University of Mary Washington - Index

University of Mary Washington - summer08 - Index

64
CLASS NOTES
Mr. Walther. She bikes on trails in
Pennsylvania, Maryland, New York, and
New Jersey. Her daughter, Ann, six Jack
Russells, one fox hound, and three horses
are all fine.
Ann Brooks Coutsoubinas and
Speros are well. This is her last year of
teaching! Gregory is still in Astoria, and
Anastasia lives and works in New Jersey.
Audrey Dubetsky Doyle bought
a new house in Temecula, Calif. In
February, she and Tom went to Pismo
Beach and toured wineries, and in May
they went to Hawaii. In August, they
went to Brussels, then took a two-week
cruise along the Rhine. Children and
grandchildren are thriving: Tiffany’s
daughter, Cynthia, will graduate from
high school next spring; Thomas’
children, Emma and Owen, are growing
like weeds.
Mary Carolyn Jamison Gwinn
and Burt sent a great picture of daughter
Mary Catherine and Mike’s first-grade
son, Mason, 7.
Marianne Carrano Raphaely and
Russ are fine and are enjoying their
grandchildren. Russ, still working,
received an endowed academic chair
from Children’s Hospital for Critical
Care Medicine. Their travels included
Disney World with son Christopher’s
family, Chicago for the AMA annual
meeting, Bermuda in August with the
entire family, the Homestead in October,
and Hawaii in November. Everyone was
in Connecticut for Thanksgiving and
New Jersey for Christmas.
Eleanor Markham Old’s Arthur
wrote that he attended Grandparents
Day at St. Patrick’s School for grandsons
Parker and Taylor. Son Jim is consulting
for Booz Allen Hamilton, and Beth is
nursing at King’s Daughter Hospital.
Arthur continues to be on the substitute
list at Lancaster County Career and Tech
Center and is active in the Lancaster
County chapter of the Pennsylvania
Society of the Sons of the Revolution.
Irene Piscopo Rodgers took her
annul skiing trip to Breckinridge, and
then she was off to Las Vegas and the
Netherlands. There, she spent a day
cruising canals and waterways with Dutch
friends on their antique boat. In March,
Don had an aortic valve replacement and
a triple bypass, and, Irene said, he is now
a new person with a lot more energy.
Irene was in Fort Lauderdale in August,
and they went to Pittsburgh to spend
Thanksgiving with family.
Barbara White Ellis has a barn
full of happy horses, but Babs is the one
mending fences because her husband,
Allen, had knee replacement surgery.
All went well, and he helps with general
maintenance. Babs volunteers one day a
week at the local vet, attends church altar
guild, and is in the local dressage club.
Jane Tucker Broadbooks’ husband,
John, received a life achievement award
in landscape architecture last November.
He sold his firm but stayed on to work
for fun. Son Jon Karl is the executive
editor of the State Journal Register in
Springfield, Ill. Kathy and children
planned to leave Utica in March to join
him. Jane talks to JoNeal Hendricks
Scully, Molly Bradshaw Clark, Susan
Horan of California, and Mary Stump
Harrell, who lives 40 minutes away.
Geraldine Jenks Winston, my
Mary Washington roommate for several
years, passed away in January. She
succumbed to progressive supranuclear
palsy, PSP, a rare and incurable brain
disorder that has symptoms of palsy
and Alzheimer’s. Through its slow,
determined progression, her husband,
Addison, was by her side. She left two
sons and daughters-in-law and five
grandchildren, and she spent many
happy years in Roanoke.
By the time you read this, class
volunteers will have met several times
to plan our 50th reunion, beginning
Thursday, May 28th, 2009. That evening,
we will have an informal get-together
at Renato’s restaurant, as on our 45th.
We will reserve a block of rooms and a
hospitality room at the Hilton Garden
Inn.Volunteers for our class are Irene
Piscopo Rodgers, Dodie Reeder
Hruby, Kay Rowe Hayes, Emily
Babb Carpenter, Marianne Carrano
Raphaely, Jane Howard Buchanan,
Edith Sheppard Ott, and me. We
welcome additional help!
Our participation in reunions has
always been above average. If you have
never been before, this is the time. We
don’t care if your hair is white or you’ve
gained 40 pounds, we just want to see
you. Plan to be there longer than just
Saturday, and please consider your
monetary gift. For the 50th we should
strive to meet a goal that sets us apart.
You will hear more as plans are made.
When your reservation card arrives next
year, set that weekend aside.
1960
Karen Larsen Nelson
2550 S. Ellsworth Road, Unit 399
Mesa, AZ 85209
karenlarsen60@alumni.umw.edu
Jody Campbell Close
3653 Kingswood Court
Clermont, FL 34711
jodycampbellclose60@alumni.umw.edu
Jody Close is ecstatic that her Marine
son is home from his tour of duty in
Iraq. She is in the throes of a campaign
to raise funds to build a new community
library in Clermont, Fla., where she is
president of the Friends of the Library.
She also is beginning to work on ideas
for our 50th reunion and is looking for
committee members. Don’t be bashful
– join her. As of March, she was looking
forward to a 10-day fall tour of Ireland.
Karen Nelson and husband
Darrell had a full winter season of
choreographed ballroom round dancing.
They spent April and May getting
organized at home, and by Memorial
Day, relocated themselves and their
two kitties to their trailer in Show Low,
Ariz., three hours away, where it’s cooler
UNIVERSITY OF MARY WASHINGTON MAGAZINE����������������
and where they are involved in all the
activities their summer resort provides.
Betty Ditmars Prosser, in her 23rd
year with Mary Kay Cosmetics, reports
all is well in the Prosser household. In
February, she was hospitalized for a “hip
revision” and therapy; her artificial hip
misbehaved and needed readjusting, but
she is now home and doing fine. The
Prossers’ daughter and her family live
in Watertown, N.Y., so they see them
and their 6-year-old twin grandsons
frequently. They miss visits with their
son, a Buddhist Tendai priest as well as
a businessman who lives in Los Angeles;
he wrote a book about his attendance at
the Tendai seminary in Kyoto, Japan.
Mamie Sue
Howlett Scott has
retired twice from
challenging careers –
once from 11 years of
teaching elementary
school, and again
from 22 years as a
critical care nurse. She
has worked with her
local theater group
and says she has fond
memories of the Mary
Washington Players. She has two grown
children, whom she visits often.
Gaye Roberts Olsen has advanced
osteoarthritis in her knees and cannot
have surgery, so a purple walker with
a seat is her new “friend” and mode of
transportation. Gaye went to Texas twice
last year to visit her mother, who is in
a care facility and doing well. Gaye has
lived in Boise, Idaho, for 32 years – 16
years married, 16 single. Gaye arranged
a successful estate sale and put her
mother’s home on the market from long
distance – no small feat! Last Christmas,
she took a riverboat cruise on the
Columbia River and enjoyed a jet boat
ride through Hell’s Canyon.
From their new home in Atlanta,
Patty Garvin Dyke and husband John
traveled to Mount Joy, Pa., Charles
Town, W.Va., and Niceville, Fla., to
celebrate 100-year birthdays and a 65th
wedding anniversary with older family
members. She says that thinking of our
upcoming 50th reunion brings back lots
of memories.
Christmas found Janet Hook Foley
at her son’s home in Leesburg, Fla.,
with her three great-grandchildren. She
still writes for the local paper, but has
considered retiring.
Gray Schaefer Dodson is happy
to report that her art work was juried
and selected for inclusion in the
UMW Centennial Exhibition, which
was displayed March through June in
the Ridderhof Martin Gallery next to
Seacobeck Hall. She also had a solo show
in Williamsburg in April and May. We
hope to have some of her paintings on
display at our 50th reunion in 2010.
Sue Smyth Lam lives in Winchester,
Va., where she and husband Larry
had moved to be near her 94-year-old
mother. Sadly, Larry passed away in
December from pancreatic cancer.
They had been married for 10 years
and enjoyed many fun times and trips
together. Between them, they have five
children and 11 grandchildren.
Golfing in Florida last winter was
great for Nancy Carruthers Meeker.
She and her husband attended a
championship tournament; they play
bridge and are taking lessons to “sharpen
their knowledge of the new conventions.”
Cyd Day Getchell and Mary
Martin ’62 have teamed up as
co-directors of Lakota Educational
Initiatives, Cyd’s nonprofit foundation to
benefit the Rosebud Indian Reservation
in South Dakota, where poverty and
illiteracy are rampant among the Lakota
Sioux. Cyd has designed a T-shirt and has
taken her first shot at designing a website.
The artwork of Gray Schaefer
Dodson ’60 was juried and
selected for inclusion in the UMW
Centennial Exhibition, which was
displayed March through June in
the Ridderhof Martin Gallery.
Elaine Venn Smith’s husband died
suddenly six years ago, but she continues
to enjoy life in the home they built at
Wintergreen Resort in Nellysford, Va.
She visits her son in Florida in the winter
and enjoys frequent visits with another
son, a daughter, and four grandchildren
who live nearby. The U.Va. School of
Nursing is working on its 50th reunion,
she said, but in the meantime the group
is enjoying small gatherings. At least
10 of them were planning an April trip
to the Outer Banks of North Carolina.
Elaine is still trying to locate Pat Durlin
Parks and Beth Deem Perico.
Nancy Moncure Deiss and Bill still
enjoy going to work every day. They
planned a trip to the Cotswolds in the
spring and also enjoy tightly-scheduled
trips to Virginia and North Carolina
to visit children and grandchildren,
who are busy with organized sports.
In the summer, they will return to the
Caribbean to swim, snorkel, and “catch
up on piles of reading.”
Last winter, Jan Latven Allnutt,
husband Bob, and 10 friends got a
license from the government and
traveled to Havana to dispense overthe-counter
medications at various
synagogues and churches. Jan jokes that
their biggest success was getting Fidel
Castro to resign. On their way home
from Florida in March, Emy Steinberg
Hyans and her husband spent a week
with the Allnutts.
Joyce Jefferies Kendall’s husband is
writing a book based on letters that his
great-great-grandfather wrote during the
Civil War. Joyce has been his research
assistant, and they have been traveling to
different places connected with the war.
Mid-March found Betsy Hopkins
Hays and Rusty at an Orlando church
conference and then in Greenville, S.C.,
for visits with doctors and friends. In
April, they planned to visit Jude Ross