Tag: 1984

Hello, classmates, and welcome to 2025. As one of this month’s correspondents signed off, “Hold onto your hats.”

David Boyd Booker left French bank Credit Agricole CIB after 15 years to take the position of head of legal and compliance at CastleOak Securities, a New York–based broker-dealer and boutique investment bank. He still lives in Manhattan (on the Upper East Side) with his wife, Lisa, and son, Conrad (currently a frosh at Northwestern; no, he did not consider Wes).    

Robert Leland is still that “crazy Californian dude you met back in 1980.” His life has taken him everywhere else, even spending five years in China, but in 2000 he ended back in his hometown with his wife. His two children are finished with college, and Robert is considering Europe for retirement. He has enjoyed being an independent financial planner much more than the 20 years he spent doing it with a corporate firm. You can look up Robert in San Francisco.

Murrey Nelson is enjoying retirement and doing lots of volunteer work. She wrote to tell us about her travels to the East Coast in October. She met up with Maureen McSherry ’87 for lunch and a stroll on the High Line in NYC, and with her old friend, Lea Barth, whose youngest just graduated from college. In Swarthmore, Pennsylvania, she and a high school friend met up with Robert Smythe ’82 and Susan (Dinsmore) Smythe ’82 at Robert’s “phenomenal” bakery, Pastry Pants. Robert and Murrey knew each other in high school. Robert, you may remember, started Mum Puppet Theatre at Wes, and he branched out locally into acting before starting the bakery during the pandemic.

Murrey also visited last year (in May) with Stephanie Grant, her NYC roommate following graduation. Stephanie continues to write and teach, while also launching her twin daughters into adulthood.

David Knudsen was issued two patents last fall as part of the intellectual property created at his company, Everything Set. He thanks the firm academic foundation he got at Wesleyan for his success. David’s company focuses on cybersecurity, especially in terms of “smart” home devices. If you’d like to read more about David’s patents, you can find more information on the U.S. Patent Office site: https://www.uspto.gov/. The patent numbers are US-12149543-B1 and US-12081518-B1.

Stephanie Fleischmann continues a successful career as an opera librettist and has several premieres and workshops coming up: In a Grove, music by Christopher Cerrone, will be done at the Prototype Festival at La Mama; The Pigeon Keeper (music by David Hanlon) will be in San Francisco at the Opera Paralèllle in March; Remedios Varios, with music by Carlos Carrillo, will be in concert at Chicago Opera Theater in April; and Claude and Marcel, with music by Alyssa Weinberg and commissioned by West Edge Opera, receives its first workshop in the fall.

A few people wrote in regarding the reunion. Rhonda Lees was very happy to attend and see Jessica Seigel, among others. Rhonda keeps up with a D.C. contingent of alums—last year, I attended one brunch with Rhonda, Michael Feldman, and others.

Karen Wise was also on campus but was much more focused on seeing her daughter, Julie Wise ’24 graduate. The West African drumming at commencement transported her back 40 years to her own ceremony. Karen is still working as a freelance book editor (mostly cookbooks) and volunteering at various food pantries in her spare time.

Liz Solar wanted to share that after 35 years of living in Boston (and working for Harvard Law School for much of that time), she has relocated to Maryland where she is working at the University of Baltimore School of Law, which she says she absolutely loves. She was appointed by Governor Moore to serve on the Commission on Judicial Disabilities. Her twins are starting their second year of college, and she is looking for places to explore in Maryland, now that she is more of an empty nester. 

Michael Lewyn was promoted to full professor at Touro Law Center.

Some book news from our classmates:

Andrew Bridge has published The Child Catcher, the true story of the fight to rescue the children confined to a violent and secretive institution in the rural South. This was the most bitterly fought mental-health lawsuit in American history. After graduating from Harvard Law School, Bridge joined the small team of civil rights lawyers representing the children of the Eufaula Adolescent Center, a violent and secretive institution in the rural South, against the state of Alabama.

Eileen Kelly published her first novel, Small Wonder. At the reunion she spoke with Parel Kapur and David (Dwight) Santos Donaldson, both of whom also published their first novels in their 60s. Parel’s book, Inside the Mirror, was mentioned in a previous Class Notes, and Dwight’s novel, Greenland, was a finalist for the 2023 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction.

Eileen also shares some sad news that her mother, Mary Kelly, passed away in May.     From 1978 to 2000, Mary served as the administrative assistant to the Philosophy Department and the sole occupant of the department’s office on the second floor of Russell House. She sent two children to Wesleyan (Eileen and Stephen ’88), and Anthony Richter became her son-in-law. (Eileen’s grandfather, John Kelly, worked in Wesleyan’s Physical Plant from the ’40s to the ’60s.)

These notes will probably not arrive until after the election season, but it will not surprise anyone that our classmates are very active. As I write this, there is a Wesleyan call being organized by Ken Rosenberg, Maria Mead, Pagan Kennedy, and others to raise funds and to benefit an organization called the Movement Voter Project, which invests in grassroots organizations in swing states and districts that do voter mobilization, mostly targeting marginalized communities. 

Hello, classmates! By the time this issue comes out, Reunion will have come and gone, so next time I hope to share some stories from our 40th.

Arthur Haubenstock recalls the major earthquake that he experienced the day after he arrived in San Francisco. That did not dislodge him from the West Coast, but his new position in D.C. as chief strategy advisor for the Department of Energy’s Manufacturing and Energy Supply Chains Office did. Art is helping to “fix the foundation for today’s energy system and ensure it is strong enough to support the clean, equitable energy transition we all want for our future.” His newest daughter was born in D.C., and he has enjoyed mini-reunions with Andy Tauber and Lisa Rein.

Last year Susie Sharpe shared the news about her TEDx talk and many opportunities opened up for her. She has retired from internal medicine and moved across the country to Sarasota. Susie met Michael Murphy in Sarasota and was thrilled to find out he was a fellow classmate. Susie was recently featured on the cover of Ranch Magazine.

Gail Farris and husband, Jay Farris, met up with Marmie Bowman and her husband, David Hunter, in Maryland last fall. And her three-year-old grandchild, Killian (daughter of Kim ’14), loves to sing the Wesleyan fight song.

Joe Pieropan does not have news but sent in a picture of his red-and-black Mazda Miata with vanity plate WESU84.

Hello, Classmates,

A short update:

Tyler Anbinder, who you will remember from last issue, is publishing a book in March about the Irish emigration to New York and reports he hears regularly from Jeddy Lieber and Leah Chang ’95.

Ophelia Papoulas had the pleasure of attending her first Burning Man this year. She had a wonderful time, despite the difficult circumstances of the final couple of days. She’d like to know if there are any Wes folk who have gone or are planning to go.

Parul Kapur Hinzen’s debut novel, Inside the Mirror, about twin sisters who struggle against family and society to become artists in 1950s India in the aftermath of Empire, will be published by the University of Nebraska Press in March 2024. The novel won the AWP Prize for the Novel, judged by Brandon Hobson, who called it “a beautiful and ambitious work of fiction.” Parul fondly remembers her first creative writing course with Professor Phyllis Rose and abides by George Eliot’s adage: “It is never too late to be what who you might have been.”

Susan Howard, along with Jessica Posner ’09, created a role-playing video game called Go Nisha Go, based on her Indian mother’s decision to delay marriage and choose education.     It won the Best Learning Game at the 2023 Games for Change Festival in New York City, out of 340 entries. The game was developed by Howard Delafield International, cocreated with adolescent girls in India, with the input of several partners in many fields. The contributing organizations include Girl Effect, headed by Jessica. Susan is developing a companion game for boys.

Michael Lewyn continues his career as a law professor at Touro Law Center, and blogs on urban planning issues at planetizen.com. He is pleased to announce that he is now married, making him a stepfather.

Finally, Stephanie Fleischman caught us up with her latest project. She wrote the libretto for the new opera, Tevye’s Daughters, with composer Alex Weiser, based on the Isaac Bashevis Singer short stories that inspired Fiddler on the Roof. It had a first workshop in November 2023 in New York City.

Reunion approaches!

Hello, Classmates,

Thank you for all your news updates. Please read to the end for some upcoming changes.

As I reported in my email to the class, we note the sad passing of classmate Leah Rugen, husband of Anthony (Andy) Boral, in January 2023. Leah was a high school English teacher, and found her way to education reform, creating engaging project-based curricula. She was a lay leader at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, Brookline, and played classical and folk guitar in her private time. Her obituary is found at this address: https://www.faggas.com/obituary/leah-rugen.

We have also just been informed of the passing of Gloria Golus Ford in early September, in Midlogian, Virginia. Gloria retired from a career as a medical relations officer for Social Security Disability, and in retirement turned her sewing hobby into a small business (Peapod Stichery). She is survived by her husband of 29 years, Martin, and their son and daughter-in-law. Her obituary can be read here.

Gail Farris reports and she and Jay have two future Cardinals with the arrival of granddaughter Caitlin in March to their daughter, Kim Farris Buckley ’14. Their two-year old grandson, Killian, loved having the Wesleyan Spirits in Atlanta in early March and enthusiastically says, “GO WES!” at the end of The Fight Song. (Can’t start early enough!)

Murrey Nelson is happy to say she has finally retired. After 20 years in the corporate world (publishing and fashion) and 17 years as a nonprofit fundraiser, she decided she was ready to have a life of freedom. While she has no big plans at the moment (other than taking the time to enjoy San Francisco and all it has to offer), she is planning to travel and expand her volunteer activities.

Scott Pearson and his wife, Diana Farrell ’87, have relocated from D.C. to Mountain Village, Colorado (a beautiful ski town right next door to Telluride), now that their children are long out of the house. He has been elected as mayor pro tem and has already started to dig into the most pressing issues: affordable housing, quality health care in a rural setting, and climate change.

Book announcements:

*Jonathan Sadowsky notes that his last book, The Empire of Depression: A New History, has been translated into Chinese, Spanish, French, Russian, and Turkish. He is also co-editor for the six-volume Cultural History of Madness, forthcoming from Bloomsbury Press in 2025.

*Andy Behrman is working on a sequel to his first book, Electroboy: A Memoir of Mania, published by Random House. The sequel will be about mental health, love, marriage, and divorce and just slightly more risqué than the first book. 

*Tyler Anbinder is publishing Plentiful Country: The Great Potato Famine and the Making of Irish New York (Little Brown) in March 2024. The book uses the newly digitized and indexed census records (like the kind you see on Ancestry.com) to trace the lives of hundreds of famine immigrants and argues that the immigrants, thought to have had few opportunities to advance in America due to discrimination, poverty, and their lack of education, actually had a lot of upward mobility.

(Tyler also informs us that he regularly has lunch with Forrest Maltzman ’86, his former colleague at George Washington University, and frequently sees his neighbor, Leah Chang ’95, whose own new book, Young Queens: Three Renaissance Women and the Price of Power, is fabulous and came out in August. Tyler’s niece, Rebecca Baron ’23, just graduated from Wes.)

Last time, we reported that Susie Sharpe had given a TED Talk, but now we can share with you (months after the fact) the URL, so you can give it a watch:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3WWnhgasvo.

Besides his book news, Andy Behrman (longtime resident of Los Angeles) is fundraising for the Democratic Party in several key congressional races across the county. His daughter, Kate, is beginning her freshman year at Trinity College, where she was named the Hillel Scholar of the Class of 2027, for demonstrating academic excellence and a commitment to Jewish community through leadership. Her sister, Emma, is 16, but still wears a Wesleyan sweatshirt.

And finally, Andy has also asked to take over secretary duties for our class. As this summer marks my 10th year at this post, it is the perfect time to turn it over. For the next notes, Andy and I will work together, and I will say my farewells then.

Until next time,

Michael