Winter Term Report Card - 2012

To the Great Class of 1969:

News of the Academy

The unusually mild Winter Term came to an end yesterday, and the students are free for the next two weeks.

On the academic front, The Scroll reported that stress levels hit a new high as measured by student visits to the counseling office.  As a result of the ongoing escalation in grades, it now takes an average of 90, up from 87 where it had been for a number of years, to make the Honor Roll.  Further contributing to the stress, 84% of the Class of 2012 elected to apply early decision to college.

In sports, girls squash was again the pride of the school.  The girls varsity team had a repeat of 2011, finishing first in New England and second nationally.  The swimming program and alpine skiing also had noteworthy seasons.  This year, both the boys and the girls varsity teams moved up one spot to finish second in the Division 1 New England championships.  The alpine ski team finished first in both the boys and girls New England championships.

The Scroll announced that the Memorial Building is scheduled for its first major renovation in the last 50 years.  Given the description of the project, it is hard to know how much different it will look at our next Reunion since much of the money will be spent on infrastructure improvements.  Here’s a link to the story.

Imagine Deerfield, the school’s capital campaign, continued to make progress, and is now at $105 million, up $20 million from my last report.  Neil Jacobs is one of only three Major Gift Leaders for Boston.

Class News

Bob Ashton is President and General Manager of Ragged Mountain Resort in Danbury, New Hampshire where he is heading up expansion.  Prior to assuming his current position, Bob spent 10 years as President and CEO of the four-season Wintergreen Resort in central Virginia.

John Mills retired in 2011 after nearly 32 years of government service and formed Patent Group Counsel with a handful of other attorneys to provide patent law services to inventors, entrepreneurs and technology companies.  Given the investor focus on the patent portfolios of technologies and the interest in protecting intellectual capital in the age of globalization, it seems as if John and his partners will have no shortage of work.

Macmillan published Hard Knocks, Howie Carr’s first novel in January.  Howie’s website describes the book as “a gritty noir mystery about the intertwining worlds of crime and politics in Boston”, a subject he previously has explored in two non-fiction works.

Rich Berkowitz was elected chairman of the board of the Community Foundation of Broward in January.  A public nonprofit organization with more than 400 charitable funds and agency endowments totaling $100 million, the Community Foundation of Broward has distributed $55 million to support community solutions since its founding in 1984.

Jonathan Carter continues to take the industrial wind developers to task and has devoted the entire January issue of The Maine Woods to the topic.  In a nutshell, King’s contention is that “mountain-top wind development is both an ecological disaster and an economic boondoggle”.  You can read more about it here.

Hank and Kachina

In his spare time, Hank Minor practices the ancient art of falconry on his farm in upstate New York with Kachina, a red-tailed hawk.  For those who may not know, the red-tailed hawk is probably the most common hawk in North America.  Several years ago, a member of the species named Pale Male became the subject of worldwide media attention when the board of one of the swishest co-ops on Fifth Avenue attempted to dislodge him from the penthouse nest he had been sharing rent free with a series of companions over the years.

Best wishes to all.

DWS

William J. Bowman 1951-2010

Bill Bowman

Bill Bowman entered Deerfield as a sophomore where he excelled in both the classroom and in a variety of demanding extracurricular activities. Most prominently, he was on the Editorial Board of both The Scroll and Pocumtuck for all three years and was Chairman of the yearbook senior year. Bill was also a member of the debating team for two years which undoubtedly served him well in his professional career as a distinguished litigator.  He graduated cum laude from both Deerfield and Harvard College.

Following graduation from Georgetown University Law Center in 1976, Bill served as a law clerk to The Honorable Thomas A Flannery of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia. From 1973 to 1983 he was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, handling an active criminal trial and appellate practice and serving for two and one-half years.  From 1977 to 1983, he was an Assistant U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia, handling an active criminal trial and appellate practice and serving for two and a half years as Chief of the Career Criminal Unit.  He then spent a year as Chief Counsel to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Subcommittee on Juvenile Justice.

In 1984 Bill joined Hogan & Hartson in Washington, DC where he specialized in commercial, insurance coverage, environmental, antitrust, contract, trade regulation, and product liability litigation. He practiced actively in federal and state courts and the District of Columbia, Virginia, Maryland and many other parts of the country.

Survivors include his wife of 25 years and two sons.

Fall Term Report Card - 2011

To the Great Class of 1969:

News of the Academy

A month after the start of its 213rd year, the Academy kicked off the long anticipated “Imagine Deerfield” capital campaign with a gala dinner organized by Mimi Morsman for 800 attendees under a 94’ blue whale suspended from the ceiling of the Museum of Natural History in New York.  Coach Smith (1960-1996) delivered grace, a role now performed before sit-down meals by Mr. Morsman, who also joined the faculty in 1960.  Frank Henry, who contributed to Voices from the Valley, a newly published collection of essays by past and present Deerfield teachers, was seated prominently.

Deerfield’s last capital campaign centered on the Bicentennial and defied skeptics by setting a lofty goal of $125 million before exceeding it by $25 million.  Perhaps reflecting the S&P's flatline since then and the consequent temperate mood, the campaign goal has been set at $200 million.  Half of that amount is targeted for the endowment, 30% will go toward new facilities (including a new dorm) and 20% will support current use projects.  Although the broad-based solicitation is just beginning, $85 million already has been committed.

Deerfield hosted Choate on November 12th in the 93rd annual matchup and streamed the Varsity Football game for the first time.  Jim Smith Field looked remarkably good following the freak snowfall two weeks earlier.  The 41-7 pasting by the Wild Boars could not easily be explained away by anything as simple as this year's curb on cheering.  With its third successive win, Choate has narrowed Deerfield’s cumulative lead in the football rivalry to a single game.

 

Class News

As everyone knows, candidates for the Republican Presidential nomination have been barnstorming the country the past few months.  What you may not know is that two indelible meetings have occurred in venues where Classmates work.  Most famously, Gov. Perry’s “Oops” moment occurred earlier this month at Oakland University in Michigan where Brian Connery has taught since 1989.  Herman Cain had a similarly [un]forgettable encounter last week with the Editorial Board of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel.  If you listen carefully to the replay, you will hear Marty Kaiser off camera patiently asking a series of questions beginning at 2:51 of the interview.

Since 1978 Van Scott has owned Savage’s, a scratch bakery in Homewood, AL that I first wrote about four years ago.  Here’s a review of Van’s place, including a photo of him putting the finishing flourish on one of his cakes.  Van is in the process of developing an online mail order business for selected items.  Stay tuned.

Christopher Beach opened the 43rd season of the La Jolla Music Society earlier this month with Havana’s Kings of Salsa, a spirited music-and-dance performance of mambo, rumba and cha, cha, cha moves.  The entertainment will continue throughout the season with performances from three major symphony orchestras, chamber music ensembles, pianists, modern dance groups, and a premier selection of pop, classical, cabaret and salsa music artists.

Christian Liipfert, after retiring from BP, has established his own eponymous consulting firm.  In August, he delivered the keynote address at The Masters Series for Legal Professionals in Houston.  Christian consults on information governance, knowledge management, e-discovery, crisis management, and compliance and ethics training.

Douglas Arnstein also has formed his own consulting firm, dubbed "Orgchange3P Consulting, Inc.", which is focused on helping companies deliver critical initiatives through program, project, and process effectiveness. This is at least Douglas's second stint as an entrepreneur who previously served as President of Absolute Consulting which was engaged in providing project management consulting.

The annual New York dinner was scaled back this year on account of scheduling conflicts, however, Rusty Young, John Lacey, Todd Stone and I had a chance to swap stories for a few hours earlier this month.  Rusty's new venture, which I mentioned in my Summer Post Card, has just lined up its first event for January.  Lacey, an amateur sports reporter in his spare time, can cite from memory the collegiate split times in the pool of either of his daughters and always delights in recounting Amherst's latest thrashing of Williams. Todd hopes to relocate his studio to nearby space where he can continue recording the rebuilding of the World Trade Center site before year end when the employees who actually occupy Wall Street move in to 7 WTC.

  

Thanks to the reach of Google, David Perednia, the Class Treasurer, and John Marchiano, the Captain of the Varsity football team, have been added to our distribution list, which now totals 115 members of the Class, half of whom are featured in our OnlineYearbook.  If you would prefer a different or more flattering photo, please e-mail one to me.  A portrait shot with a camera that has a 5 MP or better resolution and a height of 640 pixels or more will work best, according to Tim Truby.

Our social networking experiment remains a work in process.  We currently have 38 Classmates on our Facebook page and a fraction of that on Google+.  There are links to each on the right side of the blog if you’d like to join.

Happy Thanksgiving and best wishes to all.

DWS