Spring - Summer 2000

In every issue

In this issue

3 From the Head of SchoolBuilding an Intentional Communityby Michael K. Mulligan

5 Letters

campus life

alumni

OverviewSix months of life at Thacher are chronicled in this Spring/Summer issue ofThe Thacher News. From commencement activities to summer events, fromBig Gymkhana Weekend to new faculty appointments, it has been anotherbusy half-year at The Ranch.

Profiles: A History of HelpingFORMER FACULTY MEMBER

36 David C. Twichell, CdeP ’36Humanisitic Outdoorsman

TRUSTEE

38 Paul L. Yelder, CdeP ’77Building on theSpirit of Community

FORMER PARENT

40 Yvon ChouinardSetting an Environmental High-Water Mark

ALUMNI

42 Kenneth O. Rhodes, CdeP ’30Fifty Years of Public Service

44 Nicholas Cunningham, M.D.,Dr.P.H, CdeP ’46Heeding the Words of“The Banquet Song”

48 F. Perry Gates, CdeP ’59Planting the Seeds ofCommunity Awareness, Integrity,and Self-Reliance among theYouth of Maine

50 Ted Rhodes, CdeP ’65Local Hero/Community Activist

53 David P. Livermore, CdeP ’73A “Wrangler” Defends OurLast Frontier

56 Michael G. Jones, CdeP ’73If Anyone Deserves an Apple…

58 Ellen C. Loebl, CdeP ’83Redefining Rich

60 Randal S. Bessolo, CdeP ’83Enriching His Lifethrough Stewardship

EditorJane D. McCarthy

DesignTim Ditch, Jane D. McCarthy, and J. Bert Mahoney.

ContributorsDavid V. Babbott, Elizabeth A. Bowman, Camilla Evans-Hensey,Gregory T. Haggard, John S. Huyler ’51H, Jake Jacobsen, JaneD. McCarthy, Kurt R. Meyer, Joy Sawyer-Mulligan, MichaelK. Mulligan, Molly T. Perry, CdeP ’85, Cricket Twichell, FrederickC. Twichell, Gallia K. Vickery, and William C. Vickery

Sports SectionJoy Sawyer-Mulligan

Class NotesCricket Twichell

PhotographyJake Jacobsen, Jane D. McCarthy, Joy Sawyer-Mulligan, WendiParker-Dial, and Timothy O Teague

The Thacher News magazine is published twice ayear by The Thacher School, and is sent free ofcharge to alumni, parents, and friends of the School.In preparing this report, every effort was made toensure that it is accurate and complete. If there is anomission or an error in spelling, please accept ourapologies and notify the Head of School’s Office atThe Thacher School, 5025 Thacher Road, Ojai,California 93023, call (805) 646-4377, or [email protected].

Third Class postage is paid at the Oxnard Post Office.

POSTMASTER:Please send form 3579 to the preceding address.

The Thacher NewsSpring/Summer 2000Volume XII, Number 2

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Campus Life6 Commencement 2000

12 Proper Imperfectionsby Kristin M. Berona ’00, School Chair

13 The Stamp of the School Is Indelibleby Robert K. Gardner, CdeP ’61

16 Ride ’em High: Gymkhana Weekend

18 Commitment by Richard Ridgeway

20 Grandparents’ Days 2000

22 TOAD Talk by Maria Morales Kent

23 Being Part of a Legacyby David V. Babbott

24 Spotlight on Spring Sports

26 Faculty Greetings…and Farewells

28 Tidbits

29 Introduction of New Trustees

30 From Savannah to Summit:The Thacher Family Safari

32 Thacher’s Historical Society

32 Community Service throughoutThacher’s History

Alumni63 Class Notes

70 Reunion

72 Remembering C. Michael Ehrhardt

76 Obituaries

79 Calendar

Printed by Ventura Printing with soy-based inks.

Cover PhotoRobert Brownell ’02 works with Topa Topa ElementarySchool students in Ojai as part of Thacher’s CommunityService Program

NAISM E M B E R

One of the many happy rituals at Thacheroccurs each Monday morning when, at As-sembly, we are privileged to hear from

members of the faculty, each in her or his turnas TOADly duties pass from hands to capablehands. One of last year’s many memorableTOAD Talks came in late May, and I knowthat you returning students and faculty will re-call it with the same appreciation I do: It wasMr. Manson’s offering on the nature of those“threshold” moments we have in our lives, es-pecially in a ritualized life such as ours: thosetimes that call for celebration; times that“allow us to recognize, accept, and adjust to aprocess that is as natural as the sun rising eachmorning and setting each evening[:]…theyearly transformation of our present ThacherSchool into yet one more past ThacherSchool.” He went on to say that, “Thacher,like all schools, is the unique combination ofthe individuals who occupy it at any given mo-ment in time. It is something we create everySeptember only to then dismantle each June.”

What I’d like to zero inon with you for a mo-ment is the first part ofthat last sentence: “It issomething we createevery September.” (Thedismantling, thankgoodness, is a long ninemonths distant.) This avery basic notion: thiscommunity is a clothwoven of individualstrands: look closely atthe warp and woof,and you see the color,the relative strength,the texture of eachstrand; step back andsee the whole. Thiscommunity is beautifulor ugly, durable orweak, in direct propor-tion to the beauty andstrength each person,student, faculty, or staffmember, brings to itconsciously, intention-ally.

Let me speak for a mo-ment about intentionalcommunity. On onelevel this means thateach of us is here by

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Head of School

From the Head of School

choice—a combination, perhaps, of our ownwillingness, even eagerness, and that of par-ents and sometimes other family—but in anycase, by our own decision. What precedes thechoice, though, is very often this: even beforewe become members of this community, weare drawn by certain qualities we witness inaction when we are just visitors: a particularwarmth and openness in individuals and ingroups, a code of behavior and a sense of per-sonal responsibility sometimes startlingly—butreassuringly—at odds with the mainstream cul-ture. We see these aspects of life here and wantto join it.

But being chosen—admitted or hired—is onlythe beginning. The magic of this place that wesaw or felt initially does not, can not continuewithout other choices we make at each stepalong the way throughout the course each year.A random litany of such choices:

• leaning down to greet and thank the personreceiving your dirty dishes on the other side ofthat hole in the wall in the dining room andpushing your dishes back so that he doesn’thave to reach for them;

• taking a seat next to someone you don’tknow very well who’s sitting alone;

• stopping to pick up a small gum wrapper;

• taking the time to document a history paperwith absolute accuracy and precision;

• calling a close tennis ball “in” even when it’sto your own disadvantage;

• admitting a wrong and accepting the conse-quences with grace;

• listening, without immediate judgment orthoughtless reaction, when a Judicial Councilcase is presented to you and your dormmatesby one of your peers;

• letting someone else—younger, older, yourown age—onto the town-run bus before youstep on.

In these moments—whether in matters of ci-vility or courtesy, of kindness or of actualhonor—we contribute in very real ways to thebeauty and strength of the fabric of our Schooland home. When we consider carefully—andreconsider often—the weight of our actions,small and large, frequently (in Wordsworth’s

HeadBuilding anIntentional CommunityNew Year’s Banquet Speech by Michael K. Michael

Michael Mulligan onIt’s All Head Games

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thetic responses in which man first securely es-tablished himself as irrevocably human.” Notinconsequentially, they lived to tell the tale.

“Good artists,” writes Wendell Berry in Lifeis a Miracle, “are people who can stick thingstogether so that they stay stuck. They knowhow to gather things into formal arrangementsthat are intelligible, memorable, and lasting.Good forms confer health upon the things thatthey gather together. Farms, families, commu-nities are forms of art just as are poems, paint-ings and symphonies. None of these thingswould exist if we did not make them. We canmake them either well or poorly; this choiceis another thing that we make.”

So here and now, on the threshold of the only112th Thacher School we will ever have, look-ing forward but being actively mindful of thepresent, let each of us include in our NewYear’s resolutions this: to be a worthy andthoughtful artist, to make our communitywell—with consciousness and deliberation inour every action—in order to make it good.

Here’s to the best year yet! e

1 Alfred Lansing. Endurance: Shackleton’s In-credible Voyage, 1999.

2 Lewis Mumford. The Transformations ofMan, 8.4, 1956.

phrase) “nameless and unremembered”—in-cluding those (and perhaps most especiallythose) no one ever even sees or hears—we be-come the artists of our world, the architects ofwhat is sometimes invisible but is as critical afoundation for a strong and enduring home asany bricks and mortar ever were. As the authorWallace Stegner said, “Culture is a pyramid towhich each of us brings a stone.” So it is withThacher’s culture, with our lives here together;how we choose the stones we bring to thestructure ultimately and incontrovertibly de-termines its quality.

Think for a moment of Shackleton1 and hismen—numbed by the unceasing, bitter cold,dizzy with hunger, internally demoralized, stillmarooned months after the point at which theythought they’d be heroes back home in Eng-land—and consider some of the choices theymade, even in their misery: Macklin, for ex-ample, his hand mittenless and frostbitten, con-tinuing to row rather than stopping to coverhis hands because he knew that to stop was toendanger everyone in the Docker. Or Macklinagain, stepping off the dogsled so as to lightenthe load on his beloved pack team. You couldargue, of course, that these actions were nomore than survival instinct at work; but I be-lieve some other guiding principle was at work:in the midst of the most relentlessly wretchedconditions imaginable, most of Shackleton’smen chose, over and over, to make others morecomfortable, to put their own immediate orselfish desires aside, to consider the commu-nity wealth above their own as individuals—inother words, to create the best of their com-munal present, even while awaiting their ques-tionable future. In their darkest moments, theymaintained—in fact, cherished—their human-ity, what American author and critic LewisMumford2 called “the close chain of sympa-

Patty Abou-Samra ’02, LeighSalem ’02, Michael Mulligan,Amanda Grumman ’02, LizzyBrewer ’03

Claremont Graduate UniversityClaremont, CAJuly 10, 2000

Dear Michael,

This latest fall/winter issue of The ThacherNews sets off depth charges of fond memoryand waves of admiration. Not only does it fea-ture students and colleagues we knew duringour nine years on the Board, but the remindingpieces of Liz Greene and Betty Rhodes touchedus yet again. By focusing upon such intriguing“pioneers,” the magazine portrays Thacher atits human, matchless quality best. Cheers toall who had a hand in producing it.

I hope things go well for you, Joy, and theyounguns’.

Sincerely,

John D. MaguirePresident

Wacholderstrasse, GermanyJuly 13, 2000

Dear Jane,

Today I received the Thacher magazine…Iimagine how much work it was to get thisdone! The result is wonderful, and I will takemy time to read the other pioneers’ profiles. Ithink this was a very good idea to put thesearticles together in one edition…

Sincerely,

Klaus Schubert, CdeP ’56


Letters

Letters

Valparaiso, ChileSeptember 2, 2000

Hi Jane!

I’m sorry for not getting back at you sooner! Idid receive The Thacher News…The “profile”I got between its covers could have put JohnBarrymore to shame!…Time has the nastyhabit of erasing our footprints and sometimessome of us feel like the Lost Mariner of OliverSacks’s clinical tales, reinventing life and amemory to go with it every day…[It] broughtback countless memories but put me back toback with the other face of Janus. The picturesof sons and daughters of former students, thenews of former colleagues and students, andthe “otherness” of what used to be so dearlyfamiliar. Years, life. Where did it all go?

Travers Newton of the class of ’68 spent a fewweeks in Valparaiso, where he came as my in-vitee to be a part of the panel of jurors for theXXII version of our National Art and PoetryContest for people under thirty, which I or-ganize and direct for the University of Val-paraiso. We did, of course, reminisce aboutour life in old Casa de Piedra. I will send youa picture of this encounter and a catalog ofour contest. Fragments of the old Thacher sur-facing in a remote shore.

I want to wish you and the School a great2000! Please say hello to Terry, Cricket, Mar-vin, et al.

Warmly,

Edgardo CatalanArt Teacher 1964-75

P.S. I hope my novelized recollection of that“infamous camping trip” didn’t provide anyangry letters to the Editor.

Letters

and horse packing through the Sespe are just asampling of the treks students and faculty en-joyed together. As the weary campers returnedto campus, ragged muscles were soothed,body-tingling showers were savored, and thelast Sierra Cup was cleaned and stored, talesemerged of horses falling on top of each otherin the trailer or sliding off trails; an eager groupof underclassmen, affectionately named theYoung Goats, attacking Kurt Meyer’s famousdoughnuts; wading in cool mountain streamsand basking in the sun like lizards; and enjoy-ing scenic vistas from pine and manzanita-linedoutcroppings.

Vespers

On the eve of Memorial Day, students and fac-ulty met at the Outdoor Chapel for the Headof School’s traditional reading of the names ofThacher students who died while fighting warsfor America. As in the past, the seniors chose adeparting faculty member to address the audi-ence. Although not leaving—merely takingtime off to deliver baby James—the seniorsasked Dean of Students Christina Mazzola tospeak. She shared how her personal and pro-fessional lives are intertwined and how thisyear’s senior class marked critical points in herlife: her transition to motherhood when thesestudents were freshmen, her father’s suddendeath while hiking with her family as theseseniors spent their first summer vacation awayfrom Thacher, and her beginning year as theDean of Students that has been the most “re-warding, painful, difficult job that has forced[her] to grow and adapt in ways” that shenever thought possible. Her all-consuming po-sition as Dean and dealing with her family’sgrief, in some ways, swayed how she workedwith student matters and, she hopes, will pos-itively impact their lives. She closed by sug-gesting that the seniors—and the rest of theCommunity—follow the simple advice of theeighteenth century English philosopher andwriter Joseph Addison for living well, the samepiece that she had used as a theme for her col-lege essay to Dartmouth at the suggestion ofher father:

The grand essentials tohappiness in life aresomething to do,something to love,something to hope for.

All-School Banquet

The last week of school found students study-ing and taking final exams prior to the All-

ect, and gath-ering initial re-search for nextyear’s Exhibi-tion Weekend.A complete list-ing of this year’sSenior Exhibi-tions appearson page 11.

Advanced

Placement

Exams

A d v a n c e dP l a c e m e n tExams blippedonto the radarscreen next.Two-hundredseventy-threeexams were ad-ministered in 17different disci-plines. For thefirst time, sev-eral parentswho reside closeto Thacher vol-unteered theirtime to proctorthe three- to six-hour exams.For most sub-jects, studentswho receivedA.P. grades offour or five on afive-point scalereceived collegecredit units,thereby achiev-

ing advanced placement standings at college.Virtually every senior took at least one A.P.class and many took several; nearly three-quar-ters of the juniors took at least one A.P. course,as well. Very impressive overall results arrivedin July: 35% of the scores were fives, and 29%were fours; therefore, nearly two-thirds of theexams given resulted in advanced standings forthe students.

Extra-Day Trips

The entire Community then left for Extra-DayTrips throughout California. Kayaking acrosslakes, hiking trans-Sierra trails, clearing non-native brush species from Santa Cruz Island,

Senior Exhibitions

As one of Thacher’s newer traditions, the pres-entation of Senior Exhibitions signaled the endof the school year. Instead of teaching and at-tending regular classes on a Friday late inApril, Community members completed “dancecards” with their selections of intriguing topics.Among the options were comparing and con-trasting the Mbuti Pygmies and the Maasai(two African Tribes), writing and performingBlue Grass Music, studying the physics andfluid dynamics of sails, and exploring calen-dars and time. Seniors debated, demonstrated,cooked, and presented their findings to culmi-nate their year-long study. Next year’s seniorsare already toying with subjects, scope of proj-

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Commencement

School Marshals Annie Nyborg and Jake Braitman lead the seniors intoCommencement exercises

School Banquet, the one time of the year whenexcellence in academics, athletics, and com-munity service are awarded. Under the peppertrees on The Pergola as the sun dipped to thewest, amid note-passing and the freshmen serv-ing, the community gathered for the last timeof the year to share a meal and applaud ac-complishments of the Community. Some of themost note-worthy moments included the an-nouncement of the latest Cum Laude Societymembers, the Class of 2000 Dance Award, andthe Gymkhana/Horse Awards. The Cum LaudeSociety rewards and commends those studentswho not only have excellence, justice, andhonor at their core, but have also maintainedthe very highest level of academic achievementthroughout each year of their tenure atThacher. Elected in May 1999, their Junioryear: Kristin Berona, Wayne Chang, and ClayPell; joining them and elected in their Senioryear: Marisa Binder, Erin Blankenship, PaulBonewitz, Lucinda Brown, Ellie Fletcher,Brooke Halsey, Lucy Milligan, Mia Silverman,and Juliette White; and elected this year, theirJunior year: Mary Ann Bronson and BrianKelly.

Math and Dance Instructor Gallia Vickery in-vited five senior girls to the stage and explainedthe rationale for the nascent Class of 2000Dance Award in honor of the dedication, lead-ership, and accomplishments of MargauxLloyd, Lucy Milligan, Yui Scribner, MariposaWiddoes, and Megan Winecoff. From her firstfew weeks at Thacher in the fall of 1991, whenfive members came and struggled to dance asimplified portion of a movement, Gallia nowhas 20-plus students in the Dance Ensemble,many of whom can observe an intricate phraseonce and immediately duplicate it beautifully.The five seniors performed off-campus sixtimes and helped bring home two gold medalsfrom the Dance Educators of America. Theyhave been dedicated, responsible, and profes-sional, and they have guided and supportedthe younger members of the group to turn itinto an ensemble.

One of the Co-Captains of theGymkhana Green Team walkedaway with the most heavy medalthis year: Darren Bechtel sharedthe Beckwith Gymkhana Trophywith Lucinda Brown, won the Bis-sell Gymkhana Trophy for themost points on Gymkhana Day inMay, and the Vaquero Cup for thebest combination of riding andshooting.

A complete listing of awards ap-pears on page 10.

Senior Banquet

Under the big-top on the ForestCooke Lawn, seniors and theirfamilies and friends dined on Bon

Appetite’s salmon, chicken, and pasta at theSenior Banquet. While the Juniors wiskedaway the last dessert plates, Head of SchoolMichael Mulligan introduced the evening’skeynote speaker, Bob Gardner, CdeP ’60, fa-ther of Besse ’00 and Mollie, CdeP ’99. Offer-ing reflections about the Thacher educationand suggestions for the future, Bob gave anoutstanding speech that resulted in a well-de-served, lingering standing ovation. The speech’stext in its entirety begins on page 14. Mr. Mul-ligan then praised Bob’s work for the past threeyears as President of the Alumni Associationand presented him with a plaque from theTrustees. Jennifer and Rick Ridgeway, parentsof Carissa ’00, Cameron ’03, and Connor,were also thanked for their tireless efforts thisyear as Presidents of the Parents’ Association.

The newest members of the Cum Laude Soci-ety were introduced for the benefit of their par-ents just before the major Awards of the eveningwere given. The Lettermen’s Club Perpetual Tro-

phy, believed by some to recognize the SeniorClass’s best male athlete, actually honors thoseathletes with a commitment to excellence,teamwork, ability to elevate the play of others,and sportsmanship. This year’s winners wereTodd Meyer (Captain of the Varsity Soccer,Lacrosse, and Track Teams) and Anwar White(Captain of the Varsity Basketball and TennisTeams). The Elizabeth Helms Adams Perpetu-al Sportsmanship Award commends the samecharacteristics for females; Mrs. Adams bestowedthis Award on Cheryl Lynn Horton (Captain ofthe Varsity Volleyball, Basketball, and LacrosseTeams). The Newton K. Chase Community Ser-vice Award is given to that student who, throughvolunteer work in the community, has demon-strated an unselfish interest in and concern forothers. This year’s recipient was Felicity Howe.The criteria for the Charles Warren AlpinistAward is simple: the recipient is a studentclimber who Mr. Warren could trust to evacu-ate him from the mountains should he, as thefaculty leader, be injured in a climbing situation.Brooke Halsey, who served as the Camping Di-rector during the winter absence of Brian Pid-duck, CdeP ’92, received this Award.

This year’s School Chair, Kristin Berona, waslauded as being “self-actualized” (Maslowe’sterm) when she came into the job and a greatexample of the “fact that wisdom and age neednot be at odds.” In his remarks about Kristin,Mr. Mulligan quoted Abraham Lincoln’s writ-ing: “Nearly all men can stand adversity, but ifyou want to test a man’s character, give himpower.” He went on to say that such can be thecase with “those who inhabit positions ofpower in a school. Some rather than develop-ing humility, develop thickened egos while forothers, far fewer in number, may through thedemands of the job develop greater compas-sion, a more profound understanding of


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Seniors react to the end ofCommencement exercises

Recipients of the Class of 2000 Dance Award: Megan Winecoff,Yui Scribner, Mariposa Widdoes, Margaux Lloyd, and LucyMilligan

source of all lasting happiness and joy…Throughkindness, through affection, through honesty,through truth and justice toward all others, weensure our own benefit.’ This student has liveda life based on honor and integrity. To be moreprecise, this senior is deserving of this honor basedupon his willingness—to borrow the languageof Robert Kennedy—‘to stand up for an idea,to work to improve the lot of others and to strikeout—in whatever way possible—against in-justice.’ This student truly represents the bestof what Thacher is and even further, the bestof what we are as humans.”

Michael closed the evening with a speech cen-tered around Richard Wilbur’s poem entitled“The Writer,” that highlights the inherent andunavoidable tensions that “faculty mentorsand parents experience in our challenge of try-ing to help usher you, our seniors, into re-sponsible adulthood and in letting you go tospread your own wings and fly.”

Commencement Day

Seniors, their families and guests, and facultyclimbed the stony path to the Outdoor Chapelfor Saturday morning’s Baccalaureate Service.Author of A Match to the Heart and Solace of


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man, and later as a prefect,by taking stances which notalways were popular, yet atthe same time maintainingthe respect of those withwhom the recipient dis-agreed…This student’s in-tegrity may be exemplifiedby his calling attention tostudents and faculty alike tothose gray areas in com-puter downloading whereethical principles, if not le-galities, might be question-able. And, his profoundrespect for others can beseen every day. The hand ofgenuine friendship and sup-port to fellow students, tofaculty and staff, to his fam-ily alike. It is no wonderthat in time of need peers and adults alike turn

to him for advice and guid-ance…”

Finally, The Thacher Cupwas presented to WayneChang, who, in the judg-ment of the faculty, bestdemonstrates those qualitiesthe School holds as central:academic excellence, ex-tracurricular achievement,moral leadership, and concernfor others. As Mr. Mulligantold the celebrants, Wayne“has had a significant influ-ence on the School. Fromconversations about the ex-istence of extraterrestrial lifeto pondering about the val-ue of honor in one’s life tocomplete giddiness about thelatest Dilbert cartoon, this sen-ior has made the pursuit ofknowledge a hallmark of hiscareer here at Thacher. Hissteadfast morality, equanimityduring difficult situations,and genuine kindness andconcern forothers have

also marked his tenure here. HisSenior Exhibition on The BibleCodes, as a crowning achieve-ment to a distinguished academ-ic career, was provocative as wellas informative. I wonder if the cryp-tologists could have foreseen this.A few nights ago, he quoted fromthe Dalai Lama at Senior Ves-pers. I think some of what hesaid could be directly applied tohim. I quote, ‘Compassion is oneof the principal things that makeour lives meaningful. It is the

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human affairs, and a farther reaching vi-sion…[Kristin] has known who she is; she hasbeen confident of her values but never boastfulof her abilities. She has been sensitive to othersand open to review and criticism. She has qui-etly and effectively represented student opin-ion. She has listened carefully to varying pointsof view. She has worked to find middle ground,and she has held her ground when she felt itnecessary to do so. Her commitment to com-munity service reflects her deep selflessness andthe fact that she is deeply rooted in a stableself, that is, she knows who she is…she hasbeen the model of balance and health. Eversmiling and ever thoughtful…she has been agreat example, purely and simply to all, fresh-man to senior, staff to faculty.”

The final two Awards for the evening were TheCharles L. Tutt Silver Bowl for Integrity andResponsibility and The Thacher Cup. In givingThe Tutt Bowl to Thacher in 1963, Mrs. Tutt

stressed “the qualities of character not alwaysrecognized in the traditional school-typeawards.” She spoke not primarily of leader-ship, but of integrity and responsibility, of for-titude in the face of adversity, and ofconsideration for others as traits that she hadalways admired in her husband (Charles L.Tutt, CdeP ’07) and which she thought aschool should be proud of in its students. Inawarding this Bowl to Jonathan Le Plastrier,Michael Mulligan said that “the faculty wishedto honor a student of outstanding qualities towhich every one of us here today might aspire.Courage, integrity, and a profound respect forothers regardless of age or rank make this avery special person. This student has consis-tently shown courage first as an underclass-

Darren Bechtel holds his numerous Gymkhana trophies presented atthe All-School Banquet: Beckwith, Bissell, and Vaquero

An ecstatic Mariposa Widdoes

Seniors Amissa Bongo andWayne Chang

as she sang about the memories of this placethat won’t soon be forgotten. Before presentingdiplomas to the graduates, Mr. Mulligan reada brief paragraph about the unique contribu-tions to the School of each graduate and thepersonal qualities that will, hopefully, develop

Open Spaces, Gretel Ehrlich shared somethoughts with the seniors about stepping awayfrom this School into the unknown ahead:“…Let compassion and empathy develop outof your own emptiness, because only then willyou be able to provide room for the creative,loving, genius, compassionate acts in your newlife.” Tyrone Pike, CdeP ’73, President ofVPNX, a Silicon Valley computer company,told about his involvement with 15 computer-based companies—either through hands-onownership or venture capitalization—throughhis synthesizing skills honed at Thacher. Hestressed that a Thacher education yields morepeople “with the ability to synthesize—to findthe pieces that don’t look like they fit together,but if they are flipped backward, they mightfit.” He encouraged the graduates to use theirraw tools to synthesize as well as to learn thewaters, but also to take risks. “Don’t be

thrown off course, but don’t be afraid to gooff course…open your mind and your senses toart, music, literature, math, science, architec-ture, and travel. They are all the palettes youwork with when you want to synthesize.” Heurged the graduates to not be afraid to fail andthen challenged them to use their success togive back to their communities so that thosewho haven’t had the opportunity to enter the I-age will not “serve” those who have forever.

The congregation then arrived at the ForestCooke Lawn for the prominent event of theweekend: the awarding of diplomas. The jun-iors swept an aisle for the faculty who formeda gauntlet for the seniors to process through.To resounding applause and the sound of astring trio, the seniors walked two by two, ledby Class Marshalls Annie Nyborg and JakeBraitman, to the front of the white canvas tent.The seniors chose classmate Marisa Binder tosing Music Director Greg Haggard’s song en-titled “This Place.” Her clear, song-bird-likevoice brought more than a few tears and sobs


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This PlaceDedicated to The Thacher School Class of 2000words and music by Gregory Haggard

Here, out in the western skyour hearts, they will remainwherever our dreams may flywherever we will bethere’s one thing, one that stays the samethis place.

Refrain:I’ll miss the orange blossoms in the morningas the dew lays on the groundI’ll miss the rosy sunsetswe’d watch without a sound.the hills and horsesand hawks upon the wing.And I’ll miss you, my friends to whom I sing.

But oh, so much we’ve shared togetherAnd all that we have learnedwill remain forever, the way of life we lived,these things, these they will endure withthis place.

Refrain

Where’er we gono matter, no matter how farwe will knowwho we are...

Refrain

in these young people’s lives in the years tocome. Greg Haggard led the singing of “Amer-ica the Beautiful,” followed by thunderous ap-plause and shouts of glee for Thacher’smillenium graduates as they left the gates ofCasa de Piedra.e

Marisa Binder sings “This Place”

The Morgan Ward Prize for MathematicsBrooke Halsey ’00Juliette White ’00

The Computer Science AwardKevin Schmidt ’01Simon Xi ’01

The Language PrizeBrooke Halsey ’00

The Physics PrizeMary Ann Bronson ’01Claire Milligan ’02

The Chemistry PrizeKevin Cahill ’01

The Rensselaer Polytech Institute AwardMary Ann Bronson ’01

The History PrizeLucy Milligan ’00

The Darah Corbett, Jr., Studio Art PrizeSara Thacher ’00

Rhode Island School of Design AwardMegan Winecoff ’00

The Agnes M. Lord Music AwardMargaux Lloyd ’00

The Marcus Hele Dall Photography AwardCarissa Ridgeway ’00

The Harry Llewellyn Bixby Dramatic CupMariposa Widdoes ’00Paul Bonewitz ’00

The Eric Bechtel Dachs Prize for Technical TheatreMatthew Schuman ’00

The Class of 2000 Dance AwardMargaux Lloyd ’00Lucy Milligan ’00Yui Scribner ’00Mariposa Widdoes ’00Megan Winecoff ’00

The Munro Palmer Public Speaking and Debate AwardDavid Babbott ’01

The Hollister Wheaton Trapshoot AwardChris Brown ’01 and father Fred (46out of 50)


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Perpetual Sportsmanship AwardTodd Meyer ’00Anwar White ’00

Elizabeth Helms-AdamsPerpetual Sportswoman Award

Cheryl Lynn Horton ’00

The Newton K. Chase Community Service AwardFelicity Howe ’00

Charles Warren Alpinist AwardBrooke Halsey ’00

The Charles L. Tutt Silver Bowl forIntegrity and Responsibility

Jonathan LePlastrier ’00

The Thacher CupWayne Chang ’00

School Chair AwardKristin Berona ’00

The Edward R. Spaulding Tennis CupDavid Babbott ’00

The George Beckwith Gymkhana Trophy (Green)Lucinda Brown ’00Darren Bechtel ’00

The Bissell Gymkhana TrophyDarren Bechtel ’00

The Vaquero CupDarren Bechtel ’00

The Charles Pratt Trapshoot PlateChris Brown ’01

The Marvin H. Shagam AwardJennifer Bowie ’01

The Brown University Book AwardMary Ann Bronson ’01

The Jack Boyd English AwardKristin Berona ’00Wayne Chang ’00

The William Bishop Nixon Poetry PrizeNicole Silverman ’01

The Nash Robbins Short Story AwardMeredith Walker ’01

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Awards

Senior Senior Exhibition Attending College (Fall 2000)Wallis Elizabeth Adams Channel Islands Resource Management Oberlin CollegeJustin Menefee Arnold Learning Disabilities Vanderbilt UniversityBennett Baker Barbakow The Evolution of Electronic Music Brown UniversityDarren Hogan Bechtel Avalanche Accident Analysis Stanford UniversityKristin Marie Berona Diabetes: Taking Control Stanford UniversityMarisa Lauren Binder Mozart Effect University of ChicagoErin Elisabeth Blankenship Islamic Society and Women’s Role Trinity UniversityPaul Lasell Bonewitz Chess Tufts UniversityAmissa Briana Bongo AIDS: From Primates to Humans Georgetown UniversityJake Wolf Braitman Wilderness Medicine Colorado CollegeEllen Lucinda Louise Brown Astro Logic Yale UniversityWayne Lin Chang Bible Codes Yale UniversityEvy Patricia Disner Adoption University of Southern CaliforniaAlfred Schriefer English Hig-Hop Music Kenyon CollegeNathaniel Donnell Faggioli Naval Diving George Washington UniversityBrendan Patrick Fitzgerald Film and Society McGill UniversityEleanor Carol Fletcher The Life and Work of the Artist Yvonee Hudson Vassar CollegeLauren Roley Fraim Oill Spills and the Environment University of San DiegoBesse Bassist Gardner Two African Tribes Compared: University of California, Berkeley

The Mbuti Pygmies & the MaasaiElla McKenzie Goodbrod Manic Depression Mount Holyoke CollegeLacey Edison Gordon Meditation and Health Scripps CollegeMacdonald Brooke Halsey II The Physics and Fluid Dynamics of Sails Princeton UniversityPeter Robert Hartnack A History of the Blues University of Southern CaliforniaJustin David Hilton Joan of Arc University of Southern CaliforniaHannah Bolton Hooper Art in Children’s Literature Eugene Lang & ParsonCheryl Lynn Horton Rain Forest Plants and Modern Medicine Duke UniversityFelicity Snow Howe Americans with Disabilities Act 1990 University of Colorado, BoulderSung Woo Frederick Kim Japan and World War II Northwestern UniversityJonathan Ross Le Plastrier Cryptology: What Is Protecting Your Credit History University of California, Santa CruzMargaux Fraser Lloyd Social Dance: A Reflection of Women’s Culture Goucher CollegeTrevor Chase McProud Yuba River Preservation Colorado CollelgeTodd Spaulding Meyer Calendar and Time Emory UniversityLucy Elizabeth Milligan Affirmative Action Princeton UniversitySarah Gates Morrow The Power Behind the Mask: University of Colorado, Boulder

An Exploration of Mardi Gras in New Orleansand Carnival in Rio de Janeiro

Anne Meredith Nyborg Psychoneuroimmulology: The Healing Mind Stanford UniversityMarley Elizabeth Orr Cold Regions Colby CollegeRichard Hill Parks III Bluegrass Music McGill UniversityHerbert Claiborne Pell IV Livin’ La Vida Loca in California Politics: Harvard University

The Hispanic Vote in California’s Federal ElectionEric Abbott Reeser Western Aid and Mustong Emory UniversityFritz Claton Rice Controversial Music in American Culture Pitzer CollegeCarissa Kathryne Ridgeway Deep Ecology Bard CollegeMatthew Samuel Schuman Physics of Sailing University of California, BerkeleyYusill Ko Scribner The Nature of Serial Killers: Focus: David Berkowitz Barnard CollegeMia Danit Silverman Phil Ochs and Bob Dylan: Stanford University

A Spokesperson for Protest vs. A Spokesperson for SelfGuido Vincent Soracco POW Camps in Vietnam Franklin & Marshall CollegeCarlos Costa Soriano Fusion Food: Not Just a Trend? University of PennsylvaniaDevon Louise Tarasevic Adolescent Female Moral Development Southwestern UniversitySara Larissa Thacher Teaching Beginning Riding Rhode Island School of DesignAllegra Mercedes Towns Astrology Around the World Columbia UniversityPeter Rhys Warman The Physical and Psychological Determinants of Trinity University

Consonance and DissonanceAndrew Campbell Warren Snow Science Connecticut College Anwar Raymond White Vegen Diet Carnegie-Mellon UniversityJuliette Bowen White Egyptian Mathematics Wellesley CollegeMariposa Ibañez Widdoes Creating a Masterpiece: Inside and Out DePaul-Theater ConservatoryKirby Alexander Williams Non-Confirmist Music Oberlin CollegeMegan Padma Nye Winecoff Minor White, Photographer Lewis & Clark College


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Seniors

flaw and that this intended flaw makes the rugall the more beautiful. D.H. Lawrence, an au-thor whom some of you have read, once wrote,“When we get out of the glass bottles of ourego, and when we escape like squirrels turningin the cages of our personality and get into theforests again… Cool, unlying life will rush in,and passion will make our bodies taut withpower.”

In other words, our egos, our expectation thateverything should be perfect, keeps us fromcompletely experiencing nature, and life. WhileI was thinking that the dust or the bugs marredthe perfection of the setting of camping, I wasstill trapped in the glass bottle of my ego, ex-pecting perfection without flaw. Once we real-ize that perfection is impossible, and thatnature, flaws and all, is beautiful, then cool,unlying life will rush in. Passion, or true feel-ing, will make us taut with power, and we canescape our egos to see the balance that is trueperfection.

When we go camping, we find many imper-fections in conjunction with the perfection. Ablistering day will turn into a cool night, adesert trail can lead to a hidden oasis, or, ifyou’re like me, you can get your hair caught ina tent zipper minutes after appreciating thebeautiful sunset. But we grow mentally, spiri-tually, and physically from learning how to in-corporate and appreciate the flaws in thewhole, as the Persian flaw somehow completesthe perfection of the rug.

Back at Thacher we should not forget the les-sons that nature teaches us. We need to com-plement the academics with physical activity,the solitary time with hanging out with friends,and the seriousness with just plain fun. Acceptthe flaws in your work, for they are part ofwhat makes it, and us, unique. (At least that’swhat I told myself when all the visuals for mySenior Exhibition died in the middle of mypresentation.) And as you fly into summer withopen arms, remember the balance betweenflaws and perfection: don’t pout too long whenit rains while you’re at the beach because, ascliché as it is, you might see the rainbow. Andwhen you come back next fall, though youmay strive for perfection, remember to appre-ciate the imperfections in any endeavor. Youcan escape that glass bottle of your ego; youcan escape into the forests, no matter whereyou are.

Thank you, and have a wonderful summer.e


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Thank you Mr. Mulligan, mem-bers of the faculty, fellow stu-dents, and honored guests.

Well, first I would like to say con-gratulations to everyone: we havesurvived another hectic, difficult,and rewarding year; the gauntlet ofA.P.’s, papers, and finals has beenrun, and, one would hope, passed.The end of the year has alwaysbeen hectic for me. It seems thateverything is happening at once,that in each and every momentthere are three more things to bedone. Time to sit back and reflecton material for a speech nevercame, and before I knew it I wasoff camping with still no brilliantideas. But camping came as a gaspof cool, fresh air last week, allow-ing me the time to reflect and relax.And perhaps it would be exagger-ating to call it brilliant, but an ideadid come to me.

Let me first set the scene. We were riding alonga trail through the high Sespe in some of themost beautiful country I’ve ever seen. Rays ofsunlight filtered through the tops of giant pines,a cool breeze meandered through the trees, amelodious chirping of birds filled the air, andsplashes of colorful wildflowers dotted the hill-sides. It was a perfect picture except for onething: the clouds of dust that rose up from thetrail and went straight into my mouth andnose. As I rode along the trail, ineffectively try-ing to evade the ubiquitous dust, I thought tomyself, “Wow, this would be complete bliss ifit weren’t for the dust.”

Later that day, after we had set up camp andtaken care of the horses, I was sitting on a tinyisland in the middle of a perfect mountainstream, listening to its steady gurgle, sur-rounded by lush green grass and again beingserenaded by birds, writing in my journal.Amidst such beauty the thought darted acrossmy mind, “lose the bugs and this would be nir-vana.”

But even as I thought that, I realized that thisis Earth and so things will not be perfect;rather the flaws are part of the beauty of na-ture. This is the same concept as that of thePersian Flaw, which is a small and purposefulflaw designed into every Persian rug. The mas-ter weaver recognizes that nothing is without

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ChairProper ImperfectionsSchool Chair Kristin Berona’s Speech at the All-School Banquet

Our speaker tonight, BobGardner, CdeP ’60, is theauthor (along with his wife,

Gretchen) of a little knownThacher song, made popularamong the Thacher family whenthe School celebrated its Cen-tennial just over 10 years ago.His other song-writing ventureshave had a much wider distri-bution though. Anyone recallPresident Ford’s campaignsong… “I’m Feeling Goodabout America”? Bob wrote themusic and lyrics for this tune aswell as helped direct the cam-paign that won Ford the Presi-dency in 1976. Time magazine

called this one of the top jingles of the 1970s.

Now this I get from Besse, Bob’s daughter,about his time at Thacher:

Captain of Fourth Soccer Team and JV Bas-ketball: “What an athlete!”;

Cooked spaghettios on his heater;

Lived on Skid Row (the four rooms in MiddleSchool right by Ms. Sines’ house; the troublemakers lived there);

Started KTUS radio station in Upper Schoolwith friends;

Worked on the newspaper as the second headand wrote the “calendar” for the yearbook;

Member of the “Mop and Broom” Club: atake-off on PTS for those who did not ride butwere made to sweep classrooms instead;

Would jump from roof to roof on top of UpperSchool with his friends; or maybe his friendsjumped and he watched. (His daughter re-marks, “I can’t see him being that gutsy!”)

During his senior year, he was on The Notesand El Archivero boards, audio chief for theMasquers, Athletic Publicity Manager, andHead of the Audio-Visual Department. He alsowas a B Camper and co-manager of the VarsityBasketball Team.

The El Archivero from 1960 describes Bob as“one of the class’s original audiophiles” havingattempted organization of a Hi-Fi Club at theSchool. His musical interests weren’t limited

to records, however, “for he won acclaim forhis performances as pianist for Thacher’s jazzcombo, the Royal Tones.”

Although he didn’t pursue his music as a careeronce leaving the Ojai, he did continue with hiscreative bent with a career in marketing andadvertising—which followed his graduationfrom the University of Pennsylvania. Afterworking for J. Walter Thompson advertisingagency in New York and San Francisco, Bobwas asked to join President Ford’s campaignin 1976 as Associate Creative Director. In1977, he started his own advertising agency inSan Francisco that has continued to prosperand grow.

Thacher has continued to reap the benefits ofBob’s work. After the completion of the Cen-tennial Campaign, the Development Officedrew on his creative expertise in designing abrochure which would raise awareness amongour alumni of the renovation needs for theUpper School. A few years later, he was tappedagain to design a piece for annual fundraising(using half a horse/whole horse as the mes-sage—what you pay for and what you get.)Both of these were hugely successful. Most re-cently he has brought a creative touch to theSchool’s fundraising with the alumni as Presi-dent of the Alumni Association.

Bob has kept Thacher near and dear to hisheart since he left CdeP. He has been a strongadvocate of the School’s traditions and corevalues. Bob has kept abreast of changes madeover the years and has readily voiced his con-cerns that we keep these values in mind, re-minding all that “part of Thacher’s appeal is itsuniqueness and its willingness to be a little dif-ferent, even quirky.” (This is from a letterdated December 14, 1978.)

A musician, camper, fundraiser, and creativemastermind, we have certainly been blessed byhis connection with the School. In recent years,the School has seen the continuation of Bob’sspirit with the education of his two daughters:Mollie, CdeP ’99 and Besse, who will graduatetomorrow.

So now, we call to the podium Robert K. Gard-ner, CdeP ’60, to share with us his views as aThacher graduate and proud father of Besse. Ashe wrote in his e-mail to us this week: “I’vecut my speech from about two hours down to50 minutes, not counting the time for crying,rambling, and ad libbing. Hope this is OK.”e


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Introduction of Bob GardnerSenior Banquet Address by Michael K. Mulligan

market may be jittery, but it’s risen dramaticallyduring your lifetimes. But one of the most danger-ous things you can do is to take a trend line—eitherpositive or negative—and project it out into thefuture.

You know from your history courses that stuffhappens, things change—sometimes dramaticallyand unexpectedly. I’m not here to predict your fu-ture, except to say that your future is unpre-dictable. Stanford professor David Kennedy, who’sjust won the Pulitzer Prize for his book on the De-pression and World War II, said the Depression“came in a time of giddy prosperity…and it clob-bered the country.”

The grandparents in the audience—which TomBrokaw has termed The Greatest Generation—were youngsters during the Great Depression. Theyfought and won World War II, lived through Koreaand Vietnam, a number of recessions and, ofcourse, times of triumph, satisfaction and pros-perity. If any group can describe the ups and downsof America, it’s this group. If you haven’t done soalready, go talk to them. Ask them questions andrecord their stories. Learn from their experiences.The experiences of the Baby Boomers, my genera-tion, pale in comparison to theirs. (And boy, dothey know how to party.)

That is why education, particularly a Thacher ed-ucation, is so important. You have been taughtand trained to be active participants—not passiveobservers—in your lives and in the lives of yourcommunities and your country. Education, it’soften said, is the one thing that can’t be taken awayfrom you. Life delivers sucker punches, so don’tget cocky. Some things are beyond your control,but almost nothing is beyond your understanding.Your education gives you a big leg up and a way tobounce back. Remember that in the good timesand the bad.

Observation 2: Teamwork Works

In America, we tend to glorify the individual. Timemagazine’s Person of the Year is seldom a com-mittee. Yet most great advances in any field arecollaborative. I hope that you will end up on one,or a series, of great teams where, no matter whatthe field, the goals are audacious, the intensity isall-consuming, the morale is white hot, the dis-agreements are passionate, and the results arebreakthrough. Think of what it would be like to beon the team that started Microsoft or the team thatdesigned the iMac. The team that brought the mu-sical Oklahoma to Broadway and transformed mu-sical comedy. The team that first put together acharter school. The team that planned D-Day. Thefirst group of astronauts. The team called TheBeatles.


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I first want to congratulate the class of 2000. Con-sider that number. The millennium class; the classof the new century. You picked the right time to beborn. You are surfing the wave of a scientific andtechnological revolution that is being compared inits power for change to the invention of moveabletype in 1456. Not only is there change, but therate of change is unprecedented. It affects all ofus, because of the magic number, 2000, it’s youand your fellow graduates in this country who willbe always subjected to prodding and poking bysocial scientists about how you feel, what you feel,and what you think about any and all issues. Youare the benchmark class. There will be retrospec-tives and movies and documentaries and TV spe-cials about you. You will be in the media for therest of your lives. God help you.

Your class’s record at Thacher is…how to putit…memorable. On the plus side, you’ve set thebar unbelievably high in your Senior Exhibitions,and at this time when college admission is at itsmost difficult, your achievements are admirable. Iread a series of articles about this year’s collegeadmissions in the New York Times. It seemed tome that if you had almost all A’s and 1500 on yourboards, and were captain of the soccer team, andeditor of the newspaper, and had started your ownInternet company sophomore year which wentpublic your senior year, and spent your summersworking in Mother Theresa’s mission in Calcutta,then you might make the waiting list at Wesleyan.But despite all the hurdles and hand-wringing, yourrecord in college admissions is exemplary. It’s ex-emplary in many other areas as well. But you arestill the class of 2000, which means anything canhappen at any time.

As a parent, I plead with you. You’ve only gotabout 14 hours before you graduate. Remaincalm. Don’t blow it. I don’t want to say this classis different. But it is the first class in the history ofthe School where they still haven’t printed thenames on the diplomas. They’ve just penciledthem in.

I don’t have a lot of wisdom to impart to you thisevening. I have neither a grand theme nor a mem-orable metaphor. But I do have a series of obser-vations. But first a promise: This will not be anostalgic talk about Thacher B.C.—before co-ed-ucation, or B.G.—before a gym or before grass onthe athletic fields.

Observation 1: Beware of the tyranny of trends

You have grown up in an unprecedented period inthis nation’s history. Globally, we’re the one su-perpower—economic, military, and political. Wehave unheard-of prosperity—low inflation, thehighest employment rate in decades. The stock

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The Stamp of the School Is IndelibleRobert K. Gardner, CdeP ’61

It’s a great honor to have been chosen as yourspeaker this evening at the Senior Banquet. Typ-ically, this talk is given by a Thacher alumnus

who also has a child in the graduating class. Five ofus meet those qualifications. You could have heardfrom Woody Halsey, CdeP ’65, a former facultybrat and son of Mac Halsey, my former Latinteacher and basketball coach. Woody’s the fatherof Brooke, who is graduating, Phoebe, who’s afreshman, and Bronwen, class of ’98. Woody runsSchool Year Abroad, which some of you have hadthe good fortune to participate in. Woody is bright,scholarly…he would have been a great speaker.Too bad you won’t hear him.

You could have heard Justin Faggioli, CdeP ’69, fa-ther of Nate—and Claire, who’s a sophomore.Justin is a Trustee and a head of Ravenswood Vine-yards, makers of 16 of the world’s great Zinfan-dels. Had he been the speaker, we could have alladjourned afterwards to The Pergola for a hori-zontal tasting. Too bad you won’t hear from him.

You could have heard from Marshall Milligan, alsofrom the class of ’69, father of Lucy—and Claire,a sophomore. Marshall was one of the West’s lead-ing independent bankers, retired at a ridiculouslyyoung age—now with another full-time job—Pres-ident of Thacher’s Board of Trustees. He couldhave talked about his vision for the School, therole of the Board, and how he plans to fulfill thatvision. He would have been great.

Or, you could have heard from Riley Bechtel, CdeP’70, father of Darren ’00, Brendan, CdeP ’99, andKatherine ’03. Riley has been a long-timeTrustee…and I’m not sure what he does…a family-contracting business or something….but I knowhe would have been really interesting.

So instead, you got me. We’re all wondering why.But I think I know. Of all the possible choices, I’mthe only one who thinks, and often acts, like an 18-year-old. I suppose that’s why I’m in advertising.My attention span is the length of a 30-secondcommercial. I had A.D.D. before it had a name.Then, I was just considered restless, undisciplined,and unfocused. As all parents and faculty hereknow, there’s really no such thing as 18-year-oldbehavior. At any given moment, an 18-year-oldwill act five…so childish and irrational and emo-tional that strangulation starts sounding good. Butan hour later, this same person will spout the ma-turity, wisdom, and insight of a Supreme CourtJustice. The problem is that we rarely have warn-ing about which behavior will surface at any givenmoment. Tonight, I’ll try to err on the side of ma-turity, largely because my mother and my entirefamily are here, along with some former teachers.Not to mention Besse who has been dreading thismoment for months.

If you talk to the retired gazillionaires in Silicon Val-ley—often not more than a decade older than you—after the huge house in Woodside or Atherton, afterthe custom Ferrari or even a Gulfstream, after theluxury African safari, ask them what they miss…theymiss the team…the teamwork. The struggle, thelong nights, sleeping on the couch in the office, thediet of pizza, the fights. The intensity. The passionbreakthroughs. And the accomplishment.

They miss the journey. For many, the destination isboring. Most of you have had a taste of that kindof teamwork already—where you were asked todo things that you never thought you could in theclassroom or on the athletic fields or the stage.Coaches like Greg Courter and Derf and BrianDriscoll and Chris Mazzola and Cam Schryverhave demanded that you perform beyond yourpeak. Directors like Jake and Ms. Vick havepushed you beyond your limits. Because youplayed at your peak, the team played at its peak.You may or may not be the leader or the star. Youmay not get the credit you expected, or you mayget more credit than you deserve. But you willnever have more personal satisfaction and psychicreward than playing on a great team.

Observation 3: It’s okay to be elite

This is kind of a minefield. But let’s face it, no mat-ter what your background or financial circum-stances, you are all part of the elite. In this age ofpolitical correctness, that is not something that isdiscussed. It has a bad connotation. I think it’stime we took it out of the closet. You’re smart ashell; you have strongly held values; you’re well-educated. You’re going to go to the most selectivecolleges in the country and are likely to continueyour studies beyond college. Tomorrow, you’llgraduate from an elite independent school. You’reelite. It’s Okay. Get over it. Besides, it’s a badgeyou can’t erase.

But being elite doesn’t necessarily mean havingmoney. It means you have advantages that youcannot squander. To whom much is given, much isexpected. There’s a big difference between beingelite and elitist. An elitist, by my definition, is onewho tries to keep Blacks and Jews and Asians andHispanics off the team, out of the boardroom, andout of the country club.

That’s a dying breed, thank goodness, but thereare still vestiges of it in the East and South. A trueelite seeks the best not only for himself and hisfamily but the best for the community and thecountry. A true elite is a progressive elite. A trueelite listens before he leads. A true elite believes inmeritocracy. Though they’re doing their best tohide it, the next President of the United States willbe part of the elite: St. Albans and Harvard or An-dover and Yale. Take your pick. And while I’m onthis soapbox, it’s a given that all of you will be in-volved in community service throughout your lives.It’s a part of the Thacher legacy and ethic. I doubtif there’s a single Thacher grad who has not beeninvolved in his or her community, in non-profit or-ganizations and causes, making a difference. Manyof you will become outstanding civic leaders.

Tonight, I ask some of you, at least, to considergoing beyond civic leadership to enter what I think

is the most unheeded need of public service—run-ning for office and becoming an elected official.Although we have many fine people in public life,we can use many, many more. It’s no longer a goalof most younger Americans to seek high office.Twenty years ago, if you asked a grad school classwho wanted to be President of the United States,hands would shoot up; today, no hands go up. Thisis not good for our country and the world. Thereasons are obvious: almost total cynicism aboutpoliticians and the political process—fueled inlarge part by the way campaigns are managed andfinanced—a total loss of privacy, media scrutinythat knows no bounds and feeds on mistakes andindiscretion.

And yet, these are the people who make policy andthe laws that affect our lives. No matter what yourpolitical persuasion, government is a growth in-dustry that is not going away. We need able, prin-cipled people, like you, to make better, more hon-est and more ethical government. Imagine if all ourelected officials had to take courses from MarvinShagam! As far as I know, only one current Thachergrad is a significant elected official—Phil Angelides—the State Treasurer of California. But, as someonewho’s been involved in politics for 25 years, I knowreform is coming to the process, and things will bebetter by the time you are ready to run. Considerit; I’ll do your campaign.

Observation 4: You don’t have to get it right thefirst time

All parents want their children to be perfect, just aswe are perfect. We condemn the flaws we see inyou—frequently because we recognize them as ourown. Many successful people started achieving ingrade school and never looked back, but most donot. If you get it right the first time, then morepower to you. But God bless those who getknocked around and bloodied and fail and get dis-couraged and then start all over again…and ulti-mately succeed. People bloom at different timesand at different rates. There are some in this classfor whom Thacher wasn’t a perfect experience; itwasn’t for me. But Thacher is not the end of theline; it’s the beginning. Many of you will surpriseyour parents, your teachers, your peers, and your-selves as you find your stride.

When I first went on the Thacher Board, I attendeda dinner at the Mulligans’. A guest that night wasDavid Lavender, one of my Thacher English teach-ers, and nationally known as a prize-winning au-thor and historian of the West. David, whorecently turned 90 and lives on Thacher Road, cutto the chase, as always. He said to me, “I havegreat difficulty thinking of you as a Trustee.” Nodoubt, he was not alone.

There were those of us who made the academictop half possible...there were those of us who werenot prefects or captains of varsity teams…who did-n’t win prizes. Yet, we are often the people who be-come the most caring and giving and loyal alumni.In the New York Times recently, Tom Brokaw wroteabout the lack of academic distinction of many fa-mous people in politics and media including suchluminaries as Brit Hume, Dick Cheney, JamesCarville, Harry Truman, John McCain, as well astwo Presidential candidates—and Brokaw, himself.

The successes…many of the biggest and most loyalgivers are not the class superstars. Just the oppo-site. They are often the rebels and the hellraisers.

My University of Pennsylvania class has a historyof the highest reunion giving in the country of anycollege. Many of the largest gifts come from thosewho barely graduated or made no mark on thecampus. I have a close friend and classmate whowon the Nobel Prize in medicine two years ago. Hewas a hard-working, diligent student, but none ofhis peers and, I suspect, few, if any, of his profes-sors would have predicted such an outcome. Suc-cess in school, though profoundly appreciated, andcertainly to be sought, is not always a ticket tosuccess in later life...materially or otherwise. Peo-ple develop at different rates, and Thacher gradsare no exception. As Thacher’s chief fundraiser forthe past three years, I can tell you that many ofthe most giving and caring alumni were not thestars of this Banquet in their time. In fact, and Ifind this astonishing, the giving records of pastSchool Chairs, is horrible…though I know Kristinwill be an exception.

Final Observation: The “Stamp of the School” isindelible

It became apparent to me soon after graduation, asit will to you, that this is a unique and specialplace. The life lessons and the values you’velearned here are not transitory. They’re with youfor the duration—till the best you can do is alldone. No matter where you go or what you do,there are some things you’ll never be able to repli-cate—the closeness and idealism of the Thachercommunity, an extraordinarily dedicated facultyand staff, a Head of School and his wife who opentheir house every Saturday night, the extraordi-nary wisdom of Marvin Shagam (who arrived myjunior year with considerably less wisdom).

Next weekend, I will be back here for my fortiethThacher reunion with my best friends in the world.Five years from now, and every successive fiveyears after that, the class of 1960 and the class of2000 will have reunions together—something I’mlooking forward to for years to come. No matterwhere life leads you—whether it’s a well-traveledhighway or the road not taken—you and I and allThacher grads have an unbreakable bond. Thestamp of the School is indeed indelible and leavesits mark on each generation and each class. I wishyou all the best because it is the best you deserve.

In the words of the greatest poet of my generation,Bob Dylan:

May your hands always be busyMay your feet always be swiftMay you have a strong foundationWhen the winds of changes shiftMay your heart always be joyfulMay your song always be sungAnd may you stay forever young.

And, always remember this: You did not go to prepschool or boarding school or private school or highschool or secondary school. You went to Thacher.

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nd Acquistapace ’01 received the cov-eted silver-studded perpetual bridlesfor Best All-Around Horsemanshipin the sophomore or junior classes;Katherine Bechtel received the TopFreshman Rider buckle and the TopEnglish Rider Buckle; and DarrenBechtel won both the Overall HighPoint and the Overall Day High PointBuckles.

Amid tri-tip, salads, grilled vegeta-bles, fresh strawberry shortcake, andthe strains of Dan Wilson’s BluegrassBoys, guests opened their eyes andwallets to bid on a collection of Auc-tion items. Some of the more soughtafter marvels included dinner for twostudents with Thacher’s resident Na-tional Treasure, Marvin Shagam; JoySawyer-Mulligan’s almost world-fa-mous brownies; a laptop computerdonated by Thacher’s Trustees; a cov-eted set of portraits depicting the1999-2000 Lower School male pre-fects dressed as the Spice Girls; a quilt

Th u n d e r i n ghooves. Accu-rate shots (trap

and tennis, that is).G l i m m e r i n gawards. Smilingfaces. Poignant re-marks.

These scenes re-peated themselvesthroughout thisspring’s Big Gym-khana Weekend asfamilies and friends

joined students and faculty for the annual event.Equine events took center stage with rescuing,jumping, holding ribbons, weaving in and outof poles and barrels, all performed at top speedand against the clock. As the sun set in the westand the Community gathered in the Gym, rib-bons and heavy metal were awarded to theday’s and season’s top riders: the Green Team,captained by seniors Darren Bechtel and LucindaBrown, accumulated the most points duringthe season (6433); Ronald Wu ’02 and Christy

Campus Life

Top Ten Overall Season

1 Darren Bechtel ’00 1227

2 Ronald Wu ’02 832

3 Duncan Winecoff ’02 810

4 Katherine Bechtel ’03 809

5 Alex Herbert ’02 685

6 Lucinda Brown ’00 684

7 Wallis Adams ’00 600

8 Luke Myers ’03 574

9 Owili Eison ’03 566

10 Libby Rauner ’02 502

Freshman Top Ten Overall Season

1 Katherine Bechtel 809

2 Luke Myers 574

3 Owili Eison 566

4 Phoebe Barkan 461

5 Tyler Caldwell 441

6 Troy Pollet 434

7 Chance Phelps 434

8 Phoebe Halsey 323

9 Jonathan Walsh-Wilson 317

10 Jacey Roche 230

Big Gymkhana Top Ten

1 Darren Bechtel ’00 337

2 Katherine Bechtel ‘03 317

3 Alex Herbert ‘02 282

4 Duncan Winecoff ’02 265

5 Ronald Wu ’02 255

6 Luke Myers ’03 214

7 Owili Eison ’03 174


9 Chance Phelps ’03 162

10 Tamima Al-Awar ’02 148

English Overall

1 Katherine Bechtel ’03 198

2 Alex Herbert ‘02 196


4 Lucinda Brown ’00 190

5 Wallis Adams ’00 185

6 Phoebe Barkan ’03 177

7 Amanda Grumman ’02 133

8 Jacey Roche ’03 114

9 Ari Flam ’03 112

10 Lucy Hodgman ’03 101

Overall Team Totals

1 Green 6433

2 Orange 5385

3 Blue 5180

GymkhanaWeekend 2000

sewn by Susie Swan (wife of Mike Swan whoworks in the Horse Department) that featuredsignatures of Thacher faculty, staff, and stu-dents of the 2000 graduating class; and heirloomtack and spurs donated by a student who wasgiven the ensemble by his father and had beenused only once when he attended Thacher backin 1941.

Although this year’s Auction netted nearly$75,000, a new high-water mark for this event,the true success of the Auction is measured bythe gracious and dynamic participation of somany parents and friends of the School. TheSpring Hootenanny at the Mulligans’ drewmusicians, singers, and some crooners, andcaused immeasurable embarrassment for stu-

Ride ’em High


Gym

khana Weekend

dents whose parents almost rememberedwords and melodies of their favorite hits fromthe sixties and earlier.

At various venues across campus on Sundaymorning, hikers, shooters, and tennis players en-joyed the ideal weather and great outdoors.Cricket Twichell led a group of happy hikers upHorn Canyon that was in full bloom with morewildflowers than usual; this was likely due toDecember’s Ranch Fire that opened up newand different growth in the backcountry. BobHopkins, CdeP ’67 (father of Emmet ’01), drewon his ranching expertise to add fodder aboutthe plants the group happened upon. Dozens ofstudent/parent teams made their way to thePratt Shooting Range to shoot .22s at flyingskeet. When the smoke settled, Darren Bechteland his father Riley, CdeP ’70, had the most ac-curate record: 46 out of 50 shots. Just below the

Forest Cooke Lawn, six parent-student racqueteer teams took tothe courts for the annual RoundRobin Tennis Tournament. In thesingle-elimination format, David’01 and Dave Babbott, who joinedThacher’s Alumni Office staff thissummer, once again overtook thecompetition and won top honors.

The Chapel Service on Sundaywas a welcome respite of re-flection and musical solacefrom the Weekend’s hustle-bustle current. Rick Ridge-way—father of Carissa ’00and Cameron ’03 and out-going President of the Par-ents’ Association—ad-dressed the crowd with amessage entitled “Commit-ment.” Rick drew on hismountaineering and writingexpertise and borrowed

from “A Message to Garcia” as he sug-gested that the world would be better offif more people would “Commit…and thenfigure it out.”* The text of his commentsbegins on page 18.

A Sunday Brunch of Eggs Benedict,omelet bar, carved ham, and roast beefbeckoned the Community. As the after-noon drew to a close, families said good-bye to their students and ventured backhome, while the campus gradually re-turned to its normal pace. e

*These words hang over the desk ofDoug Tompkins, entrepreneur whostarted The North Face and Esprit, androck-climbing partner of Rick’s.

Thacher riders create a three-ring circus on the Gymkhana Field

As part of the Grand Entry, Darren Bechtel ’00 carries thenational flag

Eddie Tavernetti ’03 teachinghis horse to stand on a stump

Luke Myers ’03 in the Flag Race

Participants in the Ribbon Race


Cam

pus

Lif

e

CommitmentAddress at Gymkhana Weekend Chapel Service by Richard Ridgeway

Yesterday we witnessed a miracle that hap-pens every year at this time in the Ojai Val-ley. It was as magical as the spring

blooming of wildflowers, as miraculous aswatching a hatchling peck its way out of itsegg. It was…the Gymkhana.

But the miracle of the Gymkhana may not befully evident to those who have only witnessedyesterday’s event of the spring. Rather, I sus-pect it can only be fully appreciated by thosestudents and parents who have also stood wit-ness to that preceding event of the fall: thefreshman class tryouts, when Cam Schryverfirst sees just how unmolded each hunk of clayis that he has to work with.

But how do these unmolded hunks of clay turninto the fine young horsewomen and horsemenwe witnessed yesterday? In one word, it’s bycommitment. By commitment to overcomedoubt and fear. By commitment to work hard.And most important, by commitment to theidea that you can do it.

Commitment is from the Latin committo: tobegin, to undertake, to embark, and in turnthat is from Latin roots com and mittere, tocast or to send along. That’s the idea I want toreflect on this morning: to cast yourself downa new road, to embark on a new journey.

For me, some of what I know about this sub-ject comes not from the horse arena, but fromwhat I’ve brought down from the mountains.The French philosopher Rene Daumal oncewrote an allegory of mountaineering, and init he said. “Keep your eye fixed on the path tothe top, but don’t forget to look in front ofyou. The last step depends on the first.But don’t think you’re there just be-cause you see the summit. Watch yourfooting, be sure of your step, but don’tlet that distract you from the highestgoal. The first step depends on thelast.”

Commitment. You can’t make the laststep unless you make the first. Andsometimes that is a step that can feellike crossing a huge chasm. It can bescary; it can be frightening. It can haveyour stomach in knots. It can be easyto find reasons not to make it. You canconvince yourself that maybe you’renot the right person for the task.Somebody else should make the firststep. You can convince yourself thatmaybe it’s not worth the effort. Some-

body else will get more out of it than you will.You can tell yourself that maybe you need tostudy the task a little more before you start.

Certainly, you have to do your homework. Idon’t climb a mountain until I study the route,until I have a plan. Rene Daumal said that thelast step depends on the first, but he also saidthat the first step depends on the last. You haveto learn what you can about the task you havebefore you. But, when you are on the groundlooking up at a new route on a mountain, youcan’t see every passage and every turn. Youdon’t know for sure whether all the cracks con-nect.

I’ve learned a lot from the mountains, but Ithink I’ve learned even more from mountainclimbers. One of my long-time rope partners isDoug Tompkins, the entrepreneur who startedThe North Face, then sold that to start Esprit.Doug keeps a sign above his desk that spellsout, in six words, how he conducts business,and how he climbs mountains. It says, “Com-mit...and then figure it out.”

I think it’s safe to say that in December 1773when a group of Bostonians disguised them-selves as Mohawk Indians and went down tothe harbor and threw into the water 342 chestsof tea, they probably had done some of theirhomework. After all, Samuel Adams was aHarvard graduate. But I think it’s also safe tosay that neither Adams nor any of the othersknew for sure just what they were gettingthemselves into. They did not have all the an-swers. But this ability to go ahead and commitanyway, it’s an American heritage, and it’s onewe all hold with pride.

Campus Life

After speaking, Rick confers with Elizabeth McDougall

Rick Ridgeway gives his “Commitment” addressduring Gymkhana Weekend

Cam

pus Life

It was there again in the Spanish AmericanWar when another incident received widerecognition at the time with the publication ofa magazine essay called “A Message to Gar-cia.” Some of you here who are my age andolder have probably heard it, but for thosewho haven’t, ignore the anachronistic languageand phrasing that today is politically incorrect,because the message, the message to Garcia, isas correct today a sit was one-hundred yearsago.

A Message to Garcia

In all this Cuban business there is one manwho stands out on the horizon of my memorylike Mars at perihelion.

When war broke out between Spain and theUnited States, it was very necessary to com-municate quickly with the leader of the Insur-gents. Garcia was somewhere in the mountainvastness of Cuba—no one knew where. Nomail or telegraph message could reach him.The president must secure his cooperation, andquickly. What to do!

Someone said to the President, “There’s a fel-low by the name of Rowan who will find Gar-cia for you, if anybody can.”

Rowan was sent for and given a letter to bedelivered to Garcia. How “the fellow by thename of Rowan” took the letter, sealed it up inan oil-skin pouch, strapped it over his heart, infour days landed by night off the coast of Cubafrom an open boat, disappeared into the jungleand in three weeks came out on the other sideof the Island, having traversed a hostile coun-try on foot, and delivered his letter to Garcia,are things I have no special desire now to tellin detail.

The point I wish to make is this: McKinleygave Rowan a letter to be delivered to Garcia;Rowan took the letter and did not ask, “Whereis he at?” By the eternal! There is a man whoseform should be cast in deathless bronze andthe statue placed in every college of the land. Itis not book-learning young men need, nor in-struction about this and that, but a stiffening ofthe vertebrae which will cause them to be loyalto a trust, to act promptly, concentrate theirenergies: do the same thing—“Carry a mes-sage to Garcia!”

General Garcia is dead now, but there areother Garcias.

No man, who has endeavored to carry out anenterprise where many hands were needed, buthas been well nigh appalled at times by the im-becility of so many men—the inability or un-willingness to concentrate on a thing and do it.

Slip-shod assistance, foolish inattention,dowdy indifference, and half-hearted workseem the rule; and no man succeeds, unless byhook or crook, or threat, he forces or bribes

other men to assist him; or mayhaps, God inHis goodness performs a miracle, and sendshim an Angel of Light for an assistant. You,[listener], put this matter to a test: You are sit-ting now in your office—six clerks are withincall. Summon any one and make this request:“Please look in the encyclopedia and make abrief memorandum for me concerning the lifeof Corregio.”

Will the clerk quietly say, “Yes sir,” and go tothe task?

On your life he will not. He will look at youout of a fishy eye and ask one or more of thefollowing questions:

Who was he?

Which encyclopedia?

Where is the encyclopedia?

Was I hired for that?

Don’t you mean “Bismark”

What’s the matter with Charlie doing it?

Is he dead?

Is there any hurry?

Shan’t I bring you the book and let you look itup yourself?

What do you want to know for?

My heart goes out to the man who does hiswork when the “boss” is away, as well as whenhe is at home. And the man who, when givena letter for Garcia, quietly takes the missive,without asking any idiotic questions, and withno lurking intention of chucking it into thenearest sewer, or of doing aught else but deliverit, never gets “laid off,” nor has to go on astrike for higher wages. Civilization is one longanxious search for just such an individual.

Anything such a man asks shall be granted; hiskind is so rare that no employer can afford tolet him go. He is wanted in every city, townand village—in every office, shop, store andfactory. The world cries out for such: he isneeded, and needed badly—the man who cancarry a message to Garcia.

And I may add, the woman who can carry themessage to Garcia. The woman or the manwho can commit, and then figure it out. Thewoman or the man who makes the first step,who trusts the authority of their instincts, whoknows that the last step depends on the first.

Yesterday on the Gymkhana Field, I saw a longline of young women and young men whowere told by Cam Schryver to carry a messageto Garcia, and they did it. I saw on their facesthat confidence that comes from making acommitment and succeeding. And those of youhere this morning who were out on yourhorses yesterday, now you must learn to carrythat confidence forward, to your other en-deavors. To continue through your life to bebold, to commit to the untrodden path, to godown the untraveled road. To commit to beingan uncommon woman and an uncommonman.

To remember, as Theodore Roosevelt said, thatother veteran of Lieutenant Rowan’s era whoalso knew something about commitment, that“it’s not the critic who counts, it’s not the manwho points out how the strong man stumbled,or where the doer of deeds could have donebetter. The credit belongs to the man—and tothe woman—who is actually in the arena,whose face is marred by dust and sweat andblood; who strives valiantly; who errs andcomes short again and again; who knows thegreat enthusiasms, the great devotions; whospends himself in a worthy cause; who, at best,knows in the end the triumph of high achieve-ment, and who, at worst, if he fails, at leastfails while daring greatly, so that his place shallnever be with those gray timid souls who knowneither victory or defeat.” e

Chamber Sings and friends sing Mozart’s Ave Verum Corpus



Gra

ndpa

rent

s’ D

ays

Grandparents’Days 2000

Over 90 grandparents—hailing from as faraway as England, New York, Kansas, andTexas—and as close as down the hill—ar-

rived on campus in April for the Sixth AnnualGrandparents’ Days. Opening events includedtours of campus by students and an OpenHouse in the Library Archives. The focus ofarchival material was the Ojai Valley TennisTournament (often called “The Ojai” by play-ers) since it was started by William Thacher,brother of Sherman Day Thacher and since the100th Tournament was played two weeks fol-lowing the grandparents’ visit. An array of per-forming arts, including Dance Ensemble,Chorus, and Chamber Singers awed the audi-ence before Afternoon Tea was shared by all. AFormal Buffet Dinner in the Dining Hall wasfollowed by a Dessert Reception at the Mulli-gans’ home. Cricket Twichell shared some in-sider stories about the Thachers and The Ojai,before the Chamber Singers closed the eveningwith a few tunes.

Wednesday’s program allowed grandparents aglimpse of their grandchildren’s academic pur-suits and the tri-weekly occasion, Assembly.Dr. Newlin Hastings, CdeP ’34, treated thegroup to an historical moment of whatThacher was like nearly seven decades ago.The text of his speech appears on the nextpage. Multi-generational photographs weresnapped as a memento of the occasion and senta few weeks later.

The day wound up with an explanation ofsome of the finer points of Gymkhana eventsand mostly victorious athletic events for Base-ball, Girls’ Lacrosse, and Boys’ Tennis teams.

If you weren’t able to make Grandparents’Days this year, be sure to mark your calendarsfor next year’s event: Tuesday and Wednesday,April 17 and 18. We hope to hit the centurymark for attendance! e

Campus Life

Grandparents join students at Assembly

Chamber Singers perform at theMulligans’ Dessert Reception

Phoebe Barkan ’03 and hergrandparents, Joan and BillBarkan, CdeP ’35, attend classtogether

Owili Eison ’03 sits with hisgrandparents, James and VirginiaMcBride, and his cousin James

I think that I am one of the luckiest peoplehere. That’s because I have spent so manyyears of my life connected with Thacher—

first as a student in the thirties, then as the par-ent of two boys in the sixties, as a Trustee inthe seventies when it was decided to makeThacher coed, and as a grandparent of fourstudents who have graduated and three stillhere in the nineties.

My first contact with Thacher was when I felloff my brother’s horse and got knocked on myhead some 75 years ago. I woke up some timelater in the emergency room, which certainlywas not like the present infirmary. Perhapsthat’s why I have been a bit daffy ever since.

I was one of 12 smuts in a student body ofabout 60. We lived in rooms over the DiningRoom where the Head of School’s office is.There was a porch that ran all the way aroundand it was a good way to sneak out at night tovisit one’s friends without anyone knowingabout it.

One of the great pluses of Thacher is the en-richment in so many different ways. When Iwas a student back in the thirties, Mr. Thacherwould gather us in the parlor—which is nowpart of the Dining Room—then with the lightsout he would read parts of the New YorkTimes and excerpts from Dickens and otherclassical writers. Often after dinner many of

us would fall asleep; however, it was mostworthwhile. Unfortunately with the size of theSchool this can’t be continued, but has beenreplaced by open houses by the Head of Schooland members of the faculty.

At about 10 a.m., we had calisthenics outsideand softball games on various fields with S.D.Thacher and his brother, “Bill Dad,” and Mor-gan Barnes, later Headmaster, pitching. Afterthe game we had oranges, milk, and grahamcrackers before returning to classes. The re-freshment part still continues but the gamesare postponed until after school. Today thesports programs are much more varied withgood sportsmanship and good coaching em-phasized.

The Horse Program is not quite as prominentas before, but still is an integral part of Schoollife. We had more time to take camping tripsthan the students do now. Just as now we grad-uated from going with faculty members andthen as we improved we were allowed to campin small groups by ourselves. One of my earlytrips was with Mr. McCaskey who was a newmaster. I claimed to be able to cook and espe-cially to make doughnuts. Mr. McCaskey offeredme part of his brand new aluminum campingset and I made doughnuts in his coffee pot. Lit-tle did I know that for years after no one couldhave coffee out of that pot without a toppingof grease; however, he never complained.

Gymkhana, then as now, was highly competi-tive but they have stopped the relay raceswhere horses ran in opposite directions. Thiswas stopped after two horses met head-on. TheHorse Program always has been important.Mr. Thacher claimed that the “outside of thehorse was good for the inside of a boy” al-though mucking out our outdoor stalls wasplenty dirty—rain or shine.

The intimate relationship with other studentsalways has been great. Today I get to see thisfrequently at my daughter’s home when anyof their children are home: the house is filledwith their Thacher friends for any meal or tospend the night. My wife, who I met in medicalschool, claims that all she heard me talk aboutin the anatomy lab, where my table was nextto hers, was Thacher. My lab partner, Giff Pin-chot, CdeP ’33, and I discussed our days there,all of the time. Even today, half of my surviv-ing class is here.

Our days at Thacher weren’t quite as pressuredas today. Our education was excellent but re-laxed. I studied German with Herr Cook underthe little pine trees in the area by Upper School,now called the Coniferous Bosque. It stood mein good stead in college and a refresher coursein World War II. To get into college, I nevertook any exams. The Headmaster wrote Har-vard, and I was accepted. However, therewasn’t as much competition then because itwas during the Depression and a much smallerpart of the population went to college. Therewasn’t as much financial help for students inthose days either.

Today’s students face a much more formida-ble hurdle with exams and great competitionand much greater range of things to learn.That does place them under much morestress; however, they do have much greaterfacilities in which to learn and most of themfinish Thacher with several or many Ad-vanced Placement courses. There is a contin-uing need for the School in supplyingbuildings, extra help for courses, faculty, fac-ulty housing, and Endowment to supply thesethings. The White Papers which you mayhave received outline the teaching and fea-tures of the School and notes the need forfurther Endowment. In order to maintain thequality, the great faculty, and the facilities,much more is needed.

Of all the years of schooling that I had, thepart I most cherish and by which I was mostinfluenced were my four years at Thacher. Iwould like to start it all over again. e


Thacher: Then and Nowby Newlin Hastings, M.D., CdeP ’34

Dr. Hastings shares remembrances from his days at Thacher

Grandparents’ D

ays


TO

AD

Talk

TOAD TalkAccomplishments When Challenged by Maria Morales-Kent

During the weekend, I, like the restof you, had the distinct pleasureof watching our seniors come to

the end of the long Senior Exhibitionjourney.

As one of the faculty evaluators, itwas my job to observe my five seniorsin order to offer helpful feedback re-garding their work. Watching the last-minute jitters, nervous smiles, andfrantic shakes of the presentors tryingto get themselves ready—I was re-minded of a time when I experiencedmany of the same emotions—and itwas not my wedding day.

My very first TOAD Talk occurredthree years ago—in this auditorium—on a rainy day just like today. Thatmorning I talked about my participa-tion in a program called Coro in LosAngeles. Getting into the program (se-

lection day) was quite a challenge—but inmany ways that was just an introduction.

A program based on experiential rather thanbook learning, Coro focuses on a series ofseven internships in a year. So I spent most ofmy time going from one internship to thenext—at places like the mayor’s office, theteachers union, and even Quincy Jones’ pro-duction company.

Every four weeks, each of my colleagues and Iwere assigned to a new site. Not knowingwhere we were going until the night before,adjusting to the new environments, finding thatwe had an enormous project to complete inthree weeks, was pretty nerve-wracking. Thenonce we got settled, we had to move on to thenext assignment. Still one of my biggest Corochallenges came during a week called Com-munications Week.

All of my colleagues—“Coro Fellows”—hadheard about Communications Week, but aswith most “Coro” things, it was shrouded in abit of mystery, making all of us more anxious.

Communications Week took place in January.In November, we were each called into ourtrainer’s office to discuss the philosophy andpurpose of the week. Basically it was sevendays dedicated to the art of communication.

Each Fellow was assigned a book to read, andwe then had to present it to our colleagues.The rules were—it could not be a book report.

That was made explicitly clear. We had to con-vey the meaning, message, or story in some ex-periential way, and you could not reveal thename of your book until the end of your pres-entation. You were not to discuss your bookwith anyone, particularly your colleagues. Icould not imagine what books my colleagueswere given, but I was shocked, scared, con-cerned, distressed when I found out that mybook was Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler.

As you might guess, I could not imagine howin the world I was going to present this book tomy colleagues. I tried to reason with my train-ers about the appropriateness of this book forme… but they assured me that they thought Icould handle it.

So after much panic, I finally realized that Ihad to read the book. I had to buy it and ac-tually interact with it; the mere thought madeevery part of me cringe.

I remember purchasing the book in the U.S.C.Bookstore and making excuses to everyone Isaw as to why I was buying this book. I tried toread it on several occasions but found it diffi-fult to even open. The cover was a bright or-ange with a swastika right in front. EventuallyI turned to that old elementary school trickand covered my book with plain paper from agrocery bag. So, I began to read.

As I read, I discovered the power Hitler hadand how he manipulated language and basichuman emotions to move people. I rememberbeing a little frightened as I read one of his let-ters and actually understood what he was say-ing; his indignation regarding what hedescribed as human injustices committedagainst members of his community made sense.I remember putting the book down thinking“I just can’t read anymore.”

In the meantime, the weeks were progressingand we were getting close to CommunicationsWeek. I searched for some revelation. Howcould I present this book to my colleagueswithout instantly revealing it, and thus not fol-lowing through on the requirements set by mytrainer. I then had a conversation with DonFletcher, the man who started Coro, about myproject and my struggle. A great deal like ourown Marvin Shagam, Mr. Fletcher was a verywise man who often said things that simplyleft me thinking, “wow.” That day, Mr.Fletcher said something that I will never forget.

continued on page 62

Campus Life

College Counselor Maria Morales-Kent

TOAD Talks are those often-memorable addresses givenby a faculty member who ison duty for the week.

We will print one of thesemost topical TOAD Talks ineach issue.

I.R.A. asset value. Given my age of 86, it islikely that Thacher will not have to wait toolong before it can put the funds to good use!

Sherman Day Thacher encouraged me to makethe world a better place, and I take great sat-isfaction in leaving a legacy to Thacher to helpmake that possible.

Thacher welcomes your participation in cre-ating your legacy for future students. If youhave questions about estate planning, includingThacher in your will, or learning more aboutthe planned giving options available to you,please contact David V. Babbott, Directorof Special Gifts and Planned Giving, at(805) 646-4377, ext. 242, or via e-mail [email protected]


Developm

ent

Thacher is a 112-year-old mosaic of the oldand the new. Each year, an incoming class isassembled, inheriting over a century of tra-

ditions and innovation, adding its special char-acter to Thacher’s unique legacy. Thesestudents join returning students and all whohave gone before in shaping Thacher’s history.Those who teach and learn in the East End ofthe Ojai Valley owe a special debt to those whohave gone before. To paraphrase liberally fromthe Old Testament, “We eat fruit from a treewe did not plant. We drink from a well we didnot dig.”

Thacher depends on the generosity of itsalumni, parents, grandparents, and friends tokeep it in the first rank of independent board-ing schools. Although Thacher is, in the wordsof Head of School Michael Mulligan, “excel-lent in all of the things that money can’t buy,”Thacher has ongoing projects and initiativesthat will improve and sustain the School with-out changing the core values that make itunique. Thacher appreciates those who con-tribute to Thacher’s ongoing legacy, and cele-brates the example of Samuel A. “Pete” Pond,CdeP ’32.

Pete attended Thacher when Sherman DayThacher was Headmaster and has worked withor known every Head of School since. He is aTrustee Emeritus, a former parent, was Co-Chair of Thacher’s Centennial Campaign, andwas Co-Chair of Thacher’s Dormitory Project.He is a charter member of the Boot Hill Asso-ciation which recognizes his inclusion ofThacher in his estate plan.

The Thacher News spoke with Pete to learnmore about his lifetime involvement withThacher.

The Thacher News: Why do you supportThacher?

Pete Pond: Thacher has had a significant in-fluence on my life. The experience shaped myvalues and prepared me for college and be-yond, and I am profoundly grateful. Throughmy volunteer involvement, I continue to ex-pand my circle of Thacher friends, and thatmeans a lot to my wife Kip and me.

I want to do my part to sustain the School dur-ing my lifetime and do what I can to secure itsfuture after I am gone.

TTN: You have been a generous contributor toThacher. How have you chosen to give?

PP: First, I make an annual gift, and I havebeen doing that for at least 30 consecutiveyears. Without annual giving, Thacher suffers.Usually I give in an unrestricted way, but some-times I support a particular area such as schol-arships, faculty housing, or the HorseProgram. Often I give appreciated stock, and Iunderstand that I can now make a credit cardgift on-line.

Second, I have made giftsto the Thacher Pooled In-come Fund. Third, I haveestablished a CharitableRemainder Unitrust thatnames Thacher as benefi-ciary. Fourth, I havenamed Thacher as thebeneficiary of my I.R.A.As you know, these areknown as planned giftswhere I receive income forlife, with Thacher as theultimate beneficiary.

TTN: Tell us more aboutyour planned gifts.

PP: I want to be sure thatKip and I have a comfort-able retirement, and wewant to provide for ourchildren and grandchildren. We gave to thePooled Income Fund because we had somehighly appreciated stock that wasn’t giving usmuch of a dividend. We don’t need the assets,but we do need the income they can produce.Yet, we didn’t want to sell it and pay the cap-ital gains tax. The Pooled Income Fund was agood option for us because we now receive amuch higher income stream. After our deaths,Thacher will receive the value of our share ofthe Fund. Also, we certainly appreciated thetax deduction!

I established the Charitable Remainder Uni-trust for similar reasons. When the funds goto Thacher after my death, they will establisha scholarship fund for deserving students. Ihave been able to add to this fund in recentyears.

Regarding my I.R.A., I had originally namedKip as the ultimate beneficiary. Later on, Inamed Thacher as the beneficiary which makesit possible for us to continue to have incomefrom my I.R.A. until I die, provides ultimatelyan asset to Thacher, and eliminates income andestate taxes by as much as 70 percent of the

Development

Boot HillBeing Part of a LegacyThe Boot Hill Association by David V. Babbott

Photo of the Student GovernmentCabinet from the 1931 El Archivero.

Pete Pond is standing in the backrow, second from the left


Spor

ts

VARSITY BOYS’ TENNIS

Overall Record: 15-3

League Record: 11-1

Captain: Anwar White ’00

Coach: A.J. Goldman

“What a year!” was just about all Coach Goldmancould utter at the end of this banner season, in whichhis team hammered its way to the C.I.F. quarterfi-nals—and on the way, won a Tony Dunn Award fortheir fine sportsmanship both on and off the courts.The boys dedicated their season to the memory ofFrederick Stymetz Lamb, CdeP ’40, faculty memberand coach of many victorious Thacher tennis teams

Spring Sports

by Joy Sawyer-Mulligan

Spring Sports

TRACK

Overall Record: Boys: Second in LeagueGirls: Third in League

Captains: Todd Meyer ’00, EricReeser ’00, Justin Hilton ’00, andJuliette White ’00

Coaches: Derick Perry, CdeP ’83, KurtMeyer, and Sarah DelVecchio

The core of this team, formed by athletes who’drun for three years, “made it possible to train andcompete more intensely than in recent history,” re-ported Coach Perry. “Each captain contributed tothe feeling of camaraderie and competitiveness”—and helped to inspire the kind of sportsmanship thatresulted in being awarded a Tony Dunn Award. Theboys’ 4 × 400 meter relay—Justin Hilton, KirbyWilliams ’00, Bo Eison ’01, and Eric “Like-a-coyote-on-a-kitten”* Reeser—established a new Schoolrecord in that event, while Logan Clark ’01 blastedthrough School records in both the 1600 meter andthe 3200 meter, and finished second in C.I.F. Divi-sion IV championships in the 3200 meter. No sur-prise that she won Most Valuable Runner, nor thatshe won M.V.P. of the League Meet, as well. There,Allegra Towns ’00 took the 300 Intermediate Hur-dles and Deloria Many Grey Horses Lane ’01 the800 meter. Most Improved were Justin Arnold ’00and Zoë Towns ’02. “I can’t say enough about thededication and commitment of these runners,” con-cluded Perry. “The future looks bright with com-petitors such as these, as well as Canyon Cody ’01and Gavin McClintock. ’01”

*The words of Coach DelVecchio, describing howEric appeared as he zoomed up on the Cate runnerahead of him in the final leg of the relay.

BASEBALL

Overall Record: 9-8-0

League Record: 6-3-0

Captains: Matt Cohen ’01 and MattyWilson ’01

Coaches: Rich Mazzola and RobertTorres

With an early-in-the-season charge led by Matty Wil-son, who had three home runs and two wins onthe pitcher’s mound during the first four games, thisteam marched undaunted and headlong to greatachievement this spring. Alfred English ’00 had hisdays in the sun, too, both behind the plate (wherehe’d never played before) and on the mound,where, in one game, he struck out 15 players in afive-inning 11-1 win over O.V.S. According to CoachMazzola, “The regular season highlight came with abarn-burner, 10-9 victory overCate that included a two-runtriple by Michael Back ’01, asuicide squeeze bunt byMatty, and Alfred’s relievingMatty to pitch the last two in-nings.” Post-season play ex-tended all the way to the C.I.F.quarterfinals. Named Most Im-proved was first-timer MattSpille ’02; Most Valuable,Matty Wilson. “Each andevery player contributed to theseason’s success,” continuedMazzola. “With only one sen-ior graduating, we can hardlywait ’til next spring!”

The Varsity Boys’ Tennis Teamwith Coach A.J. Goldman


Sports

during his decades of service to the School and totennis in the Ojai Valley. With seniors Anwar White,Clay Pell, and Paul Bonewitz setting the tone and ex-ample of excellence, the rest couldn’t help but fol-low. The end-of-season play involved handing Catea defeat in the two schools’ final 13-5 match. Twoincreasingly formidable players won Most Valuableand Most Improved: Dave Babbott ’01 and Nick Hor-ton ’02, respectively. And with only three seniorsleaving the ranks, there’s much to look forward to inthe years immediately ahead.

JUNIOR VARSITYBOYS’ TENNIS

Overall/League Record: 5-5-0

Captain: Peter Hartnack ’00

Coach: David Johnston

Another Tony Dunn winner, this team played “withwillingness and a great sense of perspective,” ac-cording to their coach. Emmett Hopkins ’01-—“ourmost consistent winner when teamed with AndrewPoole ’02 in doubles”—proved a force to contendwith, as did Tyler Manson ’01 when he put his killerto work against the opposition. Other team mem-bers included Lee Wittlinger ’01, Brian Kelly ’01,Dan Moore ’02, Max Leeds ’02, Andrew Ma ’02,and David Gal ’02.

VARSITY GIRLS’LACROSSE

Overall Record: 19-2

League Record: 9-0

Captains: Cheryl Lynn Horton ’00 andAnnie Nyborg ’00

Coaches: Greg Courter and MaryEverett, CdeP ’94

Winner of the State Championship title for the fifthconsecutive year, this team demonstrated “some ofthe best defense a Thacher team has ever played”reported Coach Courter. They gave up an average ofonly four goals per game while scoring an averageof 13 per contest—the underpinnings of their jug-gernaut repeat sweep of the Condor League, 9-0.Erin Hafkenschiel ’01, Anthea Tjuanakis ’01, Mered-ith Flannery ’01, Brooke Toeller ’02, and EllieFletcher ’00 were the core of that fearsome defen-sive unit, playing aggressively and cohesively. Lead-ing the offensive charge (over and over) wereseniors Cheryl Lynn Horton (69 goals, 15 assists),Besse Gardner (39 goals, 27 assists), and Annie Ny-

borg (43 goals, 25 assists), while at midfield, An-drea Black ’01, Liz Sanseau ’01, and Sarah Morrow’00 provided speed and excitement in the transitiongame. At the State Championships, held at Thacherthis year, two of ours were named Most Valuable:Cheryl Lynn as the Offensive M.V.P., and goalieCaitlin Mulholland ’01 as Defensive M.V.P.

JUNIOR VARSITY GIRLS’LACROSSE

Overall/League Record: 3-4-0

Captains: Felicity Howe ’00 andKristin Berona ’00

Coach: Diana Garcia, CdeP ’95

Despite the relative inexperience of this team, itsroster was filled with determined, gutsy players,from the four seniors (Felicity, Kristin, Lacey Gor-don, and Erin Blankenship—who collectively wonMost Valuable Players) straight on down throughthe ranks of juniors and sophomores. Quoth CoachGarcia, “I was very impressed by the girls’ abilityto overcome their uncertainties about this sport, es-pecially in clinch moments against more experi-enced teams.” The squad improved dramaticallyduring their weeks together, though, ultimately beat-ing teams they’d lost to earlier in the season. Lead-ing scorers were Erin and Felicity, while MostImproved were Bea Staley ’02, Charlotte Lord ’02(also most assists), and Stephanie Hubbard ’02.“We could not have had such a great season with-out the tenacity, enthusiasm, and versatility of allthe players, especially of our goalies, Esther Guz-man ’01 and Kindra Clemence ’02.” e

Varsity Girls’ Lacrosse Team with Co-Coach Mary Everett, CdeP ’94

The Junior Varsity Girls’ Lacrosse Team on a stormy Ojai day

Greetings

David Babbott has beennamed Director of SpecialGifts and Planned Givingat Thacher. He will workwith alumni, parents,grants, foundations, andcorporations, to raise cur-rent and deferred gifts. Hehas 11 years of fundrais-ing and estate-planning ex-

perience. Most recently, David worked as the Se-nior Major Gifts Officer at the University of Ver-mont for four years. Prior to that, he worked withvarious medical groups in development, physicianrecruitment, and administration. David’s wife isNancy, a Montessori teacher who is working parttime at the Monica Ros School in Ojai to revamptheir library. They have three sons: David ’01, John’03, and Benjamin, who is in eighth grade this fall.David is a graduate of Amherst College, where hereceived a bachelor’s degree in English. He alsoholds an M.B.A. from Cornell University.

Alison Edwards Curwen,spouse of history teacherAustin and mother ofDarcy, is Thacher’s newStudy Skills teacher. Forthe past two years, Alisonworked as a teacher andreading specialist at theMonica Ros School. Priorto coming to Ojai, Alison

was an elementary school teacher in Washington.Alison is a graduate of Connecticut College andhas two masters degrees from the University ofCalifornia at Berkeley. Her interests range fromoutdoor adventure (especially winter sports andkayaking) to needlepoint, reading, and travel.

Emily Etchells is teachingSpanish II and III to fill infor Cecilia Ortiz duringher sabbatical. She is alsoteaching English Ridingwhile Liz Reynolds Ma-honey, CdeP ’88, is on ma-ternity leave. In the spring,Emily will help GregCourter coach lacrosse.

She lives in Lee Quong and works with the juniorgirls. Emily is a graduate cum laude of Colby Col-lege, where she received her bachelor’s degree inboth Spanish and Biology. She was also the captainof the Varsity Lacrosse Team. Following gradua-


Facu

lty

tion, she spent last year teaching Spanish andGeometry to American high school sophomores atSwiss Semester in Zermatt, Switzerland, and lead-ing hikes in the Alps.

Mary Everett, CdeP ’94,came to Thacher last Jan-uary as an Intern, workingin the Admission Office,Mathematics Department,and as a coach of soccerand lacrosse. She contin-ues in this role this year.After graduating fromThacher, Mary attended

the University of California at Los Angeles for oneyear before transferring to Colorado College.There she majored in Mathematics and receivedher Bachelor of Arts degree in 1999. She was theleading scorer in 1998 on Colorado’s Division ISoccer Team; she was also the ninth all-time goalscorer and the twelfth all-time scoring leader. InColorado’s Division III Lacrosse team, Mary servedas Team Captain in her last two years, was votedMost Valuable Player in 1998 and 1999, and washonored as the most valuable attack team memberin 1998. She received various All-American awardsthroughout her career, as well as the ElizabethHelms Adams Sportswoman Award at Thacher.Mary works on The Hill with the sophomore girls,lives in the Handball Court, assists with the VarsityBoys’ Soccer Team, and will coach the Junior Var-sity Girls’ Soccer Team.

After graduating fromThacher in 1995, DianaGarcia returns to teachSpanish and to help coachJunior Varsity Lacrosse,Varsity Volleyball, andThird Team Soccer. She isliving in the HandballCourt with Mary andworking on The Hill with

sophomore girls. Diana is a graduate of ColoradoCollege, where she majored in Romance Lan-guages. While there, she played Varsity Lacrosse allfour years, and served as the team’s captain duringher junior and senior years. While at Thacher,Diana played Varsity Volleyball, soccer, andlacrosse all four years, and served as captain of theVarsity Volleyball Team during her upperschoolyears and co-captain of soccer and lacrosse dur-ing her senior year. At Thacher’s commencementshe was awarded the Elizabeth Helms AdamsSportswoman Award and received an HonorableMention as an All-American Lacrosse player.

Campus Life

Faculty Greetings and Farewells


Faculty

Françoise Kasimirowski-Garcia, who is trilingualin French, English, andSpanish, is teachingFrench III this year whileChris Mazzola is on ma-ternity leave. Françoise re-ceived her bachelor’s andmaster’s degrees in Eng-lish from the University of

Toulouse in France. In her spare time, Françoiseenjoys ballet, cooking, linguistics, and entertain-ing. She also spends extensive time working withtroubled teens and with the Ojai Youth Founda-tion. Her husband, Alejandro, is a native of Peruand an interventional cardiologist. They have livedin Ojai for two years and have two children: Julianand Clemencia.

Some may remember San-ford Jensen from his rolesin various television seriessuch as Murphy Brown,Remington Steele, andFamily Ties. Recently,however, he has taken onthe role of “very involvedparent” at Ojai’s MonicaRos and San Antonio

Schools, the SchooLinks program, and the OjaiTechnology Summit. He has also devoted exten-sive time to various community projects such asOjai Shorts, the Ojai Library Foundation, and PonyBaseball. At Thacher, Sandy is teaching drama inthe Introduction to Arts class for freshmen. Sandyreceived his training at The Juilliard School andthe New York University Tisch School of the FineArts. He is married to Connell Davis, who is a fam-ily practice physician, and they live in the East Endwith their two children: Cal and Genevieve.

John Nathan, father ofsophomore Emily ’03 and12-year-old Toby, teachesJapanese History on Tues-day evenings at Thacherthis fall. Since 1994, Johnhas been the TakashimaProfessor of Japanese cul-tural Studies at the Uni-versity of California Santa

Barbara. Prior to that, he worked as a professor ofEast Asian Studies at Princeton and as a producer,writer, and director in the eighties. John holds adoctorate in Far Eastern Language/ComparativeLiterature and a bachelor’s degree in Far EasternLanguages from Harvard University. He also stud-ied Japanese Literature and Linguistics at TokyoUniversity, and is known as a biographer of YukioMishima and as a preeminent translater of Japan-ese literature. John is married to Diane and theymake their home in Santa Barbara.

Elissa Thorn joinsThacher’s faculty to teachphysics, work with thefreshman boys in LowerSchool, and participate inthe English Riding pro-gram this fall and spring.Most recently, Elissa wasteaching algebra and alllevels of physics at the

Fountain Valley School of Colorado; she also over-saw the annual boat-building project, an interdis-ciplinary unit connecting Einstein’s SpecialRelativity to Shakespeare’s plays, and an investi-gation of on-campus lightning damage prevention.Before Fountain Valley, Elissa taught physics at theSanta Catalina School for Girls in Monterey, Cal-ifornia, for three years. She holds a bachelor’s de-gree magna cum laude from Carleton College.Beyond the classroom, Elissa’s interests range fromhorses, downhill skiing, and tennis, to music, quilt-ing, lightning, and agriculture.

Finally, the Thacher community gladly welcomedDavid Harris back from his sabbatical year ofteaching physics at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie,New York.

Farewells

This summer, we said “Adios” to Spanish teacherCecilia Ortiz and her family as they left for a yearof adventure and excitement in Spain.

Bobby Acquistapace, CdeP ’95, who worked withthe Horse Department during the spring, returnedto his animal husbandry studies at the University ofMontana in Bozeman this fall.

Katherine Jappe, who filled in for Study Skills As-sistant Wendy Parker when she moved to northernNew Mexico last spring, will continue doing edu-cational consultations for some of our students,but won’t be here full-time.

Part-time mathematics teacher, Richard Heller, re-turns to academia at the University of SouthernCalifornia and his ranch in the Upper Ojai, wherehe and his wife, Velvet, raise horses, dogs, andcows.

In addition to teaching physics during David Har-ris’s sabbatical last year, Andrew Ho taught thecommunity much about speech, dance, and neuro-physiology. He is now working on his doctorateat Stanford University.

After nine years of service, Athletic Director BillVickery will take a new career path. He brought tothe Athletic Department and the Condor League (asits Coordinator) new levels of commitment andexcellence. His crowning role was during the StateLacrosse Tournament at Thacher that was impec-cably orchestrated and organized due in large partto his attention to detail and his selfless efforts tobe everywhere, doing whatever needed his attention.

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Cam

pus

Lif

e

Of the more than one mil-lion juniors who took the

1999 PSAT/National MeritScholarship Qualifying Testlast October, 50,000 are nowentered in the 2001 NationalMerit Program and will com-pete for 16,000 Semifinalistspots. Eleven of Thacher’s 65juniors (now seniors) madethis first cut: David Babbott(Ojai), Chris Bonewitz (Pitts-burgh, PA), Jennifer Bowie(Laguna Beach, CA), MaryAnn Bronson (Juneau, AK),Canyon Cody (Ojai), MattCohen (Newport Beach,CA), Peter Frykman (RollingHills, CA), Katie Harmon(Tulsa, OK), Emmett Hop-kins (Healdsburg, CA), ErinJohnson (Tiburon, CA),

Brian Kelly (Portola Valley, CA), Caitlin Mul-holland (Oak View, CA), Smitha Reddy(Moorpark, CA), Kevin Schmidt (Bellevue,NE), Anthea Tjuanakis (Portland, OR),Meredith Walker (Medford, OR), and EmmaWhite (Ojai).

Kudos for Students: The Ventura CountyCommunity Foundation awarded a schol-

arship to Kristin Berona ’00, and AllegraTowns ’00 received the Community and FolkArt Scholarship Award this summer. MeganWinecoff ’00 received notification that she wonthe first-ever 2000 Youth Directory cover art

contest; new freshman Jessica Cornwell camein second. Elected to the Ventura County Ath-letes’ Hall of Fame for the year 2000 is CherylLynn Horton ’00 (captain of Varsity Volley-ball, Basketball, and Lacrosse), who helped herteam win the fifth-in-a-row State LacrosseChampionship Trophy at Thacher late lastspring.

To loud and supportive cheers at Assemblylast spring, School Chair Kristin Berona ’00

announced that Caitlin Mulholland ’01 wouldtake over the reins for the coming school year.An athlete as well as a scholar (see the pre-ceeding article regarding the National MeritStudents), Caitlin hails from Ojai and hopesto increase student involvement in student gov-ernment and community activities.

If you wish to participate in the collective in-tellectual experience of the Thacher commu-

nity this year, read the Head’s Book Selection:Alfred Lansing’s Endurance, Shackleton’s In-credible Voyage. As “one of the great adventurestories of our time” (according to the NewYork Times Book Review), Lansing describes theattempts of Ernest Shackleton and his crew of27 to cross the last uncharted continent, Antarc-tica, in 1915. Despite being ice-moored forover a year followed by sailing make-shift boats850 miles in heavy seas to reach the closestoutpost of civilization, the crew showed heroicstrength and determination to survive their des-olate and desperate surroundings. Lectures,discussions, and study centered on lessons fromthis ordeal are scheduled for this fall. e

Tidbits

TidbitsMichael Mulligan with outgoing andincoming School Chairs: Kristin Berona ’00and Caitlin Mulholland, ’01.

Numeracy Puzzle

Last issue’s puzzle has been solved!

Here was the puzzle:

Position eight checkers on a standard 8x8checkerboard so that no row, column, ordiagonal contains more than one checker.There are many solutions, some of whichare just rotations or reflections of one an-other.

Now for a twist…Position 16 checkerson a standard board so that no column,row, or diagonal contains more than twocheckers. This one is a little more fun!

Following is one solution to the eight-checker puzzle. Credit for solving the morechallenging puzzle goes to former mathteacher Stephen B. Hauge (1976-81).

Here’s the new puzzle:

The radii of the three largest circles are 1,2, and 3 respectively. What is the radius ofthe smallest circle?

Send your solution to Kurt Meyer in theThacher Math Department via e-mail [email protected], or via U.S. mail atthe School address.

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Christine Carter McLaughlin, CdeP ’90, joinsThacher’s Board this year as the President ofthe Alumni Association. Christine attendedDartmouth College, where she was awardedthe Judith S. White Award for leadership andactivism and graduated magna cum laude andwas a member of Phi Beta Kappa. Her first jobwas as a Marketing and Business Associate forThe Quaker Oats Company in Chicago. Afterone year, she returned to Thacher to work as

the Assistant Director of Admission, Co-Director of the Human De-velopment Program, and Director of the Lectures and Concerts series.After two years, she returned to Quaker Oats, where she became an As-sistant Brand Manager for Cap’n Crunch cereal. She recently leftQuaker Oats. Christine compiled The Other Side of Silence, a pub-lished collection of essays by rape survivors and spoke about this topicat various institutions such as Harvard, the New York City League ofCounseling, Duke, and the Oprah Winfrey Show. Christine and herhusband Michael live in Chico, California.

John and Betsy Grether—parentsof Robert, CdeP ’99 (currently asophomore at Tulane University),Ted ’01, and Russell ’03—are serv-ing as this year’s Presidents of theParents’ Association and will rep-resent the parents on the Board ofTrustees. Betsy has been very in-volved with Thacher activities,having chaired the Faculty and

Staff Appreciation Day, overseeing the Country Store for the Parents’Auction, and having co-chaired the Parents’ Auction for two years.She and John have co-chaired three class barbecues, as well. Betsy is agraduate of the University of Southern California, where she majoredin Art History. She received a second bachelor’s degree in Landscape Ar-chitecture at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. John received his bachelor’s de-gree from Stanford University and his Juris Doctorate from Boalt HallSchool of Law at the University of California, Berkeley. In addition tothe family business, Grether Farming Company (lemons and avoca-dos), John is the Board Chairman for Index Fresh, Inc. (shipper andmarketer of avocados, kiwis, and Asian pears from California, Chile,and New Zealand) and the Board Vice-Chairman for Saticoy LemonAssociation, a shipping affiliate of Sunkist. e


Trustees

Carolyn M. Alm joins Thacher’s Board ofTrustees this fall. She studied mathematics andpsychology at Southern Illinois University, andlater studied botany at Georgia State Univer-sity. She is the owner and general manager ofa cow/calf ranch called Paint Rock Canyon inHyattville, Wyoming. She and her husbandbegan the John and Carolyn Alm Foundationa few years back to fund the Paint Rock Pro-gram, a five-week summer camp based at their

ranch for high-potential, at-risk students from the Los Angeles Uni-fied School District. The first students participated this summer. Priorto these ventures, Carolyn worked for Coca-Cola Enterprises in At-lanta as the Director of Information Systems Planning and Technol-ogy and as the Director of Application Development. Previously shemanaged information technology, data center operations, and infor-mation systems for the Johnston Bottling Group in Eagan, Minnesota.She’s also worked for various other branches of Coca Cola throughoutthe United States in accounting, production, sales, and data. She hasdone volunteer work for Special Olympics and Habitat for Humanity.

Margaret Hooper “Margo” Blair—the motherof Alexandra, CdeP ’98, and Alden ’01, anddaughter of John Hooper, CdeP ’34—joinsThacher’s Board of Trustees this year. Aftergraduating from Stanford University, Margostudied photography that prepared her for thefreelance photography and design work thatshe’s done in Chicago and Washington, D.C.Immediately following college, she was theadministrator for the Haight-Ashbury Medical

and Drug Clinic that catered to the medical and drug-abuse needs of thegreater San Francisco area. Margo has volunteered at Latin School ofChicago and Children’s Memorial Hospital, and served on variousboards and participated in fundraising for Planned Parenthood, Chil-dren’s Memorial Hospital in Chicago, the Art Institute of Chicago, andLatin School of Chicago. Margo and her husband Frank have lived inChicago since 1979; their hobbies include cross-country skiing andhiking. Margo is also an avid rider and owns an Arabian horse.

Trustee News

TrusteesIntroduction of New Trustees


Sum

mer

Lif

e

The sun appearedover the Tsavoplain at just the

right time. Here at18,000 feet our toeswere cold, ourthroats were sore,and our lungs wereworking overtime.We had been climb-ing up the scree onthe eastern slope ofMt. Kilimanjarosince just after mid-night, and the risingsun not only lentneeded warmth, butallowed us to seeGilman’s Point—the crater’s rim andthe psychologicalsummit—in striking

distance. For four hours we had seen onlyheadlamps in the vague and silent ether aboveus, a space seemingly beyond ourreach. But now we had a goodfeeling about our chances. Four-teen Thacher mountaineers, aged14 to 50, rhythmically hyperventi-lated according to our guide CliveWard’s instructions. “Breathe!” hehad admonished us for the pastfew days. “If you’re talking, you’renot breathing!” Approaching therim at 5:30 that morning, we allfelt grateful for his simple lessons.Clive knew: he was about to com-plete his fifty-second journey to thetop of Africa.

Five hours later we were slurpingour soup at 15,000-foot Kibo Hut,tired to the bone but flush withpride after having completed the climb in fineform. As we reviewed our ascent, laughingover one student’s Gatorade hallucinations andotherwise taking stock of worn-out musclesand tendons, the fifty-odd Wachagga guidesand porters who had made the journey possi-ble readied our gear for the two-day descent tothe Tanzanian town of Marangu, where wewould finally be able to shower and wash ourclothes after a week traversing the highest free-standing mountain in the world.

Our safari had begun over a week earlier witha low-altitude flight from Nairobi, Kenya, overthe Great Rift Valley to the Maasai Mara Re-serve, the northeast corner of the Serengeti

ecosystem. There, from our base camp on theedge of the reserve, we explored the plainstwice daily in Land Rovers designed for thechallenging terrain. Far from the tourist ho-tels, we were able to find all manner of Africangame in their most striking settings. It wasn’tlong before we had developed a taste for thesafari life-style. After a 5:30 wake-up call(“Jambo” heard outside the tent walls), hotwater brought by the camp staff, fresh coffeeand a huge breakfast, we would spend themorning tracking a pride of 15 lions or fol-lowing the guide’s instincts toward a lone chee-tah or a herd of elephant. After a leisurelylunch and perhaps a nap or journal-writingsession, it was back in the vehicles for moregame-viewing until sundown. Drinks aroundthe campfire, a gourmet dinner cooked in aDutch oven, and Clive’s endless stories of hislife in Africa—the rhythm was the same everyday; only the details changed. Not only did wemeet the classic African plains game close-up;we were invited into the homes of our Maasaicamp guards, treated to their dances and songs.

Summer Life

SafariFrom Savannah to SummitThe Thacher Family Safari by Rod M. “Jake” Jacobsen

Safari Participants: Jake Jacobsen, JamieHastings ’02, Shannon Hastings, CdeP’99, Liz Hastings, and Newlin Hastings,CdeP ’70, Marley Orr ’00, Charlie Orr(Marley’s father), Carina Fisher ’01, WaltFisher (Carina’s father), Will Johnson ’03,Katherine Halbower (Will’s mother), KyleDumont ’03, Tessa Enright ’01, MeredithWalker ’01, Amy Wyss, and PaulJaramillo

Guide: Clive Ward

Outfitter: Tropical Ice Ltd.Meredith Walker ’01 making friends

Cheetah in Maasai Mara

In-camp soccer, Maasai Mara

Mara Camp: Kyle Dumont ’03, Carina Fisher ’01, and Marley Orr ’00, withfriends


Summ

er Life

We toured their schools, bought their jewelryand weapons (many of us returned with arse-nals of various spears, bows, and blades), andlearned of their precariousexistence as traditional peo-ple in a country insisting thatthey change.

So after four days in theMara, two in Nairobi, twomore in Amboseli (the stag-ing area for the Kili climband home of a particularlyproud band of Maasai), andthe ascent itself, it was timeto drive back into Kenya (onroads which make a Sierratrail seem like a highway) forthe most unusual segment ofthe safari: the Galana Riverin Tsavo East National Park.In this semi-desert park,known in recent years as thesite of the “poaching wars”in which the Kenya WildlifeService under RichardLeakey finally eradicated theivory bandits from the north, we would onceagain live in a private tented camp, but thistime we would see most of the animals on foot,guarded confidently by armed rangers from the

Wildlife Protection Unit. Lions(maneless male hunters—off-spring, we were told, of the fa-mous “Man-Eaters of Tsavo”from the 1870s), hippo, croco-dile, elephant, and cape buffalocould spring unannounced fromthe saltbush girdling the riverbanks. Silent and steady, hyper-sensitive to sounds and smells, wepatrolled the banks of the Galanalooking for animals which, wehoped, were not looking for us.In fact, we were most nervousabout a pair of young male lionswho had decided to make ourcampsite their home for a fewdays.

The last stage of the safari beganwith a long and difficult exit from the Tsavobush into the coastal forest and plain of Ma-lindi District. On the beach at Watamu we

would be pampered by the staff of Heming-way’s Hotel, explore the ancient ruins at Gedi,and absorb the unusual Swahili coastal cul-ture, one based on the intersecting and blend-

ing of traditional Bantu andIslamic societies. Some in thegroup spent the last day deep-seafishing, while others rested,packed, or shopped for local clothand jewelry.

Just hours later, on the flight backto Nairobi, we all saw the summitof Kilimanjaro, the snowcappedicon of Africa, to the south, look-ing for all the world immeasura-ble. It seemed impossible thatscarcely a week before we had beenclimbing toward that crater, ahearty band of Thacher trekkersbreathing the thin, piercing air, to-gether on the safari of our dreams.

e

Crossing the Galana River on walk with armed ranger

Meredith Walker and Kathy Halbower (mother of Will Johnson ’03)visit “school house” with two Maasai teachers

Liz and Shannon Hastings, CdeP ’99, with two guides

Jamie Hastings ’02 with his porter after climbingKilamanjaro

Two Maasai teachers with Jake

Maasai on bike

On the game drive

For information on next summer’s

Safari, call Jake at (805) 640-8841, or

e-mail him at [email protected]

Thacher’s New Historical Society

The Thacher Historical Society is the brain-child of Trustee Emeritus Samuel A. “Pete”Pond, CdeP ’32, and is currently an ad hoccommittee of persons interested in promotingand enhancing the history of The ThacherSchool. The purposes of the Society are:

• To recall and portray the history of theSchool within its Western heritage, specificallythe Ojai Valley and Ventura County;

• To serve as a continuing guide to the futureof the School;

• To encourage students in their historical re-search; and

• To acquaint faculty, students, and friends ofthe School with Thacher’s contributions forover one-hundred years.

One of the appealing aspects of promotingThacher history is the discovery and sharingof writings, objects and photographs alreadybeing stored and preserved in the Thacherarchives. Some examples of community serviceinvolvement are included on this page.

If you are interested in participating in or sup-porting the Thacher Historical Society finan-cially, please contact Tom May, CdeP ‘52, at(707) 944-8208, or Elizabeth Bowman, Li-brary Director, at [email protected].


Satya Peake ’02 reads with childrenat Ojai’s Head Start Program Community

Servicethroughout

Thacher’sHistory

A ticket from the March 25, 1916,fete to benefit World War I soldiers

in the trenches and other Warsufferers. Thacher’s Dramatic Society

performed “Private Secretary.” Theevening’s activities raised nearly

$500 for relief organizations.

Thacher studentshelp serve dinner at

the R.A.I.N.Foundation in

Camarillo


As recorded in LeRoy Makepeace’s book,Sherman Thacher and His School, one ofS.D.T.’s favorite themes in talking to his

pupils was civic responsibility: “I have alwaysfelt that the highest duty of a citizen is to do allhe can for the community in which he lives,for the public good.” From the earliest daysof The Thacher School, students have been ex-pected to assist in maintaining their campus,from caring for livestock to cleaning class-rooms, or fixing trails and bussing dishes. Be-yond the School gates, students and facultymembers have worked for The Ojai TennisTournament throughout its 100-year history,have helped raise funds for various commu-nity activities, and have ventured to Mexicoto work on building projects for orphanages.

The Community Service Program at Thacherhas two distinct functions. First, it serves a veryreal need in the local community, providingbright and able volunteers to fulfill a wide va-riety of jobs. Second, it offers Thacher studentsan opportunity to provide service in a way thatis meaningful, necessary, and appreciated. Toaccomplish this, the Community Service Pro-

gram has developed a broadprogram to involve, inspire,and inform as many stu-dents as possible.

This fall, over 70 students(approximately one third ofthe student body) are serv-ing as volunteers at local el-ementary schools, HeadStart, the Ojai Humane So-ciety, Senior Day Care, andthe Ojai Museum during theacademic day or helping tofeed patients at two localconvalescent homes dinnerfour nights a week. Studentsalso volunteer their time tohelp feed the VenturaCounty homeless population(bring and serve dinner toresidents of the R.A.I.N.Foundation in Camarillo),while others will help feedOjai’s homeless during thewinter months when theOjai Shelter is open. Other seasonal projectsinclude assisting with the Ventura SpecialOlympics Track and Field Team, fundraisingfor UNICEF, working with blind children andadolescents from the Braille Institute, and or-ganizing holiday food and clothing drives.

Because participation remains non-compul-sory, the Community Service Program relies heav-ily on the inspiration and commitment of its stu-dent leaders in order to run smoothly. They pro-vide the spark that lights the fire under their peers.Often these student leaders are the unsung he-roes of the upperclasses who give of themselveswithout expectation of gain, recognition, or rec-ompense. A desire to give back to the commu-nity that has given so much to them or to helpthose who are less fortunate are reasons enoughfor these students to contribute their time andenergy to the Community Service Program. At

graduation eachyear, Thacherawards the New-ton K. Chase Com-munity ServiceAward to recog-nize one studentwho, through vol-unteer work in thecommunity, hasdemonstrated anunselfish interestin and an energeticconcern for others.

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Ronald Wu ’02 walks Smoky, an orphaned dog atOjai’s Humane Society

Marvin Shagam (farright) with Thacherstudents volunteeredto build a windmillfor the Sanquintinarea of BajaCalifornia to supplyfresh water (circa1965)

Children pose after eating atCamarillo’s R.A.I.N. Foundation

Thacher students aid Ojai flood victims in thespring of 1978

A Historyof HelpingA Historyof Helping

According to Madonna, “You know that we are living in a material world,”where, all too often, more attention is paid to attaining the all-mightydollar and the many extravagances it affords than living a worthwhile,

satisfying life. Fortunately, many members of Thacher’s community are mo-tivated to improve their communities and the environment, thereby helpingothers have better lives. Our theme for this magazine is Community Servicewherein we profile some members of Thacher’s community and friends whodevote inordinate amounts of their time and energy to benefit others.

For example, community members are actively saving the Carpinteria Bluffsfrom development, directing Utah’s Nature Conservancy, teaching Englishand reading to recently released inmates who are illiterate, serving as a BigBrother to inner-city youths, and making teaching devices for blind chil-dren. This was a fascinating and inspiring topic to research and write about;we hope you enjoy reading about these folks as much as we enjoyed puttingthis together. —JDMc



Top row:David Twichell, Paul Yelder, YvonChouinard, Ken Rhodes, Nicholas

Cunningham, Perry Gates

Middle row:Ted Rhodes, Mike Jones, David Livermore

Bottom row:Ellen Loebl, Randy Bessolo


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Dave C. Twichell, CdeP ’36Humanistic Outdoorsman by Phoebe Twichell Peterson, CdeP ’82

How do you cohesively, in three pages orless, tie together the life of a man who hasbeen a World War II pilot, a school head-

master, an environmentalist, an inventor forthe blind, a church parish committee chair-man, and a boat builder? Mercifully, when Iasked my father, Dave Twichell, CdeP ’36,what he had learned from his years at TheThacher School, it all became clear. He repliedwithout hesitation, “a love of the outdoors andbasic humanistic values.” Since it’s been oversix decades since my father was a student atThacher, I worried that he might stumble overthe slightly lofty question. But there was hisresponse as simple and easy as repeating hisown name. It seems also to be the recurring

theme in his life.Thacher has been a partof our family for threegenerations. My grand-father, Burton Twichell,taught Latin at Thacherfrom 1906 until 1916;Dave was a student inthe thirties and laterheadmaster in the six-ties; and I graduatedwith the class of 1982.It seems the fabric ofmy family’s sense ofvalues and those ofThacher’s are so inter-woven it’s difficult todistinguish them.

Dave was born in 1918to Katherine and Bur-ton Twichell. He grew

up in New Haven, Connecticut, where he at-tended the Miss Foote Elementary School and,later, Hamden School. Burton loved Ojai andThe Thacher School, and, as the story goes,there was never any doubt (or choice for thatmatter) in where Dave would attend highschool. Happily, Dave thrived at Thacher. Heenjoyed teachers Ed Yeomans, Marcus Dall,Joe Lowery, Owen McBride, and Sidney Treat.He played baseball, soccer, and tennis, andacted in a few plays. On one particular occa-sion he remembers dressing up as a girl for aShakespeare production. But his real love wascamping. He won a shooting prize and theK.K.K. camping award for best camper. Heeventually became an A Camper, which meanthe could camp without a faculty chaperone.With friends like Don Mennel, ChickGoodrich, and Tom Pillsbury, he cleared manytrails and camped in Lockwood Valley,Millpetero, and Cuyama.

After Thacher, Dave went to Deerfield Acad-emy for one year, and then on to Williams Col-lege where he received his bachelor’s of artsdegree as a chemistry major. He graduated inthe spring of 1941. Sensing the impending war,he enlisted and was sent to Squantum NavalAir Base in Massachusetts. There he learnedto fly biplanes called “Yellow Perils.” He wasassigned to a squadron in the Aleutian Islandsoff Alaska, where, for two years, he flew patrolreconnaissance. On one flight he and his copi-lot lost an engine and were rescued out of theocean. Later after two months in Hutchinson,Kansas, training in larger land planes called“Liberators,” Dave was assigned to a year-and-a-half stint in the Philippines. His fondestmemory of this time, of course, was the endof the War. He was on a one-week leave andwas visiting his parents in the Adirondacks.He still remembers the sound of all the bellsringing as the news spread across the country.

Like most returning soldiers, my father soughtemployment. He was hired by Anson Thacherto teach biology, but after a year and a half ofteaching at Thacher, Dave felt he needed tofurther his education. He landed back in NewHaven, where he soon married Ethel Rowley.My mother worked in the Health Departmentat Yale, while my father studied science andeducation at Yale Graduate School. He alsoacted as Assistant Dean of Students of thesophomore undergraduate class.

In 1949, then acting headmaster, DexterStrong, hired Dave to teach science at PomfretSchool in Connecticut. The following yearStrong retired and Dave was chosen as head-master, a position he filled for over a decade.

In the early sixties, Newt Chase gave Dave acall and asked him to be headmaster atThacher. Delighted to see the West again, Davejumped at the opportunity and moved thewhole family out to California. While atThacher, my parents made lifetime friends ofthe Sheahans, Chesleys, Millers, McDougalls,Goodes, Thachers, and Chases.

As headmaster, Dave worked to foster a love ofthe outdoors and camping in all his students;however, he worried that the horse traditionmight become too expensive for the School tomaintain. The Sespe had also become crowded.It just wasn’t the same experience to ride horse-back over a mountain and deep into the Sespewhen you could get there easily by car. So IkeLivermore, CdeP ’28, and Dave plotted anddreamed about hiking trips in the Sierras.

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Along with some others, they put up themoney to purchase the seven acres of privatelyowned land in the middle of a state park, andengineered the procurement of what is nowGolden Trout Camp.

Dave also tried to inspire in his students hon-esty, decency, modesty, generosity, and toler-ance. Under his tenureship, student communityservice was pushed hard. During two consec-utive spring vacations teacher Marvin Shagamtook a group of students to Baja California tohelp build a small schoolhouse for poor stu-dents. Inner-city kids were encouraged to enjoyThacher in the summer months. The idea ofAmerican Foreign Students was also encour-aged.

Tolerance is the last word in the string of clean-cut values; tolerance of race, sex, and religion.That’s what really put Dave to the test overthe years. It’s hard to believe this was even anissue, but at Pomfret School, Dave had foughthard to have the first black student admitted.At Thacher he encouraged the idea of coedu-cation and opened the doors to Jim Howard,CdeP ’69, one of the first African Americanstudents. Though he had these victories, Davewas also confronted with a student bodycaught up in the turmoil of the Vietnam Warand the sixties. The issue of drug use was in-surmountable. Dave tried to listen with toler-ance and compassion to his students, at therisk of alienating himself from his more con-servative Board of Trustees. These were diffi-cult times to be an administrator.

Following the Thacher years, Dave, Ethel, andtheir five children moved back East and set-tled in Belmont, Massachusetts, just outside ofBoston. Dave taught briefly at Harvard in theACP Program, and in the early seventies wasdirector of the middle school at Buckingham,Browne & Nichols.

Upon retiring from a career in education, hispassion for the outdoors and the environmentcaught up with him. Dave plunged headlong—and full time—into a volunteer career atManomet Bird Observatory. He took classesat the New England School of Photographyand became Manomet’s director of develop-ment and photography. He assembled thequarterly newsletter and worked hard as afundraiser. He also traveled with the scientistsas their chief data photographer to such ex-otic locales as Belize, Brazil; Tierra Del Fuego,Ecuador; and the entire east coast of the U.S.When Dave started at Manomet, it was simplya small gathering of scientists who bandedbirds and studied migratory patterns. With thehelp of my father and many others, Manomethas grown enormously. It is now called theManomet Center for Conservation Sciencesand has worked with the Belizian and Philip-pine governments as well as the State of Maineon reforestation programs. It has worked onmonitoring all the Atlantic fisheries, wetlands,and shorebird feeding and nesting sites. It now

has the largest band data base in the westernhemisphere.

Unfortunately, Manomet is an hour-and-a-halfdrive from Belmont, and with his eightiethbirthday fast approaching, Dave decided tolook for a constructive project closer to home.He found Perkins Institute for the Blind. Davehas always been good with his hands and overthe years the basement workshop has beenhome to many of his projects big and small.He has built several row boats, a 14-footwooden motor boat, many delicate woodenbowls turned on a lathe, and recently, a 16-foot sail boat, mast and all. When he discov-ered Perkins—or Perkins discovered him—theyboth realized it was a perfect match. Dave hasbuilt hundreds of educational aids includingshape puzzles for the blind, boxes with com-partments for differently textured objects, andspecial rocking chairs that spin and rock for-ward and backward as well as sideways to helpstudents with balance problems. He noticedthat walking sticks tended to get caught ondoor jams and cracks in the sidewalk so he de-signed his own using thin plastic PVC piping.He melted and curved up the bottom endthereby allowing the stick to slide smoothlyalong the floor.

Dave’s most satisfying Perkins project has beenbuilding little houses: two-foot-by-two-footboxes to be precise. He explained that childrenborn without sight or hearing have drasticallyfewer opportunities to absorb information orstimulus from the outside world and conse-quently often fail to develop mentally. Thesesmall boxes are like animated playpens. Theinfant or small child lies inside the box whichjiggles and vibrates and has various inter-changeable objects that hang within the child’sreach. On the market these boxes sell for $800.Dave makes them for $32, period. He addedwith a twinkle of satisfaction that he has evenimproved the box design by making them fold-able for easy storage and travel. Dave hasmade over 80 of these boxes and they are beingused by therapists throughout the Boston area.Alex Truesdell, who was director of the adap-tive materials workshop at Perkins was so en-thusiastic about Dave’s help that she referred toher time at Perkins as “B.D. and A.D.: BeforeDave and After Dave.”

Perkins is not alone in this phenomenon. Daveseems to define an era in the history of everyplace he goes. He has left an indelible imprinton hundreds of aspiring young minds over theyears, not the least of which are those of hisfive children and thirteen grandchildren. Whenasked if he ever plans on truly retiring, my fa-ther responded that in light of the Thacherbent to this interview, he thought the ThacherAlma Mater pretty much summed it up. Heplans on “doing the best he can do until thebest he can do is all done.” e A History

of HelpingA Historyof Helping


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Paul L. Yelder, CdeP ’77Building on the Spirit of Community by Yasmin T. Tong, CdeP ’84

When first meeting Paul Yelder, CdeP ’77,it may not be completely evident thatone is in the presence of a leader in com-

munity development. He is soft spoken andunassuming in demeanor, yet he has made alasting impression on the lives of many peoplewho have known him. I can attest to this frompersonal experience. The first time I met Paulin person he made me cry twice. First, he toldme one of those strange, but true, Thacher co-incidence stories about his first ever visit toThacher for a family interview when his fa-ther, a World War II veteran, recognized JackHuyler’s voice at the Thacher Admission Officeafter five minutes into the meeting, and morethan 30 years after hearing it once in a chance

encounter in Burma dur-ing the War. From thatpoint on Mr. Yelder andJack Huyler becamegood friends. Later in theconversation Paul de-scribed how for years hekept his office at DudleyNeighbors, Inc., in Rox-bury (a neighborhoodonce known for urbanblight), open on NewYear’s Eve. The officecomputers, typewriters,and Paul’s editorial skillswere all at the disposalof neighborhood highschool students to com-plete their college appli-

cations. Those students have gone on tograduate from Amherst, Howard, Dartmouth(Paul’s alma mater), and University of Massa-chusetts, among other universities. This lastanecdote is perhaps one of the simplest andbest examples of Paul’s work in communitydevelopment and how it benefits others.

Paul says, “Community development is any-thing having to do with building community,”so you could say he has been active in com-munity development from childhood. His com-mitment to community development wasnurtured early on, growing up in the Cren-shaw/Leimert Park neighborhood of Los An-geles, where he learned the value of communityand a sense of social responsibility. Paul at-tended Thacher gaining more experience witha different model of close-knit cohesive com-munity. Thacher invested something else inPaul, “a sense of tremendous opportunity,”which informed his future direction and rein-forced a nascent sense of responsibility to en-able others to achieve their potential.

In a relatively short time Paul has had—andcontinues to have—a distinguished career incommunity development. After graduatingfrom Thacher in 1977, he attended DartmouthCollege, where he graduated with high dis-tinction and received a Tucker Foundation Fel-lowship for a community service internship inBoston. He spent the next 16 years in Boston,where he pursued a Master of City and Re-gional Planning at Harvard’s John F. KennedySchool of Government, focusing on real estatedevelopment, and housing and community de-velopment. After graduating from Harvard,Paul began working on neighborhood revital-ization with non-profit development corpora-tions, first to preserve historic housing, thenfor the Economic and Industrial DevelopmentCorporation in Boston, where he providedbusiness consulting services to non-profit andfor-profit businesses. He returned to afford-able housing development at Roxbury Multi-Service Center, where he was responsible formanaging an abandoned housing acquisitionand rehabilitation program, and later went onto become the Executive Director of DudleyNeighbors Inc., a non-profit corporation thathe helped found to manage the operation of acommunity land trust (C.L.T.). This C.L.T. wasformed to purchase land in the Roxbury neigh-borhood and to facilitate the development ofaffordable housing through powers of eminentdomain. This work is an important compo-nent of the Dudley Street Neighborhood Ini-tiative, which is known as a national model ofresident controlled neighborhood revitaliza-tion, and demonstrated the massive coordi-nated effort of local government, neighbor-hood-based non-profit organizations, founda-tions, and corporations needed to returneconomic opportunity and a sense of owner-ship among residents in a single neighborhood.

This is the kind of work that requires one tooperate in circles of influence, negotiating withbanks and governmental agencies, and advo-cating among elected officials to obtain the re-sources and authority to change a neighbor-hood. This work also requires one to relateand respond to the neighborhood residents ina way that enables them to realize their powerto make decisions about the destiny of theircommunity. Paul is one of those rare individu-als with the tenacity and ability to move com-fortably among both groups and to achieve thedesired results. In the seven years that Paulworked in Roxbury—what was a blightedneighborhood, ravaged by arson, crime, van-dalism, and neglect—has become a vital com-munity with new housing, youth programs,

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child care, and health care resources. Not onlydid the physical appearance of the neighbor-hood change, but also, and more importantly,the community has been transformed as theresidents participated and directed the revital-ization of their neighborhood

In the years Paul spent in Boston, he was notonly committing his career to community de-velopment, but he was also volunteering as aBig Brother for two young people: one gradu-ated from Clark College in Atlanta; the otheris a high school student in Boston. Addition-ally, for several years he served on manyboards of directors for non-profit organiza-tions, including a construction training pro-gram for young people that has become amodel replicated nationwide, an adult literacyprogram, American Baptist Churches of Mass-achusetts, and a non-profit housing develop-ment corporation. Somehow he also foundtime to volunteer as a ski instructor for YouthEnrichment Services of Boston.

Three years ago, Paul moved away from Rox-bury, the neighborhood he helped to re-build,to Columbia, Maryland, and started a new po-sition as Program Director of Management andOrganizational Development with the Enter-prise Foundation. Paul is now providing tech-nical assistance to boards and staff ofnon-profit organizations in determining theirdistinct roles and responsibilities as well aswith the process of strategic planning. Paulmade this change to obtain a national per-spective on community development. Now, hetravels throughout the United States, trainingthe next generation of community developmentorganizations: housing development corpora-tions, providers of child care, youth employ-ment, or job training assistance. Paul’svolunteer experience with many boards of non-profit organizations, and as executive directorof a community development corporation,leave him well-equipped to assist non-profitgroups in resolving the managerial and techni-cal challenges of community development. Themost rewarding part of this new position forPaul is enabling boards of directors to recog-nize their own power and authority to deter-mine the future direction of the organization.The move to Maryland has helped Paul to re-duce his volunteer commitments significantly,but he still finds time to continue with twoboard affiliations now: Institute for Commu-nity Economics, which promotes communityland trusts and permanently affordable resi-dent controlled housing, as well as TheThacher School Board of Trustees.

Paul’s work with Thacher’s Board of Trusteesintegrates his past with the present and has areciprocal effect on his work today. The lead-ership and governance demonstrated onThacher’s Board assists in Paul’s current workof providing consulting services to other non-profit boards. Paul is concerned with main-taining Thacher’s accessibility to students withvaried life experiences in order to continue to

enrich a nourishing learning environment inwhich all students can grow and be challenged.As an alumnus, Paul wants to share theThacher experience with students who mightnot otherwise have the opportunity to enjoyit. Paul would also like to see the School pur-sue a strategy that strongly encourages stu-dents to participate in some form ofcommunity service, enabling them to reach be-yond the immediate ties of Thacher to embracea broader sense of community and a richersense of responsibility to one another to com-plement the sense of responsibility to natureengendered at the School.

What motivates someone to pursue this kind ofwork? How does one maintain this commit-ment to service for others?

As Paul describes it, he did not choose com-munity development; it was a calling. Growingup with a strong sense of community and per-sonal responsibility first at home and later atThacher, coupled with the privilege of attend-ing Dartmouth and Harvard, Paul recognizedearly on that he had access to opportunitiesdenied to others, all of which profoundly in-fluenced the direction of his life. Working incommunity development is a way of perpetu-ating for others some of those opportunitiesPaul enjoyed in his life. The sense of responsi-bility that originally motivated Paul has givenway more and more to an increasing spiritual-ity, which has made his work easier and pro-vides a compass for future directions. Paul’slife work has laid a foundation of hope for thefuture on which he continues to build.Through his work in community developmenthis efforts to support education, as a ThacherTrustee, or ad hoc college counselor, Paul dis-tinguishes himself as someone who builds com-munity wherever he goes. e



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Yvon ChouinardSetting an Environmental High-Water Mark by Jane D. McCarthy

Geek. Dirt Bag. Fun Hog. Vagabond Out-doorsman. Blacksmith. Deep Ecologist.Nitpicker. Accidental Capitalist.

Any one of these monikers could be—and hasbeen—used for Yvon Chouinard, the world-famous mountaineer, owner and founder ofthe trend-setting outdoor apparel companyPatagonia, and father of Claire, CdeP ’98. Fewconjure such a contradictory list of charactertraits in one individual, let alone one who hasbeen so successful. His success may stem fromhis extensive study of Zen Buddhism and itsphilosophy of focusing on the process ratherthan the result. “You don’t climb Mt. Everestto get to the top,” says Chouinard, “because

there’s nothing to do upthere. Rather, the pur-pose of the adventure isthe process itself, theopportunity for striv-ing, changing yourself,and becoming a betterperson.”

If one merely changesthe personal referencesto business terms,Chouinard’s adventurebeliefs translate intoPatagonia’s mission: “Touse business to inspireand implement solutionsto the environmental cri-sis.” He strives to steerthe company toward amagnetic north on hismoral compass therebyresulting in minimal en-

vironmental damage and, hopefully, becomingan industry leader in doing the right thing. “I’mnot in business to make a profit,” Chouinardinsists though the privately-held business inVentura, California, has been profitable formost of its 27 years of existence and world-wide sales totaled $200 million in fiscal year1999-2000. Although Patagonia’s sales repre-sent only a small fraction of the $5 billionhuman-powered recreation market, the companysets the high-water mark for influencing thetravel adventure industry. To wit, some ac-complishments:

Since 1985, Patagonia has donated a self-im-posed “Earth Tax” (the company’s way ofmaking restitution for the negative impact theycause on the environment) equal to one per-cent of sales to preservation and restoration ofthe natural environment;

Working with suppliers to develop more envi-ronmental-friendly products and components,including dyes;

Continually educating its 900 employeesworldwide on how to improve the environ-ment;

Converting to 100 percent organic cotton inits product line manufacturing rather thanusing traditionally conventionally-grown cot-ton since the latter is so detrimental to the en-vironment due to pesticide use; and

Beginning to use more energy-efficient heatingand lighting equipment in its buildings such assolar- and wind-generated electricity.

Patagonia’s environmental path is a naturaloutgrowth of several factors in Chouinard’scareer. As a seven-year-old French Canadiantransplant who only spoke French and was thesmallest in his second-grade class when hisfamily moved to Burbank, Yvon was a self-de-scribed “Geek,” who sought independent ac-tivities. He discovered climbing while pursuingfalconry as he rappelled to hawks’ nests. Aclose call while rappelling resulted in his searchfor better climbing methods.

By his late teens, Chouinard entered his “DirtBag” and “Fun Hog” era. A proficient surferfrom spending winters at Rincon and an ac-complished rock climber from spending warmmonths climbing the Grand Tetons, CanadianRockies, and Yosemite, Yvon wanted littlemore than to seek adventure. Many first as-cents, including the North American Wall ofYosemite’s El Capitan, were recorded by himduring this time.

Several aspects of the sport didn’t agree withthis rock climber. The pitons used for protec-tion points by climbers, for instance, weremade of malleable iron that were hammeredinto rocks and left for future climbers. Aftercontinued use, they often-times bent resultingin dangerous conditions. In 1957, Chouinardborrowed $825 from his parents to purchasean anvil and forge so that he could maketougher steel pitons to use and sell extras tofriends. With his blacksmith tools in the backof his 1929 Model-A Ford, he cruised theclimbing circuit selling his wares when notclimbing. While climbing in Yosemite duringthe 1970s, Yvon was shocked by the environ-mental impact caused by the repeated em-placement and removal of these hardened-steelpitons. He began the trend of “clean climb-

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ing” by making aluminum chocks that couldbe easily wedged into rock and removed byhand. This eliminated the use of a piton ham-mer and reduced the impact of protectionplacements to virtually nothing. This also madeweek-long ascents possible since aluminum islighter than steel and the chocks could bereused many times.

Another aspect of climbing that frustratedYvon was trying to climb steep ice with tradi-tional ice axes and picks made for cuttingsteps. He tested various axes and developedhis own design with a curved pick and deepteeth. This Chouinard “Piolet” could be driveninto the ice overhead and pulled up on, thuseliminating having to cut steps. This design be-came the basis for modern ice axe design andopened up the new sport of climbing frozenwaterfalls.

From these meager beginnings as a blacksmithcame the founding of the Great Pacific IronWorks in Ventura, where it’s still located some35 years later. The site was also chosen be-cause of its close proximity to good surf spotsand another aspect of Patagonia’s motto:“When the surf’s up, go surfing.” Chouinardlater recalled, “I never intended for my craft tobecome a business, but every time I returnedfrom the mountains my head was spinningwith ideas for improving the carabiners, iceaxes, and other tools of climbing.” By the mid-1970s the company had captured 80 percent ofthe climbing-hardware market, but that was amere one percent of the outdoor retailers’ salesand it would be difficult to make ends meet. At

the prodding of his wife, Malinda, he intro-duced functional outdoor apparel such asrugby shirts, corduroy knickers, and canvasshorts through the Patagonia Clothing Corpo-ration. He chose this name of the southern-most part of South America because of themystical, rugged images that it conjures up.“We wanted to make clothes for sailing aroundCape Horn or climbing in 100-mile-per-hourwinds,” he explained. As well, since climberscarry only limited garments, he thought thatthose articles needed to perform as reliably asthe pitons. “As blacksmiths and machinists,we approached the problem of designingclothes from a functional basis. We were not allthat concerned with how they would look be-cause we knew from designing tools that whenthe design is right, the aesthetics would bethere.” An early success was the signature col-orful fleece jackets, most of which are nowmade of recycled plastic soft drink bottles—afabric innovation Patagonia introduced in1993.

As time passes, Patagonia’s environmental mis-sion has become more activist reflectingChouinard’s own philosophical development. Bythe late 1980s, he was unhappy with the prac-tices of companies that harmed the environ-ment, let alone not protecting it. He decided hecould use his company as a catalyst to improvethe world, especially if he fired up his employ-ees to join the effort. This sparked environ-mental lectures and seminars for both employeesand their communities, paid “internships” foremployees of non-profit groups, and assistancefor grassroots groups including office space

and sponsorship of the An-nual Tools for GrassrootsActivists Conferences. Thelatter teaches environmen-talists everything fromstrategic planning to waysof working with the mediataught by Patagonia em-ployees.

Several years ago, thecompany studied the envi-ronmental harm caused bythe four major fibers usedin their products: cotton,wool, nylon, and poly-ester. Surprisingly, cottonwas the most destructive,prompting Patagonia toturn away from using any-thing but organically-grown cotton. They wentso far as to subsidize farm-ers world-wide so thatthey’d grow organicallywhich costs about 35 per-cent more. As well, the

company is researching ways to reduce the en-vironmental impact caused by the other keyfibers it utilizes.

Patagonia has remained relatively small com-pared to others in its industry because Yvonbelieves in limits and chooses images from hispassion to explain: “Climbing teaches you thatyou live for the days when you’re on the edge,but you never go over it. There’s an optimumsize for every endeavor, and if you exceed it,you go downhill. With this company, we couldeasily become too large and lose everything,”including Patagonia’s reputation as the de-signer of the highest quality products and itsposition as the mainstay of the climbing com-munity.

In some ways, Chouinard feels the companyhas already surpassed its optimal size. It is nowdecentralized along seven lines of activity suchas climbing and canoeing that function as sep-arate entities under Patagonia’s umbrella. Thisdecentralization relies less on Chouinard andallows him to take on the role of “residentphilosopher” and to practice his own M.B.A.style: “Management By Absence.” He spendssix to eight months each year traveling to faroff places such as bonefishing on Christmas Is-land, surfing in Fiji, skiing the French Alps,and climbing in Nepal while testing products,exploring new concepts, and developing newmarkets. This also maintains his credibility asan adventurer and brings back a sense of thefuture that few others could provide.

When Chouinard is in Ventura, he tinkers inthe company’s “skunk works,” where, for ex-ample, he’ll work on his current project of de-veloping a durable, unbreakable surfboard sothat he and others will no longer anguish overspending several hundred dollars on a newboard that breaks the next day. In a way, hehas returned to his vagabond, hands-on fid-dling mode as when he started the companyfour decades ago. And that return to partici-patory innovation combined with his acquiredbusiness acumen and ecological outlook willlikely energize Patagonia as a sustainable com-pany and a model for others in the new mil-lennium. e

A Historyof HelpingA Historyof HelpingChouinard in his “skunk

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Kenneth O. Rhodes, CdeP ’30Fifty Years of Public Service by Richard O. Rhodes, CdeP ’59

If you are late to a meeting, be careful whomyou sit next to. Kenneth Rhodes, CdeP ’30,learned that in 1948. Newly elected as

Trustee to The Board of Family Service in LosAngeles, he arrived late to his third boardmeeting. The board table was filled except fora seat next to the chairman. Ken reluctantlytook the seat, then tried to understand whatthe discussion was about. “I was really at sea.It was a rather sensitive issue, concerningwhether professional employees should join aunion, and I did not understand all the ramifi-cations.” In the middle of the meeting thechairman was called out by an emergency tele-phone call and as he left the room, he turnedand said, “Ken, will you take over till I get

back?” The chairmannever came back to thatmeeting, nor did he evercome back to the agency.

Ken discovered that he“enjoyed presiding atmeetings and did a pass-able job.” In fact, his workwith Family Services wasso “passable” that he re-ceived the Red Featheraward from the Los An-geles Community Chestfor outstanding service,the first of many awards.He was given no advancednotice about this award.“I rushed to the meeting

and to the podium as my name was being called,having first rushed to the men’s room. Afterthe meeting I discovered, and I hope no oneelse had, that when I accepted the award my flywas unzipped, a rather undressed way to receivean honor.” This event did not end his volunteerwork, and “one thing has led to another” hesays, to explain how his choice of a chair led tomore than 50 years of volunteer work for manypublic service and educational organizations,often as chairperson, trustee, or president ofthe board. He notes that “Almost every boardI have served on, I have ended up chairing asearch committee.”

Ken began volunteer work at age 35, when hefelt his law practice was sufficiently well es-tablished that he could afford the time. He hadreturned for a few years to the law firm ofWilliamson, Hoge and Curry after the war. In1948 he was offered a full partnership withthe firm, but decided to form a private practiceas a sole practitioner. “I wanted to give a thirdof my time to public service, and I thought that

this would be difficult if I became part of apartnership.” He felt fortunate to have receiveda good education and felt an obligation to givesomething back to the community. He hadheard of Family Services of Los Angeles froma friend who was on the board, and agreed tojoin. Family Services worked with troubledfamilies, the emotionally disturbed, and thehomeless. During his five years of chairing theboard, he particularly enjoyed “getting peoplewith completely different ideas and approachesto work out a consensus.”

After Family Services, Ken became involvedfor ten years with the Special Services Group,which was formed just after the Zoot SuitRiots of Los Angeles, to solve the gang prob-lem in Los Angeles by encouraging construc-tive activities. Next, Ken became involved forfifteen years with the Hathaway Home forChildren that provided residential care, coun-seling, education, and training for emotionallydisturbed children.

This in turn led to volunteer work once a weekat the Legal Aid Foundation, which offeredlegal services to those who could not afford anattorney. Ken later became a member of theBoard of Directors of the Foundation, and thenserved as chairman of the board for one year.

A similar legal aid organization was formed atthis time as part of Lyndon Johnson’s war onpoverty. Ken was elected to the County BarBoard to help as liaison in merging the twoprograms, serving for three years. The chal-lenge was to merge a federally-funded programwith a private program whose board consistedof retired judges opposed to using Federalfunds for fear of Federal control. During oneparticularly difficult standoff over the racialbalance of the Foundation staff, the board gotconsensus by temporarily abolishing Robert’sRules of Order.

Additional volunteer work included serving asPublic Defender in the Federal District Court incases where the Public Defender had a conflictof interest and therefore could not serve, and asan arbitrator for the American Arbitration As-sociation, hearing uninsured motorist cases.

The president of the Los Angeles County Barasked Ken to chair the Juvenile Court Com-mittee. At the request of a presiding Judge, Kenoffered a list of experienced lawyers willing toserve as referees, including his own name. Se-lected immediately, he then served once ortwice a week for the next three years as a

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referee as needed, reading complaints, callingwitnesses, interrogating witnesses and defen-dants, reaching a decision, then reviewing aprobation report to determine the disposition.Action could be dismissal, home on probation,or placement in foster care, a child welfareagency, county camp, or Youth Authority. Theproblems heard were often difficult, involvingabandoned children, abused children, run-aways, truancy, glue sniffing, drugs, alcoholabuse, gang fights, neighborhood brawls, andtheft. Only murder cases were heard by a judgerather than a referee.

A particularly difficult task was preparing abrief on behalf of most of the child welfareagencies of Los Angeles to be presented to theCounty Board of Supervisors to improve theformula for reimbursement of agencies fortheir costs. The agencies were not being ade-quately compensated. Ken recalls that he be-came so engrossed in the brief he was workingon that he forgot to eat lunch. Hungry, he hur-ried to a restaurant in the building, entered thecrowded elevator, and when asked by the op-erator “Floor please?” he responded, “Grilledham and cheese.”

He served on the board and was chairman ofthe Family and Adult Services Division of theWelfare Planning Council of Los Angeles. WithUnited Way, he was Chairman of the ExecutiveCommittee of the General Budget Committee,and Chairman for the Committee that deter-mined funding priorities. He remembers oneelderly board member who during meetings

would turn his hearing aid off and go to sleep,then wake up, turn on his hearing aid, andraise a question about a discussion held fortyminutes earlier.

Ken also chaired a committee to merge twocommunity centers, working with a young po-liceman named Tom Bradley, who later becomemayor of Los Angeles. Bradley was “very help-ful, always constructive.” The committee wasnew and had many members who did notknow each other. “The best way to get mem-

bers of a new board talking to each other is togo through the bylaws, paragraph by para-graph” Ken notes. “The process gives the com-mittee an identity.”

Ken was a trustee of the Los Angeles County Bar,and vice president of the County Bar Founda-tion. He also worked on a lawyers committeeto study laws on adoption. He was pho-tographed at a news conference with actressJane Russell, who was also active in adoptionissues (he claims the photographs have beenlost). He also served for two years during theVietnam War on the local draft board, hearingtough cases of conscientious objectors.

In 1960 Ken joined the board of the CaltechYMCA for 35 years, serving as chairman forthree, and started The Friends of the Caltech Y,serving as co-chairperson.

Ken was born in Pasadena, California, onApril 22, 1912, when there were more orangegroves than apartment buildings. He attendedWestridge kindergarten (as one of the few boysin the all-girl school), then Polytechnic School,followed by The Thacher School. His olderbrothers Foster, CdeP ’25, and Robert, CdeP’29, had attended Thacher before him, hisbrother David, CdeP ’33, followed. Ken’smother told a friend that she had had a son atThacher for 13 years, to which the friend com-mented, “He can’t have been very bright.”

Ken especially loved his Thacher courses inPhysical Geography, Ancient History, and

German. His favoriteweekend activity was ex-ploring the backcountryon horseback, and “sleep-ing in the open and watch-ing the constellationspassing overhead and atdawn the first rays of thesun hitting the nearbymountains, then the tips ofthe trees at the foot of mysleeping bag.” Being ableto care for a horse andpack mule, “brought afeeling of independenceand adequacy in an out-ward sense.”

At Thacher, Ken had thereputation of being veryreligious, since Sherman

Day had given him the job of announcing whohad attended church the previous Sunday.Lower schoolers were required to attend everySunday, middle schoolers three out of fourSundays, lower uppers two out of four, andupper uppers one out of four. The rationalefor decreasing religious requirements with in-creasing years of study was not clear to him.

Ken graduated from Stanford University in his-tory in ’34, recollecting that “college broad-ened me while Thacher deepened me.” Each

summer during college he spent a month withfriends hiking the High Sierras, leading packburros over passes. He received his Juris Doc-torate from Harvard Law School in ’37, thenjoined a law firm briefly before serving in theNavy, ultimately being promoted to Lt. Com-mander, a rank that he worried “far out-stripped my knowledge and experience.”

In 1938 he married Betty Fleming, who quicklylearned to share Ken’s love of the outdoors, inspite of her first camping experience with Ken,a wet, cold rainy night in the high countrywithout a tent. They raised four children: Dick,CdeP ’59, Margaret, Tom, and Ted, CdeP ’65.

Ken became active in Thacher causes shortly af-ter Ted graduated, sitting on many committees,serving as Trustee from 1977 to 1990, Presidentof the Board from 1982 to 1986, and Emeri-tus for life. He is proud of the improvementsthat occurred during his tenure on the Board.The budget was balanced, the School becameco-educational, the faculty was strengthened, thenew science building was completed, the old sci-ence building was converted to humanitiescenter, a new library wing was built, and newdorms were constructed. The Centennial Cel-ebration raised $18 million. Ken remarks “Myconnection with Thacher has covered a span of73 years. I have known every headmaster theSchool has ever had…”

In 1968 Ken became a trustee of Scripps Col-lege, Betty’s Alma Mater. He was chairman forfive years, served on the Graduate SchoolBoard, and chaired the search committee to re-place the retiring Graduate School President(Joe Platt, a former trustee of Thacher). Ken

continued on page 62


Three generations of Thacher grads: Julien ’02, Tristan, CdeP ’97, Kit,CdeP ’95, Dick, CdeP ’59, and Ken, CdeP ’30, Rhodes

Ken and Betty continued hiking well into theireighties.


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Nicholas Cunningham, M.D.,Dr.P.H., CdeP ’46Heeding the Words of “The Banquet Song” by George F. French, CdeP ’46

The brightest theme that has resonated throughthe life and works of Nicholas Cunningham,CdeP ’46, has been his relentless pursuit of

“what was fair.” Most of us, in pursuing thealmighty dollar, tend tobelittle as quixotic andnaïve all references towhat’s “fair”: we evenhear it said that “There’sno such thing as ‘fair’;there’s only what actuallyworks,” an ethic remi-niscent of “corporatetrainer” Richard Hatchwho won a million dol-lars for his unscrupu-lous role in Survivor. Yeteverything that Nicholashas done loudly pro-claims an opposite eth-ic that sounds more ofS.D.T.’s old “BanquetSong.” And the roots ofthat ethic grew not onlyout of Nick’s time at

Thacher, but also out of his earlier years wherehe was the youngest of five children in a re-markably caring and supportive family envi-ronment. “When all your siblings are older,” Nickexplains, “you don’t have any power base…”and so you have to negotiate, often invoking “fair-ness” as the universal standard.

Nick’s mother and father ran an eminently mu-sical upstate New York household that oper-ated through an elaborate rule structure, butwith a bond of fairness and Emersonian self-re-liance that held it all together. By the timeNicholas came along, both his brothers (Fred-eric, CdeP ’39, and Lawrence, CdeP ’42) andsisters already could play the tunes and songsNicholas was still trying to learn. But the rulewas that once you started studying a piece, itbecame yours. So if an older sibling wanted tosit down and embarrass you by rattling off thepiece you were struggling with, you’d just say,“Don’t play my tune!” and the older one had

to stop, because to continue wouldnot have been fair.

And much later, when Nicholascame home from an interview withthe admission people at Johns Hop-kins Medical School, he asked hismother (who had raised her childrento believe firmly in equality), “How

can I go to a school that’s still completely seg-regated?” And she answered, “You have to go,because it’s the best of the 14 you applied to.And you’ll figure out how to deal with the seg-regation problem.” Then when Nicholas didget to Johns Hopkins, he decided not to agitatewithin the school because he found it to be vir-tually impregnable. He therefore decided tojoin C.O.R.E. (The Congress of Racial Equal-ity) so that he could spend his weekends pick-eting Baltimore lunch counters for their failureto serve the mixed groups he was with, and hesang in the interracial chorus that C.O.R.E.was sponsoring. According to his now matur-ing ethic of fairness, Nicholas believed thisC.O.R.E. participation was needed to ‘pay for’his going to a segregated school. His groupsucceeded in opening up all the lunch countersand restrooms at Woolworth, Kresge, etc. Andat the same time Nicholas was discovering thepower of non-violent resistance, thereby an-ticipating its vital role in so many of his futuresuccesses.

�Just before 7:00 A.M. on a bright June day in1957, a classic yellow-and-white convertible,towing a trailer laden with an old motorcycleand a giant cello, pulled up in front of BabiesHospital in New York City. Driver Nick, col-orfully dressed and wearing one red and onegreen sock, had just served two years in the In-dian Health Service in Arizona—and in minuteswas to start the first day of a two-year pediatricresidency. This grand entrance set the tone fora professional life that would not only chal-lenge myriad conventions and assumptions,but would also pioneer a great chain of inno-vations and accomplishments that translatesinto fourteen overwhelming pages of a denselypacked Curriculum Vitae—a monumental listof achievements, honors, and awards; plus 17academic and hospital appointments, 12 grantawards, 25 appointments to professional boardsand committees, 35 health consultancies; andthen seven more C.V. pages listing countless

Alumni Profiles


“…May honor, and fairness, and kindness, and truthBe ours till life’s struggle is through.”So the stamp of the School was the stamp of the Man:It was Thacher that made Nick rethink what was ‘fair’And apply what he learned to the problems out there,And then do the best work in the world that he couldTill the best he could do was all done.


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professional publications, lectures, poster ses-sions, abstracts, and presentations.

When his pediatric residency was completedat Babies Hospital/Columbia PresbyterianMedical Center, Nicholas won a neonatal fel-lowship that enabled him to stay on there foran extra year studying the special problems ofnewborns. But this work was interrupted in1962 by a phone call from Sergeant Shriver,who invited Nicholas to volunteer for thePeace Corps and lead an 18-person medicalteam to Togo. Those first two years in Africapersuaded him of the need for a more preven-tive approach to health problems. This ap-proach was explored further first through afellowship at the London School of Hygiene,and secondly through an extended tour in ruralNigeria, operating and evaluating an “Under-Fives Clinic” in the little town of Imesi, whereNicholas demonstrated the special effective-ness of blending preventive with curative med-ical measures. An urban adaptation of thismodel was later implemented in the city ofLagos, and ultimately incorporated into theNigerian National Primary Health Care Sys-tem, leading Nicholas to a doctorate in PublicHealth and many other international healthconsultancies.

In 1969, Nicholas returned to New York andspent the following 31 years practicing andteaching pediatrics, while at the same timeseeking to adapt the principles he had learnedin Africa to the special needs of the Americaninner city. Thus in 1972 Nicholas piloted thefirst conversion of a “well-baby station” (asoperated by the New York City Departmentof Health) into the new sort of all-inclusive“preventive-curative” Child Health Clinics thathe had now spent so many years developing.The conversion of all such stations into newChild Health Clinics throughout New YorkCity was only recently completed.

Nicholas further advanced his pioneering “pre-ventive-curative” approach in 1995 by joiningwith the Soros Open Society Institute to takethe lessons learned once more into the inter-national arena. Nicholas and the O.S.I. teamorganized training conferences and site visitsthroughout 18 newly independent eastern Eu-ropean countries in order to address their in-creasingly serious problems of child abuse,neglect, and violence in the home. Nick’s sim-ply-stated goals: “To use teamwork to get that‘first love-affair’ between each mother andchild off to a strong start, to provide a ‘medicalhome’ for every child, and to help all parentsdo their very best with the art and science ofraising healthy children.”

Nicholas now lives in Manhattan with his sec-ond wife Catherine (who is a child psychia-trist) and her two daughters. Nicholas and hisfirst wife Ruth have three children: Ian, 35 (acomputer-graphics specialist); Andrew, 32 (aPeace Corps volunteer in Honduras); andHetty, 34 (a physician who lives in Harlem and

has just now taken over her father’spediatric practice; her son Adrian isNick’s first grandchild). Nicholas re-grets that none of his children went toThacher—but physicians who onlyteach don’t make enough to considerthat option.

A bare-bones laundry list (like the lastfive paragraphs) may be useful forbiosketching, but it does not do jus-tice to Nicholas. Something is lack-ing—much as a skeleton lacksflesh—and it is because Nicholas isthat rare individual whose life is morefittingly depicted in terms of the PRIN-CIPLES that he has stood for and im-plemented. There are at least sevensuch principles:

Principle 1: True fairness means youare color-blind.

Nicholas very personally implementedthis principle not only by several yearsof work with the Congress of RacialEquality, but also by marrying anAfrican American woman with whomhe had three children. And profes-sionally, his most important work wasbegun in Nigeria where his ability to heed thesuggestions of mothers and nurses stirred himinto creatively combining preventive and cur-ative measures—first in Africa and later inNew York, and then later into revolutionizingNew York City’s health-maintenance technol-ogy. None of this would have been possible ifNicholas were not truly color-blind.

Principle 2: Charm and enthusiasm can winthe day.

In his written application for the position of aDirector of an international health organization,Nicholas made this entry on the last line: “If youneed an enthusiast, I am one!” Thus Nicholasknows his special power of enthusiasm, and hemakes of it a most impressive tool. It is indeedthe more impressive for its total lack of affec-tation: his enthusiasm is eminently genuineand infectious, and he wins converts to his viewsby simply wielding his enthusiasm at them.

Late one night when Nicholas had just arrivedback in Lagos, Nigeria, the taxi he was takingto his hotel was stopped at a roadblock wherefive rather drunken soldiers ordered him outof the taxi. They bluntly demanded of him,“What have you brought us from the UnitedStates?” And Nicholas impulsively replied, “Ihave brought you a song,” which he begansinging loudly and outrageously, not evenknowing what in particular he was singing.The soldiers were quite taken aback, neverhaving encountered the likes of Nicholas, andthey were somehow charmed and disarmed bythis strange outburst, and they started to laugh.And finally the Sergeant in charge said, “Ahh,get out of here!”


Nick’s favorite utterance over the last 56 yearsappears to have been “Fantastic!” and thetrademark way he is given to uttering thatword bespeaks the enthusiasm, the sincerity,and the charm that has now so long firedNick’s every project and manifesto.

Principle 3: Music massages the spirit, preventsburnout, and lets you meet people in adifferent way.

Thacher did a great thing for this cello-playing11th grader: arrangements were made forNicholas to take lessons from an eminentteacher named Abbas who fortuitously livednear the School. With Nick Muhlenberg, CdeP’45, at the violin and Bill Nixon, CdeP ’45, atthe piano, the Cunningham Cello dominatedthis trio (at least visually) as they producedwartime Sunday-evening recitals in the old li-brary. Nicholas went on to play professionally,for a short time, with the Phoenix and thePasadena Symphony Orchestras before anothercareer delimited him to lifelong amateur status.

While Nicholas has seen how idealistic physi-cians typically get burned out from overworkand frustration, he is positive that music hashelped him avoid that fate and, in fact, hasbeen a major factor in enabling him to so en-ergetically continue teaching generation aftergeneration of new medical students. Playing

Dr. Nicholas Cunningham teaching at ColumbiaPresbyterian Hospital

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flow and trust in the teammate.

In a recent interview, Nick said, ”Anythingever accomplished was always with the helpof other people. I’ve really done nothing onmy own. I do have ideas; I think they can beaccomplished, but I am not good at followingthrough. So I always work with a team. I al-ways engage and inspire other people, and thenthe thing succeeds NOT because I was thereto make it work necessarily, but because a teamwas there…”

After Nicholas com-pleted his evaluationof the rural Under-Fives-Clinic project atImesi, he was invitedby the Ford Founda-tion to develop anurban model for sucha clinic right in Lagos,the capital of Nigeria.Now Ford didn’t per-mit them to build any-thing from scratch,but with the help ofgood people Nickbrought in, he foundan old shell of a build-ing, adapted it to theirneeds, and had thenew clinic up andrunning in jig time.But this skimping leftthe patients’ wall-less

waiting area exposed to dust clouds rolling infrom cars that zipped by on the dirt road out-side, and the colorfully dressed Nigerian moth-ers were suffering accordingly—yet no moneywas available to build the needed wall. Thenone May, Ojo—the nurse who ran the clinic—asked all the mothers to have their husbandscome down to the clinic the following Satur-day. When some 45 of them showed up, shesaid “Look, your wives like what we’re doing,but they’re getting dirty while waiting for serv-ice. We need a wall built between the openwaiting area and the street. Can you do it?”And they said, “Sure, we’ll do it!”

In no time at all these men had built a won-derful wall, at the same time creating a usefulsolidarity which Nurse Ojo (unbeknownst toDr. Nick) was then turning into a “Fathers’Club.” Around this time, the Lagos city gov-ernment noticed how effectively the new clinicwas working; they got jealous and said, “Ohthank you very much. We’re taking this backnow…” And Nick’s Lagos University colleagueDr. Ransome Kuti (later the Nigerian Minis-ter of Health), reacted by saying, “Well, this ispolitical, and I can’t get into it. There’s nothingwe can do; you’ll just have to turn the clinicover to them.”

Now this was like Pow Wow seeing thewashed-out trail in front of him. And Nick had

no way of anticipating what would happennext, any more than he had had at the criticalmoment on that six-inch shale trail. But assoon as Nurse Ojo heard the politicians an-nounce that the new clinic was finished, sheconvened the Fathers’ Club and asked, “Doyou want them to take it over, so that it’ll thenbe like any other government clinic?” Theyreplied, “Hell, no!” and went to the local au-thorities and said, “Hey, you can’t take overthis clinic—it belongs to us because we builtit!” And in the face of this all-male onslaught,the city backed off and the “builders” pre-vailed.

By putting up a wall, the men had formed apartnership that made them (along withNicholas, the clinic employees, and the wiveswho were the pre-natal-care patients) all in-volved together in the clinic’s survival. And itwas the remarkable Nurse Ojo who, like PowWow, had spontaneously reared straight upand reversed the course of fate so that the clinicproject would survive. And all Nick did herewas go along for the ride, just as he did withPow Wow.

Principle 5: The best teaching is done at roundtables.

As a long-time medical-school lecturer (whoperforce must occasionally look down on hisstudents from a lectern), Professor Nicholassaid in another interview, “One of my heroes isPaolo Freire. He wrote a book called The Ped-agogy of the Oppressed. And what he says isthat education, if it’s one way, is indoctrina-tion, and it tends to be debilitating rather thanempowering. And if you consider yourself aneducator, you have to always be prepared tolearn.…Since reading his stuff, I make it apoint to try and teach and learn in a circle sothat we can see each other’s faces.”

Paolo may not have gone to Thacher, butNicholas did. And like the rest of us, he toosat at round dining tables where each of ushad a chance to listen, and occasionally par-ticipate, while facing nine others at the sametable. There’s something about the TableRound that with everyone pretty much at thesame eye level seems to induce spontaneity:new ideas can come from any direction.

Principle 6: Peaceful change is possible whenyou work with what is best in your adversary.

If you could travel back through time to anygiven spring evening in 1945, and beam your-self down to any spot on the baseball field justbelow the old Upper School, chances are you’dhear the loud polemics that Lower Upperroommates Nicholas Cunningham and TomSimons, CdeP ’46, typically blasted at eachother. Despite the radically different politics ofthe two lads, these were friendly polemics, andtheir firm friendship was probably a result oftheir each discovering how to listen to and torespect the other’s point of view: each had



the cello has been both a balm to his spirit anda needed escape from workday tribulations.

A separate role of music is that it helps onemake connections: While working in Sloveniain 1997, Nick referred to the InternationalBook of the Amateur Chamber Music Societyand noted the name of a fellow who liked toplay chamber music. Reaching him on thephone, Nick then learned that a third memberof their now arranged trio was one PavelKornhauser. The latter turned out to be Slove-nia’s top pediatrician who, in fact, had writtena book on the subject of child abuse—exactly

the subject that Nick was in Slovenia to re-search! So they met, played Rachmaninoff, andNick got invited to present to the Slovenian Pe-diatric Society an address which is being pub-lished this year in their Pediatric Journal.

Principle 4: Move mountains to find the bestteammate you can, and then put your totaltrust in that teammate.

Nick’s horse at Thacher was Pow Wow, andone particular adventure with him stands out.It was just after a rain that the two were ne-gotiating a precarious six-inch wide trail thatwound across a shale bank so steep that riderNick could touch the shale on the right whileto the left there was a sheer drop-off. Then,unexpectedly, the trail in front was abruptlygone, washed out. And while Nick was tryingto figure out what he was going to do, PowWow suddenly reared straight up, turned com-pletely around, and was facing the other di-rection, with Nick clutching on for dear life, allstill on the six-inch wide trail. And the horsehad done this astounding thing all on his own!There are times when one just needs to depend

Nicholas and wife Catherine holding first grandson Adrian


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learned how to seek out “what was best” inthe adversary.

Nicholas later gained an ethic of non-violentresistance not only from his Johns Hopkinsyears with C.O.R.E., but also from two col-lege summers in France, where he served in theService Civile Voluntaire Internationale(S.C.V.I.), founded by a Swiss engineer namedPierre Ceresole. The latter’s message comple-mented the C.O.R.E. philosophy: “If you wantto effect change, work with what is best inyour adversary, and not with what is worst.”

This is why Nicholas became so fervent aboutIraq. He idealized that our foreign policyshould be based on all the good in the Iraqisociety, not on Saddam, who represented theworst. He therefore connected up with theA.F.S.C. (American Friends Service Commit-tee), that wanted to reach out to the doctors,the educators, the teachers, and the positiveforces in Iraq, wherever and whoever theymight be. And the only way to do that was toactually go there and meet them. Nicholas thenbecame one of a team of five pediatricians andchild-welfare specialists who traveled to Iraq inNovember, 1998, to look hard at the plight ofchildren after eight years of United Nationseconomic sanctions.

Technically they were law-breakers: there wasa State Department edict to the effect that noAmericans were allowed to go to Iraq (you’d loseyour passport if it showed you’d been there). Butthe team took a deviously roundabout routeto avoid the problem, and ultimately reachedBaghdad with a modest supply of books andmedications that had survived customs inspec-tions. During their stay they recorded inter-views with some two dozen health specialists,physicians, U.N. representatives, and Iraqi Gov-ernment officials (plus a handful of taxicabdrivers, storeowners, and business people whohappened to speak some English).

While they were there, the United States oncemore decided to bomb Iraq. Three of the teammembers opted to leave immediately, knowingfull well that the borders would shut down assoon as the oncoming bombers were detected.Yet Dr. Leila Richards, the team leader, was in-tent on staying, despite the imminent bomb-ing. Then Nicholas also decided to stay, notonly to support Leila, but also so that he couldstill manage to interview the country’s headpediatrician Dr. al-Ruznamaji (it was aboutthis time that Nick’s wife Cathy got the unset-tling word that “All had gotten out saveNicholas…”).

A rewarding interview with Dr. al-Ruznamajidid take place, and as good luck had it thebombing was canceled at about the last minute.And on their return, the team and the A.F.S.C.in December, 1998, published a booklet, “Childand Maternal Health and Nutrition in Iraqunder the Sanctions,” that exposed the terribledevastation to Iraqi mothers and children that

had been caused by the “Sanc-tions.”

Principle 7: True fairnessmeans you prize diversity.

There is a diversity thatNicholas’s life of serviceclearly reflects. It is thehealthy diversity that willbenefit all of us at such timeas there is a righteous guar-antee that every child can getthe help needed to avoid dis-ease and deprivation. Fairnessdemands as much, especiallywhen we’re reminded thatevery child is a member ofour larger family. This is ar-guably the major ethical prin-ciple of Nicholas’s life.

Our Thacher family in 1945was not rich in “diversity”:none of us was black or His-panic or Jewish or female.And we all came from well-to-do families—except onelad named Taylor Sloan, whowas there on a special schol-arship. Taylor was kind of an“outsider” in that he broughtdifferent energies, differentideas, different views…”something of an anomaly tothe “Quiet Generation” thatthe rest of us were later la-beled.

Nicholas adds: “…I’m for bringing in more ofthe ‘outsiders.’ We need to keep in contact withthose who provide different energies. I wouldnever have taken up jazz if it hadn’t been formy rebellious brother Larry, because he waswilling to go outside of Bach to really experi-ment. So keeping somebody like that in yourfamily and in your world is really important; itkeeps you alert and animated and interest-ing…and Tay Sloan, like Larry, had broughtdifferent energies and was our one outsider,our one handle on diversity.”

Then one warm Saturday evening, in the springof 1945, Taylor Sloan slipped a dummy intohis bed and quietly rode his horse down toOjai. He was caught and summarily expelled.To Nicholas, predictably, this was grossly un-fair, because a member of our family had beentorn from us.

Looking at the Thacher of today, with its won-derfully multiple levels of diversity, it’s clearthat futurist Nicholas had anticipated a comingworld that was fairer and more diverse. Yeteven in that older Thacher were the seeds ofNick’s growing convictions about fairness: forthose ready to read it, the message had allalong been right there in S.D.T.’s original“Banquet Song.” e


Playing cello is Nick’s escape from the daily work tribulations ofmedicine


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F. Perry Gates, CdeP ’59Planting the Seeds of Community Awareness, Integrity,

and Self-Reliance Among the Youth of Maine by Stephen P. Huyler, CdeP ’69

“During my senior year at college it becameclear to me that for sixteen years, edu-cation, money, travel, and a lot of care

had been pumped into me and it was now myturn to start putting that back into the sys-tem… ergo: the Peace Corps. On some basiclevel, Thacher very definitely contributed tothe preparation for the thinking process: ‘Nowit’s my turn’ Not to give back to Thacher somuch, but to give it to the next generationsome place else. To simply take the message ofplowing back into the system what the systemneeds to sustain itself and to evolve all those el-ements that it needs.”

Perry Gates, CdeP ’59, has spent most of hisadult life focused on community service. He

has had a rich and var-ied education: a Bache-lor of Arts fromWilliams, graduatecourses in education atthe University of Mass-achusetts, and furthercourses at the MuseumSchool of Fine Arts inBoston, and at Dart-mouth, Harvard, andthe University of Cali-fornia, Santa Barbara.He considers his pri-mary interest through-out his life to have beenhuman developmentand character develop-ment.

After serving in Ecuador for two years withthe Peace Corps, Perry spent a year teachingEnglish at Thacher (1967-68), before he finallysettled in mid-coast Maine. There, for the firsteight years, he worked for the Hurricane Is-land Outward Bound School creating pro-grams for at-risk youths. Then, in 1975, hefounded PROJECTS, Inc., a non-profit organ-ization devoted to planting among teenagersthe seeds of community awareness, integrity,and self-reliance. PROJECTS, Inc. has had aremarkable history. During its 25 years, it hascreated more than 20 distinct programs to fa-cilitate social and personal responsibilityamong the young.

Perry comments: “I started PROJECTS, Inc.in 1975 in recognition that most of the moresignificant experiences of life happen as bi-products of something else. We don’t learn re-sponsibility by being taught to be responsiblein a classroom. We frequently wake up ten

years later to realize ‘My God, I’m marriedand have two children!’ We don’t just go outon the street corner and say: ‘Oh, you’ll do!’and get married. It just sort of happens. It tookUlysses ten years to get home but look whathappened on the way while getting there. Theexperience is in getting there. So with this inmind, it became pretty clear to me that if Iwanted to work in a community, especiallywith young people, it was probably best to getthem involved with anything—and then thepeople with whom I was working and I couldteach them the values and the skills theywanted to have along the way. But first youhave to get them involved. So PROJECTS, Inc.did not have any real value structure itself. Thekids could build hot cars or plastic sailboats.They didn’t have to build nice wooden sail-boats. I really didn’t care. It was more in thedoing than in what they were doing. So we setup all these small businesses to make and selleverything from small wooden boxes to maplesyrup, to lobster traps, (which included catch-ing the lobsters and selling the lobster rolls.)There were endless series of opportunities likethat. And it wasn’t just junior achievement; itwas a real business because it didn’t stop atfive in the afternoon. They had to worry aboutthe evaporator boiling over at eleven o’clock atnight, and they had to build the sugar house,and they had to market the product, and thenthey had to keep the books.

“I think that probably the lowest common de-nominator value that we really tried to instill inyoung people was to take responsibility forwhat they were doing. Whether it was keepinga set of books accurately, or making sure thatthe evaporator didn’t boil over, or that a per-son was happy with their delivery of lobsters,or that a family got well treated by home coun-selors—whatever that was, be responsible forit; take responsibility for it and act upon it.Realize that what you are learning can be ap-plied to something else down the road. It’smuch like anything we do in life: it has a be-ginning, a middle, and an end. First you thinkabout a project and plan it, then you do it, andthen you reflect back on it. It’s like tying yourshoes. I need to tie my shoes, so I do it, and ifI do a good job, my shoelaces don’t come apartand I can walk down the street. If I fall flat onmy back, that’s feedback. I didn’t do a verygood job, so I do it again. It’s the same processwhether it’s going to the moon or tying yourshoes. In this way we really wanted theseyoung people to have the opportunity to ex-perience doing things for themselves. And thenwhat they did with it was up to them. We

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made no claim to values. As I said, woodenboats, fiberglass, plastic, it makes no differ-ence. Who cares? It is what they do with it thatmatters.

“We were never without a wealth of youngpeople who wanted to do something becausethere was essentially nothing else for them todo. The education system wasn’t providing itfor them; it was pretty much standard learningby rote, by the book. So they were pretty muchfree to do what they wanted in the afternoonsand evenings. Once you get one of them, if it’sfun for them, ten will follow. It didn’t takemuch. We linked with the schools so it was anafter-school project.

“After 10 or 15 years of doing that, then theschools were ready to have this approach in-fused into their system. Consequently, learn-ing through community service became moreimportant because then they could integrateservice learning with the English class, the his-tory class, and mathematics, and take the cog-nitive experience and apply it in the real world.This was the same thing I learned at Thacherand from your Dad (Jack Huyler). Take Eng-lish and just have it a part of your life. Sit in thebeautiful chapel and experience the Iliad, ifyou will, while you are looking out to the west.That to me is unbeatable. This allusion maybe a little stretch because you are not actuallydoing something with the Iliad, but at leastyou are experiencing the sense of the wholeprocess.”

Perry remembers Newt Chase coming to hishome in Hartford, Connecticut, when he wasin the tenth grade. His mother had alreadytaken him to visit the campuses of eastern prepschools; but none of them had appealed tohim. When asked what he wanted to be whenhe grew up, Perry always stated: “Either acowboy or a fighter pilot.” The Thacher head-master was the only one who took him seri-ously. Perry was hooked within minutes.Already young for his class, he repeated thetenth grade at Thacher, became a horsemanand camper, won the coveted Lowery Cup, andwent on to become School Chairman in hissenior year.

Perry states: “I think that Thacher had a veryreal way of awakening the relationship in mewith the outdoor world...That wasn’t going tohappen at the Groton School et al—and Ineeded that as a child. I need it as an adult,and I find that the times that I feel most in tuneare when I bring the intellectual to the naturalperceptive world of what I see going on aroundme. And that’s what PROJECTS, Inc. has beenall about: taking the experiential or living themoment in some other reality than just an ac-ademic or cognitive approach.

“At Thacher at the same time that I was learn-ing solid or plain geometry from Charles Beck,I was learning leadership from Newton Chase.Chase taught me how to run the student body

at the same time I had some beloved adults,my teachers (Newt Chase being one of them,as well as Bob Miller, Fred Lamb, Hank Reif,Don McDougall, and Jack Huyler), sort ofhelping me through this process. That’s what Ireally learned. And it was fairness, fair play; itwas having this admiration for some of myclassmates like Lynn White who really helpedcreate the honor system for Thacher. Hebrought it to the School. I helped in theprocess, but Lynn had the smarts and thewhere-with-all and the desire to make it hap-pen. So those are the things, almost the intan-gibles, that I feel the School has to offer whichyou don’t find in the catalog.”

Perry has spent his life trying to instill thosesame values into the teenagers of Maine. Oneof his most successful endeavors has been whatwas originally named the Community ServiceProject. According to Perry: “There were a lotof young people looking for something to doand a lot of elderly people who needed thingsdone for them. Why not get them together?Really simple. It’s worked ever since then. Somuch so that the C.S.P. went off on its own in1995, by design, and became the CommunityService Project Inc., with its own 501(c)3, itsown board of directors, etc. And then last yearthey renamed themselves Youth Links. But thegenesis was back in 1982.”

When asked if he might relate an illustrativeexample of the service C.S.P. did, Perry toldthe following story: “An elderly woman calledus and asked us to come out and help build aporch for her trailer. So four kids got in thevan and out we went and got the lumber andstarted to build her a porch. In the process welearned that she only had one light in the houseand we began to sense something funny abouther living situation. We’d been hired to buildthe porch. She paid for the lumber, we donatedthe time. The kids did not get paid. They vol-unteered their time; we in the staff were paidthrough donations and funding. We came tofind out that the electric service entrance to hertrailer was only half working. Then we realizedthat she was heating her bath water in her mi-crowave—one cup at a time! And bathing her-self for the past month and a half with thosesingle cups of water every two or three days!She had no lights in her bedroom and only halfof her cooking range worked. Needless to say,we went back to the shop. The kids set up a carwash to raise money. C.S.P. contributed therest and we hired an electrician to go out andfix her electric entrance to her house. In theprocess of that we also learned that her familylived next door and had done nothing forGrandma for the past three months! Now, wehave four kids who have had this experience.We went into it with the idea of simple car-pentry skills to build a porch. What they re-ceived was a lesson in inter-family dynamics, insocial welfare, in cultural relations between thehaves and the have-nots, in how to run a carwash and get money to pay for some of thethings that they wanted to see happen for this


woman. And I submit that they will remem-ber that experience for the rest of their lives,while if they had read a chapter in a book onsociology about how people get along with oneanother it would have been in one ear and outthe other. They would have forgotten it.

“C.S.P., now Youth Links, provides unlimitedopportunities to interface with a skipped gen-eration, their grandparents’ generation, whichmany kids do not have. It has proven invalu-able to interface with that generation and sim-ply experience their wisdom and theirappreciation for what these young people areable to do; whether that is raking leaves orsimply reading them the newspaper because alot of these elderly people are illiterate: theysimply cannot read! The kids go in and read tothem. The bonding that occurs is the magicthat makes it go on. The purpose of PRO-JECTS is to get these things set up and work-ing and then cut them free. If they are meant tosurvive they will and that’s how we’ve styledourselves, to cause this to happen.”

In 1998 Perry left the running of PROJECTS,Inc. to begin his own maple syrup company,Maine Gold, in Rockport, Maine. He loves toplant trees and to harvest the maple sap. Healso devotes a great deal of time to his mar-riage to Deborah Mehan and to their two chil-dren, Gabe (15) and Josie (11). He still serveson the board of his original non-profit, al-though he states: “PROJECTS is now sort ofon the shelf while the board works on redefin-ing its mission and deciding whether or notthere is a place for it in this community. Thenation seems to be awash in money. People getgiven things a lot—many benefits. I’m not surethat there is a need for such an organization asours right now because the big corporationshave come in and have done so much to spon-sor programs and improve conditions. Ratherthan having the young people do it, they arehanded stuff. Maybe that is the communityproblem we now have to solve.” Althoughnow involved in his own private business,working with nature and the land in a waythat he so loves, Perry Gates remains true to hisideals formed so long ago at Thacher, in col-lege, and in the Peace Corps. He continues hisinvolvement in the communities in mid-coastMaine and to give back into the system therichness of experiences he has reaped. e


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Ted Rhodes, CdeP ’65Local Hero, Community Activitist by Robert A. Isaacson, CdeP ’66

The two parallel tracks of the dirt road windin a graceful “S” pattern through a gentlyrolling meadow of green grasses just going

to seed, and white and purple flowering wildradishes. The road disappears between twogroves of tall eucalyptus trees. In the near dis-tance, beyond the meadow, stretches a grove oflarge sycamores, just starting to leaf out forthe coming summer months, their new leavespale green and silvery. The angular, steeply ris-ing, partly shadowed ridges and canyons ofthe grey, chaparral-covered Santa Ynez Moun-tains, a part of southern California’s transverseranges, tower dramatically above the lush fore-ground. The mountains’ sandstone outcrop-pings stand above the dense brush cover,

shining white in thebright spring sunlight.

This classic picture ofold California could beone of Ojai in the lastcentury, before the or-ange groves wereplanted, or perhaps thenorthern edge of theSan Gabriel Valley. Infact, it is the view fac-ing north from theocean of a small sectionof the Carpinteriacoastal plain locallyknown as “The Bluffs.”It is a well-recognizedposter made from aphotograph taken byTed Rhodes, CdeP ’65,

entitled “Country Road.” It is part of a postertrilogy by Arturo Tello and former Thacherparent, Meredith Abbott, created during a1990 fundraising campaign to save the landfrom development. To see Ted’s poster is tobegin to understand why he has devoted muchof the last 13 years to preserving this uniqueplace for future generations.

To a large extent, Ted’s pastoral view is a mo-mentary illusion, one cautiously buffered fromthe real world. For, in truth, close, just overthe grassy rise, is the perpetually busy 101Freeway bounded by its chainlink fences. Trac-tor-trailer rigs roar by incessantly, and weekendtourists pour back east to the Los Angeles area,sometimes bringing the freeway to a crawl onSunday afternoons, some 50 miles west of thevast metropolis. A sprawling, Lego-like con-dominium development rises on an adjacentbluff top just on the inland side of the freeway.A sizeable oil facility lies to the west, and a

business park already occupies the coastal shelfimmediately to the east.

Ted’s bucolic poster, however, captures the sub-tle and deeply felt beauty of a quickly disap-pearing, natural landscape, one that hasliterally been buried beneath the dozens of rap-idly growing cities crowding the coastal shelfbetween the mountains and the beaches of allof southern California. Growing up inPasadena, in the San Gabriel Valley, Ted knewwell the fate of open land in urban settings.During the last 13 years, Ted has played a keyrole in making sure that the seemingly funda-mental and inexorable economic forces of Cal-ifornia real estate would not bury theCarpinteria Bluffs, an undeveloped parcel ofprime development land sandwiched betweenthe city, the freeway and the sea. Since 1968, agood many years before Ted moved to Carpin-teria, The Bluffs has been the site of many con-flicts between developers and preservationists.Back then, when the parcel’s highest and bestuse had been for raising hay and beans, a newoil refinery was designated for the site. De-feating that project was merely the first ofmany battles.

But even then, in the sixties, when the fate ofThe Bluffs had first become a local politicalissue, Ted was already preparing for his ownlater struggle to save The Bluffs. While a jun-ior at Dartmouth, Ted took off around thecountry, campaigning for “Clean Gene” Mc-Carthy in the Indiana and California primaries.I remember putting Ted up in my dorm roomat Claremont while he helped to organize stu-dents to get them out to canvas for the antiwarplatform. Later, in VISTA, Ted did social workin Fort Wayne, Indiana, and eventually helpedto found and also to write for the Fort WayneFree Press, lending voice and organizationalskills to anti-war, civil rights, United Farm-workers, poverty and other community groupsgenerally ignored by the local media. Ted de-veloped considerable political savvy duringthose years, which included being routed froma legally-permitted peace demonstration out-side an Air Force base in Kokomo, Indiana, bymembers of the American Legion and the KluKlux Klan, who assaulted demonstrators asState troopers looked on. During experienceslike these, Ted learned how to stay calm underpressure. Even though the activities in whichTed was involved were both nonviolent andlegal, after the passage of the Freedom of In-formation Act, Ted was finally able to read hisown personal F.B.I. file that had been assem-bled on him during the sixties and seventies.

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Ted’s reaction was, “Well, if I have an F.B.I.file, I must have been doing something right!”He has learned to use his own zany sense ofhumor and the absurd in his writing and pub-lic speaking to get his points across.

Now that I think about it, even years beforecollege, when we were both Thacher students,Ted and I worked together on a home movieproject that was a sort of prelude to his effortsto save The Bluffs. We traveled around, takingfootage of remote ranches on the Californiacoast and the Channel Islands, trying to cap-ture the stark beauty of the large stretches ofunspoiled, natural landscape and pristinecoastline. We gathered a lot of scenic footage,but never really finished that movie since backthen we lacked a firm grasp of the importanceof story telling in making a picture. Still, theCarpinteria Bluffs, with its grasslands, ruggedcoastal cliffs, sea life, and mountainous back-drop, is really a perfect microcosm of the land-scape Ted tried to capture in that film done inhis high school years.

Ted’s reverence of the natural world has longbeen a powerful influence on his personal valuesystem. Horse camping at Thacher was also avery important part of his education. We oncerode 100 miles home to my family’s ranchfrom Thacher at the end of the year. Weclimbed the coast range somewhere west ofMatilija and rode along its crest high abovethe Carpinteria, Santa Barbara, and Goletacoastal plains. The views were stunning as welooked down over the narrow sea-lined shelfand the wave-carved coastline. Experiences likethat—more aesthetic than intellectual—at ayoung age, can do as much to educate one fullyin the long run as does reading a Faulknernovel or peering through a microscope. As acollege writing instructor today, I tell my stu-

dents to memorize landscapes and fill theirheads with rich imagery. Ted has always donethat. In the Santa Barbara region, Ted has be-come known as an environmental activist be-cause of his abiding reverence for nature, forthe aesthetics of place, especially southern Cal-ifornia. Once a Sociology and UrbanStudies major at Dartmouth, he hascome to see his struggle to preservethe Carpinteria Bluffs as a metaphorfor something beyond environmen-talism. He now thinks of it as polit-ical empowerment. The long daysTed dedicated to preserving TheBluffs really amounted to creating,organizing, and perpetuating a grass-roots political movement. Back in1988, Ted became involved with theCarpinteria Valley Association’s fightto save The Bluffs after a group oflocal artists, who often painted atThe Bluffs, gathered some 3,000 sig-natures on a petition protesting aproposed large-scale development onthe 81-acre site. The developmentproposal included a gated community of 341dwellings, a restaurant, 30,000 square feet ofretail shops, a 150-room hotel, and a 350-seatconvention center.

Later, in 1990, Ted became deeply involved inhelping to elect a first-time slow growth ma-jority of three new candidates who replacedincumbents on the city council. Carpinteriahad been a typical sleepy little town run by the“boys in the back room.” Up to this point, thecity council had rarely turned down a devel-opment proposal. Saving the Carpinteria Bluffsas open space integrated into the urban land-scape grew into a symbol during the campaignof a larger planning vision for the future of thewhole Carpinteria community. Throughout the

process, Tedhelped to articu-late a coherentplatform for thismovement, muchof which centeredon preserving TheBluffs as openspace. Next cameTed’s successfulopposition to theeffort by the de-feated pro-growthforces to recall thenew three slow-growth city coun-cil members. In1994, Ted led acommunity teamwhose goal was toamend the localcoastal plan to bemore restrictivewith future devel-opment on theproperty.


Political change doesn’t come easily, and thesmall community had its contentious moments,but Ted always knew that authentic politicswas grassroots politics, and not the politics ofpower, influence, and money. Ted’s parents hadalways been models for him of selfless service

to the community. They told him that being aproductive member of society required givingback to the community through service to oth-ers. His father, Kenneth, CdeP ’30, made a con-scious decision early in his career as anattorney to devote fully one-third of his time topublic service. Ted has also been especiallythankful for the years of political organizing,outright conflict, and grassroots politics he ex-perienced during the turbulent sixties. To hisfamily’s tradition of community service, he hasadded the ingredients of political strategy andgrassroots organizing, resulting in a brew offull-fledged community activism.

As more slightly watered down developmentproposals came forth for The Bluffs, develop-ers got more and more savvy as well. One de-veloper created a professional videopresentation costing thousands of dollars. Itwas carefully designed to placate citizens’ con-cerns about the project’s high sound barrierwalls created to buffer noise from the freeway.However, Ted and his artist/activist friend, Ar-turo Tello, bought a five-dollar videotape anddrove down the frontage road along which thewall was to be built, filming out the car win-dow as they went. After the developer’s videowas shown at a city council meeting, Tedshowed his homemade video once and then re-wound it and showed it again. But the secondtime he held a piece of black paper across themonitor, covering virtually the entire monitorexcept for a few inches at the top. Ted hadcomputed the exact height of the wall and ac-curately depicted the visual impact it would

Bob Isaacson sitting behind Ted Rhodes on the Isaacson family horse “Buck”circa 1954

Bob Isaacson and Ted Rhodes at The Bluffs



have on the surrounding area. The 200-personaudience let out a collective gasp when theysaw the true impact the wall would have onthe city’s views.

Another time, the developer went to greatpains to minimize the traffic generated by theestimated increase of 5,040 daily car arrivalsand departures that the development wouldgenerate. At a Planning Commission meeting,Ted and his colleagues responded to the hiredconsultant’s report by mounting tiny toy carson eight-foot strips on the wall behind thecommission members until they had a colorfulmosaic of 5,000 dangling cars. In response tosteady attacks against the slow growth move-ment by the vitriolic local paper, The Carpin-teria Herald, Ted and his colleagues publisheda 12-page tabloid of their own, which was thenhand-delivered to 5,000 registered voters.

Ted also became involved in the acquisition ef-forts of the Citizens for the Carpinteria Bluffs.This organization was co-founded in 1996 byDorothy Campbell (Grandparent of Erin, CdeP’99) after a series of heated public hearingsover yet another development proposal for TheBluffs. Aided by the negotiation efforts of theLand Trust of Santa Barbara County, a pur-chase price of 3.95 million dollars was negoti-ated for 52 acres of the 81-acre property. NowTed entered a new stage of the process: raisingmoney, lots of it, from a small community.State and Federal grants also helped out, andone of the first was written by Carolyn Chan-dler, CdeP ’81, who was then working for theLand Trust. In the fall of 1998, when themake-it-or-break-it time came, Ted and hisfriends were faced with having to raise$35,000 a day for four months in order to

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meet the purchase deadline. Gathering the sup-port of over 2,900 individuals, families, pri-vate foundations, and public agencies, thecitizens group managed to raise an astound-ing $4.65 million in two years, which includeda $500,000 endowment fund to maintain TheBluffs.

Those were crazy months for Ted, monthsfilled with brainstorming ideas to raise money:art sales, child penny drives, yard sales, carwashes, farmers’market tables. Tedand his colleaguesdesigned flyersand brochuresand, of course,applied for majorgrants. One of themore unusualideas, in which Igot involved, wasto have everybodynamed “Bob” do-nate 10 dollars tomeet a $1,000,000naming appeal.The Bluffs wouldthen be named“Bobs’ Bluffs.” Soone day I showedup at The Bluffswith dozens ofother “Bobs” fora group picture. I never did find out how muchmoney the “Bob” fundraising project actuallyraised. Creativity, absurdity, desperation... Tedand his allies used whatever worked. Nonethe-less, when Ted and his allies were put under thatsort of pressure, they really did produce. Over

$850,000 was raisedthrough modest, in-dividual donationsalone. That’s not badfor a small town.

As Ted has said ofthat period, “I wason top of a wild ele-phant. My job wasto make sure it wascharging in the rightdirection.” Many ofTed’s colleagues inThe Bluffs fightwere veteran ac-tivists or fundraisersthemselves, but Tedhad to call on all ofhis personal talentsto keep them allheading in the rightdirection. His skillswith a camera, hismusic, his knowl-

edge of film and video, his trouble shootingability as a key grip in Hollywood, his organ-izing talents, his shrewd political savvy, his per-suasive speaking and writing ability, his use of

humor to hold together overworked volun-teers, his profound commitment to makethings better for others and the next genera-tion—all of these distinct strands within Ted’slife helped to support him during his manyyears of hard work to save The Bluffs. Ofcourse, having the enthusiastic support of hiswife, Joanie, and his children, Jesse andRachel, during those years of long public hear-ings and late night organizational meetingsmade a big difference. Ted justly deserved the

“Local Heroes 1999: Ted Rhodes—Activist”award given by a local paper.

Finally, The Bluffs have been secured. TheLand Trust for Santa Barbara County nowholds a conservation easement, protecting TheBluffs forever from development, and TheBluffs themselves have been given to the Cityof Carpinteria. It is finally finished, after all ofthese years—or so I thought. A few weeks agoI stopped by to see Ted at his Carpinteriahome, and he was fuming. Now Union PacificRailroad has applied to build a large siding onits right-of-way that passes through The Bluffsparcel. A row of huge train cars could be leftthere for hours or even days at a time, block-ing the spectacular view of the ocean. “NowI’m spending half of every day fighting this newbattle,” Ted laments, adding with his inevitablechuckle, “and here I am, a former member ofthe Thacher Railroad Club!” Then, after a re-flective pause, Ted adds, “But, you know, Bob,we’ve already fought other giants. We’ll beatthis one, too... If not, well, at least I’ll be ableto look my kids in the eye and tell them wegave it our best shot.” e

Adult Education painting class pictured in “Continuing Inspiration,” used forpost card, The Bluffs campaign, and numerous publications © 1998 Ted Rhodes

“Country Road at The Bluffs” © 1990 Ted Rhodes

David P. Livermore, CdeP ’73A “Wrangler” Protects Our Last Frontier by John W. Busterud, CdeP ’72,

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John Muir observed in My First Summer inthe Sierra that: “When we try to pick outanything by itself, we find it hitched to

everything else in the Universe.” David Liver-more, CdeP ’73, loves this quote. Indeed, Davehas demonstrated throughout his life and pro-fessional career that he understands the criticallinkages between sustainable economicprogress and environmental protection. Forthe past 20 years in his work for The NatureConservancy (“T.N.C.”), Dave has been a self-described “real estate agent for the environ-ment.” In an era where business and theenvironment have often clashed, Dave has en-joyed unprecedented success as the Utah StateDirector for the T.N.C. by forging numerousalliances between business and environmentalinterests to preserve hundreds of thousands ofacres of environmentally-sensitive habitat inone of our country’s last great frontiers.

Dave’s love for the natural environment tookroot at an early age. At “Montesol,” the Liv-ermore family ranch on Mount St. Helena, andon family pack trips in the Sierras, Dave got hisfirst taste of hiking, camping, fishing, and hunt-ing. After attending Marin Country DaySchool, Dave entered Thacher where he thrivedin the outdoor setting. He especially loved theHorse Program and became an “A-Camper”despite suffering through subarctic conditionson his first camping trip, an overnight toSpruce Falls with Mr. Lamb. Although hewould deny this, Dave was also a gifted andwell-rounded athlete. He co-captained the Bas-ketball Team and played first base for theBaseball Team. It is no coincidence that bothteams went to the C.I.F. Playoffs with Dave inthe starting lineup.

After graduating from Thacher in 1973, Davetraveled east to attend Williams College. Hemajored in American Studies, writing his the-sis on the American Cowboy. Dave graduatedwith honors in 1977, winning among otherprizes, the Awards for Best Senior Student inAmerican History and Best Senior Thesis.

During his time at Williamstown, Dave alsotraded in his time-honored Thacher nick-name—“Big Liver”—for a new moniker:“Wrangler.” This requires an explanation. Al-though the details are somewhat obscure, weare informed by reliable sources that Daveearned his nickname after one particularlyeventful Saturday night when he was observedperforming tricks with his lariat that includedroping a few unsuspecting coeds on the mainstreet of Williamstown, Massachusetts. All this

and an honor graduate, too! It is no wonderthat Dave became a living legend at Williams.

During high school and college, Dave’s lovefor the outdoors and commitment to landpreservation was forged by eight summersworking as a wrangler and guide, first in Col-orado and later in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.On horseback, Dave came to appreciate firsthand that the Intermountain West was trulyAmerica’s last frontier and a finite resourceworth protecting.

Dave returned to Thacher following college towork in the Admission Office. During thattime, according to former Admission DirectorDick Sheahan, Dave wasan invaluable asset tothe School. Dick praisedDave as the “embodi-ment of just what mostparents would want in ason” and, not surpris-ingly, Dave made a greatimpression on would-beThacher students andtheir parents. Dick saysthat Dave played a bigpart in the significant in-crease in admissions ap-plications during the lateseventies. Dave also im-parted fatherly advice toDick on more than oneoccasion. Dave wouldsay, “It’s amazing whatyou can accomplish if you don’t care who getsthe credit.”

Following his “second tour” at Thacher, Davejoined The Nature Conservancy in 1980. Hewas based in T.N.C.’s San Francisco WesternRegional Office, which handled all of Califor-nia and 13 western states. Dave was assignedto cover uncharted territory for T.N.C. in theGreat Basin states of Utah and Nevada.

In his first year with T.N.C., Dave roomed withJohn Busterud, CdeP ’72, his long-time friend,School-mate, and teammate from Marin Coun-try Day School and Thacher. Although by thistime Dave had cleaned up his “Wrangling” actto some extent, John tells us that Dave stillcooked with—and, on occasion, ate from—blackened pots given to him from Camp Sup-ply at Thacher as a going-away present by BillWyman and Chuck Warren in 1980.

Since joining T.N.C., Dave has seen the

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southern Clark County.

Question 5: Dave worked tirelessly to createand then campaign successfully for the passageof “Question 5,” a 1990 Nevada bond issuethat raised $47.2 million for parks andwildlife.

The Dugout Ranch: In Dave’s view, the mostsignificant project of his career was the 1997acquisition of the 250,000-acre Dugout Ranchin the heart of Utah’s Canyon Country at thegateway to Canyonslands National Park. Thedeal took four years to negotiate and requiredraising $6.5 million to purchase and endowthe Ranch. In addition to receiving extensivelocal and regional media overage, the DugoutRanch story appeared on the front page of theSunday Business Section of the New YorkTimes. One of the things that makes the

Dugout Ranch storyspecial to Dave is thefact that Thacherteacher David S.Lavender loved thisarea and wrote elo-quently about theDugout Ranch inone of his firstbooks, One Man’sWest.

During his 20 yearswith T.N.C., Davehas started both theNevada and Utahfield offices and isproud of the growthof T.N.C.’s programsin both states. InUtah alone, T.N.C.has 8,300 members,15 employees, 400

volunteers and an operating budget of $1.5million. The Utah Chapter, over which Davenow presides as State Director, has completed

106 conservation projects preserving almost800,000 acres of public and private lands.

Those of us who have followed Dave’s conser-vation career have marveled at his success inprotecting large areas of sensitive and threat-ened parts of Nevada and Utah, states thathave heretofore not made conservation a pri-ority. We knew he was modest and selfless, ca-pable, and hardworking and easy with himselfand others. He suffers fools gladly. What wedidn’t realize is that Dave is quite fearless andconvincing when asking people to help T.N.C..As Steve McCormick, former director of theCalifornia T.N.C. office, put it: “Dave is sopersonable and easy with important and suc-cessful people. It’s a great gift in our business.He’s totally dependable and fearless whenmaking cold cultivation calls to our leadershipprospects who we hope will support the Con-servancy’s programs. Last year Dave presenteda case for support to one of Utah’s largest char-itable foundations. It carried a price-tag of $10million. After considering the proposal, thetrustees offered $8 million and Dave felt he’d



organization grow at an amazing pace. In1980, T.N.C. had roughly 300 employees na-tionally and 200,000 members. Today T.N.C.has 3,000 employees, an office in every state,1.2 million members, and an operating budgetexceeding $250 million. Using a “Quiet” ap-proach to encourage voluntary and charitableconservation, T.N.C. has become the 17thlargest charity in America and is truly the “bestin its class” when it comes to preservation ofecologically sensitive land.

Highlights from Dave’s numerous T.N.C. proj-ects over the past 20 years include:

Ash Meadows: This was a huge project inDave’s early years with T.N.C.. Ash Meadowsis the largest oasis in the Mojave Desert. Daveraised $5.5 million to purchase 12,000 acres ofthis sensitive habitat near Death Valley for over20 plant, animal, and invertebrate species

found nowhere else on Earth, including the en-dangered Desert Pupfish. The project was writ-ten up in Newsweek and the New York Times.

Ruby Valley: This was a 9,200-acre preserva-tion project near Elko, Nevada, involving sen-sitive wetlands and upland habitat ringingFranklin Lake. Dave used every tool atT.N.C.’s disposal to close this deal, includingconservation easements, zero-interest loans,and $1.5 million in risk capital.

Desert Tortoise: Dave was a key member of acoalition which put together a multi-milliondollar mitigation plan to save the Desert Tor-toise, an endangered species. This plan, whichalso allowed development in the Las Vegas Val-ley to continue, raised over $20 million fordesert tortoise protection and preserved over

In Clark County, Nevada, Davehelped broker a multi-milliondollar mitigation plan topreserve the rare desert tortoise

Dave at the Livermore family ranch with hisdaughter Jen

Dave worked as a wrangler and guide in Colorado and Wyoming for eightsummers—the best summers of his life


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let us down, which was not the case since theConservancy was quite elated at the prospectof this major contribution. I kind of think thatif the foundation had agreed to the $10 millionDave would have worried that he should haveasked for more.”

Similarly, Laurel Mayer, T.N.C.’s attorney forthe western division, praises Dave’s success:“I’ve worked with Dave on several conserva-tion proposals in Nevada and Utah. The AshMeadows project was a real coup for Daveand the Conservancy.”

Looking back on it now, Dave is not surprisedthat he chose to pursue a career in conserva-tion. As Dave puts it: “In this age of the humangenome, I am sure they will discover that mostLivermores have a ‘conservation gene!’ Mygrandmother worked to save Angel Island inSan Francisco Bay and was founder of theMarin Conservation League. My father, a one-time Director of the Sierra Club, served as Sec-retary for Resources under Reagan and had along career in conservation. My Uncle Put wasinvolved in starting the Trust for Public Land.My Uncle John has been a leader in publiclands mining reform. My cousin Dick has beenactive in the Peninsula Open Space Trust andmy brother Sam currently serves as Chairmanof the Yosemite Fund.”

While Dave also credits T.N.C. for much ofhis success, he acknowledges the importanceof his family roots. As Dave puts it: “BillWyman used to joke that there have been somany tall Livermores at Thacher, they should-n’t be measured in numbers, but in feet!” We’dlike to suggest a variation of this theme: Takeall the Livermores who have been involved inconservation, add up the results of their con-servation actions and come up with a totalnumber of ‘Livermore acres saved.’”

Today as Utah State Director of the T.N.C.,Dave lives with his wife Rebecca and daughterJennifer in a quiet suburban neighborhoodnear downtown Salt Lake City. Rebecca, agraduate of Rhode Island School of Design, isbusy with her graphics design business andwith the care and feeding of a precocious nine-year-old.

Whether you credit his family, his schooling, orhis years with T.N.C., Dave Livermore hasbuilt a highly successful and rewarding careeron the bulwark of public service. For Dave,the natural environment is truly “hitched toeverything else in the Universe.” Conservationis Dave Livermore’s calling in life and for thatwe can all be grateful. e


Under Dave’s leadership, the Conservancy’s Utah Chapter acquired the 250,000-acre Dugout Ranch atthe gateway to Canyonlands National Park

In the early days, Davecovered the Great Basin states

of Utah and Nevada in hispickup truck


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Michael G. Jones, CdeP ’73If Anyone Deserves an Apple… by Andrew F. Herr, CdeP ’73

In the late sixties and early seventies, manyof Thacher’s traditions fell by the wayside.Aside from the general turmoil in American

education, specific institutions at Thacher werechallenged and rejected. Worse, however, wasthe cynicism with which most young peopleviewed society and their ability to influence it.Against this backdrop, one Thacher traditionmaintained its prominence: community serv-ice. Rooted in Sherman Day Thacher’s visionof the role of education and the responsibilitiesof individuals, Thacher offered numerous com-munity service options. While many studentsdabbled in various volunteer activities, a fewviewed these extracurricular tasks as the corefocus of their education. And, only a few

Thacher students in theearly seventies had astronger belief in com-munity service thanMichael Jones.

Michael Jones wasdrawn to Thacher inpart because of hisGodfather, Rev. CharlesH. “Kelly” Clark, CdeP’44 (Trustee from 1995to present), who feltthat two aspects ofThacher’s program co-incided well withMichael’s interests: astrong Outdoors Pro-gram and an environ-ment where one could

follow a path similar to Kelly’s: helping othersand education. Furthermore, Michael sawThacher as a place to expand his growing in-terest in community service. Instead of “justsitting around” during the summer beforestarting Thacher, Michael’s mother, Cynthia,encouraged him to go to the Volunteer Bureau.They steered him toward Play Patio, a pro-gram that provided day care, education, andrecreation to underprivileged youngsters, cre-ated by Mayfield School students in Pasadena.This experience opened a new world forMichael in which he could have a substantiveimpact on the lives of others while learning toteach. He loved it and spent the following sum-mer teaching at Play Patio, as well.

At Thacher, Michael found a strong mentor inMarvin Shagam, architect of many Thacher’scommunity service efforts at the time. Beyondthat, however, Mr. Shagam was a consistentand strong advocate of defining responsibilityin terms of society at large—not just in terms

of the individual. Marvin encouraged Michaelto pursue a career in education.

While Michael immersed himself in traditionalThacher activities (lacrosse team captain, dormprefect, and so forth), he continued acquiringexpertise that, in time, would shape his entirelife. First, Michael began learning Spanish. Al-though not necessarily appreciated at the time,the hours spent in Mr. Miller’s Spanishclasses—or worse, in the language lab practic-ing his vocabulary and pronunciation—ledMichael to master Spanish, a skill that contin-ues to serve him well. Second, he continued toseek ways of working in the education field,including volunteering at schools in Ojai andworking at schools during his summer breaks.By his senior year, education was not just an in-terest; it was his primary focus. For his seniorproject Michael taught at a Navajo special-ed-ucation school, St. Michael’s Mission, nearWindow Rock, Arizona, in the Four Cornersreservation. The elements of his project—com-munity service for underprivileged childrenand education for Navajo kids—were consis-tent with both his core interests and the cul-mination of his work at Thacher.

Michael traveled a path directly towards a ca-reer in education. At a time when manyThacher graduates spent time during and aftercollege trying to determine what to do withtheir academic knowledge and interests,Michael went to college focused on becomingan educator. He attended the University of Cal-ifornia, Santa Cruz, in part because of its small,yet strong Education Department. (The cam-pus’s proximity to world-class surfing mayhave been an influence, as well.) Similar to hisThacher career, Michael sought situationswhere he could teach use his Spanish skills.For six months, Michael lived in a small vil-lage, Tepic Nayarit, Mexico, and taught in alocal, federally-funded, public school, while at-tending classes at a Mexican teacher’s college.His dual interests in Spanish and Educationmerged into a deep interest in bilingual edu-cation. He graduated from Santa Cruz in 1977with a bachelor’s in Latin American Studies.

Michael’s first full-time teaching was in theWatsonville School district, working withfourth and fifth graders. This District was par-ticularly appealing to Michael because of theheavy proportion of Spanish-speaking stu-dents. His interest in bilingual education coin-cided with both the needs of the communityand the expanding practice of bilingual edu-cation.

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Like most educators, Michael relishes the per-sonal satisfaction and rewards that his profes-sion offers, even though these may not berealized immediately. During his first year ofteaching fifth grade, Michael was confrontedwith a classroom challenge that he had beenwarned about in Teacher’s College. The entireyear became a contest between Michael andone student, who was determined to disruptMichael’s class and undermine Michael’s au-thority at ever possible turn. Although Michaelsurvived the year, he was more than a little dis-couraged. He convinced himself that he hadbeen unable to educate—much less control—this fifth grader. He also questioned his abilityto deal with his lack of success on an on-goingbasis. After all, one of his primary interests ineducation was his ability to have a positive im-pact on children’s academic pursuits and theirlives.

Michael returned to the classroom the next falland chalked the previous year up to a bad ex-perience. Eight or nine years later, however,Michael attended a conference and talked witha colleague who had taught in the CaliforniaYouth Authority. In sharing their experiences,they both realized that they had taught thesame troubled child, years apart. Michael wassaddened but not terribly surprised to learnthat this kid had not fared well. The colleaguethen told him about a writing exercise in whichhe asked the youths to write an essay on “whohad had the strongest positive influence in theirlives.” Much to Michael’s surprise, the kid hadwritten his essay about Mr. Jones, his fifth-grade teacher.

While continuing his day job, Michael attaineda master’s degree in administration from theUniversity of California, San Francisco, in1984. He married Joyce Shimizu; they havetwo sons: Maxwell (15 years old) and Sam (11years old). As a family, they enjoy travelingand spending time with friends in the SantaCruz environment.

In 1987, Michael was named the AssistantPrincipal of the Rolling Hills Middle School(part of the Watsonville School District). Twoyears later, he became Principal of the AlianzaSchool, a 750-student K-6 school. He has beena consistent and strong supporter of bilingualeducation and fought the recent CaliforniaProposition 227 that sought to eliminate bilin-gual education. When this Proposition passed,Michael preserved their two-way bilingual im-mersion program that teaches Spanish to Eng-lish-speaking students, and English toSpanish-speaking students, by changing it to acharter school. Only a few hundred suchschools in the nation offer this two-way bilin-gual approach, and many children have bene-fited, but Michael and his staff continue to facechallenges in helping all the students in theirdistrict.

Despite the controversial nature of bilingualeducation in California, Michael believes his

direct experience in the classroom is a validcounter-argument against doing away withbilingual education. In proper Thacher tradi-tion, too, he has been a strong advocate formeasures in which he believes. Michael has noregrets with his career choice. The rewards—which are largely non-monetary—are deeplysatisfying. The experience of giving to his com-munity and seeing the impact of his work inchanged lives and better education, outweighsthe long hours and the frustrations of admin-istering a school in tough political and financialtimes. e


Michael and his Apple have been great partners in helping students in the Watsonville School District


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Ellen C. Loebl, CdeP ’83Redefining Rich by Jane D. McCarthy

Rich. The word conjures thoughts of pos-sessing great material wealth and the at-tendant extravagant homes, lavish cars,

and exotic vacations.

But what if the word is only a name and it’s amisnomer, at that? A poor fellow named Richwas addicted to cocaine for over half of his 35years. His drug addiction led him to a shortstretch in the Santa Clara County jail and thana recovery house, which he claims saved hislife. He had dropped out of high school; hecould read, but his writing skills needed help.His prospects for living a productive lifelooked bleak.

Fortunately for Rich,one Thacher graduatecares greatly for thosewho are less fortunateand really enjoys givingback to the community.Ellen Loebl works forthe Santa Clara CountyLibrary Reading Pro-gram, the adult literacyprogram of the CountyLibrary. This programserves English-speakingadults who read orwrite below the ninth-grade level in thecounty jail, recoveryhouses, and at branchlibraries throughout theCounty. Ellen’s focus ison working with adultswho have left the jail

program or who are in recovery programs. Shehelps addicts and alcoholics acquire the lan-guage tools needed to function better in societyand obtain employment. She assesses their lan-guage, reading, or writing problems, andworks with them once a week. Unfortunately,she is often unable to work with many of herclients for much more than a few months sincethey are typically in court-mandated recoveryprograms or have recently been released fromjail, and have other more pressing needs to ful-fill (i.e., food and shelter). Obviously, this is arough time for these people, who must recreate“clean” lives, learn how to make a living, anddevelop skills to handle social situations thatsupport their new lifestyle. It’s no wonder thatrecidivism runs high as people realize how dif-ficult it is to break the cycle that started themdown a rocky road in the first place.

Rich is one of the lucky ones. Seeing Ellen afew times each month for over a year now, hiswriting has improved enough to be includedin a compendium of learners’ writing and an-other was read at a celebratory picnic. He justfinished his first year of being clean, workedhis way off probation, and received trainingto work in the Santa Clara County LibraryProgram alongside Ellen in teaching literacy toothers in his situation. As well, he worked hisway up to a supervisorial position with a paint-ing company, where he’s worked since his re-lease from the recovery house.

Ellen followed in the footsteps of her siblings,Susan, CdeP ’80, and Jeff, CdeP ’79, by com-ing to Thacher. Since Sue was a boarder eventhough her family lived in Ojai, Ellen metmany of her friends, was quite impressed withthem, and surmised that a lot was happeningon campus (especially compared to downtownOjai). Faced with the other local options forhigh school, she chose to board at Thacher.She was still homesick though. She remembersstanding with her advisor, Phyllis Johnston,gazing over the Ojai from behind Casa duringher first week. Phyllis pointed out, “Your homeis right over there. How can you be home-sick?” The Johnstons, Fred Lamb, and Mr.Hauge were her favorite teachers, and fosteredher interest in English, history, and French.

What classmate Rene Ancinas likes most aboutEllen is her sense of humor and her self-depre-cating manner. “It makes sense that she’s inthe work she’s in because she was always herown person. She was never interested in beingthe smartest or most popular person on cam-pus. She’s a strong individual who beat to herown drum.” This assessment of Ellen is evi-dent in Rene’s favorite story of her. On theirfirst horse-camping trip up to The Pines withChuck Warren, Ellen was afraid she’d be coldso she wore all of her clothes and her downparka when she climbed into her sleeping bagthat evening. Most already know the outcome:she froze from not letting her body heat warmthe air sequestered in the bag. “She took it instride,” remembers Rene, “and it was a recur-ring theme of joking between us throughoutour time at Thacher.”

Having known Ellen since they were quitesmall, classmate Clint Wilson agrees withRene’s assessment of Ellen, and adds that she’salways been “very patient, kind, sometimesshy, but reaches out when people need

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her…That may be why she’s good at her cur-rent job. I think she’s more empathetic and sen-sitive than people first see.”

Indeed, Ellen has reached out to othersthroughout her life, starting when she tutoredat San Antonio Elementary School in Ojai,while attending Thacher. “The funny thing,though, is that I started thinking about a careerin teaching at the high school level,” so off shewent to the University of Rochester to doublemajor in French and English. Once she gradu-ated, she knew there was no way she wanted toteach, and considered, instead, to do some-thing in marketing and P.R. She took an eight-month internship for the Baltimore Orioles’farm team, the Rochester Red Wings, and thenreturned to California, to intern part-time at abicycling magazine in Glendale. In her sparetime, she worked as a Park Ranger at Lake Ca-sitas in Ojai. She then landed a job teachingFrench and English as a Second Language(E.S.L.) at Ojai Valley School before takingwhat looked to be her “dream job”: develop-ing publications and brochures for a companythat charters sailboats around the world. Sheeven got to live on a houseboat in Sausalito. Asit turned out, though, the company didn’t haveenough work and most of her time centeredon answering the phone.

Ellen’s next job was at Matthew Bender Pub-lishing Company in Oakland, where she ed-ited copy for law books in the hopes oflearning how to do desktop publishing. She re-members telling her attorney father, “How canyou read this stuff? It’s so boring!” In order tonot go crazy cooped up in an office all day,Ellen started volunteering for Oakland’s liter-ary program that focuses on teaching adultswhose language skills are below the ninth-grade level. She found these “learners’” tech-niques for attaining information fascinating,since many employed various self-taught meth-ods rather than the rote memorization andspewing out of facts that is so typical in manylearning situations.

The learners and volunteers in this Programmake six-month commitments to work to-gether; unfortunately, the interactions seldomlast that long due to work schedules, incon-venience in attending sessions, and frustration,leading to high turn-over rates. Ellen did find,however, that her volunteer work was morerewarding and interesting than her job. She de-cided to become a high school English teacherby enrolling at Holy Names College, where shereceived a master’s degree in English and a sec-ondary teaching credential. At that time, anadult education credential could be attainedby simply completing some paper work, whichshe did. She started substitute teaching in bothjunior and senior high schools, but found theconstant discipline issues and the students’ lackof respect or appreciation for her efforts werenot very gratifying. On the flip side, she found

her adult learners, for the most part, to be mo-tivated since they were taking time out of theirlives to learn; they were, generally, more re-spectful, attentive, and appreciative.

About this time, Ellen decided to see more ofthe world. A friend told her about a one-monthtraining program followed by a one-year teach-ing assignment in an E.S.L. program anywherein the world. Costa Rica was Ellen’s next homebase; teaching, camping on the beach, andmaking friends with various people fromaround the world who’d come to teach inCosta Rica were the perks.

Upon her return to California, Ellen workedas an E.S.L. teacher since full-time employmentin adult education is extremely rare. Usually,these teachers, Ellen included, have two tothree part-time positions to make ends meetand, therefore, they don’t get benefits. Finally,three years ago, Ellen took her present posi-tion with the Santa Clara County LibraryReading Program. “This is the best job I’veever had,” because of her co-workers and thelearners with whom she works. “It’s wonderfulto help others and give back to the commu-nity in such a tangible way. It’s satisfying tosee how appreciative our clients are for our ef-forts and for just being treated like humans,which is uncommon in a jail setting.” Thesalary is low, but the rewards are worth it.“Many people don’t understand why I enjoythis kind of work. I’d much rather be satisfiedwith my work and know I’m making a differ-ence in other peoples’ lives than have a boringjob with a huge salary and benefits.”

If one returns to Ellen’s senior page in the 1983El Archivero, a quotation from the BrothersKaramazov appears:

“And even if we are occupied with mostimportant things, if we attain to honouror fall into great misfortune—still let usremember how good it was once here,when we were all together, united by agood and kind feeling which made usbetter perhaps than we are.”

Ellen has chosen an honorable career path thatmakes herself—and others—better than theywould otherwise be, despite the misfortunesthey endure. e



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Randal Scott Bessolo, CdeP ’83Enriching His Life through Stewardship by Eric P. Butts ’01

and Derick S. Perry, CdeP ’83

Helping disabled children ride horses. Clean-ing up after others at public parks. Servingthe homeless at a soup kitchen. Being a Big

Brother to inner-city lads.

This is but a sampling of the volunteer jobsthat Randy Bessolo, CdeP ’83, has taken onthroughout his academic and professional ca-reer. He comments, “Volunteering to help hasalways been an integral part of my life, thoughI admit at times it seemed selfish to me. I havebeen able to establish meaningful relationshipswith incredible people just by giving my time.They probably don’t understand that I havebenefited from these relationships more thanthey have.” Randy credits his interest in com-

munity service to hisrole models: parents,grandparents, siblings,teachers, and coaches.He says, “I was thebeneficiary of a strongfamily and great educa-tional opportunity,which taught me thevalue of positive rolemodels and the good Icould do by striving tobe a strong role modelfor young people with-out the same advan-tages.” This call tostewardship has led tomany meaningful andlong-lasting relation-ships for Randy. Thosewords of wisdom werea call to action.

The second of three children, Randy followedin the footsteps of his older brother Jim, CdeP’81, by coming to Thacher, where he excelledin sports and academics. His senior advisor,James Register, wrote that Randy had “an ex-cellent career at Thacher…one which has seenhim grow in maturity and self-assurance, forwhich he has been richly rewarded.” Randy’sacademic record was stellar throughout hisThacher career and earned him induction intothe Cum Laude Society; commendations in his-tory, math, and science; and admission to Co-lumbia. His favorite part of Thacher, however,was athletics to which Mr. Register wrote: “[asCaptain,] he took Thacher’s Varsity BasketballTeam to the semifinals of C.I.F. Small SchoolsChampionship. And his consistent and out-standing efforts were rewarded by beingnamed First Team, Small School’s Division onthe All-Southern-California High Schools Bas-

ketball Team, an honor no other Thacher stu-dent has ever won,” or has won since. He wasalso named “Most Valuable Player” for theVarsity Baseball Team in his senior year.

One of Randy’s most memorable moments atThacher was during the Third Round of theaforementioned C.I.F. playoffs: Thacher wasdown by nine points to Flintridge PreparatorySchool, with two minutes to go in the fourthquarter. Somehow Thacher eked out a victory.Randy remains close to many of his teammatesfrom those days including Jon Blinderman,Thacher English teacher Derick Perry, BobbyHenshel, Diogba Gbye, and Lorne Green.

Another memory Randy shared pertained tohis brother Jim. Since they were only two yearsapart, Randy got to do something that manyyounger brothers dream of: play on the sameBasketball Team. More memorable was thefact that his brother and he played baseball to-gether. Randy played catcher and Jim pitchedso Randy fondly remembers catching for hisbrother who was the star pitcher and captainof the Team. Randy later followed in hisbrother’s footsteps as captain of the BaseballTeam.

In addition to athletic achievements at Thacher,Randy enjoyed Gymkhana. During his junioryear, Headmaster Bill Wyman and he at-tempted the Rescue Race, which ended pre-maturely when both fell from the horse. Theytried again the following year but this time Mr.Wyman injured himself on the saddle horn andwas unable to complete the race. Other fac-ulty members who made a lasting impressioninclude Mr. Shagam (Latin), Mr. Twichell(freshman math), Fred Lamb, CdeP ’40 (U.S.and Film History), and John Hanna, Randy’sscience and math teacher as well as coach forthe back-to-back League Championship Bas-ketball Teams.

With his busy academic and sports schedule,Randy found little time to participate inThacher’s Community Service Program. Hedid, however, volunteer to teach disabled chil-dren to ride horses at the Halek Creek RidingClub when at home in Tiburon. Thacher pro-vided Randy with something that he wouldcarry with him for the rest of his life. Whilehe recognizes Thacher as his best educationalexperience, Randy also credits Thacher’s“honor, fairness, kindness, and truth” for help-ing him to become the person that he is today.After matriculating to Columbia University,Randy found he had extra time due to his rig-

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orous academic preparation at Thacher. Hesought ways to give back to the community,an activity that continues today. For instance,Randy has worked with one young man inNew York’s Catholic Big Brother Program,starting when this lad was eight. Randy’s com-mitment to this boy continued, even though

Randy moved to Harvard’s Business School,and then to Chicago to start his career. In all,Randy has devoted over 10 years to this fellowwho is now in college himself.

Randy got started with mentoring when oneof his fraternity brothers of Phi Gamma Delta(or “Fiji”), mentioned it as an activity in whichthe fraternity might get involved. As fraternitypresident, Randy got his Greek brothers tohelp clean public parks, volunteer at local soupkitchens, and mentor in the local Big Brotherprogram. Randy still found time to play onboth the Junior Varsity and Varsity BasketballTeams at Columbia until knee surgery duringhis junior year side-lined him from the team;instead, he served as the team’s volunteer as-sistant coach.

Following Columbia, Randy found a way tocombine his desire to help others and his loveof basketball. While attending Harvard, Randycoached students from Taft Junior High Schoolin Boston. He found that these youngsters ben-efited not only from his knowledge of thegame, but learned that by working hard atpractice, playing well together, and settinggoals, they could attain more than theythought possible and take pride in their team’sefforts.

Randy continues to combine these two aspectsof his life by volunteering at the Mercy BoysHome—formerly an orphanage that became afoster home for children whose parents are un-able to care for them. Randy is a player/coachfor the Home’s basketball program. Duringeach of the past two years, Randy took 50 kidsfrom the Home to a DePaul University bas-ketball game to meet the players and coaches.Each summer he also sponsored eight Mercyboys to attend DePaul’s basketball camp. Thisfoster home actually reminds Randy of

Thacher because of the good interaction be-tween the adult faculty and the young menwho live there. Randy also tutors kids inCabrini Green, a low-income neighborhood.

In addition to community service, Randy is apartner of a rapidly growing commercial realestate firm, Transwestern Investment Com-pany. During the past four years, Transwesternhas grown from Randy and three partners tohaving over 70 employees. He also acquiresand renovates small apartment buildings inChicago with a partner.

Beyond his busy work and community serviceschedule, Randy’s biggest frustration is notbeing able to play basketball like he could dur-ing his first two years of college. He still playson basketball and baseball teams in variousleagues throughout Chicago, but, as his speedgradually decreases, he’s focusing on pursuinga coaching career. This fall he is a rookie coachin the Illinois Warriors A.A.U. basketball pro-gram, which has produced several N.B.A. play-ers, including Darius Miles, QuentinRichardson, and Corey Magette. Randy liveswith his black Labrador retriever, Roscoe, andhas a girlfriend, Kathleen, who he has beendating for three years.

There are many definitions of success butwhether it be having a successful job, beingable to give time to the community, playing acollege sport at the Division I level, or havingpeople look up to you, Randy fits the descrip-tion. Having achieved all of these things,Randy continues to do more. In so doing, hefits a much more genuine definition of success,which is not a destination, but the quality ofthe journey to get there. e


Randy with mentoree David Carnegie

Randy coaching Taft JuniorHigh basketball team

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He said, “successful leaders are individualswho are able to identify those basic emotionaltriggers in human beings that will produce a re-sponse. Those are the great communicators.”He told me to ignore who wrote the book andsimply read his words.

That conversation was a turning point for me.I realized that as repulsed as I was by the au-thor, if I was going to communicate his mes-sage to my colleagues I had to open my mindto it. So I started to work on my presentation.

Communications Week started and I soon dis-covered the other books that my colleagueswere assigned. My best friend was assignedAlice in Wonderland. He took us to DescansoGardens and had us “chasing him” throughoutthe grounds—stopping at various points of in-terest to share the many wacky words of LewisCarroll. Another friend was assigned Grimms’fairy tales. She was asked to write a fairy taleabout our group of fellows and the lessons wewere learning.

I was in absolute awe of my colleagues andalso terribly concerned about the dark side ofmy book relative to their own. I was sure thatI was doomed to failure.

My presentation took place in a quiet room inan art gallery. I blindfolded all of my colleaguesand walked each of them into the room. I satthem in a half circle and placed on their backa sign with a racist term relative to their back-ground or gender. I then began my speech re-garding racism and human injustice. One at atime, I called three individuals forward andplaced them in front of a television with imagesof injustice toward their particular group. Asthe rest of my colleagues watched, they wereshocked and moved by what their colleagueswere experiencing. They were angered andsome even cried.

At that point, I stood before them and calledthem to action. I asked them to join me indoing all that was necessary to move againstindividuals who perpetuate these terrible deeds.I asked them to raise their arms with a “C”for Coro. They did, and so my presentationconcluded.

I was amazed by my colleagues’ unified reac-tion—no one held back. As we all stood there,our hands raised in the air, my trainers askedme to reveal my book. When I did my col-leagues were shocked. We sat down and pro-ceeded to discuss the book for several hours.

This was a very significant moment of tremen-dous learning for me. Today I often think backon everything that Communications Weektaught me.

Many times, difficult tasks, particularly thosethat you have to face completely alone, helpyou discover parts of yourself that might oth-erwise never be revealed. Although they canbe overwhelming, frustrating, even frighten-ing, being alone and depending on yourself canbe most fulfilling.

I encourage you to not be afraid of those tasks,and as the seniors have done, to embrace andto learn as much as you can from them. e


Com

mun

ity

Serv

ice Kenneth O. Rhodes

continued from page 43

was honored for his service with an honorarydegree and President’s Medal from the Gradu-ate School, and received the award of “Out-standing Trustee of the Year at a PrivateCollege” from the Association of the Govern-ing Boards of Universities and Colleges at aceremony in San Francisco in 1984. “He’s aman for all seasons,” said John D. Maguire,president of Claremont University Center andGraduate Schools. “I feel truly fortunate tohave someone with such sensitivity, wisdom,and energy leading our board.”

Active at All Saints Episcopal Church, Kentaught Sunday School, served on the Vestry,and chaired committees to replace the pipeorgan, direct construction of a new building,and search for a new minister. He personallyvisited and interviewed all seventeen candi-dates, and helped make All Saints a vibrantchurch, with an activist minister who preacheswith a “Bible in one hand and a newspaper inthe other.” The church has taken courageousstands on current issues, such as the VietnamWar, nuclear weapons, the homeless, AIDS, or-dination of woman, free choice for women,and peace and justice.

Practicing law independently for more than 30years, Ken specialized in wills, trusts, estates,guardianships, and forming corporations; thenin 1980 he joined a law firm. In spite of hismany commitments, he always had time forhis family, whether helping his children withstudies, building toy castles, tree houses anddoll houses, and teaching them tennis, skiing,and body surfing. There were many familypack trips in the High Sierras, camping in Baja,rafting the Yampa and Glen Canyon, and ex-ploring Glacier Park. After their children lefthome, Ken and Betty traveled widely, includingthree treks in the Himalayas, on one trip hik-ing 300 miles and climbing over a 17,000 footpass when in their sixties.

Ken retired, if that is the correct term, in 1990,and has remained busy ever since, delightinggrandchildren, writing, studying painting atPasadena City College, and becoming active,not surprisingly, in the P.C.C. foundation, asvice president. He enjoys keeping up withThacher, Scripps, and other organizations hehas worked with, and undoubtedly will vol-unteer for new causes in the future, since “onething leads to another. I have made so manywonderful friends,” he adds. “You get moreout of it than you put in.”

Ken is still not careful whom he sits next to atmeetings. e

by Cricket Twichell


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otes

1943

John West writes, “Same ol, same ol. Hunting—fishing—boating—traveling and piddling aroundthe house. If you’re coming to Florida, drop in!”

1944

Besides telling us about moving to the east side ofthe Connecticut River, John Griggs informed usthat his wife Susan has a cottage in Scotland onthe Black Isle Peninsula across from Invernessthat is available for rent most of the year. Golfcourses, tennis, fishing, beaches, and mountainhiking are all nearby. Check it out.

1945

After retiring from Pitney Bowes in December,1999, Bill Webster felt the magnetic pull of theOjai and moved to the Pierpont Cottages, justdown the road from Thacher, where he is work-ing part time in the Business Office.

1947

According to Tony Arnold, CdeP ’46, “LeighCross appeared on our doorstep for a quick biteof lunch on his way south to Mexico for Christ-mas. He was accompanied by a charming lady,Vlema, and a large German Shepherd more alphathan Leigh himself. Leigh’s present occupation istransforming a building in an industrial part ofVancouver into living quarters.”

1948

Michael Dorst reports: Sam Wright, Peter Dunne,Bill Bucklin, Elliot Hayne, and Sandy Walker,CdeP ’49, see each other from time to time here inSan Francisco.

1951

Unfortunately, J. Brooks Crawford won’t be at thisyear’s Class Reunion because he’ll be presentinga scientific (medical) paper in Switzerland at thattime. How disappointing to miss the big 5-0.

1953

January 2001 is when Guy Lusignan will hangup his “gone fishin’” sign. He has already soldhis forestry consulting firm and is looking for-ward to retiring...and visiting Thacher.

1954

From Dan Crotty: “Janet and I keep busy on theJESUS Film Development Board. This film of thelife of Jesus has been seen by 3 billion peoplearound the world.”

As of January 14, Ric Laurence joined the ranksof retirees who spend their time golfing and sail-ing. He cruised to Vancouver and took the RockyMountaineer Train to Banff, Jasper, and LakeLouise. He also routinely visits the Delta and thewine country. Ric doesn’t seem to miss work inthe least!

ClassNotes

“A Guy Thing”—Bill Crawford,CdeP ’53, Karl Mertz, CdeP ’68,Dick Rhodes, CdeP ’59, TedRhodes, CdeP ’65, Jim Lipman,CdeP ’52, and Bill Dawson,CdeP ’72, just before hitting thetrail at Golden Trout Camp


Cla

ss N

otes Mike Ward joyously announces the arrival in Au-

gust of a second granddaughter: Sophie AnneMurphy.

1962

An acclaimed new CD on Kool Koala Records isRich Look’s Louisana Moon, an eclectic collec-tion of songs about big cities, bayous, and love,set in New Orleans, New York, and Tokyo. Toorder: e-mail: Rich at [email protected], call at(504) 524-9857, or go through www.cdnow.com,www.amazon.com, www.theorchard.com, orwww.louisiana musicfactory.com.

1963

Even the marmots were clapping their paws whenArnie Moore played his guitar and sang aroundthe campfire this summer at Golden Trout. Arnie’swife Jeanie Moore was the Clean-up Goddess atthe G.T.C. kitchen, charming the guests into vol-unteering to wield a dish towel or a broom. Arnieis a substitute teacher for L.A. Unified. Their sonCosmo is a big senior (6′9″) in high school thisyear.

1965

In August Bill Horvitz and his wife Patti Trimblewere featured performers at the 4th AnnualTuolumne Meadows Poetry Festival. At GoldenTrout, we were treated to a pre-view of comingattractions when, around the evening campfire,Patti recited some of her poetry while Bill ac-companied her on the guitar. Fabulous!

1967

After spending seven months of 1999 in Majuro,Republic of the Marshall Islands, where BobKendig taught a junior college course on Intro-duction to Business and his wife Sue taught highschool and junior college English, the Kendigssailed to New Caledonia and then to Australia.

Beyond teaching spirituality and Psychology atSanta Clara University and Holy Names Collegein Oakland, and working in the Office for parishof the Catholic diocese of San Jose, Andy Kille ispleased to announce the publication of Psycho-logical Biblical Criticism by Fortress Press. It isone in a series of “Guides to Biblical Scholarship”which offers introductions to different methods ofcritical study of the Bible.

1969

Local boy does good! Steve Huyler’s latest book,entitled Meeting God: Elements of Hindu Devo-tion, was published by Yale University Press andvoted one of the top 10 books on religion in 1999by Publisher’s Weekly. If you are in Houston, TX,this fall you can catch his exhibition with thesame title as his book; ditto if you’re in Indiawhere the exhibit is touring the country courtesyof the U.S. government throughout 2000. It willthen travel to museums around America for sev-eral years.

1970

Rod Turner brought his family to the 30th Re-union “and we had a wonderful time, enjoyingdinner at the Twichells’, a competitive tennismatch with some other over-the-hill 1970 class-mates, and a multi-instrument concert by Mari-anne and Ames Anderson.”

1971

When ARCO was acquired by BP-Amoco, KrisMeisling was offered a job with BP-Amoco inHouston. “Hence I am moving to Houston.”Todd Oppenheimer’s prize-winning story (Na-tional Magazine Award), which was publishedon the cover of the July 1997 Atlantic Monthly,contains, according to Todd, “a sizeable bit ofcommentary from Kris Meisling, being as in-sightful and articulate as he always was atThacher.” Todd is now working on a new bookabout computers in school.

1955

Rhodes Spedale, according to an admirer namedJack Huyler, “is a well-known and highly re-spected jazz pianist, who gave up a law practiceto play.” This fall Rhodes and his wife Janet trav-eled to New York City, where he met Susan andAlex Farrand, Delia and John Haverly, Bev andEric Knudsen, Carol and David Laylin, and Beaand Jim Taylor. The whole gang then went to theMet with fabulous tickets arranged for them byclassmate Mitch Lathrop, who is a board memberof the Metropolitan Opera Company. This mini-reunion was such a success that plans are goingfull steam ahead for another get-together on April20-22 at New Orleans during the French QuarterFestival. All members of 1955 are urged to comeeat good food and listen to good music and spendtime with good friends at the Big Easy.

It was decided, hands down, that Alex Farrandsimply has to come to Golden Trout every sum-mer. All he needs is a campfire in a wildernesssetting and he’s in his element. This summerThacher graduates and their families were treatedto entertainment by Alex who delighted every-one by singing colorful, funny, poignant cowboysongs. Alex and his wife Susan are antique deal-ers in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

1956

At a ceremony in Washington on Halloween eve,Toby Rosenblatt was awarded the ConservationService Award (highest citizen award) by the Sec-retary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt. The Con-gressional Record of that day recognized Tobyfor his “extraordinary feats in various roles andover many years of public service to the commu-nity and for his outstanding work to preserve thescenic and recreational lands of our Golden GateNational Parks.” Congrats!

Dirk ten Grotenhuis and his wife Susan enjoytheir seven grandchildren even more than theyenjoyed their own kids…

1957

“I could get used to this retirement idea,” writesMike Bolduan. “First year: cycled 8500 miles,read 45 books, and thoroughly enjoyed myself.”

1958

“ Some people think I do this for fun, but I reallydo it for a living,” writes William Strong, whohas been around the world twice this year andfeels another trip coming on. “Made an interest-ing side trip down to Leyte Island, the islandMacArthur returned to in the Philippines after hemade his great promise. The Battle of Leyte Gulfwas the final naval battle between the UnitedStates and Japanese navies in which the JapaneseNavy was finished off as a fighting force in WorldWar II.”

Chris Carpenter has his hands full. As U.N. Res-ident Representative in Moscow, he is dealingwith 200,000 refugees from Chechnya. After sixyears in Russia, he plans to return to Geneva in2001.

Arnie Moore, CdeP ’63, Joe Hollow, CdeP ’63,and Jeff Mason, CdeP ’63 have a mini-reunion atGolden Trout Camp

Joe, CdeP ’63,and BrendaHollow anddaughters

Parker, son of Dodie and Bill Dawson, CdeP ’72,at Golden Trout Camp


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1974

One of the pluses of attending U.C. Riverside isthe opportunity to study modern European His-tory under the aegis of Randy Head. He has anapartment in Riverside, but his permanent homeis in La Jolla. He writes, “Send your best andbrightest to U.C.!”

Dana Lynge is the proud poppa of a little guynamed Bjorn, born in November, 1999.

1975

Julie and Eric Thomas have spawned two young‘uns, Ariel and Quinn. Says Eric, “If I’d knownhow much fun it is to have children, I would havedone this years ago!”

Hats off to Noah Rifkin, who has been namedVice President of Policy and Legislative Affairsfor Veridian Engineering, a company which pro-vides information solutions for global securityand safety and focuses on the aeronautics, infor-mation and space, and transportation sectors. Be-fore joining forces with Veridian, Noah served asthe first director of technology deployment forthe U.S. Department of Transportation, appointedby President Clinton. He also served as SecretaryFederico Pena’s senior advisor on research andtechnology issues. Who would ever believe that“baby” wheeled onto the Pergola by “nurse”Scott Le Fevre one Halloween would achieve suchheights!

1976

Nick Kent skied at Sugarbowl this past winterwith Jon Cicerone and Scott Christensen ’68.

Hart Woodson’s seven-year-old daughter Eliza-beth is finding a passion for music. She plays fourinstruments—violin, cello, piano and flute. “Forher ‘playathon,’ she played the longest of anychild—2.5 hours straight—and raised $1,000.Maybe you should recruit her for your fundrais-ing drive!” Hart is already making plans to cometo the 25th Reunion.

As the Operations Officer for Verizon’s Retail Di-vision (formed last summer from the merger ofG.T.E. and Bell Atlantic), Frank Bennett keepsout of trouble. He will take time off, however, toattend the Silver Anniversary of his Thacher grad-uation this coming June.

1977

What a wonderful addition to Golden Trout wasMeth Jiaravanont, his wife Kazumi and their chil-dren—Michael, Mika, and Aili—who left theconfusion of remodeling their home to bask inthe splendor of the High Sierra. Kazumi writes,“We had a marvelous time at Golden Trout...sur-rounded by such natural beauty and peace. It wastruly the highlight of our summer.”

If you have to go to a rheumatology meeting, itmight as well be in Nice, we always do say. So offAndy Holman went to Nice, while his familywended their way to Maine for the summer. Andyis doing research on fibromyalgen and hopes tohave his third study published in three years.

1978

Marganne Winter Oxley enjoys life on the ranchwith her husband David, CdeP ’79 and children.David put up 6,000 tons of hay last summer; hedefinitely made hay while the sun was shining.Their son Will (who is taller than both of hisfolks) is applying to Thacher; their daughter Son-dra will apply in three years. “How timeflies…Babies do grow up.”

1979

On September 24, Jeff Loebl became a marriedman when he and Laura Ann Butler agreed tokeep steady company for the rest of their lives.The new Mr. and Mrs. Loebl reside in Charleston,S.C.

1980

Our condolences to Sydney Robertson whosemother, Carmen Robertson, was killed in a caraccident in October. Sydney, her husband GeorgePratt, and their daughter Carmen Mary Sue Pratt,returned to Ojai this summer after spending aneventful year teaching at an American school inBeijing. They are now ensconced in Rennes,France, doing more of the same. Bets are that thePratts’ bearded collie, Annie, will become the sen-sation of Rennes.

1981

“It’s taken me 20 years to submit a class note,”Glen Gold wrote recently. “I thought I shouldwait until something interesting had happened—and I lead as dull a life as I can manage.” He fin-ished his first novel Carter Beats the Devil inFebruary, got an agent in March, sold the book toHyperion in April, and spent May in Germanyand England. His book is due out next Septemberin the U.S., U.K., and Germany; “since the jacketcopy will say I live with my wife, author AliceSebold, Alice and I suspect we should get mar-ried sometime before then.”

1982

Bailey Brophy Yates arrived last fall, just in timeto move to Northern California where her dad, BradYates, is a personal coach and hypnotherapist.

Sophie Berenson, daughter of Betsy and CraigBerenson, CdeP ’72, at Golden Trout Camp

Andy Herr, CdeP ’73, preparing crème brulée onone of his raft trips

KazumiJiaravanont, wife

of MethJiaravanont,

CdeP ’77, withCricket Twichell

Sydney Robertson,CdeP ’80, with

daughter CarmenMary Sue Pratt


Cla

ss N

otes “Thacher occupies quite a large place in my heart

and memory,” writes Mack Polhemus. I know it’sa cliché, but it’s the truth: the friends I made atThacher are like family. So thank you.” Mackalso wants to join the long line of those givingthanks to Terry and Cricket for dedicating theircareers to Thacher. The Twichells plan to retire inJune 2002. Mack lives in Venice and has threeankle biters: two girls and a boy all under the ageof four. In addition to teaching film and writingfor the last four years, he wrote and directed anindependent movie called The Scottish Tale, a ro-mantic comedy loosely based on Macbeth. It starsJoe Polhemus, CdeP ’85, and has a cameo ap-pearance by Craig Golding as a whacked-outpoet. After a brief theatrical release, the film’s onvideo as of this fall at Hollywood Video.

While cruising around Los Angeles, Mack hasbumped into Jack Stephenson, Anthony Mar-guleas, Mike Kong, Jon Blinderman, Craig Cold-ing, Roderigo, and Sibyll Carnochan Catalan.

1984

The Contra Costa Public Defenders are lucky tohave Liz Harrigan on their team. Liz and her hus-band Dan Groot are living in Oakland.

Mary Kuechler is the proud momma of ElisabethNorth Kuechler Engelson, born on May 17,2000. “Elisabeth is already becoming an ‘out-doorswoman’—we’ve been taking her hikingsince week 3 and she loves it.”

From Peter Thacher: “I’m fly-fishing, buildingtwo new dealerships, and taking care of ShermanThacher’s great, great, grandson, Jack. Savannahis a wonderful city. Y’all come visit.” Peter re-cently got together with Sophie Brown Twichell,CdeP ’85 and Jon Twichell, CdeP ’83 when hewas in Chicago.

Mark Fickes is now a Senior Associate with thelaw firm of Wilson, Sonsini, Goodrich and Rosatiin Palo Alto, CA.

1985

From Tony Thatcher: “I’m happy to report thatlife is good! I happily have nothing else to re-port.”

Eric Gross was busy teaching little guys in kinder-garten all they need to know in life, but now he’sthe Bilingual Resource Teacher. He also started amaster’s program in education at Cal State Uni-versity Monterey Bay. “Good to see everyone atthe Reunion. I’m currently reading Melissa’sbook.”

Congratulations to Nicole DeFever on her mar-riage to David Martin on June 17, 2000. Thewedding took place at Montgomery RedwoodsGrove in Ukiah, CA. Then off they went for ahoneymoon to Siberia and St. Petersburg, whereDave’s fluency in Russian came in handy.

Wedding bells rang for Thatcher Brown andJenny Doubleday on April 29, 2000, in Amelia Is-land, Florida. Thatcher and his bride are enjoyingliving in the Bay Area where they hob-nob withThacher cronies.

“Mina (five) and Micaela (two) are growing likecrazy,” writes Greg Berglund, the V.P. of Mar-keting for Frontgate. He sends regrets at having tomiss the 15th Reunion. “I think of CdeP often.”

Michelle Warren returned to Thacher to give avery well-received lecture to a standing-room onlyassemblage of Toads and faculty. No surprise tous that Michelle is a highly acclaimed professor.

1986

From Julian Pridmore-Brown: “I am living inBend, OR; and when I’m not playing in themountains, I fly a Boeing 737 for United Airlinesout of San Francisco.”

Move over Liam. Here comes Colin Poole Kirk-patrick to play with all your toys and knockdown your towers. Colin arrived just in time tomove into Carolyn and Doug Kirkpatrick’s newhouse in Oakland (1917 Oak Crest Drive...510-530-6432).

This spring Marjo Wilson was one of the nation-ally recognized artists exhibiting their works atthe 10th Annual San Luis Obispo County Cat-tlemen’s Association Western Art Show. Thisshow, held at the Madonna Inn Hereford Ranch,is “a major cultural event,” according to Art ofthe West magazine.

1983

Jack Stephenson has recently moved to SantaMonica where he’d love to see some other L.A.Toads. His phone number is (310) 260-1934.

Emily Williamson Hancock has her own “soccermom” shuttle service, as she picks up and dropsoff her three off-spring at their various activities.Emily, Janie Carroll Richardson, and WestonRichardson ’80 had a rendezvous this summer inSanta Barbara.

It’s been 11 years since James Wiester and Su-zomi were married. “Our daughters, eight andfive, know all their bad words in English.” TheWiesters, their dog, and five chickens live inNevada City, CA, where James works as lead car-penter for East Wind, Inc., a Japanese wood-working and home-building company.

Artist Ted Heard has a day job working in arestaurant; for the past 11 years, however, hispassion has been painting. In his spare time hetakes walks, reads a lot and enjoys going tochurch on Sundays. He sends a “hello” to all hisclassmates.

“Thoroughly enjoying the good married life,”writes Bruce Phillips, who has left the tea businessand is now doing consulting projects. Bruce andhis bride are living in San Francisco.

A big welcome to Nicholas Carnochan Catalan,son of Rodrigo and Sibyll Carnochan Catalan.Nick made his debut on July 7, 2000.

Allison Glass still works for a non-profit whale re-search organization in Gloucester, MA (yes, thehome of The Perfect Storm and, yes, she’s seenGeorge, Mark, etc.). She’ll soon co-author apaper about humpback whale acoustics.

Sandy NicholsonWatkins, CdeP ’82,with son Christopherat Golden TroutCamp. Sandy is thefirst woman Thachergraduate to come toGTC with herfamily.

ConnorWheaton is the

son of DianaLewis Callahan

and LiamCallahan.

Connor wasborn May 14,

2000.

Elisabeth NorthKuechlerEngelson,daughter of MaryKuechler, whenshe was just twoweeks old

Carina and Nicolas Steeves, children of ClaudiaOrejuela, CdeP ’84, and Mark Steeves


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otes

Dan Klein is taking off as much time as possiblefrom his work (as “a renegade, freelance improvteacher”) to play with his new son, BenjaminDarby, who was born July 30. After watching hiswife Michelle go through an extended labor, Dansays he’s lucky not to be a woman. He went toToronto to shoot a small scene in the LifetimeChannel movies about his car accident in 1988.Dan plays a harried District Attorney whobrushes off his mother, Meredith Baxter; watchfor it in February.

1987

While we were watching the Olympics, every sooften we were treated to a clever commercialwhich featured J.P. Manoux.

Michele Barnett became Mrs. Ingmar Berg onSeptember 8. Ami Becker Aronson, CdeP ’86,Eleanor Whelan O’Neill, and Natalie Stamireswere on hand to celebrate this union. Michelehas a new job with the Strategic Alliances groupat Intraspect Software covering the WashingtonD.C. and Virginia territory.

Gillian Delaney Bressie arrived on February 6,2000 to take up residence in Jennifer and DavidBressie’s household.

Jay Cowles and Tom Konrad were huffing andpuffing away together when they ran the AustinMarathon in February. Tom, who now lives inAustin, is a science-fiction writer “for as-yet-to-materialize remuneration” while his day job istrading on the stock market.

Now that Logan Meyer is done with businessschool, he’s living and working in Los Angeles.When his cousin, John Logan, got married in Oc-tober, Tim Milligan, Ted Labbe, Pat Hogan,Driscoll Robbins, and Mark Gamble, CdeP ’86,helped celebrate the nuptials.

1988

Lots of changes in Jaime Araujo’s life. She hasstopped acting professionally; she’s started a newjob at Moet Hennessy in the European division;she’s single again. “I’m loving London more thanever. Haven’t seen any Toads in a while apartfrom Adam Clammer, whom I caught up with inSan Fran in July. How about a Thacher alumnigathering in London?” Her e-mail address:[email protected].

Congratulations to Cathy Ruhl, who marriedJack Kemp in April in the foothills of the SierraNevada. “We spend weekends doing never-endinghouse projects and hiking in the mountains. It’sgreat!”

“Twelve years later, and I still remember some ofwhat I learned at Thacher,” writes Hilary Swift,“at least the part about hiking and camping.” Sheclimbed Mount Kilimanjaro this summer andloved it. Although she had never climbed high al-titude at Thacher, many of her camping tech-niques came in handy. “And the view from19,340 feet is amazing!”

1989

Congratulations to Adam Geyer, who has gradu-ated from medical school and is living in Man-hattan. Next on the docket is his residency atColumbia in dermatology. “I’m looking forwardto my first real job. It’s about time!”

After finally finishing her doctorate in history atCornell this summer, Susan Shaw moved to Texasto teach at the University of Houston. “Life as ajunior professor is busy, but I sleep much betternow that my dissertation is finished, once and forall!” She’d love to see anyone who comes herway; contact her at [email protected].

1990

Peter Everett said “I do” on July 7, 2000 in Bris-tol, CT, when he married Katy Jennings. On handto witness the uttering of these important wordswere Gideon Davis, Brian Holl, Rob Williams,Mary Everett, CdeP ’94, Bill Everett, CdeP ’92,and Rob Everett, CdeP ’89. Both Peter and Katyteach and coach at the Wooster School in Dan-bury, CT.

Kátia Costa became Mrs. Lucas Erskine Black onSeptember 3, 1999, in Salvador, Bahia, Brazil.

1991

Having finished her credential work at U.C. Irvineand with two student teaching experiences underher belt, Alex Ginter is now teaching in an ele-mentary school in Bishop. One of her mentorswrites, “Alex already has the wisdom and expe-rience of a five-year teacher. I do believe she willbe a catalyst for change!”

Morgan Ward has gone from being the MarketingManager at the South Bay Pavilion in Carson tobeing a student at U.S.C.’s Marshall School ofBusiness.

Laird Luebbers and Amanda Silva were marriedon July 29, 2000 at the Art Institute in San Fran-cisco. The newlyweds are nesting down in Brook-lyn, NY.

Timothy Farrell married Kristina Alley on Sep-tember 16 in Santa Fe, NM. Sarah Thompson,Wynne Huang, Leith Connell, Amelia Ranney,and Gillian Kneass were on hand for the festivi-ties.

Hopefully, Katie Prager will finish her last year ofvet school at U.C. Davis in time to attend her10th-year reunion.

1992

We can all rest a little better knowing that NavalAviator Brian Chad Emme is ready to fly to ourdefense. Brian euphorically writes, “Yes, that’sright. Your hard-earned but quickly spent tax dol-lars have bought you a two-million dollar man.Me. I can assure you that every single dollar youspent milked me of sweat, tears, adrenaline, joy,triumph, and defeat....Rest assured that I am stillthe same ol’ punk I always was, now I just havecooler stories to tell.” After his official wingingceremony in August, Brian will attend S.E.R.E.school to learn about survival, escape, and evad-ing the enemy P.O.W. camps.

Via Thacher’s newly revised web site, Suzie Birdwrote that after three years of teaching highschool ecology, she is going back to school to geta Masters in ecology at Colorado State University.Her focus is forest ecology, and she’ll likely be inAlaska doing research on the flood plains of ariver. “I’m loving it so far.”

Ami Becker Aronson, CdeP ’86, Eleanor WhelanO’Neill, CdeP ’87, Michele Barnett Berg, CdeP’87, and Natalie Stamires, CdeP ’87

Michele BarnettBerg, CdeP ’87,

with new husbandIngmar

Allison Reed, CdeP ’89; Brian Greene, CdeP ’89;Paula, Jeff, Becca, CdeP ’89, and Molly Clarke;Cathy Ruhl; Jason Ruhl, CdeP ’91; and MarielleWarren, CdeP ’91

Lyn Dawson, CdeP ’89, who teaches fly fishing inMontana, sent this photo of the fire in BitterrootNational Forest this summer


Cla

ss N

otes Congratulations to Meredith Bressie, who re-

ceived her B.A. in Architecture from Cal PolySLO in June. A pat on the back also goes to Jen-nifer Kritz, who, as of May 2000, has her M.A. inEnglish from New York’s Columbia University.Jennifer writes, “I’m still living in New York Cityand loving it.”

Jovi Young has graduated with an M.A. in theol-ogy from Harvard School of Divinity. Now sheand her husband are living in Santa Barbara,where Jovi is working on a doctorate in the samefield at U.C.S.B. Hooray for Jovi for beingawarded a Regents Fellowship by the U.C. Boardof Regents.

1996

Our best wishes to Brooke LeVasseur and RobHousden, CdeP ’93 who were married this sum-mer. That makes number 19 in the ever-growinglist of Thacher marriages.

Mika Steffensen and Catherine Pinkerton wereup to some risky business—skydiving in Lebanon,Maine. Mika now lives in Boston.

Maria Banman wrote that she “saw Mandy So-nenshine (live) play Sarah Jessica Parker on hershow Trackers. She works for the game showClued In, which is produced with Trackers andshe gets to go on air every so often. Baby andPosh Spice were there, too!”

1997

Kenn Young was gallivanting again last year, tak-ing the school year off to travel and do somehands-on learning. According to his parents,“Kenn studied natural building techniques andbuilt straw-bale homes in Arizona, Mexico, andGreece. He is now back at Rice in Houston wherehe is studying Nano technology.” This past sum-mer Kenn and his sister, Jovi, CdeP ’94, traveledtogether for three weeks in Turkey. See the pho-tograph of Jovi and Kenn taken in Ephesus,where they are sitting on the public toilets datingfrom around 150 B.C.

Here’s the scoop from Lisa Vogt: “After a lovelyspring off from school in San Francisco, I’ve re-turned to Harvard. Rosa (Rosalez) and I are bothtaking a class on American Cultural History inthe 20th Century, involving serious books on TV,jazz, Coney Island, and Tarzan. Just ran intoCovie Burke, CdeP ’99, which was a surprise.Nick (Golding) seems to have gone to L.A. to editfilms, suspending his college education yet again.Rhea (Wong) is the high-powered editor of aMcGill newspaper, and loving every bit of stressand muck she can rake. Brooke (Sines) says onceshe graduates from Cornell, she “will work as abartender and record voice-overs in New York,but who really knows. From all I can tell, we’redoing OK.”

Margrit Lent is “down under” where she is study-ing this year at Central Queensland University inAustralia.

Our roving reporter, Christina Chang, informs usthat Rosa Rosalez completed her first triathalonand Amy Purdie is pursuing her dream to startan organic farm. Christina spent last year travel-ing and studying in Oxford, England. “Alice Pax-ton and I had a happy reunion after threeyears—we celebrated Alice’s birthday and theEaster holiday with her family in Plymouth andDevon (where I was initiated into the world ofroasts, Yorkshire puddings and the like).”Christina is now back at Stanford for her senioryear.

Jim LaRue traveled to Bozeman, WY, for a mini-reunion in November with Abby Dachs, PaytonHolmes, Bobby Acquistapace, and Chris Labbe.

1998

This past spring Cindy Liu was the programmingchair of the Milton S. Eisenhower Symposium,the largest and oldest completely student-runsymposium in the nation. She’s in a pre-med pro-gram at Johns Hopkins where she’s also workingas a residential advisor. You know that old adage,“Give a busy person a job to do....”

With his sophomore year at Amherst behind him,Erik Morrill went across the pond to London thissummer to work at the Ministry of Art. Next stopis Greece to spend this academic year studying inAthens.

Rose Minier has her sights set on Seattle, but atthe moment is in Montana working at an Internetprovider and playing with computers all week.“Making sure to take time off and go to myboyfriend’s band’s show where I have a chanceto wear black vinyl, spikes, and boots...life isgood.”

Kelley Collier is spending the fall in South Amer-ica with plans to return to school in January.

Sun Valley, ID, was hopping on the fifth of Augustwhen there was a Toadly gathering for the mar-riage of Kate Munzig and Eric Dachs, CdeP ’94.

Earlier this year, Nick Geale took a position as anassociate attorney with the labor and employ-ment litigation section of Thelen, Reid and PriestL.L.P. in Washington, D.C. His new home ad-dress is 4758 Arlington Blvd. South, Arlington,VA 22204; his work address is 701 PennsylvaniaAve., N.W., Suite 800, Washington, D.C. 20004;his work number is (202) 508-4051.

1993

With only one phone booth in the village, GerinRiver, a Peace Corps volunteer in Panama, ischecking his e-mail ([email protected]) formessages from the outside world.

Greta Louise deBoer, weighing in at 9 pounds,13 ounces, made her debut ten minutes beforethe midwife arrived, but her mother, MeganHarding, and father, Greg deBoer, did the job eas-ily and safely. Greta, according to her proudgrandparents, “is a snuggly joy.”

“We’re having a fantastic time in Amsterdam,”writes Rosa Barkus. Jose (Klein) is finishing hismasters in film studies, and I am working for abookbinder. Life is good.”

On June 25, 2000, Helen Holmes was marriedin the Cascade Mountains. If you try to phoneHelen and Brian at their home in Eugene, OR,and get the answering machine, it probably meansthey’ve gone fly-fishing or are out hiking withtheir dog, Baxter. “I am working at GreenhillHumane Society and love having so many crit-ters in my life again!”

Laura Wentworth reports that she is teaching afourth/fifth-grade class at Whittier Elementary inBoulder and that Todd McCloskey is makingmusic around Colorado with his brother, David,CdeP ’96.

1994

Devon Brown spent two weeks scuba diving offthe coast of Honduras. In real life she’s workingin the marketing department of R.W. Beck, anengineering firm in Seattle.

Another classmate in the Northwest is Katie Kirk-mire, who lives in Portland, OR, and works forAdidas International.

Rosa Barkus, CdeP ’83, and Jose Klein, CdeP ’83

BrookeLeVasseur, CdeP’96, and newhusband RobHousden, CdeP’93

StephanieWarren, CdeP

’96, and MandySonenshine,

CdeP ’96, werebridesmaids at

BrookeLeVasseur’s

wedding

Jovi, CdeP’94, and KennYoung, CdeP’97, in Turkey

Unfinished Business at the

Turn of the Millenium

Cindy Liu, CdeP ’98

Poverty. Civil Rights. Artistic Expression.Politics. The Criminal Justice System.

Women’s Rights. Public Health. These com-plex and often-times controversial topics fallin the category of Unfinished Business: Ad-dressing Race, Class, and Gender at the Turnof the Millenium, the title of the Milton S.Eisenhower Symposium, a series of free lec-tures at Johns Hopkins University this fall.The focus of the 2000 Symposium will beto tie these large issues that America facestoday with what the City of Baltimore is ex-periencing and, to a certain extent, withwhat is happening on the campus of theJohns Hopkins University.

Despite being premed and majoring in In-ternational Studies, Thacher graduate, CindyLiu, CdeP ’98, applied to be the Sympo-sium’s Programming Chair because shewanted to help open other people’s mindsto the social problems that the United Statesis facing today. “I felt that there are many is-sues college students should be familiar with,that they may not otherwise think about.Students at Hopkins are very ambitious andgoal-oriented, but I strongly hope that theymay become inspired by a speaker or aworkshop of the Symposium and dedicatethemselves to more than just getting aheador making tons of money.”

Just beginning her junior year at Johns Hop-kins, Cindy worked this summer contactingspeakers and taking care of details to attractspeakers to participate in the Symposium.So far, the Symposium has been able to se-cure John Sweeney of the AFL-CIO and BillLann Lee, the Acting Assistant AttorneyGeneral of the United States to speak atHopkins this fall. Cindy is currently workingon inviting the Surgeon General of theUnited States, Dr. David Satcher to speak atthe Symposium. She hopes to attract the at-tention of the large premed students popu-lation at Hopkins to issues concerning thecorrelation of poverty and health. The Deanof the School of Public Health, a good friendof Dr. Satcher, wrote a letter requesting hisparticipation; an answer should come withinthe month.

“My hope is that people who attend theseseminars will remember to serve others, notjust themselves.” S.D.T. would be proud ofyour efforts, Cindy.


Class N

otes

From Justin Buell, who is at Santa Clara Univer-sity, we learned that Kim Turner interned at theWhite House this summer and Rob Landsness isat NYU.

1999

From Princeton we hear that Eliza Gregory is“rowing, writing, missing all that citrus!”

In her free time last year, Brooke MacDonald wasplaying the violin in U.C.L.A.’s Philharmonic Or-chestra or was busy running up and down thelacrosse field as a member of the U.C.L.A.Women’s Lacrosse Team (placed third in theState). She is now infusing Brown University withall her energy and talents.

Shannon Hastings finished a year of teaching ski-ing at Taos, New Mexico, and is now a freshmanat Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts. Shestill teaches skiing at a nearby small ski resortand she’s on the Mount Holyoke Crew Team, ayear-round sport.

2000

The first news entry in the Thacher Alumni Newsof a Toad who graduated in the new century:Megan Winecoff won the first-ever 2000 YouthDirectory art contest. The Ojai Valley YouthFoundation will publish and distribute the 2000Youth Directory—a phone book for teens—tolocal students in the fall and feature Megan’swork on the cover.

Lauren Fraim is ecstatic about college...althoughshe actually missed not going on Thacher’s Extra-Day Trip at the beginning of this school year.“Thacher really prepared me for college. I’m soglad I decided to take a trip out to California fiveyears ago to see what Thacher was all about. Iwouldn’t change a thing about my experiencethere!”

FORMER FACULTY

Participants at Golden Trout Camp 2000

Members of the Class of 2000 visit Joy andMichael in Wyoming in July. Left to right: MichaelMulligan, Erin Blankenship, Todd Meyer, JulietteWhite, Kristin Berona, Justin Mulholland, EllieFletcher, and Joy Sawyer-Mulligan

A Rhodes family reunion at Golden Trout Camp

Kim Cahill, CdeP ’99, Besse Gardner ’00, andSarah Sawyer, CdeP ’99

Third session at Golden Trout Camp

Meredith Flannery ’01, Laura Neville ’02, AntheaTjuanakis ’01, Sarah Sawyer, CdeP ’99, KimCahill, CdeP ’99, Besse Gardner ’00, and CaitlinMulholland ’01

Mystery sighting: Ex-faculty member Hub Segur(1961-68) visits Ted Rhodes, CdeP ’65, at TheBluffs in Carpinteria


ReunionWeekend

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Fall 1999 / Winter 2000 page 71Spring/Summer 2000 page 71

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1995


Remembering C.M. Ehrhardtby John “Jack” S. Huyler ’51H

It is so good to see so many of Michael’s stu-dent/friends here today. It is especially touch-ing to see so many of you who do NOT have

reunions this year. Michael Jr., it is great to seeyou here!

Letters have flowed into the Alumni Office andto me from other Thacher Friends of Ehrhardtwho could not be here today.

C. Michael Ehrhardt was the blythest soul Ihave ever known.

He never lost that wonderful, child-like won-der at the World and Everything in it. He wasopen—and embracing—to everything positive.

All of the Arts, devel-opments in Science,Humanism—especiallyPhilosophies—intriguedhim all his days.

I was rather pleasedwith myself to havetaken up the computerand e-mail rather late inlife. Michael came on-line in his eighties.

Michael certainly madehis mark on Thacher!Musicologist, instru-mentalist, composer,teacher!

Ah, yes! “Strings from Scratch!”

No one could ever accuse C. Michael Ehrhardtof being tradition-bound. He did some greatexperimentation in his Music Box.

With the financial backing of former reveredteacher Keith Vosburg, he purchased two vio-lins, two violas, two cellos. He enlisted fourseniors who had never set bow to string, in-formed them that they were now a string quar-tet, and proceeded to instruct them collectively.No playing of scales, no ditties; but, all to-gether now, here is your first finger positionfor the first chord of the Andante Movement ofBeethoven’s Symphony in A Major. On my cuedraw your bowstring across the string I amdesignating. Everybody ready? Now! Good!You have just played the first chord of a greatpiece of music. Congratulations!

Here is the second chord. Good. Between nowand our next lesson I want you to practice until

you can take those finger positions rapidly andaccurately. That’s all. See you Thursday.

In the Fall School Concert those four, whostyled themselves Strings from Scratch, playedthe first few bars of that opus flawlessly, toEhrhardt’s satisfaction, their self-satisfaction,and the delight and pride of the assembledSchool, who were wise enough to recognizewhat had been accomplished.

At the year-end concert the quartet played theentire Andante.

By that time they were well into two moreworks and had become aficionados of classicalmusic and limited experts on Beethoven.

Meanwhile, C.M.E. had started two other en-sembles along parallel routes. That is teach-ing! Mr. Albert Goldberg, music critic for theLos Angeles Times devoted a Sunday columnto it.

Three soundproof music rooms were subse-quently constructed on the lower floor of theBixby Art Studio (formerly the Bixby Hand-ball Court and now the Bixby Faculty Apart-ments). There were five pianos available tostudents; I wonder how many there are now.

In addition to the quartets, that year Ehrhardttaught: nine string players; 23 piano students,one of whom subsequently played as soloistwith the Ventura Symphony; and an electricguitar group, which practiced in the Quonsethay barn.

One student did, in fact, play and place in thenational competition for banjo players heldannually in Nashville.

Although it was hardly his favorite musicalmedium, it was Michael, who at the urging ofthen-Headmaster Ted Sanford, started our firststage band. We older members of the commu-nity much preferred their revivals of Good-man, Miller, and James to the sounds we heardemanating nightly from the hay barn.

The greatest regret of my life is that I cannotread music. Ehrhardt would not tolerate mu-sical illiteracy.

He gave to each Smut—unfortunately, today’sThacher students don’t know what a Smutwas—in the required freshman music class arecorder, taught each to read music, and toplay what he read. The recorder ensemble was

Obituaries


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really pretty good. They playedStrauss. Strauss never wrote amelancholy note in his life.

Would that I had been draftedinto reading and playing music.Full-fledged courses for creditwere offered by Ehrhardt inTheory and Composition;Richard Wagner, the Man WhoChanged the World; Beethoven:a Study in Genius; and Music ofthe Twentieth Century.

Ehrhardt and Educo Records putout a 12-inch L.P. record entitledSounds of Thacher. Some finesounds, indeed!

Margaret and I last saw Michaeland Florence in Mount Pleasant,South Carolina, in March 1998.Before dinner, Michael and Flo-rence invariably relaxed over amartini—a most unusual mar-tini. Michael had advised us tobe sure to arrive in time to savorone of their martinis before weate. I shan’t forget that martini,three parts vermouth and onepart gin—You heard me right: three parts ver-mouth and one part gin.

We spoke of Thacher and its current musicprograms; of camping trips (Michael alwayswore a pith helmet.); of Maharishi MaheshYogi; of Transcendental Meditation; of BrideyMurphy; and Old Klaus, the Scandinavianhorse which understood what was said to himand responded. Although walking was verypainful for him because of his feet, Michael’senthusiasm was as youthful and joyous asever. He led group singing every week; ANDhe had a piano student (on full scholarship)—

one of the servants in the retirement home.

Michael died on Christmas with his family allgathered around him. Florence said he enjoyedeach of his presents and exuded love for eachmember of his beloved family. When it wastime for a nap after a full morning, he just kepton sleeping. God bless him!

I am not sure that he is conducting the Heav-enly Choir, but I’ll bet he has an ensemble ofharpists playing his compositions and arrange-ments—perhaps even the composition whichwe shall hear just as soon as I sit down. e

Obituaries

A trio playe C.M. Ehrhardt’s Trio in D-minor during his memorial service at Thacher

The Outdoor Chapel during the service in memory of C. Michael Ehrhardt


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C. Michael EhrhardtRemembering a Musical Legend by David Marsten, CdeP ’62

Forrest H. Cook, a faculty member atThacher from 1912 to 1946, wrote the fa-mous Thacher Litany of good things: listing

the 10 best smells, the nine finest sights, theeight best sounds, etc. Among the best soundswere listed pleasant, familiar things like singingorioles, rain on the roof, a running brook, anickering horse…but it included something in-egmatically named “Walker.” I would proposea change, since “Walker” doesn’t mean any-thing to me nor suggest any sound at all. Iwould substitute “the sound of a symphonyorchestra tuning up; before a concert.”

This sound was new to me when I was a Smutat Thacher in 1958; but by my senior year, itwas already a treasured moment of recogni-tion, offering the excitement and promise of anew performance. Even after 40 years, thissound does not fail to elicit a thrill, even whena most familiar program is scheduled. And itwas C. Michael Ehrhardt who introduced meto the world of classical music.

“Music, the greatest good that mortals know,and all of Heaven we have below” (Joseph Ad-dison’s “Song for St. Cecilia’s Day”).

I must be honest…it was not always the ex-citement and majesty of classical music thatwas my primary interest. We students wouldtolerate the music with sufficient politeness.The real inducement was: (first) that we wouldescape the School and go all the way into SantaBarbara to hear a concert; and (second) thepossibility that Mr. Lamb and Mr. Ehrhardt(the drivers of the two carry-alls) might stopafter the concert at Denny’s where we couldget a milkshake and a cheeseburger. Add tothis, one exciting evening one of them got aspeeding ticket—the whole outing offered ex-quisite promise. I did not know it at the time,but the symphonic music I heard at these con-certs was capturing my soul while I was merelythinking about my stomach.

I knew nothing of classical music before at-tending Thacher: singing hymns at chapel, theballads in the Yale songbook on Tuesdayevening singing, and even the class songs (withthe Upper School purloining the “Anvil Cho-rus” from Verdi’s Il Trovatore)…all of this wasnew to me, as well.

Beginning with a tabula rasa in our freshmanyear, C. Michael Ehrhardt led our class througha course described as Music Appreciation. Thefirst class dealt with Gregorian Chant and workof minnesingers and troubadours. The next

week we got into Johann Sebastian Bach, lis-tening to piano fugues and glorious choralepisodes. By the third week we were into the lifeand the music of Ludwig van Beethoven…andwe would remain there the rest of the year itseemed. This was Mr. Ehrhardt’s moral andspiritual center. To him all music built up toBeethoven…and subsided thereafterwards, (but,of course, he was open to the newer sonicworlds of Schoenberg or Stravinsky).

In fact, in the early 1950s, Mr. Ehrhardtcoached and presented at Thacher BenjaminBritten’s Ceremony of Carols—one of the firstschools in California to perform it. (It has be-come an acknowledged Christmas classic alongwith Handel’s Messiah. Michael wrote to Brit-ten regarding some liberties that he had takenand begged his indulgence; and Britten re-sponded that he was always glad to have hisworks performed…and hoped to visit Thachersomeday, maybe during his next trip to con-duct in Los Angeles. Britten actually came oneThanksgiving (when everyone was gone) andsaid he was disappointed that he couldn’t meetMichael and hear his chorus…but he also re-vealed that he was much happier riding a horsethan attending a cocktail party.

Choral singing programs depended upon thestrength of the student forces for that year.Some years there only seemed to be a fewvoices other than droning basses, while otheryears produced a finely balanced glee club thatcould tackle serious masterworks. There wasalso a select group of the finest four singerswithin the various voice ranges—the best ofthe best—who formed a quartet called “TheHoneytones” (during my tenure this might nothave been a tonally accurate description). Wehad great fun singing barbershop quartets andrather silly stuff. (I did not realize at the timebut this would be my apprenticeship to singingmotets of Heinrich Schütz and Tomas Luis Vic-toria with the Harvard Freshman Glee Club!)Music was not merely Beethoven but came inmany forms and styles. Nothing excluded, allwas to be enjoyed.

C. Michael Ehrhardt sometimes could also bemischievous: one work he wrote was called“Prayer”—a musical setting for words by oneof the graduating seniors. Apparently one ofthe faculty members did not approve of“Amen” being sung at the end of a hymn…soC. Michael couldn’t resist but write a seven-fold “Amen.” “Wasn’t that naughty of me?”he confided…yet he added, “it sounded goodand the boys loved it.”

Obituaries

David Marsten, CdeP ’62, speaks aboutC. Michael Ehrhardt opening the world ofclassical music to Thacher students


Obituaries

C. Michael Ehrhardt was not merely a teacherof music…but became an advisor to many stu-dents—enough each year to fill a car and driveto Santa Barbara or Los Angeles for a concert.In 1949, Marshall Walter was one of his ad-visees…and he was having a difficult time withhis studies, so much so there was doubt that hemight not be invited back for his senior year.This student was quite fond of the music ofRachmaninoff and, in particular, worshipedhis Third Piano Concerto. A concert in LosAngeles was coming up with the legendary pi-anist William Kappel playing this masterpiece.When Marshall learned he was not allowed togo to this concert, he was devastated. Theheadmaster even asked if they might relent andlet him go…but Mr. Ehrhardt insisted theystick with the decision. The lucky ones went tothe concert and even went backstage after-wards to get a program autographed for Mar-shall.

At this moment, Mr. Ehrhardt decided to writea Trio in D-minor (the same key as the ThirdPiano Concerto of Rachmaninoff, hence all ofthe repeated D’s). He showed Marshall the firsttwo movements when they were soon com-pleted and revealed that the piece was dedi-cated to him…but he warned Marshall if hedidn’t get his studies up and return next year,he would not complete the Trio and it wouldnever be played.

Inspired by this dedication, Marshall did im-prove and did return. The Trio was finishedthat summer and given its premiere at theThacher library on February 19, 1950, per-formed by the Compinsky Trio (Mr. Ehrhardtin his notes to me added: Marshall went on toHarvard where he got a business degree; hehas lived for many years in Switzerland withhis wife and two children. “We still keep intouch.”) This is the profile of a great mentor.

Mr. Ehrhardt confided, “When I look back onmy life at Thacher, the productions of Shake-speare in the Outdoor Theater are among myfondest memories.” The musical scores which

he composed and collaborated with DonaldMcDougall were always memorable—finelycrafted tone poems. Some of the music wouldbecome incorporated in other compositions(the fugue he wrote in his Trio in D-minorcame from his score for Henry V while a pas-sage from The Merchant of Venice would beused in his piano concerto.) I remember in1960 going down to the Presbyterian Churchin Ojai to help record music he wrote for ourA Midsummer Night’s Dream production (Igot to strike some bells and gongs…it wasgreat fun)—the music he wrote was magical,ethereal stuff on a par with Benjamin Britten orFelix Mendelssohn. I would love to hear thiswondrous music performed again (assuredlywith a better percussion section than we couldafford in 1960).

In 1961 (November 12 to be exact) Mr.Ehrhardt took a group of brave music studentsto Los Angeles to hear Die Meistersinger vonNürnberg—it was the first Wagnerian opera Ihad ever seen. To me it was one of thoseepiphanies that one experiences just a fewtimes in life. Having spent a lifetime studyingand writing about this art form, I still relishthe memory of seeing this great work for thefirst time. It was C. Michael’s favorite Wag-nerian opera, and I am moved by nostalgia toagree with his assessment.

I vividly remember from his music lessons ofhearing about his experiences in Germany inthe 1930s as a music student in Leipzig. Theyoung, idealistic C. Michael Ehrhardt wasthrilled to be going to the country where namesof Bach, Beethoven, and Brahms should beknown as “Beruehmte Kuenstler”…and wasshocked to discover only a few knew the “48of Bach” or the “32 of Beethoven.” Germanradio had only elevator music and worse. Seatsin the Gewandhaus were given to young re-cruits of the “Kraft durch Freude” campaign;and the people would sleep through most ofthe concerts. And once, covering a Wagnerianopera as a reviewer for Musical America, hediscovered his press seat was just a few yards

from Adolf Hitler. The presence of unspeak-able evil at the altar of High Art was ashock…but also a metaphor—an aspect ofmusic he constantly reminded us: “Music is away, not an end.”

In our modern era all of the arts are under at-tack by cretins in congress, ever fearful of theconsequences of the First Amendment. As webattle for funding (whether for your local sym-phony, a regional museum, a local theatergroup, or a National Public Radio station) it isalmost too easy to become despondent andcynical. But C. Michael would always encour-age me in my battles with the Philistines…andI think he speaks to all of us here: “It all boilsdown to the fact that there have to be loyalistslike you, willing to support the arts, passion-ately. Bravo, my loyal friend. And, of course,keep it up!”

Always positive, C. Michael Ehrhardt wouldpoint out that Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony wasprobably only heard by about 5,000 peopleduring Beethoven’s lifetime. Now the music isbeing heard (thanks to advancements in elec-tronic technology) continuously on this planet.Michael found much hope in that.

Henry W. Longfellow wrote in The Song ofHiawatha (xv. Hiawatha’s lamentation)

He is dead, the sweet musician!He the sweetest of all singers!He is gone from us for ever.He has moved a little nearerTo the Master of all music,To the Master of all singing!

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C. Michael Ehrhardt with Thacher’s “The Honeytones” in 1964


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big house and let my kids have all theirrough neck friends they wanted. I’d buy aswimming pool, and have a tennis court forthe girls.

I’d buy a shooting gallery for the boys. Whenthe boys grew old enough I’d buy each ofthem a twenty-two rifle then they could seewho was the best shot and see who could hithis mark the farthest away.

When they got tired of that they could put ontheir bathing suits and dive into theswimming pool.

When they got tired of having swimmingraces and water fights they could play tennis.

John spent four years at Thacher and excelledat camping, soccer, and track; he showed di-verse interests including membership in Com-mittee X, Outdoor, the Gun Board, and heserved as President of Bit and Spur in his sen-ior year. During his junior year, he became aPrefect, “A” Camper, and “Honor-man.” Hematriculated to Stanford University where hegraduated in 1937. He then served in the Armyduring World War II and fought in the Battle ofthe Bulge. After the War, John went to workfor Alexander and Alexander Inc., where herose to the position of vice president. After re-tiring in 1976, John served on the boards of di-rectors of the United Way, the San FranciscoMuseum of Modern Art, the San FranciscoOpera Association, and the Cow Palace.

John is survived by wife of 63 years, CatherineJane Rolph; three daughters: Katherine Nel-son of Seattle, Elizabeth Metcalf of Selma, Ore-gon; and Mary Metcalf of Redwood City, CA;and five grandchildren.

Seeley Wintersmith Mudd II, M.D., (CdeP ’43),died at his beloved ranch in Big Sur, California,on Thursday, September 21, 2000. He was 75.He was born in Boston, Massachusetts, raisedin San Marino, California, and lived on theMonterey Peninsula for the last 38 years.

Seeley attended Thacher for his freshman andsophomore high school years. He graduatedfrom Stanford University, both the undergrad-uate program and the Medical School. Heserved in the U.S. Navy during the KoreanWar, and practiced urology on the MontereyPeninsula for over 20 years.

He was an original supporter of The Big SurLand Trust, a member of the Capital Club,

the Cypress Point Club, and the CaliforniaClub.

Seeley is survived by his sister Elise Marvin;five children: Elizabeth, Katherine, Seeley III,CdeP ’73, John, and William; five grandchil-dren; and one great-grandchild. He was pre-ceded in death by his wife Virginia ShawMudd.

Lewis Palmer Lane II,CdeP ’47, died on Thurs-day, August 17, 2000, athis home in Tucson, Ari-zona, after a four-yearbattle with cancer. Hewas 71.

Lew was born and raisedin Long Beach, Califor-

nia. While at Thacher for two years, Lew daz-zled his classmates with his avid interest inradio. “The intermittent buzzing of MorseCode is commonly heard issuing from hisequipment-filled room,” reported the 1947 ElArchivero. “Lew excels in the scholastic fieldtoo, particularly in the math and science de-partments.” He was active in athletics, play-ing on several teams including Baseball andSoccer. When time permitted, Lew was spottedfrequently on his well-mannered steed “Prince”on the nearby trails or showing off his tricks,including shaking hands with all four feet.

Lew won a Navy Scholarship to Stanford Uni-versity, where he received a Bachelor of Sci-ence degree in 1952 and a master’s degree in1956. He spent three years on active duty withthe Navy during the Korean War. Highlights ofLew’s career include 15 years as a contractor inMenlo Park; eight years as a construction en-gineer with Bechtel Corporation, includingthree years on the Jubail project in Saudi Ara-bia; and ten years as a Project Manager withthe Stanford University Utilities Division staff,where he retired in 1997.

Survivors include his former wife, MarilynLane of Tucson; son Lewis Lane III, daughtersLaura Lane and Susan, stepson David Simp-son; and four grandchildren.

Michael C. Head (CdeP ’48) of Ojai, died No-vember 1999. Michael attended Thacher foronly his sophomore year. He attended collegeat the Vienna Institute of Technology. He issurvived by his son Randolph C., CdeP ’74,who is a professor of history at the Universityof California, Riverside.

Obituaries

ObitsHoward O. Sturgis,CdeP ’24, died April 1,2000. He attendedThacher for only hissenior year, and thenmatriculated to Har-vard College, where heearned his Bachelor ofArts degree in 1928,followed by a master’s

degree in business a year later. He marriedEleanor Brown and they had two children:Eleanor and Howard, Jr.

John Robert Metcalf,CdeP ’33, died Sunday,September 10, 2000, ofcongestive heart failureat his San Franciscohome. He was 84. Ser-vices were held four dayslater at St. Mary the Vir-gin Episcopal Church inSan Francisco.

A third-generation Californian, John was bornin Oakland in 1916. In 1925, while in gram-mar school, John started expressing his hopes,many aspects of which were evident later atThacher, and throughout his life. (These wereshared with us by his daughter, Katherine, fol-lowing his death):

Right Living

When I grow up I expect to be honest, loyal,brave, kind, and useful, so I will follow theserules.

First, I will be honest, which means not totell a lie, not to steal, and if you know youhave something that is someone else’s andshouldn’t have it, give it to the owner.

Next I will be loyal, to my country, to myhome and school.

Then I will be brave and kind both togetherwhich means, not to be afraid of anything,especially not to be afraid to tell what’s right,or to help someone in trouble. Which isusefulness.

None of these are of much use unless you arehealthy.

If I Were a Millionaire

If I were a millionaire I would buy (a lot)about 10 acres of land. Then I would buy a


Obituaries

Walter Morris HartNoble, M.D., CdeP ’50,died Friday, July 28,2000, at his home inSan Francisco. Forthree decades, Morristaught medicine andmaintained a successfulpractice that began inassociation with his fa-

ther, Dr. Charles A. Noble, CdeP ’19. Born inSan Francisco, Morris was a fourth-generationCalifornian and a descendant of physicians andeducators.

According to the 1950 El Archivero, “Morrishas added more to the school life than anyother two boys. ‘Chuckie’s’ sense of humor andgood common sense make him an extremelylikeable and competent person. Teachers’ trustin him and boys’ respect for him are evidentfrom the positions he has so creditably held”:as a senior, he was “School Chairman, SchoolPrefect, Head of the Committee of X, Presi-dent of the Bit and Spur, Sports Editor of TheNotes, and a principal player in the DramaticClub. In scholastic work and athletics, he alsostands at the head of this class. ‘Chuckie’ workshard for his grades and, as a result, has re-ceived at least three commendations for hisgrades and effort every year. He is a four-yearletterman and captain of this year’s undefeatedTennis Team. He has also made the varsityteams for several years in Soccer, Basketball,and Baseball. With the mind and good senseMorris has, he will never have to trust to luck.”

Morris matriculated to Harvard College,where he earned an honors degree in history.He went on to Harvard Medical School andpostgraduate training at the University ofNorth Carolina at Chapel Hill and at the Uni-versity of California, San Francisco. He servedtwo years in the U.S. Army Medical Corps,mainly in Korea.

Morris received a resident teaching award atChildren’s Hospital in San Francisco, where hebriefly served as chairman of medicine and formany years was on the board of directors. Heestablished an endowed teaching chair in in-ternal medicine at California Pacific MedicalCenter to memorialize the contributions of hisfather and brother, Charles Edward Noble,CdeP ’48, who died in 1993. In addition, Mor-ris served for many years on the Board of Di-rectors of Town School in San Francisco (hisschool prior to Thacher) and Thacher’s Boardof Trustees. He served as director and presi-dent of the Pacific Union Club and a directorof the California Tennis Club. He was a mem-ber of the Society of California Pioneers andthe Frontier Boys.

After retiring from medical practice in 1995,Morris continued to teach as an emeritus clin-ical professor of medicine at U.C.S.F. He andhis wife of 37 years, Winifred Brady Noble,also traveled extensively. He is survived by his

wife; his sons Morris Hart Noble of MarinCounty and William Leet Noble of San Fran-cisco; and one grandchild.

James Barton Preston,CdeP ’64, died July 18,2000, just 13 monthsafter speaking atThacher’s 1999 Re-union (see page 61 inthe Spring/Summer1999 issue of TheThacher News fortext). At that time, hesaid, “When my owntime comes to leave this planet as we know it,it will be with ineffable sadness, but also withthe knowledge that this is something perfectlynatural in the way of the world…I will have sat-isfaction in knowing that my life has touchedothers, and others have touched mine. And itwill be especially satisfactory, to know that myname will be added to those who have gonebefore at Thacher. Our ability to touch others,and be touched by them, and hold memories pre-cious, may be one of the very few intimationsof immortality any of us can enjoy.”

While at Thacher, Jim served on The NotesBoard, as the Business Manager for ElArchivero, and as Editor of Ethos (Thacher’sliterary magazine). He also participated in theMop and Broom Club, Third Soccer Team, In-tramural Tennis, Book Committee, and Reli-gious Committee. He received the Short StoryAward for The Notes in his junior year. Hematriculated to Union, but transferred to theUniversity of California, Santa Barbara, wherehe attained a bachelor’s degree in English anda master’s degree in English Literature.

Jim worked as an Editor, Publisher, and Ownerof Special Child Publications; he also publishedJack Huyler’s The Stamp of the School in1994. Jack reported in his book that “duringthe 1961-62 school year, Tony Power, Stu Er-skine, and Jim Preston (all CdeP ’61) occa-sionally took leftover pancakes and Frenchtoast from the Dining Room. After suitablecuring on the Middle School roof, the threeboys would bring them in, varnish them, stickaddress labels and stamps on them, and mailthem to friends, as “genuine souvenirs of TheThacher School.” Part of Jim’s submission forthe time capsule buried in Thacher’s CentennialYear (1989) that is to be opened in 50 yearsread: “What matters [for making our livescount for something] is how we think and feel;how we conduct ourselves moment to mo-ment; how we treat our fellows; what can welearn, and someday teach, that has enduringrather than ephemeral value…Knowledge ofthis sort is not handed out like so muchcandy…It is not so much transmitted, as it isearned…By attending Thacher, I think youhave a slight edge.” In 1998, he founded Char-ter Investigations, a private detective firm. Jimserved as a loyal Class Representative forThacher for over 20 years. Jim is survived by

his wife Sheila Bruseth Preston of Seattle,Washington, and daughter Kayla.

Thacher Friends

Rosalind “Roz” Murray Boswell, wife ofJames G. Boswell II, CdeP ’41, died in mid-August, 2000. She is also survived by theirthree children: Jody, James, CdeP ’70, and Lor-raine; and many grandchildren, including Eliz-abeth, CdeP ’95, and Cam, CdeP ’97.

John E. Cahill, Sr., a construction contractorwhose family-owned firm helped build SanFrancisco’s skyline, died Saturday, September23, 2000. He is survived by his wife Helen, ofSan Rafael; three sons, John, Jr., of Kentfield,Gerald of Mill Valley, and Edward of Stockton;a daughter, Ann Fidanque of Eugene, Oregon;two brothers, Richard of Ross, and J. Peter,CdeP ’42, of Woodside; and 12 grandchildrenincluding Kimberly, CdeP ’99, Kevin ’01, andChris ’03.

Florence Ehrhardt, widow of Thacher’s MusicDirector from 1946 to 1977 C. MichaelEhrhardt, died on August 10, 2000. She is sur-vived by their four children: Gina, Michael,CdeP ’62, Modena, and Rebecca.

Helen I. Lochrie, who for many years workedas Thacher’s admission secretary, died Satur-day, August 12, 2000 at Acacias Care Centerin Ojai. She was very detail-oriented and as-sured that “all loose ends were tied,” accord-ing to Jack Huyler. “She could deal efficientlywith almost anything that had to do with col-lege counseling, admission, or assistant head-mastering.” She is survived by her brotherArthur Lockrie, Jr., of San Diego and sisterElizabeth Hoag McGlynn of Monterey.

Carmen Robertson, mother of Sydney Robert-son, CdeP ’80, died on Tuesday, September 26,2000, following a traffic accident in which herhusband, Jack, was also injured. She’s creditedfor organizing the art in Ojai, and making itthe artistic mecca that it is today. She is sur-vived by her husband; four sons: Nick, Drew,Winslow, and Cullen; one daughter, Sydney,who is presently working for School YearAbroad in Rennes, France; and five grandchil-dren.

Helena Duryea Thacher, wife of George B.Thacher, CdeP ’20, died on June 27, 2000. Sheis also survived by sons: Philip, CdeP ’54, andJohn, CdeP ’57; and grandchildren: Nara, Jef-frey, Peter, CdeP ’84, Sherman, and Thomas,CdeP ’87.

Virginia “Murps” Wheaton, wife of the lateformer Trustee George S. Wheaton, CdeP ’23,died Sunday, September 17, 2000. She is sur-vived by two sons: George S. III, CdeP ’51, andJohn R., CdeP ’56; five grandchildren; and fourgreat grandchildren. A memorial service washeld at Casa Dorinda in Santa Barbara on Fri-day, September 29, 2000. e

CalendarThacher Gatherings and Events

Winter 2000 – Spring 2001Saturday, January 6

Winter Alumni Day

Friday, February 16-18

Departmental Weekend

Sunday, March 11

Boston Gathering (Brunch)

Sunday, March 25

Los Angeles Gathering (Brunch)

Tuesday-Wednesday, April 17-18

Grandparents’ Days

Friday-Sunday, May 4-6

Gymkhana Weekend and Auction

Saturday, June 2

Commencement

Friday-Sunday, June 8-10

Reunion Weekend

Photo by Libby Rauner ’02

Documents

Spring - Summer 2000