To the best class in Dartmouth history: hello! I hope this finds you all having enjoyed a wonderful holiday season and a great start to 2017. Before we get to the column, a message from the class about giving! Our class demonstrated its spirit for giving and having fun with its fall participation fundraiser, #costumeorcash, posting on the class Facebook page. Notable posts include Mariah Cunnick as “Mr. T” and Alexandra Stein as “Maverick” from Top Gun. We are gearing up to break records at the 10th reunion, which, incidentally, was also the impetus for this column! In anticipation of our reunion I wanted to try something a little bit different: In lieu of current news, I wanted old news. Welcome to your “winter-themed” trip down nostalgia lane. As we all get ready to reunite in June, I thought it might be fun to reminisce a little bit about some of our shared time in Hanover. So here we go!

One of the things that was fun about this was seeing how many of us shared the same “favorite” memories from Dartmouth winters. For example: Edy Wilson wrote in to share that her favorite winter memory at Dartmouth was the first big snowball fight on the Green during our freshman year winter. She wrote: “So much fun! Slightly painful, but so much fun!” Julia Drury shared the same memory, adding: “That first late-night snowball fight on the Green, surrounded by falling snow, is my favorite.”

Perhaps not surprisingly, another common favorite was one involving, ahem, “borrowed” food trays. Alex Stein wrote: “I remember snagging trays from food court late at night and heading out onto the golf course for my first trip down that steep hill. I caught air and then continued on…it felt like I’d never stop sliding!” Justin Neiman also wrote in to reminisce about the semi-legal nocturnal sledding: “I used to love sledding on the golf course with trays we’d taken from Collis.”

For Amanda Prentice, Jean Polfus and Ali Crocker favorite memories centered around our most wintery of all traditions, Winter Carnival. Amanda wrote: “My favorite memory was doing the polar bear swim freshman year outside the Choates in Occom Pond with fellow floormates Rachel Casseus, Emily Elliott, Mark Goodson and Vince Carey!” Ali wrote in that her favorite was “exhausting the women’s ski-team dress-up locker in order to spectate the Carni Classic in the most ridiculous style possible! Think sparkles and tutus and ’80s-loud tights.” Similarly, Jean added that many of her favorite memories were at Winter Carnival with the ski team: “ski races at Oak Hill (when we had enough snow), pink hair, crazy costumes at the Carni Classic on the golf course and the ski team holding torches in a snow storm at the opening ceremony of carnival weekend.”

As for my own favorite memory of winter at Dartmouth, it was definitely seeing the incredible ice sculpture forged our sophomore year during Winter Carnival 2004, “Oh, the Places it Snows: A Seusstennial.” I won’t soon forget the sight of the enormous, highly detailed Cat in the Hat standing proudly on the Green, having been executed to perfection by Victoria Solbert ’07, Chris Polashenski ’07, Dan Schneider ’07 and our own Jeff Woodward.

Finally, I’d like to note that I heard from several of you who wrote in to say that many of their fond memories from winter terms at Dartmouth were probably…well, not quite fit to print. One of our classmates, who shall remain anonymous, spoke for many of us with this simple statement: “Most of my winter memories probably took place in a frat basement. Not my best moments!”

Can’t wait for reunion, where we can forge new memories—some of which may also be unfit to print!

For our next column, we’ll return to the more traditional format of news, so send in those submissions.

—Jessica Tory, Schwab Residential Center, 680 Serra St., Stanford, CA 94305; jessica.e.tory@gmail.com