January 2006 Letter

To the Great Class of 1969:

Class News

Our e-mail distribution list continues to expand and, with that, the potential for more news. Please help me locate the remaining 30 unaccounted for classmates by sending any current e-mail addresses you may have to me at dwsquires@gmail.com.

Since I wrote last month, Rusty Young resurfaced after 36 years of self-imposed silence and sent a group photo from his benefit concert last June. Take a look at the photo by going to Blue Bay Inn and tell me if you can identify everyone. Rusty has scheduled a return engagement for The Fab Faux on Saturday, June 24th at The Count Basie Theatre in Red Bank, NJ and would like to see an even larger turnout by the Class.

A number of classmates were quick to realize that the figure jumping into the Grand Canyon in my last e-mail could only have been Brogan Thomsen. Credit for identifying the body goes to Patrick Murphy, Charlie Hoffman and Hank Wetzel. (For news on Brogan’s latest exploits, see Albany Road Redux: Sleepless in Seattle with BT.) In other news since I last wrote, John Lacey became (unofficially) the third member of the Class to win the photo trivia contest on the Academy’s website by identifying Mr. McGlynn, for which he won a piece of crockery dating back to the Academy’s founding. I also wish to report that the General (John G. Mills III for those of you with failing memory) is making up for lost time and is in steady communication. John recently renovated a house he owns which Mark Twain once used as a writing haven in Elmira, NY, Mark Twain’s final resting spot. John’s many avocations include writing, and he has expressed an interest in using the house for future literary endeavors when he isn’t busy tending his nearby farm.

Marty Kaiser, who got his start as a member of the Press Club his last two years at Deerfield, is on a career trajectory to become the future president of the American Society of Newspaper Editors. For the full scoop, see Albany Road Redux: Marty Kaiser Stars in The Front Page. Another classmate who has spent his career in the print media is Peter Bernstein, past Managing Editor of The Deerfield Scroll, whose most recent endeavor was as a contributing editor to Secrets of Angels & Demons: The Unauthorized Guide to the Bestselling Novel. On a day-to-day basis Peter is the founder of ASAP Media, a media development firm whose clients include Reader's Digest Association, US News & World Report, and The Boston Globe, as well as other companies and nonprofit organizations. Before founding ASAP in 2003 he served as an editor at US News & World Report and Fortune. He was also publisher of Times Books, a division of Random House, Inc. and, for many years, has been the editor and publisher of The Ernst & Young Tax Guide, the country's number one annual tax guide. He is also the co-author of The Practical Guide to Practically Everything and, with his wife Amy, edited Quotations from Speaker Newt: The Red, White and Blue Book of the Republican Revolution.

Not surprisingly, how we wish to be addressed today is not necessarily the same as how we once greeted each other. While many of you know that the larger than life King Carter is now known as “Jonathan” or that Tee Johnson is more often called “Taylor”, there are other examples as well. Recently, I have heard from Doug (now “Herschel”) Collins and Doug (now “Douglas”) Arnstein. As a consequence, I find myself the only former “Doug” in the Class who still goes by that moniker, although I seem to be called “Mr. Squires” increasingly, which may be conveying a not so welcome inference. (For a current shot of how I’ve weathered over time, see the Online Yearbook. Please add your photo to those of 39 other classmates by e-mailing a current picture to me at dwsquires@gmail.com for posting.)

In a recent oversight, I realized that I should have included Douglas Arnstein in my listing of Captains of Industry. Douglas is the President of Absolute Consulting in San Francisco which is engaged in the business of providing project management consulting. If any of you are free and can afford the registration fee, you can hear him speak on “Project Planning for Executives and Sponsors” and other issues at the Workshop Extravaganza hosted by the Manitoba Chapter of the Project Management Institute on April 24th.

Alumni Website

The Alumni Website has undergone a long anticipated upgrade which is the motivation for this month’s trivia contest:

1. Name the last Headmaster to occupy the Ephraim Williams House.

2. Name the two Masters of our era for whom the former Headmaster’s house served as a dorm.

If you’ve visited the alumni website recently, you will have noticed that you no longer can log in using your old ID and password. Instead, you will be prompted for your distinctive ID which begins with a “D” followed by eight digits. I am willing to wager a large sum that none of you knows that you have been reduced to eight numbers by Deerfield or, for that matter, what your number might be. Happily, I have the answer to that question because I am in possession of the number for each of you. If you can’t wait for the letter from the Academy informing you of your ID, please e-mail me at dwsquires@gmail.com. What you will discover when you visit the Alumni Website is that it has much more information than the previous site and includes, among other things, the facility to provide you with a lifetime e-mail forwarding address so that each time you change your preferred e-mail address, all you need to do is to change it on the Academy’s alumni website and all future e-mails sent to you with a deerfieldalumni.org URL will arrive in your inbox.

Annual Support

Last month’s appeal met with success, and we closed the calendar year with 18 gifts (including two pledges) on the books. This compares with a year ago when we had 13 gifts. The honor roll of 18 includes 16 repeat donors and two new donors. To put this in further context, we currently rank fourth in terms of financial generosity and seventh in terms of participation among classes of the ‘60’s. We still have much work between now and June 30th to match last year, and I am counting on the generosity of all of you on our solicitation list who haven’t yet participated to help us reach our goal of 60 donors. You may express your commitment to Deerfield most simply by going to Giving to Deerfield and making an online gift or pledge.

Final Thoughts

In closing, I thought you might be curious to learn more about the new Head of School. For those of you who would like to see Dr. Curtis, please go to Albany Road Redux: Deerfield's New Head of School and look at some material cribbed from the Andover website.

I wish each of you the very best for 2006.

Marty Kaiser Stars in The Front Page

The American Society of Newspaper Editors issued the following press release on September 21, 2005:

Editors elect Kaiser to ASNE leadership ladder

W. Martin Kaiser, editor of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, was elected treasurer-designate of the American Society of Newspaper Editors during the group's fall board meeting in Sacramento, Calif. on Sept. 16. Kaiser will become treasurer of the group in April 2006 at the annual convention and will rise through the officer ranks each year until reaching the ASNE presidency in April 2009.

"It is a tremendous honor to become an ASNE officer. I value the faith put in me from my fellow board members," Kaiser said. "There couldn't be a more important time for our industry. I believe we have an exciting future if we use our strengths as journalists to be leaders in the changing media world."

"ASNE must play a leadership role as our industry changes," Kaiser said. "The work we do as journalists is so important to our society. Editors must take the lead and let their voices be heard."

ASNE President Rick Rodriguez, executive editor, The Sacramento (Calif.) Bee, said, "Marty is a top-notch editor who has worked as hard as anyone to help foster ASNE's goals of improving journalism. He'll be a terrific president and representative for our industry."

Kaiser joins Rodriguez; David Zeeck, executive editor, The News Tribune, Tacoma, Wash., vice president; Gilbert Bailon, editor, Al Dia, Dallas, secretary; and Charlotte Hall, editor, Orlando (Fla.) Sentinel, treasurer, in ASNE's leadership.

ASNE, founded in 1922, with about 750 members, is the main organization of the directing editors of daily newspapers in the Americas. The organization is leading efforts to increase diversity in America's newsrooms, bolster media credibility and improve high school journalism.

Sleepless in Seattle with BT

One man's gift to the city for more than a decade
Volunteers make tradition out of luminarias

Friday, December 16, 2005

By ATHIMA CHANSANCHAI
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

Even with a full moon, it was pitch black outside.

But Brogan Thomsen is hard to miss.

Nicolas Ringgold, 5, helps Brogan Thomsen light luminarias at the South Ferdinand Street boat ramp on Lake Washington as the Christmas ships pass in the background.

About this time every year, you'll hear him before you see him.

He's the guy yelling, "Woo-hoo! Luminaria! Lighting at 6!" at the top of his lungs.

Wearing a worn fireman's jacket and a Santa hat Thursday night, he whirled up and down Lake Washington Boulevard South in a beat-up blue van, its doors hanging open. Volunteers ran alongside it and grabbed thousands of white paper sacks filled with sand and votive candles, setting them along the path bordering the lake. They were in a hurry, beating the cold by rushing to beat the Christmas ships before they passed this part of Seward Park.

Soon, the sky was lit not only by the moon, but also by nearly 2,000 flames flickering inside the sacks.

So went another year of a homegrown Seattle tradition, luminarias at Seward Park, an annual gift from a guy who liked how the path lit up the way to the Christmas ships.

"I thought the city did it! I've seen it every year and I thought, what a good city to live in! Now, I think, what a great city to live in with people like this," said Sandra Kurjiaka, a Capitol Hill resident who had come down to see the Christmas ships with friends of Thomsen's and gotten drafted to help out. "I had no idea it was regular people and an individual loving the world!"

Thomsen, 55, a local general contractor and volunteer with the deaf/blind community, started the tradition in 1991 after being inspired by the luminarias at Green Lake. But he thought it was getting a little too crowded there, so he checked out other venues where he could provide an extra add-on of the holiday spirit.

At first, the Seattle Parks and Recreation Department balked at helping him. He couldn't pull it together in five days, they said. Thomsen said he could.

Thomsen, who said he's tenacious when it comes to cutting through bureaucratic red tape, got through and put out 600 bags -- almost a mile long.

The parks department now helps clean up and provides sand, but Thomsen hopes the event will be more official in the future.

It's a ragtag operation that's cost Thomsen about $4,000 over the years on votive candles, No. 8 paper sacks, cigarette lighters and the sand that keeps the luminaria from floating away on the wind. Sometimes the lighters don't work and they improvise, using blowtorches or larger, long-handled lighters. Volunteers keep warm by sneaking a snack of boiled potatoes dipped in curry mayo or hot apple cider Thomsen keeps on a camp burner nearby.

This year, Thomsen and volunteers -- some he'd met through Thumbs Up! years ago when they painted over graffiti -- laid out nearly 2,000 of the bags along the path from the South Ferdinand Street boat ramp to 50th Avenue South. About a dozen volunteers showed up, including newcomers Alex Blanton and his wife, Jenna White. They saw Thomsen's flier at the Seward Park PCC Market and linked it to the lights that had enchanted them the year before. This time, they wanted to help.

Blanton dropped off the bags while White set them up in a process relatively unchanged over the years: unfold, load with a can's worth of sand, insert candle.

As she's done in previous years, Gretchen Thomsen, 79 -- Brogan's mom -- held down the fort, loading bags into one of several vehicles and guiding volunteers who streamed through.

Marcia High met the younger Thomsen working on a job at Kubota Garden and got hooked after helping out last year.

"I had so much fun last year, I couldn't wait to do it again this year," she said.