Sharon Burns Walsh
410.251.8566
sharon.walsh68@gmail.com

I decided to reach out to classmates who weren’t able to come to our 50^th reunion for this column.  The reunion was an emotional high for almost everyone who attended. If you were one of those people who couldn’t attend and I haven’t contacted you yet, please send me an email for the next column.  Your classmates missed you and would love to get an update about you. Kathy Rieser moved to St. Petersburg, FL two years ago with Jill, her partner of 10 years, after 40 years on the farm in the western Catskills of upstate NY.  It was a “big change– no more animals, no more snow and ice and cold– but lucky to still be working as The Trash Queen and still able to do physical labor.”  She and Jill are also vendors at Brocante, a monthly vintage market in St. Pete that keeps them busy. She saw Cynthia Newby last year when she was in the area.  Kathy would love to hear from classmates through email or Facebook, or let her know if you’re passing through St. Pete. Sally Eser Stuart wrote: “I enjoyed the postings online about our 50th reunion and was sorry not to be able to join all of you. It looked like a wonderful trip back in time! I suddenly recalled and re-sang some of the songs from “Good Grief, It’s the Sheik.” I had hoped to attend, but the past year was very busy for me handling the health crises of others. My mother died at age 97 before Christmas. My husband of 50 years was in a car accident last January and continues to work toward recovery. Thankfully, the rest of the family are very well — three adult children and five grandchildren. Until last January I was working as a medical social worker. Prior to that I was a director of Christian education and hospital chaplain. After Hood, I got an MTS degree from Candler School of Theology (Emory University) and an MSW from Dominican University in River Forest IL. We started out in Atlanta, moved to Chicago for 12 years with Fred’s law practice, then came back to Atlanta in 2009. So that’s about it! Fifty years in a nutshell. It’s been great!” Lucille VanBaaren and I had a lovely chat on the phone, in which I learned she has an advanced degree in toxicology and continues to work as the person responsible for Global Regulatory Affairs for Estee Lauder. She works mostly in New York City and at the company’s R&D facility.  While she doesn’t do much traveling for work now, she has spent considerable time in Asia, Latin American and Europe on business.  Although she had expected to retire before now, she was persuaded by the company to stay in order to complete a special project. She expects to retire in 2019 and isn’t sure what she’ll be doing after that except spending more time with her two grown children and two grandchildren, ages 16 and 14, who live nearby. Carrie Wissler-Thomas: “I am still President/Executive Director of The Art Association of Harrisburg, the nonprofit art school and gallery, which keeps me very busy 6 or 7 days per week. I manage the art school for youth and adults, coordinate our extensive community exhibition program, and oversee a part-time staff of 5. My husband will be retiring in February, but I plan to continue to work, as my work is truly my mission. I still paint and exhibit my own work as well. Scott and I travel to Scotland and England every Oct. for three weeks of hiking, visiting friends, and touring historical sites and museums. This April, however, we are going to Greece and will visit Crete and Santorini – fulfilling my dream ever since I wrote my Hood Honors Paper on “Lyricism in Minoan Art”! Our son Dylan, his wife Sheena and our grand-daughter Catherine live nearby and we enjoy spending time with them.   We have lived in our Uptown Harrisburg home since 1991 and love being in the city…our house is literally a “house museum,” filled with our extensive art collection, and we like sharing it with the public in fundraising tours and soirees to benefit the Art Association. We have a busy life, which is why I did not attend our 50^th class reunion!” Remember that our next big reunion is coming in 2023, so if you missed the 50^th, resolve now to join us for the 55^th!

Sharon Burns Walsh
410.749.0426
sharon.walsh68@gmail.com

With only a few months left until our 50^th reunion, Susan Marano and I hope your plans to be part of the weekend are well underway.  If you’re not there, we can promise that you will be missed.  Mary Bloodgood VanHyning was headed to California to visit her daughter, son-in-law and two granddaughters in late October. She envies people whose grandchildren live nearby.  She definitely plans to be at the reunion as do several people from French House. She had heard from Linda Winter-Blacksher that she will not be able to attend the reunion because of a previously scheduled trip to Italy. Marjorie Field Trusler retired in 2005 as a professor of French and Spanish at West Virginia Wesleyan College.  She has spent the last ten years doing all the community work, traveling, visiting, reading, exercising and lolling that she didn’t have time for when she was working. She has been looking for an awe-inspiring answer to the question, “So what have you been doing since you retired?” People keep asking Sue Warshaw Stinson if she’s busier in retirement than she was while working, and her response is a definite, “No, I am definitely busy but rarely frantic as I used to be.” She thought she was finished with professional work after her book was published in late 2015, but is still finishing a couple smaller projects.  Her major activities these days revolve around volunteer civic engagement at the local, state, and national levels. She works with the League of Women Voters (including committees and action on Immigration, Social Justice, Voter Education/Registration, and Fair Elections) and also volunteers with a couple of community agencies.  “And then there is the increasing amount of time I have to spend to keep my body going with as little pain as possible.  Jim and I occasionally fit in some travel, including our fourth Road Scholar trip this past spring to Peru.  I’m looking forward to seeing everyone at the reunion.”  Gail Davis Williford is in the midst of packing for a move to the Austin, TX area.  After 41 years she has left Houston to return to the city where she first lived in Texas.  Both of her children and her ex live in Austin.  Daughter Jean is a social worker at Seton Hospital in Austin, and son Richard works in commercial real estate.  John is retired.  Gail retired from the ministry and now works as a life coach and fills in doing weddings, funerals, etc.  She says, “I love having the opportunity to stay active in people’s important life events.  Life is good.”  Also in moving mode was Charlotte Sizoo Whitenight who was leaving her home in Catonsville, MD last November for a new one in Baltimore.  “My advice to all my classmates is never stay 25 years in one house, unless you’re more disciplined than I about clearing clutter!  I’m doing the baby-boomer thing, moving to a downtown city neighborhood, Baltimore City, into a high-rise condo.  The neighborhood is fantastic, a block from Johns Hopkins University, vibrant, walkable and filled with students, lots of new restaurants and entertainment.”  Since she has friends and volunteer activities in the general area, she will no longer be driving 20K miles per year.  As a member of the Class Gift Committee, along with Sandy Gerwin Herndon and Pam Nicholson Neuman, Charlotte thanks those in the class who have supported Hood’s Annual Fund each year, and thanks you in advance for your continued, generous support. Everyone’s support is especially crucial in our Reunion year.  The Committee was thrilled to have 8 major donors by last October who pledged donations of $60,000 to the Scholarship and Annual Funds.  $28,000 was already received as cash donations for the scholarship by late October.  The total goal for the Class of ’68 gift is $136,000, with a 68% participation rate.  Of this total amount, our specific goal for the Scholarship is $64,000.  Charlotte adds, “This seems ambitious but we can do this!  I chose the painless way to donate, a direct IRA donation.  Look on Hood’s website for information on IRA donations–it’s really easy!” She encourages everyone to think about including Hood in your will for any amount or percentage as have eight of our classmates. We’d love to be able to announce at the Reunion luncheon a substantial increase in this number. Many thanks to Pam, Sandy and Charlotte for taking on this considerable fund-raising effort on behalf of our class.  Hoping to see everyone at Hood in June!

1968

Sharon Burns Walsh
410-749-0426
sharon.walsh68@gmail.com

I had a special request from our Class Giving Co-Chairs Sandra Gerwin Herndon and Charlotte Sizoo Whitenight to include the following in our class column: “Sandy and Charlotte want to thank classmates who contributed to the 2015-2016 Giving Campaign. Our 50^th is fast approaching, and they have kept us informed of “nascent” 50^th fund-raising plans in recent Giving letters.  Now they’re reminding us of the need to get seriously started.  Our classmates at the 45^th liked the idea of an endowed scholarship.  Surprisingly, this requires less money than you’d think–$50,000 minimum at a 4% interest rate will result in an annual scholarship of $2,000.  With Hood’s $48,000 annual tuition and room and board, many students are cobbling together small scholarships so even our modest scholarship will be helpful to a student and will exist as long as Hood exists.  If we raise more than $50,000, we can increase the scholarship amount for a single student or perhaps award more than one scholarship.  Giving Year 2016-2017 contributions go to general operating funds, not to the scholarship. Now we need to set-up a steering committee of 4 to 6 members to address issues such as scholarship name, eligibility and selection criteria. Sandy and Charlotte live in the greater Washington area but volunteers from anywhere in the country are welcome.  Just email Charlotte at charwnt@aol.com. We are a generous class both in terms of our financial support and our long-term, continuing friendships.  Let’s all support our class by contributing to the Class Gift and attending the Reunion.”  Co-chair Sandy Gerwin Herndon also sent a personal update.  She has been caring for and living with her 95 year-old-mother in Bethesda, MD for the past four years.  Her son and his wife design jewelry, and moved into Sandy’s home in Shady Side, MD about a year ago.  Her two daughters live in Maine and Georgia. Sandy is the proud grandmother of six and continues to work part time in a catholic high school as an assistant in their campus ministry office. Note from the Office of Alumni Relations and Annual Giving:  It would be great to identify a few lead gifts from classmates for the establishment of the scholarship.  Additionally it is customary for the 50^th reunion class to also give to the Hood Fund during their reunion year.  This fund allows for support of scholarships for all Hood students in addition to the establishment of a scholarship.  (Minimum of $50,000 is needed to endow the scholarship as stated above.)  Contact Charlotte if you are interested in giving a lead gift (minimum of $5000 to the endowed scholarship effort). Donna Nelson Hyde is retired and living in Aliso Viejo, California. She loved teaching both music and 6th grade for 38 years in the Saddleback Valley Unified School District.  She has enjoyed conducting 2 children’s choirs at Irvine Presbyterian Church for 21 years but is planning on this being her last year so that she has more time for traveling. She somehow manages to find time to sing in an adult choir, ring hand bells at her church and volunteer for charity work with her sorority. The last two years she has participated in mission trips helping to refurbish a school in Swaziland and installing a playground with Kids Around the World in Jericho, Israel. She says,” I loved visiting these countries and really getting to know the people and gaining a better understanding of their cultures.” She makes several trips east each year, visiting her mom in PA and other family in VA. She keeps in touch with her roommate, Laurie Kammler Kaye, and has gotten together with Debby Mattas Willis.  She adds, “I’m looking forward to our 50^th! This time I won’t be in the middle of a children’s musical.” Lots of news from Gwen Ebersole Lehman who lives about half an hour from me in Ocean Pines, MD.  Gwen retired in June 2015 from Stephen Decatur High School where she became something of a legend for the drama productions she directed and often wrote.  In her honor, former students and colleagues established the Friends of Gwen Lehman Foundation to raise money for scholarships for students interested in theater studies.  Ron and I attended her retirement party, and it was apparent that Gwen was beloved by all who worked with her and were taught by her. Gwen reports that the Foundation was able to award a scholarship this year to a young woman at Sarah Lawrence.  Her husband Don retired this year, and they bought a second home in Landowne, PA so they can spend more time with their two grandsons.  She has begun to paint and even exhibited a couple pieces in Ocean City, MD, is working on a young readers’ book, continues to write plays for the high school, and does volunteer work at the Art League and for county counseling services.  Remember that we need 4 to 6 steering committee volunteers for the Hood scholarship. Say “yes” and you’ll be doing a wonderful service for your class and for future Hood students.

1968

Sharon Burns Walsh
410-749-0426
sharon.walsh68@gmail.com

Most of the news in this column was sent to me last fall.  Unfortunately, length limits prevented me from including it in the late winter column. My apologies to those who had to wait to see their news appear. Cheryl Bonynge Harker is thrilled that she and husband Dick are expecting a baby boom in the next few years to add to their 34-person combined family including 10 grandchildren and 5 great-grandchildren. They spend lots of time boating with family and friends when they’re in Island Heights, NJ and go to their condo in PA for the colder weather. In the last year and a half they took two extended cruises, one for 78 days to the Far East and another for 35 days on the Voyage of the Vikings. She keeps up with Lucille VanBaaren and admires her stamina as she continues to work at a cosmetics company. She was hoping to see Ginny Munson Hammell ’67 in Florida this past winter and congratulates her on the Virginia Munson Hammell ’67 Trading Room dedicated at Hood in October 2015. When she wrote, she had just communicated with her little sister Linda Ayers ’70 for the first time in years so may soon have more news to report. Sandy Deemer Harra and husband Ed became retirees in June 2013. She occasionally returns to her former school to sub and likes maintaining a connection with that community.  She loves seeing her former students and visiting with the staff, but she enjoys retirement more.   She and Ed have traveled some, usually somewhere where they can snorkel. The Big Island is a favored destination. When she wrote in October 2015, it was 83 degrees at her home in California and they were hoping El Niño would bring relief from a difficult summer of drought and forest fires. “We feel blessed that our little country town has remained fire safe.” Both of her sons live out of state. Matt is in Portland, Oregon and Nathan is in Fulton, Missouri.  Our condolences to Sandy on the death of her mother Joan Pouchot Deemer ’40, P’68, P’81 in May 2015.  Bev Thompson Gardner and husband Bernie are both enjoying retirement although Bernie continues to do consulting work at the School for the Environment at U MASS, Boston.  They live in Pembroke, MA, for the winter and Eastham, MA, on the Cape in the summer. They are both active at their Unitarian/Universalist church.  Son Alan is an engineer at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute; his wife Nora is an artist. Bev has three granddaughters-Ella, 12 years old; Lucy, 9; and Tessa, 5. Her Hood connections at church are Joyce Clarke Hockman ’67 who left before our class arrived, and Meredith Owen Atkinson ’69. She added thanks to Linda Search Atack for the years she served as class columnist. Carol Huntington and husband Al live with four “formerly feral felines” in their 1840s home overlooking the Kennebec River in Bath, ME.  They have been there since 2002, a difficult time for them since four members of Carol’s immediate family died that same year.  Carol still works full time as a social work senior therapist at the local hospital intensive outpatient program and as a hospice social worker in Portland, ME.  She is also an ordained Episcopal Church deacon.  Her career has included both medical social work and parish-based ministry in Boston and northern New Jersey cities. She and Al met 25 year ago when they were both working at a homeless shelter in Hoboken. Carol is a peace activist and toured New England teaching about Palestine which she  visited twice in recent years. She is also a nationally certified nonviolence trainer and has taught courses in seminaries and several schools of social work. In what must be very limited spare time, she is working to reclaim and maintain the formal gardens that were planted by previous owners years ago around their home. Stephanie Negoescu Goble and her husband have been living in San Antonio, TX for over 30 years ever since he retired from the Air Force.  They have 5 children, so she now spends lots of time flying all over the country visiting grandchildren.  Since retiring from teaching high school geometry to the children of wounded warriors at Fort Sam Houston, she invests lots of time in the kitchen preparing all her food from scratch.  She began eating organically several years ago at the urging of her oldest daughter who is a master herbalist.  She is hoping to reconnect with classmates Jane Walters Jasper and Rosemarie Dempsey Curlett.  Finally, from your class columnist, happy 70^th birthday to everyone who has celebrated (or soon will celebrate) that landmark life event this year!

Sharon Burns Walsh
410-749-0426
sharon.walsh68@gmail.com

Sharon Burns Walsh the Class of ’68 is still out there making its mark on the world, but many are definitely taking life a bit more slowly. For my first time in the class columnist role, I emailed classmates whose maiden names started with the letters A through H, so if you didn’t hear from me, then Hood doesn’t have a correct email for you. Please send that information to Hood, and I’ll be sure to contact you for another column. Several who responded sent thanks to Linda Search Atack for loyally serving as class reporter for the last several years. Linda was one of the first to answer my email and says that she retired from child welfare at the end of July and is enjoying a much needed rest and re-charge. She is now turning her attention to major house repairs due to a water pipe leak that she hopes to complete by January. Then she plans to work part-time with teenagers aging out of foster care. Her three grandsons are now 9, 5 and 2 and so much fun to spoil. Two live in the Chapel Hill area and the youngest in northern Virginia. She has been in touch with former roommates Mary Kay Noren and Amy Rosenberg Cornblatt. Mary Kay and Don have sold their home in Easton, Maryland and are moving to a South Carolina island. They continue to have sailing adventures that “sound like a travelogue.” Amy and Marc moved last fall from Philadelphia to the Boston area which is where Amy grew up. Linda adds that the common theme for the three former roommates seems to be “sorting and editing” the accumulation of all the “stuff” they’ve acquired through the years. Rosemarie Dempsey Curlett reports that she is still working as the County Coordinator at the Amy Lynn Ferris Adult Activity Center in Chestertown, Maryland where she has been for 27 years. After a move five years ago closer to Chestertown, John has plenty of ground for his garden. They have one granddaughter, 21 years old, and two grandsons, who are 8 and 11. She stays in touch with Jane Walters Jasper who lives in upstate New York. Sharyn Duffy says she doesn’t have any kids or even a trophy husband but still has 2 horses. In 2014, her 30-year-old horse that she had for 27 years died, which was a terrible loss for her. His replacement from Wisconsin arrived at the end of September after a search she characterized as an “adventure worthy of a short story.” She is hoping he gets along with her mare who “gets to be a cougar.” She also reports with thankfulness that she has completed six years of treating her multiple myeloma holistically and without chemo. Carol Fogler is hoping to provide information and inspiration to young women when they consider career options. She funded the placement of a copy of Finding Justice in every public high school in Maryland. It’s a history of women lawyers in Maryland since 1642. It was published in association with the Maryland Women’s Bar Association Foundation and the University of Baltimore Foundation. Carol still lives in Columbia, Maryland. Living less than an hour from me (Sharon Burns Walsh) in Selbyville, Delaware, Mary (Rita) Rous Hollada wrote that she and Larry are still working but have reduced their schedule to allow a little more discretionary time. They will be married 50 years in December and will celebrate by spending a month next spring in Scotland. She adds that doesn’t make her feel as old as the fact that her oldest grandson was married in October 2015. Rita and I are planning a Hollada-Walsh mini-reunion before the holidays. Still professionally active, Phyllis Gimbel (Schnitman) was promoted to full professor in June 2015 and published a book on school leadership in October 2013. Her husband is on the Faculty of Harvard School of Dental Medicine and has a private practice in implants in Wellesley Hills, Massachusetts, where they live. They also have a home and 88 acres in southern Vermont where they spend a lot of time with their children and 5 grandchildren. As usual, our class overachieved—this time it was in sending news. I have included items this time in the order I received them. Because the class columns are limited in length, I regret that I cannot share news sent by Carol Huntington, Beverly Thompson Gardner, Cheryl Bonynge Harker, and Sandy Deemer Harra. You can look forward to hearing all about them– and others– next time. No more empty columns for THIS class, I promise.

The Class of 1968 needs a new class reporter. Please contact the office of alumni relations at alumoffice@hood.edu if you would like to become the reporter.

Margo Melton Nutt has published James Melton: The Tenor of His Times. James Melton was perhaps the first multi-media performer—concerts, recordings, movies, the Metropolitan Opera, radio and television. The book is a daughter’s attempt to rediscover the fascinating man who was her father. Copies of the book may be ordered through Amazon.com or directly from the author at Margo Melton Nutt, 560 Hawk Pine Road, Norwich, VT 05055 or tenorofhistimes@gmail.com.