The granite of New Hampshire may be in our muscles and our brains, but we all have amazing heart and soul as evidenced by the astounding acts of the past few months. Our very own Annette Gordon-Reed ended her eight-year tenure as a member of the board of trustees with a wonderful smile and a statement of devotion saying “what an honor to be asked to serve, and to serve.” She oversaw the distribution of the precious big “D” parchment to our palindromic pair class of ’18, some of whom have proud parents in our class, including Barnes Darwin, Jane Alexander, Robert Webb, Cathy Haley Rost, Grace Macomber Bird, Tom McGonagle and Anne Hallager McGonagle, David Edelson,and Annabelle Brainard Canning. Also getting measured for the lone pine robes of the trustees is the highly distinguished Eileen Chamberlain Donahoe, who is the executive director of the global digital policy incubator at Stanford University Center for Democracy, Development, and the Rule of Law. Eileen joins classmates Bill Burgess and chair Laurel Richie on the board.

On the Fairfield University campus David Frassinelli was honored with the Distinguished Faculty/Administrator Award. He is the vice president of facilities management and oversees campus operations as well as capital planning and construction. He has overseen the construction or renovation of more than 500,000 square feet of campus facilities that include a stadium, residential buildings, a dining hall, a center for nursing and health sciences, parking garages, and now a new $42-million school of business. He obtained a master’s in finance from Fairfield in 1992.

Down in Virginia Yvonne Howell is professor of Russian at the University of Richmond. She enjoys the music scene with her husband, Carter Blough ’76, who is a bass player in several bands there. Her next book is a translation of a “Russian feel-good book” called Moments of Happiness.

In Bourges, France, nearly 40 years after her 1979 language study abroad trip, Julie Koeninger rekindled relations with her host family in the shadows of the cathedral. She shared this family one term later with Sharon Washington, and they recalled the interesting 10-kilometer journey each morning on bike for Julie and moped for Sharon. The “memories came flooding back” for Sharon, who recalled the incredible home-cooked meals and the daily visits to the patisserie. I personally recall the speedy, intrepid mobilette driver Sharon weaving through traffic to get to classes as I hoofed it through farm fields along the river, casting my fly rod, if I had time! The College’s “spell on them remains” indeed.

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—Emil Miskovsky, 520 Seneca St., Suite 312, Utica, NY 13502; (802) 345-9861; emilmiskovsky@gmail.com; Veronica Wessels, 224 Buena Vista Road, Rockcliffe, ON K1M0V7, Canada; (613) 864-4491; vcwessels@rogers.com