Feb 2003

Greetings classmates, and Happy New Year! I must humbly apologize (Trent Lott’s getting to me) for missing the deadline for last issue, but I attribute the failing to my annual appointment with classmates at the Yale Club for Yale-Harvard weekend.

This year, a most impressive group assembled in Manhattan. It included Don Galligan, Steve Dixon, Jim Schweitzer, Tim Harris, Quentin Lawson, Jeffrey Rosen, Dave Stretch, Ralph Sando, Rob High, Bob Newman ’68, assorted spouses, and your faithful correspondent.

Although The Game was not particularly inspirational, we were encouraged by one aspect of the trip. Last year, when the Yale Club inexplicably declined to show the game (Actually it was explicable: they wanted to maximize attendance at the Bowl.), we watched at a wonderful little west side pub named Scruffy Duffy, where we were dubbed “the older people’s table” by management and serving staff. This year, we were among the springiest chickens in the audience. So we’ve got that going for us. Anyway, everyone seemed to be doing well, and looked surprisingly good, although failing eyesight may account for that perception.

In other news, Dr. Stephen Billick was awarded the Outstanding Service Award of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law at their annual convention. Bates is a clinical professor of psychiatry at New York Medical College and is also on the faculties of New York University and Columbia University. Congratulations to him.

My old Ezra Stiles classmate Tom McCaughey wrote from London with a bunch of family news. “The farther we get from our years at Ezra Stiles, and especially as I am now working overseas, the more I look forward to seeing what our fellow classmates are doing.

”My wife Susan and I have been living for the past year in London, where I am an investment banker with ING Barings, specializing in M&A for private equity firms. We have happily settled into a house in Belgravia with our two daughters, Olivia (Yale ’20?) and Kathryn (Yale ’22?), and we would love to hear from other classmates living in London. My oldest daughter, Amanda (Yale ’01), is also in London working at Lehman Brothers, and my second daughter, Caroline (Brown ’04), is taking a semester abroad at Glasgow University studying painting, so the center of the family is now in the UK.

“In the October class notes you cited Tom Guterback’s feat of having a daughter born in each of the last four decades — must be a Tom/Class of ’69 thing: I have also had a daughter in each of the last four decades, although I doubled up in the ’80s with a fifth, Diana (Manhattanville ’06).”

Winter is a good time to hear from classmates from the frozen north. They obviously have indoor time to write. Here’s a nice missive from Lee Bachman: “Greetings from Minneapolis! I am still CFO at Bachman’s Inc., our family-owned retail floral and garden business, but looking to retire in another three years or so. I have three sons in town, one a dentist, one an emergency physician, and one recent college grad still sorting his options. We just hosted some long-lost relatives from Germany (near Kassel) where my great-grandfather left a 150-acre farm in 1885 to come to America and start a new life. Our German cousins still have a family Bible from 1747 and church records tracing the family back for over six generations. My other interests include a new baby granddaughter and part-ownership in a pro soccer team, which includes at least one Yale graduate as a player. It was not the Vikings’ year, but the Minnesota Wild hockey team and the Twins are doing great. Hope to see some of you at the next reunion.”

Finally, Bob Pollack sent the following report: “I left the healthcare business in 1997 and turned to consulting. I then had the good fortune of inventing a wireless and/or Web-based way of collecting and displaying information in Real Time. It is fun and rewarding and has taken me into businesses I would have never dreamed of. While pursuing this I was offered, and accepted, the position of CEO of Vshift, an IT company. Quite a shift, psychiatry to technology. Daughter Jessie is about to turn 17 and is a 7 handicap golfer; all else is wonderful with us. Living in central Florida. All classmates welcome to visit.”

Thanks to all of you for your contributions. Keep them coming.