Class Note 1970
Issue
July-August 2022
Can you believe it? Are we finally having a real, in-persongathering on campus to celebrate our “Fifty-ish”?
I don’t know about the rest of you, but was our graduation really 52 years ago?
Damn! We’ve become those old guys. Simon & Garfunkel’s “Old Friends”is playing in my head.
As Dartmouth celebrates 50 years of coeducation, I invited Janis Nelson and Louise Weeks Thorndike, two of our senior year exchange students to look back on what it was like to be trailblazers, circa 1969-70.
Janis writes: “I was a theater student from Barnard (then the women’s arm of all-male Columbia), excited to do a year at the Hop. Barnard had no real theater program, so Dartmouth’s was a great opportunity.
“Dartmouth changed my life by giving me the opportunity to perform in memorable plays, allowing me to study film with Joe Losey, and exposing me to marvelous teachers.
“I also became a sequential Dartmouth spouse, marrying first Tom Nelson ’67 and then (after a brief marriage and divorce) my classmate Jim Ruxin. Jim and I have three children (Julia, Lehigh ’14; Elizabeth, Tulane’17; and David, UVA’17).
“I also made lifelong friends at Dartmouth: John Lugar, Wayne Scherzer ’72, and Wendy Samuel ‘71. My son, David, is named for the late David Carroll ’72.
“I spent my earliest post-college years in theater and film production and was admitted to the Directors Guild as a unit production manager and assistant director.
“I earned my law degree from UCLA in 1986 and spent 30-plus years as an entertainment attorney, retiring as general counsel of the Sundance Institute two years ago.
“My husband, Jim, and I live in Los Angeles. He’s a retired film editor, teaches that at USC, and leads local film discussion groups.”
Here’s what Louise Weeks Thorndikeshared: “My motivations for applying were quite self-centered and hardly laudable. I wanted to escape the stifling experience at my all-women college, Mount Holyoke, and spend the year with my Dartmouth boyfriend.
“Although I was salutatorian of my high school class, I was a mediocre B student at Holyoke. I’m sure I got into Dartmouth because I’m a legacy and applied to go the whole year.
“My main impressions were how intellectually stimulating it was to be around men as opposed to women, who mainly talked about their diets, the men’s schools to which they got rides, and which term papers they were behind in writing.
“I was an art history major, and no student ever asked questions. Nor did the professors. They lectured, we mutely listened and scribbled notes as fast as we could.
“Dartmouth was so fun. If we escaped, it was to see plays and museums in Boston or go skiing for a weekend.”
Sadly, Louise started having neurological symptoms last October. She was diagnosed with brain cancer and died on February 28 at her daughter’s house in Silver Spring, Maryland.
—Stu Zuckerman, P.O. Box 85, Bridgehampton, NY 11932; (917) 559-0063; stuartz@gmail.com
I don’t know about the rest of you, but was our graduation really 52 years ago?
Damn! We’ve become those old guys. Simon & Garfunkel’s “Old Friends”is playing in my head.
As Dartmouth celebrates 50 years of coeducation, I invited Janis Nelson and Louise Weeks Thorndike, two of our senior year exchange students to look back on what it was like to be trailblazers, circa 1969-70.
Janis writes: “I was a theater student from Barnard (then the women’s arm of all-male Columbia), excited to do a year at the Hop. Barnard had no real theater program, so Dartmouth’s was a great opportunity.
“Dartmouth changed my life by giving me the opportunity to perform in memorable plays, allowing me to study film with Joe Losey, and exposing me to marvelous teachers.
“I also became a sequential Dartmouth spouse, marrying first Tom Nelson ’67 and then (after a brief marriage and divorce) my classmate Jim Ruxin. Jim and I have three children (Julia, Lehigh ’14; Elizabeth, Tulane’17; and David, UVA’17).
“I also made lifelong friends at Dartmouth: John Lugar, Wayne Scherzer ’72, and Wendy Samuel ‘71. My son, David, is named for the late David Carroll ’72.
“I spent my earliest post-college years in theater and film production and was admitted to the Directors Guild as a unit production manager and assistant director.
“I earned my law degree from UCLA in 1986 and spent 30-plus years as an entertainment attorney, retiring as general counsel of the Sundance Institute two years ago.
“My husband, Jim, and I live in Los Angeles. He’s a retired film editor, teaches that at USC, and leads local film discussion groups.”
Here’s what Louise Weeks Thorndikeshared: “My motivations for applying were quite self-centered and hardly laudable. I wanted to escape the stifling experience at my all-women college, Mount Holyoke, and spend the year with my Dartmouth boyfriend.
“Although I was salutatorian of my high school class, I was a mediocre B student at Holyoke. I’m sure I got into Dartmouth because I’m a legacy and applied to go the whole year.
“My main impressions were how intellectually stimulating it was to be around men as opposed to women, who mainly talked about their diets, the men’s schools to which they got rides, and which term papers they were behind in writing.
“I was an art history major, and no student ever asked questions. Nor did the professors. They lectured, we mutely listened and scribbled notes as fast as we could.
“Dartmouth was so fun. If we escaped, it was to see plays and museums in Boston or go skiing for a weekend.”
Sadly, Louise started having neurological symptoms last October. She was diagnosed with brain cancer and died on February 28 at her daughter’s house in Silver Spring, Maryland.
—Stu Zuckerman, P.O. Box 85, Bridgehampton, NY 11932; (917) 559-0063; stuartz@gmail.com