Steve Hauge takes the wheel
Welcome to a new scribe for our class notes!
Now that Dan Farley’s final column has appeared in the September issue of Williams People (and congrats again to him for winning the Thurston Bowl for his 10 years of secretarial service), let’s jump right in. Henceforth material will appear on the class website as well as in the college publications so please check both.
In ascending to this august position, I want first to celebrate those who have preceded me in handling the class quill: Dick Lammert (1973-78), Sandy Read (1978-86), Janet Brown (1986-88), Phil Dodd (1988-93), Sandy Read (second tour, 1993-98), Field Horne (1998-03), Sandy Read (third tour, 2003-08), Cole Werble (2008-13) and Dan Farley (2013-23). Fifty years is a long time to carry the water – so let’s give them “a tip of the cap” for their generosity in spending their lives to do the class’s work.
I also wanted to acknowledge Pete Farwell again. Jay Haug did a wonderful job toasting him as he gave Pete a bowl from the class at a 50th Reunion dinner, but he passed over Pete’s singular accomplishments. While Pete’s modesty would ask that I not enumerate all he has achieved, allow me to highlight some of his extraordinary accomplishments over 44 years of coaching at Williams:
A career track and field record of 459-51 – so a winning percentage of 90%!
228 All-Americans, including 29 individual national champions
58 Little Three titles in men’s and women’s cross country
5 NCAA team titles
5-time national coach of the year
Induction into the U.S. Track and Field Cross Country Coaches Association Hall of Fame
And these records do not reflect the significant personal impact Pete had on so many runners over those many years. So “Bravo” to a historic career.
Scott Hopkins, our new Vice-President for Outreach (and purveyor of preserves), and I have often been asked: how many classmates do we have? Here are the accurate figures: In September of 1969, 338 men entered Williams in our class. Over the next four years we added 146 more classmates: 116 new members and 30 exchanges. Thus our class at its largest numbered 484: 389 men and 95 women. Since then, 21 classmates have asked to be “removed” from our class, 39 others have affiliated to other classes, and 62 have died. As of Reunion, we therefore had 362 members of the class – 253 original members, 82 additions and 27 exchanges, with 286 men and 76 women. (So the appearance of 172 members at Reunion was an attendance rate of 47.5%!)
One of the most touching moments at Reunion was the Remembrance Service for our 62 classmates who have passed. (Remember the comment ascribed to Banksy: “They say you die twice – one time when you stop breathing and a second time … when somebody says your name for the last time.” -- so we are postponing that second time.) Steve Harty spoke movingly about them, his daughter created a photo-montage to celebrate them, and Bill Tarter led the service by reminding us of the impact they had on our lives. As 42 of them died in the last 10 years, we should be mindful, as Bill pointed out, of the value of friends and the way we spend our time.
A final comment on our Reunion: Tom Lee sent a note to our class in July with the final figures of our $10 million gift to the college, with $3.2 million of “new money” raised to support our two Class Gift Purposes: $2,219,871 for the Class of 1973 Career Exploration Internship Fund and $991,329 to add to our Class of 1973 Memorial Scholarship (which had $1.5 million as of June, 2022).
If the Internship Fund provides a 5% draw, it will produce $111K annually. So if each stipend is $5,000, we can fund 22 summer interns annually. (This will be once all the pledges have been received.) If the new funding for our Memorial Scholarship is added to the current corpus (again, assuming completed pledges), we will have $2.5 million. Since the cost of Williams’ tuition/room/board/fees for 2023-24 is $81,150, a 5% draw will provide $125,000, or 1.54 full scholarships – or three half-scholarships. Both will be significant accomplishments.
At Reunion Weekend, Cole Werble mentioned that he and I were in the same first grade class at Beauvoir School in Washington, D.C.! Amazing how small the world is. That got me thinking whether we may have other classmates who also were in first grade together, or even kindergarten. Serendipitously, as we were walking into the Saturday morning Reunion event, I fell into step with Karl Machata and raised the question – and he said he and Dave Schooler had been in kindergarten together. Small world indeed. (Does any other classmate have a fellow classmate who shared kindergarten or first grade?)
A final item to kick off my secretaryship -- let me invite you to take the challenge of the attached 50th Reunion acrostic puzzle. (It will be easier to do if you print it out.) Half of the clues are related to our class, so it should recall those early years. I hope you enjoy the answer when you achieve it.
Steve Hauge
