Class Note 1966
There are a number of power couples around—Bill and Hillary, Brad and Angelina, Kermit and Miss Piggy. But out in Wyoming the dynamic duo is Hank and Leslie.
Hank Phibbs, a native of Casper, took his Hastings College of Law degree from San Francisco back to Teton County in 1972 and has been there ever since. With a civil law practice representing small businesses, ranchers, homeowners associations and the Jackson Hole Community Housing Trust, Hank’s been up to his boot tops in community growth and conservation issues. Right now he’s in his second term as an elected county commissioner.
Hank’s wife, Leslie Peterson, served as a county commissioner herself in the 1980s and has been a member of the Wyoming Water Development Commission and served on numerous environmental groups. In early 2009 Leslie was elected chair of the Wyoming Democratic Party, stepping down a year later to run for governor. She got caught in the strong Republican tide last November.
Married for 35 years, Hank and Leslie have two sons, Travis, who lives in Jackson with wife Kristi, and Monte, over the mountains in Colorado. They have also been something of a magnet for other ’66s. Ken Taylor and his wife, Caroline, have been out “in the valley” since the early 1990s, spending winters and summers skiing, fly-fishing and golfing with family and friends.
Jeff and Penny Gilbert, still based on the New Hampshire seacoast, also spend about three months a year in the Jackson Hole area “hiking, biking and chasing trout.” Back in the Granite State Jeff, who already has had successful careers as a business lawyer and an investment banker, is a principle in W.J.P. Development, which owns and manages community shopping centers. He also served in the New Hampshire House of Representatives for five years and is currently treasurer of the port advisory council, a member of the housing and conservation planning advisory board and the state park system advisory council.
What else? Well, Jeff is president of the board of trustees of the Housing Partnership, a local organization providing affordable and workforce housing in the seacoast region; treasurer of the board of trustees of Strawbery Banke Museum; and a member of the board of the New Hampshire Preservation Alliance and a trustee of New Hampshire Public Television. No wonder he needs to get away once in a while!
Also out west, Alan Anderson hosted his 66th birthday party at San Francisco’s Bohemian Club last October. He invited the immortal Fred Parris of the Five Satins. Freddy didn’t make it, but classmates and Chi Phi brothers Wally Buschmann, Dick Sheaff, Kevin Trainor and Bob Wilson reportedly offered their own crowd-pleasing rendition of “In the Still of the Night.”
If you haven’t yet voted in our 1966 Alumni Council election for either Jon Colby or John Rollins, who have graciously tossed their hats in the ring, you may still have time. Polls close May 1. You can vote online at the class website: www.dartmouth.org/classes/66. That’s also where you can learn all about our fabulous 45th reunion, October 13 thru 17, at the College, during the school year, when the foliage should be gorgeous!
—Larry Geiger, 93 Greenridge Ave., White Plains, NY 10605; (917) 747-1642; lgeiger@aol.com
