience by literally bringing land-locked students inside the belly of the whale. Cynde may even be at a school near you. Check out Cynde’s schedule, where else but at thewhalemobile.com.

Pherabe Kolb also has embarked on an exciting career opportunity. She writes, “After 12 wonderful years I am leaving the Smithsonian to join the Aspen Institute as the managing director of communications and public affairs. I start in November. Aspen is an educational and policy studies organization that fosters leadership based on enduring values and provides a nonpartisan venue for dealing with critical issues. The headquarters are in Washington, D.C., so I will be staying here (where I’ve been since graduation), but will be based in Colorado during the Aspen Ideas Festival each summer. So if any ’94s are headed out West for that event, look out for me!”

Already an accomplished entrepreneur, CEO and Ph.D., Frida Polli had some other big news coming to us through Demetra Navab Taleghani. Deme writes, “On June 27 Frida tied the knot with Conor Bastable in a beautiful ceremony in New York City. Several classmates were there to celebrate Frida’s special day, including Demetra Navab Taleghani, Catherine Adams Stanzler, Daniele Caston Stanzzini and Christy Brogan.” Congratulations to you both!

In a last bit of news, Anne Jeffers Weber, along with husband Scott and two daughters, recently made a big move. Anne shares, “After enduring 25 years of winters in Hanover, Minneapolis and Chicago, we moved south to Austin, Texas. While it’s been a bit of a culture shock, our girls love playing sports all year round outside and we’ve definitely enjoyed eating our way through this foodie town.” Luckily, Anne has two dear Dartmouth pals who lived in Austin for many years—Katherine Osborne Valdez and Gwin Pitman Teasdale—and they can surely give Anne tips on Texan life. As a teaser for the next Class Notes, I’ll let you in on some of Gwin and Katherine’s fun endeavors.

Thank you for all of the news you took the time to share, and I invite you to continue keeping me in the loop on your lives and the lives of your friends. I’m looking forward to a full mailbox with updates, New Year’s resolutions and more. Let me know what you’re working on, and I’ll share some resolutions in the next article, due out at the end of February, which coincidently is just about the right time to remind us what we were resolving in the first place.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

In June almost 500 ’94s, their families and guests gathered in Hanover to reconnect with each other and the College. Jen Suhie Hagelston chaired our reunion committee, and she did a fantastic job in managing the events and tone of the weekend. Our class tent was perfectly positioned outside the Gold Coast dorm cluster. We dined at twilight in idyllic New England summer weather and enjoyed the crooning of the beloved Dartmouth Aires. Jonathan Kehl and Matt Zavod impressively rejoined their old group in a birthday serenade of Megan Mitchell.

I caught up with Craig Daily and Jamie Laughlin at Friday night’s dinner outside of Rocky. You may remember the duo as fellow Psi Upsilon brothers, and let me assure you they are now completely a respectable attorney and physician, respectively. They bantered about training and personal achievements in the Iron Man world. Though they had no idea they would be mentioned here, I was frantically taking mental notes for this column as well as recognizing a need to revisit some personal fitness goals after the weekend. I was amazed at their stories, and throughout the weekend found out that many of our classmates have focused their minds, bodies and spirits on endurance feats. I heard rustlings about several Bay Area residents competing in races, including San Francisco resident Darin Hughes and Marin County resident Justin Sadrian, who can be seen training vigorously throughout town.

Always the avid athlete, Darcey Forbes Bartel has continued her training for triathlons and ran her first marathon, along with classmate Beth Donohoe Cook, in Boston in 2012. Deme Navab Taleghani, our class president and cochair of the reunion committee, somehow also found time to complete the grueling training for and successfully run the Boston Marathon this past April. Deme’s motivation was inspiring in her touching words: “I’m not running the Boston Marathon for myself. I am running it for my real hero, a woman who is like a sister to me, my best friend from high school, Julie Hiraga Stolzberg.” While Deme doesn’t feel that she is “built for running,” her determination and loyalty drove her.

In addition to coming to a college reunion, some classmates had the added perk of mini-family reunions when siblings and extended family happened to be on campus as well. Tom Boldt made the cross-country trip from Santa Monica, California, and enjoyed connecting with three generations of Boldt alums, including Peter Boldt ’10 and Michael Boldt ’79. Alli Hyun also connected with her brother, who was in Hanover for reunion; I spent time with my brother and sister-in-law.

To cap off an already remarkable weekend, our philanthropic-minded classmates contributed a record-breaking $1.745 million to Dartmouth College. Giving chairs Christina Dowding Nicholas, Catherine Adams Stanzler and Deme Navab Taleghani worked through the year to secure the 335 donations. This reunion gift marks the profound appreciation, gratitude and love classmates have for the College and the dear friends we met there.

After taking in all that Hanover air and sage advice of faithful, former class secretary, Suzie Fromer, I am both honored and terrified to assume the role of Class Notes reporter. Please, I implore you, keep your updates coming. Otherwise, you’ll be rolling your eyes as I pontificate on my renewed sense of devotion to Dartmouth or how those new fitness goals are going or whatever my weekly cause may be.

Laura Hardegree Davis, 1664 Cambridge Court, Bethlehem, PA, 18015; lauradavis723@mac.com

Ten years ago Nihad Farooq handed over the reins of this column to me. So it seems fitting to report, in this, my last column, on what she’s been doing this past decade! After receiving her Ph.D. in English from Duke University, Nihad became a professor at Georgia Tech’s School of Literature, Media and Communication—where she recently received tenure! So a hearty congratulations to Nihad, whose areas of study include American studies, transatlantic anthropologies of race, migration and ethnicity, evolutionary theory, gender studies and British fin-de-siècle literature.

Also receiving tenure and a promotion is JeffreyBart” Bingenheimer, who is now an associate professor in the department of prevention and community health at the George Washington University Miliken Institute School of Public Health. An expert in the social determinants of health-related behavior and social epidemiology and the quantitative methods for studying both, Bart has conducted research on sexual behavior, HIV risks and the impact of neighborhood on health and mortality. Prior to joining the school, Bart was a National Institute of Child Health and Human Development-funded postdoctoral fellow in family demography and individual development at the population research institute at Pennsylvania State University. After completing his doctorate in 2005, he was a Robert Wood Johnson Health and Society scholar at the Harvard School of Public Health. His current research focuses on the influences of gendered family, peer group and community contexts of behavioral risk factors for HIV, STIs and pregnancy among adolescents and young adults in Ghana.

And in yet more academic news, David S. Cohen has just been promoted to full professor at Drexel University’s School of Law. In addition David was recently awarded a 2015 Innovation in Scholarship Award from the Center for Reproductive Rights for his scholarly work on issues at the intersection of constitutional law and gender, masculinity and violence against abortion providers.

And I’m pleased to report that Mike Houston and his design team were recently awarded a daytime Emmy for their work on the PBS production, The Mind of a Chef, in the category of outstanding main title and graphic design.

Jen Skoda gave birth to a third child, a May Day girl named Astrid Rose.

Kimberly “Nala” Walla and her partner, Keeth, of nationally acclaimed children’s music band The Harmonica Pocket, have just released Sundrops, their third all-ages recording. Their albums Ladybug One and Apple Apple won national acclaim, awards and radio play. They recently performed with the Seattle Symphony and they plan a full slate of concerts around the Pacific Northwest. Visit www.harmonicapocket.com for updated concert details, and to hear their album-streaming sampler, visit https://soundcloud.com/theharmonicapocket.

So that’s all, folks. Thanks for reading, and rest assured because I’m handing over this awesome responsibility to the equally awesome Laura (Hardegree) Davis, who is also going to continue to serve as our class’s vice president in addition to taking on the ’94 class newsletter. So please help her out and get in touch with her soon with all of your news at lauradavis723@mac.com, because if she can do all that, you can do that little, can’t you?

So long, and thanks for all the dish.

Suzie Fromer, 76 Dogwood Lane, Irvington, NY 10533; suziefromer@gmail.com

Got an update this month from Jay Torian, which was a nice surprise. He described himself thusly and wasn’t sure if I would remember him: “I used to have long hair and played guitar a lot back in the Hanover days.” Of course I remembered him, it was Dartmouth, after all—how many people did that describe?! He wrote me a nice, long update, so I’m going to sit back and let him take the column reins for a few paragraphs.


“I’m living in Newton, Massachusetts, and married to a Dukie who’s a doctor at Brigham and Women’s Hospital. We’re expecting our first child at the end of March. I’m associate director of web development at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (DFCI); we manage the institute’s websites, web marketing and social media channels. Prior to that I had a run as a net software developer for a handful of tech startup companies around Route 128, most notably VistaPrint.com. We had a good IPO but I was always interested in mission-based work, so I moved over to DFCI. Dana-Farber is a great company to work for; I’ve been there eight years.


“Lastly and maybe most interestingly, my wife’s grandfather, Irving Sager ’35, is 100 years old. He’s literally one of the last three members of the Dartmouth class of ’35 and is an amazing guy. He’s truly a great American and a fantastically charming person. He worked on secret radar technology at MIT during WW II and ran a successful business in N.Y.C. for many years. He’s told me stories about Dartmouth in the 1930s—things such as tying a rope and skiing behind cars and other things. He had his 100th birthday in December and we’re having a baby soon—so you start thinking about the full circle of your life.


“And to anyone who may remember me as a guitar player, I played with a few bands around Cambridge and Boston for 10 to 12 years after school. I played places like TT’s, Middle East, MamaKin and Lizard Lounge, recorded at some studios in the area and had a couple songs played on local radio at 1 a.m. It was fun, but eventually less so over time. I still love my guitar collection though!”


Thanks so much, Jay. And for anyone who saw it, Irving Sager and the two other remaining class of ’35 alums were also featured earlier this year in a really interesting piece in The Wall Street Journal.


Orit Halpern co-curated a show earlier this year at Parsons School of Design titled “Furnishing the Cloud.” The show examined how we have historically imagined the architectures of our common stock of knowledge—the universal library, the endless bookshelf, the collective brain—and proposed new infrastructures for storing, accessing and processing “the cloud.” Orit also published a related book, Beautiful Data: A History of Vision and Reason since 1945, in January with the Duke University Press. Congrats!


I also am happy to welcome Gib Dunham and family to my newly adopted hometown of Irvington, New York. He tells me he also recently saw Jeff Yasuda and Peter Moore on a trip to the West Coast. 


And I heard that Jess Andre and family have recently relocated from Los Angeles to Seattle. She’s reachable on Facebook if anyone in the Pacific Northwest wants to get back in touch.


Suzie Fromer, 76 Dogwood Lane, Irvington, NY 10533; suziefromer@gmail.com

Ever since Roe v. Wade anti-abortion forces have tried nearly every tactic to eliminate it. And while the murder of an abortion doctor may make headlines, the stories of the men and women who are terrorized on a daily basis for being involved in abortion care have not been heard. Until now.


In Living in the Crosshairs: the Untold Stories of Anti-Abortion Terrorism, David S. Cohen and Krysten Connon have compiled their extensive interviews with abortion providers across the country to tell the stories of how these healthcare workers are targeted at home and work, in person and online. Drawing on ideas from the interviews, the authors then propose several legal and societal reforms that could improve the lives of providers—including the suggestion that we redefine targeted harassment as terrorism rather than protest.


David is a law professor at the Drexel University Thomas R. Kline School of Law, where he teaches constitutional law and gender and the law. This important work will be out May 1. Congrats!


Dr. Christine Carter, a happiness expert at UC Berkeley’s Greater Good Science Center and a speaker, writer and mother, also has a new book out—The Sweet Spot: How to Find Your Groove at Home and Work. At this point in her career Christine found herself exasperated by the busyness of modern life—too many conflicting obligations and not enough time, energy or patience to get everything done. Determined to create a less stressful life for herself without giving up her hard-won career success or happiness at home, she road-tested research-based tactics that promised to bring more ease into her life. Drawing on her vast knowledge of the latest research related to happiness, productivity and elite performance, she followed every strategy that promised to give her more energy—or that could make her more efficient, creative or intelligent. The Sweet Spot shows us how to live in that zone we’ve glimpsed but can’t seem to hold onto—the sweet spot where we have the greatest strength and also the greatest ease. 


I checked in with Christine to tell her congrats on the new book (I really enjoyed and highly recommend her first book, Raising Happiness, too), and received the following update: “I just got back from Seattle, giving a talk at Microsoft. I was introduced by fellow ’94 Liz Berger Friedman! She has worked there for 11 years and her husband Jordan Friedman is going to be working there soon, too. Jen Dirksen Archer joined us for lunch. She has four kids, ages 3 to 10. It is not dull in their household!”


Thanks and congratulations, Christine!


And I’ll end this column with some official class business. This June 19-21 is our class’s 20th reunion (actual 21st). It’s on my calendar, and I hope to see lots of ’94s there—it should be a lot of fun to see where 20 years, give or take, has put everyone.


I’ll also be retiring from my “job” as class secretary as of this reunion. When I took it on 10 years ago I was newly pregnant with my first child, living in a new community and happy to reconnect with an old one. But now it’s time for me to move on in search of my own sweet spot. If you’re interested in the position of class secretary, please drop me a line or contact our class president, Deme Navab Taleghani, at demetra.taleghani@gmail.com.


Suzie Fromer, 76 Dogwood Lane, Irvington, NY 10533; suziefromer@gmail.com

In a column first, I have cool news on something done by an alum’s daughter. Kristin (Bruhl) Wu’s 10-year-old daughter, Lauren, created a cookbook with recipes from 26 governors that was featured on Time’s website. 


Lauren asked every U.S. governor for his or her favorite recipe, and 26 responded (27 if you count Hawaii, which came in past the deadline). American Cooking, the resultant compilation of recipes, includes many regional favorites such as Gov. Martin O’Malley’s crab cakes (Maryland) and Gov. Rick Scott’s two variations on key lime pie (Florida). If you’re seeking some gubernatorial culinary inspiration, you can peruse the cookbook at http://time.com/3422429/governors-cookbook.


Kristin and her family live in San Carlos, California. 


Some news-seeking on Facebook this holiday season yielded a photo of Kevin Williams spending Christmas with Steve Reber and family, so I reached out to Kevin and got the following update just in time for my December deadline: “After three kids, eight years of being a stay-at-home dad and getting a master’s in library science, I have finally re-entered the work force. I recently started working as a knowledge management analyst (which is really just a fancy way of saying corporate librarian) in Richmond, Virginia. Being at home with three kids under 9 was fun and challenging, but I have to say that I’m extremely happy to be working again (sorry, kids). This past summer I had the pleasure of spending time with Honor Sachs, who was in town doing research at the Library of Virginia, and even had a few visits from my former roommate Steve Reber. Richmond is a fantastic, rapidly growing city and if you’ve never been, come on down and let me know!”


On the home front, I am very excited to announce the launch of my food allergy support group’s new website, www.foodallergyny.com. The site provides information and support for food-allergic families in Westchester County, New York, and the N.Y.C. metro area. I’d like to give a big thank you to Food Allergy Research & Education (FARE) for the grant that enabled me to turn this into a reality. In addition to local resources, the site also points to many national sites, such as FARE, that help give one a better understanding of food allergies. After all, these days it seems it’s rarer not to know a child with food allergies than it is to know one. The site is also very helpful to anyone with food allergies navigating a trip to N.Y.C., so please spread the word to anyone who might benefit; thank you!


And my husband, Andrew Hyman, and I have moved. Only 10 minutes south, but just in case someone wants to be even more old school than me (I still type two spaces after every period) and wants to send me an actual letter, it’s worth noting that my address below has changed. FYI: Making sure there is only one space after every period in this document, per my editor’s instructions? The hardest part of writing this DAM column for the past nine-plus years.


Suzie Fromer, 76 Dogwood Lane, Irvington, NY 10533; suziefromer@gmail.com

Heather Searles and her wife, Christina Guillory, traveled from their home in New Orleans to Boston this fall for Heather to give birth to the couple’s twin sons Jax and Crosby. While a trip is the last thing on most couple’s agendas immediately before a double due date, Heather and Christina had to travel to another state in order to give Christina any parental rights to the duo. If Heather had opted to give birth in their home state of Louisiana, Christina wouldn’t have been listed on the birth certificate or been able to adopt the boys. She would therefore have had no rights at school or to make medical decisions for the twins or even have been guaranteed custody in the event that something were to happen to Heather. However, because they had been married in Massachusetts, Christina was listed on the boys’ birth certificates when the couple traveled there for the delivery. And though much of Louisiana is behind the curve on gay rights, more progressive New Orleans will often honor what is written on a child’s birth certificate.


So though it was disruptive to relocate the family to Boston for two months, Heather and Christina enjoyed seeing East Coast friends—both Lynn Webster and K.J. Ward were there to meet the new additions—and were glad to be closer to family during this happy but hectic time. Heather also added, “We recognize how privileged we were to be able to do this and how most gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender Louisianians don’t have this option.” I see from Facebook that the boys are adorable and growing quickly!


I also heard from Jana (Friedman) Brown, who has been writing professionally for 20 years in the publishing, newspaper and magazine industries. Currently she serves as the editor of the St. Paul’s School’s award-winning alumni magazine in Concord, New Hampshire, where she lives with her family. In addition, for the past few years she’s been working on a screenplay with actor and director Perry King (Riptide, The Day after Tomorrow, Melrose Place, Spin City). The Divide is now taking shape as an independent film to be shot in California next summer. Set in drought-plagued northern California in 1973, The Divide chronicles the story of Sam Kincaid, an aging rancher with a failing memory, his estranged and independent-minded daughter, Sarah, and Luke, a young ranch hand who finds himself in the midst of this family in crisis. Internal struggles, the realities of an unforgiving landscape and the need to reconcile a long-ago tragedy collide to create the backdrop for this classic American Western.


For details about the movie, visit www.thedividemotionpicture.com. If you would like to help Jana fund the film, you can donate at https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/90298581/the-divide-motion-picture?.... 


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Trevor Burgess was feted in an August New York Times article for ringing in the morning at the New York Stock Exchange, therefore becoming the first openly gay chief executive of a publicly listed bank. Trevor is CEO of the St. Petersburg, Florida-based C1 Bank, which is so named in honor of the bank’s principles, which include putting clients and the community first. In the article, Trevor commented that he hopes he will “be an example for young people who are interested in business.” He certainly is; last year Trevor was also named the 2013 Ernst & Young Florida Entrepreneur of the Year in the financial services category. Trevor lives in the St. Petersburg area with his partner, Gary Hess, and their daughter, Logan, who just started kindergarten. 


Thatcher Wine’s company Juniper Books was recently featured on CBS Sunday Morning. Thatcher’s company creates bespoke library collections for private and corporate clients as well as designing custom covers, books-by-the-foot and more. His work truly needs to be seen to be appreciated, so if you missed the show, you can check out his website at juniperbooks.com or view the segment at www.cbsnews.com/videos/bespoke-libraries-bring-books-and-design-in-harmony.


I also heard from George Tschiporikov that his wife, Brittany Sweeney, gave birth to their daughter, Hanna Sofia Tschiporikov, on May 25 in Mammoth Lakes, California. He is already Dartmouth-hopeful for her: “Maybe class of 2035?”


And Nathan Herring wrote in to report that his wife, Miller H. Sherling, gave birth to their second daughter, Calliope Joyce Herring, on March 23. He writes, “I’m still out in Seattle and have been working for Google since 2010, mostly on cloud storage. (Cloud is an appropriate team to have in Seattle.)”


Congrats to everyone on all this wonderful news.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

I received the below email update from classmate Anne (Jeffers) Weber just in time for tonight’s deadline; thanks, Anne!


“I don’t think I’ve written an update in many, many years, but given our 20th year as alums is just over a month away, I thought I might.


“After working in ad agencies big and small, going client-side for a short stint and starting and selling my own startup, I’ve settled back into the kind of agency I love—small, nimble and creative—at Glantz Design. I’m the proud mother of two girls and happy to be celebrating 10 years in Evanston, Illinois, where I serve also on the boards of four local nonprofits. 


“I regularly keep up with a few ’94s and can report: I’m looking forward to celebrating the bat mitzvah of Elissa Slovik’s daughter Abigail this month. After completing her M.D. at Harvard, Elissa went back for her master’s of public health at the University of Michigan and now works for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs.


“Whenever I get home to Colorado I see Gwin Pitman, who is in consulting with Deloitte and the mother of two little towheads. 


“I also keep up with Lorien Albala Saumier, who, in addition to many duties within her community and kids, is an amazing knitter and entering her second career in insurance as she gears up to take over her family business.


“Most years we also reunion with Laura Lee (Hardegree) Davis and Kelly (Bell) Lytle. Laura keeps busy with three kids ranging in age from a teenager to a 5-year-old. She and Ken Davis live in Pennsylvania, where he also took over the family business, and they remain quite active with Dartmouth. Kelly and Rich Lytle ’93 are happily entrenched in Asheville, North Carolina, where she raises their three boys and acts as director of programs for Susan Loomis, an experiential French cooking school. Truly wish we were getting together this year, but trying to convince my family to make the trek next year.”


Which provides me with a great segue into a message from our class president, Deme (Navab) Taleghani. Since our 20th class reunion will be held next year—June 19-21, 2015, to be precise—we need your help to form a reunion committee. In Deme’s own words: “Consider volunteering with a friend. It’s not that much work and actually fun. (I should know because I chaired the last two reunions.) The College helps and provides volunteers to run the actual reunion. So don’t worry, you will not work at all during the reunion, just enjoy yourself, hang out and drink. So far we have a small group that has already agreed to be on the reunion committee: Sam Stoddard, who will serve once again as our reunion treasurer, and Laura Davis, Catherine (Adams) Stanzler, Colleen (Linehan) Haskell, Sarah Thomas, Hugh Carspecken and Marlyse Haward-Sawyer. This is a great start but we need more volunteers and still need a reunion chair to steer this amazing group of volunteers.”


If you are interested in helping, please shoot Deme an email at demetra.taleghani@gmail.com. And happy 20th!


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

I am happy to announce that Sari Cohen and Adam Pollak have had their third child, a beautiful baby girl named Nedavya. Sari and Adam live in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where Adam works as a project manager at Giant Eagle and Sari serves as a naturopathic counselor at the center for integrative medicine at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, a part-time professor at Chatham University and is also a consultant and writer for Professional Health Products. Congratulations!
In more local news, Andrew Hyman (a.k.a. “dad” around here) has switched jobs and is now chief operating officer and general counsel at Athyrium Capital Management LLC in New York City. Athyrium is a specialized asset management company focusing on investment opportunities in the global healthcare sector.
I reached out to Lynn Trujillo after living vicariously through her amazing Facebook posts this year and got the following scoop on her recent travels: “This was my second three-month-plus trip to South America this year. My travel took me through Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Chile (including Easter Island) and Argentina. I try to get down to South America at least once a year to volunteer on a cultural preservation project for a tribe in Peru that I became involved with in 2011; I usually tack on some travel after my volunteer work.” 
And when Al Patetta saw that the last DAM was one ’94 column short, he sent me a very touching email; I’ll let him close the column this month. “I hope this finds you well and sufficiently busy. I was disappointed to see there was no ’94 alumni news, so here’s my contribution. I am currently fighting and, I hope, winning the fight of anyone’s life with MS (ask my doctors). This is by far the toughest thing I’ve ever had to do. An ordinary day consists of getting up, eating breakfast and waiting for the para-transit bus to take me to the YMCA for some self-directed physical therapy. Then I come home, record the results of my workout in my journal, shower and eat lunch, then play games on Facebook to stay sharp. This disease has taken quite a bit from me, but I have not lost hope.”
Al can be reached at alfredpatetta@gmail.com or via Facebook; I’m sure he’d love to hear from some old friends. Thanks, Al!
—Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

I’ve got lots of happy news to report this summer, but I’ll start by breaking the news that our very own People’s Most Eligible Bachelor Sam von Trapp is officially off the market. He was married to Elisa Maya Sepulveda this past May in a chapel on the grounds of the von Trapp Family Lodge in Stowe, Vermont. The happy couple will be living at the property, where Sam is working on mountain bike trails and snowmaking and the Trapp Hill Brewery. 


In new-baby news I’m happy to report that Diem (Do) Bloom gave birth to Minh Walter Bloom on April 2. Andrew and I had the pleasure of attending the baby shower in N.Y.C. in February, when we got to visit with Diem and her husband, Dave, as well as meet her parents and many brothers and sisters, which was a lot of fun. Diem is returning to work soon as production manager for the law division at Oxford University Press, where she has been working for the past four years. 


Also in April Lexie Riley Bonitatibus and her husband, Peter, welcomed their second daughter, Isabella Alessandra Bonitatibus. She joins older sister Lira Atalanta, who is 19 months old. Writes Lexie, “We can’t wait to bring Isabella and Lira to Dartmouth for our class reunion next year. We still live in our log home in Saratoga Springs, New York, a great place for our kids to grow up loving the outdoors. Peter and I work at GE and I took a promotion last summer at GE Energy in cost control. We love being parents and look forward to teaching our kids all sorts of things through the years.”


And speaking of teaching all sorts of things, Robert Bordone reported that he was recently promoted to the rank of full clinical professor of law at Harvard Law School. Bordone, who is the founding director of the school’s negotiation and mediation clinical program, is now the Thaddeus R. Beal Clinical Professor of Law at Harvard, where he teaches courses in dispute resolution and negotiation.


Which leads me to my last bit of news, poached from Facebook. Shoshana Leis recently posted the following as her status update and it caught my eye: “MSU [major status update]: Ben and I are in the final stages of negotiating our contract to be the rabbinic team of Congregation Har Shalom in Fort Collins, Colorado. We plan to leave in the end of July. Goodbye, N.Y.C. beat. Hello, Rocky Mountain high.”


Mazel tov and congratulations to everyone for all the happy news and worthy accomplishments.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

Having just finished reading another book and not quite sure what to read next, I was delighted to get a press release announcing the publication of A Long, Long Time Ago & Essentially True by Brigid Pasulka. Brigid’s first novel successfully weaves together two rich narratives—one set on the eve of World War II and the other against the backdrop of 1990s Krakow. It has won acclaims from Publishers Weekly and was selected as a fall pick for Barnes & Noble’s Discover New Writers series and now also comes highly recommended by me.


After graduating from Dartmouth with a focus on art and writing Brigid decided to spend the year abroad, eventually ending up in her family’s native Poland. Upon arrival she spoke about 10 words of Polish, had no job, no place to stay and no contacts, but nevertheless she decided to spend the year there. After returning to the States Brigid started a fulfilling career teaching English at Whitney M. Young Magnet High School, an academic magnet school in her native Chicago. She found, however, that she couldn’t stop telling stories about her time in Krakow. The result is her first novel.


Congratulations also go out to Sarah E. Wagner, assistant professor of anthropology at University of North Carolina, Greensboro, who recently published To Know Where He Lies: DNA Technology and the Search for Srebrenica’s Missing. The study examines the DNA-based forensic system developed to identify the more than 8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys killed in the July 1995 genocide at the UN “safe area” of Srebrenica. It also analyzes the technology’s sociopolitical import for postwar Bosnia—from surviving families to nationalist political leaders and international representatives—as well as its application beyond the Balkans.


Katie (Hartnack) Beltramini wrote in to let me know that she and her family have moved to Bend, Oregon, where she continues to work for Yahoo! Finance as a product manager. “We now live across the street from Jen (Novotney) and Jamie Laughlin. Jen and Jamie are both doctors—Jamie is in heart rhythm cardiology and Jen is a hospitalist. Our two kids Will (3) and Holly (1) are big fans of Jen and Jamie’s children Maddie (5) and Abby (3). I’ve already had to go over to borrow milk! So far we’re loving life in Bend and looking forward to visitors.” 


Katie was also in Boston over Labor Day weekend, when she met up for lunch with Christy (Dowding) Nicholas and Ashley (Bowen) Swenson. “Christy brought along her daughter Lex (1) and is due any day with her second.” Katie also writes that she is looking forward to our reunion next summer.


Thank you, Katie, for a great update, and also for the smooth segue. Our 15th year reunion is indeed next year and our reunion chair Demetra Navab Taleghani requested that I share the following information with everyone:


“Save the date for our 15th-year reunion June 18-20. Your reunion committee includes Demetra Navab Taleghani, Sam Stoddard, Catherine Adams Stanzler, Darcey (Forbes) Bartel, Laura Davis, Justine Fahey, Josh Heikkila, Ann Koppel, Kelly Bell Lytle, Frida Polli and Wendy Tamis.


Preparations are already well under way for class cocktails, dinners and much, much more. Online registration will begin this winter and will be the simplest and speediest way to reserve your plot of grass at the ’94 tent. Also make sure you visit our class Web site at www.dartmouth94.org for more details regarding reunions and registration. Can’t wait to see everyone in Hanover in the spring.”


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

Seems everyone was very busy over the summer; thank you to everyone for writing in to share your news. 


My hearty congratulations to David S. Cohen, who won a teaching award at the inaugural graduation of Drexel University’s Earle Mack School of Law earlier this year. David is an associate professor at Drexel Law in Philadelphia, where he teaches constitutional law. The Excellence in the Classroom Award was voted on by students and the winners were announced in the middle of the graduation ceremony. We actually got to visit with David this summer—it had been a year since we’d last seen him and his wife, Cassie Ehrenberg ’96—and we had a blast watching our four boys (!) play together.


From Facebook I learned that Rebecca Eldredge recently launched threefourone, a new strategic marketing initiative that represents an innovative take on the traditional cross-promotional event format. Incorporating elements of cause-related marketing, threefourone matches businesses and not-for-profits based on shared current or desired target market to serve as co-hosts for an event that showcases each participant’s products, services or programming and enhances the enjoyment of attendees. For more information, you can find them on Facebook, visit their Web site at www.3four1.com or find them on Twitter at threefourone. Look them up if you’re going to be in the Dallas area; the events look phenomenal.


I got a note from Nina McAdoo, who it turns out lives only 25 minutes from me in Westchester County, New York. We commiserated via e-mail over the sad state of our respective tomato crops; seems like we both picked a hell of a year to start growing tomatoes. (For anyone who doesn’t know what I’m talking about, this summer’s record rains in the Northeast brought the worst tomato blight in years. And as I write this Hurricane Danny is threatening to do in the last of ’em.) “It’s been a really long time since I contributed to our Class Notes, so here goes. In January I had a baby girl named Caitlin Sydney McAdoo Savitt (yes, I saddled my daughter with four names!), who joins her also lengthily named brother Aidan James McAdoo Savitt, 5. I am an in-house corporate lawyer with the accounting firm KPMG LLP in New York; my husband, Andy Savitt, is a marketing and communications consultant. We live in Tuckahoe in the New York suburbs of Westchester County. We have been enjoying this very rainy summer as much as possible and look forward to spending Labor Day weekend up in Maine with fellow ’94 Lauren DeLong, her husband, Mike Healey, and their two boys Calvin and Luke.”


And I heard that Ashley Campion was just appointed to the board of directors of New Avenues for Youth. This Portland, Oregon-based nonprofit service organization is committed to helping at-risk and homeless teens gain the life skills necessary to lead sustainable lives and avoid lifelong homelessness. Ashley is the vice president of the Helen K. and Arthur E. Johnson Foundation, where she has served for 15 years. She is also involved with a number of other nonprofits in Portland, including the Community Transitional School, Friends of the Children and Planned Parenthood.


Last but not least, hot off the presses as I write this, Leah (Tarpy) Rodgers and Greg Rodgers have a brand new son! I don’t have too many details yet but earlier this week I received the following missive from the proud new papa: “Franklin Robert Rodgers was born at 9:20 a.m. Tuesday, August 25. Seven pounds, four ounces. Mom and baby are doing great!”


Congratulations to everyone. And happy Halloween.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

Not much news this time, so my apologies for a short column. Last November Susan M. Cordaro was honored for excellence in pro bono advocacy at the Sanctuary for Families Above & Beyond Pro Bono Awards and Benefit in New York City. An associate at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP in New York, Susan received this award for going above and beyond in providing outstanding pro bono representation and advocacy on behalf of victims of domestic violence. 


The awards ceremony and benefit honored members of the legal community who put in hundreds of hours on cases involving immigration, child custody, trafficking, contested and uncontested divorces, orders of protection and lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender issues. Sanctuary for Families is the largest not-for-profit agency in New York State dedicated exclusively to serving domestic violence and trafficking victims and their children. Services include shelter, counseling, legal advice and representation, economic development assistance and a special program for children who have witnessed domestic violence. 


And as I’m wrapping up my own year-end to do lists as I write this, I got an e-mail from Leland Gershell. “ I just wanted to provide a brief update for the magazine—in all of the craziness this year I forgot to e-mail an announcement from me and Lauren on the birth of our baby boy Alexander, who arrived in January. He joins older sis Caroline, who deserves credit for putting up with his constant intrusions!”


Looking forward to catching up with everyone in at the reunion this June—don’t forget to mark your calendars for June 18-20. For more information or to register online, visit www.dartmouth94.org.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

I’m pleased to report some cool news from Mike Houston, whom I got curious about after I saw the Facebook group “I want Mike Houston to join Facebook” (which I’m happy to report he has now done); good timing, because he’s been up to an awful lot! For the past 12 years Houston has been working as an artist and a cabinetmaker in N.Y.C. In 1999 he co-founded Cannonball Press (http://cannonballpress.com), which he still co-runs. Based in Brooklyn, Cannonball Press publishes small black-and-white woodcuts as well as giant woodcut installations and performances. In December Houston and his business partner were named United States Artist Ford Fellows and were also featured in Juxtapoz magazine and were in The Washington Post this past January. “We presently have shows up at the Taubman Museum in Roanoke, Virginia, and the Northern Illinois University Museum of Art in Dekalb, Illinois. This past weekend we were printing our own version of the Bounding Billow, a ship’s newspaper, on board the USS Olympia in Philadelphia as part of Philahgrafika 2010—a printmaking triennial. Yes, we were pulling prints on board a ship built in 1892 on a press from about the same time in a blizzard. We’re heading to Copenhagen tomorrow for a show at Mohs exhibition space. But more important than all that—I’m getting married in May to a wonderful woman by the name of Alison Hart, whom I love dearly.” 


Also on the happiness front, Dr. Christine Carter, a happiness expert best known for her science-based parenting advice, has a new parenting book out, Raising Happiness: 10 Simple Steps for More Joyful Kids and Happier Parents. A sociologist and executive director of UC Berkeley’s Great Good Science Center, Christine also writes the blog Half Full: Science for Raising Happy Kids, (greatergoodparents.org). Christine strives to be a counterpoint to some of the more opinion-based parenting advice platforms out there; however, her newest book is as much about her personal life and her children as it is about science. A parent-to-parent tone and humorous, tell-all approach also make the science accessible and fun for parents. Christine is also a columnist for The Huffington Post and also has a private consulting practice near San Francisco helping families and schools structure children’s lives for happiness.


And now more happy news! I’ve been chatting with Lynn Webster on Facebook and was so intrigued by her status updates out on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, I contacted her to see what she was up to, and here it is:


“I was teaching kindergarten and first grade in Worcester, Massachusetts, when I met my wonderful husband, Jason Ben David. He is a hunter and a farmer and a carpenter. We have two daughters, Maple (6) and Ivy (4). I have been staying home with them on the farm we created here on our two acres, The Little Pond Farm. We have Boer goats, ducks, pigs, chickens, quail, pheasant, sheep and rabbits. Our kids have participated in every aspect of farm life. They’ve watched baby goats get born, seen eggs hatch, planted seeds, picked their own lunch from the back yard, built nest boxes, caught loose chickens. We raise almost all of our own organic meat year round and all of our organic vegetables over the summer. Every year we get a little closer to becoming self-sustained. This summer we have a booth at the farmer’s market so we have increased the size of our garden tenfold.” With her oldest entering kindergarten last fall Lynn also returned to teaching pre-K, so she has now taught every grade in early childhood.


And once again, don’t forget to mark your calendars for our upcoming reunion this June 18-20. Our reunion committee has been hard at work planning an amazing weekend and it is going to be a great get-together. For more information or to register online, visit www.dartmouth94.org.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

If any of you saw the Phillies game back in April where a dad reached out over the balcony railing with one hand, effortlessly caught a fly ball and then handed it to his beaming young son—all while also holding a baseball-hat shaped dish of ice cream—well, that was our very own David Cohen! If you missed it, you can watch it on YouTube along with more than 100,000 other viewers to date. The clip of the amazing catch set the sports blogosphere on fire and was picked up by a number of national sites, including sports.yahoo.com, yahoo video and fark. See it for yourself and read about it in David’s own words on the Phillies blog he writes for, The Good Phight, at www.thegoodphight.com/2010/4/15/1425401/the-catch-of-a-lifetime. Well worth a few moments of your day.


Brigid Pasulka, whose first novel Long, Long Time Ago & Essentially True was published last year, was recently named the 2010 recipient of PEN/Hemingway award. This prestigious prize is awarded annually for a distinguished first book of fiction. Brigid received her award from Patrick Hemingway in a ceremony at the JFK Presidential Library in Boston in March. Past winners of the PEN/Hemingway include Jhumpa Lahiri for Interpreter of Maladies and Joshua Ferris for Then We Came to the End, among many other well-known authors and titles.


Brigid will receive an $8,000 prize from the Hemingway Foundation and a one-week residency in the Distinguished Visiting Writers Series at the University of Idaho’s M.F.A. program in creative writing. She will also receive a Ucross Residency Fellowship at the Ucross Foundation in Wyoming, a retreat for artists and writers. If you haven’t already checked out her book or if you want to see what else she’s up to (word is she’s working on a new novel set in Italy!) or read her blog, visit her website at www.brigidpasulka.com. I also heard that she got married this past May in Chicago—so congratulations are in order all around.


Belated congrats also go out to Kim (Gantcher) Spodek and her husband, who welcomed a third child, a little baby girl named Siena Lea, last April. 


And for lack of more news I’ll let you know what I’ve been up to. I recently started a support group for parents of children with food allergies in Westchester County, New York, just north of New York City. Westchester Food Allergy Support Team (WestFAST) has helped create a social network among parents of food-allergic children, enabling them to share valuable resources and information. I am also excited that the Food Allergy and Anaphylaxis Network (FAAN) has chosen to hold a fundraising walk in Westchester this year and will be helping out with that as well. If you or someone you know has a child with food allergies and lives in or near Westchester county, please feel free to contact me either at the below e-mail address or through WestFAST’s Facebook page for more information.


And speaking of Facebook (and what column would be complete without paying homage to the DAM secretary’s favorite new resource?), we’ve also finally started a Dartmouth ’94 group on Facebook, so next time you’re on, please take a moment to join us.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

Do any of you remember Susie Lee’s singing debut during freshman trip at Moosilauke? I wasn’t there, but I heard she stood on a table and sang the “I like the Sprite in you” song at the top of her lungs and was forever known (well, for at least freshman year) as “the Sprite girl.” I hope memories will be shorter lived regarding the summer day camp debut of my 2-year-old son Peter, who also made quite an impression on the first day when he decided to strip down and streak the whole camp. Sigh. This event was foreshadowed by my husband Andrew Hyman’s joke at our recent 16th-year reunion; upon leaving the kids’ event at Leverone Field House he told our son, “Come on, this may be your only chance to rush the field.” We can only hope he’ll have outgrown his penchant for streaking by college.


We had a great time returning to campus at reunion, which took place during an idyllically beautiful New Hampshire summer weekend. Things had certainly changed for us, however, from when we were last there, as we’re now traveling with 2- and 4-year-old boys. Instead of returning to the dorms, we opted to bunk with Sari Cohen and Adam Pollak, who live(d) in nearby Warner, New Hampshire. As it turns out, it’s a good thing we finally made the trek up to see their beautiful New Hampshire home, as by the time you read this they will have relocated to Sari’s hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. There Adam will be working as a supply chain manager for Pittsburgh-based grocery chain Giant Eagle. Our boys had a great time playing with their daughter Geri (4) and son Ezra (2) and we had a wonderful time catching up and enjoying some wonderful home-cooked meals and look forward to visiting them next time in Pennsylvania.


We didn’t actually get to spend too much time at the campus or the reunion, but I did run into Alissa Peck, Liz (Berger) Friedman, Rebecca Shaewitz Nathanson and Jen Azapian, who had flown in from France, where she is attending business school, in front of the Hanover Inn. Then we headed straight for the kid-friendly activities, where I had a nice chat with Ann Koppel and Erin (Green) Comite and also saw Mike Schlenker and Greg Irwin, who were both there with their wives and active little boys.


In other class business news, I have been told that we are in need of a class webmaster. The company that hosts our webpage has a very easy-to-use interface that is only slightly more complicated than sending e-mail. So even if you’re no computer expert, serving as our class webmaster would be a great and easy way to get involved in our class leadership. Please let me know if you’re interested.


Other exciting news from June includes this juicy tidbit. A.J. Goldman did his first solo sail across the Pacific Ocean in the 2010 SSS TransPacific Yacht Race in a 36-foot sailboat, Second Verse. For more information, or to see photos of A.J.’s journey, visit http:// mac247waikiki.com/sailing.

Hope everyone has had a great summer and is still enjoying the last bits of it. And if you have an update on Susie Lee, please write; I’d love to hear what she’s been up to.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

I’m happy to announce that on May 10 Shauna Fitzgibbons and husband Gary Culliss welcomed their third child, Elle London Culliss. Shauna and her family are living in New York City and are happy to be spending a lot of time with Shauna’s sister Courtney Fitzgibbons. Courtney, her husband, Michael King and their twin daughters recently moved from California to Montclair, New Jersey, for jobs in New York City and to be closer to family. Shauna told me that Michelle Serlin also recently had another baby, a boy. I was promised more details soon, so stay tuned.


Dominique (Ellner) Goldstein responded to my desperate plea on Facebook for news by telling me that she has recently changed jobs and is now working at Google. She and her husband and beautiful daughter Juliette live in New York City and love coming up to Tarrytown to play with us. Thanks, Dom!


In case you missed it, Dr. Christine Carter recently made a very lengthy and impressive appearance on the Rachel Ray morning show to discuss and illustrate points from her new childrearing book, Raising Happiness. If you haven’t already picked up a copy, you should—it’s fantastic.


As always, when no one sends me news, I have to fill the gap by making my own. Avid readers of my column may know that my two boys Danny and Peter have a lot of food allergies. I mean—a lot. So I reached out to Kyle Dine, one of our favorite musicians, to see if I could put my entertainment industry background to use to help him make his second album an even bigger success. If you haven’t heard of Kyle (yet!) don’t feel bad. His first album, You Must Be Nuts! has been a huge hit—on the allergy circuit. Yes, that’s right, Kyle is a food allergy musician. I pitched him on the idea of getting some better-known kids’ musicians to duet with him to help him spread his educational and empowering message to a wider audience. As a result of all my hard work, Kyle’s second album, Food Allergies Rock! (out now!) features duets with the Grammy-nominated kids’ group Milkshake and hip kindie (that stands for kids/indie) musicians Tito Uquillas of The Hipwaders and Charlie Hope. I’m also throwing the first-ever Westchester, New York, food-allergy-friendly Halloween party, which will serve as a fundraiser for the Food Allergy & Anaphylaxis Network (FAAN) and as the U.S. album launch for Food Allergies Rock! So if you’re in the New York City area on Halloween, please join us from 2-4 p.m. at Life: The Place to Be in Ardsley, New York.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

We start off with our baby-news-of-the-(every-other)-month-club with another happy Brigid Pasulka update. I got in touch with Brigid to congratulate her on her novel, The Sun And Other Stars, which was published this winter (and selected by Oprah as one of her winter reads!) and was thrilled to hear back from Brigid that she is also a new mama. “My husband and I just had our first baby—a boy—Levi Vierling Coffey on December 3. We have no clue what we’re doing, so all advice is welcome. Just don’t tell me they never sleep through the night, because that’s all I have to hold onto right now.” I assured her they all do sleep through the night—though I did pointedly refrain from telling her that as parents, she and her husband will probably never do so again—they don’t need to hear that now, right?


I also heard that Dominique Ellner Goldstein gave birth to her second daughter, Jacqueline Ava Goldstein, on January 11. I am sad to say I haven’t had a chance to make it down to the city for quite some time to visit Dominique, and this winter has just been brutal here in the Northeast, but as the weather warms and we can once again stand to be outside, I hope to try to make it to Manhattan with my two off-the-wall boys to meet Dominique’s newest little one. So happy for you guys!


In less sleep-deprived news, Judd Serotta was elected to the board of directors of the Louis D. Brandeis Center for Human Rights Under Law, an independent, nonprofit organization established to advance the civil and human rights of the Jewish people and promote justice for all. Previously Judd had served as a member of the center’s legal advisory board. Judd is a litigation partner at the Philadelphia office of Blank Rome LLP, where he has more than 16 years of experience litigating complex commercial disputes and alternative dispute resolution. 


And in nearby New Jersey we now find Earl Plante, who has relocated to Somerset from San Francisco, California. Earl recently began working as the director of resource development at the New Brunswick-based nonprofit New Jersey Community Capital (NJCC). Every year this community development financial institution provides millions of dollars in capital and technical assistance to support the revitalization of underserved communities across the state. These efforts create high-quality housing, early care, education and employment opportunities for thousands of low-income people. Recently NJCC has emerged as a leader in developing innovative strategies to address the foreclosure crisis and to rebuild New Jersey neighborhoods in the wake of Superstorm Sandy.


Congratulations, Earl, and welcome back to the East Coast.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

I was just checking my Facebook feed, thinking it was probably about time for Lexie Riley Bonitabus’s fourth baby to be born when, bam, there was the announcement! 


“Giovanni Antonio Bonitatibus arrived at 11:09 this morning, December 11, 2013, weighing 9 pounds, 4 ounces, and measuring 21 1/2 inches. Mommy and baby are doing well (Daddy too)!” A hearty congrats to the whole Bonitatibus clan!


And in other creative endeavors, it was just announced that Sarah Wagner’s second coauthored book is about to be published. Wagner is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at George Washington University in D.C. The book, Srebrenica in the Aftermath of Genocide, will be published by the Cambridge University Press this year. Using an interdisciplinary approach and more than 10 years of fieldwork in Bosnia-Herzegovina and surrounding countries, Wagner traces the genocide’s reverberations in the book—many of which have implications for post-conflict societies around the world.


Also hitting the bookshelves this month is Brigid Pasulka’s second novel, The Sun and Other Stars. Set in a seaside village on the Italian Riviera, the book tells the story of a widowed butcher and his son in which the characters’ losses are transformed into hope. Having very much enjoyed Pasulka’s last novel, I am looking forward to reading this one too; nothing like recommending a book to your book club where you can jauntily toss out that you “happen to know the author.” Congratulations, and good reading to all!


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Not a lot of news to report today, but as I sit here poolside at the Tarry Crest swim club in Tarrytown, New York, on this warm, breezy day that doesn’t bother me too much. My husband, Andrew Hyman, and I just got back from a brief trip to North Adams, Massachusetts, where we attended Wilco’s Solid Sound Festival at the awesome Mass MOCA museum and had a near encounter with Elizabeth Greenberg. Unfortunately their wireless network wasn’t as good as advertised, so by the time we connected virtually we’d missed each other actually—but next time we’ll plan in advance to meet up! For anyone who hasn’t been, the Mass MOCA is an amazing museum. Set in an abandoned transistor factory that practically bankrupted the whole town when it went under, it’s now one of the largest art exhibition spaces in the world, which means they can host some super cool exhibits (suspended “exploding” cars, for instance). Combined with things such as the Solid Sound festival and other musical and multi-media performances, the museum has, I hope, spurred a suitable revival for the local economy. I highly recommend a visit, even with kids of all ages, if you’re ever in the area.


I did a little LinkedIn poking around and would like to report that classmate Nelli Black is now a producer at CNN’s In America. Previously, she worked at ABC News and The New York Times.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Shauna Fitzgibbons’ husband, Gary Culliss, sent me an e-mail in late June announcing the birth of their fourth child. “We are thrilled to welcome an 8-pound, 13-ounce bouncing baby boy into the world today. I’ve attached a photo of mom and son together from this evening. They are both doing fine, and the whole family is overjoyed with our new addition to the family!” It took Shauna and Gary a day or two to pick a name, but after ruminating they picked Bronson Justice Culliss. Bronson, whose middle name was selected because Shauna and Gary met in law school (Harvard, for those keeping score), joins big sisters Elle and Emmy and big brother Hudson in the Fitzgibbons-Culliss household. They live near us in New York City, so Andrew and I are planning to head down soon and meet the newest family member.


Speaking of Andrew Hyman, aka my husband, I am pleased to announce that he was recently promoted to special counsel at Covington and Burling, LLP. Andrew’s practice focuses on corporate finance and mergers and acquisitions. 


And in other law news, associate professor David Cohen has received tenure from Drexel University’s Earle Mack School of Law in Philadelphia. The day after he received tenure, he was awarded the best professor award, the Dean Jennifer L. Rosato Excellence in the Classroom Award, from the law school’s graduating class. David has now won this award three times—from the four classes that have graduated so far from the new law school. Congratulations! David currently serves on the board of directors for the Women’s Medical Fund in Philadelphia and is a contributor to the Feminist Law Professors blog and The Good Phight, a blog on the Philadelphia Phillies.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Scored an update from Heather Nolan off Facebook. She’s looking forward to trading in Davis, California, for Los Angeles in the fall. Heather will be relocating there along with her husband, John, and their 3-year-old son Django in time for her to start a master’s program at UCLA in cinema and new media studies. I suppose this makes us bitter SoCal University film rivals (having studied at USC myself) but I think our shared Dartmouth heritage can help me overcome that. My one question for Heather as she becomes a Bruin is if USC students drag stuffed bears around on the ground in honor of the rivalry, what do UCLA students drag around? The USC mascot is the Trojan….


Received an e-mail from Alissa Peck that she and husband Jeremy Fader welcomed son Max Henry Fader to their family, where he joins big sister Amanda. Born May 12, Max weighed in at 8 pounds, 3 ounces. Congrats!


I also received the following amazing and amazingly concise missive, considering the incredible places he’s both coming from and going to, from Dan Polta: “After living in Islamabad, Pakistan, for five years and working as the principal of the International School of Islamabad, I’m moving to Guatemala to be the secondary principal at Colegio Maya.”


I couldn’t just let that go, so I wrote Dan back and begged him to tell me more; he was kind enough to elaborate about his experience these past few years in Islamabad: “In some ways it is very boring as a city and at the same times very unpredictable. There have been times when terrorist activities seem like they will shut down the city but things seem to keep going. When I arrived the country was on an upswing. Following a major bombing three years ago, the expat presence reduced significantly. Things were quite bad after that with repeated attacks on police bunkers in the city. The situation seems to have ‘stabilized’ but anything can happen. At school we monitor the news and security situation daily; sometimes we go on virtual school and keep the students at home.” We hope Dan’s move goes smoothly and can’t wait to hear more from his new post.


And I awoke this morning to a last-minute reprieve from Kevin Williams, who heeded my desperate news-fishing post on Facebook last night. “I just received a master’s in library science from Catholic University in May, which, I have to say, was made particularly interesting by the fact that I had to commute two and a half hours from Richmond, Virginia, to D.C. for some of my classes, and that my wife gave birth to not one but two little girls during the course of my time in the program. All of this while playing stay-at-home dad by day, club DJ by night. Needless to say, four hours made for a good night’s sleep for me. That said, school is done, the youngest (6 months) has been sleeping through the night, I’m looking for a library job and I now consistently get six hours of sleep a night. Ahhh….”


On the home front, husband Andrew Hyman tossed a piece of paper in my overflowing inbox to let me know he’d been selected for inclusion in the to-be-published Super Lawyers magazine’s 2011 New York Rising Stars list. Cool. Now if only my 3-year-old would stop referring to himself as ‘Dopey’ (as in the dwarf) things would be going pretty well around here.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Gregg Costa has Kai (Singer) Falkenberg ’95—with whom he clerked together on the D.C. Circuit Court 10 years ago—to thank for passing this bit of news on to us: “Just reading through this month’s alumni magazine, which prompted me to write you to let you know that last month Gregg Costa was recommended by Senator Hutchison to fill a vacancy on the federal bench in Galveston, Texas. Gregg is currently an assistant U.S. attorney in Houston, where he has distinguished himself in his exceptional handling of a number of high profile cases—most notably the prosecution of alleged Ponzi-schemer Allen Stanford.” 


It is with a very heavy heart that I also pass on the following sad news from Martha Kiddoo Krieg. I could not write it more beautifully than she does, so I won’t try.


“I haven’t written yet but feel the need to let the class know what has happened in our family. Last December we lost our son, Max (age 5) after a very brief illness. The day before Thanksgiving I took our kids Hannah (age 7) and Max skiing. On Thanksgiving Max woke up with a croupy cough—we got him a steroid, he wore his pilgrim hat at Thanksgiving dinner and all was fine. Friday morning Max had his breakfast but his breathing became labored. I was on my way to the doctor when his breathing became worse so I pulled into the paramedic station, where he stopped breathing. Max was intubated and transferred to the pediatric intensive care unit [PICU]. He was in a coma for the six days in the PICU as we rode the roller coaster of what could be wrong with him. On the sixth day the doctors told us that he had suffered an hypoxic brain injury and would not wake up. We were able to donate his kidneys and cornea before we pulled life support on December 2. Needless to say, we are devastated. Hannah has lost her best friend and brother and Kurt and I have lost a child. We had a lot of Dartmouth support for Max’s memorial service—Darcey Forbes Bartel, Liz York, Sarah Power Berglund, Deb Haferman Brandt, Stacy Smith Branca, Sheila Bassiri Ahmed, Dawn Matthews, Amy Nevin Martin, Sally Lim and Jeff Yasuda made the trek to Truckee, California, to celebrate Max. Jane Eckels would have been there, but she was giving birth to her first son in Alaska. In Max’s honor we have set up the Max Krieg Memorial Fund, which benefits the Glenshire Elementary School—Max and Hannah’s beloved elementary school. If anyone would like to donate, please make checks to the Tahoe Truckee Community Foundation, Max Krieg Memorial Fund, P.O. Box 366, Truckee, CA 96161.”


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

I had the pleasure of catching up with award-winning film and commercial director Adam Lipsius right before the theatrical release of his first feature-length film 16 Love in January. After graduating Adam worked in children’s advertising with Saatchi & Saatchi. He then started a film career in post-production in New York, working under such directors as Martin Scorsese on Kundun and Bringing Out the Dead and Barry Sonnenfeld on Men in Black before going on to study writing, directing and producing at the University of Southern California’s School of Cinema-Television. His graduate-school short films, At A Loss…, A Modest Proposal and have played dozens of festivals, including the Beverly Hills Film Festival and the Philadelphia Film Festival. While he was still finishing up film school Adam got a job making commercials for a toy company, which yielded spots for Bratz dolls and other Little Tykes products—and, with their small budgets and a quick shooting schedules, proved to be excellent training for independent feature filmmaking.


A teen tennis tale, 16 Love was written and produced by the team behind A Cinderella Story and features young stars Lindsey Shaw and Chandler Massey. E One, the international distributors of the Twilight movies, has bought worldwide rights. Adam forged a cutting-edge plan for distribution in the United States, where the film enjoyed a simultaneous 10-city theatrical run with day-and-date video-on-demand and online streaming.


Next up for his production company, Uptown 6 Productions (so named because he and his wife, Linda, met many years ago on the New York uptown 6 subway line), Adam is developing a young adult detective movie, Knox Chase on the Case, which he will write and direct. He’s also optioned the graphic novel Nanny and Hank: Retirement is Hell, which he describes as a “septuagenarian vampire story.” He’s hoping to get it up on the big screen by the 2013 holidays, “because I think 70-year-old vampire grandparents make for a happy Christmas—but that’s me.”


On a more domestic note, Adam is also the proud father of daughter Dorothy (5) and son Eli (3), who both make their big screen debuts in 16 Love. Adam splits his time between Los Angeles and Denver, Colorado, where his daughter is in class with Owen, the son of Lisa and Jake Mortell. Sam Winslow also lives out that way and, according to Adam, “we are always threatening to go out and have a beer together.” Adam also teaches acting for the camera and shooting action at the University of Colorado, Denver. Congrats to Adam on the film, and thanks so much for a great update!


I also found an interesting post on Facebook from Nicole Schmidt, so I reached out to find out more about her and her husband’s organization, the Baby Alex Foundation. 


“In 2007 our son Alex was born prematurely, at 26 weeks gestation and weighing less than two pounds. He suffered many complications in the hospital, including a severe brain hemorrhage that destroyed part of his brain. Thanks in part to Alex’s amazing neurosurgeon, Edward Smith ’92, Alex has made tremendous progress. He is now a thriving 4-year-old, although he struggles with many obstacles resulting from his difficult start, including cerebral palsy on his left side. Through athletics we have helped Alex gain the use of his left side. My husband, Erik, and I established the Baby Alex Foundation in 2008 to raise money for cutting-edge pediatric brain injury research. We have given more than $150,000 in grants to institutions such as Dartmouth-Hitchcock, Harvard Medical and Children’s Hospital Boston and Mass General.” 


For more information about the foundation, please visit www.babyalexfoundation.com, and if you are an athlete, you can join their long distance running and triathlon team, Team Baby Alex Foundation.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

After a 15-year investing career in Silicon Valley, Ian Picache crossed into the world of entrepreneurs last March when he co-founded Bergine, a luxury daily flash-sale website based in San Francisco. Last October New York City-based Gilt Groupe acquired the company, which—like their site Gilt City—focuses on deals from luxe local businesses such as high-end restaurants and gyms as well as services like floral arrangements and wedding planning consultations.


In other business news Frida Polli was named a Harvard Business School 2010 Kaplan Life Sciences Fellow. These awards are given to first-year M.B.A. students with life sciences backgrounds who are planning careers in science-related businesses or organizations.


If you had a chance to catch any morning talks in March you might have seen Erica Katz Abramson talking about her new book Bonding Over Beauty, which hit stores that month. Katz describes the book as a down-to-earth guide for moms of tweens designed to help them open up a dialogue with their daughters during those often-awkward years. In the book she dishes out advice to moms on how to discuss such sticky issues as shaving legs, using tampons and wearing makeup to school. The book also provides chapter-by-chapter beauty-themed mother-daughter bonding activities.


My recent Susie Lee update earned me a write-in from K.J. Ward. “I’ve gotten to see her and her new family a few times during the last several years. Randy Akee and I got married in 2004, he graduated from Harvard in 2006 with a Ph.D. in economics and we moved to Bonn, Germany so he could take a three-year postdoctoral position. I worked as an internal communications consultant for McKinsey & Co. in Cologne. Just more than a year ago we moved back to Massachusetts. Randy is an assistant professor of economics at Tufts and, in addition to maintaining a contract with McKinsey Germany, I am (once again) the director of Boston’s supportive services drop-in center for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered and queer adolescents. We never thought we’d be back in Boston, but it’s nice—even though Heather Searles moved to New Orleans like two weeks before Randy and I moved back here. Luckily, she and I have been able to visit each other. Our dog Shaka is less thrilled to be back in the United States. He had gotten quite used to going to restaurants and shops and traveling on trains in Europe, but those freedoms have come to an end for him.” Thanks, K.J., and welcome back to the States, where—probably coincidentally—our soles are generally cleaner than those in Europe.


I also have been asked to pass on the following sobering news from the ’94 class officers. Since our class is no longer a “young” class (ouch!) we will no longer receive generous subsidies for DAM. Sadly, only about 250 of you reading this right now are currently paying class dues, which means the entirety of current collected class dues plus additional funding are going to be needed to pay for the publication and mailing of the DAM to our class. If things continue on this course, it means we will be running an annual deficit of $3,000-4,000 on DAM alone, excluding any reunions, events or sponsorships of College activities. Unfortunately, this is not sustainable. Unless we are able to eliminate this funding deficit (meaning more folks pay their dues!) we will no longer be able to provide non-paying classmates with DAM and other class services. So if you want to continue to receive this publication, please send in your $40 class dues either by returning a ’94 class dues solicitation or by using PayPal on our class website at www.dartmouth94.org.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

After graduating from Dartmouth Mariama Todd received her M.S. in publishing from New York University. Her latest venture, hot off the proverbial presses, is www.40muse.com, the online lifestyle destination for black women age 40-plus. She says it more eloquently than I could, so I’ll let her: “Everyone who knows me knows I feel strongly about media that speaks to and supports black folks. As I got closer to 40 I got tired of not seeing myself and my needs reflected in the pages of publications on the newsstand and online. I am stepping out on faith (and some market research) that others in my demographic feel the same. Check us out. Spread the word. Leave comments and suggestions for things you would like to cover. Most importantly, join me for the journey.”


In addition Mariama is a volunteer with imentor, an organization that aims to improve the lives of high school students from underserved communities through technology-enabled mentoring.


Matthew Bloch wrote in to let me know that Gregg Costa was recently nominated by President Obama and approved by the senate as a federal court judge in the Southern District of Texas. At 40, he is the youngest judge in the country at this level. Matthew and Glenn Ingram attended Gregg’s investiture in Galveston last year, and Matthew reported the following from the event: “It was well attended by more than 250 people, including 20 federal judges, a U.S. representative and all of Gregg’s family and friends. We were very proud of him.”


Co-edited by Elizabeth Greenberg, A Perfect Fit: The Garment Industry and American Jewry, 1860-1960, is now available on Amazon.com. Drawn from an award-winning exhibition of the same title at the Yeshiva University Museum, the book features essays from various scholars investigating the role American Jews played in creating, developing and furthering the national garment industry in the century roughly following the Civil War. 


I have also recently caught up with Carnell Chosa through Facebook. After graduating from Dartmouth Carnell received his master’s from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education. After spending four years as a planner for the New Mexico Office of Indian Affairs, Carnell co-founded the Leadership Institute, which he also co-directs. The institute is housed at the Santa Fe Indian School in New Mexico.


Carnell also had some amazing end-of-year holiday plans, which include the honor of traveling with Comanche activist LaDonna Harris to the Bolivian Solstice on Lake Titicaca. There, Carnell will have the unparalleled opportunity to celebrate the solstice with Bolivian President Evo Morales at an honoring-the-earth ceremony December 21 at Lake Titicaca.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Thatcher Wine was featured in The New York Times last year for his work assembling custom book collections and creating “decorative book solutions” for interior designers, homeowners, visual merchandisers, set designers and businesses. In addition to helping book owners fill in their collections he also designs and prints custom book jackets and covers for collections, whether they were lovingly amassed over the years by booklovers or just hardcover overstocks wrapped for visual appeal. Thatcher’s work can be found in some of the world’s finest homes, hotels, retail stores, restaurants and even yachts. In case you’re looking to start or add to your own literary collection, Thatcher also sells books at his Juniper Books warehouse in Boulder, Colorado. For more information or some beautiful photos of his work, visit http://juniperbooks.com. I seem to be one of the last kindle/nook holdouts, so I really appreciated the artful displays on Thatcher’s bookshelves, including a stunning Christmas tree made up of repurposed, carved law books for his company’s last holiday party.


I also heard from George Fesus ’64 that his daughter Katie (Fesus) Zanto was chosen as a recipient of L.L. Bean’s “Outdoor Hero” award for her work in founding and running Adventure Risk Challenge (ARC), based in Truckee, California. Fueled by her dedication to both education and the environment, Katie’s idea in founding ARC was to incorporate wilderness challenges into a literacy and leadership curriculum in order to raise the aspirations of California high school students. Thanks to ARC, hundreds of teens from immigrant families have improved their reading and writing skills while also experiencing the outdoors—some for the first time. Katie put her master’s from Stanford in curriculum development together with her 10-plus years experience as an Outward Bound instructor to develop ARC, which has proven to be a life-changing program. Seven years after its start ARC enrollees have both passed their high school exit exams and enrolled in college at higher rates than their non-participating classmates. ARC gives teens access to a 40-day summer course as well as weekend retreats that combine an English curriculum that includes journaling, public speaking and poetry with backpacking, kayaking and rafting. I don’t know if it’s just me, but it seems most fitting that this amazing organization was created by a Dartmouth alum, and I’m very impressed—so glad L.L. Bean saw fit to honor her, and that her father sent the news to me to share. For more information on Katie’s organization, visit arcprogram.org.


I’m also pleased to report that Lexie Riley Bonitatibus has had a third child, son Peter Cesidio Stephen Bonitatibus. Congratulations to Lexie and her family up in Saratoga Springs, New York.


And I’m extremely happy to announce that we have two new class of ’94 newsletter editors, Terry Boyle and Jessica Cormier. Don’t forget to update them on your news, news of your fellow ’94s, news of your Dartmouth gatherings large and small and, most importantly, pictures! Unlike the DAM column—which is severely limited in length and cannot accommodate any photos—the newsletter is the perfect place to share pictures of your accomplishments and families with your classmates. Good luck and thank you to our new newsletter editors! Terry can be reached at tboyle@landvest.com and Jessica can be reached at jessicacormier94@gmail.com or you can send news to them online through our class website’s online Green Card at www.dartmouth94.org/index.php?r=6.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Earl Plante has been appointed the new chief executive officer of San Francisco Pride (SF Pride). Earl joins SF Pride from the Latino Commission on AIDS in New York City, where he served as director of development.


Earl relocated from New York to the San Francisco Bay area this past December. In his new role with SF Pride Earl will oversee the annual production of SF Pride Celebration & Parade, one of the world’s largest. He will also serve as a key fundraiser for critical community based organizations and services that SF Pride supports as well as act as the organization’s main link to the media, the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community and the general public


Earl said he is “honored and humbled by this exciting opportunity to serve as CEO for SF Pride, a truly groundbreaking, inclusive organization in the forefront of progressive social and economic justice for LGBT equality. I look forward to working closely with SF Pride leadership, sponsors and the diversity of community stakeholders as we continue to build upon SF Pride’s mission and visionary legacy.” Congratulations on this wonderful new appointment!


Hugh Carspecken wrote in with an update from Dallas, where he has been living for the last few years. “In fact, I live just down the street from Glenn Ingram. We represent Dartmouth proudly as the boat anchors for the annual holiday neighborhood party boat race. You would be surprised how scared some of those big Aggies and Longhorns get when you mention ‘boat race’! I’ll let Glenn share who has taken the title the last couple of years...I have two little girls, 6 and 4, on whom I try to dote, when they’re not bossing me around. But, my wife, Cassie helps me keep them in line. Have recently started another company in the technology space, which looks promising but will require more working and less doting. There is always an open door policy to any alumni passing through Dallas!” Thanks so much, Hugh, both for the update and the invite.


Jennifer Zepralka has rejoined the law firm WilmerHale as a partner in the transactional and securities departments. Jennifer rejoined the firm from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, where she was the first Linda C. Quinn Attorney-Fellow and also served as senior special counsel to the director of the division of corporation finance since 2009. Jennifer focuses her practice on corporate finance, federal securities law compliance, governance and business transactions. Jennifer is a former counsel in the corporate practice at WilmerHale, having advised public companies and financial institutions on compliance with corporate and federal securities laws.


Frida Polli has started blogging for Forbes online; you can check it out at www.forbes.com/entrepreneurs.


And Jess Andre and her husband, James Heugas, welcomed daughter Juniper this February, and from Facebook it seems like everyone is doing just fine. I also heard that Elise Wellford Tillinghast made her daughter Lucy a big sister when she welcomed son Turner Everett Tillinghast on February 27. Congrats, mamas!


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

I recently got a nice note from Thatcher Wine, whose company, Juniper Books, I featured in a column a few months back. He wanted to add a few personal details to the update, and of course I am happy to do so. Thatcher writes; “I live in beautiful Boulder, Colorado, with my wife, Kristen Carpenter, who is a law professor and associate dean at the University of Colorado Law School. We are the parents of Cedar (5) and Jasmine (3). We all love to hike, bike and ski!” Thanks, Thatcher.


I also received a note from Kelly (Nugent) Motz, who wrote in from D.C.: “Eric and I are thrilled to inform you that Amelia Beth Motz arrived January 2. She joins big brother Maddux (1) and sister Savannah (6).” Needless to say, they have their hands full and were too busy to write in with any more details!


And I’m pleased to be able to announce that our next class Alumni Council representative will be Stephanie (McMichael) Vartughian.Since 1913 the Alumni Council has provided means for a dialogue between Dartmouth’s alumni body and the College’s administration and trustees. As our class representative Stephanie will review all College-related initiatives and will provide a single point of contact for any concerns our class might have. Stephanie has had diverse work experiences ranging from advertising to investment banking. She also earned a business school degree from the University of Chicago. Her strong background in communication, analysis and advocacy—also garnered during her time in a global client coverage role at two “bulge bracket” financial services firms as well as in a leadership role for an organization that funds outreach programs in New York City—make her an ideal choice for this role. I’d like to thank Grant Bosse for serving as our class’s Alumni Council representative for the past three years and to congratulate Stephanie on her new position.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Professor Robert C. Bordone’s Harvard Negotiation and Mediation Clinical Program was selected by the International Institute for Conflict Prevention and Resolution to be the recipient of its 2010 Problem Solving in the Law School Curriculum Award. The clinic’s director and founder, Robert is the Thaddeus R. Beal Clinical Professor of Law at Harvard Law School. Along with Nancy Rogers, Craig McEwen and Frank E.A. Sander, Robert is also currently writing Designing Forum and Disputing Systems, a new text on problem-solving and dispute systems design that will be published by Aspen in 2012.


This month I also have the pleasure of having had several guest column writers—without further ado, I present the beautifully crafted stories of Dr. Mary Hayes, Marcelino Garcia, Ruth Mamaril and Rebecca Obstler.


“On March 12 Dr. Mary Hayes married Jim Lawrence in a beautiful ‘medievalesque’ wedding ceremony in an old southern mansion at the Castle Hill resort in Oxford, Mississippi. Marcelino Garcia, who served as the man of honor, Ruth Mamaril, who was a bridesmaid, and Rebecca Obstler, who read an assortment of poems both tame and erotic, all flew in from faraway places to take part in the festivities. 


“For the past five years Mary has been teaching medieval literature at the University of Mississippi, where she is an assistant professor of English and director of the medieval studies minor. She met her future husband on a boat sailing across the Drake Passage while en route to run a marathon in Antarctica in 2005. They live in Oxford with their two black labs, Chutzpah (who was the flower girl in the wedding) and Zeke (who had an untimely attack of ‘cold paws’ before the event and thus stayed home to guard the house), rescued dogs who share their parents’ zeal for distance running. As part of her work toward tenure, which she hopes to be awarded next year, Mary published two books earlier this year: a scholarly study of medieval piety and a textbook on the history of the English language. 


“Since graduation Marcelino has lived in Chicago. After working in the international relations department of Chicago 2016, the organization tasked with bringing the 2016 Olympic and Paralympic Games to the city, he now works as an attorney helping people going through the mortgage foreclosure process. In addition, he is also a partner with Overseas Strategies, LLC, a small company that does consulting work in the import/export trade business. An avid traveler, he has visited more than 60 countries and is always planning his next trip to a new location.


“Ruth Mamaril has worked in various aspects of the post-production industry, from post supervising to editing, both in L.A. and N.Y.C. She moved to New York City 11 years ago and currently freelances as a film/video editor. You can see what she’s been up to on her website www.ruthmamaril.com. In the last year she has enhanced her passion for travel with a new love: surfing. And she was definitely stoked to have had the opportunity to reunite with her fellow Dartmouth alums at Mary’s wedding.


“Rebecca Obstler has also lived and worked in a variety of exciting locales since graduation: New York City, Rome, Washington, D.C., and now London for the past two years. She was thrilled to be able to fly in for Mary’s wedding and to spend time with her old mates. Rebecca hopes soon to recapture the magic she shared with her fellow ’94s the day after the wedding at ‘Graceland Too’ in Holly Springs, Mississippi, the local $5 alternative to the better-known and less colorful attraction in Memphis.”


Thanks, guys, both for writing in and also for literally writing my column for me; it was a luxurious break!


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

This month I have news about Alessandro Ceglia, who I tracked down after seeing a mention on the Dartmouth Alumni in Entertainment and Media website. After Dartmouth Alessandro attended the animation and digital arts master’s program at the University of Southern California’s School of Cinematic Arts. He is now an animator and award-winning filmmaker based in Los Angeles. His film The Intruder (2007), a combination of 2D and 3D techniques, screened at more than 30 festivals worldwide. More recently he completed Babayaga (2011), a film commissioned by conductor Michael Tilson Thomas and the New World Symphony Orchestra that screened at the inauguration of Frank Gehry’s latest architectural project, the New World Symphony Hall in Miami. He has also worked extensively as a 2D and 3D animator for television commercials and music videos and has taught animation at Loyola Marymount University. Currently he is working as a rough layout artist at Dreamworks Animation SKG, where he is working on the film Turbo, coming out this year. To see some of his amazing work, visit http://alexceglia.webfactional.com.


I also have news from Frida Polli,Ph.D., who just finished up an M.B.A. at Harvard. After a decade of neuroscience research in Boston, she has relocated to New York City to launch Pymetrics, a company that applies neuroscience-based assessment to the field of human capital management. Pymetrics aims to make the hiring process more scientific by using cutting-edge, neuroscience-based software tools designed to yield improved outcomes for job seekers and firms. Their multi-stage software platform aims to improve hiring, retention and development of employees in fields such as consulting, financial service and technology. Using short computer games to assess applicants instead of self-report questionnaires, Pymetrics also uses the latest machine learning technology to provide companies with a “people recommendation engine.” Frida and her almost-7-year-old daughter Ele have moved to North Battery Park in Manhattan, where they are enjoying the view of the new World Trade Center and the area’s many parks. For more information on Frida’s new company, you can visit www. pymetrics.com. You can also reach Frida at fridapolli@gmail.com.


Along with a number of other Dartmouth alums, Ara Lovitt has gotten involved with a national movement to create policy debate opportunities for at-risk, urban populations. Ara is serving as the young professionals leadership board member for the nonprofit association the National Association of Urban Debate Leagues (www.urbandebate.org/index.shtml), or NAUDL. Now a presence in 19 major cities, NAUDL offers thousands of at-risk students a chance to participate in debating with remarkable results. Many of the Urban Debate Leagues boast near perfect high school graduation rates, despite working with school systems with closer to 75-percent graduation ratings. Peer review studies reaffirm that participation in urban debate also increases standardized test scores and GPAs. 


For the last nine years Pherabe Kolb has been working at the Smithsonian Institution. After starting in government relations, she moved over to the communications office, where she is currently the associate director of strategic communications for the Smithsonian. Her latest project has been to develop its first-ever national advertising campaign. With the tag line “Seriously Amazing,” the 165-year-old institution wants to assure the younger generation that it is not, in fact, “the nation’s attic,” but is instead a historically rich and still relevant place to visit.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Well, the saying is “no news is good news,” but I’m here to refute that. Sorry this month’s column is more like sound bytes, but that’s all I got. I dug around my inbox and Facebook for these little gems, so enjoy and, more importantly, please send me some news.


After working withglobal consulting firm ZS Associates for seven years, Jim Adelizzi has transferred to the firm’s new San Diego office, where he is now serving as a principal. Jim joined ZS Associates from Prometheus, where he had served as vice president of strategic planning and analysis.


Tod Modisett worked with producer Doug Reid ’00 editing segments for NBC’s The Sing-Off. “We got assigned all the Dartmouth Aires’ stuff. It was a lot of fun and the Aires are doing amazingly well on the show. Check them out on Monday nights.” Thanks, Tod!


In other Los Angeles area news, it seems Jess Andre is now situated there. She also got married this year, so congratulations are in order!


Elizabeth Greenberg is now curator of fine arts at Siena College, an independent Roman Catholic liberal arts college situated in Loudonville, New York, just outside of Albany. 


And Nathan Saunders transferred from the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission office in Washington, D.C., to the SEC’s offices in Philadelphia. Thanks for sending, Nate!


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suziefromer@gmail.com

Beware, people—DAM gets read far and wide. I received the following message from Susie Lee after I put out a somewhat embarrassing note about her behavior during freshman trip in a past column: “My mom gets the alumni magazine and came over last weekend with the Sept/Oct 2010 issue asking me if I stood on tables and sang songs at Dartmouth. The thing I remember most about the freshman trip is that our trip leader killing a chipmunk that had the misfortune of running into our cabin. Then he skinned it and ate it amidst much screaming and yelling. When we all got back to Moosilauke our group reenacted the incident in a play with the remnants of the actual chipmunk carcass attached to a string. (He had dried out the skin over the cabin sink).”


Susie kindly also sent in an update. It seems after graduating from Dartmouth she attended Cornell for graduate school and also spent some time living in Japan. She finished her Ph.D. in history at Cornell in 2004 and is happy to be away from those cold Ithaca winters. Currently she is an assistant professor of history at St. John’s University in balmier New York City climes. She is also writing a social history of J.P. Morgan & Co. before the Second World War. Somewhere along the way she also married a Yalie, Greg Pak, and together they have a son, Wyatt, who recently turned 3. If we can coordinate over the increasingly crazy holiday season, I’m hoping we can get the boys together for a mini-North Mass reunion soon. 


I also received an update from Jenny (Kim) Voelker, who has returned to the States after living in London for three years with her husband, Marty, and two children Tommy and Brooke. They have resettled in Darien, Connecticut, and are looking forward to taking their children up to Hanover soon. “I see lots of Dartmouth hats and shirts worn by passersby in this town. And as such I have dug out my own Dartmouth sweatshirt (the same one that I had in college) and started wearing it again too. Green pride still lives here!”


Dawn Urbont, who lives in Los Angeles, gave birth to her second son, Sebastian Miller Corman, this past August. She wrote—to a mother of two boys—“The reality of life with two boys hasn’t hit me yet.” Take a deep breath, Dawn, it seems to only get crazier. Dawn also recently sold a TV pitch to Teen Nick, so she is one busy lady right about now.


I also received details on Michelle Serlin’s new little one; Michelle and husband Adam Hittelman welcomed son Daniel last July in New Haven, Connecticut. Congrats!


My warmest wishes for a happy and healthy holiday season and New Year to you all.


Suzie Fromer, 26 Irving Ave., Tarrytown, NY 10591; suzanne.fromer@alum.dartmouth.org

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