Early season’s greetings! Young Dawkins is on the move! “Our family—wife Ruth, son Tom, now 4, and I—have returned to London after a glorious green-tinged summer holiday in the States. First a week in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, with Sal Sciretto ’92 and family; then a great lunch in historic Yorktown, Virginia, with old friend Nels Armstrong ’71; and finally a few rounds of golf with former roommate Ken McGill on the coast of North Carolina—44 years after we first stuck a tee in the ground together on the old nine-hole course at the Hanover Country Club.


“But we won’t be in the United Kingdom for long. After an amazing and educational stint with Save the Children UK, which took me to some of the remote corners of Liberia and Mozambique, we are heading to Australia, where I have signed on as executive director of alumni and development with the University of Tasmania. All blue-water sailors and other ’72s who find themselves heading Under Down Under are invited to enjoy a refreshing pint or two of Cascade Premium in the historic capital city of Hobart.” 


Congrats to fellow author (mine is a customer-service treatise The Best Service is No Service) Mark Woodward on the debut of his e-book novel Xylophone Fragments, “a literary mystery that revolves around the classical concert world [and] follows the investigations of a musical detective as he attempts to explain the mysterious disappearance of all traces of a long dead composer,” according to the press release.


Mark explains: “I think music has been underserved by literature in recent years. In the 19th and early-20th centuries music was an important part of literary culture. Writers who imbued their works with musical themes included many of the greats. We seem to have lost that in the last 50 years. I wanted to return to literature some sense that music was still important. In writing a mystery that hovers over the concert world, I wanted to do more than pay lip service.” Look for local color: The novel begins and ends at Quechee (Vermont) Gorge but not in the way you might think, and climaxes at the Hopkins Center, where Mark spent many years in the marketing department.


Class president Bill Schur continues to keep us together. “Bill Roberts joined me at Wrigley Field as the Reds downed the Cubs 5-0. Bill is well and enjoying his career as an Episcopal priest. He confessed to me that he really is a White Sox fan, but I forgave him nonetheless. Bev Love was our dinner guest at our Highland Park [Illinois] home, in town for a medical convention. He is a gynecologist in Natchez, Mississippi. Bev reports that Vaughn Tatum is practicing internal medicine in Chicago and Oak Park, Illinois.”


Right after delivering this issue Lori and I will join Thurm Lowans at his wedding, so look for news next time round!


Please continue to send your updates and news.


—Bill Price, 12 Lummi Key, Bellevue, WA 98006; bill@drivasolutions.com