Fall 1999 - Winter 2000

The Thacher School 5025 Thacher Road Ojai, CA 93023 Address Service Requested

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Overview

In every issue

Six months of life at Thacher are chronicled in this Fall/Winter issue of The Thacher News. From Opening School activities to Departmental Weekend, from sports to plays, it has been a busy half year.

3 From the Head of School The Good High School: A Reflection

by Michael K. Mulligan

Profiles: Thacher Pioneers

5 Letters

In this issue Campus Life campus

life

6 Acquaintances Renewed 8 Footlights, Moonlight, and Charity 9 Pack up Your Horse and Head for the Hills 10 Music Weekend 11 Learning from the Earth 12 Reflections on Becoming a Parent 13 Tidbits, Numeracy Puzzle 14 Thacher’s Initial Public Offering 16 Fall/Winter Sports

ALUMNI

TRUSTEE

22 Bertel M. Ekman, CdeP ’51 Content at Day’s End

37 Terdema L. Ussery, CdeP ’77 Making the Most of Hoops and Hopes

24 Klaus Schubert, CdeP ’56 Trading One Casa Rustica for Another 26 Hisakazu Hirose, CdeP ’66 Learning in an American Dream 28 Cynthia F. Hunter, CdeP ’80 Lessons Learned amid Manure Piles 30 Carol J. McConnell, CdeP ’81 A Product of Her Environment

36 Hubert Honanie, Jr., CdeP ’57 Dances with Snakes, Toads, Sunlight, and Gems

O HO L

THE T H

C

HER S AC

1889

Alumni alumni

The Thacher News Fall 1999/Winter 2000 Volume XII, Number 1

44 Class Notes

Editor Jane D. McCarthy

54 Obituaries

Design J. Bert Mahoney, Tim Ditch, and Jane D. McCarthy

56 Bookshelf

Contributors W. Austin Curwen, Camilla Evans-Hensey, Gregory T. Haggard, John S. Huyler ‘51H, Rod M. “Jake” Jacobsen, Jane D. McCarthy, Alice P. Meyer, Kurt R. Meyer, Joy Sawyer-Mulligan, Michael K. Mulligan, Molly T. Perry, CdeP ‘85, Cricket Twichell, Frederick C. Twichell, Gallia K. Vickery, and William C. Vickery

57 Calendar

Cover Photo Science Department Chair Rae Ann Sines and her Environmental Science students set up grids on the hills overlooking the Gymkhana Field to track regrowth of vegetation following the Ranch Fire.

42 No Man Is an Island Edgardo Recalls a Weekend Pack Trip of 30 Years Past

34 Stephen M. Batts, CdeP ’76 Flying His Dreams

22 Alumni

40 Former Faculty Member

40 Edgardo Catalan Artistic Endeavors

32 Cindy Castañeda, CdeP ’88 “The Banquet Song” Becomes a Lullaby

Profiles profiles 37 Trustee

FORMER FACULTY MEMBER

Class Notes Cricket Twichell Sports Section Joy Sawyer-Mulligan Photography Camilla Evans-Hensey, Jane D. McCarthy, Joy Sawyer-Mulligan, Wendi Parker-Dial, and Timothy O Teague

The Thacher News magazine is published twice a year by The Thacher School, and is sent free of charge to alumni, parents, and friends of the School.

In preparing this report, every effort was made to ensure that it is accurate and complete. If there is an omission or an error in spelling, please accept our apologies and notify the Head of School’s Office at The Thacher School, 5025 Thacher Road, Ojai, California 93023, or call (805) 646-4377.

Third Class postage is paid at the Oxnard Post Office.

POSTMASTER: Please send form 3579 to the preceding address.

NAIS

MEMBER

Printed with soy-based inks.

From the Head of School

by Michael K. Mulligan

n 1983, Harvard professor Sara Lawrence Lightfoot published her award-winning book The Good High School: Portrait of Character and Culture. I was fortunate enough to have been part of a small group of school heads who had the opportunity to talk to Dr. Lightfoot about her research and writing when I first became Head of Thacher in 1992. At that time, I took close notes on what she defined as “signposts” of a healthy and vigorous school community. I resolved that I would return to these notes after a few years “on the job” to see how The Thacher School was faring relative to Dr. Lightfoot’s list of critical indicators of school excellence. You will note that Dr. Lightfoot’s hallmarks of health are virtually all about school values—a far cry from those who insist that excellence be measured only by government-mandated standardized test scores.

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Michael Mulligan, Head of School

Not surprisingly, first on Ms. Lightfoot’s list of The Good High School was the concept of core values: the school must have these at its center, and, furthermore, they must be well-understood. I thought at that time—and continue to feel strongly—that Thacher is one of the best examples there is of a school with well-defined, well-understood, and longestablished core values. How do I know? Stop any Thacher student, staff, or faculty member on The Pergola and ask him or her: What are the core values of The Thacher School? Most often, they will recite without the blink of an eye the litany of virtues given to us by our founder Sherman Day Thacher: Honor, Fairness, Kindness, and Truth. They will then note Thacher’s program wherein these virtues find their expression: academic excellence, Our Honor Code (repeatedly debated and endorsed), and our distinctive Outdoor and Horse Program.

The hint of the long-standing critical examination of the Honor Code is further evidence of the vibrancy of Ms. Lightfoot’s second road sign regarding school excellence, that of being “endlessly self-critical while being simultaneously deeply rooted in the institution.” Following several years of internal and external assessments, directed by our Strategic Planning agenda, I am confident in saying that Thacher has set the industry standard for self-critical examination and feedback. Fourteen studies, later followed by ongoing debate and discussion, have resulted in the shining Strategic Plan, 1999-

Head of School

Head The Good High School: A Reflection

2005, mailed to all those interested in our School.

This document is the ultimate expression of our being “endlessly self-critical.” (“Endlessly” is not used lightly here because we intend to follow up several of the studies with biannual survey with students, parents, and alumni/ae to make sure we are continuing to actually achieve what we have set out to accomplish.) This Plan was driven by good business sense, by an overwhelming desire to make sure that we are doing the best we can for the present student body and for future generations of Thacher students, and by the abiding devotion of the Thacher community to this School.

Dr. Lightfoot’s third criterion of school is that good schools have “permeable-boundaries within the larger social context—boundaries crossed by families while the school remains a world unto itself: safe, healthy, challenging, demanding, lively.” Time was that Thacher, like nearly all independent national boarding schools, would have fallen short of this goal—and happily so, given the tastes of sometimes iconoclastic school heads. Families—both faculty and student—were to be seen only occasionally, and heard from as little as possible. Dropping off Junior on opening day and picking him up at Christmas was quite sufficient, thank you. The truth and the practice now at Thacher are quite different: Parents don’t lose Junior to Thacher; rather parents (and often grandparents) join The Thacher School Family. School events—on and off campus—are enlivened by enthusiastic parent participation. Some parents of alumni/e have even taken to creating their own reunions given the friendships they developed at Thacher. From Family Weekends, Grandparents’ Days, and School sporting events, lectures and concerts all the way to the weekly Mulligan Open House are fully subscribed to by our families, old and new. When we say times have changed, I can think of no better example than our Open House where parents drop by for cookies, ice cream sundaes, and occasional foosball and Ping-Pong games frequently. Truthfully, I am not sure what my reaction would have been as a teenager at boarding school having my parents drop in at the Head’s Open Home, (were he to have had an Open House—which he didn’t.) That Thacher kids are generally genuinely pleased that their folks have come by is even more impressive. Indeed, even at the annual fall and spring Parent Hootenanny, the young Toads get over their embarrassment at having mom lead the crowd in a rousing Pete Seeger protest song. It is at times like these that School and Family come together almost seamlessly, and happily so.

Parents are now officially represented on the Board of Trustees as well as through several arms of the Parents’ Committee. Thacher is not simply more hosFall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Head of School

pitable to parents because parents want more intimacy with the School; rather, we rely upon parents to help us critically examine our policies of in loco parentis (the current example being our look at the pros and cons of wandering), and we seek to link arms with parents as we jointly share in the all important task of raising these adolescents. This team approach is most often seen during those trying but important times when students lose their way and teachers, parents, and teens pull together to make sense of what happened. In fact, shared values between parents and the School are ultimately the single most significant factor in whether a student succeeds here or not.

It remains true, nonetheless, that there are boundaries between the greater world of families and the School itself. Thacher has its own culture, its own rules—based upon universal principles of good conduct, to be sure, but not always held by the “outside world”—and its own idiosyncratic customs and practices. It provides safety and risks, rewards and challenges, problems and opportunities to its students that go beyond and transcend the culture of families and most other schools. And this is the value-added of the Thacher experience. It is the fertile ground from which springs rich growth, and it is why character development is paramount here.

Dr. Lightfoot then addressed directly the issue of School leadership. She said, “The work of the leaders is most importantly to define the parameters of meaning: How is it people should be in this community?” This work falls directly on my shoulders. Barely a day goes by when I do not think or talk about what and how we should be at this School. This is unrelenting and critical work, and the opportunity for modeling this behavior is not something I take lightly. I have come to experience directly the veracity of her words. The obligation falls most heavily upon my shoulders as Head, and then fall proportionately to the administration and faculty, the seniors, and there on down.

Dr. Lightfoot emphasized that good schools have at their core teaching. She refined this to say that the “learning in the moment, attending to the moment” should take precedence over always “anticipating where you are going.” Now this is an art. As leaders, we are expected to always be pointing to the future, to be spelling out where we are going and why, and then showing how we are going to get there. All of our planning, research, and fundraising have me always looking to the next day for change, growth, and improvement. Yet if I as a Head and we as a School do not attend to the moment, we have lost our teaching opportunity. We will have created a school environDr. Lightfoot went on to make the argument ment where we are always looking forward to, that excellent schools reflect the pluralism of rather than experiencing the richness of, this our society as a whole and the globalism of very moment. the world in which our students will live and work. Not long ago, independent schools were Sometimes crises are the best venues for learngenerally one color, one sex, one religion, and ing in the moment: How must we be? How one gender. Pick the school and assign the cat- have we fallen short? Where must we go? Over egories. Now independent boarding schools— the years I have had more than sufficient opand Thacher is no exception—are oftentimes portunities for this kind of teaching. Tough more pluralistic than some colleges and any times are powerful learning moments for all. number of suburban and rural high schools. That is why they are tough: they require more Thacher’s student body, as noted by one visitor than the usual insight and energy. And there this year, looks like the United Nations. The are almost always difficult decisions to be faculty, on the other hand, while increasingly made at these times, and then communicated, gender balanced, is still overwhelmingly white. defined, and sometimes defended and then disAs Ms. Lightfoot would be quick to point out, cussed ad infinitum and ad nauseam. But as students need to look at the adults in their Dr. Lightfoot notes, these are rich times for community and be able to witness success sto- communities. ries of those who were once in their shoes. As noted in our Strategic Plan, we still have sig- But relying on crises as a means of teaching nificant work to do here despite having Asian, how we should be is rather like relying on a Latino, and African American role models. Ms. sprint to get you up Mount Everest. The jourLightfoot warned that “one of anything in a ney is too long and treacherous to maintain school is treacherous…One token releases the such a pace. Defining, modeling, explaining, core faculty from the real responsibility of and teaching just what it is that defines our ‘dealing with it.’” “Dealing with it” means, of best selves must be done every day, in all ways, course, that it is the responsibility of every fac- sometimes at a sprint, but more often at a jog, ulty member to take prejudice, head-on, not a walk, or simply by sitting down and reflectto turn this and related thorny issues over to ing. My favorite time for discussions about the “race or gender representatives” on the fac- meanings with students is the “Fireside Chat” ulty. Beyond this, she noted, we must provide where I, once a season, meet with students and to them leaders and models on the faculty have an open dialogue and free exchange with whose very presence suggests that this world is them on some topic of importance to them. now one where anyone so motivated can stake Topics have included teen sexuality, campus a claim of ownership and leadership. We are after check-in freedom privilege “wandering,” working on this at Thacher, but there remains the Honor Code, and the “two strike” punlots of work to do. ishment system. I have found these open fopage 4

The Thacher News

rums to be powerful: Students are given strong footings to express opinions; thoughtful listening on all sides is the norm; and I can talk about what our ideal vision is and how we should be by virtue of specific example. This is, after all, far better than sermonizing, and I learn much from our students at every session.

Yet I do not fool myself for a moment: I can do this work better being a meaning-maker. Every moment presents an opportunity that should be seized. Do you think that one can overdo this? I will know when faculty and students start avoiding me at lunch.

To a Zennist, of course, there exists only this moment. The future is a mere mental construction. To put it otherwise, I quote Nick Thacher, CdeP ’63, Head of New Canaan Country Day School, in his recent essay “Reflections on Stepping Down”: “Time is a precious commodity. Carpe Diem; seize the day!

It’s not a new idea, that: Every parent knows it; every teacher appreciates it…Time once lost can never be recaptured.” The job of a leader is at once to attend to the moment and yet be sure that every moment is invested with those seeds that sprout into the healthy fruits of the next day. It is an ageless paradox: to live this moment fully while ensuring that the next does not leave us bankrupt.

Sara Lawrence Lightfoot’s admonitions to school leaders are particularly striking to me these several years later because their relevance seems not to have been diminished a bit. Indeed, our public officials would do well to read The Good High School once again because Ms. Lightfoot’s definitions of excellence transcend that hobgoblin and deceit put forth by our politicians that excellence is measured primarily in test scores. She contends, and I concur, that we would be far wiser to examine the values of our schools since everything emanates from these values. She asks: What are those core values? Are they understood? Does the school seek to improve? Does it have it have well defined albeit permeable boundaries?

Does it provide a global perspective and rich role modeling to a pluralistic community? Do the leaders define how people should be in the school community? Are learning and teaching at the center of the school? Does the school attend to learning in the moment?

Ask these questions about a school and you will learn a lot more about the school than anything standardized scores will tell you. It will tell, first and foremost, whether it is the kind of school you would like your child to attend or not.

Thacher measures up well, but not perfectly to these questions. We have work to do, but we knew that. And that work is also part of the fun of enjoying this moment for every school, like every person, is on a “journey.” There is no arriving at the end of the journey really; there is only the travel and, we hope, the cherishing of each moment along the way. e

Letters

To the Thacher Alumni Magazine:

When I read Marshall Milligan’s speech from the Outdoor Chapel, reprinted in the last issue, I felt so relieved that someone else could put into understandable words the sense of spirituality that we all received at Thacher.

And you all are the only people in the world who can understand what happened to me years ago, as I broke up with a girlfriend. She said, “You are not spiritual!” Again, I say to you, my brothers and sisters, only you can understand how my mind went that very moment to the past, to a hilltop overlooking the Ojai Valley, sitting on top of my horse, and soaking in the very essence of spirituality—the nature around us, as Marshall said, and as he alluded to the sensibilities of Sherman Day Thacher (and his aversion to organized religions). I knew my girlfriend was totally wrong, but how could I explain it to her?

Marshall Milligan responds: I wanted to talk about the spirituality of the Thacher experience, because I think we too seldom acknowledge it and because our non-Thacher friends too seldom appreciate it. Apparently, Ken’s experience is just such a case. I’m wondering if there are others among us who might have recollections or comments on the subject of spirituality and the Thacher experience. Let us hear from you.

January 27, 2000 Dear Ms. McCarthy,

I felt nostalgic reading the latest Thacher News. My family and I had some good years there in the 1960s. I fondly remember doubles matches with Hub Segur, Tim Carey, and Bob Then, just yesterday, I found the following Chesley, faculty gatherings at the Sheahans’ or poem in an old long-forgotten box. It was writ- Betty Saunders’, early years with the Halsey clan, Upper School management with Milt ten my Junior year at Thacher: Frye and Roy Bobby, and so much more. I came at a time of change for the School, OJAI SUNSET change that now seems relatively insignificant given where Thacher stands today. However, I With the sun in my eyes do have the feeling from reading The News And the wind in my ears that much of what was Thacher then remains.

On a mountain top.

My cheeks are stretched cold And my coat keeps me warm On a mountain top.

January sunset seen at its peak From atop a horse called Rufus On a mountain top.

Rufus and I admire the sky And listen to the world below From a mountain top.

Hungry, Rufe? Just another minute While I sort things out On a mountain top.

Letters

Letters Lakehurst, NJ February 16, 2000 Dear Jane,

This is a brief note to say what a splendid job you did on the latest Thacher News— Spring/Summer ’99. You always do a fine job, but this time I was prompted to write. The layout is excellent, because it is both artistic and compelling.

The Headmaster’s words constitute truth at a deep level. News of the School is full of interesting reports and vignettes. I am always happy to read of people I have known and worked with: Tom May on the past Buildings and Grounds Committee; John Lewis and his 100% loyalty; Herb Moffitt, former hardworking Board member, whose sons, Jim and David, were mathematics students of mine; Bob Hunter, Board Member in my day; David Garden of 1999 Shangri-la whose son, David, was another of my students; Tony Thacher; Marshall Milligan.

Your section, “From the Earth,” is fascinating…digging out interesting material about alumni…

Very best wishes,

David Koth, But life moves on. I now live in Brookline, MA, Mathematics Instructor, Business Manager a psychologist with a second family (my wife 1970-71, 1972-74, 1975, 1976-78, 1980-83 Peg, 12-year-old Sam, and 9-year-old Anna), and I have lost touch with many of those I knew in The Ojai. I’d like them all to know they remain in my mind and heart and it would be a pleasure, over time, to talk together and to remember.

Fondly, Dick Burhoe English Teacher, 1959-67

Long ride down to dinner and bed I won’t forget he peace I had On a mountain top.

You know what I mean?

Ken Jacobs, CdeP ’68

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Family Weekend

Campus Life

Family Weekend Acquaintances Renewed t Class Barbecues scattered across campus on Friday evening, parents donned chef hats and aprons to barbecue tri-tip and chicken for the assembled children, families, and faculty members.

They also brought copious amounts of desserts to share before the community gathered in the Lamb Auditorium for Friday evening’s impressive Sampler of Performing Arts. The Chamber Music Ensemble played Mozart’s “Romanza” from Eine Kleine Nachtmusik and “Gavotte” from J.S. Bach’s Suite #3 in D Major. The Dance Ensemble performed “Interplay,” choreographed by Gallia Vickery, an intricate modern piece complete with special lighting effects. Jake Jacobsen directed his cast i n a “ Te n Minute Earnest,” a synopsis of Oscar Wilde’s play The Importance of Being Earnest. The Chamber Singers, directed by Gregory Haggard, sang a traditional chantey enti-

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Freshman parents: Helen Keane (mother of Brian ’03); Carolyn and Randy Tapscott (parents of Sarah); John and Betsy Grether (parents of Robert, CdeP ’99, Ted ’01, and Russell ’03), and Sally Pollet, mother of Troy ’03 Susan and Tom Stenovec (parents of Tim ’02) and Liz and Newlin Hastings, CdeP ’70, (parents of Shannon, CdeP ’99, and Jamie ’02) gear up for the Sophomore Class Barbecue

Columbia University Senior Associate Director of Admissions Diane McKoy served as Saturday’s Keynote Speaker page 6

The Thacher News

by Jane D. McCarthy

tled “A Roving” and William Shield’s “O Happy Fair”; the Thacher Chorus wrapped up the evening with the traditional folk song, “The Water is Wide” and “Matilda,” a traditional calypso folk song. An equally impressive array of desserts including brownies, assorted bars, and coffee on The Pergola was the evening’s finale.

At the Outdoor Amphitheatre on Saturday morning, parents witnessed what students do at 10:30 a.m. three times each week: Assembly.

Features included the debut of a new faculty singing group, Locus Vocus, various reminders about the Weekend’s activities, and Wayne Chang giving a Senior Reading. Students led their families to classrooms, where they were reincarnated into teachers to explain chemical reactions, write/draw Chinese characters, or share solutions and rationales for statistics questions. Throughout the morning, the library staff displayed books on topics as wide ranging as modern art to Cold War archives, and Chinese philosophy to the history of cryptography. People purchased and donated these 86 volumes that can now be found in the library stacks. The Parents’ Committee did a swift business at the Thacher gear sales table: caps, sweat shirts, and t-shirts were this year’s big sellers. Some families found their way to the Sidney Brody Gallery to enjoy the extensive exhibit of student art that ran the gamut of sculpture to photography, water color to pencil sketches.

Towards the end of Saturday morning, Michael Mulligan spoke to the families of the sense of peace and well-being of the Ojai which are beneficial for students as they face pressures of work, sexual experimentation, drugs and alcohol use, and peer acceptance. Beyond Ojai’s healing powers, however, Michael enforced that “Teens need to be known and held accountable for learning, homework, and writing.

They learn through connections with caring adults…who can help mentor them to adulthood.” He emphasized the need for smaller classes and schools that create a community where every individual offers his unique talents, gifts, and strengths to the betterment of the community. Michael then introduced Diane McKoy, Senior Associate Director of Admissions at Columbia University. Beyond recommendations to bear in mind about the collegeapplication process, Diane reiterated the importance of reciprocal involvement by all community members to better society. Since she came to the balance of the Family Weekend activities, seniors applying to Columbia and their families could individually discuss Columbia’s admission process with her.

Celeste Thomas (’00) and her father, John

Family Weekend

Color Guard leads the Horse Exhibition Grand Entry

There was barely enough time for all of the parent/student teams to shoot trap on Saturday afternoon. Chris Brown ’01 and father Fred, who shot 46 out of 50, achieved the highest overall score for the Weekend, while Michael Dachs ’03 hit every disc thrown his way. Just as the shooting wound up, the athletic events began with four Boys’ Soccer teams playing against Cate and Ojai Valley School, and the Girls’ Tennis and Volleyball teams duking it out against Cate. A highlight was the Varsity Soccer team’s win over Cate, 5-1, just one week after losing during Cate’s Parents’ Weekend game.

Li Li watches Chance Phelps ’03 write “Hello” in Chinese

Art and Riding Instructor Steve Carter watches as his riding group, the “Low Riders,” square dance their horses to Jesse Kahle’s calling from Jack Huyler’s golf cart

New this year was an information/questionanswer session for parents and students to learn about the various exchange programs available to juniors: English-Speaking Union, School Year Abroad, and Maine Coast Semester. This meeting adjourned in time for parents to sample the local Ojai cuisine or head to the Dining Hall for a spread of Prime Rib, Vegetarian Quiche, and Chocolate Mousse Cake.

The traditional hootenanny at the Mulligan Open House got underway around eight and featured parents embarrassing their children with their musical talents.

treated to the well-known strain’s of Pachelbel’s “Canon in D,” played by a quintet of flutes, viola, and cello. Nan GrandJean, mother of Addie Hearst ’01, spoke about three important lessons that she learned between the ages of 15 and 50.

First, Nan spoke of the difference between the inside and the outside of Bright and early Sunday morning at the Out- ourselves and of her atdoor Chapel, the Thacher Community was tempts “to give as much love as possible to the ones I love.“ Next, she spoke of discovering our giftedness and developing whatever gifts/talents to the best of our ability.” Third, she talked of our limited life span and the importance of spending it on the people and things that we love. In closing Nan said: “Always look inside. You will find infinite fun and energy, plus eventually a sustaining passion that will pull you joyously through life and make you wish that you could have more than only one lifetime.”

An astounding exhibition of riding expertise was Sunday morning’s main event. Following the traditional entrance of the Color Guard (Seniors Lucinda Brown, Devon Tarasevic, and Wallis Adams), Esther Guzman ’01 led the audience in singing “The Star Spangled Banner.”

Next, seven riding teams led by the Horse Department faculty displayed equestrian skills that ranged from square dancing on horseback to the calls of Jesse Kahle to weaving in and

out of each other in intricate patterns that required coordination and timing, to bare-back stunts and standing on saddles. Given that the majority of riders had ridden for only seven weeks at the time of this display, they were amazingly composed and well-heeled. As one parent observed, “only one spill [a bareback rider who immediately remounted, unscathed] and definitely no chills”: the thermometer reached the century mark. Horses, feet, and buses brought the group back for a final brunch at The Pergola before families wound their way down Thacher Road with happy but tired hearts from this jam-packed three-day Weekend. e

Nan Grand-Jean, mother of Addie Hearst ’01, gives her message at Sunday’s Chapel Service: “What I Learned Between 15 and 50” Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Campus Life

Campus Life

Plays

Footlights, Moonlight, and Charity

he Thacher Masquers performed two plays this year: The Importance of Being Earnest

by Oscar Wilde in the fall, and the musical Sweet Charity by Neil Simon (choreography

by Bob Fosse) in the winter. Although these plays represent settings and characters as different as one can imagine, the Masquers portrayed their roles deftly, to the delight of the audiences.

Employed as a hostess at a New York dance hall in the late 1960s, Charity Hope Valentine displays her innocent vulnerability repeatedly throughout Sweet Charity as she tries to find happiness with various unimpressive boyfriends. Her “real” chance for marriage comes when the “fickle finger of fate” traps her in an elevator with a claustrophobic tax accountant (Oscar Lindquist) who also seems to be in search of “something.” Romance blossoms only to falter when Oscar discovers Charity’s true occupation and dating history.

The Outdoor Theatre Through trials and tribulations, Sweet Charity was a perfect backdrop continues searching for love, wide-eyed and for the witty Impor- hopeful. tance of Being Earnest, a play that was first per- Oscar, etc.: Paul Bonewitz ’00 formed at Thacher in Vittorio, etc.: Chris Bonewitz ’01 the same spot in 1913 Charity: Mariposa Widdoes ’00 with boys playing the Herman, etc.: Emmett Hopkins ’01 women’s roles in full Daddy Brubeck, etc.: Kirby Williams ’00 Victorian dress. At Daddy’s Assistants, etc.: Andrew Warren ’00 Drama Director Jake Ja- and Peter Warman ’00 cobsen’s side (and, in his Cops, Customers, Street People: Will Barkan words, “significant in ’02, Alden Blair ’01, and Emery Mitchem ’01 the establishment of cast Lead Hostesses: Margaux Lloyd ’00, Esther unity, focus, and trust”) Guzman ’01, and Julia Erdman ’03 Chris Bonewitz ’01, Paul Bonewitz ’00, was Associate Director Mariposa Widdoes ’00, Ursula, Hostess: Monique Gaskins ’02 Logan Clark ’01, and Grace Carter ’01 who put to use many of the techniques and Hostesses, Street people, etc.: Lily Mitchem in The Importance of Being Earnest. skills she honed last summer at the compre- ’01, Lacey Gordon ’00, Zoe Towns ’02, hensive National High School Institute The- Heidi Cole ’02, Youna Kim ’02, Meredith atre Arts Program, held at Northwestern Walker ’01, and Emma White ’01 e University. The fantastic plot and ironic twists display Wilde’s wit in what he understatedly called a “somewhat farcical comedy” about the amorous misadventures of two young English gentlemen.

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Emery Mitchem ’03, Youna Kim ’02, Margaux Lloyd ’00, and Kirby Williams ’00 in Sweet Charity.

Lane: Will Barkan ’02 Merriman: Alden Blair ’01 Algernon Moncrieff: Chris Bonewitz ’01 John Worthing: Paul Bonewitz ’00 Lady Bracknell: Anthea Tjuanakis ’01 Gwendolen Fairfax: Logan Clark ’01 Miss Prism: Meredith Walker ’01 Cecily Cardew: Grace Carter ’01 Rev. Canon Chausible: Kirby Williams ’00

Sound and lighting technicians Kevin Schmidt ’01, Matt Schuman ’00, and Sara Thacher ’00 page 8

The Thacher News

Campus Life Campus Life

Packing Pack up Your Horse and Head for the Hills

W. Austin Curwen, Director of the Horse Camping Program

yon’s Camp. Ladybug. Pine Mountain Lodge. Ten Sycamores. To some these are just words on a page. To others, they are indelibly etched in their minds from horse camping trips harking back to the founding of the School. In many ways, these names are as much a part of one’s Thacher career as Upper School or Chick Barn Alley, and there is no reason to believe they won’t continue to make their mark on our students.

The Thacher Horse Camping program met its goal of getting all of this year’s freshmen class out on a trip during the year.

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Austin Curwen and Brian Pidduck, CdeP ’92, entice all students to participate in the Outdoor Program during Assembly

and over The Ridge. On the home front, the pack station is getting ready for some reorganization to complement the new barn project. Meanwhile, on the other side of The

This year’s smuts seem to be especially keen on getting back into the Sespe. Several members of the class of ’03 have reflected on the impact of Ridge, work continued at Patton’s Cabin. A their experiences. Robert Cerda likened his ex- new tie-rail was installed, along with a fence in perience to “taking the step into the unknown front of the cabin to create a more permanent campsite and to allow for easier loading and unloading. In addition, the enclosure was expanded toward the river to allow easier access to water.

With a vast wilderness as our backyard, along with the School’s continued commitment to bringing students into the backcountry, the Thacher Horse Camping Program is poised to continue providing camping opportunities far into the next millennium. e

Chris Bonewitz ’01, Emma White ’01, Alex Herbert ’02, and David Gal ’02 enjoy breakfast before hitting the trail

and unraveling the mysteries as they lie on the path ahead.” Russell Grether enjoyed being part of a group: “I think that the main focus of our trip—after we found out what we had done—was unity.” Katie Kuhl summed up her feelings: “My trip never failed to be exciting, and I won’t ever forget it.” Clearly the value of our outdoor excursions remains as strong as ever.

While the terrain was a bit dry in the fall, trips went off without a hitch, relying on packed feed and careful planning to go where the water was, namely Patton’s and Willett’s. Once the rains came in the winter, the river rose and native grass grew, thereby assuring adequate horse feeding through the spring into EDTs. In addition to motivated students and good luck with the weather, the Horse Camping pro- Sophomores Alex Herbert and Maddie McQuillan gram has done some fine tuning both at home see how much they can stuff into a pack Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Campus Life

Campus Life

Music Weekend Alexander String Quartet kicks off February’s Departmental Weekend

of a coyote. The pair then struggles against overwhelming odds, frustrations, and tragedies to realize their dreams. The film’s writers, usic Weekend” is a more apt name for Anna Thomas and Greg Nava (both of whom this year’s Departmental Weekend in live in Ojai and Greg was also the film’s direcFebruary, since it featured a wide vari- tor) conducted the discussion portion of the mornety of musical performances. Kicking off the ing’s events. festivities Thursday afternoon was a master class for the AP Music Theory students con- Later that afternoon, Van Dyke Parks, father ducted by the Alexander String Quartet. In that of Richard ’00 and songwriter, led his trio the class had been studying Beethoven’s style through an eclectic mix of musical pieces with and how his composing differed from others of themes ranging from the Marines to Califorhis era, the Quartet demonstrated what nia, with nuances of Randy Newman, Gordon Beethoven was trying to achieve. They then Lightfoot, and Bob Marley that crossed the played the same music as if it had been written borders between pop, Broadway musical, clasby one of his peers so that the students could sical music, and jazz. He interspersed his songs identify the differences in style. This was a fas- with amusing banter about the origin of ideas cinating exercise for these young musicians and that spawned the songs and funny incidents gave them a greater appreciation for the con- from when he’s previously performed them. cert that the Quartet presented to the entire The students and faculty were captivated by community following dinner. It featured music

by Beethoven, Bartok and Mendelsohn, and proved to be an interesting comparison of styles that spanned from the Late Baroque/Early Classical era to the atonal pattern of Modern Music. This Quartet is widely admired for its interpretations of Beethoven and Bartok and has established itself as an important advocate of new music through over 25 commissions and numerous premier performances. Many students had never heard a string quartet before and were impressed by the variety and intensity of sound that the ensemble made.

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The entire School assembled at the Ojai Playhouse on Friday morning for a private screening of El Norte, and a question-and-answer discussion about the director’s use of indigenous Latin American music. This gripping story follows two teenage siblings who are forced to leave their Guatamalan homeland because of political turmoil during the 1980’s. Their arduous journey north—El Norte—to America contin- Joy Bergeron ’02 and Nate Wallace ’02 learn some ues with their crossing the border with the help swing-step basics on Saturday afternoon page 10

The Thacher News

his rich piano style, mesmerizing stories, and charming personality.

Speaking of piano, Friday night featured Boogie Woogie pianists Rob Rio and Clark Sonny Horton. Their coming from different stylistic schools of Boogie Woogie added intrigue and excitement to their performances, especially when the two pianos were dueling with left-hand bass lines and dazzling right-hand riffs. They stretched the limits of what can be done on 88’s and inspired budding Thacher pianists to further their studies.

Ever since, the sound of fledgling Boogie Woogie enthusiasts can be heard from the various pianos around campus.

On Saturday morning, science teacher and world-class dance competitor Andrew Ho and senior Margaux Lloyd taught swing dancing to a full auditorium of students in preparation for the big dance Saturday night featuring swing band Lee PressOn and the Nails from San Francisco. Stud e n t s perfected their peek-aboos, rock steps, and arch turns, and then displayed their best moves that evening.

The dance floor was a Science teacher and world-class bit tight dance competitor Andrew Ho and since nearly Margaux Lloyd ’00 demonstrate e v e r y o n e dance steps to the students danced continuously, but that didn’t stop the smiles and cheers for a terrific Music Weekend. e

Campus Life

Learning from the Earth

Campus Life

Science Environmental Science

problems, and examine alternative solutions randomly selected from a 100-meter transect for resolving and/or preventing them. line. Monthly, the class visits the quadrants to observe the re-growth of various plants.

Thacher’s location adjacent to the Los Padres Two months after the fire—following the rainy National Forest—brimming with streams and months of February and March—the seedlings fields, flora and fauna—offers an extensive and began to sprout. The following month, stuvaried stage for environmental dents found up to a dozen different types of field studies. For instance, the plants growing, including burr clover and wild class tested and compared the hyacinth and peonies. Visual inspection indiwater quality of the Ventura cates that where goats had grazed before the River watershed. Thacher Creek fire, more burr clover is evident; fewer plants on campus is virtually the head- seem to be sprouting where the fire burned hotwaters of the Ventura River wa- ter and the goats had not grazed. This study tershed while the Main Street field will continue for the next 10-15 years or until site in Ventura is the mouth of the the hill returns to its natural chaparral-covered Ventura River and the final desti- state. nation of the waters from the Ojai Valley. Students noted the Another ongoing study employs ozone-detectmoderate increase in nutrients in- ing patches hung across campus to determine cluding nitrates, phosphates, and ambient levels of anthropogenic ozone gas. ammonia that were most likely Foggy, humid versus dry, warm days; copier from treated sewage, fertilizer, machine versus Perimeter Road vehicle exand agricultural runoff from the haust; orchard versus classroom sites: oneOjai Valley. More impressive was inch-square swatches will yield air pollution Seniors Carlos Soriano and Marley Orr detect oxygenation of the the increase in the biological oxy- data that this class can compare with last year’s Math-Science Courtyard stream gen demand in agement in the mid-80s, she was intrigued with the waters between the two expanding her one-semester elective course to sites, indicative of what is a full-year Advanced Placement course. An en- otherwise known as euthusiastic group of students greeted Rae Ann trophic conditions found upon her return and anxiously learned about commonly after water has environmental problems through both didactic passed through farms, fields, and hands-on field studies. Employing various and towns. Last year when scientific principles, concepts, and methodolo- Thacher Creek ran year gies, they could further understand interrela- round, class studies focussed tionships of the natural world. By identifying on the insect larva and their and analyzing environmental problems—both food preferences, specifically natural and human-made—they would evalu- leaf detritus. ate the relative risks associated with these This year’s Ranch Fire offered the perfect backdrop Seniors Lauren Fraim and Cheryl Lynn Horton receive instruction on for observ- setting up ozone-detecting patches ing the regrowth of vegetation on the data and subsequent classes can use for comhills overlooking the Gym- parison studies. khana Field, otherwise known as secondary succes- This successful and interesting course rounds sion. While the earth was still out the Advanced Placement course offerings blackened in January, four at Thacher and gives students practical techone-square-meter grids were niques from which to examine their environment. This mindset not only benefits the students, but shows students how they can preSeniors Carlos Soriano, Cheryl Lynn Horton, serve and restore their environment for future Wayne Chang, and Justin generations to enjoy. e ust before leaving on sabbatical a few years back, Science Chair Rae Ann Sines spotted an ACORN course outline for a year-long Advanced Placement Environmental Science course. Having received a Masters from Duke’s School of Forestry and Environmental Man-

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Arnold with Science Chair Rae Ann Sines

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Campus Life

TOAD Talk

Toad Reflections on Becoming a Parent Molly Twichell Perry, CdeP ’85 hen I was eight months pregnant with Jordan and big as a barn, I ran into the mother of Califia Davis, [CdeP ’98], a former Thacher student. Seeing a pregnant woman always seems to elicit words of parenting wisdom from the observer, and this case was no exception. Califia’s mom, Lorraine, said something that struck me as odd at the time, but it has stuck with me ever since. She said: “The love you have for your children is a strange thing. They can light up your life or they can drive you to drink, but, without a doubt, my child is the only being for whom I would willingly throw myself in front of a bus and be happy that I did.”

W

TOAD Talks are those oftenmemorable addresses given by a faculty member who is on duty for the week.

We will print one of those most topical TOAD talks in each issue.

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The Thacher News

“Oh yes, I’m sure.” I replied, just as I had replied to those who had said that I would never sleep more than three hours in a row again, or that breast-fed babies’ diapers didn’t smell, or that stretch marks were sexy. I thought “There must Molly, Derick, and Jordan Perry be something about parenting that addles the brain. I’m sure that I will love my baby, but it would be sheer lunacy to pick a fight with a ten-ton moving mother thought that it was the friendliest place vehicle. Self-sacrifice is not a pastime in which on Earth because everyone waved at us as we drove up the Main Street—only later did we I frequently engage.” discover that, in fact, the street was one way, in Yet, here I stand, just short of a year later, the other direction. Needless to say, I didn’t ready to admit that my nine-month-old baby apply. Someone on the Admission Committee has me wrapped around her one-and-a-half- might have remembered my face. It was too inch-long little finger. The logical conclusion— large of a risk to take.) Remember that they parenting does, in fact, warp your brain. I are the ones who love you so deeply that they don’t know how it happened. I don’t know would sacrifice (and most likely already have) what changed, but now I know that I wouldn’t themselves for you. Are a few hours of your think twice about hurling myself into the path time too much to give up for the ones who of any rapid transit vehicle if I knew that by might be the only thing standing between you and ten tons of steel? I doubt it. e doing so I would save my little girl.

So, you’re thinking… “Interesting, masochistic, but interesting. But what does this have to do with me?” My point is this: In five short days we will depart for a long-awaited vacation.

Most of you will spend at least some of the time during these precious two weeks—when you aren’t sleeping—with a parent or two.

When you are with them, you may be tempted to walk five yards ahead and pretend that they don’t exist. (College trips provide priceless fodder for embarrassing parental encounters. Take my experience at Dartmouth, for example. My

Molly Twichell Perry, CdeP ’85, is a Pioneer in her own right: She is the first Fac Brat to come back and teach at Thacher since Anson S. Thacher, CdeP ’23, and she is the only one with the additional title of “Mom.”

Tidbits

he calm of Thacher’s winter break ended before dawn on December 21,when a brush fire threatened the eastern side of campus.

Known as the Ranch Fire, it began in the Upper Ojai when some firecrackers were set off, and quickly spread west (at one point in the night it moved one mile in fifteen minutes due to 80 m.p.h. winds) towards Meditation Mount, Ojai Valley School’s upper campus, and Thacher’s Gymkhana area. Fortunately, Dennis Hill, one of the Maintenance workers, aroused various co-workers who met him on campus to fight the fire shortly after midnight.

They cut fire breaks, took a stand at Diamond Hitch Campground, employed the School’s water truck to fight the flying embers, and saw how important the end-of-season brush removal was in saving the campus. Several faculty homes closest to the flames were sprayed with fire retardant; the fire came within yards of these structures but they were saved. The School’s remuda of 120 horses was shuttled from Carpenters Orchard to the safety of the corrals and arenas with the help of various faculty families, staff, students, and neighbors in the early morning hours. Miraculously, the prevailing winds shifted easterly at dawn and the fire turned towards the Los Padres Forest where it continued blazing for nearly a week.

Only one tack shed in Carpenters Orchard— the School’s latest piece of construction—was lost, but the outlying foothills that Thacher students have climbed and ridden on for over a century resemble a gray moonscape. Work crew spends its time re-establishing lost and forgotten trails and trying to avert major erosion problems.

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View of Gymkhana area two days following the Ranch Fire

Numeracy Puzzle Last issue’s question was attempted, but not completed. Here was the question…

A courier starting at the rear of a moving army 100 miles long rides to the front, delivers a message, and rides immediately to the rear, where he finds he is 100 miles ahead of his starting point. In all, how far did he ride? Of course, the army was moving at a steady pace and the courier’s speed was constant…and here is the solution.

100 Army

x Army

Courier’s Route 100 Army Let the Army’s rate be 1; the courier’s rate be r. Then Rate · Time = Distance Courier up r · (100+x)/r = 100 + x Courier back r· (x/r) = x The time for the Army to move x miles is x. Therefore: 100 + x = x x = 100 – x and r r

So: r = 100 + x x

and r =

x 100 - x

and x2 = 1002 – x2 x = 50 √ 2 x = 70.70 miles Distance travelled: To the front: 100 + 70.7 miles To the rear: 70.7 miles So the courier rides a total of 100 + 70.7 + 70.7 = 241.4 miles Our thanks to Richard Myrick, CdeP ’39, of Washington, D.C., and former math teacher Stephen Hauge (1976-81) for sending us their attempts to solve this puzzle.

Tidbits

Tidbits

ive seniors received word recently that they are Finalists in the 2000 Competition for National Merit Scholarship Awards. Lucinda Brown from Chevy Chase, Maryland; Brooke Halsey from Ojai; Clay Pell from Tucson, Arizona; Allegra Towns from Santa Paula, CA; and Juliette White from Colusa, CA, will hear later if they will receive scholarships toward their college education.

F

allia Vickery, one of Thacher’s mathematics teachers and Dance Instructor, choreographed and then danced in “Cantatas: An Evening of Contemporary Dance and Renaissance Song” at the Ojai Art Center in January.

This same show premiered at Santa Barbara’s Center Stage Theater last June. Gallia is a member of the Ajiva Dance Theater—a troupe of seven dancers, aged 25 to 50, who also choreograph their dances. In “Cantatas,” they danced to Renaissance songs performed by the Madrigali Singers, an eleven-voice, co-ed group based in Ojai.

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echnology Director and Mathematics Instructor Kurt Meyer was named Educator of the Year by Ojai’s Chamber of Commerce. At a celebratory dinner/dance at the Ojai Valley Inn, Kurt was honored for his dedication to his profession, his efforts to establish state-ofthe-art technology skills for teachers and students throughout Southern California, and for being instrumental in providing Internet connections for many local community organizations including the public library and schools.

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e

Here’s the new question: This is an old chestnut that people may have seen in various forms: Position eight checkers on a standard 8×8 checkerboard so that no row, column, or diagonal contains more than one checker.

There are many solutions, some of which are just rotations or reflections of one another.

Now for a twist…Postition sixteen checkers on a standard board so that no column, row, or diagonal contains more than two checkers. This one is a little more fun!

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

page 13

Technology Technology

TEACH THE TEACHERS

COLLABORATIVE

Thacher’s Initial Public Offering

by Kurt R. Meyer

ioneers are forever exploring boundaries; pioneers in education are no exception. The last century’s legacy of Freud, Piaget, Kohlberg, and Gilligan leave us with firmer understanding of human development and challenge us ever to improve the educational experience of our children. In recent years, Ted Sizer and Howard Gardner also have contributed significantly to our thinking about schools and schooling. And, as the Internet continues to erode traditional boundaries—international, socio-economic, legal, and even generational (grown adults are addicted to video games; preteens are trading stocks)—it is no surprise to find pioneers at the forefront of its myriad applications. When barriers or allegiances that traditionally delineate groups are disassembled—or reassembled—new possibilities for teams arise and, with them, new potential for learning and achievement.

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Chris Grant ’02 unpacks laptops lent by Gateway Computer Corporation for participants to use this summer

Benjamin Wallace, CdeP ’99, helps configure the network

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The Thacher News

Such has been Thacher’s experience with the Vons/Pavilions Teach The Teachers Collaborative (TTTC), an ambitious, groundbreaking teachertraining program for K-12 educators in a fourteen-county region in Southern California. A little boarding school in a rural community has found a partner in a very unlikely place: the enormous Los Angeles County Office of Education (LACOE). As the largest public education agency n the U.S., this 800-pound gorilla not only engages in, but often dictates, the agenda of California State education policy-making and fiduciary funneling.

With influence that extends to the heart of Sacramento politics, LACOE is as unlikely a Thacher bedfellow as it has been a favorable one. How— and why—has this partnership worked and,

most importantly, what does this success mean for private education and boarding schools in particular?

Necessity—in this case, size—mothered the inventive partnering of these two venerable schooling institutions, but it has been the enduring quality of our mutual respect that keeps us together. The sheer scope of the Teach The Teachers project—as dictated by Vons’ market area (328 stores in 14 counties)—required that Thacher seek out an institution with “reach” whose name represented quality and credibility, and LACOE was it. After all, forming an eight-week training program for 1,344 public school teachers this summer was not to be accomplished by Casa de Piedra alone. Coordinating with 14 county offices of education in Southern California; selecting participants; identifying instructors; auguring course content for—and teaching—twenty-five unique seminars; feeding and housing our guests (no, not a chocolate on every pillow); organizing software and hardware—these tasks require a staff of over 120.

LACOE’s mission—to provide support services to 1,700 Los Angeles County schools— fits hand in glove with that of Teach The Teachers. To help meet the organizational challenge of TTTC, LACOE retains a full-time staff member, Cheryl Lee, who is the project manager there for the Vons/Pavilions Teach The Teachers Collaborative. With Thacher’s Program Manager Alice Meyer, Cheryl helps bring together the course content and instructional staff that comprises this summer’s program. A great deal of the trust between Thacher and LACOE stems from the extremely positive working relationship these women have achieved. Their effectiveness as a team is reflected in both the strength of the summer curriculum and the quality of the staff we’ve assembled to teach it.

From our “first date” Thacher and LACOE have viewed each other as extraordinary. When we first approached the County Office leadership, Thacher was immediately seen as peculiar. We were not selling something; we were not asking for something; we had no political axe to grind; we had no turf to protect. Instead, we were offering to help build an allexpenses-paid summer program for LACOE’s constituents! Thacher was the mouse removing the technology training thorn from the great lion’s paw—and we have been treated like kings. In partnering with Thacher, LACOE is able to enhance its leadership throughout both

fessionally contented teachers back to their communities in Compton, East L.A., Imperial County, Fresno, and Bakersfield, for example, Thacher becomes much more than a mailing, a poster, or even a video segment can make us. Thacher is understood as a home where scholarly As public education comes under increasing pursuits and personal scrutiny (and California’s educational ranking reflection go hand in continues to languish in 49th place in the U.S.), hand. the importance of program credibility cannot be over emphasized. School leaders and teacher Head of School participants are desperate to produce results, Michael Mulligan has and they will spend their time only on pro- been heard to quote Shakespeare often enough: grams that do so. This means that TTTC must “a rising tide lifts all boats.” What TTTC be “aligned” with the State Academic Content achieves for teachers and youngsters in our imStandards (the “what”) as well as the Subject mediate California neighborhood will come Frameworks for pedagogy (the “how”). We back to help Thacher; as a lesson, we hope, it are able to achieve this through LACOE’s con- will help public and independent schools siderable resources that already committed to across the entire United States. Michael’s work these standards (another indication of their pi- with NAIS committees and other national oneering spirit), and as a partner they are able groups will help to preserve and protect the to share them advantageously with TTTC. future of boarding schools; let our public-priWith such a “standards-based” foundation, vate partnership experience at Thacher be a TTTC is a program LACOE can proudly pro- guiding beacon. e mote throughout its vast sphere of influence— a benefit of great value to Thacher. Meanwhile, LACOE is happily discovering the organizational agility, programming creativity, and the special opportunities that Thacher’s premier residential facilities offer our program. Together, the institutions are auguring a unique solution to the professional development goals for California teachers. We have a healthy appreciation for the essential nature of our respective contributions—and with this a frontier is crossed; a new allegiance is born. We are combining the best of what’s “private” with the best of what’s “public” to create a program that achieves both soundness and flexibility.

Technology

the County and Southern California by its partly “owning” a flagship program that no other public education agency can match.

LACOE’s pioneering spirit—to extend a hand toward the “peculiar”—and wholeheartedly embrace of this experiment to combine educational resources in unusual ways—was absolutely key to the early success of TTTC. One need only a marginal sense of public education bureaucracy to understand the degree of risk-taking that was required of the LACOE leadership; to say “yes” to this project.

TTT participants last summer

The benefits for Thacher are enormous—as, I believe, they are for education in general.

Through TTTC, a broad spectrum of educational leaders in Southern California live for a week at Thacher and return to their colleagues and students with a strong, positive message about residential education. Like a throwback to their college days, the Thacher experience engenders strong social and professional contacts among TTTC participants that enrich each teacher’s work well after they leave CdeP. And, they express a corresponding loyalty to the Program. As Diane Tengan of Gahr High School puts it, “I could feel the traditions of Thacher—honesty, trust, diligence, creativity— in the room.”

In population centers most boarding schools can only dream of breaking into, Thacher not only creates a name for itself, it earns a position of esteem—and even affection. By sending proFall 1999 / Winter 2000

page 15

Sports

Fall/Winter Sports

BOYS’ FRESHMAN SOCCER

by Joy Sawyer-Mulligan

Varsity Soccer Team celebrates 5-0 victory over Cate at this Fall’s Family Weekend

Fall Sports BOYS’ VARSITY SOCCER Captains: Michael Back ’01, Jake Braitman ‘00, and Todd Meyer ‘00 League Record: 7-10 Season Record: 2-13 Coach: Fred Coleman “In all of the ways we look at the concept of team at Thacher, this was a great one,” said Fred Coleman of this group of 15. “They balanced tough competitiveness and tenacity with support of each other and of the unit as a whole.” The season’s highlight had to have been the squad’s whistle-to-whistle domination of Cate on Family Weekend, a dramatic rebound from a loss on the Mesa the preceding Saturday. High goal scorer and high point player was Matty Wilson ’01 (9), who shared most assists honors with Todd Meyer. Most Valuable Players were Jake Braitman and goalkeeper Andrew Warren ’00, while Justin Arnold ‘00 won Most Improved Player.

“This team played with passion and mental toughness,” Mr. Coleman went on to say, “carrying on the tradition of Thacher soccer in a way that would make former players proud.”

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The Thacher News

BOYS’ JUNIOR VARSITY SOCCER Captain: Darren Bechtel ’00 League Record: 6-0-2 Season Record: 6-0-3 Coach: Jack Crawford The JV Boys’ Soccer team posted a 6-0-3 season record, ending with the Condor League Championship title held tight in their hands. According to Coach Crawford, the team’s success was “a great credit to the captain, whose enthusiasm, diligence, and rapport with his teammates qualify him as a leader par excellence.” Notable scoring performances came at the feet of Dave Babbott ’01, Trevor McProud ’00, Blake Caldwell ’01, Chris Bonewitz ’01, and Kevin Cahill ’01; Dan Bartlett ’02 and Matt Brewer ’01 were standouts on defense.

Captains: Tyler Caldwell ’03, Owili Eison ’03, and Troy Pollet ’03 League and Season Record: 2-1 Coach: Michael Mulligan This team’s only loss came in its season opener (to Happy Valley’s Varsity team); from that moment forward, there were no more goals for the opposition (great credit to goaltender Richard Smith ’03). Especially sweet were two victories (2-0 and 3-0) over Cate on their Parents’ Weekend and ours. Though often overmatched in size and necessarily limited in practice time (their trusty steeds being their first priority), this group, nonetheless, revealed a powerful team concept and some significant talent. High Scorer was Owili Eison; “his speed and goal hunger mark him as someone to watch in coming years,” said his coach. Of the season as a whole, Coach Mully had just three words: “Another banner year!”

GIRLS’ CROSS-COUNTRY BOYS’ THIRD SOCCER

Captain: Juliette White ’00

Captains: Peter Hartnack ’00, Jon Le Plastrier ’00, and Fritz Rice ’00

Coach: Sarah DelVecchio

League and Season Record: 2-4-3 Coach: Andrew Ho Season’s highlights including tying a very strong Cate team on their Parents’ Weekend without the team’s usual goalie and with only a baker’s dozen of players and beating OVS 3-zip on our own Family Weekend. Chris Grant ’02 was a champion in the goal; memorable, too, were Dan Moore’s ’02 continuous sprinting, bicycle kicks, and flying headers.

Kevin Schmidt ’01 won particular praise for his significant improvement on defense during the course of the fall.

This team of spirited harriers won all their meets but one (against Cate, when half the girls were out), including the culminating Condor League Meet at Dunn, where Logan Clark (Most Valuable of the season) placed first and set a course record. They then went on to run at Mt. SAC (San Antonio College— where they’d run two times previously) in the CIFs, placing tenth in their division. “This was, handsdown, the strongest team I’ve ever worked with,” said Dr. D. Seniors included Juliette White, Marley Orr, Mia Silverman, Hannah Hooper, Felicity Howe, and Allegra Towns. Named Most Improved was Carina Fisher ’01. Returning varsity runners in Fall ’00: Logan Clark ’01, Laura Neville ’02, Lily Mitchem ’01, Claire Cichy ’01, and Deloria Many Grey Horses Lane ’01 who, according to her coach, is “the athlete to watch next year” and was voted next year’s captain.

GIRLS’ VOLLEYBALL

Captain: Fred Kim ’00

Captains: Evy Disner ’00 and Cheryl Lynn Horton ’00

Coach: Pierre Yoo This cohesive and highly focused group of runners—heavy on the juniors—ended its season 1-1 in dual/ tri-meets, and third in the Condor League. Having graduated five of seven varsity runners last year, the team relied on experienced sophomore Will Barkan, captain Fred Kim, and new-to-the-sport Chris Brown ’01 (who also won MVP); also proving his mettle was Canyon Cody ’01, who finished sixth in the league finals. In addition to Fred, other seniors who provided critical leadership were Justin Mulholland, Eric Reeser, and Matt Schuman. Junior Matt Cohen won Most Improved. With ten of the fourteen runners returning to the team next fall and at least a few freshmen rising to the ranks, the future of the team looks promising.

League Record: 4-1-0 Season Record: 7-3-1

Coach: Chuck Warren

Coach: Fred Coleman

A building year if ever there were one, yet this team kept its collective shoulder to the wheel, working hard to improve and genuinely did, maintaining exemplary enthusiasm in the face of some close matches that ended in defeat. As their coach said, “This suggests a depth of character—among the younger players especially—that, when combined with the gradual improvement of their skills, should carry them to future victories, even when a narrow loss is a possibility.” Varsity letter winners included captains Cheryl Lynn and Evy, Jennifer Bowie ’01, Heidi Cole ’02 (named Most Improved), Mercedes Farrell ’02, Betsy Bradford ’02, and Alex Herbert ’02.

Captains: Besse Gardner ’00 and Samantha Grumman (’00)

Coach: Chris Mazzola Landing a season record of 10-5, this team won several important matches against large public schools, most notably over Dos Pueblos (Santa Barbara) and Rhigetti (Santa Maria). The team finished second in the Condor League. The team greatly benefited from the experience of talented sophomore newcomers Bea Staley at #2 singles and Libby Rauner at #2 doubles. Elizabeth Sanseau ‘01 was named Most Valuable Player (and captain for next fall’s team); Emily Dachs ’01 and Meredith Flannery ’01 shared Most Improved honors.

GIRLS’ JUNIOR VARSITY TENNIS Captain: Marisa Binder ’00 Season Record: 2, 3 Coach: David Johnston “The whole team was most valuable!” said Dr. J at season’s end. Led by a committed and optimistic captain, seasoned players Emma White ’01, Smitha Reddy ’01, Yasmine Arastu ’01, and Laura Allen (’01) joined spirited sophomores Claire Faggioli, Laurel Peterson, Satya Peake, and Chelsea Bauch to form the core of the team; their opposition was most often varsity squads. Promising rookies included Nikki Silverman ’01, Jane Kwett ’02, and Iyana Reid ’02.

Captain: Felicity Howe ’00

League Record: 2, 10 Season Record: 3, 13

GIRLS’ VARSITY TENNIS

League Record: 2, 2 Season Record: 10, 5

GIRLS’ JUNIOR VARSITY SOCCER

Winter Sports GIRLS’ VARSITY SOCCER Captain: Sarah Morrow ’00 League Record: 6-1-1 Season Record: 8-6-2 Coaches: Bill Vickery and Mary Everett, CdeP ’94 Led by five seniors—Sarah Morrow, Kristin Berona, Erin Blankenship, Besse Gardner, and Mia Silverman—started the season bound and determined to be a better team by playoff time. They started in November emphasizing precise passing and a possession-style of attack while moving players around to different positions to find their most successful formation. After some frustrating results early in the campaign, persistence and patience paid off in the end. Individually and as a team, they made significant strides, finishing the League Season with a fine record and as co-Champions with Villanova.

In the CIF playoffs, the team won its first-round match 3-1 in overtime against Viewpoint, but was upended in the next round by an exceptionally strong team from Pasadena Poly—a team that was seeded first in our division and went on to playing the tournament final. With nine returning juniors, this group is primed for continued success next winter!

Sports

BOYS’ CROSS COUNTRY

According to Coach Coleman, “This team learned to play a beautiful style of soccer and ended the season as Condor League Champions.” Key ingredients in this team’s success were the inspiration from Captain Felicity who continued to support the team at practices and games, despite the disappointment of her season ending due to a shoulder injury. The Coach’s Award went to Betsy Bradford ‘02 for her help, loyalty, and devotion after her ACL surgery early in the season. Highlights of the season were defeating Villanova twice and Cate two out of three times. Laurel Back ’03 scored the most goals (11) and had the most points (24). Ellie Fletcher ’00 led the team in assists with five.

GIRLS’ THIRD SOCCER Captains: Amissa Bongo ’00, Suriya Jayanti ’00, and Addie Hearst ’01 League Record: 1-1-1 Season Record: 1-3-1 Coaches: Andrew Ho and Wendi Parker-Dial The last game against Midland was the highlight of the season for many reasons. Thirty Third Teamers crammed onto a half field, cornered by JV, Varsity, and Freshman made for a crowded field. The final score, 7-0, was in large part due to sophomore Meg Kwan’s five goals scored in two quarters.Meg won the Most Valuable Player award while Lucy Hodgman ’03 was named Most Improved Player.

JV Soccer player Ellie Fletcher ’00 Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

page 17

Sports

GIRLS’ VARSITY BASKETBALL Captain: Cheryl Lynn Horton ’00 League Record: 7-3 Season Record: 9-4 Coach: Rae Ann Sines Captain Cheryl Lynn broke all of the individual scoring records set by Katie Russell, CdeP ’99 last year.

Her new records are: Most Career Points: 883; Most Points in a Single Season: 305; Highest Points per Game Average: 21.8 point post season. She qualified for the CIF Statistics Leader for regular season points per game average of 22.5. Her highest game was 35 points against Cornerstone Christian, with whom this team shared the Tony Dunn Award. The team also played in CIF Playoffs against #2 seed Brethren Christian and, unfortunately, lost.

Meredith Walker ’01 earned the Most Improved Player award.

GIRLS’ JUNIOR VARSITY BASKETBALL Captains: Lucy Milligan ’00 and Stephanie Hubbard ’02 League and Season Record: 0-7 Coach: Pierre Yoo Coach Yoo summarized this season as “Play Basketball and Have Fun. It really did not matter who won the game, but rather HOW you play the game.” The team came close to victory when playing against Ojai Valley School, when they outscored OVS 20-12 in the second half. Unfortunately, the opponents had enjoyed a great first half and these Toads couldn’t surpass them. However, the team was proud of themselves for playing clean, non-violent games even when fouled and hurt by opponents.

Boys’ Varsity Basketball team became the Condor League Champions; pictured here with the team are Assistant Coach Rich Mazzola and Coach Brian Driscoll

nominee and his shot-blocking prowess had him among the best in the Southern section. The team ended its season with a tough three-point loss to Kilpatrick in the second round of CIF’s.

BOYS’ JUNIOR VARSITY BASKETBALL Captains: Blake Caldwell ’01, Wayne Chang ’00, and Guido Soracco ’00 League Record: 11-0 Season Record: 11-2 Coach: Derick Perry, CdeP ’83 This was one of the finest seasons in Thacher’s JV Basketball history. The team’s dedication and diligence paid off in well-earned victories and consistent improvement. All of the players contributed to an outstanding season. Their teamwork and genuine affection for each other made them a joy to coach. Blake Caldwell won Most Valuable Player status, Simon Xi ’01 won Most Improved Player kudos, and the team won the Tony Dunn Award.

BOYS’ VARSITY LACROSSE Captains: Jake Braitman ’00 and Todd Meyer ’00

BOYS’ VARSITY BASKETBALL

League Record: 5-4 Season Record: 6-4

Captains: Michael Back ’01, Jay Thornes ’01, and Anwar White ’00

Coaches: Bo Manson and Jack Crawford

League Record: 7-1 Season Record: 10-9 Coaches: Brian Driscoll and Rich Mazzola This team made it to the second round of the CIF Playoffs due to its stellar League Record. Andrew Warren ’00 became more of an offensive force this season and Anwar White developed as a defender and shot blocker. Andrew Ma ’02 provided stability in the middle and, along with Anwar, was a rebounding leader. The lone freshman, Brenton Sullivan, distinguished himself with clutch free throws and intelligent play throughout the year. Anwar was mentioned by many opposing coaches as an All-CIF

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The Thacher News

“Improvement” describes and defines this season.

This young team—14 of the 22 players were new to Varsity—enjoyed positive and enthusiastic support from the seniors. New Head Coach Crawford shared his tremendous knowledge and experience with the team that challenged both returning and new players to learn more complex systems. The newer players were so intrigued that many plan to attend lacrosse camps this summer. A highlight of the season was beating the alumni team during the Winter Alumni Days in January.

BOYS’ JUNIOR VARSITY LACROSSE Captain: Nate Faggioli ’00 League and Season Record: 5-4 Coaches: Peter Robinson and Terry Twichell This was a happy and successful team. Plagued by injuries and flu, this team never made excuses and never gave up. The team came from behind in four of its five victories, including thrilling one-goal victories over Windward and OVS. The defense—anchored by Most Valuable Player Matt Spille ’02 and Most Improved Player goalie Jose Estrada ’02— was the key to the team’s success, yielding more than six goals only twice. The offence—led by goal scorer Bobby Kellogg ’02 and assist-leader Leigh Salem ’02—was well-balanced because the midfielders made such a strong contribution, especially Captain Nate Faggioli, swing man Nathan Wallace ’02, and the powerful Tim Stenovec ’02. According to Coach Robinson, the season’s “high point came against OVS: We were tied 3-3 with four minutes to play and scored three goals, one

by Leigh Salem, one by Bobby Kellogg, and one by Tim Stenovec, to secure the victory 6-3.”

BOYS’ FRESHMAN LACROSSE Captains: Tyler Caldwell, Drew Fleck, and Charlie Munzig League and Season Record: 6-2 Coach: Greg Courter This group of neophyte lacrosse players experienced great success due, in part, to the leading scoring of Charlie Munzig and Tyler Caldwell. Will Chamberlain became an excellent goal tender and won kudos as the Most Improved Player. Highlights were two victories over Cate and a victory at the league tournament over the Midland team that had defeated the Toads earlier in the season. e

Development

An Enduring Contribution to Thacher

f you’ve been thinking about making a substantial gift to The Thacher School, perhaps you should consider real estate. If a cash or securities gift isn’t practical, your personal residence, farm, vacation home, commercial property, or parcel of undeveloped land might be more suitable. This gift may offer you the opportunity for valuable income tax and estate tax savings. You may also free yourself of burdensome management and the problems involved in selling the property or leaving it to estate liquidation. Whether or not Thacher keeps or sells the property, you’ll make a satisfying and enduring contribution to the School’s work.

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Choose the time of your gift If convenient for you, you can make a gift of real estate now. Assuming you itemize deductions on your return, you’ll receive a substantial income tax deduction, and have the satisfaction of seeing the results of your generosity.

Perhaps an immediate gift isn’t desirable. You may want to use the property a while longer, or even retain lifetime use. In any case, you still can make the necessary arrangements now and benefit from a sizable current income tax deduction. Following are various types of gift possibilities for consideration by you and your tax advisors.

1. An outright gift of real estate When you make an outright gift of real property, you obtain an income tax charitable deduction equal to the property’s full fair market value (if held long-term) instead of the lower cost basis.

This deduction lets you reduce the cost of making the gift and frees cash that otherwise would be spent on taxes and upkeep. Also, you avoid tax on the property’s appreciation, the transfer isn’t subject to the gift tax, and the gift reduces your taxable estate. Your deduction for a gift of appreciated real estate in any year generally is limited to 30% of your adjusted gross income, with a five-year carryover of the unused deduction.

Development

Development Gifts of Real Estate

use and that of any survivor, Thacher must receive the entire property outright.

3. A fractional interest

Tax savings for partial gift

Let’s say you have a home you don’t occupy year-round. You can make a deductible gift to Thacher of an undivided interest, allowing the School exclusive use of the property for part of each year. A vacation home can be ideal for 2. A retained life estate this purpose. For example, you could give Thacher a half interest. You would continue Give your home but enjoy life to use the property for six months of each year while the School, as half owner, would use it tenancy You can give Thacher your home and receive a for the remaining six months. As a result, charitable deduction for it, even though you you’d be entitled to an income tax charitable continue living there. This is called a “retained deduction based on half the property’s fair life estate.” Let’s assume you want to continue market value. using your personal residence for life. You also may want a survivor (perhaps your spouse) to 4. Generate a life income gift enjoy life occupancy. But, ultimately you’d like The Thacher School to get the property. By Give your home to a trust deeding your home to Thacher now, subject to If you don’t want to live in your unmortgaged these rights, you may obtain a sizable income home any longer, consider transferring it to a tax deduction this year. The amount depends Charitable Remainder Trust. The trustee then on the value of the property and your age (and can sell the property and invest the proceeds in the age of any person given life use). income-producing securities. You’ll receive a life income and so will a survivor named by you. The trust principal ultimately becomes You keep rights and Thacher’s, thus allowing you to reduce and/or responsibilities eliminate estate taxes when spouses are the In addition to the right to live in your home, only income beneficiaries. When you transfer you retain the right to rent it or make im- appreciated property held long-term, you provements. You continue to have responsi- won’t pay any tax on the capital gain. Also, bility for maintenance, insurance, and property you could realize a substantial current income taxes. Your gift to the School must be an ir- tax deduction. revocable remainder interest. After your life

Explore the benefits of a Gift of Real Estate When you give your home or other real estate to Thacher, you create an enduring testimonial to your interest in its important goals. Your personal satisfaction is complemented by valuable tax benefits. Consult with your accountant or tax-advisor to determine the best option for you. If you have any questions, please call Terry Twichell, Director of Development at Thacher, at 805-646-4377, extension 224. e

Fred Lamb, CdeP ’40, gave his family home in Benedict Canyon, California, to Thacher.

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Thacher Pioneers

EKMAN

SCHUBERT

HIROSE

Thacher

PioneerS n this issue, we profile alumni, one Trustee, and one former faculty member who came to Thacher from various quarters and walks of life to benefit—as well as contribute—to the Thacher experience. The School embraces and encourages diversity in its student body and faculty as a means of enriching the community and learning to appreciate, respect, and adjust to different people, lifestyles, and cultures evident in our increasingly diverse society and ever-changing world. We became interested in how these “pioneers” heard about Thacher, how their experience here

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HONANIE

Thacher Pioneers

HUNTER

shaped their lives, what they are presently doing, and their future plans. Profiles include some of the first minority students, some of the first female students, and students from various countries before international travel was commonplace. In the past, profiles were written by a cadre of volunteers (friends or relatives of the individuals, or School personnel). This time, we chose to let those being profiled write their thoughts and memories of their experiences at Thacher, while the Trustee and former faculty member profiles are written in the usual style.

McCONNELL

USSERY

CASTAĂ‘EDA

CATALAN Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Thacher Pioneer

Alumni Profiles

Bertel G. Ekman, CdeP ’51 Content at Day’s End was born in 1932, the only child of a thirdgeneration hotel and restaurant couple. My schooling was typical, with a burning interest for sports. Due to many extracurricular activities (scouting, tennis, riding, sailing), my scholastic standard should have been even lower than it was. As my home and my parents’ hotel and restaurant were outside Helsinki—the capital of Finland—my journeys back and forth to school were long. Later on, after the War, my parents sold their hotel/restaurant and started a new establishment in the City; I continued attending the same school for boys.

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It was through the American Field Service (A.F.S.) that I first heard about the possibility of studying in America. My parents and my headmaster agreed to let me try it. Thacher was my first choice because of its location in California and its outdoor activities, especially the equestrian focus. My parents and the headmaster looked at the scholastic standard of Thacher and hoped I might benefit. I particularly remember reading the prospectus from Thacher, where it was mentioned that students were allowed to bring with them to School one easy-chair, one lamp, and two horses. Amazing priority!

I arrived in Santa Barbara after a four-day-and-night journey by Greyhound from New York. Although I can’t recall who came to get me on my day of arrival, I slept for 24 hours before being picked up and brought to Thacher. I had arrived before the opening of term and was guided around campus by one of the teachers who was cleaning out the baseball cupboards on each field. I was told there were spiders in the cupboards and that you could tell if they were poisonous by turning them upside down to look for a red spot on their bellies (Black Widows).

I particularly remember reading the prospectus from Thacher, where it was mentioned that students were allowed to bring with them to School one easy-chair, one lamp, and two horses. Amazing priority!

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I had not brought a horse from Finland with me and did not particularly like the idea of hiking. On various occasions, I had been warned about a purple horse that nobody liked to ride. I was also told that this particular horse never stayed in the big training enclosure; his normal routine was to throw the rider and charge through the high fence, resulting in frustrating repair jobs and telltale scars on the horse. “If you get that horse, refuse it” was the advice of my fellow students.

One day, Headmaster Newton K. Chase showed me an extremely dirty horse in a corral. He suggested I groom it and at least get the feeling for being around horses. A funny colored creature emerged, purple, with ugly scar tissue. Mr. Chase informed me later that day that an anonymous sponsor from Ojai had made it possible for me to have a horse during my Thacher year. A strange friendship developed between the purple thing and myself. I got used to the Western saddle, to being thrown at the most unexpected moments and to a thinking animal, kind, but scheming at all times. Neither of us had any previous gymkhana experience, but we learned enough to make the second team. I remember one sack race in particular. Thimbolina, or the purple one, had quickly mastered the turn by the sack when I bent down to pick it up. I did not fall a single time, except once. I could never figure out why she chose to go straight when I bent down. She left me holding the sack—on the ground. From the Gymkhana Field she continued straight back to her corral. She came to me when I whistled for her at the big round-up after the holiday break, and she earned me the honor of receiving the Dawson Improvement Vest.

Other fond memories are of the Glee Club, the togetherness of our choir singing in church in Santa Barbara, the play As You Like It, the babysitting at Anson Thacher’s, Douglas the mule, rattlesnakes, and my right nipple that was cut off on the spring mattress in a friendly wrestling bout with Wilbur Cox—I scraped it off the metal strip, rushed down to the Infirmary, where it was taped back on; to this day, it is still upside down. Other favorite memories include my first day in the Upper School, when I was kindly invited to throw a baseball from one end of the corridor to the other and how, when the ball had left my hand, the chap at the other end of the corridor stepped away and watched the ball continue its way through the glass door; how my green rattlesnake skin dis-

I enjoyed studying—probably for the first time in my life—though unused to it as I was, not very successfully. It was both helpful and fun to study with other students. I particularly remember studying for finals in English Literature. Three of us debated over possible test questions and finally decided on making a résumé containing year, principal author, principal work, historical and religious influences, as main headings. This covered a time span, if I remember correctly, from Chaucer to modern times (1951). Mr. Huyler was ill with a very sore throat on the day of exams and the test paper was pushed to us under the door. There was only one question to the test: name the principal authors, their main works, and historical and religious facts that influenced them, from medieval until our time. All three of us passed the exam, but we had a hard time convincing Jack Huyler that no cheating had taken place. The combination of outdoor life, camping, sports, and hard studies was unique and unequalled anywhere in my experience. The Norman Mackintosh Todd Memorial Medal for Sports that was awarded to me at the graduation ceremony touched me profoundly.

I actually quit school when I returned to Finland, and decided to do my military service in the A.C.A.C. The Olympics ’52 in Helsinki saw me as an interpreter for all of the equestrian teams. By that time I had decided to become the fourth generation in the hotel and restaurant business. I spent a year in France in order to learn the language and enrolled at the S.S.H., Hotel School in Lausanne, Switzerland. Following graduation, I worked at a New York hotel through The Scandinavian Foundation. I spent another eight months as a night auditor at Holyoke in Massachusetts. I married Majbritt Hjordis in 1959 and continued working with my parents at their restaurants in Helsinki. In the meantime, we had two children, Niklas in 1961 and Maria three years later.

My wife continued working with her parentsin-law, but I broke away in 1966 to manage a luxury hotel 50 kilometers from the capital. Four years later, I was asked to join The Intercontinental Hotels that was about to open a hotel in Helsinki. I stayed with the hotel as assistant manager for three years, then was transferred to The Portman InterContinental in London, where I worked as resident manager for four years. In 1978, I was offered the InterContinental

Jerusalem to manage, which I did for five years.

I then moved to Copenhagen in Denmark to manage the Angleterre, also part of the chain.

When InterContinental sold the Angleterre, I chose to leave the chain in order to stay in Copenhagen. It was the summit of my career. I managed one of the most famous hotels in Europe, we lived close to Finland, and we had the rest of Europe close at hand. What could be better? The new owners also bought another hotel in Copenhagen and I spent my time between the two. But a new partner was brought in from a Swedish hotel chain. They wanted their own man in as part of the Bertel’s son Niklas deal, and I was without a job! We moved back and daughter-in-law to Finland in 1986 when I was 54 years old and Xiao Yun had, overnight, become too old to get a job in the hotel industry in Finland. I was unemployed for a year and then worked as a restaurant manager for half a year until the place was sold.

I decided there and then to give up my profession. The University o f Majbritt Ekman, Helsinki em- Bertel’s wife ployed me as custodian at the Swedish School of Social Science where I spent the rest of my working life in a happy environment, enjoying my work immensely.

I became a senior citizen at the age of 65 in 1997. e

Thacher Pioneer

appeared during Easter holidays; and how could I ever forget the Easter camping trip made by The Four Fools and a Finn!

The Ekmans’ sonin-law Jan and daughter Maria

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Thacher Pioneer

Alumni Profiles

Klaus Schubert, CdeP ’56 Trading One Casa Rustica for Another hile writing this I am sitting on the porch of our “finca” on the beautiful island of Mallorca, Spain, in the Mediterranean Sea, where my wife and I live about half of the year since my retirement three years ago. A “finca” is a “casa rustica” with a pool and quite a lot of land surrounded by orange and almond trees. The climate and the landscape often remind me of Thacher and my year as a student at the Casa de Piedra 45 years ago.

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What was the situation for my family and me when I became a Thacher student in 1955? The time immediately after World War II was very tough for the people living in Germany. Because we had lost our home in Berlin in the bombings, we went westward in 1945. My father, a celebrated architect, was not allowed to work as an architect for about four years; instead, in order to survive, he had to stoop to making—with his own hands—and selling toys for children. Germany was divided into a democratic western part and a communist eastern part. Democracy in West Germany was still a weak plant, but rooted firmly and growing steadily. The industry recovered fast and the Volkswagen was the most admired and wanted car in those years. Winston Churchill named the political border between the two sections the “Iron Curtain” which, in 1961, became visible as “The Wall” that divided the city of Berlin into two parts. Fortunately, this is now history with the fall of The Wall and the overwhelming reunion of both parts of Germany in 1989-90.

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The Thacher News

off the coast of Bar Harbor, Maine, where they spent their summers. Driving across America to their home in Pasadena, I got the first impression of this vast country and I admired the Purcells’ patience in answering all my questions. Towards the end of vacation John, CdeP ’58 (my foster brother) and I left for Thacher.

What follows is a brief résumé of my year at Thacher. I believe that at the age of 17, a person’s character is formed more than at any other time during one’s life. This is the time when values such as honesty, modesty, team spirit, and social and multi-cultural understanding are laid and accepted as basic rules for future behavior. This year was the time when my interest for outdoor life was roused: I very much liked horseback riding, camping, and all kinds of sports. I still remember my Easter trip in ’56 with seniors Gerry de Santillana, Gordon Chamberlain, Ralph Cross and Michael Shore, CdeP ’57, when we lost the trail somewhere in the mountains, but found a miner’s cabin instead. I remember the rattlesnake we hunted (I still have the rattles), the condors we saw, and it being pretty cold at night.

I was fascinated by the landscape of Southern California, especially the Mojave Desert, which created my deep love for deserts in general.

(Last year my wife and I toured the Namib Desert, and this year we will be in Maroc and the Sahara.)

What impressed me most during that year at Thacher, however, was the personality of the teachers. They did not merely teach but felt responsible to transfer those values I mentioned above, especially Fred Lamb, CdeP ’40, David Lavender, Bob Miller, Michael Ehrhardt, and finally Jack Huyler, H ’51, whom I admired most, and still do. My wife agreed when she met Jack and his charming wife, Margaret, in Munich in the late ’60s and later again when our family visited Thacher in 1987 and we were guests of Margaret and Jack at their home in Wyoming. Music Director Michael Ehrhardt was probably a little disappointed that I neglected playing my cello; but I think he finally accepted it when he noticed how much I liked the outdoor life. I was very happy when I became a member of the Pack and Saddle Club and of the Orange Gymkhana Team. I graduated with the class of ’56.

As a high-school student in Hannover, a city located 70 miles from the “Iron Curtain,” I heard of the American Field Service (A.F.S.) offering scholarships for a one-year stay in the United States. I applied and—although there were many applicants—was selected. This was the start of an unforgettable year at Thacher and with my host family, the Purcells. I am very happy to have had this opportunity and I want to thank Thacher and the Purcell family, again, for this experience of a lifetime. In that era the way to America normally was by ship. Our family visited Thacher in 1987 and were After sailing for ten days I arrived at Quebec, given horses for a trail ride. My wife and our Canada, and joined my “family” on an island daughters had very little or no experience with

Back home I had another year of school before graduation because of Germany’s different school system. In 1958 I joined the Navy and began my career by becoming a Commanding Officer of a mine-sweeper and a teacher at the Naval Academy. This “normal” career ended in 1965 when I was granted a scholarship to study law at the Universities of Kiel and Munich (which finally took eight years). The West German Navy at that time needed someone who, in one person, could estimate both mili- of our daughters grew up with their families tary and legal aspects concerning personnel travelling around, they speak different lanand sometimes political issues as well. After guages, they think interculturally, and they fremy studies I found myself at a desk within the quently work and live abroad, especially here Ministry of Defense in Bonn. I worked there in Europe. for more than a decade in various positions ranked as a What impressed me most…at Thacher…was the personality captain; mainly I de- of the teachers. They did not merely teach but felt veloped rules and regulations on personnel responsible to transfer the…values [of honesty, modesty, issues not only for the team spirit, and social and multi-cultural understanding]…

Navy, but for the Armed Forces in gen- as basic rules for future behavior. eral, prepared laws of that matter for the Federal Parliament—the My life-long preferred hobby has been blue“Bundestag”—and was an attorney at the water sailing, which I started in the early ’60s, and finally we called a sailing yacht our own Supreme Court level. for many years. We sold it three years ago At 48, I left the Navy to become the Personnel when we bought that “finca” I spoke of in the Manager for Bayer, one of the biggest chemical very beginning. This woke up a new and, until companies in Germany and a global player then, unknown interest in Mediterranean garworld-wide with a headcount of 150,000 dening that I enjoy very much. But since I am (Bayer produces much more than aspirin!). retired time is running out to get a better golfThis was a challenge I wanted to take and it handicap, watch the oranges grow, visit worked very well. I was happy to have this re- friends, see other parts of the world, and do so sponsible job in a very different surrounding, many things I never had time to do before. which included the introduction of an inter- What a wonderful life! e national management training and development system not only for Bayer, but for the subsidiaries abroad as well. Besides that, I ran my bureau as an attorney.

During my studies at the University of Munich, I married Christiane, and we have two daughters, who are 30 and 25 years old. Melanie followed in my footsteps as an A.F.S. student and graduated from a high school in Long Beach, California; she works as a product manager in Italy with the Benetton Corp. Sandra, the younger Daughter Melanie, wife Christiane, daughter Sandra, and Klaus Schubert one, works with an architect’s bureau and lives close to our home near Bonn. When I was young, international experience was the exception, but the generation

Thacher Pioneer

horses and I hadn’t seen the trails for 30 years!

Jesse Kahle said to me: “Okay, Klaus, you know the trails!” and off we rode. We all very much enjoyed the trip and the horses found their way back alone. In Germany, this would not have been possible; a licence is required for everything!

Klaus and his family riding Thacher trails

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Pioneer Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Thacher Pioneer

Alumni Profiles

Hisakazu Hirose, CdeP ’66 Learning in an American Dream lease let me start with an old, but the most shining photo of my youth, taken at the upper soccer field almost 35 years ago. To many of you who don’t know me, I was an American Field Service student from Japan in the year 1965 to ’66. Life at Thacher was, in a word, terrific. Thanks to all the people who made that year so precious and so meaningful for me for the rest of my life.

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Before getting into any of this, allow me to tell you a little of my story. I was born in Tokyo in 1947, two years after the end of World War II. My father, Sanehide Hirose, was a director of a ceramic company, Noritake, and my mother, Akiko Hirose was the daughter of Fusaaki Uzawa, a famous lawyer and a President of Meiji University in Tokyo. My father died when I was ten months old and my mother, who never remarried, had to raise her three little sons while arranging flowers to support us. Since mother had lived in the U.S. for a few years before the War, she taught us to look at the world with a global perspective and pushed us to learn English. When I was offered the highly selective American Field Service scholarship during high school, she was glad and never hesitated to let me go to the U.S. for a year.

For me, a year in America was a big dream that came true in my first few weeks in California. My host family was the Grimes of Oxnard. Mr. Grimes was a newspaper editor; his graceful wife enjoyed playing piano to her unique and brilliant children: Bob, Doug, and Diana. All of them enjoyed their lives in a pretty house with two cars and a clean pool surrounded by a lawn garden. This was really an “American Dream” for a Japanese high school boy of the 1960s (and still is!). I owe much to this family all through the year and especially to Doug with whom I spent my time at Thacher as a classmate, too.

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The Thacher News

The next stage, at Thacher, was something out of the dream. I had heard that The Thacher School was one of the top boarding, preparatory schools in the U.S., located in the mountains, without any girls (at that time). I thought it might be like a dark, Zen-Buddhist training

temple in the mountains of Kyoto. Reality was slightly different. Students worked hard when they studied, but, once finished, they knew how to have fun [see top photo on page 27]. When I asked a girl whom I met at A.F.S. parties outside Thacher whether it would be possible for her and her friends to come to Thacher for a dance, everyone without exception said, “Yes, I would love to!” The young Buddhist trainee in Japan would have been jealous, but I was happy and thought that the environment was beyond the American Dream that I had cherished. I have to add, however, that after awhile, I realized the truly difficult problems that friends were facing, in a way more difficult than the questions with which Buddhist trainees were struggling: the Vietnam War. And, I had to face a much lighter but also serious reality that the girl whom I dated undoubtedly wanted to come to Thacher, but not particularly to see me.

Returning to my year at Thacher: Compared to the general Japanese high school education, Thacher’s was substantially advanced (the textbooks we used for English literature and Calculus, for example, were college-level which would hardly ever occur in Japan), more extensive (not only intellectual or athletic training, but included skills for life such as developing a sense of responsibility, cooperation, and leadership), and perhaps longer lasting. The Thacher education gave me skills to communicate well enough in English to sustain my later professional life. My thanks to all the faculty and friends, but particularly to Mr. Huyler, Mr. Burhoe, and Mr. Shagam, my Dorm Head. They taught me how joyful it is to be with nature in the mountains horseback riding, or at the Outdoor Chapel at sunset, or just lying on the grass quietly looking up at the sky.

My gratitude, as well, to Mr. Erhardt, our music teacher, who cultivated not only my ears to enjoy music, but also my heart to feel the composer’s world.

One last notable episode was a modest but important discovery of an American culture when soccer season was about to end. The senior members gathered together one day to decide on the junior leader for the next season. I thought in a society like America, a country of democracy of all people with equal rights and individual freedom, a vote and its majority rule would prevail over everything. Or, perhaps, as often happened in Japan, the coach would nominate the new leader. The decision would, in any case, soon be made. But instead, a long, serious discussion among the senior students took place. Everybody spoke out, not

As to international activities, after two years in France (1986-88), I was appointed to be a member of a working group of the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT)—an intergovernmental organization, whose center is located in Rome—and worked with, for example, Professor Classes of 1966 and 1967 on the steps of Upper School Farnsworth of Columbia University, for the promulgation of the for his own sake, nor out of his personal pref- UNIDROIT Principles for the International erence, but for the future of the team, until fi- Commercial Contracts. In 1995, I started to nally a decision was agreed upon. At the end, cultivate a new field, Consumer Law, in which an eye-closed vote was taken. Americans seem we are far behind the U.S. to respect the majority of opinions, but try to get the best answer from within for the While attend a Symposium on “De-regulation” strength of the team. And, once they decide on at U.C. Berkeley last November, I decided to a leader, they let him take initiative that gives visit Thacher after 33 years of separation. Alhim stronger leadership than would occur in though it was an abrupt and short Japan. This discovery—which may hit only the visit, I was warmly received by the Compared to the general Japanese high surface of the deeply rooted complex of Amer- faculty members, including the Head ican society and its culture—gave me an en- of School, Mr. Mulligan. I was quite school education, Thacher’s was during interest in studying social sciences. lucky to see some of my old friends substantially advanced…more extensive… on the soccer fields, where they After returning to Japan, I had a hard time watched their children playing games. and perhaps longer lasting. readjusting to the preparatory study for the Talking with them, sitting on the Japanese college-entrance examination, and grass, watching the squirrels with the Twin failed to get into the most difficult one, the law Peaks behind, feeling the soft winds, I rememschool of the University of Tokyo. Although I bered the same precious moment long ago. could enter into other universities, I decided to try one year later again and succeeded that And I contemplated quietly as I had done betime. Much later when I thought about this fore. I could gradually regain the spirit I had failure, I wrote what follows to one of my long forgotten in the midst of the exhausting Thacher teachers whom I respect very much: everyday life in Tokyo. The beautiful sunset in “…I have always been proud and never re- the Ojai Valley from a seat in the Outdoor gretted that I studied a year at Thacher even Chapel was an addithough my entrance into our university was tional present to me. postponed because of this different experience I was refreshed. of a year abroad. It was not true that my failure was related to my A.F.S. experience. And Coming back home, not only for me, but also for so many A.F.S. re- my elderly mother turnees in Japan—I would say for all of with whom my famthem—one year in America was incomparably ily lives, was so happy important and fruitful that one or even two to hear my story of years’ extra work for the preparation to enter Thacher. So were all into a Japanese university meant nothing. You of my family memmight not believe it and you might think that I bers. Please take a wrote this to make you feel better. But, I say look at the last photo. Atsuko and Hisakazu Hirose with their this honestly from my heart. A year in your It was taken in the three sons: Mitsuru, Takayoshi, and country has supported me directly or indirectly country (“Kiyosato” Kazutoshi throughout the rest of my life. It is not just the village in Yamanashi) skill in English or other knowledge, but some- last summer. The green field and the farm was thing far more important that was given by cultivated more than 60 years ago by an Ameryou and your people.” ican teacher, Mr. Paul Rosdie. Thanks to him, this village has become an oasis for those who When I graduated from university, I was lucky live in the Tokyo area. As The Thacher School to have a seat in the law faculty of research and Mr. Rosdie did for so many people, I would assistant on civil law. Four years later I became like to contribute something meaningful to the associate professor at Sophia University and people around and hopefully to the whole then at the University of Tokyo. Since 1994, I world, too. e

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have been full professor of this University. My work has been mainly in contracts and family law. (I have made some contribution to the law reform in Japan in these fields as a member of various governmental committees.)

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Alumni Profiles

Cynthia F. Hunter, CdeP ’80 Lessons Learned amid Manure Piles ou probably haven’t noticed it. The horses gaze over it from their corrals. In the early mornings, freshmen stumble by it as they empty their wheelbarrows of the previous night’s fresh manure. It’s been there for awhile now. It’s just a rock. A rock with a fading plaque.

Y

It wasn’t there when I arrived at Thacher in 1977, among the first group of women “pioneers” to shovel with the boys. But that’s where I go now when I want to talk with my father. It’s his rock. The place where his Thacher friends wanted to remember him and the place that he would remember the most.

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teacher, Peter Robinson, who encouraged me to speak out in the School newspaper about my feelings on the hot topic of the days: public display of affection or “P.D.A.” I had tried to avoid taking a stand by making a joke—“If you have the itch, scratch”—and he called me on it, saying, “Why don’t you say something about how you really feel?”

But in those days I didn’t dare show my serious feelings except in the privacy of Dostoyevsky papers. But Robi’s words etched my psyche, inspiring me to trust the power of my own voice.

The Thacher Legacy It’s also a reminder of what I have valued most My father learned such lessons of integrity in from the early coed days the 1920s at Thacher. When he left the views at Thacher. from Topa Topa and the walks through the orange groves, he never let the wisdom of Casa de Piedra fade from his heart. More than 60 The Values of Manure years later, as his time grew short from cancer, I’m sure my Dad, who it was still the Thacher days about which he graduated in 1924, would reminisced. appreciate the location chosen for his rock, adja- When I was 14, he and my mom, the first cent to the horses’ manure woman honored as a Thacher Trustee and a pile. He, like the rest of us veteran horsewoman herself, asked me which Thacher grads, under- high school I wanted to attend. My choices stood manure. He under- were a Bay Area private girls’ school near stood that from it came home where we wore uniforms or Thacher, its many of the greatest joys first coed year, with a ratio of three boys to in life: a spontaneous one girl. And, of course, you had to have a nicker from a four-legged horse. companion, rides with the boys at sunset along the Sespe, and the wisdom of discipline and I remember how my older sister suggested Cate and how puzzled I was by my father’s veheresponsibility taught by the shovel. ment response that under no circumstances For us Thacher gals, it also taught us about My father learned such lessons of integrity in the equality. From the 1920s at Thacher. When he left the views from first day on campus, we shoveled right Topa Topa and the walks through the orange along with the boys, groves, he never let the wisdom of Casa de Piedra never questioning our shared roles. And un- fade from his heart. More than 60 years later, as like my years after his time grew short from cancer, it was still the Thacher, there was no boys’ club with which Thacher days about which he reminisced. to contend; they welcomed us. Despite a century of catering to was Cate an option. “But Dad, if you’re giving boys, camaraderie overcame any lingering me a choice.....” “NO!’” chauvinism in the transitional years. Unlike the college I later attended dominated by fraterni- There was no choice in my mind. I was headed ties, Thacher embraced the opposite sex. south for the boys and the horses. My parents trusted that somewhere between the barranca I remember how I found my voice in those self- and the barns, the education would follow. conscious high school years. It was a male Then there was Uncle Jack Huyler’s pointed

Thacher Pioneer

acceptance letter about “all play and no work makes for....”

Of course, from the moment I arrived to this day, I’ve conveniently forgotten the rest of his precautionary advice, lost amidst the boys, horses, camping trips, and other unexpected adventures.

Boys Will Be Boys As newcomers and females to Thacher, we bore the brunt of some remarkable pranks and School inductions. Several of us were selected into a secret male society and given instructions to sneak out of our dorms and be at the Headmaster’s house at midnight. I will never forget a disheveled Bill Wyman standing before us in blue pajamas asking what we were mate Bob Foss, after his diagnosis with schizophrenia, alall doing in his living room. ways wanted to talk Or the time Nick Ault, CdeP ’79, one of the about—his days at Thacher. senior ringleaders, crashed into my dorm room at three o’clock in the morning, swearing me to No one except those of us secrecy. He then delivered the news that he and who have sat at the Outdoor some friends had just rolled the Headmaster’s Chapel at dusk with the car after an evening joy ride to Ventura. At the aroma of manure over the hill time, being in on that secret was an honor as understand the value of this time and place, and how these great as unproctored exams. were the best years of great lives A few of us had the privilege of appearing in that take us to other people’s the secret tradition as one of Mr. Shagam’s Shangri-las. hand-picked ghosts in the twilight hours on Piedra Blanca. Outfitted in gobs of makeup But when I drive into the Ojai and and a yellow gown, as if debuting for Gone glimpse the faraway bluffs, they with the Wind, I was to sway onto the rock seem to mark the passage of time with classmate David Budlong as Mr. Shagam and the century of lives that have heralded our spirits before a terrified band of passed under them. It’s then I go back to the stables, and lean against freshman. Thrilling! the rock with the fading plaque Then there was the Extra-Day Trip that had where I’m reminded of the lessons the whole School talking: when the young and gathered amid the manure piles. e handsome Mr. Sutphen bravely took seven of us girls on an ExtraDay Trip into the Sespe our first spring. That was the trip when, during lunch, I had to pull my pants down in front of him to get the red ants off, a mortifying experience for a sophomore.

What Remains Somehow between these episodes, “allnighter” papers for Robi, Mr. Miller’s Spanish homework, and Gymkhana Weekends, when Mom and Dad would come to check up on me, I managed to get my horse’s corral shoveled and still receive my diploma.

Cynthia received her Bachelor’s of Science degree in Economics from Trinity before receiving her master’s degree in Journalism from Columbia University. She now lives in Steamboat Springs, Colorado, specializing in equine photography when she’s not on the ski slopes It is twenty years ago this June that I left the as staff photographer for Steamboat Ski Replace my father remembered so vividly from sort. The images on this page are a sampling of the 1920s. The place my late friend and class- her equine photography. e

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Alumni Profiles

Carol J. McConnell, CdeP ’81 A Product of Her Environment When Jane McCarthy, editor of The Thacher News, contacted me to ask if I would write about my experiences as a “pioneer” at Thacher, I kept thinking, “She must have the wrong person.” Pioneers are people like my great-grandfather, who attended Thacher at the turn of the century. That is, the last turn of the century, 1900. James Gifford Kellogg, CdeP ’01, traveled from Chicago via train and carriage to make the journey into the Ojai Valley. His physicians hoped that the warm California winters would improve his troubled breathing. They were right! Not only was living in Southern California an inspired remedy for his respiratory ailments, but he instantly fell in love with the cultures of California and the West, as well. From that time on, he recited stories of the Native Americans, orange groves, and missions to all who would listen. After graduating from Thacher and completing an engineering degree at Cornell University, my great-grandfather returned to California to build a “winter home” in Pasadena. That house still stands today and serves as the President’s Home at Cal Tech. Needless to say, his time at Thacher changed the path of his life.

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California. But Thacher was for boys! What a disappointment.

Fast forward to the year, 1976: I am a twelveyear-old girl eating breakfast cereal at the dining room table when I happened to read an article in The San Francisco Chronicle: The Thacher School was admitting girls!!!! My mind was reeling. Could this really be the same “Thacher” that I heard family members talk about for years? Is this the same “Thacher” that emphasized academics and horses? What a dream come true! I could leave San Francisco (city life never really agreed with me) and head out to the “country.” I could go to school with boys (a dramatic change from The Hamlin School for Girls that I was currently attending).

I remember my first visit to the Thacher campus as a prospective student. It was still all boys. As I was escorted on a campus tour, the young men stopped and stared at me. Wow!!!

This was sure different. They greeted me with some apprehension. I sensed that students and faculty alike were excited about the idea of coeducation but were hesitant to welcome females onto their campus. In this respect, I guess I really was a “pioneer.” The following September, I arrived to begin my freshman year. I was thrilled about being assigned my very own horse. His name was Sky and he was superb at Gymkhana. Then, there were all of these boys.

Our entering class (CdeP ’81) was composed of thirteen girls and approximately thirty-five boys (the ratio was even more skewed amongst the upperclassmen). It was a little overwhelmHis son, James Hull Kellogg, CdeP ’31, also ing, but I just thought of them all as big attended Thacher. My grandfather shared his brothers. love of the open chaparral and his deep affection for animals with all who would listen. It took about a week for me to realize that that Whether they came from Chicago or from was not how they viewed us. In fact, we were quite the attraction. All I realize that one old adage is true: We are, indeed, products of our the girls lived environment. I am certainly a product of The Thacher School. I on “The Hill” (in the Sespe, learned that working hard has its rewards; that one should always Topa Topa, consider the position, needs, and views of others before making and Matilija Dormitories). decisions; and that the beauty of the environment around us is Each night, something to cherish.

Perimeter Road was the Pasadena, they heard embellished stories of the boundary beyond which no boy could cross. grandeur of the Sespe and the uncanny virtues After a few short months, the intersection of of his faithful horse Sheik. Although my grand- the walking path and Perimeter Road turned father raised his family in Chicago, he would into “Lover’s Lane:” If a guy walked you up describe his time in the Ojai Valley with such the hill, everyone in the dormitories above was merriment and wonder that my mother gossiping about it by the time you arrived at dreamed of attending the boarding school in your room.

By my fourth year, I started to go through withdrawal. I loved the Ojai Valley, and the friendships were priceless; but it was time to move on. As the spring approached, I found that the students I would miss the most were my prefectees. What a wild bunch of sophomore girls! They looked to me for guidance and friendship, and I loved being a resource for them. Through their eyes, I could see how much I had grown in four years.

It was not until I left Thacher that I realized the importance of my experience there. I was very independent and not afraid to be away from home. The academic demands were almost negligible my first year of college, since my high school preparation had been so strong. I majored in Physiology with a concentration in Nutrition at my great-grandfather’s alma mater, Cornell University.

I returned to California and applied to the School of Veterinary Medicine at U.C. Davis. It had been a lifelong goal of mine to be a veterinarian. Admission into the school, and therefore the veterinary profession, has always been very challenging. I literally had to have straight “A’s” in all of my science classes.

Thank goodness for Mrs. Anne Thacher (wife of Anson “Tony” CdeP ’58), my Chemistry teacher, who taught me how to pay attention to details and think concepts through methodically. I did succeed in gaining admission to the Veterinary Program, followed by four glorious years of studying the concepts of medicine and surgery, as applied to companion animals.

As a practicing small-animal veterinarian, I soon learned that one’s ability to make educated decisions and judgments is essential to the “art” of medicine. Over time, I found that I had more of an interest in the management side of things.

How do we keep things organized and working efficiently? How do we ensure that the veterinary profession receives the recognition and respect it deserves? Hence, I joined Priority Veterinary Consultants, a veterinary management and legal consulting firm in Philadelphia. Through consulting with other veterinarians, public speaking, and publications, I have, I hope, made a contribution to my profession.

Thacher Pioneer

For me, the day-to-day experiences were both exhilarating and exhausting. The homework was tough, but the trail rides, Gymkhana events, and sports teams were great fun. I loved the orange and avocado orchards, the smell of the chaparral, and the sound of wildlife in the mountains behind us. It really was a dream for me.

James Gifford Kellogg, CdeP 1901, in 1898

As a natural extension of my consulting experience, I attended Purdue University’s Executive Business Management Program. I completed my M.B.A. degree last spring, and I am currently Associate Manager of Professional Services for Alza Pharmaceuticals.

As time progresses, I realize that one old adage is true: We are, indeed, products of our environment. I am certainly a product of The Thacher School. I learned that working hard has its rewards; that one should always consider the position, needs, and views of others before making decisions; and that the beauty of the environment around us is something to cherish.

I have always journeyed far from home. I have lived on the East Coast on two separate occasions, and I lived overseas for two years, with solo trips in and around the Pacific Rim and Africa. I attribute my love of travel to Thacher, as well. One gains a tremendous sense of independence and competence when one treks off to boarding school at age thirteen. In this sense, I suppose that I am somewhat of a pioneer. I just see myself as someone who wants to learn as much as possible and experience as much as possible, while the clock is still ticking.

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James Hall Kellogg, CdeP ’31, with Sheik

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Alumni Profiles

Cindy Castañeda, CdeP ’88 “The Banquet Song” Becomes a Lullaby n 1983, I was an eighth grader looking for options. I didn’t want to go to Central Union High School, the single high school in our small town of El Centro, California, in part because I was a bit scared. I had never been among the social elite and from my observations of high school students it seemed that those years in school were some kind of runway fashion show, at least for the girls—after all my older sister took about 11⁄2 hours getting ready for school! Furthermore, I was academically inclined and knew by then that I wanted to go on to college and not many of the students from Central were choosing that option. I wanted to go to a high school were students were there to learn and had all made the decision to go on to college.

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that had a zoo on campus and one in Colorado that was also outdoor-oriented and had horses.

I completed the applications and sent them on their way and made a request to have a site set up nearby to take the SSAT; the closest scheduled location was San Diego, 120 miles away.

Not many people from my county attend boarding school; I only know of one other and he attended The Webb School. Needless to say, I am indebted to all of the folks who helped me along the way: my teachers, especially, Mr. Thomas W. Henderson and my best friend’s mother, Karen Stiegler, who wrote letters of reference on my behalf. My Uncle Frank, a custodian for a school in the Los Angeles area, also tried to help me by arranging for me to meet with a counselor who knew something I did not know anyone about a school named Cate. And, who knows, who had ever attended if it had not been for a mix-up in directions boarding school either. So and the fact that we were never able to find where did my inspiration his home, I might have ended up there! come from? Believe it or not from the long-ago can- My first news back was from the school in New celled sitcom The Facts of York. They would love to have had me join Life—really! After all, them but were unable to meet the level of fiwhere else would the nancial aid that my family required (read “full daughter of a migrant farm- scholarship” here). I was devastated. I felt sure worker dad and a home- that the others would turn out the same way. maker mom get such no- Again I waited. I heard from Thacher, or more tions? My dad had dropped precisely, Mr. Stephenson, next. They had read out of school at sixth grade my application and were interested in having me to work in the fields and my visit. However, it was late in the application mom had dropped out in process and they couldn’t wait until April when tenth grade because she my SSAT scores would be ready. Did I have felt her English wasn’t good any other scores I could send them? I had taken enough after spending most an IQ test to be admitted into the gifted proof her elementary years in Mexico. Of course, gram, but it had been five years prior. I was reI didn’t think life at boarding school would be tested despite being discouraged by the school like the television show and I was not interest- psychologist who pronounced, “Well, your ed in going to an all-girls school either. score will probably go down because you are older now. People rarely do better on these My next stop was the public library where I things the second time around.” Whatever my looked up boarding schools in the card catalog score was, it actually went up and my scores and found only one entry, Boarding School were sent to Thacher; I never did take the SSAT. Guide 1975. I found it in the reference section and skimmed through it. I discovered they had My family and I visited Thacher on a beautiful a helpful index in the back with special topics spring day in 1984. It was a six-hour drive taught at each school. At the time I was fo- from our desert home to Ojai on the foothills cused on becoming a veterinarian and was of the Sespe. I’m not sure, but I think the oroverjoyed to find an entry titled “Veterinary ange trees were blooming and a light rain had Sciences.” As I recall, only one school was recently washed the campus and left small pudlisted: The Thacher School. The School dles. Of course, the campus was stunning. The sounded great, but, unfortunately it was listed huge pepper trees on the Pergola, the students as being an all-boys school. Undaunted, I gathered at Assembly, milk and grahmmies, copied the address of the National Association people in cowboy boots and blue jeans: an odd of Boarding Schools and requested an updated collection all in all. We toured the campus and copy. When it arrived a few weeks later I was my family and I were awestruck by the vast elated to find that Thacher had gone co-ed! I resources, dorm rooms, small classes, hundreds also chose two other schools, one in New York of horses, delightful Spanish architecture and

The Horse Program, camping, and senior year serving as a freshman prefect were the extracurricular focuses of my life at Thacher. I rode every season, all four years—back in the day when you could still get by without participating in a team sport. Still there were many notable moments that seem particularly vivid in my memory. When riding the trails, either alone or with company, it seemed that the hills of the Sespe were a revitalizing force and spurred reflection on the fact that each of us is a very small part of a larger community. The packing contest in which classmates Christine Johnson, Patrick Chu, and I landed first place in the humor category with our “Breakfast at the Country Chicken,” with Patrick as the female lead and I as the male. We packed a small table onto the horse and glued food and paper plates from the dining hall onto it for our winning entry. Christine served as the maitre d’. I also recall having a conversation with Mr. Robinson freshman year discussing colleges in which he boldly predicted, “Sure, in four years you’ll be at Harvard.” How did he know? Catching bluegill in the Sespe with Wonsik Choi, CdeP ’88, with nothing more than a line and hook— not even any bait—and then having to eat them for dinner. Drifting down the Colorado River in a kayak my freshman year with Seth Shaw, CdeP ’85, as team “Cinnamon Toast,” in a trip led by Mr. Wales and Mrs. Edwards. Unforgettable food feasts (a.k.a. munchouts) with my charges in my senior year. Navigating my way through Thai culture, during my summer as an A.F.S. student in Bangkok.

Of course, there were other less pleasant memories as well. Having to ride to the ranger station with Jennifer Ybarra, CdeP ’88, to find a ranger and request a helicopter evaluation for Christine Johnson who had been kicked in the face by her horse, Caribou. After getting on our horses, Jen fell when her saddle slipped down to the horse’s belly. By the way, Christine went back to riding as soon as she was able, earned the ranks of Top Horseman and “A” Camper senior year, and is now a veterinarian in Oakland. Trudging out of the Sespe on foot during a pouring rainstorm and crossing the creek which was running fast and about thigh

high. It was also no fun when a particularly mean burro bit Shoshi Asnis, CdeP ’88 and me on a trip sophomore year. Finally, the School’s collective sadness and grief when we learned that Amy Klausler had died as a result of a horse riding accident is also a poignant memory. Each memory is a reminder that a very good life can also have its low moments.

Thacher Pioneer

modern science labs. On the way home we all talked about the beautiful campus and how friendly everyone seemed to be. I was thrilled by the horses as was my younger sister, Liliana, who was three at the time. We headed home to wait again. But it was not too long before Mr. Stephenson called us again with the good news that I had been admitted. My family was thrilled but we held our breath until we received the financial aid offer. A generous financial aid offer made it possible for me to attend Thacher and I enrolled in the fall of 1984.

I was also admitted to the school in Colorado although it was a rather moot point after Thacher captured our hearts. I am fortunate that my parents placed education above the traditional Mexican norm of keeping their daughters at home and supported me in attending Thacher; they’re the best!

My twelve years since graduation have led me in unexpected directions. As Mr. Robinson predicted, I attended Harvard and picked up a degree in Social Studies. During my junior year I was selected as a Truman Scholar and won a $30,000 scholarship for graduate studies with a goal of pursuing public service. That led me to work at the Truman Foundation and the U.S. Department of Education for a year after college before I enrolled at the University of Chicago and earned a Master’s in Public Policy with an emphasis in higher-education policy. In my professional life since, I have worked for the Chicago Community Trust, DePaul University, a consortium of Big Ten Schools, and most recently at the University of Illinois as Assistant Dean at the School of Social Work.

I take pride in the work I’ve done in higher education, even if it is a far cry from being the veterinarian I once thought I would become.

Now, I’m preparing for my greatest challenge to date: parenthood. My husband, David Fanning, and I are expecting our first child in June.

[Editor’s note: At press time, Cindy and David announced that Daniel Declan Fanning arrived on May 23 at 5:07 p.m. All is well.] Dave and I have been married for almost five years and started dating over ten years ago thanks to Patrick Chu, CdeP ’88, who enrolled at M.I.T. the year before David. Dave completed his doctorate in physics last year and started as a senior research scientist at TriQuint Semiconductor in Dallas, Texas, last October. When I left my position as Assistant Dean and moved to Texas to join my husband, I was concerned about making the transition to being at home.

However, I’m enjoying myself by taking time to learn things that I had deferred until now: gardening, sewing, cake decorating, country/western dancing, and preparing for the baby. I wonder now, just like when I was working, how will I get everything done?

When riding the trails…it seemed that the hills of the Sespe were a revitalizing force and spurred reflection on the fact that each of us is a very small part of a larger community.

I may return to graduate school in a couple of years to pursue a doctorate in education or public policy, return to higher education administration, or perhaps life will take me in another direction altogether. After all, I never thought I’d be the first in my family to graduate from college and get a master’s degree to boot! Or that my high school years would be the last time I lived in California.

I cannot imagine how much more hectic things will be when our baby arrives, but I’m looking forward to finding out. One thing is certain: this child and any who may follow will grow up hearing stories about horses, camping, and avocado and orange orchards, and thinking “The Banquet Song” is a children’s lullaby. e

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Alumni Profiles

Stephen M. Batts, CdeP ’76 Flying His Dreams guess I would have to say that I took an uncommon path to Thacher. Born to a lower middle class family in Los Angeles, California, I grew up in the San Fernando Valley. I attended public schools prior to my exposure to Thacher. I say exposure, because I had not a clue of the place until I was called before my counselor one day as a ninth grader at San Fernando Junior High School. My counselor told me that my academic record made me a candidate to take advantage of a scholarship offer

by The Thacher School. As soon as she explained to me what Thacher was, I immediately told her I wanted to go. At that time in my life, I was on a path to fulfill my dream of becoming a fighter pilot in the United States Air Force. Many thought this to be unusual since—although my father, brother, and uncles served briefly in the Army—there were no career military people in my family. I like to think that I became enamored with the idea because of my favorite television show at the time (12 O’clock High).

Around the time I was eight years old, I seriously embraced the concept of “strapping on an airplane” and going into battle. I later formed a plan by which I would attend the Air Force Academy, play football there, and become a fighter pilot upon graduation. Therefore, the offer by my junior high counselor merely required a quick “cost-benefit analysis,” comparing my chances for admission to the Academy as a public high school graduate

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of the personally enriching experience that awaited me at Thacher. As I look back upon my experience there, I fondly recall the sense of caring and family that I felt among the faculty, students, and staff. I never doubted the genuine concern for my well-being and my future that virtually all of my teachers exhibited.

From what I have witnessed during recent returns to the campus, some of these same individuals—Peter and Bonnie Robinson, Terry and Cricket Twichell, Marvin Shagam, to name a few—are still there, not just molding young minds, but also shaping extremely wellprepared world-class citizens.

Apparently, my logic while in junior high was sound, as I gained Congressional appointments to both the Air Force Academy and the Naval Academy (my back-up plan). I entered the Class of 1980, the first class to admit women to the service academies. Thacher had made its indelible mark upon my soul. Thanks to the painstaking efforts of folks like Steve Griggs and Geoff Bird, I did so well on my French language placement examination that I was not required to take any French classes. The highly rewarding experience I enjoyed with Marvin Shagam during debate exercises surely had something to do with my selection of Humanities as a major. Those many nights of agony I endured as David Koth welcomed me to his humble home in the shadow of Upper School and patiently explained to me the foibles of higher math also paid off, as I was placed in the accelerated math program at the Academy. Thanks to Peter Robinson and Terry Twichell, I played lacrosse well enough to make the Varsity Air Force team for all four years. I graduated with a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Humanities in 1980.

Then began my odyssey of travel. First was a stop in Columbus, Mississippi, to earn my wings. During that year I not only Finally and perhaps the most profound gift of all for me has learned to fly a jet but I met the been the development of the drive to never tire of learning. woman who would This drive was not only nurtured in me while at Thacher, but later become my wife, Moteshia also fortified with a type of fearlessness that tells me that I Odom (she was atcan learn anything if I want to. tending the Mississippi University for versus my chances as a Thacher graduate; the Women). I graduated from pilot training and was assigned to Anchorage, Alaska, where I choice was a no-brainer. flew C-130 transports and re-supplied the While I immediately realized the prestige ad- string of early-warning radar sites along our vantage I would gain for college admission by extreme northern border with the Soviet attending Thacher, I had no idea of the depth Union. I married Moteshia and we were trans-

God has truly blessed me throughout my life.

Not the least of these blessings was the opportunity to attend Thacher. In addition to the things I have already identified, Thacher subtly prepared me in many other ways to deal with various other adventures. I learned humility, which served me well as our crew landed under fire by enemy forces during the invasion of Panama in 1989. I developed compassion,

which came into play as I traveled to the jungles of Laos, Cambodia, and Vietnam to aid in the search for answers regarding the over 2,000 American servicemen who did not return from the war in Southeast Asia. The discipline I developed (thank you Bob Coombs) surely saved my life in the skies over Iraq and Kuwait, as we flew through the oily black plumes caused by the burning oil wells set ablaze by Saddam Hussein’s forces during Desert Storm. Finally and perhaps the most profound gift of all for me has been the development of the drive never to tire of learning. This drive was not only nurtured in me while at Thacher, but also fortified with a type of fearlessness that tells me that I can learn anything if I want to.

While in Argentina this past year, I realized that I have not yet lost that drive. Today, I am a Lieutenant Colonel, preparing again to fly my airplane, this time in a Combat Search and Rescue role. My only remaining military goal is to become a Commander. The time is rapidly approaching when I will have to leave my military adventure and pursue something else. I don’t yet know how I will transition, but I do know that whatever new career I take, it will have to make me excited to get up in the morning and go to work everyday. e

Thacher Pioneer

ferred to Frankfurt, West Germany. There I became a Special Operations pilot, and I trained to use the C-130 to infiltrate, re-supply, and exfiltrate highly-trained, special-operations forces hundreds of miles behind enemy lines (the Cold War was still very much in effect, so you can imagine which enemy we trained to counter). We thoroughly enjoyed Europe and saw the birth of our first daughter, Marlena.

Then, we were off to the panhandle of Florida for more flying and the birth of our second daughter, Marion. I have also been assigned to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and Washington, D.C. Perhaps my most challenging assignment has been the one I just completed: after studying Spanish for six months I was sent to the Argentine School of National Defense, in Buenos Aires, for the entire year of 1999.

Stephen played on the Varsity Lacrosse team during his upperclass years at Thacher

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Alumni Profiles

Hubert Honanie, Jr., CdeP ’57 Dances with Snakes, Toads, Sunlight, and Gems write this letter with a mind filled with fond memories. My name is Hubert Honanie, Jr., CdeP ’57. Honanie is a Hopi Indian name meaning “badger.” The Hopi are people, few in number, who live on the chilly plateau of Northern Arizona. We are the people who never change our last names and who are the strange ones who dance with snakes to make the rain. Even other Indians are in awe of us.

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I will always remember my classmates…studying, horse riding, shoveling, and running soccer…the young men of Athens.

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eling, living daily life, and running soccer with me. Thacher was the best time of my life. My friends are the young men of Athens. A hello to Peter Henze, Paul Helms, Fred Shore, and Leslie Roos.

From Jack Huyler’s book The Stamp of the School:

Hubert Honanie...a Hopi, was Thacher’s first Thanks to classmates Richard Grant and Aldwyn Native American. Hubert was a leader; a good Hewitt, I have kept in touch with Thacher. We student who went on to Stanford; and a talented artist; but it is for his sophomore English all work in downtown Los Angeles. themes and for his camping skills that I reWith deliberate and slow pace, I am stepping member him with special fondness. into the dimension of Millennium 2000. I have a new wife and new In English II boys were encouraged from timelife. This lady is from to-time to describe real-life experiences. On the far-away land of such occasions, Hubert would usually write Guatemala. Her town fascinating accounts of trips shared with his is Santa Lucia, Cotzu- grandfather; attending the ancient tribal ritual malguapa, a southern dances, going into the mountains to seek a province on the Pacific totem for young Hubert… side. Her name is Marisol that translates I learned much from camping with Hubert, to “dancing sunlight on who gained the coveted “A” classification early the ocean waves.” in his Lower Upper year. As well as being a Upon reading this in- fine camper, he was an outstanding camp cook. formation, I suspect His apple pies, tacos, and tortillas were espeamused smiles will cially tasty... cross the faces of my Hubert had learned from his grandfather never former classmates. to lie on his face to drink from a stream, but to For 22 years, I origi- hunker at stream’s edge and with a very rapid nated a fine jewelry movement of the hand send a stream of water concept in the city of up to his mouth. The motion was more rapid Pasadena. I am a goldsmith and cutter of gem than the lapping of a dog; and I was reminded crystal and stone. In this time, I constructed of Gideon in the Old Testament, who chose as original and personal items for Pasadena clien- his commandos those who did not lie face tele. Being only a short hop from downtown down at the stream when they drank. They L.A., I launched myself into the international could look about themselves at they drank and marketplace. I am sensitive to the fact that the were less likely to be taken by surprise. The world is changing and there is a schism on the bond between Hopi brave and Israelite warperception of world trade. I view the world as rior is intriguing... a panorama of colors. Armed with my California resale permit, I am able to unlock the During his four years at Thacher, Hubert was doors of superior gem dealers and designers, chosen captain of the Second Baseball Team from the diamond to the pearl. With conven- in his sophomore year and of the Second Socient appointment by home phone, I can meet cer Team his senior year. He was elected memclientele in the lobby of the International Mart ber of the Student Council, the Honor Committee, and of the Outdoor Committee, on Hill Street in Los Angeles. secretary of the Bit and Spur, and Prefect in I love the high energy and the comings and go- both junior and senior years. ings of world people in this marketplace. The world of nature’s gems is always interesting The quotation which appears beside his phoand the unlocking of nature’s secrets is sur- tograph in El Archivero is from “After Sunset” by Grace Hazard Conkling. It is clear that prising and never-ending. the classmate who selected the passage knew I will always remember my classmates who Hubert well: “I have an understanding with stood beside me, studying, horse riding, shov- the hills…” e

Trustee Profile Trustee Profile

Terdema L. Ussery, Jr., CdeP ’77 Making the Most of Hoops and Hopes t first glance, it may appear that Terdema Ussery, CdeP ’77, was born under a lucky star. This President and Chief Executive Officer of the Dallas Mavericks holds a bachelor’s degree from Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, a master’s degree from the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, and a law degree from the University of California at Berkeley, where he also attained the coveted position of executive editor of the California Law Review.

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Terdema, however, wasn’t spoon-fed any of these educational or subsequent business opportunities.

Instead, he employed his diligence and perseverance to overcome the obstacles of growing up in the poor Compton/Watts section of Los Angeles, and to fulfill his goals. Terdema recalls his parents telling him he could do anything he wanted, but it was up to him and that the decisions he made would determine his destiny.

Terdema faced a significant destiny-directing choice towards the end of his junior high school years, when a school counselor suggested that, as a promising minority student, he should apply for a scholarship to Thacher. He accepted the challenge only to find that his shining-star status in Watts fell to mediocre standings at Thacher. “I was woefully behind,” he remembers, “and I had to work very hard to catch up academically. There were a lot of kids who had been in private schools all of their lives and who were better students; better prepared.”

On Terdema’s first day at Thacher, he and his parents headed to the barn area to choose a horse since Horse Director Hal Johnson felt a stronger bond between horse and rider would result if the students classified themselves and had a choice in their equine companions. Hal indicated the level of horses on the corrals— “Bunny” for beginners, “Patches” for intermediate, and “Rowdy” for advanced. Terdema saw “Beethoven-Beginner” and grabbed for the tag at the same time freshman Loren Churchman reached for it. Both held on firmly to the tag and Loren asked Terdema, “How are we going to decide this?”

Resorting to his childhood ways, Terdema said, “I guess we’ll have to fight for it.”

Loren thought better of that idea: “I’m not going to fight you over a horse!” and relinquished the tag. Terdema kept Beethoven throughout his first year and presently says that one of his most thrilling memories of Thacher was the first time he and Beethoven ventured out of the ring and up onto the trails alone: “There was a feeling of accomplish-

by Jane D. McCarthy

ment, freedom, and bonding between myself and the animal, which I will never forget.”

Terdema’s struggles with the Thacher lifestyle were pervasive. When first accepted to Thacher, his long-time boyhood friends warned him, “You’re gonna be a white boy when you come back.” Indeed, upon returning to his hometown during school breaks, toting his lacrosse stick, his friends told him, “You’re in a different world. We don’t want to hang with you anymore.” Terdema found himself in a different world at Thacher, as well; he didn’t know many things that most take for granted such as what a goose down jacket is; that a stereo can have more than one component; and that some cameras have detachable lenses. “I remember asking Loren if I could take his Nikon camera home for a weekend,” Terdema remembers. “I had no intention of taking pictures; I just wanted to show my neighbors that you could actually remove and change lenses.”

The socio-economic disparity between his worlds at home and at Thacher put Terdema squarely on the fence and uncomfortable in both settings. As he remembers: “The Thacher kids were wealthy. They had never seen anyone like me before and I was one of only two blacks in my class and seven in the entire School. I missed girls! I couldn’t stop staring at the wet hair of some of my classmates. It was strange to see it lay down and change colors when it was wet. Simple things, but dramatically different for me.”

To fit in better at Thacher, Terdema toned down his Afro, threw away his steel comb, expanded his music selections, and polished his manner of speech (“I’m trilingual: Spanish, English, and ‘Hood,’” he says with a smile.).

He became involved with “The Notes,” Indoor Committee, and Judicial Committee, and played Varsity Lacrosse. Still, in his sophomore year, Terdema confided in Terry Twichell that he was seriously considering returning to Watts High School, where he could become an A student again and concentrate on sports, especially football in which he excelled. “If you’re a quitter,” Terry told Terdema, “go ahead and quit. But, I don’t think you are. You think you’re working hard now, but if you worked

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Trustee Profile

even harder, you’d have the grades you want.”

Terdema credits Terry with saving his Thacher career, and challenging him to overcome his academic deficit. Through perseverance and extensive studying, he gradually surpassed some of his peers academically, earned Commendations in Algebra and U.S. History; and he began considering Ivy League schools. Part of his junior year was spent as an exchange student with other boys who traveled to the Emma Willard School in Troy, New York; at least he could interact with girls again. The ratio wasn’t bad either: 40 boys to 440 girls.

He learned a lot about camaraderie, the diverse intellectual prowess of bright women, and the intimidating feeling of being a threat (along with all the other Thacher boys) to what the girls at Emma Willard held dear. “It was the perfect point/counter-point to the argument that Thacher should remain single-sex.”

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returning to Harvard that same night after spending his winter break at home, and walked into his room to hear this news. He took the next plane home since the only thing that really mattered to him was that his father—his best friend—live. Mr. Ussery recovered and continues to run his store. Terdema transferred to the University of California’s Bolt Hall, where he was elected Executive Editor of the Law Review, the most prestigious position available to law students. He told his new bride, Debra, that because he made Law Review he wouldn’t see her for a couple of years. That omen came true, but she stood by him through those years, as she had done from the time they were adolescents back in Watts. (In fact, their first “date” away from home had been at Thacher when they were only 13 years old.)

This string of degrees resulted in numerous job offers once Terdema finished law school. He accepted a position at the Los Angeles office of the prestigious San Francisco-based law firm, Morrison and Foerster, initially focusing on corporate banking. He gradually shifted his practice to entertainment law when his musician friends (Terdema plays the drums) periodically asked for his help. He expanded into sports law in the same manner, always intending to work on the business side rather than the representative/agent angle of the field.

Terdema matriculated at Princeton, where he, once again, found himself among very bright, hard-working students. During his first semester there, he spent time fundraising for his Thacher class, but came up with only average academic results. “I thought being at Princeton was enough, but I encountered competition as I had at Thacher all over again; this time, however, I was prepared and knew how to study.”

It’s unusual for a Thacher graduate to make a university football team, but Terdema did, and during his freshman year. All of his roommates This journey through a mostly white and privwere football players, except for one classical ileged world forced Terdema to learn diplomacy and to accept different points of view. “I’ve never reI thought being at Princeton was enough, but I encountered ally been accepted in the white man’s world,” he says, “and competition as I had at Thacher… this time, however, I… I’m not totally accepted back knew how to study. in Watts anymore either.”

While searching for a way to cellist. “I tired of spending my evenings alone help youngsters bridge this same gap through with him, listening to him play Mozart on the the Constitutional Rights Foundation, he discello, especially since Mozart never wrote a covered the Continental Basketball Associapiece for the cello.” Off the football field, he tion, a “farm” league with teams in cities had made the academic team, joined the without a National Basketball Association Princeton Forensics Team, worked a couple franchise. Through his volunteer work in a jobs to pay bills, and rediscovered girls. He program that taught youngsters about law gained admission to the Woodrow Wilson through sports, he met then-C.B.A. CommisSchool of Public and International Affairs in sioner Irv Kaze, who eventually offered him his junior year. He graduated from Princeton the job of deputy commissioner and general with high honors and thought he would delay counsel. entering graduate school to try professional football. Weighing in at 210-plus and physi- Terdema joined the C.B.A. and a year later becally fit from lifting weights and playing sports, came C.B.A. Commissioner, the first Africanhe reported to training camp. That didn’t last American to serve in that capacity of any long: he was “scraped off the field and put major sports league. Terdema’s work there back together after a few days.” Pondering a brought unprecedented recognition and succareer in politics, Terdema entered John F. cess to the league as he negotiated licensing Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, agreements, national sponsorships, and lucrabut found his interests lay in law. He took the tive media contracts as well a three-year agreeentrance exams and entered Harvard Law ment with the N.B.A. for the two leagues to School, as well. work together closely. These circumstances brought rapid growth and much needed staTerdema had just been elected to the Harvard bility to the C.B.A. He also pioneered C.B.A.’s Law Review and had received his first assign- anti-drug and player education programs. ment when tragedy struck. At his family’s N.B.A. Commissioner David Stern says this of neighborhood grocery store, his father was Terdema’s management style: “From the first shot in a holdup—fortunately not killed like time I met him, ‘T’ impressed me as that special the stores’ security guard, but badly injured kind of sports executive—[he] has a firm grasp and bleeding on the street. Terdema had been on the financial and marketing sides of sports

Trustee Profile

while never forgetting that what takes place This $350-million project, scheduled to open on the basketball court is the core of your busi- next year, will be the core of a retail/entertainness. He likes people and they like him—for ment center in the image of Times Square. his manner, his competence, and his integrity.”

The Dallas Mavericks is about a $100-million Ultimately, Terdema’s accomplishments with business, and Terdema runs the daily operathe C.B.A. brought him to the attention of tions. In order to secure fans from every segment sports marketing giant Nike. He served as pres- of the community, he carefully manages every ident of Nike Sports Management, where he aspect of business, from the way they market was responsible for marketing Nike’s elite pro themselves to the way they design their licensed athletes and negotiating contracts. “We re- merchandise. He wants to use sports to reach structured that side of the business,” said Ter- the community’s youth and make a positive dema, “and it evolved into what is now Nike impact. When he first worked at the MaverSports and Entertainment.” Twice during this icks, he heard gripes about the team’s lack of stint, he was included on The National Sport- presence in the city’s minority neighborhoods. ing News’ annual list of the top-100 most pow- He also heard rumblings that the only reason erful people in sports. occasional sports clinics were held was to garner support for the new arena. He was very While the accolades were piling up, however, familiar with these complaints, as he’d heard Terdema realized that something was missing similar grumblings back in Watts. He sought to in his life. Extensive traveling (logging 300,000 greatly expand the Maverick’s presence in every miles annually on cross-country and overseas Dallas community and to make a positive imtrips), coddling rich athletes, and spending pact on kids’ lives. Besides having his athletes more time in the airport than at home with his offer routine clinics, he feels it’s important for family was not the way he wanted to live. He the city’s youth—especially African-Amerireflected on the quality time he’d spent with cans—to see African-Americans who are suchis father: “It was just being around him, see- cessful even though they don’t play sports. “Ining how he carried himself, being exposed to stead of hero worship,” he said, “I think we his values, and watching him interact with peo- should respect and applaud professional athletes ple,” Terdema remembers. “You only get one who have gone on to do great things. But there’s shot at fatherhood and I didn’t want to mess it no equilibrium. We don’t applaud the physiup for our two children.” He left Nike and cians, the journalists, the teachers, and the sciplanned to take a year off to shift his focus, entists who are also doing great jobs.” starting with a family vacation to Mexico.

As if the daily management of the Mavericks Just a short time later, Ross Perot, Jr., had pur- weren’t enough for Terdema, he is intimately chased the Dallas Mavericks and wanted to involved in the Dallas/Fort Worth business round out the organization’s leadership struc- community. He sits on the boards of the ture with someone who possessed a strong fi- Greater Dallas Chamber, Dallas Museum of nancial background and could provide a major Art, Dallas County Advisory Board of The Salmarketing boost to a brand name that ranked vation Army, Boys’ & Girls’ Clubs of Greater at the bottom of N.B.A. merchandising. De- Dallas, California Science Center, Y.M.C.A. of spite his apprehensions, Terdema interviewed Metropolitan Dallas, N.B.A. Board of Goverfor the position and gradually warmed to the nors, and W.N.B.A. Operating Committee. notion of joining the Mavericks through sub- This past summer, Governor George W. Bush sequent discussions with Perot at the N.B.A. announced the appointment of Terdema as one All-Star Game. One of the major reasons for of six new additions to the Texas Higher Eduhis change of heart was Perot’s emphasis on cation Coordinating Board. family. “As always, I took my father to the AllStar Game and we talked with Ross,” Terdema This is the second year that Terdema has served recalled. “Later, we sat in chapel together and on Thacher’s Board of Trustees, focusing on my father talked with him awhile. When the Program and Development Committees. everyone walked away, my father talked about He felt compelled to join this Board because he Ross’s family values and how impressed he was wanted to help Thacher continue its tradition with them. This man works at a very quick of uniqueness in secondary education, and, in pace and still finds time to focus on raising his some small way, give back to the School that family. That was an inspiration to me because changed his life. He wants to do all he can to most of the people I have met talk about being ensure the long-term health and well-being of successful, but they regret that they lost their the School and its students, and to acquaint as families in the process. So, I would pray, many people as possible with the unique insti‘Where are the successful Christian people?’ tution that is Thacher. The special strengths Then I slammed into one. The opportunity to that he brings to the Board are his marketing work with him took it over the top.” and his sports expertise, along with a sensitivity to low-income students and their needs. He Perot is mutually complimentary about work- hopes to impart his personal philosophy to ing with Terdema: “[He] is an innovator and a these students: Don’t ever quit; don’t ever give dynamic leader with phenomenal contacts.” up; pursue your dream. “As my father always In his first season with the Mavericks, Terdema told me: ‘The higher up you go, the bigger the played a key role in the campaign that led to bullseye on your back.’ I just hope I can make the early January 1998 election by City of Dal- a big enough difference in the lives of others las voters to help fund a new downtown arena. before I get ‘hit.’” e

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Former Faculty Profile

Former Faculty Profile

Edgardo Catalan, 1964-75 Artistic Endeavors ith Headmaster Newton Chase’s blessing, Thacher’s Art Director of the ’50s and ’60s, Gui Ignon, reincarnated the old Bixby Handball Court into the Bixby Fine Arts Studio. He also got a large proportion of the student body involved in artistic pursuits.

Upon Gui’s death in the summer of 1963, Thacher’s new Headmaster David Twichell scrambled to find a replacement art teacher to continue the momentum of the Fine Arts Program. Hearing of David’s predicament, Otis Wickenhaeuser, CdeP ’49, suggested that Thacher consider hiring a young Chilean artist whom Otis had met while overseeing an academic program for some Lewis and Clark College students who were studying in Valpairiso.

So impressed with the paintings was Otis that he tracked down the artist to his studio at the School of Fine Arts of Viña del Mar, where he’d just begun teaching. Otis purchased several of Edgardo’s paintings and kept in touch with him when he returned to the States.

Sight unseen, David hired Edgardo; so began his introduction to the States.

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were somewhat difficult to comprehend. But, as Bob Miller remembers, “he was a quick study,” and the language barrier wasn’t a difficulty for long. Beyond that, when he set his brush, crayon, or pencil to paper, he communicated beautifully. Edgardo’s philosophy about teaching art to teenagers in a high school setting, was that “talent is not as important as the development and expression of the creative process itself. That is why so many students who felt they didn’t have any ‘artistic talent’ whatsover, discovered that they could do—and did—so many interesting things in art.” He expanded the art curriculum by offering handson courses in photography, cinematography, ceramics, sculpture, and jewelry making, as well as more non-traditional art forms such as non-tie-dying, silk screening, and “junk” sculpture. He also added art history and appreciation courses, complemented by seminars about art in society. At his peak, three-fourths of the School were studying or creating art in studios and darkrooms. Finally, he initiated a program of guest artists (to conduct workshops) that brought to the School, among others, the black sculptor Noa Purifoy; the actors Karl Malden (being a cousin of Les Larsen helped), Woody Chambers, and Vincent Price; and a director of cinematography, his dear friend Floyd Crosby.

Some remember Edgardo as a somber fellow; it’s likely that those people didn’t experience his lively sense of humor and the occasional zany comments that he often sequestered.

Many students sought his companionship for horse camping trips, treks that didn’t always turn out as planned. Among the more unforgettable trips was an Extra-Day Trip with a group of “A” Campers and a backpack trip with Jim Watts, Steve Some of his fondest memories are of those early years at Thacher. From the Abercrombie, viewpoint of an artist and an immigrant, trying to keep up with his art while Neil Howe, and others to teaching, learning a new language, and starting not only a family but also the upper lakes in Yoa new life was difficult, but those years were some of the most important semite. A trip and happiest of his life. that falls in the “interestNormand from France; and shortly thereafter, ing” category was a backpack Extra–Day Trip Peter Reid from Scotland. The Catalans to the High Sierra, when a bear strolled quickly acclimated to the new language, cus- through camp on the first night out, taking adtoms, and boarding school lifestyle. “The vantage of the full stock of food. Edgardo witThacher values of honesty, integrity, hard nessed the pillaging, but was so worried about work, and concern for others,” recalls freezing to death if he climbed out of his sleepEdgardo, “were already part of our own up- ing bag (there was plenty of snow on the bringing so we felt right at home with them.” ground) that he opted to stay bundled up and English was a struggle in the beginning for try to relax.

Edgardo and his announcements at Assemblies Edgardo and his bride of a few weeks AnaMaria, were part of a “miniature United Nations” that started working at Thacher in 1963: Betty Saunders from New Zealand; Jorge Ramos, an exchange teacher from Peru; Wilfred Tims from England; Michel

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in Hollywood for five years before attaining a master’s degree in economics at Thunderbird.

He and Thacher classmate Sibyll Carnochan married a few years back and reside in Santa Monica; Rodrigo now works for Epson Company.

Former Faculty Profile

During his second year at Thacher, Edgardo took a bunch of freshmen on what became known during a subsequent Reunion Weekend as an “infamous” weekend horse camping trip.

Edgardo remembers it as a disaster from beginning to end. One of the “survivors,” Phil Angelides, CdeP ’70—a California Congressman when the story was retold at Reunion— quoted Edgardo as yelling as all hell broke loose at Dynamite Canyon Camp: “It’s every man for himself!” (see an abbreviated version of this story beginning on page 42.)

Finally, Edgardo keeps in touch with a few of his former students. Some of his fondest memories are of those early years at Thacher. From the viewpoint of an artist and an immigrant, trying to keep up with his art while teaching, learning a new language, and starting not only After 11 years of teaching at Thacher and rais- a family but also a new life was difficult, but ing two children here, the Catalans moved to those years were some of the most important Santa Barbara, where AnaMaria pursued a and happiest of his life. e doctorate in Spanish (she had taught some Spanish classes while they lived at Thacher) and Edguardo pursued his artistic career. He works primarily in oil and watercolor, mostly with glazes, seeking transparency and luminosity in his colors. He strives for order and clarity in his compositions. His iconography comes from nature and he works mostly with the landscape and the human figure in a nonrealistic manner. A decade after leaving Thacher, Edgardo and his wife divorced; Edgardo moved back to Chile, where he joined the faculty of the University of Valparaiso, set up a studio on a hill overlooking the bay, and began teaching at the School of Architecture and the School of Design. Pinochet was still in power; Edgardo found his repression harsh, brutal, and not conducive to creative endeavors. Therefore, while maintaining his home base in Chile, Edgardo periodically came to the United States to exhibit his art and traveled throughout Europe.

Five years ago, Edgardo received a phone call from his dear friend and former Thacher colleague, Les Larson, who said: “It is lonely here in Tennessee. Would you like to join me at the Webb School?” Edgardo joined Les, but, unfortunately, a good match didn’t gel between him and Webb. Two years felt much more like several to him and he returned to Europe.

There he encountered an old friend, a German musician from Hamburg, Heike. A year later they were married in Denmark and then moved back to Chile in 1997. He has devoted his life to painting, teaching (at the University of Valparaiso, one course at the School of Architecture and one course at the School of Design), the directorship of the University gallery, and the organization of its annual national art and poetry contest for young people. Lately he has been working on a poetic recreation of the landscape of his hometown of Valparaiso, and also with the human figure in autobiographical or social themes, sometimes quoting from old masters. Since childhood, he has enjoyed literature poetry, cinema, music politics sciences, history and, lately, physics.

Edgardo’s children still reside in California.

Lorena, a pre-school teacher in Santa Barbara, draws and paints in her free time. Rodrigo, CdeP ’83 matriculated to Brown, then worked

Edgardo’s painting, Economia de mercado (Market Economy)

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No Man Is an Island Edgardo Catalan Recalls a Weekend Packing Trip from 30 Years Past every man for himself.” Some Thacher “ t’salumni attending a School Reunion a few

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years back say they heard that phrase during a horse-packing trip. I swear I never said such a thing.

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The Thacher News

the mountains of the Los Padres National Forest stretch towards the east and disappear under some dark clouds. Patches of snow were everywhere and the ground was soft, moist, and slippery from the recent rains. We crossed a creek and reached another narrow trail, about 15 inches wide, that went down and around the slope of a mountain towards a deep canyon. It was dangerous, even under normal weather conditions, cut on the side of the mountain; the left-hand side was sheer straight up, and the right went down via a steep cliff to the bottom of a canyon. It was the infamous Shell Cliff.

Let’s go back to the beginning when I came to Thacher from a narrow country in the tip of south America, having just married the most beautiful girl in town. Horses were part of the School’s important Camping Program. Horses were not strange animals to me since I had learned to ride before I learned to walk on a farm in southern Chile. That is why I wasn’t worried when a group of freshmen asked me to take them on a three-day camping trip into the After about 200 yards, the slope was covered with loose, white gravel—hence the name— Topa Topa mountains in late January. which made for very precarious terrain. Here Flattered, I said yes. Little did I know that I was and there, a stubborn bush or small tree clung their last choice. Everybody else on the facul- to the slope. It was getting dark very fast. The ty had found an air-tight excuse to turn them kids were apprehensive. The thought of turndown. This group of four freshmen and one soph- ing back crossed my mind, but the School’s omore was the most disorganized, helpless, motto, “The stamp of the School is the stamp and incompetent lot in the Horse Program. of the man,” was pretty strong stuff. We would be the laughing stock for generations to come It was a gloomy, cold, windy, and heavily over- if we did return. I wouldn’t mind that, but it cast morning when we assembled in front of would be tough on the kids. the camping depot. We had had plenty of rain the week before and my southern instinct was I decided to take the lead with one of the mules telling me that more was on the way. Every- in case the trail gave way. I mumbled “Geronbody laughed when I asked the supply master imo” under my breath and pushed forward. for a tent. Cowboys didn’t use tents. Still, I in- We were half way through the trail, and I sisted and secured a large piece of black tarp to thought we were going to make it, when the ground gave way just behind me. My horse one of our two pack mules. jumped forward, the rope slipped from my After a final check, we said goodbye to a hand- hand and the mule I was pulling went down ful of friends and curious onlookers. Nobody the cliff. could have mistaken us for the Wild Bunch.

The “A” Camper led the way up the narrow In the moment of panic, everybody yelled. I trail that twisted up the hill and bent on the looked back thinking that half the group had side of the mountain on the edge of a deep gone down. A big chunk of the trail had colravine. During the first couple of hours every- lapsed, but the group—all shook up—was still body was jolly, talking, singing, and telling there. Only my mule was missing. I looked jokes, until, slowly everybody fell silent, lis- down the canyon. By some miracle, the fall of tening to the huffing and puffing of the horses. the mule had been cut short by a scrubby little tree about 50 feet from the trail. Caught beHalf way up the mountain, we took our first tween the branches, her four legs up in the air, rest. The “A” Camper told me we had forgot- she was trying to free herself. I pulled out a ten an important piece of equipment and asked large hunting knife, secured myself with a rope, permission to return to School for it; “No need and slid down. There was a unanimous cry to wait, I’ll catch up in a jiffy.” Two hours later from the wild bunch: “Please don’t kill her!” when we reached the summit, the storm was (The only time I had tried to kill anything had about to break. An icy cold wind had begun to been in that farm in Chile when I was asked to blow and everybody, except for two boys, had kill a chicken by wringing his neck. I did such on their ponchos. The “A” Camper hadn’t re- a lousy job that the poor thing wandered about in a daze for days afterward, until he collapsed turned yet; he never would. and died of sheer exhaustion.) All I wanted We pushed through some thick bushes and was to free the animal from the tangled harness came to an opening from which we could see and pull her out of there before it was too

boys took the ends of it and shook it. The big black thing flapped in the air loudly, scaring the already nervous horses and mules, sending them running every which way. One of the mules ran up the canyon and got the packs all tangled up in the bushes. The other jumped back and fell flat on her back into the torrent, With a stretch of the trail gone, the group was smashing the packs on the rocks. For a few cut in two. Using Army shovels, we started seconds there was pandemonium. Looking at working to build up the trail again. By the time the mess I thought, “What the heck am I doing we finished, it had started drizzling and it was in this God-forsaken canyon?” pretty dark. We repacked the mule any way we could and kept going. We reached Dyna- By the time we got everything under control, it mite Canyon, our first stop, about six in the had started to rain again. I thought we would evening and set up camp in a narrow clearance never manage to get the mule out of the creek by a small creek. Since there was not enough and pack everything in the damaged packs, but room for the horses, we took them across the we did. I was finally trying to saddle the last horse with numb fingers and feet because I’d given my creek and tied them up. poncho to one of the students. The kids pulling Assignments for camp set-up were given to the the mules were already picking up the trail out students, including digging a trench around the of the canyon. I thought I was the last one leavtent to prevent water from coming into our ing the camp when I heard, “Please don’t leave sleeping ground. By the time camp was ready, my brother! He can’t get on his horse. Please the rain was coming down heavily, and it was don’t leave him here.” The boy was too small, pitch dark. We ate a warm meal, and crowded too tired, too cold, to get on his horse, but I knew under the tarp, braced for a long cold, stormy if I got down from mine, I would never be able night. With my saddle as a pillow, I fell asleep. to get back on it. That’s the moment when I supposedly yelled the infamous phrase, “It’s every The rain on my face woke me up: the wind was man for himself!” threatening to blow the tarp away and somebody cried, “There’s water in my sleeping The young, small brother moved his horse near bag!” I turned on my flashlight to see two boys a rock so he could climb on it. The rest of the sitting in a puddle, shivering and looking mis- group, in the meantime, had disappeared up erable. The trench hadn’t been completed and the hill into the thick fog that now hung over water was coming straight into their side of the the canyon. We moved fast to catch up with tent. For the next five hours, we tried to sleep them on steep, narrow, slippery trail. We were and keep dry by bailing water, but the rain, thun- finally coming out of the canyon when a horse slipped on some wet rocks. I yelled for him to der, and a roaring sound kept us awake. jump. He leaped from the saddle and the horse After what seemed an eternity, I got up at first slipped down the hill several feet, but free of light to find a mess under the tarp. All the area rider, managed to hold on, climbed back to the unprotected by the unfinished trench was a trail and ran away. The boy then rode on the pool of water, mud, wet sleeping bags, and back of my horse; we reached the spine of the shivering kids. The rain had subsided a bit and hill where lay the dreadful Shell Cliff again.

I told everybody to get dressed. The blasted We dismounted to let the horses rest and to trip was over. We were going back to School tighten up the saddles. The packs on the mules were getting loose and I prayed they would no matter what. Everybody agreed. hold until we crossed the Shell Cliff. I told the The little creek was no more. It was now a kids to pull their horses, but I decided to stay roaring torrent coming down the canyon and on mine. We began to cross. It had stopped the source of the roar we had heard during the raining, but suddenly, a loud thunder clap night. “Impossible to cross it, sir.” With ropes echoed through the mountains. My horse tried tied around my waist, I began to cross the ice to climb the side of the mountain and I went cold water with a current so strong I thought I the other way. My fall down the cliff was cut would be swept away. The water came up short by some bushes I managed to hold on to above my knees, but I managed to cross and a few feet down the trail. I couldn’t see what began to pull the horses and mules across the was happening up there, but some pots and creek. The water kept rising and by the time pans were clattering down the mountain.

When I managed to climb back to the trail, I we finished, it came up to my waist. saw the mules trampling on the packs. The The camp was a mess. There would be no hot trail was in shambles. One horse was running breakfast since the matches had been left out in with the saddle on his belly. I could see some the rain. One student’s feet were so swollen he kids and horses in the distance. My own horse couldn’t get his boots on. We hurried to pack was nowhere to be seen. By now the tattered the mules before the rain started again. We packs were rolling down the cliff to the dispacked up the camp, but couldn’t feed the tant bottom of the canyon. I couldn’t care less. horses because all the grain had been used the “To hell with it,” I thought and tried to catch night before for two horses. The tarp was cav- up with the group. We crossed the Shell Cliff ing in under the weight of a pool of water. Two and stopped on the other side to assess the late—that was, if she didn’t have a broken bone. With relief I noticed that, except for some bloody cuts and bruises, she was otherwise unhurt, but terribly frightened. I cut her loose and with the help of some of the kids and lots of luck, hauled her out of there.

damage. My horse had been caught, but we were missing the two mules and two other horses. One boy had stayed on his, but had been unable to control it and had galloped out of sight.

Free of the mules, we moved fast getting to the crest of The Ridge about two in the afternoon.

It had taken us six hours to get there. The rain had stopped and among some low clouds, we could see the Valley. We had almost made it.

Then I saw the boy whose horse had galloped off. Half a mile down the trail, he was lying face down on some flat rocks and was not moving. I thought the worst. The kids started yelling at him, and, to my relief, he got up and waved at us. With a limp, he started hiking down. His horse was gone.

We arrived at the School at about five in the afternoon. It was getting dark and the rain was coming down heavily again. A pitiful sight: the sorriest, most miserable looking bunch that ever came back from a camping trip in the 80 years of the School’s history. Wet, dirty, muddy, tired, ponchos in tatters, no hats, no mules, no equipment, and two kids on foot. A group of students and teachers, including the headmaster, had congregated at the camp supply store to meet us. When we got there, a big cheer went up in the air. For years it has reverberated in my ears.

John Donne said that “no man is an island.” I, myself, have never liked groups, associations, fraternities, and the like. I get suspicious whenever I see more than two people getting together. With Mark Twain, I would say—but for different reasons—that I’ll never join a club that would have me for a member. Throughout my life, I have been branded as an antisocial, a loner, a misanthrope. But even now, I have to recognize that man is a social animal, and that most of the time, his subsistence, his wellbeing, and his fulfillment in life depends on this.

No, it is not every man for himself. As one of the members of the real Wild Bunch in the Sam Peckinpah movie said, “We either hang together or we hang separate.” I hope the kids in that trip learned that lesson.

A week after our return, Jug Reynolds and Jesse Kahle, the two cowboys in charge of the Horse Program, found the two mules and the two horses in a valley five miles away. They also went down the canyon at the Shell Cliff and brought back the smashed packs and every piece of equipment we had lost, down to the last spoon and fork. It only added insult to injury. e

A Thacher

Pioneer Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Class Notes

Class Notes

by Cricket Twichell

1931 Sad news came from Bill Lisle: On November 7, 1999, Lambert “Larry” Hopkins, Jr., died. For the past few years, he had been living with his son, Lambert, CdeP ’60, in Eugene, OR.

1937 News from John Ferry: “Still keeping six sheep— our last horse became like the Thacher symbol.

Paul Fay keeps us in touch with the survivors of our class when we see him at our annual Naval War College symposium in Newport” We are sorry to report that Jon Frost’s wife Mary died in October 1999. “I’m now living alone (with help) in the same house on the ranch in Colorado.”

1938 “I’m grateful for good health and a wonderful family,” writes Duncan Patty. Last June all 23 members of his family (including 13 grandchildren) spent a week scuba diving, fishing and snorkeling at Kona Village on the Big Island. In 1999 he also took a trip to Mainland China.

1940

REUNION YEAR

From Wheeler North: “I am retired and slowly gathering moss.”

Bill Hufstader was reminiscing about Todd MacTodd (Norman Mackintosh Todd) and Crellin Griffith and “some guy named Don Maron, CdeP ’38, who had a box of raisins grafted to his right hand. They have all departed for that big corral in the sky.”

Donald Allen is begging off his 60th Thacher reunion to attend his daughter’s wedding in Italy.

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The Thacher News

Roderick Carpenter, CdeP ’47, outside his new studio

1943 “We’re staying home and getting ready to sell a house that is too big for part-time residents,” writes Roy Holland, who spent five months in 1999 riding the blue highways from Washington state to Maine with SOWERS—a ministry of retired RVers who work at Bible camps.

1946 Anthony Arnold reports that his most unusual visitor of last year was Leigh Cross, CdeP ’47, who appeared on their doorstep for a quick bite of lunch on his way south to Mexico for Christmas. He was accompanied by a charming lady, Velma, and a large German Shepherd. Leigh is presently transforming a building in an industrial part of Vancouver, B.C., into living quarters.

Nicholas Cunningham just finished two decades as head of outpatient pediatrics at Columbia University College of P.T.S. Seeing patients, doing research, starting programs, teaching child development and abuse prevention, and consulting for George Soros’s Open Society Institute in Eastern Europe fill his days when he’s not playing squash, tennis, and chamber music, or tending to wild grape vines, cutting trees, mowing lawns, or reading Born to Rebel by Frank Galloway. We feel fortunate to have heard from him at all.

Class Notes

1954 Cowboy poetry was the drawing card for Carol and Bill Oxley, “Buckshot” Bill Crawford, and Jim Griffith, CdeP ’53, when they met in Elko, NV, to bask in poetry written by and for ranch folks.

Retired, but not really, Brewster Knight is teaching part-time in the mathematics department of George Washington University.

Janet and Dan Crotty keep busy on the JESUS Film Development Board. This film portrays the life of Jesus and has been seen by three-billion people around the world, many of whom have never seen a film before.

Cassandra and Rich Look, CdeP ’62

1947 Roderick Carpenter placed his shingle outside a new studio in Amesbury, MA, last fall. As you may recall from a previous issue of The Thacher News, Rod is an art conservator who cleans and repairs works of art and frames.

1948 Chris Boyle explored the down-under of Down Under when he went SCUBA diving for 16 glorious days in Australia in October. Our condolences to Chris whose 94-year-old mother died this past year.

Michael F. Dorst sees classmates Sam Wright, Peter Dunne, Bill Bucklin, Sandy Walker, and Elliot Hayne from time to time in San Francisco.

1951 Their five children and seven grandchildren are seeing a bit more of Nancy and Bill Cox now that Bill has retired as pastor of the Christ Presbyterian church in Telluride, CO, and moved to nearby Santa Barbara.

1953 “Looks like I’ll have fun, fun, fun till Daddy takes my T-Bird away,” says Jim Griffith, who is having a good old time in his retirement, making a CD of border corriolos (Mexican ballads) and writing books on the traditional arts of Tucson’s Mexican-American community, another on the folk saints of the US/Mexico borderlands, and a third about the public religious art of the state of Sonora, Mexico.

1958 South of the border is luring Alexandra and Mike Ward, who have visited Mexico three times this year in addition to taking a trip to Ecuador and another foray to Chile.

Sheri and George Clyde, CdeP ’59

1960 Richard Walden is enjoying the good life these days. His pecan business at Farmers Investment Company is thriving; his daughter, Deborah, married a great guy in December; and his divorce finally went through after a 21⁄2-year struggle. Now he’s found the love of his life in Nan Stockholm, Stanford ’76, Stanford Law ’80, and a horse lover to boot.

1959 From Harry Wyeth: “I took a shot at climbing Mt. Aconcagua (6,964 meters) in Argentina in January. It’s a huge, cold, and windy mountain. I was in the 60-70% of those climbers who didn’t make it, and was done in by a combination of altitude, 25-kg packs, cold, and wind. But I had a great experience!”

From September through February, Sheri and George Clyde were hanging out in Auckland, New Zealand, where George worked as General Counsel for America True, one of the boats that competed for the coveted America’s Cup. George was the rules guy: the person consulted on rules issues. And, he was the protest guy: the one who dealt with the protests that are infamous in the America’s Cup. “Being a part of this bizarre, high-tech, and enormously expensive sport—and the international yachting scene that accompanies it—has been quite a kick.”

Jim Acquistapace, CdeP ’61

1963 Deanne and John Huyler went trekking in the Atlas Mountains of Morocco after traveling in Spain.

ganizations serving the sick and the poor such as homes for the aged, AIDS hospice centers, and free clinics serving poor neighborhoods in large cities. In addition, Knights and Dames of Malta from San Francisco and Los Angeles enable over 100 critically ill men, women, and children, known as Malades, from the western United States to join thousands of Knights and Malades from the rest of the The Knights of Malta was founded as a re- Catholic world in making a religious pilgrimage ligious order in 1099 to care for the pilgrims to Lourdes, France, each year. Membership who became ill while traveling to the Holy is confined to practicing Roman Catholics.

Land. Over time it became a formidable military force defending western Christianity The world-wide order is ruled from Rome against the followers of Islam. In the Great by a Grand Master and a Sovereign Council.

Siege of 1565 on the island of Malta, 900 Applicants must serve a probationary peKnights and 1000 soldiers delivered a crush- riod, make at least one pilgrimage to Louring defeat to 80,000 of the Sultan’s forces. des to care for the sick and poor who accompany them, and be approved by their Today the Order provides financial and vol- Bishop and the Sovereign Council. Conuntary help to many Roman Catholic or- gratulations, Peter.

If all goes according to plan, J. Peter Baumgartner, CdeP ’51 will be invested in the Sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of St. John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta on June 23 in Los Angeles. Presiding over the ceremony will be Archbishop Cardinal Roger Mahoney of Los Angeles and Archbishop William Leveda of San Francisco.

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Class Notes

1964 CFO-for-hire Kip Witter is working in Silicon Valley with The Brenner Group.

Jim Preston and his family spent a wonderful holiday in Cancun, where they went snorkeling and did some sight-seeing and lots of relaxing. According to their Christmas letter, another highlight was their trip to Ojai for Jim’s 35th reunion: “For Jim, the pleasure of seeing classmates again was a treat beyond words.” Their daughter Kayla, a 7th grader, is doing some competitive skating, taking piano lessons, and has a very active social and telephone life.”

Jesse and Rachel Rhodes, kids of Joni and Ted Rhodes, CdeP ’65

Mo, Whitney, and Nori Livermore III, CdeP ’66

Hill, CdeP ’66, Peiper, Laurel ’01, and Bettie Hastings and the Sundance Gang

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The Thacher News

At Pedernales Village

by Bob Isaacson, CdeP ’66

Near Point Arguello, below the domed sage hill, we park our cars at Pedernales, on the windy Sudden Flats where sixty to eighty Chumash lived for thousands of years, the place where Portola’s men found flints for their black-powder muskets in the outcroppings along a crumbling sea cliff We gaze to the southeast: a gray-white watercolor fog sweeps the low mound of Point Conception, the long hills and mesas summer-dry, bright, weirdly yellow, framing the dark sea, whale path and white cap, cliff-tearing, deep indigo.

On the village terraces wild oat, rip-gut brome, milk thistle, datura conceal the ancient paths between huts, meeting place, fire pit, and grinding stone.

We walk gingerly, but only to cluster cautiously around our parked cars: below the tall, wind-thrown grasses, Rattlesnake now warms his liquid, dark skin among the rounded half-buried pestles, the hand-curved fragments of shattered, empty hoyas, the smooth stones of ancient fire rings that held nighttime heat.

1965

REUNION YEAR

Stephen Gardner’s son, Stephen, Jr., is ensconced in “Make Way for Ducklings” territory now that he is a student at Harvard University.

It’s been a long, up-hill battle, but the Citizens for the Carpinteria Bluffs, under the aegis of president Ted Rhodes, has successfully raised the $4.5 million necessary to insure this special coastal land—“82 acres of sweetly undeveloped land offering unobstructed vistas of the mountains and the sea”—will be preserved forever as a passive nature preserve. Ted quipped, “I was on top of a wild elephant. My job was to make sure it was charging in the right direction.” This meant quitting his day job and spending an entire year leading the fund-raising effort.

1966 Slovakia’s Peace Corps Country Director is Nelson Chase, who, prior to this assignment, was Peace Corps Country Director in Moldova (199496) and Albania (1996-97). “We anticipate moving back to the USA in 2000.”

1967 Karl Kroeber, the new Executive Director of the Sierra Madre Foundation, has two boys in college—Gavin in his last year at Reed and Logan in his first years at Sonoma State.

Bob, CdeP ’67, Ali, Matt, and Nick Johnson

1968 The traveling Jordans have pulled up stakes once more and after “living around” the state of California have returned to the southland, where Alexandra is studying Industrial Design at CSU Long Beach and Peter Jordan is working from their home in Long Beach. “Come see us.”

Class Notes

Hailey, Trevor, and Henry Harmon, children of Kimberley and Mark, CdeP ’73

Claire ’02 and Lucy ’00, daughters of Gretchen and Marshall Milligan CdeP ’69

1969 For four years, Jim Munger has been the numero uno at the Dunn School and keeps in touch with Thacher through the Condor League.

Jutta and Andi Rossman with their four kinder came all the way from Germany to visit the Huylers in the summer of 1999. “Andy was our AFS son in 1968-69,” writes Jack Huyler. “He and Jutta came to us for their honeymoon, and most of our family have visited them more than once.”

From Scott Kennedy: “After 31 years of careful evaluation, I have given the OK for a first baby.”

Stay tuned for the next episode.

The Hastings Family—Newlin, CdeP ’70, Liz, Shannon, CdeP ’99, and Jamie ’02—waiting for snow in Taos, New Mexico

Paul, CdeP ’71, Kimberleigh, Claude, and Chloe Gavin

1972 Dodie and Bill Dawson plus their two boys are coping with a major home renovation that has meant “moving into the Marin County equivalent of married student housing” while the contractors work their magic on the Dawsons’ digs. The whole family took off for Bora Bora to celebrate Dodie Wils and Parker Dawand Bill’s 10th wedding son, sons of Dodie and Bill Dawson, CdeP ’72 anniversary.

“My research has been published in the U.S.G.S. Bulletin on local geology (20 page manuscript with map) and I’m willing to share it with interested Thacher students,” writes Art Wahl. His wife of seven years, Diane, spends her time chasing two-month old Derek and two-year-old AJ when she’s not working as a geologist for the County of Ventura. Art builds “ultra-custom” homes in Santa Barbara.

Rod Turner, CdeP ’70, and family

Thacher and baseball. Fathers and sons. The tradition continues when John Busterud and his Kentfield neighbor, classmate, teammate on Thacher’s 1972 CIF tournament baseball team, Bill Dawson coach their sons Tommy Busterud and Wills Dawson in Ross Valley Little league.

John is an attorney for Pacific Gas and Electric company where he supervises the corporate and environmental section of the Law Department.

He also continues to serve in the U.S. Army Reserve, where he is a Major in the Army’s Special Operations command. Tommy also has a sister, Becky, who is now 11.

Sam, Louisa, and Tom, children of Annie and Harry Hanson, CdeP ’74, at Walden Pond

Bryan, CdeP ’74, Louise, Maggie, and Annie Beckham

1973 Boun Ly and those ladies in his life are keeping busy. Alicia (7) is a tennis player, Megan (9) is a competitive figure skater; Suzanne is taking a sabbatical from college teaching to do work on research and curriculum development; Boun works for State Farm and in his free time runs, and plays tennis and basketball. This past year Boun took a trip to Paris to be with his father; the whole family went to Hawaii for a week and the “girls” enjoyed the Cascade Mountains.

Jacquie, Charlie, and Winston Neville, children of Jeanne and Steven, CdeP ’74

Philip Angelides, CdeP ’70, and family

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Class Notes

Roberta and Noah Rifkins, CdeP ’75 Catherine and Rachel, daughters of Nancy and Robert Rex, CdeP ’74

1975

REUNION YEAR

While in San Francisco on business recently, Liz Westbrook Hydes (Emma Willard ’75) stayed with Jen and Carmaig de Forest. “We had a mini 25th Reunion with a few classmates (Noah Rifkin, Joe Dignan, and Carmaig) on St. Patty’s Day at the Beach Chalet. Liz also reconnected with Tim Bowman, CdeP ’77 while on business in Salt Lake City. “We went for a 5.5-hour crosscountry ski trip on April Fool’s Day.”

1976

Ned, CdeP ’74, Laura, and Schemmy Banning

Lieutenant Colonel Steve Batts has returned from Buenos Aires, where he completed The National War College of Argentina (taught in Spanish). His wife Moteshia and their daughters Marlena (12) and Marion (9) traveled to Buenos Aires to visit Steve and came back with wonderful stories of life below the Equator. Steve is now Stateside at Moody Air force Base in Valdosta, Georgia.

Congratulations to Barry Kaye, who married Laurel Robinson in Telluride, CO, last November.

Caitlin, Molly, and Carey, kids of Michele and Will Wyman, CdeP ’78

1977 New house, new job, new puppy. “Life has just been getting better and better!” writes Peter Downey, Financial Policy Manager for the Washington State Department of Transportation.

1978 It was wonderful to see Ken Everett charging down the Thacher lacrosse field just like old times (well, almost like old times) when the alumni played the Varsity Lacrosse team in January. Ken’s son Jaime Everett is a sophomore at Thacher this year. Ken was itching to play Ken Everett, CdeP ’78 against his son’s team and survive; he did.

Annie and Charlie, kids of Susan and Scott LeFevre, CdeP ’75

Alexandra and Katherine, daughters of Sophie and Kendric Foultz, CdeP ’77 Harry IV and Donald, sons of Brooke and Peter Conkey, CdeP ’79

Robert and Will, sons of Vickie and Carl Costigan, CdeP ’77

1979 Noah Rifkin, CdeP ’75, Joe Dignan, CdeP ’75, Liz Westbrook Hydes ’75, and Carmaig de Forest, CdeP ’75, at The Beach Chalet, San Francisco.

While reading an article in the San Diego Tribune, we learned that Itsushi Wakabayashi is living just north of Rancho Bernardo. Itsushi and his wife Masako have two boys, Ken (3) and James (1).

J.E.B. Pickett was best man for Larkin BertramCox when he married Amy Forest on October 29, 1999, at Mauna Lani on the Big Island of Hawaii. Congratulations to Larkin and his ladylove.

Liz Westbrook Hydes ’75 and Tim Bowman, CdeP ’77 page 48

The Thacher News

Ally, daughter of Angie and Murray Orrick, CdeP ’77

Adriana Schwartz, Mollie and Cabot Brown caught up with Diane Downey over dinner in San Francisco. Diane’s older daughter Courtney is matriculating to Brown this fall.

Class Notes

Carmen Marysue Pratt, daughter of Sydney Robertson, CdeP ’80, and George Pratt

1980

REUNION YEAR

All the way from Bejing, an e-mail message came to Thacher on January 4, 2000 announcing that Sydney Robertson had given birth to Carmen Marysue Pratt. All their friends at Thacher are feeling bereft since they’re missing out on seeing little Carmen in action. Sydney and her husband George Pratt are spending the year in China where George is teaching English with the School Year Abroad Program and Sydney is doing college counseling and snuggling with Carmen. Carmen will be multi-lingual early on as the RobertsonPratt family will be stationed at SYA in Rennes, France, starting in the fall.

John, Gus, and Eve Stacey, CdeP ’83

Leigh and Katharine, daughters of Rob Thomas and Belinda Hanson, CdeP ’82

Baby Robert, son of Don and Marian Schinske, CdeP ’82

1982

Hannah, Liam, and Sarah, children of Anthony and Mary Everett Bourkes, CdeP ’81

1981 This summer watch for a CBS series called “Survivor.” Mike Sears, who has been commuting to Borneo, is shooting and directing 13 one-hour Survivor shows.

With his five-month tour in Bosnia finished, Ken Chance writes, “We’re moving to Baumholder, Germany, right near the French border; so if you’re looking to hit both France and Germany, our place makes for a great way-station!”

From Mike Voevodsky: “Big year for the Voevodsky family—Mia turned 3, Paule turned 5, Therese started both an Internet company and a private consulting practice, and Mike completed his first 1⁄2 Ironman in 5:38.31 with virtually no training given the entire family’s busy schedules.

E-mail us at voevodsky@dnx.net.”

Twichell male bonding—Jon ’83, Cameron, and Terry

More Moores: Erica Fiedler Moore and Sam Moore’s ’79 new baby, Kendrick Clifford Leader Moore, was born in August, 1999, and is little brother to Richard Moore.

And more Nikitopouloses: Alison Terbell Nikitopoulos gave birth to Anthony in February 1999.

Vaki, his big bro, is four years old. Alison, who is teaching music appreciation and music history part-time at Louisana State University, considers herself “blessed to have found an ideal balance between working and mothering.”

Alex, CdeP ’81, and Katie Ballon Calhoun, CdeP ’83

At the end of November, Christy, MacGregor, and Brad Yates welcomed the newest member to their family, a beautiful girl named Bailey Brophy Yates. They returned to northern California where Brad continues his practice as a personal coach and hypnotherapist.

Christine, Kiki, Lara, and Jake Cunningham, CdeP ’83 Anthony Aristides and Evangelos “Vaki” Nikitopoulos, sons of Alison Terbell, CdeP ’82

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Class Notes

1985

REUNION YEAR

Hina and Manish Bhakta are looking forward to the—gulp!—15th Reunion in June. Their son Tern was born in April, 1999.

Sophie Brown Twichell took a business trip to Peru in March; and it looks as if she’ll be returning to South America in April, all part and parcel of her job with the Field Museum in Chicago. Sophie, Jon, and Cameron will be in the Ojai for the Reunion in June.

Camelia and Violet, daughters of Caroline and Bruce Somers, CdeP ’83 Vicki Nesbitt Palor, CdeP ’84, and family

1983 Ellen Loebl, who lives in Palo Alto, is making a difference in people’s lives. She’s teaching adults in recovery and alternative sentencing programs how to read as part of the Santa Clara County Library Reading program. In her free time, she goes hiking, rides her bike, and goes to Giants games.

Teresa, Thomas, and Ed Sanchez have returned to Reno by way of St. Louis, MO, and Charlotte, NC. Ed is responsible for the training and development of Bank of America’s retail brokerage unit in the western United States; Thomas is doing the WEBELOS, soccer, baseball thing; and Teresa is exercising her green thumb and assisting in Thomas’s classroom.

1984 If you happen to have a copy of the 1999-2000 California Association of Independent Schools Directory, Elise Edwards Ruiz-Ramon’s son is smack dab on the front cover. “He’s the young boy being read to by the older girl. At the time, he was in Kindergarten and she was his ‘eighth grade buddy’ at Sonoma Country Day School in Santa Rosa.”

“All is going great for us!” wrote Vicki Nesbitt Palor, who is keeping busy with their three children. She also finds time to serve as Treasurer for the East Las Vegas Mothers of Multiples Club.

Her e-mail address is lvpalor@hotmail.com.

Dilys Bart saw his way clear of San Francisco to attend this year’s Academy Awards. He has a private ophthalmology practice.

Even a Florida hurricane couldn’t keep Michelle Warren from attending Sarah Peapples’ wedding in Boulder, CO—well, not exactly. She did miss the wedding but arrived in time for the reception that was “beautiful and snowy.” Sarah Konrad, Stephania Serena, and Betsy McAtee, CdeP ’81, were also there when Sarah and Vahe Derounian joined forces.

“I took a year off from teaching to build my own house,” wrote Eric Gross last fall. He is serving on the Steering Committee of the Resource Center for Non Violence in Santa Cruz, CA, but found time to travel to China last November.

Santiago, Chile, is the present stomping ground for Pancho (Francis) Barassi, his wife Anamaria Orellana, and their two sons: Sebastian (3) and Francis (2). They expect to be there three years while he works for Xerox. Brother Ted Barassi is married to Christine Kim and is just starting a new e-business: Phlair.com.

Diogba Erick G’bye and his wife are expecting their second child in mid-October. They bought a new home in Aliso Viejo in Orange County. He’s currently working for Federated Mutual Insurance as a Marketing Representative.

Elizabeth Chiu Gould and her husband Peter are the proud parents of Nicholas Harrison, who was born on December 28, 1999. She is on leave from her investment banking career and thoroughly enjoys motherhood.

Bride Sarah Peapples, CdeP ’85, with Michelle

Peter Cole recently sculpted and co-authored a Warren, CdeP ’85, Stephanie Serena, CdeP ’85, book on snowmen for Chronicle Books. Come July, Peter will spend time with his sweetheart in Vienna and in Kiel, Germany, to set up an art installation about travels to Guyana, South America.

and Sara Kendras, CdeP ’85

Liam Kirkpatrick, son of Carolyn Reed, CdeP ’86, and Doug Kirkpatrick, CdeP ’86, in London

Bobby and Liz Huntington, CdeP ’84

Jordan Perry, daughter of Molly, CdeP ’85, and Derick, CdeP ’83 Julie Huntington dePolo, CdeP ’86, with husband Dan and daughter Sydney David and Lukas, sons of Amanda and David Chao, CdeP ’84 page 50

The Thacher News

Devon Speer Eastman, daughter of Alexandra Wyle, CdeP ’86 Tom, CdeP ’87, and RJ Thacher

1986 “Carolyn and I are planning the wedding,” writes Alex Wyle Eastman after their daughter Devon was introduced to that dashing Liam Kirkpatrick, son of Doug and Carolyn Kirkpatrick.

Paul Bressie proposed to Claudia Goria while perched on the top of a mountain at Squaw Valley. They were married in a small village in the north of Italy where “the procession wound through town with the bride and groom in a horse-drawn carriage tossing traditional candied almonds to the children.” Now Paul and the Mrs. are ensconced in San Francisco where he is establishing his company called Boulevard Investments.

PC Magazine knows a good Toad when seeing one. It just awarded its coveted Editor’s Choice Award to David Richardson and his web company, Zkey.com.

Nancy Nichols hiked around Italy, starting in Zurich to Pompeii and back. Then she zipped off to San Jose de Cabo and to Guatemala. When she’s not enlightening her high school freshman with tales of her adventures, Nancy is working towards her M.A. in Colonial American History and running 30 miles a week.

Rebecca Clyde Tenant is juggling her residency in family practice at U.C.S.F., motherhood (Joey is now 3) and domestic engineering (settling into their new home in Berkeley). Husband J.P. is studying at U.C.’s Haas Business School.

Kate Twichell is putting finishing touches on her Master’s thesis while running training programs at Mypoints.com in San Francisco.

Dan and Julie Huntington dePolo pulled up stakes in Portland, OR, and moved to the Napa Valley where Dan is working for Beringer Wine Estates while Julie is settling into their new home and riding herd on little Sydney (16 months).

“Please call (707-226-7586)—we have plenty of room, and of course, plenty of that Napa Valley nectar to share!”

Stephen Kong is working with his brother Michael, CdeP ’83, on magazines in L.A. and Chicago: Angelino and Chicago Social, respec-

tively.

1987 Jennifer and David Bressie have been married five years, have one child, and have “zero home,” at the moment. They’ve become vagabonds while their house is being renovated and enlarged in preparation for the arrival of another little Bressie. David, with his Real Estate Brokers License in hand, has been running things at Intereal, a real estate company in the Bay Area.

Michele Barnett joined the East Coast contingents when she moved to Annapolis this year. She sees Ami Becker, CdeP ’86 quite often, but looks forward to meeting other Eastern Toads. Planning her wedding for September and making business trips to San Francisco every month or so occupies the majority of her free time.

REUNION YEAR

After graduating from Scripps in 1994, Sadie Harrison-Fincher lived in L.A. for a year and then returned to Texas, where she ran the Hallmark division of a family business. Highlights since then include marrying a Texan, remodeling an old house, and making plans to start law school in the fall of 2000. “I often wonder where all my old friends are and what they are doing. Please contact me at sadiefincher@yahoo.com.”

Class Notes

1990

In June 2000, Jonathan Feldman is due to complete his Masters in Middle Eastern Studies at Princeton. What’s next? A Ph.D. in Art History.

In June 1999, Oak Strawbridge became a married man when he said “I do” to Susan Buck. His next monumental event is graduating from Georgetown’s McDonough School of Business this spring.

Alexa Wilson married John Maley last December 4. They are “torturing as many cows as possible” on her folks’ cattle ranch, and tending to “six horses, two cow dogs, a passel of aloof barn cats, and one cranky green parakeet.”

Jordana Munk is working toward a Master’s of Fine Arts at the Rhode Island School of Design, where she will be joined by her fellow classmate Amy Bird this coming fall. She is engaged to Ross Martin, whom she met at Brandeis University, and plans to marry this coming November.

1988 Big year for Cindy Castañeda: After her husband, David Fanning, completed his Ph.D. in physics from the University of Illinois, he accepted a job as Senior Research Scientist at TriQuint Semiconductors in Dallas, TX. Cindy is now busy fixing up their new home in Texas, and is getting used to being a full-time mom. As of May 23, Daniel Declan Fanning is keeping his folks up at night. Send your congrats to them via e-mail at thacheralum@hotmail.com.

Eric Anderson left Seattle to attend his sister’s graduation from Harvard. Then he kept travelling eastward to England where he delivered a talk at Oxford’s Statistics Department. “Taking an academic leave of absence to escape the Seattle winter (and spend the months in the mountains of CA!).”

C.P.A. David Callaghan has been commuting from L.A. to N.Y. as a litigation consultant with Ernst and Young. Home Sweet Home is in El Segundo.

1991 After eight years of undergrad and graduate school, Dan Callaghan graduated last May from Case Western Dental School. With California doing its magnet thing, Dan was drawn to Cedar Sinai in Beverly Hills for his residency.

1992 “I like living in Oakland and have become a huge Oakland A’s fan,” writes Jessica Bliss, who is fund raising for a private high school in San Francisco.

What a year for Anne Berube Gard. Right after her marriage to Steve Gard, she began teaching kindergarten at Monica Ros School (right down the hill from Thacher on McNell Road). After school she dashes off to take courses at Cal State Channel Islands where she’s in a credentialing program. As if that’s not enough on her plate, they recently moved to the East End within walking distance of her job. A good move for Steve as well since he’s teaching at Ojai’s Matilija Junior High. Their new address: 3350 Thacher Road, Ojai 93023.

Kendra Schmidt has a to-die-for job which requires her to travel to Italy and France several times a year to check out potential villas and castles for a vacation rental business. Blossom Beatty was able to join her in France when one of Kendra’s trips coincided with Blossom’s vacation from teaching high school English in Los Angeles.

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

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Class Notes

1995

REUNION YEAR

Between classes at Hanover, med. school applications, and thesis writing, Kacey Perkins found time to send a photo of gathered Toads to Brian Driscoll in the Alumni Office.

James, CdeP ’98, and Jennifer ’01 Bowie

1998 An assistant teacher in a freshman seminar class at M.I.T., Casey Muller, according to his mother, “lives in a co-op dorm whose members maintain their ramshackle old house, clean, and cook.”

Anne Berube, CdeP ’92, and Steve Gard

1993 Allison Glass is a marine naturalist guide for whale watching trips out of Gloucester, MA. “I particularly enjoyed coaching against Bo Manson last year, “ writes Jesse Wooten, who is teaching social studies and coaching lacrosse at Dunn Middle School. Jesse reports that Jay Gudebski is living in Oakland and running a landscaping company with his brother, Jordan Gudebski, CdeP ’90.

Having finished her student teaching and about to finish her Masters, Laura Wentworth is now teaching second and third grade in a job-share program. “This school is two blocks from my house so I am very excited.”

Gerin River worked for Americorps and America’s Promise in Madison, WI, after graduating from Brown University. Now he’s off to spend two years with the Peace Corps in Panama, where little guys will be learning science under Gerin’s tutelage.

Kerryn Sanan is still singing in New York City. If passing through NYC, drop her an e-mail at KJSsing@aol.com. She and Dee Donahue are heading to Oregon for Helen Homes’ wedding in June.

Kacey Perkins, CdeP ’95, Emily Wilson, CdeP ’95, Betsey Greennay, CdeP ’97, Sarah Perkins, CdeP ’97, Jamie Hastings ’02, Graham Donath, CdeP ’97, Newie Hastings, CdeP ’70, Shannon Hastings, CdeP ’99, Kim Turner, CdeP ’98, Katie Kochandorfer, CdeP ’97

1996 Brooke MacDonald, Aurige Bork, Catherine Pinkerton, Laurel Braitman, Leyla Abou-Samra, Quinn Kanaly, Maria Banman, and Stefanie Warren celebrated Mardi Gras in the Big Easy with David Ross. “Ask Pinky about the light pole.”

Even at Duke, Ashley Wick can’t escape her father’s uncontrollable screaming during her lacrosse games.

1999 This past fall, Erin Campbell left Waterville, ME, to spend a semester in Salamanca, Spain, where she brushed up her Spanish. “I am thinking of majoring in philosophy and environmental policy.”

From Tim Johnson in Hanover, NH: “Dartmouth is great, but I still miss everyone.”

Nathan Holmes is currently in the process of getting the city of Davis to finance a monument to ex-Smiths guitarist Johnny Marr. “Funds are low, so send money!”

1997 Chris Labbe reports that all is well at Montana State University, where he is a sophomore.

Natural builder and traveler Kenn Young thinks that a straw-bale guest house would be ideal for Thacher.

Bobby ’02, Cynthia ’99, and Jaime ’97 Kellogg

1994 Meredith Bressie is due to graduate this spring from Cal Poly with a degree in architecture. She’s been on the Dean’s List and was an intern with the Arthur Gensler firm this past summer.

Rita Howe and Nate Toll are busy planning a June wedding in Ojai. They spent time with Devon Brown in Lake Tahoe recently; Devon lives in Seattle now.

Philipe Manoux is working as a product designer for a privately held medical equipment manufacturer in the New York Hudson Valley.

Along with Caitlin Crounse, CdeP ’95, and Quinn Kanaly, CdeP ’96, Brian Bennett will graduate from Princeton this spring. In July, he’ll leave for Hong Kong, where he’ll work for TIME Magazine’s Asia bureau and start his career in journalism.

page 52

The Thacher News

Seth ’00, Josh ’94, and Ryan ’97 Kurlinski Ashley, CdeP ’98, and Ian Wick

Class Notes

FORMER FACULTY NEWS On December 27 C. Michael Ehrhardt passed away in Georgia, where his entire family had gathered to celebrate Christmas with him.

Michael had been a music teacher at Thacher for 31 years (1946-77). A talented musician, a fine teacher, an excellent role model for generations of Thacher students, he left his mark on the Thacher community.

Roger and Barbara Marvin Nozaki added one more little guy to their family line-up when Jacob was born on September 26, 1999. Now living in Fairfield, CT, Barb has put her teaching talents on hold to be a full-time mother for Jacob and his big bro Samuel (2).

Jenn and John Friborg have a new “star� in their home, little Samantha Taylor Friborg, who made her appearance this winter in Concord, MA.

Samuel and Jacob Nozaki, sons of Barbara and Roger

uke Kai Lin has a new baby brother, Noa, who arrived this winter. John Lin is still Assistant Head of the Middlesex School in Concord, MA, while Marilee runs herd over the boys.

John and Jenn Friborg with Samantha

Noa and big brother Luke, sons of John and Marilee Lin

Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

page 53

Obituaries Obituaries

Obits

Colin Gillespie Jameson, CdeP ’25, passed away on Saturday, February 5, 2000. Born in Winnetka, Illinois, and raised in Santa Barbara, CA, Colin arrived at Thacher in 1923.

According to the 1925 El Archivero, “When great clouds of smoke and evil smelling gases roll out of the doors and windows of the laboratory and huge pots of bubbling liquid are borne outdoors, you can be pretty sure Jameson is making up a few chemistry experiments.

His researches with [Paul] Harwood in the lab are either going to blow the place up or make them both famous.” Colin was an Honor man, went on to win top commendations in Chemistry, as well as German and U.S. History, and spent his non-academic time working on “The Notes” and the El Archivero Board, as manager of the Track Team, and in the Drama and Glee Clubs.

Colin matriculated at Williams College and then to Harvard Law School. He began a first career with a New York City law firm, then happily became a copywriter for J. Walter Thompson in Chicago. After many years at that advertising agency, he pursued his shortstory writing career. His stint in the U.S. Navy Intelligence Department in Washington, D.C., during World War II spawned his science fiction story that focused on the premise of the Chinese developing an atomic bomb. After that story was published, the F.B.I. discovered that Colin had, indeed, guessed correctly. His book, I Do Not Own a Pornograph, Fiction and Fantasy, a collection of his short stories, was published in 1967.

Colin and his wife, Nancy, were married in Washington, D.C. more than 25 years ago and made their home in Key West. He operated a boat sales, maintenance, and service business on Stock Island during the late 1950s. Colin was active in the Key West Humane Society, Friends of the Library, and the Key West Art and Historical Society, where he served as treasurer for many years, and the Old Island Restoration Foundation. He was also recording secretary of Arcturus, a Key West men’s group.

Colin is survived by his wife Nancy of Key West; his brother, Owen, of San Francisco; a son Colin, Jr., of Alturas, CA; a daughter Adair Jameson of Townshend, VT; and grandchilpage 54

The Thacher News

doctorate. He served in the Navy as a Lieutenant before finishing his medical training; eight months at Yale working with Drs. Gazelle and Amuda; residency in pediatric surgery at Children’s Hospital in Boston; research Lambert Arundel Hopkins, CdeP ’31, died No- in cardiac therapy; and further surgical training at Peter Brigham Hospital in Boston. He then vember 7, 1999. His senreturned to the West Coast to set up his pracior page in the 1931 El tice, and worked at Children’s Hospital in Los Archivero, quotes GoldAngeles, Pasadena Huntington Medical Center, smith: “with meek and and St. Luke’s Hospital. unaffected grace. His looks adorned the venerBeing a great horseman, Bud was a member able place.” To sum up of the El Rancheros, and rode throughout Lambert’s two years Santa Barbara County with that group until here: He was Captain of just a few years ago. He loved his days at the Second Baseball Team during his junior year, and played on the Thacher and spoke highly of his two years in First Baseball Team in his senior year. Other The Ojai throughout his life. sports-oriented pursuits included track, tennis, soccer, and the Bit and Spur Team; he was also Bud is survived by his wife Gloria Taylor, a member of the Cabinet, “The Notes” and El whom he married in 1947. They had five chilArchivero Board, Honor Man, Indoor Com- dren: Theodore, Ann, Irving III, Claire, and mittee, and Big Tournament Committee mem- Jane (who died in 1980); they also have ten grandchildren and one great grandson. The ber, and Prefect. family home is in Pasadena, where his widow Lambert matriculated at Williams, where he still resides. earned a Bachelor of Arts degree; he later earned a Masters in Business Administration Charles Carey Donworth, from Stanford. For many years he was in the CdeP ’42, died of cancer at Army or working for the Department of the his Seattle home on NovemArmy as a civilian, and he spent a number of ber 30, 1999. Arriving at years in Athens. He spent his retirement in We- Thacher from Seattle, Carey ston, Connecticut. He is survived by his wife, spent two years here and beMajorie; a son, Lambert, CdeP ‘60, and a came known as a “dynamic daughter, Constance; and several grandchil- fellow with a rare ability of excelling in both athletics and studies and at the same time helpdren. ing in every way he can the School he loves.

Irving Avard “Bud” Meeker, Jr., M.D., CdeP Fairness and wit are two of Charlie’s out’36, passed away on standing attributes, and it is no wonder that February 12, 2000. he is so popular; he is also continually steady Although he spent and dependable.” During his junior year, he only two years at played Second Team soccer, basketball, and Thacher, Bud was en- baseball, but progressed to First Team in all of deared to his class- these as well as track in his senior year. He mates as a result of his managed “The Notes” in a “business-like “sparkling humor and way,” served on the Cabinet, Outdoor and feigned cynicism,” ac- Ojai Tennis Tournament Committees, and was cording to the 1936 El a Prefect both years.

Archivero. “He was a hard worker and, by virtue of this peculiar- Following Thacher, Carey earned a Bachelor ity,” he served on the boards of both “The of Science degree in Industrial Administration Notes” and El Archivero. He also played on at Yale. He became a self-employed management the Second Soccer team, captained the Second consultant and labor negotiator for Personnel Baseball team, and established himself as a Strategies in Seattle. He was credited as being a key player in creating and leading metro, the miler on the Track team. agency that cleaned up Lake Washington. “He Bud matriculated at Princeton for his bache- was one of the key people in this community in lor’s degree and then to Columbia Pediatric the last half-century,” said Jim Ellis, who also Medical School, where he received his medical was a member of the group that worked to credren and great-grandchildren. Reportedly, Colin’s final parting words were: “Ave atque vale: Veni, vidi sed nihilum vici”: Hail and farewell! I came, I saw, I conquered nothing.”

Carey is survived by his wife Martha “Marty” Lemming Donworth; three children: James, Elizabeth “Betsy”, and Cynthia “Cindy”; and six grandchildren.

Peter Morrison, CdeP ’44, died at his home in San Rafael, CA, on December 12, 1999. He was the son of the late Stanley Morrison, professor at Stanford Law School, and Carroll Morrison of San Francisco.

He attended Thacher for three years and earned a reputation for “his quickness of mind that won him many arguments.” He served as the captain of the Tennis team in his senior year and was one of the Top Ten Tennis Players during both of his upper school years. He participated in the Outdoor and Parlor Committees, Second Soccer team, National Rifle Association, and was the Associate Editor of “The Notes.”

Following Thacher, he served in the Navy during World War II, before receiving a Bachelor of Arts degree from Yale University in 1950, and a Bachelor of Law degree from Stanford University in 1953. He retired from Salomon Smith Barney. He was a stamp collector and an avid railroad enthusiast throughout his years at Thacher and beyond.

Peter is survived by his wife, Susanne; his brother Stephen, CdeP ’41; his children, Stanley, CdeP ’76, Elizabeth Wessel, Stephen, and Madeleine Morrison Young; and three grandchildren. A memorial service was held on Friday, December 17, 1999, at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Marin Church in San Rafael.

David Lightfoot Milbank, CdeP ’47, died in the company of his family on March 2, 2000, at his home in Sandy, Utah. He was born February 22, 1930 in Vancouver, B.C. to Mary and Robbins Milbank of New Hampshire and California.

In his two years at Thacher, Dave established himself as an ardent camper and excellent horseman, passions that continued throughout his life. “Very quiet and conscientious in his schoolwork,” according to the 1947 El Archivero, “he achieved the ‘All Privileges List many times, and became one of the top students in his class. Dave matriculated at Princeton and graduated with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science. He then earned his Master’s degree in International Relations at Johns Hopkins University in 1966. He was a Distinguished Graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College in 1974 and was honored by the Industrial College of the Armed Forces as the top civilian graduate in 1982. page 55 Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

From 1951 to 1957, Dave was on active duty in enlisted and commissioned service in the U.S. Army Infantry and was a veteran of the Korean War. In 1957, he transferred to military intelligence in the active reserve from which he retired as Lieutenant Colonel in 1982. From 1957 until his retirement in 1985, he worked for the C.I.A. in the Directorate of Plans, the Directorate of Operations, the Office of National Estimates, the Directorate of Intelligence, and the Intelligence Community Staff.

While working for the C.I.A. and later for various private defense contractors, he published several articles on international terrorism.

supporter of Planned Parenthood, volunteered for the Pasadena AIDS Service Center, and was a member and past president of the Pasadena Art Alliance. She is preceded in death by one son, Carl, CdeP ’62; she is survived by three children: Natalie, Sarah, and James, Jr., CdeP ’71; three grandchildren; one great grandchild; and her sister, Caroline Rollins. A celebration of Liz’s life was held on February 4 at The Athenaeum in Pasadena.

Class Notes

ate Meteor. In the year before he died, he formed a new corporation, Donworth/McReynolds Inc., that advises corporate boards and executives on governance issues.

Marjorie “Midge” Soule Orrick, wife of attorney and former Securities and Exchange Commission member Andrew Downey Orrick, CdeP ’35, died on December 13, 1999. She was a socially prominent member of several San Francisco civic and charitable organizations, including the University of California at San Francisco Hospital Women’s Auxiliary, St. Luke’s Hospital Women’s Auxiliary and Foundation, and Children’s Theater Association of San Francisco. In addition to her husband, Midge is survived by their five children, two brothers, and five grandchildren.

He married Sally Louise Thomas on September 26, 1959, and spent three years as vice consul in Zagreb, Croatia. He made his home in McLean, VA, for the next 35 years before retiring to Sandy, UT. Dave was an avid golfer and a distinguished leader of the Boy Scouts of America in the national capital area. A benefactor of environmental funds, education programs and the arts, his generosity was superceded only by his depth of character and caring.

Anne Elizabeth Mayhew Pfau, wife of 25 years of George Pfau, CdeP ’42, died at her home in David is survived by his wife; his children San Francisco on April 5, 2000. She sucMichelle Robbins Milbank, Karen Milbank cumbed after a courageous but lengthy fight Quackenbush, and Thomas Lightfoot Milbank; against cancer. Anne grew up in Piedmont, and two grandsons, and a sister, Daphne Milbank attended U.C. Berkeley. She worked as an exWhite. A memorial service was held at 3:00 ecutive secretary for 20 years, working for on Sunday, April 30, 2000, at the Immanuel SPUR and the Junior League of San Francisco.

Presbyterian Church in McLean, VA. She also managed her apartment building in San Francisco, but considered her primary and most important profession to be that of mother for her only son, George III, who is 17. She also found time for her favorite hobby, tennis.

Thacher Friends Her husband served on the Board of Trustees as the President of the Alumni Association C. Michael Ehrhardt, who from 1967 through 1973. In addition to her served as Thacher’s Music husband and son, Anne is survived by her sisDirector from 1946 until ter, John Mayhew Beales of Tiburon; and her 1977, died two days after mother, Joan Rapp Mayhew of San Rafael.

Christmas following a Her father is the late Clarence W.W. Mayhew, lengthy illness. Last Feba well-know architect. ruary, he had a severe case of pneumonia. He also Elizabeth “Betty” Fleming Rhodes, commuhad pulmonary fibrosis nity leader, social service agency volunteer, and and other complications. Michael’s wife, Flo- wife for 61 years of Kenneth O. Rhodes, CdeP rence, and their four children were with him ’30, died January 15, 2000, two months after when he died. At Thacher’s Reunion Weekend suffering a major stroke. She had served as in June, his life and contributions to the School president of the Pasadena Y.W.C.A. board, vice were celebrated. president of the Junior League, and on the boards or advisory boards of Caltech UniverElizabeth “Liz” Rollins Greene, wife of James sity, Westridge School, the Child Guidance C. Greene, CdeP ’32 (an attorney for O’Mel- Clinic, the Pasadena Settlement, Pacific Clinics, veny & Myers of Los Angeles, who died in Hospice of Pasadena, and Las Familias del August 1997) died on Pueblo, and was recently honored as a 50-year January 21, 2000. Born member of the League of Women Voters. She is in Montague, MA, Liz survived by her husband, four children, seven graduated from Smith grandchildren, and three brothers. A memoCollege in 1938 and rial service was held on Saturday, February 5 at married Jim in 1940. All Saints Episcopal Church in Pasadena. e Liz sang in the choir at the Neighborhood Church, was a member of the Junior League of Pasadena, was an active Fall 1999 / Winter 2000

page 55

Bookshelf

Bookshelf

Stephen P. Huyler, CdeP ’69 Meeting God: Elements of Hindu Devotion

by Jane D. McCarthy

New Haven: Yale University Press, 1999

his October, Stephen P. Huyler, CdeP ’69, spoke to the Thacher community about his most recent book, Meeting God: Elements of Hindu Devotion. Ten years in the writing, Meeting God is really a culmination of nearly three decades of study that began soon after Steve graduated from Thacher. The world-reknowned, elderly ceramicist Beatrice “Beato” Wood, who lived in the Upper Ojai and was one of the founders of Dada, had befriended Steve and invited him to travel with her to India the following year. She had traveled extensively there and embodied the Hindu culture and ethics in her lifestyle and artwork.

Before his trip, Steve consulted various scholars at the University of Denver to develop a plan for his upcoming trip and research. When Steve arrived in India on his 20th birthday, Beato’s wide circle of friends immediately embraced him and became the foundation of his kinship with India during his subsequent travels there.

T

Through his extensive studies and experiences—as a doctoral student at the University of London, as co-curator of the exhibition “Puja: Expressions of Human Devotion,” at the Smithsonian since 1996, as a teacher of graduate courses on Hindu ritual at the Ohio State University, and while living and working with some of the 800 million Hindi in India— Steve expanded from anthropologist to admiring believer of this faith. In Meeting God, Steve gives a first-person, detailed account of the daily devotional practices, or puja, that anchor Hindus in the divinity of the universe, and give meaning and balance to their daily existence.

Household rituals and community festivals circumscribe Hindu life and prayers embrace the day from the sacred dawn to honoring the spirits within one’s work and seeking the security of deities in the evenings.

The book’s vivid vignettes of individual Hindus practicing their various rituals, coupled with captivating color photographs, offer an excellent introduction to this religion practiced by one-sixth of the world’s people. They also page 56

The Thacher News

help the reader visualize the heart of Hindu belief: the moment of worship known as darshan or “seeing and being seen by God.” Steve’s personal accounts of Hindu practices and descriptions of contemporary Hinduism help the reader to appreciate this often confusing faith. His clear explanations, stories, and stunning photographs of Hindus worshipping lead the reader to understand the central Hindu concept in which many gods express a single, universal divine principle.

After listening to Steve’s talk and slide show regarding his book at Thacher, English teacher Jake Jacobsen said, “What impressed me the most, besides the photography, was that he stills speaks with such obvious passion, let alone expertise, on a subject that is not new to him. It was wonderful for students and faculty to hear Steve’s own devotion to the cultures of India; he is a teacher who clearly enjoys sharing with others his love for that country.” e

Meeting God is Steve’s fourth book on India, the others being Gifts of Earth; Terracottas and Clay Sculptures of India (1997), Painted Prayers: Women’s Art in Village India (1994), and Village India (1985). Publisher’s Weekly named Meeting God as one of the top ten books published in 1999 on religion, and one of the 100 most worthwhile books of 1999.

Calendar

Thacher Gatherings and Events

Summer and Fall…

Sunday, June 18 through Friday, August 11

Teach The Teachers Collaborative Saturday, July 15 through Friday, August 4

Golden Trout Alumni Camp Friday, September 1

School Begins Thursday, September 14

Ventura/Santa Barbara Gathering Saturday, September 16

Class Representative/Decade Chair Meeting Fall Alumni Day Sunday, September 24

Pasadena Gathering (brunch) Tuesday, September 26

Portland Gathering Thursday, September 28

Seattle Gathering Tuesday, October 17

Chicago Gathering Thursday, October 19

New York City Gathering Tuesday, October 24

San Francisco Gathering Friday, October 27 through Sunday, October 29

Family Weekend Saturday, January 6, 2001

Winter Alumni Day

Bay Area Soccer Fans: Take note and come cheer on Thacher’s Boys’ Varsity Soccer team at pre-season practice games in the Bay Area: Monday, August 28, at 3:00 vs. The Urban School of San Francisco (Polo Field) Tuesday, August 29, at 2:30 vs. University High School (Kezan Stadium) Wednesday, August 30, at 4:00 vs. The Branson School (in Marin County)

Shayla Cooke ’03 riding Cascade Photo by art instructor Wendi Parker-Dial