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CLASS NOTES
Henry S.
Coleman Now I know someone reads this, since I just received a great note from Arnie Zentner. He retired from the practice of psychiatry in Hartford, Conn. and now lives in Sarasota, Fla. You can find him in Sarasota during the winters and Brookfield, Conn. during the summer. He says there is a thriving Columbia University Club in Sarasota and he has renewed his friendship with classmate Jack Orkin, who also retired there. Arnie and his wife Peggy have four grown children and two grandchildren. I reported this to Howard Clifford when he called from Tenderfoot, Idaho where he was tearing around with a Good Humor van until the freezing component died. Now he is in the soft ice cream business. Howard wondered how many other classmates have some grandchildren to brag about, and was also curious as to how many golden wedding anniversaries we've had in our class. Now there are some items for classmates to write to me about.
George W.
Cooper Once again, not a flood. But, at least, a smattering. I found this quote from Charles Dickens: "A smattering of everything, and a knowledge of nothing." Well, your correspondent protests - these columns do not cover "everything" but they do provide more than "nothing" when classmates contribute "something." To the extent that they have done so, here are the results. Last December, Andrew Lazarus was a featured speaker at a special symposium on "Property Assessment and Conservation Easements" at the Government Law Center of Albany Law school. Andy is former head of the Pawling (N.Y.) planning board and has been a director of the Oblong Land Conservancy. Way to go, Andy, but what if the land worth preserving is round, instead of oblong? More Parts of the Puzzle is the name of Robert Pease's latest opus, a collection of new stories, poems, letters and, to quote the author, "even a couple of dubious limericks." This is his 17th book in print, including six novels and two books of poetry, all self-published. Let us all join in Bob's expressed hope that someone in publishing may yet take over the latter task. Finally, a letter from my favorite, and invariably winning opponent at the ping-pong table many eons ago, Richard Sterne. After reminiscing about, inter alia, his participation, with Bernie Sunshine '46, in a famous debate against a powerful team from Cambridge U. (not the upstart in the Boston suburbs), Dick goes on to report that he retired from teaching at Simmons College in 1997 to do research on the treatment of justice and law in the literature of India. Recently, Dick was invited to be a visiting scholar in education at, you guessed it, that "upstart" in Cambridge, Mass. Between such scholarly duties, Dick and his wife, Ruth, travel extensively, including a recent visit to Mexico, allegedly in search of the long-missing Ambrose Bierce (not a member of our class). Keep those cards and letters coming, folks!
Theodore
Melnechuk Sylvain Bromberger, back in our student days at Columbia, was one of the literary bunch who revived the Philolexian Society and edited or wrote for the Columbia Review; others included Allen Ginsberg, Herbert Gold '46, Daniel G. Hoffman '47, John Hollander '50, Norman Kelvin, Louis Simpson '49GS, and me. Meanwhile, courses that Sylvain took with Professor Ernest Nagel helped to focus his interests on the intersection of linguistics, logic and philosophy. After getting a Ph.D. in philosophy at Harvard, he taught at Princeton and then at the University of Chicago, until joining MIT in the late 1960s. Six years ago, Sylvain retired from teaching and administration but has continued as an emeritus professor in the department of linguistics and philosophy, still thinking and writing, usually in collaboration with the linguist Morris Halle. In the collection of his papers, On What We Know We Don't Know, published by the University of Chicago Press, the title I like best is "Ontology of Phonology" because it rhymes. (As you surely remember from our College days, ontology studies the metaphysics of being, and phonology the articulation of speech.) Sylvain told me that he may be the only person who has tackled that particular subject, which, if so, would logically mean that he's the worst in the world at it - but, as he pointed out, also the best! Last year, Sylvain and his wife, Nancy, celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. One of their sons is a Ph.D. entomologist interested in pesticide effects on the environment; the other is a lawyer recently enabled by a foundation to organize a national version of the N.Y.C. program he founded of pro bono lawyers. Sylvain and Nancy live at 146 Beaumont Ave., Newton, Mass. 02160. Robert C. Clayton had occasion to quote Mark Twain's comment that the reports of his death were greatly exaggerated, when Bob learned by phone (as we classmates later learned by letter) that his obituary was to be printed in the previous issue of this magazine because its staff had been misinformed. I had two reactions to this episode. First, I sent Bob, who lives at Apt. L-2105, 475 FDR Drive, New York, N.Y. 10002, this limerick: "Though Columbia College Today, / Wrote of Clayton that he'd passed away, / By mail they admit,/ It's too soon an obit., / And old Bob's still among us. Hooray!" Next, I decided to write most of my own obituary before too late and send it in, so that at the appropriate time, there could be a published record of what I was proudest. Maybe you should do this, too - but before you do, please send me an account of what you're up to now. Norman W. Eliasson, alas, did die, on December 11, 1999. You can read his obituary elsewhere in this issue. Two of Norm's old friends in the class of '47, Egon E. Weck and Robert Young, kindly sent me copies of the obituary published in The Washington Post, which I relayed to CCT, along with a copy of the anecdotal eulogy Egon gave at the funeral service. His eulogy ends, "To me - as to others - Norm leaves behind a great void that can be mitigated only by his living memory." To reinforce Egon's closing phrase, I now quote verbatim the notes that Norm wrote last year for class notes: "I have a mini-reunion with Don Crabill '54 every Sunday since he became a member of my church. He remembers a Columbia College Club meeting in my apartment in Washington in 1959 before I moved to Germany. Dean Palfrey, who was then one of the Atomic Energy Commissioners, was the speaker, and Gene Rossides '49 was also there. I'll be visiting relatives in Munich and in Finland this summer, as well as my elder daughter in Venice, where she is in an NYU M.A. program for a second summer. The final summer will be at the Washington Square campus." Norm's ashes are in the columbarium at Arlington National Cemetery. Frederick R. Karl is not retired, although his wife, Dolores, is, after having been a vice president at Morgan Guaranty Trust; he is still a professor of English and American literature at NYU. They have three daughters, all of whom graduated from Barnard. He is the author of books on American fiction and modernism, as well as four large biographies of Joseph Conrad, George Eliot, William Faulkner, and Franz Kafka. (Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? may soon ask its contestants which of those novelists was female.) Two of these biographies were in The New York Times's list of the year's best books, and another was a runner-up for the Pulitzer Prize. Fred is also general editor and volume co-editor of Joseph Conrad's collected letters, five of whose eight volumes have appeared. NYU has funded a project on biography that has enabled him to edit four volumes of Biography and Source Studies, with a fifth volume forthcoming. Recently, he sold his archive of manuscripts, typescripts, and correspondence to the U. of South Carolina's Bruccoli collection, which has also just purchased the archive of biographer Leon Edel. These were added to its well-known collection of Scott Fitzgerald material as part of its planned center for biography research. Fred and Dolores live at 2 Settlers Landing Lane, East Hampton, N.Y. 11937-3317.
Joseph B.
Russell Responding to my plaintive cry for comments, Dick Sachs says hello and expresses the hope that I may be able to join him and Joe Broadwin for lunch soon, as our last date conflicted with a prior obligation; I shall certainly try. Meanwhile, Dick reports that he is teaching, at the New School University, a course entitled "Participatory Democracy: Political and Social Change," and next fall will be teaching a course about democracy endangered by cynicism, complacency and low voter turnout. He notes that the coming presidential election could determine the fate of our nation for the next half-century, in that the Republican candidate, with a friendly Congress, would certainly tilt the Supreme Court further to the right and complete the dismantling of the remnants of the New Deal, the Fair Deal and the Great Society, together with further erosion of civil rights, women's rights and gay rights. Whether you would find these results desirable or undesirable, the prediction is a clarion call to vote on November 7! From down under, Colin Hughes e-mails that as a chairperson of a commission now revising the constitution of his home state of Queensland (the northeastern sixth of the island continent and the Great Barrier Reef), he is busily invoking the ghosts of Hamilton and Jay. He thinks an essay written for Lawrence Chamberlain, an M.A. from the then department of public law and government, and over 30 years of teaching political science back home, may also have helped. In early December, he was keynote speaker to an assemblage of electoral types in Adelaide. According to a recent New York Times Book Review piece by Matthew Cooper, deputy Washington bureau chief for Time magazine, Jules Witcover has come up with some provocative ideas for fixing our present system of presidential elections in his book, No Way to Pick a President, described by its reviewer as an "often wise volume on what's wrong with presidential elections." Edith and George Cook had a good visit last fall with Paula and Walt Schlotterbeck in the Seattle suburbs, where they have both come safely through bypass surgery and seem to have settled in as happy as the local clams. The news of a complete recovery is most welcome, and we wish them an obstacle-free future. George also sent in a copy of a letter from Dean Quigley advising that the current holder of our class scholarship, Karen Graves, is now a senior majoring in psychology; she has been active in Big Brothers/Big Sisters and the Double Discovery tutoring program and plans to attend graduate school in social work. Karen writes that she has "for three years been fortunate to be the recipient of the Class of 1949 Scholarship Fund in Memory of Dean Lawrence Chamberlain. It has been a truly great honor. I am sure I cannot express my gratitude in words. Without the assistance of such a scholarship, my education here would not be possible. As I graduate this year in May, your kindness will not be forgotten." A regular guy, an "ordinary person," Carlton Oberg (remembered as Ole, the catcher, by his many friends with whom he played softball on South Field) died on October 4, 1999. He is remembered in his Midwestern community of LaPorte, Ind., as a fine craftsman. He spent his retirement years mending antique furniture and building eighteenth and nineteenth century reproductions. After graduation, and before moving to the Midwest, he and his new wife, Belle, a graduate of St. Luke's Hospital School of Nursing, lived at 180 Cabrini Blvd., the same address as that of your correspondent for more than 36 years! To the rest of you layabouts, my message is plain - WRITE! Or e-mail if you prefer - but take a few moments out of your busy day so that I can let the rest of our mighty class know how you are.
Mario
Palmieri Many of us will soon be heading for Morningside Heights for reunion. In the last issue, we gave you the highlights of the program, and from that you know that it will be an entertaining and interesting weekend. Do join us; it's not too late to register, and the 50th is something special that you don't want to miss. Nor is it too late to contribute to our gift to the College. If you've not yet done so, now is the time to send your unrestricted contribution to the Columbia College Fund. Your Class of '50 reunion committee set a goal of $100,000 to mark this special anniversary. Help us reach it and make your class noteworthy in the College's history. News of classmates: Desmond Callan, retired from medical practice, lives in Hillsdale, N.Y., where he devotes his energies to community health centers and allied activities. John H. Cole, retired as a management consultant, lives in Guilford, Conn. Norman Dorsen is still active as a professor at NYU Law School. He is on the executive committee of the International Association of Constitutional Law and until recently was chair of the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights. Roland Glenn has been executive officer of the Department of Social Services for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. He is also the CEO of a community park association in Boston that develops programs that emphasize multi-cultural understanding. William Hill is a professional engineer and consultant in Weston, Conn. Bill says that he and classmate Don Marquardt are the only two designated Fellows of the American Society of Quality Control to have graduated in the same college class. Bernard Prudhomme, who retired from Coca-Cola, lives in Duluth, Ga., where he is active as a library volunteer; he does plan to be at the reunion. F. Theodore Reid, after 44 years as a psychiatrist, has retired and is living near Guadalajara, Mexico. Ted is devoting his retirement years to writing and learning Spanish. Dudley Rochester, another retired physician, is in Charlottesville, Va. Dudley still is involved in medicine as president of the American Lung Association of Virginia and member of the American Lung Association National Council. Donald Ross is retired from his career as an engineer. Don was involved in the operation and design of many chemical and power plants in various locations. Retirement activities in Westwood, N.J., include golf and writing military histories; he served with the Marines during the Korean conflict. John Uhler and his wife, Ann, who was a nurse at St. Luke's, recently celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary. John retired as a colonel from the Army Reserve; the Uhlers live in Titusville, Fla. Sad to report that John Zegger, a track star in our day, died in January, 1999.
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