Wabash College - Class of 1991

We just received word that there are 60 days left in the College's fiscal year 2006-2007. The Wabash Development folks have begun posting an online Honor Roll of Alumni donors, which lists alumni who have made gifts to the College in “real-time,” reflecting gifts processed through the previous business day.

Our check of the list at http://www.wabash.edu/alumni/honorroll#class1991 shows that 61 members of our class have given to Wabash so far this year. This means we'll need "40 for 40": 40 more of you to reach 40% giving for the class. (If we achieve this, by the way, we will eclipse the highest number of total donors from last year.)

Each time Kip and I have the opportunity to make contact with the Wabash community, we see the tremendous influence it has on its students, faculty, administration, parents, and yes, definitely in its alumni. Wabash not only opens that doors to dream big, but it also facilitates the connections to make those dreams happen.

We very heartily thank those 61 of you who have already contributed to ensuring that Wabash. For the rest of you who have not yet given, visit www.wabash.edu/alumni/egift or call 877-743-4545 to make your Annual Fund gift today. The 2006-2007 fiscal year ends on June 30, 2007.

Regular blog peruser and Morgan County Circuit Court Judge Matt Hanson is heading to the Middle East. Here's the scoop:

My plan is to be done with work in the next week or two and then gear up for military life. I will be going to the Middle East to help run the prison system. We are a small team that was put together for particular skill sets. I like to think of us as the “anti-Abu Ghraib” squad, but who knows what will happen when we are in theater.

While I’m gone, a local attorney will be my pro-tem and will basically get to act like me.

I plan on being gone for a good amount of time, and I’m not sure when I will be back. As you know, the political waves may make it earlier or later.

It feels good to be with a strong group of people, and all are extremely high-speed. My group kind of reminds of me of a bunch of Wabash guys in that they are motivated, aggressive, intelligent, and skilled at what they do. It truly is an honor to serve with them.

I will do my best to send photos from overseas and will try to slip in the red W whenever I can. Enjoy the game next year, smoke a stogie for me, and we’ll see you back in 2008.

Captain Matthew G. Hanson
193 MP BLD

We'll be sure to pass along his cables from overseas as we get them. God Speed, Matt.

According to Indiana Lawyer, along with the Class of ’91 Grapevine*, the seven-member Judicial Nominating Commission completed two hours of deliberation to settle on six candidates for the opening on the Indiana Court of Appeals vacated by Judge Patrick D. Sullivan, who will retire on Aug. 1. Among the half dozen is Randall C. Head, who is currently working in the Tippecanoe County Prosecutor's Office. The second interviews will take place in Indianapolis on May 11. From there, the commission will choose three names to forward to Gov. Mitch Daniels, who in turn must select an appointment within 60 days of Sullivan’s leaving.

Best of luck, Randy!

* The Class of ’91 Grapevine includes a reliable cadre of classmates who are diligent in forwarding breaking news about the class or about Wabash. In this case, thanks to Mike Langford for the news tip. Wanna be in the Grapevine? Just forward any juicy bits to us.

Alumni Director Tom Runge reports that our beloved Hollett Little Giant Stadium will be receiving a much-needed new blanket of sod this summer in preparation for the upcoming football season this fall. It's about time. When I attended the Bell game in November, I had never seen the field so torn up. Chick Clements must have been beside himself. Runge tells me that the fall deluge of rain rotted the grass roots.

Nevertheless, the field should be ready for the September 8 rematch against the "evil" Franklin Grizzlies who stole a victory from us in overtime last year. Who can forget the Homecoming our junior year (unless you were drunk at the time)? The shootout between our Brett Butler against Franklin's Reece Mann. The banner on the press box that proclaimed, "The only thing Grizzly about Franklin is their women." (I found this particularly funny hailing from Franklin and having my brother and father in attendance, both Franklin alumni!) The Dannie Game is in Greendingle this year (Nov. 10), so that means the...

Official Class of '91 Tailgate Party – September 29, 2007 – in a parking lot somewhere behind Hollett Little Giant Stadium

...is set for Homecoming. Mark your calendars! 

This fall's Homecoming (September 28-29) will feature a Glee Club Alumni Reunion. Practice will begin Friday night, and the weekend will conclude with a concert Saturday night after the big game against Earlham. This weekend provides an exciting opportunity to sing with current students and alumni from all eras. It will also be an occasion to witness the wonderful commitments made by the current students and the Glee Club Director, Dr. Richard Bowen. Save the date and let the song echo loud and long!

I'm sure many of you remember taking standardized tests our senior year at Wabash. After four years of writing long and short essays in blue books, there was nothing more frustrating than feeling ill-prepared to fill out multiple choice answers in those stupid little circles with our Number 2 pencils. With as many lawyers as Wabash produces, some of our alumni have noticed how law school admission standards increasingly relay on the results of the dreaded LSAT.

Not surprisingly, the LSAT prep courses can get pretty pricey for our young lads. Enter the new College initiative, the LSAT Boot Camp, with its first session scheduled for this May. It's designed to help Wabash students perform their best on the LSAT so they can better attend the law school of their choice. To date, many alumni lawyers have supported the inititiative by contributing $250 gifts of support. If you'd like to help out, keep this valuable program in mind when making your gift to the Annual Fund this year. (Just write "LSAT Boot Camp" in the memo of your check to Wabash College.) For more information, contact the Alumni Office.

OK, I have officially run out of things to post. So I did a quick Google image search of "Wabash College." This photo popped up from the April 11, 2003 airing of Jeopardy. It's Double Jeopardy. "I'll take College Team Nicknames for $600, Alex..."

I'm Drew Brees.

I know you guys have stuff to report. Drop me a line and let me know what's up. It doesn't have to be major news. Let us know what's happening, what you think about what's going on, etc.

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. has died. A “Native Middle-Westerner” borne of a proud German heritage, Vonnegut will best be remembered for his WWII novel Slaughterhouse-Five, or The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance With Death. His hometown of Indianapolis was in the midst of a “Year of Vonnegut” celebration, unable to hear him make one final lecture at Butler University at the end of this month.

OK, where’s the Wabash connection? Well, Wabash College is mentioned in Breakfast of Champions, and supposedly Vonnegut modeled the novel’s protagonist, Dwayne Hoover, after a Wabash alum, though I’m not sure who. The College has also reported on his impact in our English department and the College community.

One of the great highlights in my life has been securing an interview with my literary hero for Indianapolis Monthly magazine in 2002 on the occasion of his 80^th birthday. As you might expect, he wasn’t easy to contact, but I managed to do it. I was never more well-prepared (nor more nervous) for any interview I have ever conducted. And I have to admit that our conversation was a little stilted, up until the moment I asked him about a movie cameo, and he just lit up:

IM Speaking of school, how did you end up in Rodney Dangerfield’s movie Back to School?

KV Whoever wrote the script put me in it. Then they called me up.

IM The English professor gives Dangerfield’s character a bad grade on a paper written by you, then tells him he knows nothing about Vonnegut.

KV Yeah. “I know one thing. You didn’t write this, and whoever did doesn’t know the first thing about Vonnegut!” [laughs] “Hey, Vonnegut, can you read lips? Fuck you!” [laughs] I loved it. And it earned me more respect from my druggist and my dry cleaner here in New York than anything I’d ever done.

Yeah, that’s probably the only time the f-bomb has ever been printed in the urbane regional mag, and who better to drop it than Vonnegut.

So, God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, Billy Pilgrim, Howard W. Campbell Jr., and Kilgore Trout. In his words:

I tell you, we are here on Earth to fart around, and don't let anybody tell you different.