Letters to the Editor

ANOTHER CENTENARIAN

It was wonderful to read about Alice Grosjean ’27 (at left, from “Living to 100,” Spring 2005). She was my mother’s roommate in college, and she and I are good friends.
You should know that my aunt, Eleanor Scott Evans ’25, is alive and well (although deaf and having vision problems) in Cincinnati. She, my mother, Catharine Scott Hunt ’27 (deceased), Agnes Elizabeth Scott ’22 (deceased), and Esther Scott Galloway ’20 (deceased, but lived beyond 100), are honored by the Scott Scholarship, which I established at the College in the 1980s.

We see many alumni magazines — yours is the best!

Elizabeth Hooker
Wooster, Ohio

WHAT THEY STARTED

How surprised I was to see my parents ice skating in the picture opening Class Notes (Winter 2005, page 31): Ginny Gwin Kerr and George Kerr, ’27s. They started a whole line of Wooster grads: son Robert Kerr ’54, who married Jean Thompson Kerr ’56 and sent son, David Kerr ’84, to Wooster; daughter Catharine Kerr Jacobson Serr ’60, who married William Jacobson ’60 (son of Miriam Stewart Jacobson ’28) and sent a son, Matthew Kerr Jacobson ’86. Matthew married Lydia Geddes ’94.

George Kerr’s brother, Robert ’40, married Florence Dunbar ’40 and sent a daughter, Beth Kerr ’66. Sister Ruth Kerr McHendry attended Wooster but didn’t graduate; she married John Franklin McHendry ’35.

This picture captured one of many great moments we all had at the College!
Katy Serr ‘60

Rochester, New York

GENEROUS IN ’50S, TOO

The article, “Wayne County’s Neighbors Give Generously” (Oak Grove, Spring 2005), reminded me that there have always been local people who supported the College directly and indirectly. Many of us students in the 1950s received that “Wayne County Generosity” because of our relationship to the college.

I am grateful to the following Wayne County neighbors:

• U. S. Steel Fabricating, for much-needed summer employment during my second year at Wooster and for assigning me to the production line rather than the customary janitor’s position;
• U. S. Post Office, for employment at Christmas during my last three years;
• Wooster YMCA, for employment on Saturday mornings when I was not involved in track or football;
• Freedlander’s department store, for allowing me to make small purchases solely on my signature and trusting me to pay within thirty days. Once when I was three days away from my first paycheck, out of money and out of food, I bought a three-pound box of chocolates, the only edible item that I could find in Freedlanders. It served as my nutrition until payday;
• members of Second Baptist and Westminster Presbyterian churches, for feeding our souls and our bodies through worship and home-cooked meals;
• Mr. Charles Morrison, barber, for not fearing the loss of his white customers by cutting African American students’ hair during the day rather than the traditional time, after 6 p.m.;
• Mrs. Pearl Miner, an African American, for inviting the African American students to her home for pre-Thanksgiving dinners and an introduction to the Wooster community;
• Attorney Hank Critchfield for graciously giving me keys to his office and law library so I could research my senior I.S., “The Effect of Ohio Statutes on Racial Discrimination in Places of Public Accommodation.”

Donald B. Register ’59
Oak Park, Illinois

DON’T LIKE THE CHANGES

The last two issues of Wooster had content of little interest to me, other than my class notes. I used to like the articles that related to the process and content of a Wooster education. Now you are delivering articles similar to what is found in newsstand magazines or perhaps the Sunday newspaper weekend magazine.

Dick Currie ‘61
Penfield, New York

LOVE THE CHANGES

This issue of Wooster is absolutely the best I have ever seen — from the 1920s too! A very long time. The pictures, the cover, the stories are so good. Thank you.

Catherine Compton Chase ’40
Shokan, New York