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CLASS NOTES
Jim Shaw Bennett Weinberg has authored, with Bonnie K. Bealer, The World of Caffeine: The Science and Culture of the World’s Most Popular Drug (Routledge, 2001), “the first book in any language to tell the complete cultural, social, historical, scientific and medical account of a drug used regularly by more than 90 percent of the people on earth. The book has been favorably reviewed by the New England Journal of Medicine, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Wired, Food and Wine, the London Evening Standard, the London Guardian, etc., and was the subject of a major feature article in The New Yorker (July 30, 2001). I was recently interviewed by Scott Simon on NPR’s Weekend Edition. Would love to hear from classmates and especially to learn of experiences with caffeine.” Write Bennett at baw@bawinc.com. These days there can be more than caffeine keeping some people awake. This class’s last column was devoted to September 11, but other classes are doing so in this issue instead. I am keeping this column short to give them more space.
Paul S. Appelbaum Unlike several College classes, we were spared the loss of classmates at the hands of the terrorists on September 11. But it took a bit of luck to do it. Bill Geissler’s ’77 office was on the 25th floor of Tower 2. He writes: “I was on a New Jersey Transit train arriving in Hoboken when the second aircraft crashed through the second tower. All of my company’s employees were evacuated safely, although we lost one passenger on the United flight from Boston.” Jim Sabella, a partner in the law firm of Sidley Austin Brown & Wood, also had offices in the World Trade Center. Fortunately, he was seeing a client in midtown at the fateful hour. His firm, too, lost one employee. Echoing an experience that many of our classmates must have had, William Rochelle ’69 writes, “Our family is OK. However, six fathers of children at my son’s school died.” We all were victims of the terror on September 11, no matter where we were.
Barry Etra In the wake of September 11, all else seemed to pale; a new form of communiqué appeared in a CCT envelope, though — a short list of classmates with some shorter notes attached, but all were given the status of “unharmed.” This was a good thing. From the list: Dave Colangelo is still living in Northern Virginia and working in Washington, D.C.; John Cusker resides in California but was in NYC on September 9; Nick Iversen works in midtown. Peter Herger says, “Heal, beloved city; I know Columbia and Columbians will be helping in many ways...” Don Jackson also is “alive and well” and continues, “Remember, we will win, but it will not be free of sacrifice. God bless America.” Lorin Walker, Frank Canosa and Mayer Grosser were simply “unharmed.” On a foreign note, Drew Gerstle studied and taught in Japan and Australia from the late ’70s and since 1993 has been Professor of Japanese Studies at the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London. He’s been married since 1976, and his son, Christopher, is in his final year at Leeds University. His book Chikamatsu: Five Late Plays was published this year by Columbia University Press. He mentioned that the new Research Center for Asian and African Literatures at SOAS has established several links with current Columbia faculty. And so we strive on. Peace go with us, brothers.
Fred Bremer The recent dearth of letters and e-mails has made assembling this column more challenging. Fortunately, I have been able to enlist the help of my spouse and other classmates to update you on the latest news from the gang. My wife, Sue, came home the other day from the Barnard Toddler Center (a program for 2-year-olds that my daughter, Katie, is attending) and related that she met Richard Briffault (associate dean at the Law School) who was dropping off his son, Jonathan. The head of the program was surprised that Sue and Richard knew each other, and then heard that Richard and I graduated from the College in 1974. One of the assistant instructors overheard the exchange and said, “My father graduated from the College in 1974!” It was Columbia sophomore Katie Meehan, daughter of Bill Meehan (a partner at McKinsey & Co. in San Francisco). I guess it is getting harder to separate the various generations of Columbians. This might lead you to presume that Richard and I were the last two to add new members to the extended family of the Class of ’74. Astute readers of this column would already remember that Jonathan Cuneo (a D.C. lawyer) and his wife, Mara Liasson, have a daughter who is now a year old. But now I receive a birth announcement from Isaac Palmer (an entertainment lawyer in Los Angeles) and his wife, Pattie, proclaiming the birth of their third child, Avery Roger Palmer, in early October 2001. (The holder of the “earliest member of the Class of ’74 family” is sure to evolve — please write or e-mail new candidates.) Evidence of a different type of fertility came in the mail from Italy, where Alberico Cetti Serbelloni Editore announced that they had published the first large-scale monograph dedicated to the portraiture of Timothy Greenfield-Sanders. It cites Timothy for having “created the most imposing portrait gallery of famous faces in recent times.” Not a surprise, as among the 350 published portraits are Lou Reed, Jimmy Carter, Monica Lewinsky, Steven Spielberg, Willem De Kooning and Muhammad Ali. (It is rumored that I’m coming up soon on the list.) You can get a copy at the Museum of Modern Art or the more plebian Amazon.com. I end this tale with two vignettes of two lawyer classmates who had different dislocations related to the attack of September 11. The first involves Frank Bruno, the only classmate I know of who worked in the World Trade Center. Frank, a partner at the former law firm of Brown & Wood (which was recently rechristened Sidney Austin Brown & Wood) is alive and well and relocated to a temporary office at 52nd Street and Third Avenue in midtown Manhattan. The other story deserves its own paragraph! If it is early September and the world has just been shocked by the assault of the World Trade Center, and if most Americans are afraid of flying and anything involving the Muslim sphere, what do you think Larry Silverman did? Well, this Covington & Burling litigation partner delayed his trip two weeks and then proceeded on to a hiking adventure in Ladakh, in the India Himalayas close to war-torn Kashmir and a mere scud from Afghanistan. There he climbed Mount Stok Kangri, some 19,000 feet above sea level. “There were troops all over the place,” said fearless Larry. No kidding. You don’t have to father another child, shoot a famous photo or take a foolhardy adventure to be mentioned here. Just mail or e-mail me a factoid of your or another classmate’s mundane news and your classmates will be felicitous!
Randy Nichols As I compile these notes, the events of September 11 and their aftermath still weigh heavily on us, and the future is unclear. In the days following September 11, I had the opportunity to communicate with some of you, and it was very good to be in touch with you. Some of the notes that follow come from those communications. I ran into Barry Concool and his daughter, Micaela, in October at the Philadelphia area introduction to Columbia reception. Because Micaela has applied to the College for admission next fall, Barry will not be interviewing prospective students this year. Michael Dulberg is well and practicing law in Phoenix. Robert Katz attended the Society of Columbia Graduates dinner in October. The society is an organization composed of graduates of Columbia’s undergraduate schools who have given at least 10 consecutive years of service to the University as alumni. Read on for more information about the society and the contributions that the Class of ’75 makes to it. Remon Lapid was away from his office at 111 Broadway, 11–2 blocks from the WTC, and is one of our classmates who checked in on the September 11 status page created by the College (www.college.columbia.edu/wtc/). Paul Argenti, Michael Bergmann, Andrew Gordon, Jeffrey Hon, Jeffrey Kessler, Ira Malin, Albert Mrozik, Gavin Nichols, George Robinson, Jeff Schnader and Richard Stein also checked in. Randolph S. McLaughlin, professor of law at Pace in White Plains, N.Y., was recently honored for helping Westchester County’s African-American community. He was recognized for his work as founder-director of the school’s Social Justice Center. Terry Mulry and his wife, Anne, enjoyed a September breakfast with our common Columbia adviser (in religion), Paul Valliere. It was great to hear from Terry, who was the best man at my 1975 wedding in St. Paul’s Chapel, and also to get an update on Paul and his family. Robert C. Schneider has been a board member of the Society of Columbia Graduates since 1998 and also was a member of the Dinner Committee for the Society’s 92nd Annual Dinner on October 11. The Great Teacher Awards for undergraduate teaching at the College and Engineering are presented at the society’s dinner each year. Also in October, Bob became a sustaining member of the New York State Bar Association after 23 years as a regular member. Dwight Valentine watched the events of September 11 on TV at his Boston law office. He writes: “My heart is with everyone, then, now, always. Be strong; stay the course; love one another.” Peter Zisson was traveling in Phoenix on September 11. He rented a car upon arrival the previous Saturday and so was able to drive home to Memphis, leaving Phoenix on Thursday morning and arriving in Memphis on Friday night. Classmates and friends, when you receive this issue in January 2002, at the end of the holiday season, I hope it finds you and your families happy and healthy and enjoying the new year. Best wishes to you all.
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