On behalf of my classmates, we send an incalculable amount of thanks and best wishes to Janice Kassman, whose singular talents and loving energy were vital to our success on Mayflower Hill. * Bob Ryan sums it up, “Going to miss Dean Kassman, who saved my career at Colby with her concern and dedication.” * Pam Ellis “wouldn’t even have known the opportunity to show her watercolors if good friend and personal cheerleader Bob Ryan hadn’t dropped her name to the organizers” of the Bates, Bowdoin and Colby College alumni art show at the Thomas Moser Furniture Gallery in Freeport in July. Pam’s son Connor will begin studying audio engineering this fall at the New England School of Communications in Bangor. * Terri Lewis ’83 and John Clevenger celebrated their 25th anniversary in Paris, then headed to London to see the Patriots play the Rams at Wembley Stadium. Terri runs her own PR company, and John recently traded a small consulting firm partnership to help take a larger firm public. Weekly travel takes him to L..A, Nashville, or Chicago—where he would love classmates to be his “business dinner!” * Nancy Welsh Isbell’s son Brian graduated from Middlebury with a degree in environmental studies and geographical information systems. * Peter Cocciardi’s daughter Emily is a junior at St. Joseph’s College of Maine, playing soccer and majoring in elementary education. Son Matt graduated from Bates and was a field representative for Sen. Scott Brown’s re-election campaign. * Joel Harris’s son got married in August. He and his bride teach at Connecticut’s Avon Old Farms School. Joel’s middle daughter is putting her Smith art degree to work as an artist/waitress/nanny/punk rocker in Northampton, Mass., while his youngest daughter starts at Conn. College this fall. * Debby Bartlett Smist and husband Peter traveled to Italy for their 25th anniversary. * Alexander Jones changed coasts and now manages all information technologies activity for Heath Tecna Aerospace in Bellingham, Wash., one of the foremost suppliers of interior products for the passenger aircraft industry. * Brigitte Raquet Farrell became certified as a personal fitness trainer and now works at the local YMCA in Westminster, Md. She also “totally loves” running her own business, In Balance Fitness (inbalancefitness.org). * Kathy Dornish DuGrenier and husband Robert had an amazing time in beautiful Istanbul last summer, installing several large chandeliers, a glass sushi bar, and many other light fixtures and glass sculptures that Robert created/produced for the Divan Hotel in Taksim Square (dugrenier.com/dugrenier/Divan_Istanbul.html). The DuGreniers spent their sixth-grade son’s April vacation in Matapalo on the Osa Peninsula of Costa Rica. “Lush, tropical rainforest, four types of monkeys swinging through the yard, and scarlet macaws dropping beach almonds on the roof.” * You can’t make that sh*t up, or this: Yesterday I went shopping for a mesh pencil cup at Staples in Waltham. They were sold out.
Fall 2012