Spring Term Report Card - 2016

To the Great Class of 1969:

News of the Academy

When Pat Gimbel retired as head of admissions after 23 years, it was widely accepted by interested observers that she would be a tough act to follow. This term it was announced that Pat's successor would be leaving after just three years and that the position would be filled by the retiring Athletic Director who has coached and taught at Deerfield for more than twenty years. In what appears a distinct shift from the triple threat model, Deerfield will have a full time Athletic Director for the first time next fall.

The question which inquiring minds wanted answered this spring was whether last year was an anomaly or the end of Deerfield's dominance in Boys Lacrosse. Happily, the team returned to its usual form and cruised to a 15-1 record with the only loss coming at the hands of Trinity-Pawling in OT. The team ranked second in New England and sixth nationally which matched the 2014 results. Varsity Boys Baseball, in contrast, finished 2-12.

Chip Ainsworth reported in The Greenfield Recorder that the Academy would be building a temporary ice skating rink at the south end of Main Street on land recently purchased for the relocation of the physical plant. The "Barn", where hockey games have been played, will be rebuilt with a field house above and will be ready in the fall of 2019. According to The Scroll, an anonymous donor has contributed a substantial portion of the estimated $50 million cost.

Although you now can watch the commencement exercises online, the destination of the school's newest alums seems to be on a "need to know" basis. For the third year in a row, there will be no accounting for where graduates will be matriculating in the fall.

Earlier this month it was reported that the Academy reached a settlement with a member of the Class of 1957 over charges involving an art teacher which the alumnus had brought in 2013.

News of the Class

After 36 years at AIG, Steve Bisbee retired this term and is now free to think about what he would like to do at the start each day when he tires of more skiing out West. Steve held a number of positions with AIG and, at various points, worked in San Francisco, Chicago, Dallas, Philadelphia and New York. His most recent responsibilities involved overseeing all distribution aspects of AIG's business with wholesale brokers.

Sandy Weissent recently celebrated the 25th anniversary of the founding of the CEO Roundtable. The CEO Roundtable was created by Sandy at the request of the Dean of the Graduate School of Business at the University of Chicago as an alumni activity for "C-Suite" alumni of the school. Since 2010, the CEO Roundtable has expanded to serve "C-Suite" executive leaders from any school and increased its program offerings to include, in addition to monthly dinners, social networking events and business conferences in Chicago.  

Frank Henry will be completing his one-year stint as Interim Head of The Bement School with a trip to Korea and China on behalf of the school in June. After a summer in Maine without the usual August interruption for faculty meetings, Frank will head to Providence where his wife is finishing her PhD at Brown. Beyond that, plans seem open-ended except that Frank intends to remain involved in education.

In an oversight, I neglected to mention last fall that Robert Clough received the Distinguished Citizen Award, the highest such honor, at the Katahdin Area Council's annual Boy Scouts' dinner in October. Robert is the lead physician for Cardiothoracic Surgery of Maine, the only cardiothoracic practice in northern New England. Following graduation from the Tufts University School of Medicine in 1977, Robert started Bangor's first cardiac surgery program ten years later.

Undergraduates will clear out after exams this week. For us, this weekend was the signal to break out the BBQ.

Best wishes for the summer.

DWS 

Winter Term Report Card - 2016

To the Great Class of 1969:

The Academy is on Spring Break, and I am delinquent in reporting to you for the first time since I adopted the school calendar for my updates. Like the swallows at Capistrano, we return each March to our seasonal destination, and time ran out this year before I could decide what news was fit to print this term.

Unfortunately, the news is neither good nor necessarily fit to print. We learned this term that the school had settled a case with a student involving Mr. Lambert for $500,000, three years after the Academy confirmed that Mr. Hindle had engaged in inappropriate behavior. This news was followed in short order by another lawsuit against the Academy involving Mr. Hindle dating back to 1979. Needless to say, these allegations are not unique to Deerfield or to all boys schools since there also was a report this term of abuse dating back to the same era involving a female student at St. George's School in Newport, RI.

On a more positive note, the Village Green has a new look this term. The Civil War Soldier who has stood guard since 1867 at the site of the original Meeting House on Old Main Street was carefully shored up and crated off down the road to the Pocumtuck Valley Memorial Association where he spent the winter. Work on the 29' pedestal which lists the residents of Deerfield who died in the Civil War is expected to begin this summer. The fate of the 1,300 lb. statue is still to be determined. While purists would prefer that he either be restored or remain in a museum, the former seems impractical due to the ravages of time, and the latter alternative would leave the pediment denuded. One alternative under consideration is to create a bronze replica which could be coated so that it appeared, for all intents and purposes, the same as the original. Although the Academy does not own the monument, the school has established a fund to assist with the restoration. If you are interested in learning more, please contact me.

News of the Class

Frank Henry, in his capacity of interim head of Bement, registered his opposition to a proposed 400 mile long natural gas pipeline which will run through the north meadows of Old Deerfield. As of earlier this month the Academy had not taken a position and, according to a spokesman, has no plans to do so yet.

AC Starkey was in St Barth's last month where he and his wife attended a small gathering with Jimmy Buffett. As the only known BowieNetter in the Class, AC is still coping with the untimely demise of David Bowie. As evidence of of his bona fides, AC attended six Bowie concerts during the Reality Concert Tour in 2006.

For the second year in a row, Rusty Young produced the "Masters of Music" series in Vero Beach, FL. This term's performers featured Peter Yarrow from Peter, Paul and Mary fame, the Kingston Trio and The McCartney Years, a tribute band celebrating the work of Paul McCartney.

Hank Minor and his wife have relocated from upstate New York where he had run the family business for many years to more temperate North Carolina where they bought a horse farm. Among his varied interests, Hank is a licensed falconer and has been training hawks for seven years. You can read what else he's been up to on his personal website.

I find myself continually surprised as how time seems to be accelerating. With most of the Class turning 65 this year, I suspect that there is more to news report than I have been able to uncover. Please help by emailing me your news or posting it to the school directly.

Best wishes to all.

DWS

Fall Term Report Card - 2015

To the Great Class of 1969:

The Choate Boars, which might easily be mistaken for a NESCAC team, trampled Deerfield 48-13 on the Lower Level, winning for the seventh straight year and capping off another undefeated season in which their average margin of victory was 33 points. Mercifully, the game wasn't streamed this year, concluding an expensive four year experiment.

As it turns out, Choate's prowess on the football field has not translated to superior fundraising. In July, Deerfield announced that it had raised $254 million (vs. a $200 million goal) in just four years (vs. a five year target). This titanic result equated to an average contribution per "alumni opportunity" of $26,000+ per head, twice as much per capita as Choate was able to raise in its most recent campaign.

In case you were wondering how some of this munificence would be spent, the Boyden Library will be home to more classrooms, group study rooms, student seating and several new offices. The new space will also include a permanent "Innovation Lab" in the basement. Overall, the Library will offer students additional space and comfort for studying, as well as additional resources.

July 2005

Earlier this month, six of us met for our annual dinner in New York. The classmates who appear with me in the inaugural photo as well as the most recent are Steve Bisbee, John Kjorlien, John Lacey and Tom O'Gara. Todd Stone, who has made virtually all of the dinners, is the only one not pictured in the 2005 gathering. Tee Johnson, who lived in Buenos Aires at the time, and Christopher Beach, who departed that fall for La Jolla, are in the 2005 group.

November 2015

One regular who had to pass this year was Rusty Young who has become a Florida resident where he is busy with his concert promotion business on the senior circuit. Others who have made at least one of our gatherings include Robert Clough, Tom Ehrgood, AC Starkey and Will Colwell.

In October, the La Jolla Music Society named a new president and artistic director to replace the irreplaceable Christopher Beach after ten years with a new president and artistic director. Christopher will devote himself to a career as a theater and development consultant. He will continue to reside in La Jolla with his partner Wesley and will remain with LJMS on a part-time basis to complete the design and construction of the Conrad Prebys Performing Art Center.

Just this month, Architectural Record named six schools with "stellar design-build programs" in its annual ranking. For regular readers of the blog, it probably comes as no surprise that Hank Louis's DesignBuildBLUFF program at the University of Utah was among those listed. See the story here.

Austin Clarence Starkey, Jr.

In case you were wondering what ever had happened to AC Starkey after all these years, you needn't worry. As I have known for some time, AC lives the good life, splitting his retirement years between the northern clime of New Jersey, his native state, and the warmer southern reaches where he usually winters in St Barts, Nassau and Palm Beach. In the photo to the left, AC appears to be a dead ringer for Daddy Warbucks in the lobby of the Graycliff Hotel where he is enjoying a custom rolled Graycliff Cigar after a tough day on the beach, a perfect complement to what the Graycliff Hotel and Restaurant has always been known for: excellent cuisine, fine wines and luxurious accommodations. The hotel will probably be the last to ban smoking in public places since the hotel is a national landmark and the founder of the cigar company also owns the hotel. On the theory of "no wine before its time", AC set aside a $200,000 bottle, a price point Hank Wetzel was able to achieve for a single case for the more budget-minded in 2006.

Fall term grades are available on December 1. In the meantime, remember the joy of the Thanksgiving Break and no longer having to worry about all this.

Happy Thanksgiving and best wishes to all.

DWS