Class Note 1981
Issue
November-December 2023
Sophomore Summer 1979 doesn’t seem that long ago, but apparently it was. Shelley Warren Weiler sent out Big Question #16: “What do you actually remember of that semester?” Many classmates conjured interesting and overlapping fragments.
Some reflected on their academics: Lydia Herman Lazar and Nadine “Deanie” Pearce wrote in about professor Peter Kelman’s education class, whereby students moved into Channing Cox for the quarter in a 24/7 alternative learning experience. Deanie says, “(It) taught me how to pursue interests and tap into others who share those interests, how to speak up about them (Deirdre’s soapbox on the Green), how to be a better listener (was it Liz who came to our meeting with her mouth taped shut?) and how to make Sue’s awesome carrot cake!” She got to know amazing classmates, “several of whom I count as my best friends to this day. Peter, thank you for the most powerful learning experience of my four years at Dartmouth.” Lydia adds, “The summer of ’79 showed me that I too belonged at Dartmouth, that there really were kindred spirits for me there.”
Jon Cohen’s classroom memory is “suntanning on the metal roof of Gamma Delt, then sitting in air-conditioned luxury at Professor Jacobus’ art history class, my only easy summer course.” I was in that course and I didn’t think it was so easy. Paul Yelder recollects “the ‘Camp Dartmouth’ gathering affectionately referred to as ‘Earth, Wind, and Fire,’ also known as Professor Jastrow’s ‘Earth, Moon, and Planets.’ ” Charlie Craig suspects he was in this class too.
Probably outside the classroom, Jeff Healey learned “that grilling chicken takes much longer than you think.”
Non-academic pursuits made more numerous impressions. Julie Styles Matuschak recalls “running and jumping into the river with Julie K,” while Hugo Ribot remembers “nocturnal skinny dipping” therein and “James Bond movies screened at Webster Hall.” Jeff Walters also remembers 007 and river dips, plus “softball games on the Green, cutting up dozens of watermelons for an ’81 event on Tuck Mall, and seeing fireflies for the very first time (I grew up in northern California).”
Tom Waterman’s standout memory was “the July 4 bottle rocket war on Webster Avenue. Highlights included the use of ski pole launchers for improved accuracy, a classmate running through the smoke clouds with an American flag, and another classmate snatching a bag of confiscated student IDs from a campus police officer, sparing eight others a fine and disciplinary record.” Well done, mystery classmate.
Lynnette Marshall “will never forget the epic surprise 20th birthday party for Mary Favret at Sigma Alpha Epsilon” and reminisces on “the beauty of the foggy mornings on the Green, burning off to glorious summer days.”
With that ethereal image, we’re reminded that summer is fleeting. I regret to report the deaths of classmates William Brown “Bill” Rockwood and Stuart T. Weinberg. Heartfelt condolences to their families.
—Ann Jacobus Kordahl, P.O. Box 470443, San Francisco, CA 94147; ann@annjacobus.com; Emil Miskovsky, P.O. Box 2162, North Conway, NH 03860; emilmiskovsky@gmail.com
Some reflected on their academics: Lydia Herman Lazar and Nadine “Deanie” Pearce wrote in about professor Peter Kelman’s education class, whereby students moved into Channing Cox for the quarter in a 24/7 alternative learning experience. Deanie says, “(It) taught me how to pursue interests and tap into others who share those interests, how to speak up about them (Deirdre’s soapbox on the Green), how to be a better listener (was it Liz who came to our meeting with her mouth taped shut?) and how to make Sue’s awesome carrot cake!” She got to know amazing classmates, “several of whom I count as my best friends to this day. Peter, thank you for the most powerful learning experience of my four years at Dartmouth.” Lydia adds, “The summer of ’79 showed me that I too belonged at Dartmouth, that there really were kindred spirits for me there.”
Jon Cohen’s classroom memory is “suntanning on the metal roof of Gamma Delt, then sitting in air-conditioned luxury at Professor Jacobus’ art history class, my only easy summer course.” I was in that course and I didn’t think it was so easy. Paul Yelder recollects “the ‘Camp Dartmouth’ gathering affectionately referred to as ‘Earth, Wind, and Fire,’ also known as Professor Jastrow’s ‘Earth, Moon, and Planets.’ ” Charlie Craig suspects he was in this class too.
Probably outside the classroom, Jeff Healey learned “that grilling chicken takes much longer than you think.”
Non-academic pursuits made more numerous impressions. Julie Styles Matuschak recalls “running and jumping into the river with Julie K,” while Hugo Ribot remembers “nocturnal skinny dipping” therein and “James Bond movies screened at Webster Hall.” Jeff Walters also remembers 007 and river dips, plus “softball games on the Green, cutting up dozens of watermelons for an ’81 event on Tuck Mall, and seeing fireflies for the very first time (I grew up in northern California).”
Tom Waterman’s standout memory was “the July 4 bottle rocket war on Webster Avenue. Highlights included the use of ski pole launchers for improved accuracy, a classmate running through the smoke clouds with an American flag, and another classmate snatching a bag of confiscated student IDs from a campus police officer, sparing eight others a fine and disciplinary record.” Well done, mystery classmate.
Lynnette Marshall “will never forget the epic surprise 20th birthday party for Mary Favret at Sigma Alpha Epsilon” and reminisces on “the beauty of the foggy mornings on the Green, burning off to glorious summer days.”
With that ethereal image, we’re reminded that summer is fleeting. I regret to report the deaths of classmates William Brown “Bill” Rockwood and Stuart T. Weinberg. Heartfelt condolences to their families.
—Ann Jacobus Kordahl, P.O. Box 470443, San Francisco, CA 94147; ann@annjacobus.com; Emil Miskovsky, P.O. Box 2162, North Conway, NH 03860; emilmiskovsky@gmail.com