Although many of us may have "lost a step toward first" athletically, a number of our classmates are as active as ever in the writing and publishing of books. Our "literary corner" portion of this website seems to be expanding. Of particular note are the first two memoirs listed below by two of the four African-American members of our class.

• Class Poet Laureate, Tom Greening, has frequently written poems pertinent to matters of current interest. Here is his poetic perspective on drone warfare:

  MY DRONE I know that I am not alone in wishing I had my own drone. I'd fly it here, I'd fly it there, I'd fly my drone most everywhere. Especially I'd like to scare small children who presume to dare to live their simple childish lives while I determine who survives. I'll be the ruler of the sky, and with my drone I'll sanctify the steady march toward victory by drone-empowered saints like me. Tom Greening




• This website now contains an extensive collection of Tom Greening's poems written over a period of years including two poems specifically in honor of the recent 60^th Reunion.
  
  
• Dan Callahan has published not one, but two books this fall. One is a memoir, In Search of the Good: A Life in Bioethics (MIT Press) and the other is a collection of essays over the years, The Roots of Bioethics: Health, Progress, Technology, Death (Oxford University Press).
  
  
• Rear Admiral Joe Callo has established an outstanding reputation as a naval historian. His most recent book entitled "The Sea Was Always There", has recently been published by Fireship Press. To read a foreword to the book written by John Lehman, click here.
  
  
• Nathan Garrett's recently-published memoir, "A Palette Not a Portrait" is now available from Amazon. The flyleaf abstract notes:

  "This memoir starts with humorous but honest glimpses of this mostly middle class and mostly African American North Carolina family. It contains revealing stories about the author's life at Yale from 1948 to 1952 and his unusual experiences in the military. The setting then shifts to Detroit and descriptions of involvement in the "numbers racket", fighting off rivals for the hand of his wife of now 52 years and becoming the 65th African American CPA in the nation. The sections that recount his return to North Carolina in 1962 are filled with insights on black business, the civil rights and antipoverty struggles, Historically Black Colleges, social and civic organizations and his pioneering work in public practice and in the regulation of public accountancy nationally. The concluding sections are an essay on his quest to understand God and religion and a thoughtful dialogue on love and marriage."

• John Richard (Dick) Cooper's memoir "My Life — One Stone in the Great Wall," not yet in print, deals with the significant changes and progress made regarding race and gender issues during his lifetime and the problems that still remain. To read the entire prologue of Dick's book click here.
  
  
• The two remarkable memoirs above seem to demand a reprise of an essay by their roommate, Dr. Charles Payne, entitled "Retribution, A Remembrance" that appeared on this website shortly after Charlie's untimely death in 2007.
  
  
• Dick Thompson announces that his third book, "Destiny's Journey - Homeward Bound," is now published and is available for purchase. Purchase details are given on Dick's Classmate Activities page.
  
  

(Well okay, most of the demanding was done by Alan Stamm.) The magic jukebox that will play all your favorite Whiff songs is now back in operation, and it won't even require you to put in a nickel. Just click here to see the Whiffs as they were in 1952 and at the 55th reunion, then click the song title you want to hear on the jukebox.

Dr. Richard Rifkind and his wife Carole co-produced and co-directed “Naturally Obsessed: the making of a scientist,” a one hour documentary film showing the training of young scientists and their role in the process of discovery. Their film was given an award from the National Academy of Science for excellence in the communication of science. To read more about the film, click here.

Clovis Heimsath, architect, artist and author has been busy. His architectural firm's classroom addition to the Austin Independent School District's Langford Elementary School features some interesting "green building" components; click here for more detail.

To see what some of your other classmates are doing, click on "Classmate Activities."

One of the webmaster's saddest tasks is posting the names of recently deceased classmates on the necrology pages which list their names in alphabetically and by date of death. To date, 502 of our classmates have perished. Here are the names of those who have left us in the past year.