Tag: 1979

Jono Cobb shared that “Like many of our classmates fortunate enough to have that option, my wife Suzzanne and I have been riding out the pandemic in the country which in our case is Martha’s Vineyard. We are also fortunate to have been able, since last March, to switch our teaching jobs to remote versions. I was already using Powerpoint slides as the basis for riffing about anatomy and physiology with my undergrad students. Suzzanne’s voice and music history curriculum was a tougher conversion. By summer our daughter, Jordan, will be living in Harlem near Rachel Christmas Derrick, with whom I’m in frequent Facebook contact.”

     Speaking of Rachel Christmas Derrick, she is “Still pinching myself that I’m actually making a decent living as a writer and editor. Writing is the only thing I ever dreamed of doing for a living. Despite the pandemic, 2020 was relatively kind to my family: I was promoted to assistant vice president and managing editor of the financial services nonprofit where I’ve worked for three years. My husband and I celebrated our 25th anniversary. Our daughter graduated magna cum laude from Yale, made Phi Beta Kappa, and went to Oxford, where she’s getting her international relations master’s in refugee and forced migration studies. Our son, now a junior at Wesleyan studying history and chemistry, was accepted into Columbia University’s three-summer pre-med program. Neysa Dillon Brown, Adrienne Kelly Lumpkin, Vicki Wilson, Michelle Morancie, Wanda Wardlaw Matthews, Jeanette Talavera, Becky Vazquez, Jay Hoggard, Allison Brown, Mora McLean, and quite a few other Wesleyanites remain in my life 46 years on.”

     “I (Denise Giacomozzi) am a volunteer with the COVID Grief Network, a volunteer-run mutual aid network that offers free 1:1 and group grief support to young adults in their 20s and 30s who are grieving the serious illness or loss of someone to COVID-19. We continue to see an increase in the number of young adults who are requesting our support, and we are in need of more volunteers to offer care.” Please visit the Wes notes online for a full description and websites.

     In her first ever alumni note, Jane McCoy Dausner reports, “40 years ago, I graduated from Columbia University with my master’s and have been working in hospice and palliative medicine ever since. I married my high school sweetheart the same year, and we have three daughters, three sons-in-law and four grands. I continued with athletics, playing and coaching tennis, basketball and softball; my girls are now coaching their kids. I got nationally ranked in singles 10 years ago. I urge all alums to consider putting “donor” on your driver’s license; this is very close to my heart, having donated a kidney to my sister 20 years ago. What an experience! I wish you all health, safety and peace through these challenging times; times that always provide opportunities for learning and improvement. Would love to hear from Jane Alexander Gutcher and Beverly Hinton!”

     Matt Okun and his wife Annie are headed back to Matt’s old stomping grounds in DC. They are looking forward to spending time with Casey Dinges and his family, high school buddies, Annie’s two grandkids in Alexandria and Matt’s daughters and granddaughters in Philly and Brooklyn. “What a long, strange trip it’s been! Planning to be teaching this fall, not even contemplating retirement.”

     Peter Campbell writes “While we don’t see each other in person because of COVID, Zoom, texts, emails and even Facebook keep a bunch of us ’79ers together including George Dupaul, Tim Fitz, Gary Breitbord, Mike Scacca, and Frank Hauser. All of us were roommates at some point. There is always some very intelligent thread on family, sports, politics or the weather. Everyone’s memory is still good as no one has forgotten anything embarrassing anyone else has ever done. A larger group of late ’70s DKEs has a twice monthly happy hour call which re-creates the old DKE Friday afternoon bar experience from our era.”

     Architect Willie Lee Jones shared an article about him and his path to becoming director of parks and recreation of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. “We’re an expansive park and recreation department with over 230 facilities. We are an NRPA CAPRA accredited department, have the Carolina Star Award from the North Carolina Department of Labor, and we’re the only park and recreation department in the state that does.” To read the full article: http://blog.mecknc.gov/park-director/

     Stephen Lewin-Berlin finally retired last year from a career of starting software companies. “I was on the founding team for half a dozen or so, and several were quite successful. Unfortunately, our plans to travel extensively in retirement were curtailed by the pandemic. Our home life, here in a cohousing community in Acton, Massachusetts, is filled with dancing and drumming, reading and video binges, and social and political activism with a focus on anti-racist work, voting rights and environmental action. With three kids scattered across the world (Australia, California and Massachusetts) our family visits have become virtual online experiences, but with vaccines coming fast, we hope to travel again.”

     Alan Scott advised me that Mark Miller tracked Alan down recently and told him that their mutual friend, Bruce Hardesty, died in 2017. Bruce and Alan had been out of touch for many years. They lived in the same dorm or apartment for four years at Wesleyan; Bruce was a good friend.

Hello everyone. I hope all of you have been weathering the pandemic and various levels of sheltering at home as well as you can. My husband and I (Diane) have been pretty much staying sequestered in our home but are cautiously optimistic about 2021. 

On that subject, Peter Cherr passed along his innovative approach to uplifting us: “In April, in response to COVID-19, I started a Haiku project called “Haiku in the Time of Corona Virus” in hopes of bringing some peace and calm and perhaps respite for people in this trying time. Toward this goal, I write and post on Instagram at least one Haiku every day with an accompanying picture which I hope uplifts people. The project can be found on my page @peter_c_cherr, and also, by the end of December, the website kindovermatter.com will have published 27 Haiku in their “Poetry Corner.” I have posted over 160 Haiku on Instagram to date and will have posted over 250 by year-end. The project will continue daily into next year while we wait for the pandemic crisis to ease.” 

Barbara Woike retired from the Associated Press in New York in March 2019 after being a photo editor there for 32 years. “My husband Jim McNamara and I decided to try small town living, surrounded by nature, so we sold our Brooklyn co-op and moved to the Berkshires. We now live in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, a stone’s throw from the Red Lion Inn and the Main Street that still looks pretty much the way it did when Norman Rockwell painted it half a century ago. We couldn’t have been better placed when COVID-19 struck, and we’re enjoying our new lifestyle, but it is sad to see Tanglewood and all the other cultural attractions shut down and the local economy suffering.” 

 Cliff Hendel recently authored a chapter in a collective work published in Spain called A La Sombra—Actores Secundarios de la Historia. Each of the 57 chapters pairs a leading historical figure with another person who has remained “in the shadows” but without whom the historical figure would not have reached the status/notoriety he/she enjoys. His chapter had a certain Wesleyan connection. It involved the relation between Hamilton (relatively unknown, even in the United States, before Chernow’s biography and Miranda’s musical) and Washington (a global demi-god). Cliff continues to live in Madrid, practicing law and finding time to be a patron of the Fundación Española Pro Bono and to coach a team of law students from Madrid’s Universidad Carlos III in the annual Vis Moot competition.

Laura Walker, with an accomplished career most notably for transforming New York Public Radio into an independent media powerhouse and for spearheading successful, innovative initiatives at Sesame Workshop and Carnegie Hall, was recently appointed president of Bennington College. Congrats, Laura!

Ben Solnit reports that he has been running Zoom board meetings for the ACLU of Connecticut and the Morris Land Trust. Virtual mini-reunions were attended by Kitty Hannaford, John Hatleberg, Maura Resnick, Kate Sutherland, Laura Tully, and Laura Walker, along with many spouses. Ben is also taking a class with Professor Emeritus Herbert Arnold on Wolfram von Eschenbach’s masterpiece Parzival. “If 2020 has you down, medieval literature is the way to go.”

In an impassioned plea for environmental action, Ellen Reiter writes “All I can say is glad I’m old . . . I’ve been a climate activist since the 70s, but seeing negative results: climate change is out of control, and we humans, in my opinion, sit atop the endangered species list and indeed deserve to go extinct! Sorry, not sorry, world needs to stop burning fossil fuels, destroying ecosystems and waging endless war, all in the name of run-amok capitalism and systemic racism.” She also shares that she has recently relocated from San Francisco to Ocala, Florida to care for her very cool parents!

Casey Dinges retired after 35 years at ASCE working on infrastructure issues.

Diane MacLean Boumenot has retired from the American Mathematical Society and now works as a professional genealogist specializing in southern New England. Her website is onerhodeislandfamily.com. Diane published a guide to Rhode Island genealogy through the National Genealogical Society in 2018.

In our last issue, Ann reported on the passing of Joe Britton. Our former co-class secretary, Gary Breitbord, passed along the following message after we went to print on that issue: “Joe Britton passed away in May. He was my third-floor sophomore year roommate; one of my best friends in the world; my brother in every sense of the word; a staunch defender of DKE; a loving father, son, brother, husband and grandfather. He was the best of us. Please keep his family, wife Nancy, son Scott, daughter Paige, and granddaughter Madison in your thoughts and prayers. Also take a moment to remember the times and stories that made Joe such a great friend and such a special person. God bless and rest in peace.” 

Please send us news for our next issue. We are part of a wonderful community. Connections to our friends, no matter how long it’s been since we last saw each other, are important and bring joy even, maybe even especially, in these challenging times.

Ann Biester Deane | abdeane@gmail.com

Diane LaPointe | dmlapointe28@gmail.com

From the epicenter of the coronavirus, New York City, I (Ann) hope all of you are safe and well. Most of my neighbors fled the City in March (and spread the disease), so the eerie quiet continues.

Elisabeth Inomata is one of the assiduous teachers in our class. “I am online teaching as an ESL and JBL (Japanese bilingual) teacher at the intermediate school in Fort Lee, N.J. Grateful for my hardworking students!”

Tina Palmer said, “I am one of the zillion teachers who had to learn how to teach remotely in a weekend! It has been a huge learning curve, and between trying to figure out the best way to teach four different high school math classes and finish a graduate-level class online, it has been surreal. Our second son, wife, and 17-month-old moved down two weeks into the quarantine. He was trying to work from home, and she was suffering from horrible morning sickness. They needed help, and we welcomed being shut in with one of our grands! Life is very busy and very different. We went from empty nest to full and overflowing with two of us having to create home offices! My husband is a pastor, so he has time during the week to be in charge of childcare. He does the service on Facebook Live each Sunday, with me as a reader and sound technician. We are blessed with family and to still have paychecks coming in. We are well.”

Jono Cobb is another classmate teaching online: “Hope you and yours are all well during this time of upheaval. Glad we were able to have our class Reunion last year! I’ve just finished my spring semester of teaching the latter half of which was all conducted online. It had its pros and cons, but there’s no legitimate substitute for the face-to-face version. That said, I’m reluctant to return to the classroom until long after the pandemic has swept through which I strongly doubt will be before the second semester of the upcoming school year.”

Sean Barlow and Banning Eyre are now producing Afropop Worldwide from their home on Pearl Street in Middletown! “It seems we evacuated Brooklyn at an opportune moment. We’re gradually digitizing our field archive here in the house, and keeping busy, which is a blessing!”

Jonathan Raab writes in: “My wife and I retreated for these last two months to our post-modern family compound in Stockbridge, Mass., that my architect father designed and I helped build with Ned Dewees and Kim Clark, after our sophomore year. Been working remotely full-time in my energy and climate mediation practice, including running two 300-person Zoom and WebEx conferences for our New England Electricity Restructuring Roundtable (now in its 26th year) and a sister roundtable in the mid-Atlantic. My son, who works full-time as the first director of Instagram at Nat Geo, had to delay his Stockbridge wedding for a year. My daughter, who manages a restaurant at the Four Seasons in Jackson Hole, is furloughed for the time being.

“My firm Stuart Cohen & Julie Hacker Architects LLC is working remotely with staff on our projects. There is still construction allowed in Illinois, so projects, thankfully, are still moving forward slowly, but that’s something! I am Zooming with everyone, it seems, and it is the best way I have found to communicate with clients, consultants, and contractors. Although nothing beats going to a jobsite. I do that with my partner on Sundays. I managed to get a PPP loan with difficulty, although it is hard to know what staff I will need after the two months of loan forgiveness is up. Family is scattered around the country but safe, so that is a blessing. I found out that my good friend from Wesleyan, Douglas Bass ’78, died from complications from COVID-19, and it broke my heart. What a crazy, creative soul he had. I will miss him dearly. Stay safe, friends, and keep a sense of humor. I feel like a character in Waiting for Godot.”

Mark Miller contributed some sad news: “I just learned that classmate Alison Goodzeit Aller, passed away in December. She was a Foss 9 dormmate freshman year and a good friend for the next 10 years. I lost track of her in the mid-1980s when I moved back to the Midwest. I will always remember her quiet smile and knowing looks.”

It is with profound sadness that we inform you of Joe Britton’s passing. Former President of DKE, he was adored and respected by all who knew him. An avid sports player and fan, he will be remembered fondly. His full obituary can be found at fluehr.com.

Ann Biester Deane | abdeane@gmail.com

Diane LaPointe | dmlapointe28@gmail.com

It was a great pleasure for all of us who attended our 40th (!) Reunion in May. While we broke the 40th Reunion attendance record, many were missed. Hope to see more in 2024.

Beth Masterman is a grandmother! Her daughter, Amanda Krenztman ’08, delivered Fjord Lillian Karlsen in June. As Beth says, “Fun!” Beth won Top Choice for Executive Coaching in the 2019 Massachusetts Lawyers Weekly reader’s choice awards. She is waiting to fill her coaching queue with lawyers.

Kimberly Carrell-Smith writes in: “I’m gradually moving into retirement, leaving my job as a history professor last spring. I’d been half-time in the Lehigh University history department for 23 years, so leaving that was bittersweet. I’m continuing with my other half-time job, running the interdisciplinary graduate program I’ve directed at Lehigh for the last 12 years. So still placing and overseeing community fellows in one year experiences with local nonprofits and local government, as well as teaching their core courses all year. Also looking forward to the birth of our first grandchild who will live only a mile away from us. I suspect that’ll be my new half-time job . . . Still in touch with my first year roommate, Lisa Giancola (was it really 44 years ago this fall that we arrived at Foss 5?), Kate Meal Goetz, Kathy Herron and her husband, Peter Scherer, Frances Sheehan, Ellen Blau, and occasionally Jane Cooper ’80. Wondering where all the other A-2 roommates and friends are these days.”

Matt Okun chimed in: “It was a wonderful 40th Reunion and we all had a great time. Certainly, the highlight of the weekend was the party at Eclectic. I had a chance to spend some time with my nephew, Alex Okun ’20, and his roommates. Just came back from Portland, Ore., where I saw Tom Valtin and his wife, Ellen, who were taking their son, Jamie, to Lewis and Clark. Expecting Jim Cummings to visit in the coming weeks. I am sending out greetings and love to all of our classmates, especially the folks in greater New York, some of whom were not able to make Reunion. I won’t forgive anyone who visits Seattle without letting me know.”

Clifford J. Hendel reports from Spain, where he has lived for more than 20 years (and which he first got to know on a Wesleyan semester abroad), that last year he left his Madrid law firm to set up a solo shop as arbitrator. Practicing under the name of HENDEL IDR, he sits in international commercial, construction, and sports disputes.

Freed from some of the constraints of collective practice, he has been dedicating substantial time to academic, pro bono, and similar matters. He coaches a Spanish university’s team in the Vis international commercial arbitration moot, is a founding patron of Pro Bono España (a platform for the dissemination, promotion and execution of pro bono work in Spain.) Next year, he will be publishing a short work analyzing the synergistic relationship between Alexander Hamilton – who has recently been restored to his rightful place in history by a musical created and composed by a Wes alumnus – and George Washington. Clifford has been enjoying watching his family grow, reporting that while he’s not sure if he likes being a grandfather, he loves having a grandson.

Ben Solnit shares that “on Aug. 10 our daughter, Rebecca, married her college sweetheart, Ben Rosenfeld, at a ceremony held at our house in Morris, Conn. Rabbi Ari Rosenberg of Temple Sholom officiated. Among the wedding guests were John Hatleberg, and his wife, Rise. Rebecca was recently promoted to the position of program manager of Teacher Pathways for the Philadelphia School District and Ben is applying for a cardiology fellowship as his residency in internal medicine draws to a close. Our other daughter, Anita, has completed her first year as an LMSW for Mt. Sinai Hospital’s Family Clinic in New York City. Audrey and I continue to enjoy our volunteer work in literacy, legal services, library groups, and nonprofits.”

Doug Pavlak reports great “news from Falmouth, Maine—the successful launch of my son, Gunter ’23, to Wesleyan! The entry process was pretty amazing. The football team was waiting with golf carts at a staging area on Lawn Avenue at Butterfield. They had everyone unloaded within less than five minutes; and all of my son’s belongings were waiting in the room when we got to it. Other small colleges take note!”

Doug Pavlak reports great “news from Falmouth, Maine— the successful launch of my son, Gunter ’23, at Wesleyan! I have to say that the entry process was pretty amazing. The football team was waiting with golf carts at a staging area on Lawn Ave. at Butterfield. They had everyone downloaded and off to a more permanent parking space within less than five minutes; and all of my son’s belongings were waiting in the room when we got to it. Other small colleges take note!”

Jono Cobb contributes that “my wife, Suzzanne, and I spent a couple of August days in beautiful Lenox, Mass. We were there to visit our daughter, Jordan, who was performing the ingenue role in The Merry Wives of Windsor at Shakespeare & Company. Harold and Vivian Brown drove from their home in western Connecticut to join us for the performance and dinner afterwards. Fortunately, in part because of the many reunions she’s attended, Suzzanne knows many of the players about whom we shared old stories and more recent news. Our bragging about Jordan included mentioning her podcasts, in which she writes, produces, and performs some of the voices, most notably Janus Descending, which has recently surpassed 100K downloads.”

Jane Marcellus is co-editor (with three colleagues in the U.K.) of The Legacy of Mad Men: Cultural History, Intermediality, and American Television.

Ann Biester Deane | abdeane@gmail.com

Diane LaPointe | dmlapointe28@gmail.com