Norm Sylvester in June will wind up his three-year term as our class representative on the Alumni Council, which was started in 1913 by President Ernest Martin Hopkins, class of 1901, as a clearinghouse for interchanging alumni ideas with the College. Expanded in 2007, it now has 125 members, including reps from the most recent 55 classes. Upon the recommendation of our nominating committee, chaired by Walter Vail, the class executive committee nominated Jack Bennett to assume Norm’s responsibilities through June 2015—leaving head agent Jack, who accepted immediately, with a very full platter. 


The aforesaid Mr. Vail also has a new job—as a selectman of Oak Bluffs, Massachusetts, on Martha’s Vineyard. “The other person elected last year was Mike Santoro, cousin of Buddy Teevens,” he says. “We both won big, by two-to-one over incumbents, so it was evident the town, mired in an organizational and financial mess, wanted a change. Being retired, I have plenty of time to work on the issues and we’re making great progress. There has to be more to retirement than golf and tennis.” 


Mel Alperin, our gift planning chairman, reminds us to consider joining the Bartlett Tower Society (BTS) and including Dartmouth in our estate plans. Says Mel: “A simple bequest or other deferred gift (like a charitable gift annuity that pays you a rate of return for life) can do the trick.” His goal is to secure 58 BTS members by our 55th reunion in 2013. Contact either Mel or Mark Dantos at the College, (800) 451-4067.


Andy Peterson tells me that he and wife Sharon still sleep in a riverside lean-to below their house in West Fairlee, Vermont, winter and summer, dashing uphill to warmth and breakfast each morning. He still backpacks despite bypass surgery. In Hanover our intrepid 100-mile bicyclists Dan O’Hara, Dan McIntyre, Dave Bradley and Gersh Abraham ride the Prouty fundraiser every July. But my vote for this year’s “Guts Ball Award” goes to Fred Pitzner for his amazing 800-mile trip in September on his Harley Ultra Classic through the Colorado Rockies, including the hair-raising 23-mile stretch from Ouray to Silverton—which he did not once, but twice. Having reached Silverton in one piece, he turned his bike around and rode back up to Ouray. Says fearless Fred, the retired banker who’s been battling pancreatic cancer for several years: “There are hairpin turns up and down the mountain. One mistake and you go off the cliff. It was my biggest riding challenge, so I went for it.”


Pete Kelsey and Winkie are avid wintertime travelers. In November they spent a “fabulous” week in the Galapagos Islands in pursuit of blue-footed boobys and the other unusual wildlife that captivated Darwin once upon a time. After New Year’s they began a month-long cruise from Singapore south past Bali, around northern and eastern Australia to Auckland, New Zealand. Pete and Wink recently moved to a condo in Hanover, where “we’re the young people,” but will continue to summer with their dogs at Lake Fairlee in Vermont. 


Sadly, Joe Livermore, retired judge of the Arizona Court of Appeals, died at his home in Tucson on September 28.


—Steve Quickel, 65 Chapel Road, New Hope, PA 18938; squickel@usinvestmentreport.com