Class-Going, Culture Head Reunion Program For 1928

By commencement time next June, the chances are that no group of alumni will be better informed on the modern workings of Harvard than the members of the Class of '28.

This is because this 25th reunion class has not waited until commencement week to return to the college with their wives and families. Instead, they have instituted a series of "Return Tickets to Harvard" which has brought members of the class and their families to Cambridge during mid-term, mid-week "working days."

In the past, the 25th reunion, lasting the better part of a week, was confined entirely to Commencement, when the College closed and the program was so crowded with social events that there was little time to catch up recent Harvard developments.

The Class of 1927 pioneered in making a 25th reunion something more than a social affair. With the cooperation of the faculty, it set up a series of symposia designed to bring the Old Boys' nostalgia up to data. But these pre-reunion events were held the weekend before commencement when the College was to all intents and purposes shut down.

With the hearty approval of President Conant, Provost Paul H. Buck, Secretary to the University David Little, and Alumni Secretary Peter Pratt, the Class of 1928 has been visiting Harvard in large groups since last October.

On the first occasion, key members of the class, from areas as far away as Seattle, returned to Cambridge for a weekend as guests of the directors of the Harvard Alumni Association. They were briefed on the house system, group tutorial, general education, and financial aids by such experts as Dean Delmar Leighton, Lowell House master Elliott Perkins, and John U. Monro. They took in the Colgate football game and then heard dean of Admissions Bender on admission policies in the evening.

This was a stag affair, but on Dec.17, a Wednesday, more than 100 members of the class, plus their wives and sons over 16 spent a crowded 13 hours going to college again. Nineteen different courses, some of them as early as 9 o'clock, were open to them. The visitors then lunched in the houses as the guests of Provost Buck. In the afternoon they went on guided tours through Lamont and Houghton, built since 1928, visited the new--to them--Indoor Athletic Building to watch work out and a freshman swimming meet, then spent a pleasant evening at Lowell House listening to talks by undergraduate leaders, Provost Buck, and Dr. Perkins, not to mention the songs of the red-tied Dunster Dunces.

A similar, though different, program is in the works for early April, when other facets of the University will be bared.

Meanwhile, the first Thursday of every month since last Spring has been of occasion of a luncheon meeting at the Harvard Club of Boston, where such officials as Tom Bolles, Lloyd Jordan, Treasurer Paul Cabot, General Education Chairman Philip Rhinelander and others have expounded the College's current thinking. Similar affairs, though less frequent have also been held in New York, Washington, and elsewhere around the country.

The social side of reunions hasn't been neglected, either. For the past five years, the Class and families have men for supper at the Harvard Club before the annual Yale, hockey game. This Fall, a luncheon at Princeton before that football game, attracted almost 200 members of the class and almost 500 attended a luncheon before the last Yale game.