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Winter 2012 from the EDITOR We received lots of letters about our trivia request to see how many 25-year varsity head coaches you could name. Nearly three dozen nominations in all…. Well, we did the research and here’s what we learned. First let me say that 25 years is a long time, and not being named to this august group should not be taken as a slight against any of the coaching greats. Among them, the Winter God Len Sargent. Although he came to Taft in 1937, he assisted Coach LaGrange for many years before taking the helm in 1951; he retired in 1969—certainly worth an honorable mention. Also, Lance Odden, who took over for the Winter God and brought lacrosse to Taft, coaching that team until 1979, long after he became headmaster. It’s worth noting that Assistant Headmaster Rusty Davis, who brought home four consecutive New England championships with girls’ soccer, turned in his whistle after only 24 years. At least that’s what Taft Annuals tell me; there is plenty that they didn’t. Some early years do not even list coaches. We called on the Archivist Alison Gilchrist to fill the On the Cover Vision forTaft v Members of the varsity football team celebrate their victory at the New England Championship. Robert Falcetti Please recycle this Bulletin. holes, and here’s what we came up with. If you know differently, we welcome the information! Dick Cobb: Girls’ Basketball 1972–2001 (and still timing games!) Jim Logan: Basketball 1933–63 (time off for WWII and illness, but easily 27 years) Patsy Odden: Girls’ Ice Hockey 1976–2001 John Small: Cross Country 1959–86, Track 1958–87 Larry Stone: Football 1961–96, Baseball 1962–96 John Wynne: Wrestling 1966–2000 And still coaching… Peter Frew ’75: Boys’ Tennis 1986–present* Steve McCabe: Track 1983–present* Steve Palmer: Boys’ Cross Country 1987–present (see page 21) *Sabbatical year included —Julie Reiff WWW Taft on the Web Find a friend’s address or look up back issues of the Bulletin at www.taftalumni.com Visit us on your phone with our mobile-friendly site www.taftschool.org/m What happened at this afternoon’s game? Visit www.taftsports.com Don’t forget you can shop online at www.taftstore.com 800-995-8238 or 860-945-7736 Look up your classmates on the go! x B u l l e t i n Winter 2012 Volume 82, Number 2 Bulletin Staff Director of Development: Chris Latham Editor: Julie Reiff Alumni Notes: Linda Beyus Design: Good Design, LLC www.gooddesignusa.com Proofreader: Nina Maynard Mail letters to: Julie Reiff, Editor Taft Bulletin The Taft School Watertown, CT 06795-2100 U.S.A. juliereiff@taftschool.org Send alumni news to: Linda Beyus Alumni Office The Taft School Watertown, CT 06795-2100 U.S.A. taftbulletin@taftschool.org Deadlines for Alumni Notes: Spring–February 15 Summer–May 15 Fall–August 30 Winter–November 15 Send address corrections to: Sally Membrino Alumni Records The Taft School Watertown, CT 06795-2100 U.S.A. taftrhino@taftschool.org 1-860-945-7777 www.TaftAlumni.com Heads Up The list of Taft faculty and alumni headmasters continues to grow. Henry Pennell, who taught here from 1943 to 1960, went on to head St. Mary’s Hall in San Antonio, Texas, and Peter Becker ’95 was recently named the next headmaster of The Gunnery and Dan Scheibe ’85 of Lawrence Academy. For a complete list, visit www.taftschool.org/headsup. The Taft Bulletin (ISSN 0148-0855) is published quarterly, in February, May, August and November, by The Taft School, 110 Woodbury Road, Watertown, CT 06795-2100, and is distributed free of charge to alumni, parents, grandparents and friends of the school. All rights reserved. 2 Taft Bulletin Winter 2012
Letters Love it? Hate it? Read it? Tell us! We’d love to hear what you think about the stories in this Bulletin. We may edit your letters for length, clarity and content, but please write! Julie Reiff, editor Taft Bulletin 110 Woodbury Road Watertown, CT 06795-2100 or juliereiff@taftschool.org Band on a Truck I am intrigued with the photo of the band in back of a truck in front of Sullivan’s. I used to hang out at Sullivan’s as a wee lad. Mrs. Sullivan was one of the world’s nice ladies. My grandparents’ place was just up the road at the corner of Cutler and Main. We didn’t do anything like that during my tour with the band 1954–57. Phil [Young] came to Taft in 1949 according to my Annual. Looking at the cars and the dress of the kids I suspect it was early in his time there. I would also say that the truck appears to be parked. Look at the posture of the boy on the ground in back of the truck. He isn’t walking. Main St. at that point had two traffic lanes and the truck is parked on the side. The band appears to be decked out in senior sports jackets, a tradition at the time. The Class of ’57 broke that tradition opting for rings instead. Phil Young was one of my favorite people at Taft. Thanks for bringing back some nice memories of him. —Tommy Hickcox ’57 This marvelous photo is so evocative for me, not just because it’s my dad [P.T. Young], but it speaks of early ’50s Main St., Watertown (looking east from the present library), apparently on Memorial Day. That funky grounds crew truck was also enlisted at year’s end to transport the Taft band to the annual feed at Black Rock. We would all pile into the back (imagine the safety factor) replete with hamburgers, hot dogs, whole cases of coca-cola (gold!) and 5-gallon tins of potato chips, courtesy of the kitchen staff. In typical Taft fashion this represented not only a liberation from tired dining room fare, but the sheer exhilaration of flying down Route 6 in cattle-car fashion with visions of the annual feed in our collective future. The archives article by Alison Gilchrist was well researched and entertaining. I make my living in the restoration of furniture so the details were poignant to me. I will pay more attention to the HDT building’s doorways when I return. —Jim Young I just received my fall 2011 Taft Bulletin and noticed the photo of Mr. Logan on page 2. I will enter the competition, although I have lost touch with the school somewhat, having lived in Australia since 1969. I did visit the school once with my then 12-year-old son in 1992 while I was on a visit to my father’s upstate New York home. I was captain of the 1961–62 basketball team, so I guess one of the answers to your trivia question is Mr. Logan. He probably chalked up 25 years as soccer coach as well. I also guess that Mr. Small and Mr. Sargent would be on that list. Pre 1959 I have no idea—there were probably many. I think Mr. Poole left before he would have chalked up 25 years. And perhaps Mr. Odden, although I doubt he would have kept on coaching after he became headmaster. I have recently retired (2009) from teaching high school in Sydney’s Northern Beaches. I coached the girls’ basketball team for 35 of those years, and the baseball/softball teams for 25. My school was Mackellar Girls’ High School in Manly Vale, where I started teaching history and English in 1972. —Jay Owen ’62 ??? The latest Bulletin asks for remembrances of long-term coaches. I recall two others from my era. Len Sargent, a bachelor until late in his career, married while I was at Taft. He coached hockey forever. And John Small, who coached track and cross country. For a long time Small was appreciated by a small coterie of Latin and German scholars and distance runners. It was an austere society that I was privileged to be included in. To this day I remember the obscure Latin sentence painted on the inside door of his second-floor HDT apartment: Aeternumque locus palinuri nomen habebit, which I understand translates as “This place shall forever have the name of Palinurus.” Palinurus was the name of Odysseus’s helmsman, I believe, and was also the name of Small’s sailboat. Cross country, although ostensibly a team sport, was perhaps the most introverted of sports at Taft, and Small appealed to the introverts and loners, affirmed the importance of their marching to a different drummer. These men were bachelors for all or most of their Taft careers; perhaps the closest thing I’ve ever known to monks. I suspect there are not a lot of them still at Taft or at any boarding school. But I think they were important to its history and to its culture at the time, before coeducation. —Jeff Boak ’70 Taft Trivia Prior to the football team winning the New England Class A Championship this fall, when was the last time they took home the title? Email your guess to juliereiff@taftschool.org. Congratulations to Bob Foreman ’70, whose name was drawn from the many entries that correctly identified Jim Logan as a 25-year head coach. Taft Bulletin Winter 2012 3
- Page 1 and 2: Vision forTaft Winter 2012
- Page 3: in this issue B u l l e t i n Winte
- Page 7 and 8: Better Brain Care MONTREAL—After
- Page 9 and 10: In Print A Good and Perfect Gift: F
- Page 11 and 12: Bowlby’s Battle for Round Earth F
- Page 13 and 14: Honoring a Hero Will Keys ’06 Mem
- Page 15 and 16: Club Homework Helpers Taft students
- Page 17 and 18: Inspiration Through Celebration As
- Page 19 and 20: Student Perspectives Mark W. Potter
- Page 21 and 22: y Makkonen and Peucker. Cassie Rusc
- Page 23 and 24: the game in overtime (1-2) in a har
- Page 25 and 26: A Geologist’s Vision forTaft with
- Page 27 and 28: Where is the Taft campus and commun
- Page 29 and 30: Wold Family Chair in Environmental
- Page 31 and 32: Robert Falcetti
- Page 33 and 34: highly motivated future leaders fro
- Page 35 and 36: The Systems Guy Charles Thompson us
- Page 37 and 38: home to his Brooklyn neighborhood a
- Page 39 and 40: from the ARCHIVES Yee-Fun Yin A Tro
Winter 2012<br />
from the EDITOR<br />
We received lots of letters about our trivia<br />
request to see how many 25-year varsity head<br />
coaches you could name. Nearly three dozen<br />
nominations in all…. Well, we did the research<br />
and here’s what we learned.<br />
First let me say that 25 years is a long<br />
time, and not being named to this august<br />
group should not be taken as a slight against<br />
any of the coaching greats. Among them, the<br />
Winter God Len Sargent. Although he came<br />
to <strong>Taft</strong> in 1937, he assisted Coach LaGrange<br />
for many years before taking the helm in<br />
1951; he retired in 1969—certainly worth an<br />
honorable mention.<br />
Also, Lance Odden, who took over for<br />
the Winter God and brought lacrosse to <strong>Taft</strong>,<br />
coaching that team until 1979, long after he<br />
became headmaster.<br />
It’s worth noting that Assistant<br />
Headmaster Rusty Davis, who brought home<br />
four consecutive New England championships<br />
with girls’ soccer, turned in his whistle<br />
after only 24 years.<br />
At least that’s what <strong>Taft</strong> Annuals tell me;<br />
there is plenty that they didn’t. Some early<br />
years do not even list coaches. We called<br />
on the Archivist Alison Gilchrist to fill the<br />
On the Cover<br />
Vision for<strong>Taft</strong><br />
v Members of the<br />
varsity football<br />
team celebrate<br />
their victory at<br />
the New England<br />
Championship.<br />
Robert Falcetti<br />
Please recycle this Bulletin.<br />
holes, and here’s what we came up with.<br />
If you know differently, we welcome the<br />
information!<br />
Dick Cobb: Girls’ Basketball 1972–2001<br />
(and still timing games!)<br />
Jim Logan: Basketball 1933–63<br />
(time off for WWII and illness,<br />
but easily 27 years)<br />
Patsy Odden: Girls’ Ice Hockey 1976–2001<br />
John Small: Cross Country 1959–86,<br />
Track 1958–87<br />
Larry Stone: Football 1961–96,<br />
Baseball 1962–96<br />
John Wynne: Wrestling 1966–2000<br />
And still coaching…<br />
Peter Frew ’75: Boys’ Tennis 1986–present*<br />
Steve McCabe: Track 1983–present*<br />
Steve Palmer: Boys’ Cross Country<br />
1987–present (see page 21)<br />
*Sabbatical year included<br />
—Julie Reiff<br />
WWW<br />
<strong>Taft</strong> on the Web<br />
Find a friend’s address or look<br />
up back issues of the Bulletin<br />
at www.taftalumni.com<br />
Visit us on your phone with<br />
our mobile-friendly site<br />
www.taftschool.org/m<br />
What happened at this<br />
afternoon’s game?<br />
Visit www.taftsports.com<br />
Don’t forget you can shop online<br />
at www.taftstore.com<br />
800-995-8238 or 860-945-7736<br />
Look up your classmates<br />
on the go! x<br />
B u l l e t i n<br />
Winter 2012<br />
Volume 82, Number 2<br />
Bulletin Staff<br />
Director of Development:<br />
Chris Latham<br />
Editor: Julie Reiff<br />
Alumni Notes: Linda Beyus<br />
Design: Good Design, LLC<br />
www.gooddesignusa.com<br />
Proofreader: Nina Maynard<br />
Mail letters to:<br />
Julie Reiff, Editor<br />
<strong>Taft</strong> Bulletin<br />
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Taft</strong> <strong>School</strong><br />
Watertown, CT 06795-2100 U.S.A.<br />
juliereiff@taftschool.org<br />
Send alumni news to:<br />
Linda Beyus<br />
Alumni Office<br />
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Taft</strong> <strong>School</strong><br />
Watertown, CT 06795-2100 U.S.A.<br />
taftbulletin@taftschool.org<br />
Deadlines for Alumni Notes:<br />
Spring–February 15<br />
Summer–May 15<br />
Fall–August 30<br />
Winter–November 15<br />
Send address corrections to:<br />
Sally Membrino<br />
Alumni Records<br />
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Taft</strong> <strong>School</strong><br />
Watertown, CT 06795-2100 U.S.A.<br />
taftrhino@taftschool.org<br />
1-860-945-7777<br />
www.<strong>Taft</strong>Alumni.com<br />
Heads Up<br />
<strong>The</strong> list of <strong>Taft</strong> faculty and alumni headmasters continues to grow. Henry Pennell, who<br />
taught here from 1943 to 1960, went on to head St. Mary’s Hall in San Antonio, Texas,<br />
and Peter Becker ’95 was recently named the next headmaster of <strong>The</strong> Gunnery and Dan<br />
Scheibe ’85 of Lawrence Academy. For a complete list, visit www.taftschool.org/headsup.<br />
<strong>The</strong> <strong>Taft</strong> Bulletin (ISSN 0148-0855)<br />
is published quarterly, in February,<br />
May, August and November, by <strong>The</strong><br />
<strong>Taft</strong> <strong>School</strong>, 110 Woodbury Road,<br />
Watertown, CT 06795-2100, and is<br />
distributed free of charge to alumni,<br />
parents, grandparents and friends of<br />
the school. All rights reserved.<br />
2 <strong>Taft</strong> Bulletin Winter 2012
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