Hello, Class of ’79! Hope all is well with you and yours. I am sitting here on a rainy, icy Lincoln, ME, day wishing for summer — not spring — mud and black flies are not exciting!
One of the things we discussed at the Reunion was a class gift in honor of our 50th. Some gift suggestions were a tree, a sculpture, or a bench. If you have an opinion or another idea, send me an email or put it on the class Facebook page. Also, I would really like to put a group photo of all the people who attended in this column. If you have a copy, please email it to me.
I have not written about people in our class who have passed away, but I am going to tell you about Larry Gering. Larry was a forestry grad who retired as an associate professor of forestry and environmental conservation at Clemson University. In 2017, Larry was awarded a national forestry teaching award from the Society of American Foresters — the Carl Alwin Schenck Award for teaching excellence in the field of forestry education. He was a forest biometrician and retired from Clemson University after his 34th forestry summer camp in June of 2019. Larry connected with me before our 40th Reunion. He was on the committee and was working on getting forestry grads to attend. He was so excited about the Reunion and about his plans for moving back to Maine to enjoy his retirement. It was very sad that he didn’t have much time to enjoy it.
Chuck Crowell writes: “I retired from Caterpillar, Inc. after 45 years at the end of January 2024. My time there was spent in research (a fair amount on forestry machines), small machine product development — where we lived in England for four and a half years — and product safety and compliance. I was the ISO/TC127 ‘earthmoving machinery’ chair for eight years (I started participating in standards development in 2006 and still do currently to a smaller level). I am currently the chair of ISO/TC145/SC3 ‘graphical symbols for use on equipment’ (side note: once I was working on symbols for laundry instructions for clothing — Terrie (my spouse) was amazed but also looked at me sideways . . . 🙂 perhaps they are not as clear to everyone). I worked with great people around the world and saw places I never dreamed of traveling to. In retirement, we still live in Trivoli, IL — and are doing occasional travel, in some cases places I have been, but Terrie didn’t get to go, and looking for places neither of us has been. October 2024 was Ivalo, Finland, in Lapland for Northern Lights 68+ degrees N and ‘the green lady, she came a dancing.’ I am still active in our local fire department as an EMT/firefighter (33 years).”
Dale T. Phillips released A Great Reckoning, the seventh novel in the Maine-based Zack Taylor mystery series — his 36th book overall. Guess those writing seminars with Stephen King ’70, back when he taught at the University of Maine for a year, have paid off! Dale’s first poetry collection, Madness in a Minor Key, was published this past spring by Genretarium Publishing. He also signed books at the South Portland Barnes and Noble this spring.
Please send me your news — trips, retirements, grandkids, awards. We enjoy hearing from you!