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Class Pages : Class of 1958

CLASS OF 1958 50th REUNION NEWSLETTER

September 2006

NEWS FROM NORTHFIELD from Helen Engelbrecht Ownby

            September 2006-1956....yes, that’s 50 years ago....That was the point in time where the Northfield Class of 1958 was almost doubled, with the addition of “New Juniors”.  We came from high schools in various states with the knowledge that we would have a “better chance” at education than in our home schools.  It was a big shock to some of us to realize that we were not among the brightest stars, but in a school where every subject was just a bit more challenging than any we’d previously experienced.  The first few months were tough to integrate into the society of 4-year students who knew all the ropes and the 3 years who had already made the transition...so we tended to stick together, after all, we were seated separately from the “old juniors” in chapel and assembly!

For all of us new and old, life rotated around the dorms. We did dummy together, ate together, studied, slept, and participated in meetings, silent time, social events based on the dorm system. The circle was larger in the three wings of Gould than in Moore Cottage, or Weston, or Merrill-Keep, but many of these classmates became our life long friends...Others, just seemed to disappear as we headed off into college and adulthood.

             An all girls school meant that the rules for male visitors were strictly enforced and a letter from across the river was the pass to the other side, aside from the ‘blind dates’, orchestra, and drama, the river was wide....

            By the time we became Seniors, we were truly one class of about 175 who marched across the Auditorium Stage to receive our diplomas.  For many of us, that was the last time we’d see Northfield, even to this day.  After 50 years, it’s time to return, time to renew old acquaintances, to visit a chapter of our adolescent life, to sing the class songs and hymns together again.

            So what has happened to the Class of 1958 in the past 50 years?  As far as our relationship to Northfield Mount Hermon School is concerned, the biggest was a vote at our 30th reunion to merge our alumni status with Mount Hermon Class of 1958!  The schools had merged by that time and we realized that not only had there had been a number of marriages among our classmates, but we had a joint history which we did not see in our youth.  Since that time, at each five-year cycle, we’ve been invited back to campus and those who’ve made the trips have learned to know as adults, not only our own Northfield classmates and their significant others, but also our Mount Hermon classmates and theirs.  We’ve worked well to make some of our reunions the envy of other classes and we’d like our 50th to be the same.  At this point in our lives, we tend to be retired, on the verge of retirement, or determined to work to the bitter end....so, take a long weekend out of June 2008 (tentative dates are June 4-8, will be confirmed early 2007) and put it on your Blackberry, Calendar, or Palm...We need to see each and everyone of you to again march into the Auditorium on a Saturday morning....

Helen Engelbrecht Ownby ’58, Class Secretary, 4530 Deer Run, Evans GA 30809-4446
heownby@mindspring.com  (706) 651-9229

 

NEWS FROM MOUNT HERMON, from Don Braue, Class Secretary

Our MH commencement exercise program lists 152 candidates for graduation on 8 June 1958.  Twenty-three of you graduated Cum Laude including Bart Ferris and Peter Heydon.  Their notable achievements are becoming increasingly known to all of us; we thank you guys very, very much.

John Abel was the first Cum Laude candidate listed and he is now Professor Emeritus and Graduate School Professor, School of Civil and Environmental Engineering (CEE), Cornell University.  John started teaching civil engineering in Ithaca in 1974 after teaching four years at Princeton.  For the five years before retiring in 2004 he was the Director (department chair) of CEE.

Hey, Classmates, I ask, are you planning to attend our 50th reunion?  Look at what John wrote about his retirement celebration:  “But even more, the weekend-long celebration was a reunion of friends who delighted in reconnecting with each other and in recalling the heady, work-filled days when our group of faculty and students were developing new computer graphics and computer-aided design for structural engineering.”  Can it be said any better?

Norm Barstow graduated from Brown, served two years for Navy ROTC, worked for a private book seller, worked in Hartford as a credit insurance underwriter (Aetna), started an MBA and then decided he enjoyed teaching more than business. His masters’is in Early Childhood Education. Norm was an elementary classroom teacher and, for the last ten years, an elementary science coordinator for the Simsbury School System.  He writes: “I’ve been retired now for 2 years but am very active as President of the CT Science Teachers Association.  My term is up in June, but I plan to keep involved with consulting and giving professional development workshops in elementary science.” 

Barre Littel informed me that Nils Blatz was the minister of a large church on Long Island.  It was great to hear from Nils who writes: “I just retired from a (fairly) large Episcopal Church in Brooklyn Heights (New York City), but semi-retired is more like it.  I am presently covering a tiny Episcopal Church on LI’s North Fork (after DL Moody, I can’t help calling it the North Tine) in the town of Mattituck.  Three days a week – it’s really an ideal ‘semi-retirement’ so far.”

Dave Eberhardt in Baltimore writes inimitably, so let me just quote him:“I am one of the few ex-cons that was given some direction (I wouldn’t say corrected—in that I had done nothing wrong) from my incarceration.  I worked in the criminal “injustice” system the Baltimore City Jail (social work) since 1974 after being incarcerated for an anti-war protest—pouring blood on draft files with Father Phil Berrigan in 1967 (a life ‘high point’).  (I also have a pardon from Pres. Reagan—who, actually, deserved a pardon from me).  I’ll retire in a couple of years (had my first full-time job at age of 34—a veritable hippie).  I keep trying to write Henry James style sentences (don’t we all?) & what would Thomas Donovan think?  I have a second book of poems coming out this summer and majored in English at Oberlin.Finally, David Newman writes in a way suggesting that he is coming home to Hermee!  He writes:  “Hi, Don--Don’t know if you’ll remember (I do) a scrawny red-headed classmate who hung out with Dale (Beetle) Bailey all those years ago.  Anyway, I’d like to get on the e-mailing list of what’s happening in the way of plans for our 50th.  I live just north of the NH line in Maine, was in touch with the Payzants last year but otherwise have not been a very loyal alum.  Twenty years teaching at St. Paul’s School (remember the *** we used to destroy in cross country) sort of confused my loyalties.  I retired from SPS two years ago and am now a volunteer at a juvenile detention home here (I was a theater director/teacher) and catching up on all the reading I never had time for.  Best to you and I’d appreciate being put on the inform list.”

Keep this kind of email coming, folks, and we might just have a really fine party in two years.  You are definitely on the list, David.

My news is short.  In May, Donna and I did the Montauk Century …riding our bicycles from Penn Station (NYC) to Montauk Point in one day (145 miles--ouch).  Is it the marines who say pain is weakness leaving the body?  In June, we bought sea-touring kayaks that we enjoy here in Sparta on Lake Mohawk.  We enjoyed kayaking on Lake St. George and Rangeley Lake in Maine this summer.  Age is only a state of mind, so they say!

In the words of Garrison Keillor, “Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.”

Don Braue, Class Secretary ’58, 101 Cedar Falls Terrace, Sparta, NJ  07871
don@braue.net           (973) 729-6541

 

Interested in helping to plan for your 50th reunion?

Members of the Class of 1958 will be joining on the Northfield Mount Hermon campus on October 19 & 20, 2006 for a 50th Reunion Planning Committee meeting.  If you’re not already involved, please consider joining the team!  By joining the 50th Reunion Planning Committee, you can help make your 50th reunion as successful and memorable as possible. You will be able to share your ideas with your classmates, plan events and activities for reunion weekend, help raise funds for your Class Gift, make new friends or reacquaint yourself with old ones, and have a wonderful time doing it!  For more information about the meeting or the specific volunteer opportunities available, please contact: Karen Fuller, Associate Director, 50th Reunion [karen_fuller@nmhschool.org, (413) 498-3672] or Josie Rigby, Assistant Director of Alumni and NMH Community Relations [josie_rigby@nmhschool.org, (413) 498-3138].

Class Volunteers
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Class AF Goals & Giving
NMH Annual Fund : Class Progress July 1, 2007 - June 30, 2008

Class and School	Giving to Date	Pledges to Date	Goal	Donors to Date	Pledges to Date	Donors Goal
1958MH	$55686	$2792	$80000	53	5	70
1958N	$17735	$2045	$20000	53	4	60

Last Update: June 27, 2008

 

Class of 1958 Photos
2007 Reunion — 25th Reunion Alumni Events Photos



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