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Class not es 68

migrated west to her hometown of Santa Fe, NM. Owen’s classmates may discern a certain consistency in these news flashes, since even at Hotchkiss, he was often the last student to make it to Chapel before the service began. Some things never change. Anyone craving green chile or spiritual enlightenment should feel free to get in touch.

Jon Berk ’68

Holy Pancakes, Batman! That’s Some Collection!

M A C S TA R R I N G

Above, Paul Mindus ’68 at his wedding with attendees Gary Johnson ’68 and his wife, Kyle; left, Mindus and Eva Berger were married on Aug. 6 at the Sequoyah Country Club in the Oakland hills.

writes, “Excited that after 30 years as pastor of Faith Bible Church in Littleton, NH, we are able to expand our campus and purchase the 14,000-square-foot building in front of the church as well as all its parking. Retirement seems unlikely until my 70s. God has blessed Jan and me with three great kids (ages 40, 38, 35) and kids-in-law (ages 49, 37, 36) and seven grandkids (ages 16, 14, 12, 12, 9, 4, and 1). Just think: our 50th cometh in 2019!!!! How can we all be this old?!!!”

BY CHELSEA EDGAR

CLASS AGENTS: Bill Benedict, Bob Clymer, Parky

Conyngham, Mark Hinckley, Tom Randt, Jorge Rodriguez, and Will Smart

At the traditional Thunder Mug Competition our lower mid year, I A N L A M B E R T O N was one of the stars. Little did we know that we were watching the emergence of a master comedian! This summer at the Paradise Theater in Gig Harbor, WA, Ian had the starring role in Curtains. The critics raved: “Played by Ian Lamberton, Lt. Cioffi is the square-jawed lawman until he isn’t. Mr. Lamberton came perilously close to laughing, Carol Burnettstyle, at one point, but that’s okay in a show such as this. He did a nice job in the role and an even nicer job with his consistent Boston accent.” Perhaps we can mount a 50th Thunder Mug event at the Reunion?

H o t c h k i s s

M a g a z i n e

Finally, as you may also know, our classmate P E T E G I D W I T Z passed on in Chicago on June 5, 2017. The Class extends our sympathy to his family. Make plans now to be at the 50th. We will celebrate new beginnings. We will remember our shared experiences, good and bad. We will honor those classmates who can no longer be with us.” PAUL MINDUS

and Eva Berger were married on Aug. 6, 2017, at the Sequoyah Country Club in the Oakland hills after a five-year courtship. They live in Oakland, CA. Paul’s daughter, Sophia, lives in London. Eva’s daughters, Sara and Malkie, live in Tokyo and New Jersey, respectively. Attending with friends and relatives were G A R Y J O H N S O N and his wife, Kyle.

CLASS AGENTS: Doug Campbell, Ace Crary,

Andy Cushman, Richard Dana, and Nick Moore

CLASS AGENT: Tom Keating

Former publishing maverick O W E N L I P S T E I N proudly reports that he married Maggie Fine in 2015 at his property, Shakespeare on the Hudson, in Athens, NY. He is equally delighted to announce the birth of his first child, Charlotte Benjamin Lipstein, on June 23, 2017. He and Maggie have recently

Owen Lipstein ’69 and his wife, Maggie Fine, welcomed their first child, Charlotte Benjamin Lipstein, on June 23.

PHOTO BY PETER HVIZDAK / NEW HAVEN REGISTER

that our BIG 50th is set for Sept. 28-30, 2018. If you haven’t received the initial letter yet, drop me a note. It includes critical information on hotels and scheduling. In response to my requests for news over the past several years, many of you have promised to join us for the 50th and provide all of the lurid details then. Well, the time is coming — make your plans now! Also, we need help planning. The alumni office has a basic framework, but we need to have everyone’s input to make it a great event. Please let me know if you’d like to help as we bring the event details together.

Dock builder, conservationist, and Edgartown poet laureate S T E V E E W I N G is this year’s recipient of the Walter Cronkite award from Sail Martha’s Vineyard. The award honors someone who lives up to Mr. Cronkite’s legacy of conservation and maritime tradition.

on Berk likes to say that the obsession began during his lower-mid year at Hotchkiss, when he would spend Saturday afternoons sprawled on the floor of John Titcomb and Jeff Wenk’s double on the second floor of Coy, engrossed in the escapades of Sgt. Fury and the Fantastic Four. At home in Roslyn, Long Island, comicbooks (Berk insists that “comicbook” is one word, not two, as it’s commonly written) were forbidden; his parents threw out his collection while he was at camp the summer before he came to Hotchkiss. But that didn’t stop him from sneaking the occasional copy of Batman or The Amazing Spider-man from the local five and dime — and, over the course of his life, amassing what’s widely regarded by prominent enthusiasts and appraisers as one of the best collections of all time. Quips Berk: “If it weren’t for parents like mine who threw out all those books, they wouldn’t be the prized collectables they are today.” Berk, a personal injury lawyer in Rocky Hill, CT, first became serious about collecting while he was in law school at Boston University. He lived near Boston Square, which had a comicbook store that sold hard-to-find vintage editions. When he saw that he could get his hands on these rare comics, he was hooked. “I’m a geek,” he says matter-of-factly. “I was always interested in the things that were obtuse and not well-known.” Berk was a serial collector: he’d start with one superhero, like Spiderman or the Hulk, and find everything he could within a particular era, then move on to another character. Part of the excitement, he says, was in tracking down the books — which, in the pre-Internet age, required a considerable amount of sleuthing. “I wrote a lot of letters,” he says. “People would advertise in the comicbook buyer’s guide, and you’d write. You didn’t know what they looked like. I didn’t even know what the covers looked like. You found books by luck. You networked, went to conventions.” Berk wasn’t only interested in the books; he was also fascinated by the stories behind them. About 15 years ago, he came across a copy of Mystery Men that held a clue to its previous owner: a coupon slipped between its pages with the name “Lamont Larson,” a renowned collector, sketched on it in pencil. Determined to find out whether the book had once belonged to Larson, Berk embarked on a fact-finding mission that concluded with a call to Larson’s 91-year-

old mother in a nursing home in Wausa, NE, eventually confirming that the book was, indeed, a Larson original. (Says Berk: “She was very nice!”) Gradually, his collection morphed into a mini-museum, consisting of nearly 18,000 books, pieces of art, and other memorabilia, that took over his entire basement. According to Vincent Zurzolo, co-founder of Metropolis Comics, Berk’s collection is unmatched in its breadth and depth. “Between the comic books and the art, this is one of the best collections ever assembled,” Zurzolo said in an interview. “We had to process this to put it into our database, and often, when we entered a book, it was the first one we’d ever had. Metropolis Collectibles has been the largest buyer of vintage comics in the world for over 30-40 years — so we’ve had pretty much everything. When I’m seeing ‘Does not exist in database’ over and over again, I know we have a very, very special collection.” For decades, Berk thought he’d hold on to his comics forever, but at some point, he realized that he’d reached the pinnacle. “It was time to pass on the hobby,” he says. Last June, Berk divested himself of most of his collection, selling off more than 17,000 items in a four-day auction. He won’t get into what the pieces sold for, but one source that tracks vintage comic sales reports that a 1940 copy of Fantastic Comics #3 fetched $243,000. The few pieces Berk can’t bear to part with are some of his personal favorites: the Larson copy of Mystery Men, some Spider-man illustrations by Jack Kirby, and original drawings by Lou Fine, Berk’s favorite comicbook artist. Now, he seems at peace with his decision to downsize, but some days, the sight of his near-empty basement makes him sad. “But I don’t have any regrets,” he says. “I simply redistributed some of the books, so they’re out there for someone else to collect and assemble.” Old habits die hard, though: “Have I since accumulated a few inexpensive comics? Well, yeah.”

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