Class Notes 1993

It’s summer, so we asked a few classmates about their favorite memories of Sophomore Summer.

Meredith (Katz) Gantcher writes: “My memories of the summer are drenched with the trepidation and thrill that I felt each time I launched myself off the banks of the Connecticut River, gripping one of the many rope swings that lined the shore, my heart pounding with the fear I’d forget to release just at the right moment; the wonder I felt during languid late night walks in the pitch dark to the golf course or Ledyard dock looking up at the star-filled night sky, the small ripples of the river or the chirp of crickets breaking the silence; actually fulfilling what I felt was the quintessential Dartmouth student experience of being invited to my professors’ homes for a meal and conversation; and the innocent fun, certainly by today’s standards, of packing into cars and driving off campus to a nearby farm to go berry picking with my Tri-Delt sisters, gorging on strawberries as we picked them, and then heading back to the house for a daiquiri party.”

Erica Klein writes: “I loved everything about Sophomore Summer! Great weather, amazing friends, laidback classes, and the whole Green all to ourselves! To this day non-Dartmouth friends lament to me how awful it must have been to be at school all summer. I always vehemently disagree. I would’ve stayed at Dartmouth every summer if they would’ve let us all be there!”

Mike Pence writes: “The highlight for me was caravanning up to Reggaefest in Burlington, Vermont, with 20 buddies and Pete Harrison’s boat in tow.”

Sam Cook writes: “While Sophomore Summer was filled with fun times at the river and hanging with friends on the Green, I will always remember the time Liz O’Hara and I were almost arrested. We were lab partners in a plant biology class and needed to collect, press, and identify a variety of local flowers. Let’s just say I learned the hard way just how different the rules were in my home state of Georgia vs. Vermont. Who would’ve known that it is illegal in Vermont to pick wildflowers near the shoulder of the interstate? As we returned to my car with our arms chock-full of multiple floral species, our excitement quickly evaporated as two policemen stepped out of their car and immediately began lecturing us about the law we were breaking. Embarrassed, yes; defeated, never. We negotiated our way to freedom and were able to convince the cops to let us keep the loot so as to not let the flowers’ sacrifice be for naught. Even better, we got an A on the project!”

Shana Smith writes: “Favorite overall memory would be tubing with our class in the Connecticut. Maybe somewhat uniquely since I grew up in rural Georgia (where we’d speed-swim out of ponds, rivers, and lakes when a cottonmouth or water moccasin decided to join us), I appreciated hanging out in a natural body of water without keeping my eyes peeled for something venomous.”

—Munir Haddad, P.O. Box 1754, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568; munir.s.haddad.93@alum.dartmouth.org; Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 1 Stanmore Court, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky. 93@dartmouth.edu

The class executive committee writes to formally announce creation of the 1993 Endowed Scholarship Fund to support a current undergraduate. Alice Campbell has graciously accepted the role as project development director to ensure that our program is a success. We voted on this effort during our last reunion and have finalized the details to make it a reality. We’re very excited to support students and build relationships with current students (and as they graduate, younger alumni) to maintain a relevant connection to the College.

Jon Eburne announced the opening of The Print Factory (www.printfactorybellefonte.org/), a nonprofit, independent bookstore and culture space located in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, close to Penn State University, where he is professor of comparative literature, English, and French and Francophone studies. Jon notes that he has been dreaming of opening a bookstore since moving to Centre County 20 years ago.

Roberta Braum announced a new position as director point of sale at Starbucks.

Our class continues to increase our presence and impact in Hanover, as Irene Georgakoudi returns to Dartmouth as professor of engineering at Thayer School of Engineering and codirector of translational engineering in the cancer research program at Dartmouth Cancer Center. “I work on developing noninvasive technologies that harness the natural ‘glow’ of cellular and extracellular tissue components to enable a new level of understanding of tissue function and dysfunction over a wide range of spatiotemporal scales. My goal is to bring the microscope to the patient to monitor with subcellular resolution key morphological and metabolism-focused functional features without exogenous contrast agents or biopsies. Efforts focus on cancer detection and treatment, neurodegenerative diseases, and aging.” Dartmouth adds in her bio that, “Georgakoudi’s passion for using lasers for therapeutic and diagnostic applications was sparked in the basement of Wilder Hall at Dartmouth, where she pursued undergraduate research and her degree in physics.”

Special thanks to Kadesha Bagwell, who continues to provide us with fantastic longer form updates in our class newsletters. If you aren’t receiving your newsletter, please update your mailing address on the alumni section of the Dartmouth website. And if you’ve got news that you’d like to share, we’re always excited to hear from you.

—Munir Haddad, P.O. Box 1754, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568; munir.s.haddad.93@alum.dartmouth.org; Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 1 Stanmore Court, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu

Lisa Overton wrote from Greece, where she met up with Betty Wang for a yoga retreat and some island time. They also visited Istanbul, aided by local advice from Selen Unsal, who arrived in the city the day after they left.

Chip Davis shares, “A Big Green contingent of ’93s at my father’s funeral this summer—Andrea Greer, Angus King, Baird Ruch, Sandy Osborne, Jess Griffiths, and Tim Wennrich—comforted my family, which includes Ellen Davis Parish ’92 and Dan Parish ’90. I covered the rowing events of the Paris Olympics for Rowing News in Vaires-sur-Marne, where Oliver Bub ’20 and Billy Bender ’24 finished 10th for the United States and Molly Reckford ’15, finishing sixth in the lightweight double, made it three Games in a row in which a lightweight from Dartmouth represented the United States in the Olympics. Gustav Peebles also headed to Europe this summer—as associate professor at the department of social anthropology at Stockholm University in Sweden.”

The Dartmouth alumni page made an engaging post on Facebook: “Without using your class year, tell us how Dartmouth old you are.” Veree Hawkins Brown commented, “I used a landline in my room to call home weekly and had an answering machine on it for messages from mom and friends.” Mark Feinberg recollected that “If you could dial fast enough, you didn’t have to put in your personal code, and it was a free call.” Veree added, “Pottery cups used for Class Day on the Lone Pine, which was a bust!” Rachel Byrne quipped, “Totally! I think that was the one and only time they did that.” Jennifer Patterson Parrack enthused, “and we got to keep them!” Kristen Anderson reminisced about how “My mom snail mailed episodes of The Simpsons she had taped on VHS since we didn’t get Fox in the dorms.” Erik Ochsner posted,“We ordered EBAs, and the hospital was still on campus!” Shellon Blanchard-Clarke remembered, “I had to make sure I built in travel time to and from Kiewit Computation Center to get my printouts,” which was similar to Adam Leader’srecollection of “picking up printouts at Kiewit. Pat & Tony’s delivering kegs to the fourth floor of Hitchcock.” Betsy Barth Marantz remembered that “Hovey’s opened in Collis. Meatloaf and Adam Sandler performed on campus.” And Cameron Pelly was even more specific with concerts marking our time: “The Kinks played freshman year,” to which Farrell Page Harwood responded, “Along with Ziggy Marley, Squeeze, and the B52s (they may have been after freshman year—the fact I can’t remember is my response to the original request above).” Alli Hammond centered on how language study abroads and foreign study programs “were canceled due to the Gulf War.” Donna Mulvihill reminded us that“Jake Tapper was a cartoonist for The Dartmouth.”

—Munir Haddad, P.O. Box 1754, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568; munir.s.haddad.93@alum.dartmouth.org; Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 1 Stanmore Court, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu

Summer means books, and a few of our class writers and authors shared what they have written, what has influenced them, and what they are reading.

Sharon Amy Wiggins is a school librarian in Westchester County, New York, for the last 14 years. She shared a book from college that has influenced her the most: Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston. Amy’s senior thesis centered on the book: “It brought me deeper into the trove of Southern Black female writers and allowed me to see myself and my community proudly represented in literature.”

Geoff Tuff reflected that “the book I was exposed to at Dartmouth whose ideas have stayed with me the longest and played the most substantial role in how I think and focus my writing is Edmund Burke’s A Philosophical Enquiry into the Origin of our Ideas of the Sublime and Beautiful.” Geoff’s most recent article in the Harvard Business Review (January) is titled, “When an Active Pause Is the Best Strategic Choice.”

Kate Gaertner has an essay titled “Circular Food Systems: Feeding the Urban World” in a compendium of essays, Proven Climate Solutions: Leading Voices on How to Accelerate Change. Kate provided a book recommendation influenced by her time at Dartmouth: “I would suggest Donella Meadow’s book, Thinking in Systems: A Primer, to anyone who wants to understand the most effective levers for transforming systems. Donella is a legend—globally and among the legions of Dartmouth students she educated from 1972 to 2001.” Kate and her family are excited to be moving to Boston this summer, so please connect if you’re in the area.

Brian Schott is the founding editor of the art and literary journal, Whitefish Review (WFR). He collaborates with Adam Blue,who has been the art editor since issue No. 4. Brian writes that the 29th issue, the music issue, “feature[s] an interview with Raven Chacon, the first Native American to win a Pulitzer Prize for Music [and] Toby Scott, Bruce Springsteen’s longtime sound engineer, about the guitar he gave Bruce for his birthday that now sits in the Music Hall of Fame. The cover of the music issue is a custom screen print for WFR by Mike Tallman, who has done gig posters for The Allman Brothers, Phish, and the Rolling Stones.”

Andrew Von Mayrhauser is an eighth-grade English teacher and grade level dean at Head-Royce School in Oakland, California. He started teaching middle school in the fall of 1993, straight out of Hanover. He shared that his “favorite book is usually the most recent good book I’ve read, which happens to be The Last Ranger by Peter Heller ’82, most famous for The Dog Stars.” Andrew is also an accomplished storyteller, with a “list of 31 stories I tell students and recently have been telling for Moth events. I won at a Moth event recently and will be telling at the Moth Grand Slam in San Francisco this fall.”

—Munir Haddad, P.O. Box 1754, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568; munir.s.haddad.93@alum.dartmouth.org; Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 1 Stanmore Court, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu

Spring-like weather stayed around for a while this past fall and the class of ’93 took advantage. Mark Hirshey and I hosted a mini-reunion tailgate at the Dartmouth-Harvard football game in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in late October. Elise Sheftal Warhaftig, Pam Harris, Todd Cook, Luke McInnis, Margaret Fawley, Pete Essig, and Greg Porter were all in attendance. Pete, Greg, and I stayed for the nailbiter of a game. Pam has suggested hosting another mini-reunion in Boston this May. Look for our class emails with details.

Our class had a fabulous showing for President Beilock during the presidential welcome tour stop in Boston, with Tamer Alamuddin, Todd Cook, Dan Rottenberg, Alex Kaplan, Betsy Marantz, Jennifer Morgan Peterson, Robyn Cohen, Karen Febeo, and me in attendance.

Gustav Peebles wrote that he attended the presidential welcome tour stop in N.Y.C. and met up with Alice Campbell and they shared photos of Eric Ochsner, Carrie Cantor, Alyssa Tablada, Sharon Tomao, Nicole Sayfie Porcelli, Betty Wang, Selen Unsal Jacoby, Tammy Sloan, Amanda Salzhaur, and Holbrook Newman. The New York ’93s looked to have bested Boston’s attendance this time.

Give a rouse! Josh Kraft, president of the New England Patriots Foundation, posted on LinkedIn that at this year’s annual Bridge Gala, “We recognized a great friend, Miceal Chamberlain, president of Bank of America, for his significant work in the community.”

Rob Simmlekjaer hosted “New York’s biggest block party,” shepherding the more than 50,000 runners during his first N.Y.C. Marathon as CEO of the New York Road Runners. Rob has always had pride in his New York roots and now he gets to champion the entire city. He told NY1, “What’s special about it for me, as a New Yorker, is it’s lots of people’s first taste of New York. This is how they will experience our city and they’re experiencing it in such a positive way.”

Lisa Overton wrote that she bumped into Adriana Popescu at a holiday party in the Bay Area and celebrated her (belated) birthday with pizza and sparklers.

Marshall Billingslea led an online Zoom event for the class, providing us with an overview of the unclassified report of the bipartisan U.S. Congressional Commission on the Strategic Posture of the United States. The commission, of which Marshall is a part, is composed of six Democrats and six Republicans and established under the National Defense Authorization Act. More than 50 classmates joined for the briefing.

Kadesha Bagwell sent a beautiful card from France. She is working on our next class newsletter; please send along your latest. We love news that we can share.

—Munir Haddad, P.O. Box 1754, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568; munir.s.haddad.93@alum.dartmouth.org; Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 1 Stanmore Court, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu

After living in China for six years, Farrell Paige Harwood returned to Virginia, where her eldest graduated from the University of Virginia. Her youngest graduated from high school in China before returning with husband Shawn. You can find the Harwoods in Richmond.

This summer I (Munir Haddad) was on a road trip to take my son to camp. I stopped in Larchmont, New York, and stayed with Pete Essig and his family. Our boys are around the same ages and quickly got to throwing a football, playing MineCraft, running around the house, and laughing.

As part of that journey Matt McGinnes and his wife, Missy, allowed me to invite myself to stay at their house in Cleveland. One evening Russ Brady joined Matt and me for dinner out. They both missed our 30th and we were excited to share stories. We shut the place down. In our defense, it was still light out. Russ invited us back to his house where we continued to reminisce, share stories of our children (how some of theirs are older than we were when we met each other) and the responsibilities of everyday life.

Tammy Fagell Sloan invited the Haddad family to her house on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, while Sara Ehrlich and her family were in town. My son and Sara’s had met each other as toddlers and are now both going into sixth grade. They took off together while we adults talked about reunion, friends, and places we’ve lived. Sara, husband Chris Ehrlich ’92, and I have unintentionally followed each other around the country, so I’m hoping that their next stop is settling in Martha’s Vineyard with us.

A work trip took me to the San Francisco Bay Area. Kim Carlson Hobson joined me for lunch in Sausalito. She missed our reunion, having recently attended the delayed 25th of her husband, Jake Hobson ’95. Kim and Jake have two children in high school and Kim leads marketing for a healthcare start up that provides oral immunotherapy, a way to build resistance to food allergies. We remembered Dwight Fenton and shared memories.

Mark Hirschey came to Martha’s Vineyard in August and stayed with us for an evening before the rest of his family joined him. His eldest is a senior in high school and his triplets are sophomores. He continues to work in energy consulting.

Jason Barabas and his wife, Jennifer Jerit, both Dartmouth professors of government, visited the Vineyard in August and were adopted by the extended Haddad family. They attended the third annual Black Alumni of Dartmouth Association (BADA) event in Oak Bluffs, along with me, Tammy Fagell Sloan, Adam Sloan, and their daughter, Nina Sloan ’24.

Kelly Copper and partnerPavol Lista ’95 received a 2023 Guggenheim fellowship and went on a two-month cross-country motorcycle trip through America loosely inspired by the 1969 film Easy Rider. They will be cataloging their journey in a work of art to come.

—Munir Haddad, P.O. Box 1754, Vineyard Haven, MA 02568; munir.s.haddad.93@alum.dartmouth.org; Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener. kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu

Greetings, ’93s! By the time you’re reading this many of us will have been back to Dartmouth for our 30th reunion and still wondering where all that time went!

Todd Sisitsky has spent that time not only cultivating a wonderful career but has recently been elected to serve a four-year term on Dartmouth’s board of trustees. According to his trustee bio, “Sisitsky is the current chair of the Geisel School of Medicine board of advisors and is one of five alumni and healthcare investors instrumental in the launch of the Dartmouth innovations accelerator for cancer” supporting cancer research. He is also “president of the publicly traded alternative asset management firm TPG and is co-managing partner of TPG Capital, TPG’s private equity business in the United States and Europe, where he co-leads the firm’s investment activities in healthcare.” Todd and his wife, Holly, currently live in San Francisco with their three children.

Our globetrotting Munir Haddad ran into Georgia (Green) Gillette at the ASU+GSV Summit in San Diego, California. Georgia is currently vice president of strategic alliances at Opportunity@Work, a Virginia-based company promoting hiring workers who are skilled through alternate routes. Georgia sums up her career in her LinkedIn profile: “I am a senior leader passionate about education and workforce development with global experience in designing innovative programs, building corporate citizenship initiatives, creating effective marketing and communications strategies, and managing high-performing teams. I’ve been fortunate to work in different capacities for several fantastic national and global nonprofits on the forefront of social change, primarily in the youth development and education sectors. I thrive on leveraging the talents and strengths of the corporate sector for nonprofits and the communities they serve.”

Munir also grabbed coffee with cardiologist Kenneth Bilchick in Charlottesville, Virginia, where Ken is a member of UVAHealth. Ken has had a distinguished career specializing in cardiac rhythm abnormalities. He both performs a variety of cardio-corrective procedures and is involved in research regarding cardiac irregularities, having authored more than 30 peer-reviewed publications. He’s also fluent in Spanish and has taken his talents abroad to Spain, Latin America, and the Middle East.

Another doctor making headlines is Pamela Adelstein, who recently joined Fenway Health in Boston as its director of family medicine. According to the press release, “Dr. Adelstein is a family practice board-certified physician who blends her experience practicing mind body medicine and acupuncture with her Western medicine training to care for the whole person and their family.” Pamela also speaks fluent Spanish, is conversational in French and Portuguese, and enjoys the outdoors with her husband and two college-aged children.

Last, but certainly not least, we know where to point you for a good brew! Greg Hoffmeister, and his wife, Michelle, are opening a brewery called Doctor’s Island Brewing Co. According to the Hull Times, the taproom will “look out at the actual Doctor’s Island—the more common name of Black Rock Island, just off the Black Rock Beach at the Hull-Cohasset line,” Massachusetts. It continued, “The Hoffmeister family owns Black Rock Island and said the Doctor’s Island name came from it being the stomping grounds of resident Horace Cook and his doctor pals, who drank whiskey, played games, fished, and unwound with the medicinal quality of the fresh sea air. For nearly a century the family has made it the setting for some of their best summer memories, and they say they’re looking to bring that same laidback vibe to the mainland at their Nantasket outpost for the next century to come.”

Cheers, ’93s! And keep the news coming!

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, P.O. Box 991, Nantucket, MA 02554; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

Happy spring, ’93s! Hope everyone is getting geared up for our 30th reunion June 15-18. Keep an eye on your inboxes and check our Facebook page or the alumni portal for additional details.

Kari Loya has recently added to his expansive career resume with a new book, Conversations Across America: A Father and Son, Alzheimer’s, and 300 Conversations Along the TransAmerica Bike Trail that Capture the Soul of America. His bio on Amazon sums up the rest quite well: “Kari Loya is an educational leader, executive coach, storyteller, and adventurer. He has worked nearly three decades at a range of innovative educational institutions, beginning with Teach For America in 1993 and serving most recently as headmaster at the Good Hope Country Day School in the U.S. Virgin Islands, when he received a Klingenstein Fellowship from Columbia University. He is also an Emmy-winning bilingual voice talent, musical artist, and author of My Top 40 at 40: Making the First Half Count, which recounts many other adventures. He spoke at TEDx UC Davis in April 2022 on the theme of metamorphosis. He holds an A.B. from Dartmouth College and an M.B.A. from Columbia University. He currently lives with his wife and daughter in Sugar Land, Texas.”

Renee Reed and her partner, Jacqui Bliss, recently celebrated the 15th anniversary of their company Anytime Fitness in Dallas. Their business model relies on a personalized approach, coaching each customer on an individualized basis, rather than a generic training model. Renee and Jacqui use their own collegiate athletic experiences (Renee in basketball and Jacqui in track and field) in combination with several other coaches on staff, including a nutritionist, and a physical therapist available on site to offer a full-service, all-hours gym. They are located in the Oak Cliff neighborhood and have remained a mainstay of their community despite the challenges of the last few years.

Clark Khayat, who is currently the executive vice president and chief strategy officer for KeyCorp, was just named as his company’s next chief financial officer when the current officeholder retires in May. Congratulations! Clark has been with KeyCorp since 2012, previously working at Occom Ridge Partners, Progressive Corp., and McKinsey and Co. He is also an adjunct professor at Case Western University. 

Susan Stuebner continues to make national news by leading a tuition reduction at Colby-Sawyer College. Tuition will plummet from the current $46,364 to $17,500 for the incoming class of 2027. For reference, tuition was $14,340 when we matriculated in 1989 and was $17,229 our senior year. I’m going to posit that those of us contemplating or paying higher education bills would welcome this type of “regression” with open arms!

Sadly, we have lost another classmate. Elizabeth “Beth” Johnson Kindelberger’s father emailed with the somber news. Her obituary notes that she “died peacefully on November 6, 2022, from complications of lung cancer” and was surrounded by her loving family. Her father also shared that she “highly valued her Dartmouth education and experience.” The full text can be found at www.copelandfuneralhomes.com/obituary/ElizabethBeth-JohnsonKindelberger. Our sincere condolences go out to her family and friends.

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, P.O. Box 991, Nantucket, MA 02554; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

Class of ’93s, you are some astounding individuals! Peter Kuechle, our beloved Alumni Council representative, biked in the Pan-Mass Challenge (PMC) in honor and memory of the people in his life who have been touched by cancer. His neighbor posted, “How lucky am I to have such amazing neighbors and friends who think about me at one of the most difficult times in my life. Peter rode and completed the Pan-Mass challenge ride from Boston to Provincetown (160-plus miles) in record-breaking heat in memory of special people he knew who lost their battle to cancer and in honor of me, who is currently fighting this disease. The PMC’s mission is to raise funds for cancer research and treatment at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.”

Tracey (Pettengill) Turner is the founder and chairman of Copia Global (copiaglobal.com), which provides “e-commerce for 750 million middle- to low-income Africans.” The company was recently featured at Forbes.com with an article highlighting the compelling journey from need to solution. Tracey began the company in 2010 and “to date, they have served 1.6 million customers through 30,000 collection points.” It is a wonderful piece detailing an innovative solution to a longstanding problem.

Bobby Sepucha shared on LinkedIn: “I am thrilled beyond words to join my colleagues at Fresenius Health Partners and InterWell Health on the next step in our journey to help people with kidney disease live their best lives. I am incredibly proud of everything we have done at Cricket Health, and I am very excited to build on that foundation of success at the new InterWell Health.” He and his wife, Karen (Cushing) Sepucha, live in Concord, Massachusetts, with their family.

Bill Lapcevia currently works for NS1 (ns1.com), which describes itself as “the world’s leading platform for smart network control.”Bill recently wrote an article that was picked up by Channel Futures titled “Don’t Get Buried in a Cloud Marketplace” The article provides recommendations “to learn why cloud marketplace partnership is valuable to customers.”

Next, Jay Decker messaged that he had started painting in the last year and a half. He has a website, www.jaydeckerart.com, featuring his impressionist works that showcases his terrific talent and clear passion for the work.

Shana Smith posted a photo with Abby Wildman Konopasky stating that they “traveled around the former Soviet Union together on a Dartmouth exchange but hadn’t seen each other since graduation. So great to finally catch up this morning in Silver Spring, Maryland!”

Shana also gave a shoutout to Kate Gaertner for her sustainability consultancy business, Triple Win Advisory (triplewinadvisory.com). Its stated mission is to “help build sustainable, stakeholder-centric, value-based, innovative, and resilient companies.” Kate is also the author of Planting a Seed and conducts sustainability workshops.

Finally, I opened an email from Andrew Weber and laughed out loud. “Here’s what I’ve been up to lately: I’ve seen a million faces—and I’ve rocked them all!” In addition to providing entertainment, he and his wife orchestrated an incredible bike-packing trip in Europe with their two sons and extended family. Their Facebook updates were awe-inspiring, as were the pictures that accompanied Andrew’s post, saying, “Cashed in a Christmas gift to check the Telluride Via Ferrata off the bucket list. A perfect day out in the mountains with some real moments of exposure and fear.”

I’m hoping to see these inspiring classmates and many, many more of you at our 30th reunion, which is June 16-18, 2023! In honor of this milestone, please email Dwight or me your favorite senior spring memories—we know there are some good ones out there!

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener. kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, 200 E 72nd St., Apt. 20K, New York City, NY 10021; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

Lauren Greenberg passed along a great Instagram post from @50yearsof womeningreen: “Today we want to recognize the former co-captains of the ’93 softball team, Lauren Greenberg and Erika Biseler. Lauren and Erika both signed the Title IX complaint filed with the Education Department’s office of civil rights [OCR] in Boston. This complaint ultimately led to the program receiving full-funded varsity status for the ’95 season. Give a huge rouse for Lauren and Erika!” An appreciative @mfortier100commented: “Thank you for profiling Lauren and Erika. We always admired their courage in filing an OCR complaint in their senior year but never knew their names. In 1996 Dartmouth reached near gender parity in athletics: 48 percent of female population and 47 percent of female athletes. A few years earlier it was a disparate 35 percent.”

Nicola Zesiger Mullen was profiled in Bronxville Living in May 2022 for making a big international impact with the nonprofit she founded with her good friend and neighbor Dr. Elena Ladas. Nicola got her M.B.A. from Columbia and has extensive global healthcare experience. Dr. Ladas has a Ph.D. in nutritional science and is a registered dietician. They put their considerable talents together to improve the nutrition of children in impoverished areas, with a focus on how proper nutrition can help combat cancer and other diseases. Per the article, “The International Initiative for Pediatrics and Nutrition (IIPAN) was officially launched in 2017 at the International Society for Pediatric Oncology’s annual conference in Dublin, Ireland. In 2022 IIPAN centers exist in 19 countries and 28 hospitals around the world. IIPAN is a recognized partner of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Agency for Research on Cancer, a WHO research subsidiary.”

Marshall Billingslea shared his extensive and high-ranking government experience in a “D’93 Special Session: Ukraine,” which was a great insight into the current conflict. Marshall’s government career spanned the U.S. departments of defense, state, and treasury as well as NATO and is impressive enough to garner his own Wikipedia page. He is currently in private practice, a senior fellow with the Hudson Institute, and lives in the Washington, D.C., area with his wife, Karen (Ehrhardt) Billingslea, and their family.

Rachel Byrne wrote that “My son, Nathan Tamkin, will be a ’26 and is happy to join big sister Danielle at Dartmouth in the fall!”

Preeti Sinha is now heading up the UN Capital Development Fund. Her formal title is executive secretary. Her bio for the site states: “Preeti Sinha is a globally experienced investment and development banker with a 30-year track record associated with raising and managing institutional public and private development capital.”

Our ’93 Compassion Committee has organized a wonderful series of classmate-led events. Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, who lives in the Upper Valley with her family, kicked off things in March with a Zoom yoga session.

In April Sue Levy hosted an event titled “Take Control of How You Eat and Feel: Easy Tips to Reduce Inflammation & Feel Great!” Sue segued a challenging illness into Savory Living, a company exploring the connection between nutrition and health promoting food as medicine. The program has taken off, not only offering services to individuals, but also being utilized by numerous Fortune 500 companies, organizations, physicians, and health plans globally.

Our May event was Dr. Adriana Popescu’s “Self-Care SOS: Tools to Release Stress and Anxiety.” Adriana specializes in treating addictions and trauma in the San Francisco Bay Area. She is currently the clinical director at Avery Lane, an innovative and holistic treatment program for women with co-occurring addiction and mental health disorders. Additionally, she’s a contributing author, private practitioner, global workshop provider, and podcast host!

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, 200 E 72nd St., Apt. 20K, New York City, NY 10021; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

Greetings, ’93s! I am hoping by publication this pervasive Omicron strain has eased (and not been replaced!) and that you and your families are healthy and well. Our fabulous social media chair Munir Haddad organized another Zoom call for us in mid-December; these gatherings are great and we encourage you all to join whenever you’re able!

Andrew Weber joined us from Shiprock, New Mexico, where he and his wife, Heather Kovich, live on the Navajo Nation reservation with their two children, ages 8 and 10. The reservation is located on the Four Corners and encompasses land in Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado, and Utah. Andrew writes outdoor Visit with Respect guidebooks, which coach travelers on how to enjoy important historical sites without damaging them. His most recent publication is Exploring Utah’s Bears Ears and Cedar Mesa. He talked us through the political ping-pong of how President Obama designated Bears Ears as a national monument, President Trump dramatically cut the monument’s size, and then President Biden restored it and even augmented the protected area. While Andrew did not ask me to do so, I will shamelessly plug a college friend and say that it is available on Amazon and has gotten great reviews! Andrew’s wife works at the hospital on the reservation, and their briefly intended stay in the area has now turned into a multi-year home with no current plans to relocate.

Kathy Vaughn again bridged the significant time change and joined us from Nairobi, Kenya, where she has been for more than 15 years with her partner, Silla Mullei ’95, and their 9- and 13-year-old children. Kathy has had quite the international exposure, having done her formative schooling in Tokyo before coming to Hanover. Her children are now participating in “democratic learning” online, which she describes as a project-based approach to learning where every term is different. Kathy is trained in the field of education but is currently working outside of the classroom.

Also joining us from afar was Miller McCord from Rome, Italy. Miller was based in San Diego, where she spent 19 years working for a nonprofit. She then headed east to spend three years sailing in the Caribbean and now lives in Rome with her partner, somewhere in the vicinity of his family’s home and 700-plus olive trees. Sounds fabulous!

Taking the time change in the other direction, Lisa Overton joined us from Alameda, California. Lisa is a management consultant who was previously downtown in San Francisco but moved to a more spacious setting once it was clear that Covid wasn’t going anywhere quickly. She has been shifting her focus to more nonprofit work and is currently doing a lot with First Book here in Washington, D.C. First Book’s website (firstbook.org) describes its mission as “Building a path out of poverty through educational equity.”

Finally, Doug Chia had exciting news to share: The first of his two sets of girl-boy twins (yes, you read that correctly!) are ’25s! They did have first-year trips, although a highly modified version after several of the trip leaders came down with Covid right before departure, and a Homecoming bonfire (with actual safety regulations—oh, my!). They are living in the Choate and River clusters, and his son is rowing lightweight crew. We were all excited for them, and I’m sure I was not alone in being envious of them just beginning their Dartmouth journey!

Keep our Dartmouth journeys alive by sending your news to Dwight or me! Cheers!

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, 200 E 72nd St., Apt. 20K, New York City, NY 10021; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

As I (Natalie) write this, summer term is wrapping up and the ’25s are getting ready to join the Big Green family. And, sometimes, joining the Dartmouth family means keeping it in the family! I inquired on our Facebook ’93 page as to who had offspring at, or headed to, Hanover and got some quick responses.

Carolyn Riley Chapman wrote, “My daughter, Kristin, is a ’24. There are definitely a few kids of ’93s there. More to come, I’m sure!”

Betsy Barth Marantz said, “Mine is a ’25, starting in a couple of weeks. She’s counting the days!”

John Stanton added in that“Tom Lynch and Tony Godsick each have daughters on the Dartmouth lacrosse team. And one ’93 has a son still in high school who is being recruited by our football team.”

Karen Sepucha,who is married to Robert Sepucha Jr., said “Our daughter will be a ’25 too (after taking a gap year).”

Selen Unsal posted that,“My daughter, Leyla, will be a ’25 starting in a few weeks. (My husband, Paul Jacoby, is a ’92.) We’re excited for her to meet all the other ’93 kids!”

Jennifer Campbell Whalen said, “I married T.J. Whalen; our daughter, Campbell, is a ’22; and our son, Cooper, will be a freshman this fall—a newly minted ’25!”

Douglas Chia reported that he has “twins (boy-girl) going into the class of 2025.” He also mentioned that U.S. Rep. Alex Mooney has a child at Dartmouth.

Chad Thomas, who is married to Cathleen Millett Thomas, said, “Our eldest son, Griffin, is a ’24. He made the best of a tough year. Can’t wait for him to experience ‘real’ Dartmouth this fall.”

Rich Lytle wrote that he and his wife, Kelly Bell Lytle ’94, have a son, Richard, who is in the class of 2024.

Kristin Vinson reports, “My daughter, Carolina Guerrero, is a ’23 wrapping up her Sophomore Summer.” Those lucky dogs, or as Marianne Ruhl Nikas sagely corrected, “Don’t you mean lucky ‘Salty’ dogs?” Yes, ma’am!

Heidi Smith passed along, “I think there are quite a few.” She mentioned Doug Chia’s twins and gave a shout-out to Veree Hawkins Brown and Todd Sisitsky as having Dartmouth offspring as well. And Carolyn Riley Chapman mentioned Amanda Salzhauer.

Finally, Rachel Byrne said, “My daughter is a ’23! My son is a high school senior, so we’ll see.”

To all of you going through the process at whatever schools, best of luck! My husband and I have one down, one to go (neither Dartmouth applicants, though I would have loved it!), and know it’s tough sledding for us parents. Keep the news coming (just no hate mail please—we’re just the scribes, not any part of the admissions process), and we hope everyone stays healthy and well!

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, 200 E 72nd St., Apt. 20K, New York City, NY 10021; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

Greetings, ’93s! Big news haul, so let’s get to it! Munir Haddad, our class social media guru, along with class president Veree Hawkins Brown, set up an awesome 50th birthday Zoom celebration in April. More than 70 of our classmates participated in the tri-part format: Zoom, then a Kahoot quiz, then breakout rooms using a Dartmouth-created program called Kumospace.

Participants came from literally all over the globe. Geographically notable attendees included Dan Subin, who called in from London despite the virtual party beginning at 1 a.m. local time, and Kathy Vaughn, who was even further in Nairobi, Kenya. Random selections to represent other areas of the continent include Sarah Leach in Whistler, British Columbia; Charles Preuss in Menlo Park, California; Lynne Rainville in Lexington, Virginia; Rich Lytle in Ashville, North Carolina; Allison Esenkova in Houston; and Chris DiSantis in Sewickley, Pennsylvania. We also had several high-profile classmates in attendance, including Jason Barabas, who lives right in Hanover and is leading the Rockefeller Center at Dartmouth; U.S. Rep. Alex Mooney (R-W.V.); and the always fun and exuberant Annie Edgerton, who lives and performs in N.Y.C.

Following introductions on Zoom, Munir coached us all, some more technically challenged than others (hey, birthdays…), on how to sign into Kahoot for a ’93 pub quiz. It was neck and neck for a while, and great fun to reminisce, but our winner was Jeff Middents. Alec Smith came in second, Marianne Nikas was third, and David Blum and Amanda Salzhauer were right on their heels.

We then broke into three smaller groups using Kumospace, which allows you to move both between rooms and within each room to sidle up to someone and have a chat. I got a chance to catch up with Renee Kalvestrand,whois out in the Midwest in Edgerton, Wisconsin, with her family, and Tracy Welch, who is in Winchester, Massachusetts. Tracy and I got a giggle reminiscing about winter term our junior year when we were in Vail, Colorado, with Alexis Templeton, the late Deborah Bernstein, and a number of other classmates and yet she and I were the only ones to jump on cheap tickets to go sing along with REO Speedwagon at an outdoor concert. Ah, youth!

I was pulled away early but Munir shared this fun report: “We planned the event for one hour, but people were bouncing in and out of Zoom until 10 p.m. and in Kumospace until around 10:30 p.m. I got a chance to speak with Doug Chia and David Hsu, who were on Zoom, and we signed off around 10 p.m. Then I bounced over to Kumospace just to see if anyone was there before shutting that down and lo and behold, Veree was there with Jeff Middents, Kathy Vaughn, David Blum, Greg Taff, Marianne Nikas, Sara Leach, and Sara Olsen. As we chatted, Kathy Vaughn pointed out that the birds were chirping and the sun was coming up, as it was 5:30 a.m. in Nairobi. She wins! Others started to peel off as Easter bunnies were expected and early mornings called. Veree and I shut it down a little after 10:30 like the exhausted and very happy hosts we were. And Miller McCord emailed me around 10:30 asking if people were still in Zoom. So…we’ll do it again. We’ll try a ‘brunch’ so that more international alumni can make it. And we will do another 8 p.m. for people who couldn’t make it because of Easter plans.”

Give a rouse to Munir and Veree for a great event! Outta space, but keep the stories and updates coming!

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener. kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, 200 E 72nd St., Apt. 20K, New York City, NY 10021; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

Greatnews haul—keep it coming! Munir Haddad reports: “We relocated the family from Marin, California, to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, in September. We’re living in West Tisbury and have seen Tammy Fagell Sloan and her husband, Adam Sloan, at a safe social distance. Come visit.”

Tracey Pettengill Turner shares, “I don’t have a lot of new news: still married and the three kids (ages 7, 9, 11) still have pulses, which is saying a lot in 2020; still running Copia Global, a mobile commerce business for East Africa; still running when I can; still living in and loving London and quite schizophrenic about moving back to the Bay Area. (I’ll see when the world rights itself.) I am really missing Dartmouth friends these dark days but very happy I get to see Dan Subin here in London!”

Sam Cook conveys: “I was recently promoted to chief commercial officer of Tecnica Group North America. I have worked for Tecnica Group for 25 years managing various brands within our company’s portfolio. For the past eight years I was the North American president of Blizzard Skis, Tecnica Ski Boots, and Tecnica Footwear. In my new role I oversee the alpine and footwear business units for Blizzard, Nordica, and Tecnica brands in the United States and Canada, focused on enhancing and optimizing processes and technologies to support the sales, product, and marketing teams. Our company mission is to inspire an active, outdoor life. While the pandemic has created incredible challenges for all of us, we remain committed to building outstanding products so people can enjoy the outdoors safely and responsibly.”

Andrew Weber reveals, “The nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty comes up for a five-year review early in 2021 and the new Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty with Russia is set to expire on February 5 unless both sides agree to an extension. As of now, Marshall Billingslea remains the chief U.S. negotiator.”

Andrew Baker says, “Life during the past 27 years has been interesting. I’ll start with the best stuff: Laurel Deck Baker and I have been together for 30 years now (we met sophomore winter). Our son, Bentley, is 14 and our daughter, Anna Claire, is 6. Needless to say, family life brings me joy and contentment in deep and abiding ways. A swift summary of the other stuff: I’ve worked at three different movie studios, a talent agency, and a couple of production companies. I taught Ice Cube how to use the internet, played on a softball team with Meatloaf, and got into writing arguments with Stan Lee (Los Angeles is a peculiar place). I wrote for a short-lived show based on The Crow, helped pioneer early internet animation storytelling with The 7th Portal and Afterworld, and contributed to the script that ultimately became Lost. Then, after leaving Los Angeles, I got a master’s, taught college, high school, and middle school English. I’ve coached squash and baseball. We’ve lived in California, Alabama, and now Connecticut. And somewhere in there I became a certified yoga instructor. Now I’m back writing full time. I’m also collaborating to adapt a video game into a tween animated show, turn a film intellectual property into an esports video game, and waiting to see if two shows I helped with get set up. When I’m not writing I help run a charity event that gives people an opportunity to play the game Survivor. For the most part, though, life is just the everyday: get up; see what joints aren’t working that day; get the kids to school; hike, write, dream. It’s a small life and yet there are those who love it.”

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener. kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, 200 E 72nd St., Apt. 20K, New York City, NY 10021; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

With the ’24s headed to the Big Green, we asked our classmates for their favorite freshman fall memories. Jeff Middents posted, “How about finding myself with a free two hours of time one evening, which I decided to fill with an impromptu session of going to language lab to practice Japanese (for once!) only to realize when I got out that I completely forgot to go to my first college exam (in math) ever, that I had stayed up until 2 a.m. studying for? Ran to the professor, who was picking up the exams, blurted out the truth, and he let me take it the next day. And this is why, as a college professor now, I am completely sympathetic to dumb first-semester freshman excuses—the dumber the better. My favorite from the other side of the desk: the poor young woman who tearfully discovered in week eight of the semester that my class met three times per week, not two.”

Annie Edgerton said, “Oh, man, those Hanover snowball fights were the best.” Sara Olsen remembered “great conversations with new friends who were so intelligent and thoughtful.”

Andrea Greer said that her “favorite freshman fall memory was going really, really fast at the Head of the Charles with Chip Davis, Josh Bers, Dave Cramer, and Rob Trenkamp in the lightweight 4s.”

Unfortunately, we also have sad news to share: the passing of Lance Brackee. John Stanton provided the wonderful tribute below with contributions from Olaf Minge, David Krause, and coach Buddy Teevens ’79.

“I regret to inform that we have lost a big part of our class family, literally and figuratively. Our own Lance Brackee passed suddenly from a heart attack on August 19.

“Lance will always be remembered as one of the best football players ever to suit up for the Big Green. Possessing a rare combination of size, strength, and coordination, he was a three-year starter at offensive tackle. With Lance anchoring the line, Dartmouth enjoyed one of its winningest three-year stretches in school history, claiming the Ivy League title each year and setting numerous scoring, rushing, and passing records. Lance was twice named to the First-Team All Ivy team and, in recognition of the Ivy League’s 50th anniversary in 2005, Lance was named to Dartmouth’s ‘All-Time’ football team (second team honors).

“Despite his imposing physical stature, Lance was the proverbial gentle giant. Anytime he knocked an opposing player down (which was often), he would extend a hand to help the guy back up. His affable demeanor, infectious smile, and bear hugs were well-known to his classmates. His brothers at Theta Delta Chi can recall many good laughs from Lance’s jokes.

“After graduating from Dartmouth and Thayer with degrees in engineering, Lance returned to his native Minnesota. He embarked on a successful career working as a software engineer and platform manager for several companies. Lance also had a stint playing semi-professional football. In addition, he was an avid outdoorsman and volunteered as a Scout leader for his children’s troops. Lance is survived by his wife, Melissa, and three children, Hunter, Logan, and Megan. A GoFundMe site has been created to assist Lance’s family, www.gofundme.com/f/remembering-lance-brackee.”

Olaf attended the wake and had a chance to talk to Melissa and Hunter, who (following in Lance’s footsteps) was an offensive lineman on the state champion football team last season. Despite Covid-19 restrictions, many attended the outdoor event. It was obvious that Lance was well-loved and will be dearly missed by many. He certainly will be by our class.

Keep your updates coming: Dwight Fenton (dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu) and Natalie Weidener Kupinsky (natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu).

—Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu; Dwight Fenton, 200 E 72nd St., Apt. 20K, New York City, NY 10021; dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu

The ’93 notes are back with new co-class secretaries, Dwight Fenton and Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, and we’re excited to hear from you! No news equals no column, so we need your help to make this a regular feature. It’s late April as we write this and the two of us are hunkered down here in New York and Washington, D.C., respectively, working from home, practicing social distancing, and extremely grateful for all of the healthcare professionals and other essential workers who are helping us all get through this pandemic.

As an epicenter of the virus, New York City has been hit hard and a return to pre-Covid living is still weeks away. My kids and I (Dwight) escaped to Montauk for an easier form of distancing than what an apartment allows, but it’s still been an adjustment with lots of homeschooling, cooking, cleaning, oh, and work. Knowing that this is being written for a July/August issue makes me wonder what things will be like by the time you read this. What will returning to “normal” even mean? I read somewhere that this feels like Mother Nature sent us to our room so we could think about what we’ve done. I hope we come out of this better for it.

The Washington, D.C., Maryland, and Virginia area has likewise been very proactive in Covid-prevention measures. Maryland’s governor, Larry Hogan, is the chair of the National Governors’ Association and, along with vice chair and New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, has had a strong national presence during this pandemic. As of this writing, all three locations are still subject to stay-at-home orders with schools closed for the foreseeable future. As the mother of a high school senior (and a sophomore), I (Natalie) and my husband have found it hard to watch her miss so many once-in-a-lifetime events, but we all feel very lucky to have our health and a comfortable space here in Potomac, Maryland, to quarantine together. We have our fingers crossed that she, and all of the other seniors, will be able to start college this fall as planned.

In non-Covid news, New York and Washington, D.C., continue to have a strong Dartmouth presence, including very energetic and active Dartmouth clubs. In Washington, our very own Tara (Burke) Vold is the current president of a terrific chapter of Women of Dartmouth. Mostly paused like so much of the world, we know they will all be back up and running as soon as they can with a full slate of events and activities. If you need information on how to get involved with your local alumni association or with the College in other ways (Dartmouth is always looking for applicant interviewers) please reach out to either of us and we can help you out.

Finally, looking ahead to brighter days and looking back on fond memories, we want to hear from you about your Dartmouth beginnings! What special memories do you have from orientation or freshman trips? What dorm were you assigned to and do you still keep in touch with your freshman dorm pals? Send us your scoop: Dwight Fenton (dwight.e.fenton.93@dartmouth.edu) or Natalie Weidener Kupinsky (natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu).

—Dwight Fenton, 200 E. 72nd St., Apt. 20K, NY, NY 10021; dwightedmundfenton@gmail.com; Natalie Weidener Kupinsky, 9733 Beman Woods Way, Potomac, MD 20854; natalie.weidener.kupinsky.93@dartmouth.edu

I had the pleasure of hearing from John Beebe, who wrote that after 20 years in Madison, Wisconsin, and four in Baltimore, he moved back to New England. John missed the reunion this year because he was moving into his new home in northeast Massachusetts.

He said he’s been working for Philips HealthTech for the past four and a half years; he moved earlier this year to its clinical innovations team in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where he’s verification lead for its NICU of the Future project, working on solutions to improve how care is provided for prematurely born infants. This effort is dear to my heart, since I’m the mother of two children born prematurely (my son, born at 36 weeks weighing just under seven pounds, gave us much more of a scare than the 32-week-old daughter who weighed in at under three pounds at birth).

John said he’s been married for 21 years and has a retired racing greyhound. For fun, John said he likes gardening and is a big movie and history buff.

In September John made his first trip to Hanover in many years. “So many changes in town and on campus, but the nostalgia was fun as I watched new students getting ready for their freshman trips,” he wrote. “It’s so great to be back in the Dartmouth area!”

We are of course all saddened by the passing of Beth Krakower in September. While I had the honor of knowing her, I’m grateful that Jeff Middents was willing to write her obituary for this issue.

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzanne.spencer.rendahl@gmail.com

Hi, everyone! Currently the grass is just starting to turn green here in New Hampshire. In the spirit of summer term, when this issue hits, I solicited remembrances of that special sophomore season.

Taking two Tuesday and Thursday classes for long weekends, finding creative ways to spend time outdoors, and searching for air conditioning on campus were big themes.

Andrea Greer said she took two classes, Tuesday and Thursday, one on Arthurian romance and one on Dante’s Inferno. On days off she’d take four- and five-hour rambles all over town, often out toward Lyme or Etna, New Hampshire. “It seems like no summer could ever be that decadent.”

Annie Egerton also opted for four-day weekends. One of her classes was “Films of the ’80s,” which allowed her to spend half of her educational summer sitting in the Hop theater with A/C and smuggled-in popcorn. Unfortunately, her second class was “Methods and Theory of Literary Criticism,” which single-handedly put a damper on her planned decadence.

Jeff Middents took three classes. One of them was the “Films of the ’80s” with Annie, because he says, “it was air conditioned, a good number of my friends were taking it, and I really just wanted a relatively easy class (with two other major courses that summer) where I could maybe write about Beetlejuice.”

But never underestimate the power of a fun film class. While Jeff says it was the only film class he formally took at Dartmouth, it changed his life. “I joined Dartmouth Film Society that summer and dove head-first into its activities, which led to me running DFS the year after graduation. And now I am a professor who teaches and studies film.”

Beth Krakower took electronic music and practically never left the radio station so she could be in air conditioning.

Jeannie Chang Bell took minerology that summer, and spent lots of time swimming or tubing in the river. I remember a few times sunbathing near the docks with friends and meeting some members of the U.S. Olympic men’s crew team who were training there.

Brock Wilson remembers a day trip with friends to “the copper mines” somewhere in Vermont. He said most jumped and some dove a harrowing 70 feet to the water. He wrote, “My one dive from that height drove my outstretched fists into my own face, giving me two black eyes. I may have pics somewhere.”

Julia Whitworth remembers hiking Mount Moosilauke on the 4th of July at night to look down at the fireworks in all the small towns around it. Veree Hawkins Brown remembers strawberry picking.

Betsy Barth Marantz remembers celebrating her birthday by baking cupcakes for her religion seminar. Unfortunately, her professor visiting from Scotland had never heard of this tradition, so the cupcakes were consumed after class.

And finally, Roberta Christina Di Giorgio said she left Sophomore Summer two weeks into term “due to the onset of a very horrible autoimmune disease that since changed my life.” She wrote, “Deb Bernstein was my roommate when my parents scooped me up to be hospitalized. I am most grateful to this day for the steadfast support of my friends—in particular, Deb—that summer and as I struggled through my last two years at Dartmouth in and out of hospitals and going through crazy treatments. These are friends for life. I wish I had been there Sophomore Summer!”

Wishing everyone a happy, healthy summer with fun and safe outdoor activities, and maybe some A/C if it gets too hot!

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzanne.spencer.rendahl@gmail.com

While it’s late for talking about Homecoming (yesterday—Christmas—we got eight inches of snow), it does get us ready for reunion, so I will proceed. I took my kids to Homecoming for the first time this past October, which is not that commendable given the fact that I live 12 miles away. There I briefly bumped into MaryBeth Keiller, who lives outside Boston.

I also marched in the parade alongside Sarah von Maltzhan, who I spent a term in Budapest with in 1992. She was spending the Homecoming weekend on campus with her oldest daughter; Sarah lives in Manhattan and has four kids. During the foreign study program Sarah and I took a 12-hour, overnight bus from Budapest to Istanbul, where we were easily the only people in said bus who weren’t smoking the entire 12 hours. (My kids informed me when I told them the story that it’s much funnier to say we took a bus from Hungary to Turkey). Anyway, we marched in the alum parade together. At the start all the athletic teams passed us in their floats, which gave me a primer on the athletic teams we have. Did you know we have an ice skating team?

Last year the powers that be within the town of Hanover felt that the bonfire situation was too dangerous, with drunk freshmen careening toward it, trying to touch the flames. So the town demanded that a six-foot chainlink fence be built around the bonfire, and it was. This didn’t stop a first-year student wearing a cape from jumping said fence, running right toward the fire, scaling the fence again and promptly getting tackled by campus security.

I hope to see some of you on campus in June. In the meantime, send me your news.

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzandj@comcast.net

In a strange turn of events, I found myself driving to State College, Pennsylvania, last October for an advanced yoga teaching certification exam. While the timing and the situation was a bit surreal—taking a two-day yoga test on the outskirts of one of the biggest football schools in the country during its homecoming weekend—I was able to inject some normalcy into my time there by meeting up with Jon Eburne. Adding to the surreal nature of the trip was getting a glimpse of the election while driving through mid-Pennsylvania during October of 2016: there were Trump signs everywhere.

I had breakfast with Jon on the morning of my big test and felt as though I was traveling back more than two decades. A former Russell Sage dormmate freshman year and for perhaps six months or so one of my housemates in Norwich, Vermont, after graduation, Jon is now a professor of comparative literature at Penn State. I hadn’t seen him in more than 20 years, when my husband stayed with him in Philly as we were driving cross-country; Jon was then in graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania.

I didn’t get to meet Jon’s wife, Hester Blum, also a professor of comparative literature, and daughter Adelaide. His years on Dartmouth’s rugby team had taken their toll, but otherwise he hadn’t changed—the same witty, thoughtful and fun person I met my freshman fall. While the trip was a haul from where I live (a nine-hour drive), I had such a great time that I wouldn’t mind making it again and meeting the rest of his family.

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzandj@comcast.net

One of the perks of being class secretary is the chance to learn and write about so many of our brave classmates. One of them is Beth Krakower, who in addition to promoting the likes of The Batman Lego Movie with her public relations company, the Krakower Group, has gone public with her battle with triple-negative breast cancer.

She discovered a tumor during a regular exam around Thanksgiving 2016 and started treatment almost immediately.

To help endure several brutal rounds of chemotherapy, she’s envisioning her blood cells as tiny PacMen chomping away bit by bit at the tumor and each of her friends as the weapons in the arsenal. In the meantime, she’s shared photos of her bald head, as well as modeled numerous whimsical wigs (the Queen of Hearts is my favorite). While enduring treatment with humor and running her own company, Beth has also been raising money for triple-negative cures and reminding men and women to do monthly breast exams.

Her tumor, which her oncologist told her was originally the size of a golf ball, in February had shrunk down to the size of a pea. Beth celebrated by trying out pea recipes.

Beth plans to have surgery in June, so please keep your thoughts with her and all those battling cancer.

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzandj@comcast.net

I was happy to read an article on Philly.com that featured our classmate Lisa (Yaffe) Sprafkin. The article recounted her accident our Sophomore Summer, where she was hit by a truck while riding her bicycle, her five weeks in a coma, her five months in a recovery facility in Pennsylvania working her way through a traumatic brain injury. But she made her way back and was in the same chemistry class with me senior year and graduated a year after us. The article told the inspiring story of her life since, including her 2011 wedding to her husband, Neal, and their subsequent efforts to have a baby and the arrival of their daughter, Sydney, through a surrogate.

My fellow Dartmouth Symphony Orchestra viola sectionmate Marianne (Ruhl) Nikas visited the greatest city in the world (besides, in her opinion, Philadelphia) to see the Broadway musical Hamilton. On a different musical front and in a different city, Annie Edgerton performed our national anthem in 107-degree heat at a Texas Rangers game in Dallas in August. It was her 24th anthem in her quest to perform it at all 30 home baseball stadiums.

Did anyone catch Rob Simmelkjaer covering the Rio Olympics for NBC? He wrote of how he nurtured his passion at Dartmouth in a SportsBusiness Journal column: “I called my first game (hockey) on WDCR radio as a freshman at Dartmouth College, and it was love at first mic. I loved the adrenaline rush from calling a two-on-one break. I relished traveling with the team and interviewing the coaches. And yes, like most talent, I adored the sound of my own voice.”

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzandj@comcast.net

Anne Katherine Smith wrote that she spent a few days on campus in November, attending the inaugural Women of Dartmouth professional retreat. She said that 50 alumnae from the classes of 1974 through 2004 came to Hanover for the retreat. She roomed with Erika Beisler and Melissa Roche, friends since her freshman year in Richardson Hall, and reconnected with the five other ’93s who attended: Veree Hawkins Brown, Karen Febeo, Jalieh Bonar Shepard, Sabrina Pagani and Anne Whitman.

Anne wrote that she is in her fourth year working for South Shore Conservatory, a large community music school on the South Shore of Boston, where she serves as director of community partnerships, overseeing all off-campus access-based programming. In that role she makes connections with social service organizations, private and public schools and councils on aging and designs arts-based programming to fit their needs, hires faculty, writes grants and oversees marketing. With her three kids nearing the age of independence (they are 19, 18 and 13) she had time to join the Tanglewood Festival Chorus and sang in nine performances with the Boston Pops at Symphony Hall in December.

By sheer coincidence, during the same weekend of the Women of Dartmouth retreat I happened to be on campus for a different event. My 10-year-old daughter led me through the halls of the Thayer School of Engineering, where I watched her participate in a regional robotics competition. Her team didn’t win in any of the categories, but the kids had fun and got extra excited about engineering thanks to a presentation from some students on Thayer’s Formula Racing team. Who knows, maybe it was really a Future Women of Dartmouth retreat in disguise?

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzandj@comcast.net

I had the pleasure of talking with Anna Jaeger recently. She’s living in San Francisco, working for Tech Soup, where she helps develop apps for social service agencies. One, the Safe Shelter, helps agencies find safe places for people to stay at night.

Another app, Range, helps kids who qualify for free or reduced lunches—currently one in seven in the United States—find meals during the summer. Only one in six kids who qualify for those lunches receive them during the summer. The app locates the time and place where meals are served for kids, showing on the phone in the form of a map with more information. Pretty cool.

Anna lives with her partner and two kids and serves on her local PTA. She sees Angela Lee, who lives in D.C., and Laura “Ed” Gadd ’91, who lives in Austin, Texas.

—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH 03781; suzandj@comcast.net

I was honored to receive an email from Veree Hawkins Brown, a friend since freshman fall, asking me to serve as class secretary. I accepted, but my first entry will be brief. My 5-year-old son managed to break his femur bone while skiing in January and the ordeal has left me little time for outreach. I will simply say that if you’ve never had to lift a 45-pound kindergartner in a fiberglass body cast from bed to wheelchair to couch for six weeks (and counting), you really haven’t experienced one of the greatest joys that parenthood has to offer. 


But bones heal and our frigid and snowy New Hampshire winter thaws as time marches on. It’s going to be 26 degrees this last day of February—balmy compared to recent temperatures. 


Please send me what you are up to up so I can include it in a future issue.


—Suzanne Spencer Rendahl, 224 Route 120, Plainfield, NH, 03781; suzandj@comcast.net


Thanks all who wrote in after my requests for info. Because I’m writing this column on a plane back from Europe, I thought it appropriate to start with a few international updates. Jeff Allen writes, “We [his wife and three children] moved to Cape Town, South Africa, from Bogota, Colombia, in August. Both my wife and I work at the U.S. consulate general, where I run the consular section handling everything from U.S. tourists in trouble to issuing visas to foreign tourists.” They are enjoying life in the beautiful Constantia Valley, 30 minutes southeast of downtown Cape Town. “Baboons in the schoolyard and penguins joining us on the beach are far less stressful than fighting the traffic in Bogota, where we spent the last three years.” 


From the recently wed Matt Bonaiuto: “After spending a year in Islamabad, Pakistan, I moved to Paris a year ago (December 2013). My wife (also a U.S. foreign service officer) and I met while hiking in the foothills of the Himalayas (the Margalla Hills at the edge of Islamabad) soon after arriving in Pakistan in the fall of 2012. We got engaged a year later in the foothills of the Rockies in Boulder, Colorado. Hans Mallalieu came down to Paris (from London) to witness the civil ceremony; Seth Alpert and Chris Onken came to Washington, D.C., for the wedding in late August. My wife (a Bowdoin alum) and I will be in Paris until 2017.”


Julie (Jacobus) and David Clarkson are in Charlotte, North Carolina, with their three children and two dogs! David is the treasurer at Extended Stay Hotels and Julie is a web developer at Superfly Web Designs. I posed a few questions to some folks: If you could go back to Dartmouth now and take classes again, which class would you take for the first time or re-take and why? Julie’s answer, “If I could go back to Dartmouth now, I would be a computer science major with a minor in digital arts and design. I would not sleep until 10 most mornings and eat pizza and EBAs chicken sandwiches at 11 p.m. On second thought, maybe I would.”


Greg Chapman, who lives in the Seattle area (Bainbridge Island), answered the same question: “I tell my kids all the time that going to my history classes was like going to the movies. The professors did a great job bringing the topic to life. It would be fun to go back and take some classes again with popcorn in hand!”


Congratulations go out to newly elected Rep. Alex Mooney—who won a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives in the West Virginia Second District! He is he first Hispanic elected to Congress in West Virginia history.


A question for you for the next column: What is your favorite memory of winter in Hanover? 


—Beth Krakower, c/o CineMedia Promotions, 11500 Olympic Blvd., Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90064; dartmouth93@gmail.com


The typeface looks the same. The number to the left is correct: you are reading the ’93 column. It’s all familiar, and yet something seems…unusual. And yet somehow familiar?


As it happens, this is not your regularly scheduled class secretary here. She is, of course, dancing the samba with her fellow futbol aficionados in Brazil at the World Cup! Actually, that’s not entirely true. Or even remotely true. Beth Krakower is currently recuperating from wrist surgery and thought it best to take a short break from the keyboard. This time, it’s back to an old voice as I, Jeff Middents, make a guest re-appearance with this month’s happenings! 


I have been as delinquent as everyone else in getting information in, so I will start with my own update: I still live just outside of Washington, D.C., teaching literature and film at American University and writing about transnational cinema both in and out of Latin America. I see quite a bit of Angela Dadak ’92 (which might be because we’re married, heh), but also spend some time with another Dartmouth grad since, as it happens, my son Xan became best friends in kindergarten with the son of Brian Slocum ’92. Now about to start fourth grade, the kids have stayed friends—and Brian and I now trade off carpooling kids to soccer practice. 


It turns out that our stalwart secretary isn’t the only person in recovery at the moment. Marianne Ruhl Nikas wrote from Malvern, Pennsylvania, that she is currently recuperating from shoulder surgery for a torn rotator cuff in her left arm. She writes: “Despite being in a sling almost 24/7 for six weeks, I’m hoping to travel to both Cape Cod and Bermuda with my family later this season. My husband, Alexander Nikas ’95, helps to ferry our children Cole (13) and Sophia (9) to various music lessons, camps and sports. I’m working part-time with Colonial Family Practice-Gateway Medical Associates in Coatesville, Pennsylvania, and Alex is working fulltime as an attorney for Teva Pharmaceuticals in Frazer, Pennsylvania. As he likes to say, ‘I’m the guy who writes the warnings at the end of all the drug advertisements!’ ” Recover quickly, Marianne!


Anna Jaeger wrote in from San Francisco, where she lives with her partner Lynne and their two kids, Colby (6) and Jordan (3). She is the chief technical officer for the nonprofit, Caravan Studios, a division of TechSoup Global. She is building apps for the social good. Check out these two in particular: SafeNight, an app to help survivors of domestic violence and trafficking find emergency shelter, and Range, an app to locate free summer meals for youth.


As for the far-flung among us, J. Christopher Bell is currently traveling around Bali and other islands in Indonesia for a month, meeting Balinese locals and fellow travelers from around the world. When not traveling, he does consulting for application programming interface technical communication and programming through his company JX Consulting Inc. in San Francisco. For fun, JX makes music with friends and practices photography. (You can see some of his work, both portraiture and abstracts, at jxphotography.com.) Feel free to drop him a note at jx@doitall.com to say hello!


Beth will be back with the next column, ready with her sharp wit and all the ’93 news that’s fit to print. Reach out to her—and the rest of us—via Facebook, Twitter (@dartmouth93), email or even pen-and-paper to the address below. In fact, since it’s summertime and folks are a-traveling, send a postcard from wherever you’re at and really relive the days of yore.


—Beth Krakower, c/o CineMedia Promotions, 11500 Olympic Blvd., Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90064; dartmouth93@gmail.com


I would like to start this column highlighting some good works that some of our classmates are doing in memory of others that we have lost. Shawn Burt oversees Road Hockey to Conquer Cancer (RHCC, www.teamuptoconquercancer.ca), the world’s largest event of its kind. He writes, “We raise funds for critical cancer research at the Princess Margaret Cancer Centre—one of the top-five cancer research centers in the world. Each year this event becomes an excuse for our Dartmouth friends to come together to raise funds while re-visiting old times. Not surprisingly the team is called Tenacious D and we have been one of the top fundraising teams in the first two years of the event, having raised more than $60,000. RHCC itself has raised just under $6 million across Canada in two years.”
Rob Simmelkjaer posted on the class Facebook page, “As you know we lost our classmate Deborah Bernstein to breast cancer earlier this year. It was in part Deb’s untimely death that inspired me to run this year’s N.Y.C. Marathon for Fred’s Team to benefit Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. Please support my run and honor the memory of Deb by contributing.”
Congratulations go out to Amy Beatie, who was married this past August to Declan Gavin. According to The New York Times listing, she is “the executive director of the Colorado Water Trust, a nonprofit organization in Denver whose aim is to restore and protect the flow of water in streams and rivers. She graduated from Dartmouth and received a law degree from the University of Denver.”
Sharon (Cox) Hujik writes in, “My husband, Peter Hujik ’88, and I are thrilled to share that our family has expanded with the recent addition of John (4) and Nora (2), who are joining big brother Luke (6). Our two youngest were born in Haiti and their adoption was finalized at the end of June. I’m a full-time mom (and we’re home schooling) so life is busy, but we’re very blessed!”
Lastly Olaf Minge is enjoying life in Minnesota with wife Amy and two kids. He works at Target HQ and recently became chair of a Haitian community development and clean-water organization. He writes, “Big fundraising event each year is a Rotary-sponsored polar plunge in a frozen lake, which is a little hard for Haitians to relate to. Two years ago the ice was so thick we had to use extra-long chainsaw blades to cut our hole. Give a shout if coming to Minneapolis!”
—Beth Krakower, c/o CineMedia Promotions, 11500 Olympic Blvd., Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90064; dartmouth93@gmail.com



On October 23 I got to see the bonfire in Hanover.


On streaming video, sure, but the bright blur on my screen brought back memories of past Homecoming weekends. Twenty years ago we were the ones who built that bonfire—and, unlike the year before, ours successfully collapsed during the inferno. If you were part of that ’shmen construction crew, drop me a line to let me know whether your current fire-building experience these days involves engineering Burning Man or just staring at the Yule log.


If I had looked more closely during my virtual Homecoming experience this year I would have seen some familiar faces, as nearly a dozen ’93s gathered with their partners and families for a reception at the Hanover Inn. Ursula Jackson jumped into the spirit of the weekend: “I had a great time with my daughter as one of three ’93s who walked in the parade. (I hear that is an increase from last year’s sole representative.) Marcus Sherman and I just celebrated our 10-year wedding anniversary this past July 24. We live in East Hartford, Connecticut, with our three children Noelani (9), Jackson and Jeremiah. Last spring I made my debut as a softball coach for my daughter’s minor league softball team. I’ve been working part time for the past nine years as the director of wraparound services for the Village for Families and Children, providing children in the greater Hartford area with therapeutic and recreational mentoring. I also minister at my church, the Family of God, in Glastonbury.” 


Renée Reed happened to be in Hanover for reasons other than running around burning wood: “We attended the women’s basketball reunion, where I saw classmates Kelly Begg Lawrence and Tara (Burke) Vold. Returning players congregated at 5 Olde, teamed up with current players for a three-on-three tournament and had an amazing dinner and slideshow at Jesse’s. The turnout by the alumnae was amazing and it truly filled me with pride to be part of such a great group of people! I live with my partner in Dallas, where we own and operate two Anytime Fitness health clubs. Our son turns 2 on November 15, so between him and the two clubs there’s never a dull moment!”


A special shout-out to the other ’93s at the homecoming reception: Maxine Mauricio, Tig Tillinghast, Carolyn Chapman, Corinne Mayland, Andrew Toler, Steve Hubbard, Juli Hincks, Rich Lytle and our class prez Beth Krakower.


Although she didn’t make the social event Jessie Griffiths did make the most of the rest of the weekend: “We managed to see some soccer on Sunday, a beautiful day. I went to Fall Fling on Saturday night and the Decibelles and Dodecs rocked the house as always. My husband, Tim Wennrich, is an organic farmer in Bethlehem, New Hampshire, where he grows and sells beautiful veggies and makes feta and chevre from the milk of his gaggle of goats. We have three children, two biological sons and a daughter whom we adopted from Guatemala last year. My boys now attend the Woodland Community School, which I founded with three other mothers. Located on Tim’s farm, the school has 18 kids in a mixed-age classroom. Recently I have been working on a children’s album called Move Your Boots with my band The Bramble Jam. I love singing again.” There is a song called “Mommy’s Lost Her Marbles” which is darn funny—check the band out online.


’Tis the season, so I wish you the best for a wonderful end-of-year holiday. Remember to send us your cards, letters or pictures so that we can keep the class informed!


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com


A few months ago I was listening to NPR and heard about a fantastic off-Broadway production of Romeo & Juliet where the two actors did not recite the Bard’s actual words, but rather various people’s recollections about what happened in the Shakespearean play. (Quick: How much do you remember?) Lo and behold, when the interview turned to the writer-directors I recognized the voices of Kelly Copper and husband-collaborator Pavol Liska ’95, who have been working together since their Dartmouth days. Their New York-based theater company, the Nature Theater of Oklahoma, is currently touring internationally with Romeo & Juliet and will be in Columbus, Ohio, on May 18-20, so check them out!


Tracy (Masonis) Trivas just had her new book The Wish Stealers published by Simon & Schuster. When a sinister old woman tricks 12-year-old wish-maker Griffin into accepting a box of 11 shiny Indian Head pennies from 1897 she soon learns these are no ordinary pennies, but stolen wishes that come with a horrible curse. Ancient alchemists, Macbeth’s witches and a first crush are woven through the story. You can read all about it at www.tracytrivas.com. Tracy’s other book, A Princess Found, a non-fiction story about an adopted woman who discovers she is African royalty, came out by St. Martin’s Press last July. Living in California with her husband and daughter Hadley, Tracy reports, “She loves it when I wear an old Dartmouth sweatshirt with the big white capital letters. She shouts out the letters that she has learned in preschool!”


Andrew and Laurel Baker continue to live and work at Loomis Chaffee, a boarding prep school in Windsor, Connecticut. He writes, “I run an upperclassmen boys’ dorm filled with 39 teenagers ranging from 15 year-old sophomores to 19-year-old postgraduates—and so by the time our son Bentley, now 3, enters his teens we will know all of his tricks, much to his eternal chagrin. When I’m not teaching, dorm-parenting or coaching (boys JV squash, sandwiched by two intramural sports, soccer and softball, the latter being the best coaching gig in all the land) I’m writing. Google Afterworld, Gemini Division, Valemont and Woke Up Dead to see some of the online shows I’ve helped with during the past several years. All in all life treats us well, although I always hear the siren song of Hollywood—and one of these days I’ll just have to crash against those rocks once again.”


Doug Chia, senior counsel and assistant corporate secretary at Johnson & Johnson, was named to the 2009 Directorship 100, which annually recognizes the 100 “most influential people in corporate governance and the boardroom.” (Barack Obama is on the list, so that might give you an idea of what’s going on). Doug and wife have had their hands full with Brendan and Madeline, who just turned 7, and Alex and Jonas, who just turned 2. Needless to say they’re happy to give twin parenting advice to anyone who needs it!


I got news that Holly Benson is running for office! After serving as both a state representative and then heading up two different state agencies she’s currently vying to become the Republican candidate to become Florida’s next attorney general. Best of luck!


Finally, I’m typing this up as the Vancouver Winter Olympics are closing down, which may be a good time to wish hearty congratulations to all the Dartmouth folks involved with this season’s sports extravaganza, including classmate Chris Grover, head coach for the U.S. cross-country ski team. See you in Sochi! (Which reminds me: If anyone is heading out to the World Cup, let me know!)


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com


The fall approaches and with it come the back-to-school jitters. Twenty years ago we were just about to hit sophomore fall—and perhaps discover that the D-Plan had scattered our best friends from freshman year to all ends of the earth. At least we weren’t ’94s, clearly identifiable as ’shmobs roaming about campus. Then again, it turns out some of those ’94s weren’t so bad: take Tig Tillinghast, who ended up marrying wife Elise (Wellford ’94). They report the impending birth of their first child in September, a daughter. They also purchased another maple grove to add to their maple syrup operation in Thetford, Vermont. Belated congrats also go out to Susy Struble on the December birth of Quinton Robert Cole!


Jon Ruiz is starting his own company designing and implementing software for mobile devices. He writes, “After 10 years at Wily Technology, a startup founded by Lew Cirne and acquired in 2006, I’ve decided to go it my own. I’m also expecting to find more time to spend with wife, Kristin Anderson, and family (classes of 2025 and 2030).” 


Last fall John Stanton also kept it in the Dartmouth family and married Cindy Bellefeuille Stanton ’97. Alums in attendance included Sen. Alex Mooney along with a flurry of ’97s: Alix Baseman Aguilera, Meg Blakey Lyons, Nina Nho Shaw, Beth Landy Horak, Natasha Lam O’Rourke, Jodi Scarpa Robinson, Lynne Campbell Soutter, Morgan Soutter, Jessica Hughes and Jenna Kurowski Cerrati. Also in attendance was former Dartmouth student disabilities coordinator Nancy Pompian. The wedding was performed in the Church of Christ and the reception was at the Hanover Inn. In keeping within the Dartmouth spirit John proposed to Cindy the previous May outside of the Corey Ford Rugby House following the alumnae varsity rugby game. The happy couple currently resides in Washington, D.C.


Amy (Hannah) Anderson has a different perspective on back to school. She just finished her first year as the head of the English department at Wellesley (Massachusetts) High School: “After 15 years in the classroom I still love teaching, and so far I’ve loved the challenges of leading a department of dedicated and passionate educators. I’m the mom of two great kids—Megan is 7 and Conard (not Conrad—people always think it’s a typo, but his name is Conard) is 2 1/2. My husband, John, and I will celebrate our ninth wedding anniversary in July. We live in Arlington, Massachusetts, where we get to see some of my favorite Dartmouth folks—Brendan ’91 and Michelle (Couture) O’Day ’92 as often as busy schedules allow.”


Amy also let us know about my fellow Thayer buddy: “I am in touch with very few ’93s other than the lovely and talented Elisabeth Delehaunty. I get to see Beth a couple of times a year when she is visiting family in Worcester or when she comes to N.Y.C. to exhibit her company’s latest fashion line at the New York International Gift Fair. Beth’s company, Elisabethan, was way ahead of the green curve: Back in the early 1990s Beth was already repurposing blue jeans as reversible jackets and stitching funky shorts from vintage fabrics purchased at yard sales. In her latest designs Beth takes tired Ts and reincarnates them as richly colored and beautifully pieced skirts, shirts and scarves. Check out her website (elisabethan.com) for images and to find a list of shops around the country that carry Elisabethan. Beth and her husband, Peter, live in beautiful Paonia, Colorado.”


I hope your summer ends smashingly—drop a line our way if you would like to discuss what you did on summer vacation.


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com


It’s your fault. All of you. You are the reason I struggle each month to fill up each column with my allotted 600 words. (Except for Suzy Struble, who keeps posting interesting info about our classmates on the class Facebook page.) 


Interesting tidbits I have learned from Suzy Struble’s posts: Pete McBride has a documentary making the rounds called Chasing Water. He has been shooting photos for National Geographic.


Barry Cole co-produced a film that won the Audience Award for U.S. Documentaries at Sundance called Alive Inside: A Story of Music & Memory, about using music to help dementia patients.


Chris Fromm has joined with a group and set up a medical clinic to help provide care to the victims of Typhoon Haiyan.


Channeling my best Porky Pig imitation, “From the ‘th-th-th-th-th-that’s awesome’ ” file: Conductor Erik Ochsner has been named associate music director of Bugs Bunny at the Symphony. He will make his debut conducting the show with the Detroit Symphony in April 2014. After rave reviews for his Pixar in Concert performance with the Indianapolis Symphony, he will conduct that show in Krakow, Poland, celebrating International Children’s Day in May. He continues as founder and music director of the NY-based SONOS Chamber Orchestra.


Congratulations to Chris Grover, who was the head coach of the U.S. cross-country ski team at the Sochi Olympics!


A bit of ’93 class business: We were so lucky to have been at Dartmouth in the fall of 1989 with our very own brand new shiny Mac Classics. We were on the front end of the computer learning curve before many of our compatriots at other schools even knew what the horrors of the sad Mac face meant. As a result of our experiences in the wild west of Tetris and ripping the sides off the dot matrix paper, our class is funding a thesis award for the computer sciences department! 


From Josh Hall ’14, one of three recipients that we are funding: “I just wanted to write and say thank you for the thesis award from the class of 1993! Specifically the award will be going to my digital fashion project, where we hope to produce interactive and responsive wearable technology from three different garments. Thus far these garments include a mechanical wedding dress, which can react when the bride kisses the groom, and a motorcycle jacket, which will automatically signal turns or stops based off of their GPS location and final destination. Lastly, we hope to create a musical skit, which will react to sound or audio currently around it. This project would not be possible without this reward.” Remember to pay your class dues so we can continue to fund great works with our thesis award. If you don’t treasurer Sara (Fried) Ehrlich and president Veree (Hawkins) Brown will send sad Mac faces to haunt you in your sleep!


To close up another column, Jalieh Shepard wrote to me via Facebook and was looking for folks who had done the economics department program in Budapest with her in the fall of 1991. Separately it had come up in conversation that I had actually never done an foreign study program (FSP) or a language study abroad (LSA) while at Dartmouth. 


For next column I am asking you to email me at dartmouth93@gmail.com and tell me where you went on your FSP or LSA and share your favorite (publishable) story from that time abroad.


—Beth Krakower, c/o CineMedia Promotions, 11500 Olympic Blvd., Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90064; dartmouth93@gmail.com


I am writing this month’s column soon after celebrating my one-year anniversary in Los Angeles—and while preparing to head to the Telluride Film Festival, where I will have the pleasure of hanging out with Jeff Middents and his lovely wife, Angela Dadak ’92, and lots of other Dartmouth volunteers. 


Kudos to Kathryn (Savarese) Lazerow, who was named one of the “12 Moms Who Rule the Tech Industry” by Business Insider. From the write-up: “Kass Lazerow (with husband/business partner Michael Lazerow) has given birth to as many companies as kids. Together they’ve had more than $2-billion worth of successful exits, Michael says. That’s Buddy Media (sold to Salesforce.com for $689 million last year), U-Wire/Student Advantage (IPO) and Golf.com (sold to Time). Golf.com, we’ve heard, was Kass’ idea and she was COO during her second pregnancy. Today she’s the mom to three kids.”


Kudos also to Elad I. Levy, who has been appointed chair of the department of neurosurgery at the University at Buffalo School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. The dean of UB’s school of medicine and biomedical sciences, Michael Cain, said, “Dr. Levy rapidly emerged as our top candidate possessing the administrative, scientific, clinical, leadership and visionary skills needed to move the department forward.”


Congratulations to fellow Angelino Brent Schindele on his impending nuptials! He is finishing a two-month run playing the hero in The 39 Steps in L.A. and about to head to San Francisco to play the lead in a revival of the 1960s musical comedy Superman. He writes: “In the two weeks in between I’m also getting married. Never done that before, so this will be the role of a lifetime, I daresay—I can’t wait!” Dave Engstrom and his wife, Nora ’97, will be in attendance.


Want to feel really old? Courtney (Cook) Williamson is the parent of a ’17! She wrote in: “I am departing New York as of this month for a job as the director of strategic marketing at the Holderness School in Holderness, New Hampshire. I’m really looking forward to being back in New Hampshire, not least because my daughter is heading to Hanover as part of the Dartmouth class of ’17. I’m looking forward to visiting campus a lot more often—having a point of view as a parent is a lot of fun. I’d love to hear from classmates in Boston and greater New England and hope to connect soon.”


Erin Rowland and her husband, Steve Sloan ’91, last year moved to Belmont, Massachusetts, where they welcomed their second child, Alexander. Their oldest son, Theo, just turned 8. They recently saw several old friends at a get-together in the Upper Valley, including Jay ’91 and Suzanne (Spencer) Rendahl, Danny Lambert ’92 and a whole crew of ’91s, including Allegra Kochman, John Decker, Cindy Greene, Kathy Fallon and David Newman and their families. 


Also on the move is the Rev. Julia Whitworth, who moved back to New York City this past year with husband Ray Neufeld and their children Liam (7), Gregory (5) and Grace (2). “I am an Episcopal priest and am newly the canon for liturgy and the arts at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. It’s the perfect marriage of my past and present vocations. We live on the cathedral grounds with real peacocks in our front yard. Look us up if you are living (and raising kids) in New York or just passing through!”


—Beth Krakower, c/o CineMedia Promotions, 11500 Olympic Blvd., Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90064; dartmouth93@gmail.com


I type this up having just returned from Hanover and the amazing 20th reunion! The weather-perfect weekend included meeting up with old friends, checking out new campus buildings or being amazed by the combination fireworks show and Aires concert (no, really—they were synchronized). A warm thank you to reunion chairs Veree Hawkins Brown and Juli Hincks for engineering a great event! Check out the ’93 Facebook page for lots of pictures and updates—and if you couldn’t make it, post a picture there to let the rest of us know what you are up to.


Reunions also marked the switch to a new slate of class officers, with Veree now serving as our new president. Staying in their current roles are treasurer Sara Ehrlich and head agents Tammy Sloan and Amanda Salzhauer. New officers include: newsletter, Seth Alpert; strategic communications, my old roommate Rich Yeung; Alumni Council reps Aly Jeddy and Matt McGinnes; gift planning, Juli Hincks; and webmaster Ryan Pulis, who will use Wonder Twin powers with Olaf Minge.


Reunions brought people from far away, although I think the winners are Adam and Melinda Persson, who traveled from Singapore! Since it’s Olympics season, it’s time for a ’93 all-international update. Many responded to the call, so this will carry over until next time as well.


Laura Gulayets Iwan has been living in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, for the last 15 years: “I am a systems engineer at Automotive Fuel Cell Cooperation, where I help design and test proton exchange membrane fuel cells for use in hydrogen-powered Daimler and Ford passenger cars. I work part-time, however, so that I can help keep things running smoothly on the home-front with my real Canadian-born husband, Brian Gulayets, and two sons, ages 5 and 7. I still enjoy playing trumpet with various bands around town. I’m a Canadian citizen now, and really like the benefits of the socialist government, including affordable healthcare and many parks and recreational facilities. In my opinion, the increased taxes are worth it!”


Laura isn’t the only one working on cars. Adrienne Parker writes from Versailles: “I work for PSA Peugeot Citroen in Paris in the radio and navigation development. I joined in September 2010 after 11 years at Audi in Germany. With our recent alliance with GM I may be making some visits to Detroit in the next months. Would love to welcome Dartmouth visitors to Versailles (where I live) or Paris!”


Speaking of the City of Light, Somesha Ferdinand and Kadesha Bagwell send salutations du Paris: “It’s funny that we both settled in France as our first encounter was in 1991 when we participated in the Lyon language study abroad program. Apparently, we were taken by our linguistic and cultural immersion experiences. Twenty years later we live in Paris and are raising bicultural families with our respective husbands!” Somesha finished Columbia Law School in 1996 and is raising two very energetic, irresistible little men with one not-so-little man, her husband. She is general counsel at AXA Corporate Solutions. Kadesha obtained her law degree from Boston College in 1999; currently a full-time mother, she returns to practice international business law this fall.


There is one officer I left out from the above list: the secretary, responsible for this very column. Indeed, I pass the pen to someone whose voice should already be familiar: our former president Beth Krakower, who takes this on right as she moves from New York to Los Angeles. It has been a real pleasure to serve as class scribbler for the last three years, and I look forward to reading more about you in columns to come. 


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com


It was so great to see so many classmates at our 19th reunion! As my predecessor Jeff Middents mentioned in our last Class Notes column, I have shifted from president to secretary and want to thank our outgoing class officers for an amazing five years! 


To continue with Jeff’s Olympics/international theme from the last column, we continue with the (mostly) international Class Notes.


Kathy Vaughn has been living in Africa for quite some time. From Nairobi she writes in to tell us about her past five years working all over the African continent (South Africa to Liberia to Ethiopia and all corners of Kenya) as a consultant trainer, facilitator and executive coach specializing in leadership, conflict management and collaboration. In addition to helping shape the development of Africa, Kathy is ensuring that her children are aware of their heritage, as she described, “from their ethnic mother tongue to the Japanese and Irish traditions I enjoyed growing up as a third-culture child—an always interesting, frequently challenging, but often highly amusing endeavor in a culture outside one’s own.”


Masaaki Kobayashi writes, “I am living in Tokyo, Japan, with my wife and 4-year-old son.” He works for the global network of an international advertising agency and often makesbusiness trips overseas, including recent trips to Kenya, SouthAfrica, Nigeria, Dubai and Egypt. 


Also living outside of the United States is Eduardo Fernández.After graduating from NYU law school in 1996 he went to work for Willkie Farr & Gallagher. In 1999 he was sent to the Paris office for a two-year stint, but his French-born and NYU Law trained wife persuaded him to remain. He was admitted to the Paris bar in 2003 and made partner at Willkie in January 2005. Eduardo and his wife have three sons: Julien (12), Nicolas (9) and Alexandre (7). Lest the old traditions fail, Eduardo’s older two boys have taken to baseball, and Eduardo coaches on the 7-10-year-old team for the Paris Universite Club. Chasing his kids led to marathon training with Eduardo having run the Paris Marathon (in under four hours!).


We have kudos for alumni living this side of the pond as well. John Goff has published a children’s book (for ages 8 to 12), The Take Over. This is Goff’s second book, written from his experiences as a teacher and student. His previous effort is One Bad Thing, released in 2008. 


Bummed about having turned 40 this year? Kari Loya didn’t let it bring him down, with his anecdotal memoir, My Top 40 at 40: Making the First Half Count (A Modern Man’s Story Collection). This fun way to celebrate the big 4-0 last year includes 40 of his favorite stories spanning six continents and two decades. 


Congratulations to David Katz on the arrival of his (and wife Julia’s) second child, Eliza Colby Katz. He adds: “Meanwhile my business partner and I continue to work on our track record as we build out our hedge fund that we launched this past June. I am commuting up to our office in San Francisco from my home in Newport Beach, California. Hope to see more Dartmouth friends in one of these two places.”


Though not an international update, it feels like I’ve moved to a different country! This life-long curly haired N.Y.er has taken the plunge and moved to the land of low humidity—Los Angeles. Keep your life updates coming and contact me if you want to “do lunch.”


—Beth Krakower, c/o CineMedia Promotions, 11500 Olympic Blvd., Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90064; (310) 439-1403; dartmouth93@gmail.com


Unfortunately I have the sad task of informing the class of the passing of one of our own, Dann Angeloff. Dann passed away following a two-year bout with bile duct cancer, and is survived by his wife, Anne-Marie, and three children.


Pete McBride said, “Dann was one of the few people that could navigate any crowd of people—bankers, Marines, ruggers, etc.—and leave everyone smiling. His ability to blend absurd goofiness, humility, confident leadership, inspirational integrity and duty was a rare, unusual gift. I’m not sure I’ll ever encounter it again.”


A few classmates spoke about meeting Dann on the first day of freshman year. McBride described, “I had the privilege to live with Dann my first two years at Dartmouth. I will never forget Day 1 freshman year. Dann wore a visor upside down and backwards and Army pants. He excitedly played me his answering machine message, which referenced our Topliff basement cubicle as the ‘Hanover Beach.’ ‘Who is this guy?’ I wondered. ‘The unbridled optimism.’ Of course this surf-talking character would soon prove to be one of those granite-like compasses—rock solid and always showing the way.”


Brian Sims also noted that Dann “was wearing a visor backward on the rugby field. I’d never seen anything like it. Who was that guy? What was he thinking? And how could he run so fast without breaking a sweat? I spent the next four years with Dann learning about life. Most of it was on the rugby field, but some of it was in a fraternity basement or on a road trip or one summer living together in California. After college we followed different paths but our friendship stayed strong.”


Angus King writes, “He was a genuinely bright light, someone who truly embodied the best of the Dartmouth spirit, in terms of his humility, sense of honor and loyalty and a great reserve of quiet strength. He tempered all of that with a ready laugh and goofy sense of humor that made time with him both fun and meaningful all at once. He was also a wonderfully devoted husband and father. His family was his greatest source of pride.”


Jim Young gave one of the eulogies at Dann’s memorial. “Dann and I logged many long hours debating the merits of him leaving investment banking and joining the Marine Corps. While it seemed like a tough decision at the time, I think in the end it was easy, almost inevitable because Dann knew he would not be fulfilled until he was serving a cause much larger than his own and one that would test him like nothing else. As an outside observer I would say the Marine values matched his own. And, thus, he looked upon his service so solemnly and as the pinnacle of his career. It also explains the profound respect he had for his fellow Marines.”


About 40 classmates were in attendance at Dann’s memorial service. The family asks that in lieu of flowers, contributions may be made to the Marine Corps Scholarship Foundation in memory of Major Dann V. Angeloff Jr. (www.mcsf.org) or CanLiv (www.canliv.org). 


His family set up a website (http://dannangeloff.com/main.html) that has more information and asks that you submit memories for the family. 


—Beth Krakower, c/o CineMedia Promotions, 11500 Olympic Blvd., Suite 400, Los Angeles, CA 90064; dartmouth93@gmail.com


This month we continue with some leftover news. Munir Haddad is always good for updates, the first of which pertains to anyone visiting L.A. anytime soon: “Corinna Knight is president of the Dartmouth Club of Los Angeles (DCLA)—she’s connected to everyone and the club has events on a regular basis, so you can always find something going on. DCLA recently hosted a tailgate party for the men’s soccer team as they came to town to play UCLA in round 16 of the NCAA. It was a fantastic event for parents and alumni, who came out in force to support the Big Green. Though the game ended with UCLA’s heartbreaking goal with nine seconds left in the second overtime, the DCLA fans could not have been more excited by the play of our team. I couldn’t speak the next day from all the cheering.


“Tim Reidy once again convinced me to join him in the Turkey Ride, a 25-mile up-and-downhill mountain bike loop around Mount Tamalpais on Thanksgiving morning. I’m happy to say that I can still complete the ride alive and this time I made it intact. I’m equally amazed that Tim managed to essentially ride it twice in the same amount of time, since he kept circling back to make sure I was in fact alive. Post-ride, our families enjoyed Thanksgiving dinner together.”


Munir also sent the following press release from Pete Essig, which I quote: “Irving, Texas: Head Dartmouth football coach Buddy Teevens announced the signing today of Thomas Philipp Essig to the class of 2032 football team. ‘We’re thrilled to have signed Thomas. We think he has tremendous potential at a number of positions.’ ” Congrats, Pete!


Chris DeSantis originally wrote in December to tell me about selling his company Hawk Corp. for a pretty penny, and that he was now “searching for the right fit.” Lo and behold, sometimes it pays to wait before going to press: As of mid-January Chris took the reins as president and CEO of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based Latrobe Specialty Steel Co., a leading global manufacturer and distributor of high-performance specialty metals. With his background in metals and materials sciences plus extensive experience in aerospace and defense, Chris said in the press release, “I am thrilled to join Latrobe’s exceptional management team at a time when many exciting and important programs are well under way.” 


Finally, Alli Hammond wrote with her view of the world of education, something I can sympathize with: “My family—spouse David, son Finley (4) and daughter Eden (3)—is in Cincinnati, Ohio, where I have been since 1997. Back in November we camped out for four days alongside 80 or so other crazy families to get Finn into the German language elementary magnet school for next year. I am writing an essay about the experience and thinking of calling it ‘Waiting for Ubermensch.’ I am an assistant professor (‘educator,’ meaning twice the teaching load, but no obligation to publish) of rhetoric and composition at the University of Cincinnati. I found out via Facebook that an article I had assigned for my classes to read was written by David Martosko ’91. I would love to have other scholarly overlaps and interactions, so if any of our classmates are involved with food discourse, give me a holler!” 


Alli also mentions that she “spent a crazy weekend with a passel of Dartmouth women and looking forward to doing it again in 2011.” That sounds like a good wish for everyone as we head full-on into spring and summer—no time like the present to re-engage with each other. Keep writing in!


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com


Inspired by this issue’s survey, I sent 100 random ’93s the following prompt: “You win $5 million from the Publishers Clearing House Sweepstakes and the same day as that big Ed guy gives you the check, aliens land on the Earth and say they’re going to blow up the world in two days. What are you gonna do with the money?” Savvy filmgoers from the year we graduated high school will recognize this as the “lunchtime poll” from Heathers—and lo, folks responded!


Brandon Elliott says: “I now have three kids, Mason (12), Thomas (9) and Anna (6). In August I left Friess Associates after 10 good years trying to dodge market fluctuations and make money for clients invested in the Brandywine Funds. I have now jumped to the other side of the investment table and joined Consol Energy as VP of investor and public relations and have relocated my family to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It’s true this place is nuts about their Steelers—and their Penguins! As for the money and the world ending: one last good day of powder skiing or fly-fishing depending on the season the aliens arrive.”


Annie Edgerton has my favorite response, appealing to my taste buds: “I would bring everyone I love to a gorgeous deserted island in the tropics and we would stuff ourselves with amazing food and incredible wine until the world goes ‘Boom!’ I am currently doing yet another stint in Broadway’s Mamma Mia! and have continued with my Major League Baseball anthem quest—to date I’ve sung for 11 of the 30 teams, and hope to add six or eight more in 2011. Big Green baseball-lovers, keep your eyes peeled for me at a stadium near you! I am also having a ton of success in the wine business, primarily teaching classes and writing my blog: wineminx.blogspot.com. You can keep apprised of both projects on Facebook; my pages are ‘Annie Edgerton Anthem Quest’ and ‘Wine Minx.’ ”


Farrell Harwood includes a great defensive maneuver: “Pool the money with others to build something to destroy the aliens? Or go to Fiji with the family so we can enjoy some family time in the sun and go out with a tan and cosmo in hand. Nothing radically cool happening over here, but if any ’93s are in London, reach out so Dan Subin and I can show you a couple of our favorite pubs. If you don’t support Chelsea, don’t let Dan know.”


Andrea Greer has hope beyond the apocalypse: “Just in case the aliens changed their minds, I’d invest $2 million for my retirement, donate $1 million to the Sunflower County Freedom Project in Mississippi and start a foundation with the final $2 million. Two years into working for myself as a fundraising consultant for nonprofits I finally took a vacation and visited León, Nicaragua. Fantastic!”


Dan Foster also provided a great update: “Last spring I joined Lawyers Without Borders in Hartford, Connecticut, as senior counsel. I have spent most of my time working on a trial advocacy training program for lawyers and judges that we conducted in Monrovia, Liberia, in November. The Liberia program focused on human trafficking. We hope to return to Liberia to conduct a similar program next year and to continue our work in other countries in East and West Africa, but everything depends on obtaining funding. On a more personal note, my older daughter, who attended our graduation in ’93, is now at the Maryland Institute College of Art, and my younger one just started high school. Tempor fugit nimis.”


More next time—and send in your own response to the lunchtime poll!


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com


The large majority of the Class Notes that I have written during the last couple years have been joyous affairs, relating a lot of the joys and successes that we gladly share with others: new jobs, new family members, new experiences. We revel in the new, almost as if we can relive those experiences from 20 years back when everything was in the future tense; the back of this magazine looks forward as it simultaneously looks back, in both directions with green-colored glasses on. But if we think of our class and what we also try to foster here, it is also that we are something of a family—and that not all our experiences are bright and sunny, and that sometimes we need to share the immense pain as well as the joys.


Several folks related news to me concerning Madeleine James, the 5-year-old daughter of Collie James. In mid-January Maddie was diagnosed with a malignant, inoperable brain tumor known as diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG). Although DIPG is mercifully not a disease that generates much pain on its own, she quickly lost control of all motor functions before passing away in her sleep on March 13. Before that, however, Collie and Kajsa, Maddie’s mother, committed to help build a seaside learning center at Maddie’s favorite location in the whole world, where she had the most amazing experiences at summer camp: the Ocean Institute in Dana Point, California. (Looking at the plans for this place, I can see why she loved it: Right next to the water, it provides hands-on experiences for kids of all ages.) Please consider contributing to the Maddie James Foundation (and learning more about both her and plans for the learning center) by visiting the website at http://maddiejamesfoundation.org.


I asked Collie for permission to dedicate this column to Maddie’s memory. He replied yes, and added the following: “Since Maddie’s diagnosis in January I have been truly touched by the outpouring of love and support from classmates around the world. You have lifted me up during an unspeakably difficult time. I’ll never have the joy of seeing Maddie graduate from kindergarten—let alone watch proudly as she walked across that stage in front of Baker—but I have a million memories that will sustain me through the darkest moments. With your help I hope to soon visit the Maddie James Seaside Learning Center and see a million more memories being created by other families. And in that, I know Maddie will be with me forever. From the bottom of my heart, thank you.”


To Collie—and, indeed, to all of us ’93s who have lost someone close over the last 20 years—I extend peace, love and the warmest of memories. Though ’round the girdled earth we roam, our touch with each other remains.


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com


As I write this particular column (back in October) the sports world is definitely ablaze: the baseball deities have made St. Louis ecstatically happy, Dartmouth won an amazing football game at Homecoming and, in my own limited worldview, first-grade soccer games are even better when mud is involved. No one does sports, however, like Rob Simmelkjaer. Formerly an executive at ESPN, Rob recently became senior vice president at NBC Sports Ventures, where he will be helping to broaden the channel’s global interests. Congratulations!


Speaking of Dartmouth green football, I received a picture in my inbox of the most amazingly smiley kid holding a football with a great big green “D” on it—none other than Greg Hoffmeister’s 5-year-old son, Tate, beaming after fetching the ball after a Dartmouth extra point. Seriously, you can see just how thrilled he is. Greg writes that the picture comes from when he was up in Hanover in early October “to watch the Big Green take on Penn in the first-ever night game under the newly installed lights at Memorial Field. There was a great crowd on hand (even students!) even though it was raining. I ran into classmate and fellow Big Green teammate Clay Adams. Unfortunately, I won’t be able to make it up for Homecoming Weekend, but Rich Lytle who is a neurosurgeon in Asheville, North Carolina, will be there. He is going to spend the night with us in Needham, Massachusetts, before driving north.” Hope you guys had a blast!


Amy Tracy wrote in from Los Angeles and reports that “I’m working for a medical company called Cranial Technologies as a clinical representative. I’m married to an editor/director and have a 6-year-old son and 4-year-old daughter. I have run into several alumni at work and love to connect with friends and alumni through Facebook. We had the privilege of seeing President Kim when he came to L.A. a couple months ago. If you’re in the area, give me a holler!” Amy, don’t be surprised if you hear Beth Krakower hollering back—I caught up with her myself in early September at the Telluride Film Festival, right before she was about to move off to Los Angeles. 


I was sad to hear that Liza Veto was leaving the D.C. region over the summer, but her recent note speaks to the amazing opportunity that has brought her back north: “After 13 years of federal service with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, mostly doing policy work, in August I relocated to Boston from D.C. Earlier this year I was selected as a Broad Foundation resident in urban education and am now serving in state government, at the Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education. I am working with the leadership here to figure out what support systems—both academic and non-academic—students need in order to be successful, particularly in struggling schools, and how the state can help school districts put those supports in place. I’m looking forward to the challenge and am thrilled to (finally!) be back in New England.”


Send me your holiday news—and don’t forget to sign up for the upcoming reunion extravaganza this coming June! In the spirit of the season, I leave you with words from the most lounge-worthy holiday carol out there: “To the strange and the ordinariest, me to you—the merriest!”


—Jeffrey Middents, 505 Ethan Allen Ave., Takoma Park, MD 20912; dartmouth93@gmail.com