![[1962 Class Ring]](../images/62_ring.gif)
Received a short message from Roger Sullivan by e-mail in response to my inquiry about ERIM in the last Class Notes column. Roger left ERIM to accept an exciting new opportunity at IDA before Jack Walker became acting president at ERIM. Thanks, Roger, we are glad to learn that you are now "on-line" with MIT1962 and hope to hear more about your experiences in the Washington, D.C. area. If I'm not mistaken, Roger, Jack, Ed Feustel and yours truly were all in the same freshman section in 1958-59. It's a real pleasure to keep in touch with the old "gang" after all these years.
Alan Kotok is also on MIT1962, and his "best" e-mail address is kotok@memit.enet.dec.com While casually looking through a book at the MIT Museum on computer hackers, I noticed that Alan is given credit as being one of the notable early hackers while an undergraduate at MIT. Perhaps Alan can tell us how he became so famous, and how that experience has contributed to his professional success.
The following message came in on the internet just after I had completed the last column, so I'm passing it along before it gets lost on the information superhighway.
After 5 years in the writing, Tom Sheahen has completed his Magnum Opus, entitled "Introduction to High Temperature Superconductors,"which is to be published by Plenum Press in October, 1994. Tom hopes all his classmates will but the book out of general loyalty, or better yet, because they actually want to know something about this field of technology. The book is tutorial in style, aimed at engineers and managers, rather than limited to MIT physicists. Tom's major hope is that it will be used in college courses about high temperature superconductivity. On a more personal note, Tom continues to be very active in refereeing amateur ice hockey, a skill he developed by playing intramurals on the MIT outdoor rink behind the old Briggs field house. After 35 years as a referee, there is general agreement (among mathematicians and players alike) that Tom's talents as a referee are billions of times greater than they were as a player in 1959-1962. After reading recently about the trials and tribulations of officials in little league sports, I hope for Tom's sake that the ice hockey fans don't get quite as riled at the officials as they seem to become in baseball, football, soccer, and other amateur sports.
Peter Maas sends his greetings from Scotland with the news that the MIT hack of the campus patrol car got publicity world wide! There was a lovely picture and caption in the GUARDIAN newspaper "over here in Great Britain." The picture now hangs with pride of pinboard place outside Peter's office at Strathclyde University (Glascow, Scotland) in the Physics & Applied Physics department where he has taught, done research, administered almost anything, etc. since 1970. Peter says that it is a typical academic life .... do it all yourself. FYI, the actual mock-up of the campus patrol car used in the hack will be on display in the MIT Museum, where it has found a happy home along with one of the plastic cows from the Hilltop Steak House on U.S. Route 1 in Saugus.
Phil Schmidt comments that one of the wonders of cyberspace has finally occurred - "After all these years of being too lazy to send in any class news, your (class secretary's) persistent presence in my (e-mail) mailbox has finally got the best of me!" Phil is entering his 25th year as a faculty member in mechanical engineering at the University of Texas in Austin. He really enjoys the academic life and wouldn't think of leaving it. He is teaching in the thermal systems program and doing research in microwave heating for industrial applications - these activities have kept him beneficially occupied for lo these many years. Weekends are spent enjoying music and the scenic beauty of the Texas hill country. Phil and his wife, Donna, have just passed a milestone in their lives: graduated their first kid from college, and have two more in the pipeline. Now with all the kids out of the house, Donna's decided to go back to college to get a Master's degree. Phil is considering the possibility of going back to graduate school in Medicine so that the entire family can sign over all of their worldly possessions to the student loan fund. They calculate about 10 more years of tuition payments.
Phil spent a weekend visiting Pete Neal and his wife Merrie in Buffalo, NY. Pete's been with Moog Corporation (in hi-tech electro- hydraulic control systems) as a senior tech staff member and manager for about 20 years, after stints with Bell helicopter in Texas and Calspan in Buffalo. Pete and Merrie have a beautiful home on the shores of Lake Erie, two boys and a girl (more accurately, two men and a woman), and a golden retriever. This past May they finished the college routine in grand style by graduating not one but two of their brood. The third graduated several years ago and is gainfully employed. Pete seems to be experiencing a slight case of fiscal disorientation (read positive bank balance), but the family seems to be coping with this situation nicely. Both Phil and Pete send their best regards to the '62 crowd and look forward to hearing about our continuing adventures as we successfully navigate around the road kill along the information superhighway.
The latest mailing from the MIT MUSEUM SHOP includes an ad for the "Smoot T-Shirt" with the explanation: "Smoots (for the uninitiated)are the painted markers on the bridge that crosses the Charles River at MIT. The Smoot legend goes back to 1958 when Oliver Smoot '62, the Lamda Chi Alpha fraternity pledge, was plunked down from one end of the bridge to the other, thus establishing its length at 364.4 Smoots plus one ear long. For the last thirty(-five) years his fraternity has maintained the tradition by repainting the original Smoots. The 100% cotton T-shirt is wrapped, front and back, with Smoots. M, L, XL Item #1070 $14.95 plus tax for MA residents.
John Banzaf, our famous anti-tobacco crusader and law professor, has been back in the spotlight vocalizing and orchestrating criticism of tobacco company executives on a network news show after the nationally televised Congressional hearings on nicotine in cigarettes.
Bill Koch has moved out of the acting- president's job at Kendall Square Research with the appointment of a new president, and has remained on the Sports pages with his yachting victories over Dennis Conner in the 150th anniversary regatta of the New York Yacht Club out of Newport, RI.
Hank McCarl
Department of Economics
University of Alabama at Birmingham
Birmingham, Alabama 35294-4460
U.S.A.
phone: 1-205-934-8833
FAX: 1-205-975-6234 or 1-205-934-1318
email:
hmccarl@worldnet.att.net
BUSF038@uabdpo.dpo.uab.edu
HMCCARL@mail.business.uab.edu
or 0004241803@MCIMAIL.COM