Class Notes, Nov-Dec 2024

From Ted Snow:

“There are a few benefits of having a stroke, which I did several years ago – like good parking spaces and getting special treatment at the airport – but I don’t recommend it. But a few good things came out of it: Time to copy and organize a lifetime’s worth of photos, and writing a book: The Sixth Element: How Carbon Shapes Our World.

Before my poor health forced retirement, I was a rocket scientist at the University of Colorado, launching research rockets at White Sands, New Mexico and Woomera, South Australia, and being a member of the group that built a new (launched in 2009) instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope (the Cosmic Origins Spectrograph; still working in mid-2024.) I married Connie in 1969, just after our graduation – some of you may remember her, because we started dating in 1967. We are still together, having three grown sons and three grandkids. As I always say, it could be worse…”

From the 1969 website: “Proving once again the value of persistence, Reed Hundt’s Coalition for Green Capital won a major commitment from the federal government…In 2022, the Inflation Reduction Act set aside $27 billion for public-private investments in rooftop solar installations, energy efficiency upgrades and other projects that help reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The $27 billion will be leveraged by private investors to over $150 billion in loans for such purposes. It’s a major win — and could be a model to mobilize the huge amounts of capital necessary to fund the transition to clean energy.”

Bill Pennington died on July 14, 2023. From Dignitymemorial.com:

“During his time at Yale, he met the love of his life, Karen (Wijas) Pennington; they were married December 6, 1969.

Bill began a long career in the telecommunications industry upon graduation that ranged from supporting companies in our local communities to international clients. He was always a part of the innovation and implementation of current telecommunication technology, understood the intangible nuances of how to pull together and lead a team, plus knew how to relate and converse with customers on exactly what they required. Initially working in Chicago, he and Karen lived in Hinsdale, Illinois…They seized an opportunity to move to Dallas, Texas in 1978. Bill and his family settled in the Prairie Creek neighborhood in Richardson, Texas and are long-time members of Saint Mark the Evangelist Catholic Church in Plano, Texas.

An avid sports fan, Bill loved his Dallas and Chicago sports teams, plus closely followed Formula 1 racing. He loved watching his sons play competitive sports, and he could always be spotted in the dugout or courtside, coaching their teams during their formidable little league years. In recent years, he relished every opportunity he had to watch his grandchildren participate in their activities as well.

Always a bright mind, he also had a selfless heart, always giving his time to support others. Bill was dedicated to his family, loved to travel, and dabbled in scuba diving….He was deeply patriotic, loved what America stands for, and was so proud his eldest son and grandson currently serve in the United States Navy.”

Reed Hundt reports on the death of Don Lewis:

“Freshman year, Don lived across the narrow hall from Mike Buas and me on the “extra” fifth floor of Lawrence Hall that was assigned to Davenport College-destined matriculants. He was the only one of the five of us (on his side, Alan Cohn and Randy Kennon) who was courteous and curious enough to write us all notes saying he was looking forward to meeting us. Thus began a lifelong friendship. As with so many of you, my memories now resemble postcards on which are written indelible vignettes. 

Don provided me a number of epiphanic firsts. He was the first classmate in my observation to have a date come to stay with him — his high school sweetheart Terri came from Springfield, NJ, amazingly, in fall 1965. In the spring of freshman year Don took me to my first Passover, at his Grandmother Rose’s apartment in the Bronx. (It was thereafter inevitable that I would have a Jewish bride.) In sophomore year he was the first to introduce me to Greenwich Village, Frank Zappa, the Fugs, and a substance now generally legalized. Six years later, when he was in architecture grad school at MIT and I in law school, he taught me not to throw kerosene on a wood fire in a wood cabin in the woods, as I nearly ignited a spectacular conflagration that would have been curtains for Terri, Ling, Don, and me. In 1980 Terri and he were there when I married Betsy Katz. In 1996 they met me in Bangor, near their home, when Senator Olympia Snowe summoned me to an event in celebration of her tie-breaking vote that put in place our FCC program to connect every classroom and library in the country to the Internet (now $100b of spending over nearly three decades has nearly completed the task). I saw Terri and Don last at our 50th, but for the last three decades the Internet let us keep in touch and my capacious iPhone preserves our emails.

I never stopped learning from Don: about philosophy, men’s groups, curiosity, and the persistence of caring. I easily recall his chuckle at the myriad amusing aspects of life as we saw it. He had an irresistible aura of genial and sympathetic understanding. Hardly ever seeing him in person, I always took joy in being his friend. I am very glad, and honored, that in his final week he called me over 3,322 miles of inseparable distance to say goodbye. He asked me to record his passing for the class and I have here done so.”

More memorial information, and often pictures, are available on the class website: yale1969.org.