Talk about a landslide! Jack Bennett won overwhelming confirmation as our next Alumni Council representative by a vote of 151 to 0. With more than half the 295 qualified voters (dues-payers) weighing in, not one voted “no” or filled in the write-in box. Jack will take over after Norm Sylvester’s expiring term and serve through June 2015. 


The huge vote, facilitated by webmaster/listserver Andy Thomas, augurs well for enthusiastic attendance at our 55th reunion in June 2013—not to mention this year’s Hanover gatherings: the June 1 luncheon reunion and the September 28-30 fall mini. (The latter was moved to a warmer date on the Penn football weekend because the College scheduled the late October Harvard game for 5 p.m.) As council vote recorder, I fielded ballots from Tampa to Tokyo (Chik Onodera), with notes from former roomies Steve Dawkins in Key West, Florida, back from a sojourn in France, and M.D.s Pete Flowers, enjoying retirement from family practice in Lebanon, Pennsylvania, with wife Ann, and pediatrician Lee Wight, who’s retired with Jan to Laguna Woods, California—on “the left coast.” Henry Hof, an astute investor who spoke kindly of my investment letter, voted too, as did John Whiteley’s widow, Kim, Joe Kabat’s Sheila and Ed Turner’s Rosemarie. 


Cack Bittner, from his Pocono outpost in Dallas, Pennsylvania, tells of a remarkable 16-year-old Paralympic skier from his area named Stephanie Jallen, whom he’s aided for several years as she downhilled and slalomed her way, with one arm and one leg, onto the U.S. national team for 2014 in Stochi, Russia. Born with congenital hemidysplasia with ichthyosiform erythroderma and limb defects (also known as CHILD syndrome), she recently won gold at the U.S. championships in Waterville, New Hampshire. Cack met her via a Shriner’s service project. “Expenses run upwards of $40,000 a year,” he says. “She maintains a full fundraising schedule plus honor-roll status in school.” Stephanie was thrilled when Tryg Myhren, who grew up in her area and is deeply involved in the Paralympics, looked her up at a meet in Oregon. This winter she skied with the team in Europe. Her trainer, says Cack, is an ex-Marine who barks “Get up!” when she falls. Check out www.stephaniejallen.org. 


Cack and Joanne had a ball last summer house-sitting at Larry Hampton’s awesome farmhouse/villa in the Algarve region of southern Portugal—traveling the Iberian peninsula, basking at the pool, playing golf and enjoying the car, housekeeper and parts of the wine cellar approved by Larry. Larry and Helga want to downsize in the Algarve and again need a sitter to show around buyers while they summer at their place in Wimbledon. In February they were still looking for ’58s who could sit from late June to September.


Carter Elwood, noted Russia scholar at Carleton University in Ottawa, has published a book titled The Non-Geometric Lenin in which he exposes the Bolshevik leader’s mistakes and cover-ups. Another recent ’58 author, the indefatigable John Murphy, waxes amusing and insightful in May I Approach the Bench? about his courtroom adventures—deftly edited by Frank Gado.


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