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teaches mostly Japanese adults with Skype and children in Latin America with Zoom Platform. The curriculum is provided and works well. The whole system is amazing and certainly global in all respects. He and Jovita will be back in Vermont in October 2019 to connect with friends and visit the NMH campus. On their way back to Indonesia, they will spend a week in Paris, where Ricker lived in 1979. Jovita wants selfies by the Eiffel Tower and Ricker wants to revisit favorite places he knew back then. He is listed on Amazon’s authors’ page. Ricker’s new book, Francine, A Unique Beauty, can be found on Amazon. • Will Thomen was back in Hawaii last July for a reunion with elementary school classmates. In August, he enjoyed a delightful luncheon with Northfield classmates Diane Sewall Chaisson and Deb Jenks. The next day, he spent a memorable afternoon with John Gamel on a boat sailing around Boston Harbor. On his way back to Illinois, he marveled at the amazing Mosaiculture exhibit of 38 huge organic sculptures portraying the history of Canada in Jacques-Cartier Park in Gatineau, Quebec. • Unfortunately, the fall issue of NMH Magazine left out a portion of my class notes from June 2018. So I am including the list of names of our classmates who attended our 55th reunion as well as the part of my notes that somehow got cut: Fourteen of our classmates returned, including Holt (Beau) Anderson, Chuck Bates and wife Ruth LeBar, Rafael Fraguada and wife Mary, Tom French and wife Carol Norris, John Gamel, Don Glascoff, David Gregory, John Hoy and wife Alesia, Dave Robinson, John Schadegg, Tim Sullivan, Richard Watson and wife Kay, Rick Weisman and wife Melody, and me. Thanks to a special hook-up that Holt and John Gamel arranged, John Brock and Ricker Winsor were able to communicate with us via the internet. Mimi Woodcock Karlsson provided a marvelous spread of food and libations for all of us to enjoy. The tour of the Northfield campus on Saturday was particularly enjoyable. The weather was perfect.
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Northfield Mount Hermon Robert Eastman rheastman4@comcast.net • Pamela Street Walton pawalton@myfairpoint.net From Pam: We will come together for our 55th reunion on June 7–9, 2019, so get into your cars and/or planes and travel — even if you have physical challenges. There will be golf carts to transport us and elevators to get us to our rooms. • Marcia Stacy Kemp had a
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Marcia Eastman Congdon ’64 (left) and Gail Myers Pare ’64 (right) presented a watercolor of “The Chat” to Allyson Goodwin ’83 in July 2018.
wonderful September 2018 combining travel with genealogical research. She spent time in Iceland and then, with a friend, visited Marcia’s relatives in Sweden, the friend’s relatives in Ireland, and on to England. Marcia has been working on family genealogy with her relatives in Vadstena, Sweden, for many years; she was surprised by the visual resemblances when she finally met with them. • Faye Lavrakas began a new “career” as a California Uber driver in the Monterey and Carmel area at the beginning of summer 2018. She has met people from around the world, and some have been only two degrees of separation from family members and friends. Vacation took her to the East Coast. She first visited a friend in New Jersey and they saw the Downton Abbey exhibit in New York City, where she was awed by the spectacular costumes. Faye really appreciated the New York deli food, since, according to her, good deli food is lacking in California. She then traveled to Boston, where she stayed with Kathy Marsh and enjoyed fried clams and scallops, and on to Cape Cod. Last November was not quite as much fun as knee replacement surgery was the main event, but she is getting around and will be fit as a fiddle for our reunion in June. • Jean Chatfield is still involved at First Church in Middletown, Conn. The church celebrated its 350th anniversary last year and has a diverse and growing congregation. Sadly, Jean’s mother (97) passed away last Thanksgiving; Jean noted that her mother lived a long, colorful life, including service in the U.S. Marine Corps Women’s Reserve during WWII. • After 51 years in California, Susan Alexieff Marangell and her husband, Ken, have left their home near Los Angeles and moved back to North Haven, Conn., to care for Ken’s mother. They have 32-year-old twins: their son is in China and their daughter is in Australia. Susan hopes to make it to reunion. In the meantime, she
would love to have anyone who remembers her (West Gould) to be in touch. Contact me for Susan’s email address. • Dana Hastings Murphy moved to Memphis, Tenn., to take courses in Middle Egyptian (hieroglyphics) at the Institute of Egyptology within the University of Memphis. At our ages, this may sound unusual, but Dana read Middle Egyptian texts for 25 years with a group of friends in D.C., but then the group disbanded. Now she will study the language in a more formal way. Her son visited his mom’s new home in December 2018, and they did in-depth research to find the best barbecue place in the city (hope she’ll share the name of the location for the next column). • Reunion will be a special time for all, but an extra-special time for Marcia Eastman Congdon and her husband, George. Their daughter, Nancy ’89, will celebrate her 30th reunion and their son, John ’94, will celebrate his 25th. What could be better than having joint reunions? In July 2018, Marcia and Gail Myers Pare once again organized a mini reunion on campus. In attendance were NMH employees, friends of Marcia’s from Northfield Elementary, and quite a few graduates from both Northfield and Mount Hermon. At the luncheon, Allyson Goodwin ’83 (NMH Advancement Office) was presented with a watercolor of the Chat that had belonged to Gail. The painting was given to our class (at our 50th reunion) by Sue Melanson and then given to Gail. Gail felt the painting should “come home,” so it is now in Mayberry House, where Allyson lives. • Catherine “Toushy” Bliss Squires started a bed and breakfast (peppercottage.org) two years ago and it has become a busy venture. She lives in a favorite tourist destination, the Cotswold Hills in England. The oldest part of her hodgepodge house was built in the 1590s! She has met people from all over England, Austria, Germany, Holland, Australia, and New Zealand. The only downside is that she doesn’t do much else! Her stepson and daughter-in-law now live in France after several years jumping back and forth across the channel. They and their two children (in their 30s!) are an important part of Toushy’s life. Her daughter is married to a vicar (pastor), which gives them a busy and demanding life and a lot of fun for Toushy. • We can all take a lesson from Kathy Childs Jones in how to stay connected with classmates. In June 2018, Kathy, Gayle Landgraf Leaversuch and her husband, Bob, and Kathy Marsh met at the DeCordova Museum and Sculpture Park in Lincoln, Mass., where they enjoyed hot drinks in the
