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At another Alumni Weekend moment, two ’58 classmates needed no re-introductions.
Bruno Katsch and Milan Sowis grew up a block from each other in Irvington, N.J., and have known each other since they were fourth graders at Augusta Street School.
“We played in the street together. We went to high school together. We grew up together,” Sowis says. They were each other’s best man at their weddings.
And both went to Stevens, Katsch driving them in his parents’ car each day from Irvington. They were even lab partners.
There are some differences. Sowis worked for 32 years at AT&T and Bell Labs, where he was a supervisor, and Katsch was an engineering supervisor with PSE&G. Sowis loves the Yankees; Katsch, the Dodgers.
Why did both attend Stevens?
“I had to keep up with this guy,” Katsch says.
So many more moments like this replayed over Alumni Weekend 2008.
The weekend this past May saw a strong turnout of classes marking special anniversaries—those ending in “3” or “8”—as well as other classes looking to reunite with old friends and participate in the weekend’s many activities. Several generations of Stevens alumni gathered for private suppers and receptions, the well-attended Alumni Luncheon and Dinner Dance, campus tours and other activities. The Class of 1958—marking its 50th anniversary—entered the Stevens Old Guard and saw more than 78 alumni and guests come back to Stevens. But the weekend also attracted more than 100 young alumni, who made for a lively gathering at a Hoboken restaurant for a Graduates of the Last Decade (GOLD) Friday night social.
As he celebrated his class’s 40th reunion, Marty P. Valerio ’68 received the prestigious Stevens Alumni Award at the Alumni Luncheon for his outstanding dedication and loyalty to the Institute. The Alumni Association also honored several members of the more recent anniversary classes, from 1983 to 2003, with the Harold R. Fee ’20 Alumni Achievement Award for their outstanding service to the SAA and the Institute. Honored at the weekend’s Alumni Dinner Dance were: Ronald M. Panicucci ’83; Franklin W. Boenning ’88; Mark I. LaRosa ’93 and Joelle M. Hinds-Ware ’93; Joseph G. DiPompeo ’98; and Terrence M. Carroll ’03.
While most alumni returned to campus on Alumni Day, the Saturday of Alumni Weekend, the golden anniversary class got the party started days earlier.
A fine turnout of ’58ers came back to campus the Thursday before Alumni Weekend, when they embarked on a walking tour of the Brooklyn Bridge and Downtown Manhattan that simply became known as “Hank’s Hike.”
Avid outdoorsman Hank Koenig ’58 and his wife, Sheila, planned this hike that also included a visit to Ground Zero. Sadly, Mr. Koenig, an active member of the Class of ’58 Reunion Committee, passed away in January 2008. But his dream of this urban hike continued, with Sheila guiding it, and became among the most praised events of the weekend.
“He’s here in spirit, absolutely,” Sheila Koenig said, as she toasted her husband at his class dinner that Friday night. Mrs. Koenig traveled from Oregon to celebrate for her husband, as Fran Viertel, the wife of the late ’58 Class Secretary Richard Viertel, came in from California. Dick passed away in 2005 and had helped plan many class reunions, including the class’s 45th in 2003.
Both women received strong ovations during the Class of 1958’s class dinner—an evening filled with emotion. The room was still as Ray Cabrera read the names of deceased classmates. But joyful moments outnumbered the somber ones, as hearty toasts, cheers and good conversation filled the room.
The evening included a number of awards and a talk by Stevens President Harold J. Raveché, who gave an update on Stevens and its accomplishments in research and academics. The Class of ’58 presented Dr. Raveché with a check for $58,000, to go toward the class’s scholarship fund, with 54 percent of the class making donations.
Reunion classes gave generously to Stevens this year, as the classes of 1938 to 2003 gave a total of $258,000 in gifts and commitments, many to the classes’ scholarship funds. Dr. Raveché graciously thanked these alumni for their support, as he addressed them in his “State of the Stute” speech at the Alumni Luncheon.
The Stevens president noted the good turnout for this weekend, from the ’58ers to the youngest alumni at the GOLD reception.
“It’s indicative of the appreciation that alumni have for what Stevens gave them,” he said, assuring the alumni present that the Stevens’ broad-based education, depth in skills and strong work ethic is “the same today as yesterday.”
But there is one difference today. Being good in your field and having a good work ethic is not enough, Raveché said, as engineers around the world are willing to work for less money. Engineers “have to have more,” he said, such as having the ability to recognize the problem that needs to be solved as well as the talent to solve it; to have a higher sense of the needs of industry; to be more innovative—all skills that Stevens fosters.
Raveché noted some discouraging statistics regarding American industry and innovation, with the United States number four in the world in industrial production, with manufacturing only making up 12.2 percent of the gross national product, with a 12-year slowdown in innovation and Japan leading the U.S. in IPOs.
In the wake of these challenges, Raveché noted the importance of the upcoming presidential election. “We in the U.S. need to develop an innovative spirit to rekindle the sense of enterprise that built this country,” he said.
“This time in America is a time for Stevens Institute of Technology.”
Raveché then spoke of a number of successful Stevens-based entrepreneurial efforts, among them the SPOC (Stevens Proof of Concept) pain locator device developed by Stevens students and Dr. Norman Marcus. SPOC recently received FDA510 clearance for manufacturing and marketing as a clinical device.
Several Stevens alumni make up the SPOC team, and Raveché praised their and the accomplishments of so many Stevens alumni over the years.
In conversations over the weekend, alumni certainly attributed some of their success to their solid Stevens education.
After Stevens, John Jacobsen ’58 became a naval officer and engineer and worked with NATO in Norway. As a Seabees captain, he built construction projects internationally.
“I always looked back at the lessons that I learned at Stevens,” including the varied education, he said. “That helped me get into other opportunities.”
Among the Class of ’58 are executives, senior-level engineers, professors and entrepreneurs. Mike Bonner is a Brookhaven National Laboratory and Oak Ridge National Laboratory engineer whose nuclear safeguards work took him to Europe, Russia and Siberia many times, as he still works for ORNL. Art Bendelius is a retired senior vice president with Parsons Brinkerhoff and active consultant, who worked on every continent except Antarctica. Ray Cabrera spent 34 years with Union Carbide, working in Thailand, Capetown, South Africa, and Buenos Aries.
A Korean War veteran who entered Stevens four years older than most of his classmates, Cabrera said that the opportunity for an education at Stevens changed his life.
“It made a world of difference; it’s significant,” Cabrera says.
While some Stevens alumni entered the Institute with war experience, others came from an entirely different world.
Ivan Shim ’58, now of Melbourne, Fla., grew up in the West Indies and entered Stevens in 1954, the first in his family to attend college.
“I was one of two Asians in the class,” he says with a smile, and of Chinese descent.
His English was slightly different from his classmates, but Shim found a bigger adjustment in adapting to American customs. Life in the West Indies was governed by an informality and relaxed pace, as neighbors and friends always felt free to drop by each other’s homes at the spur of the moment. In America, he found a greater formality, he says.
But he adjusted, played soccer at Stevens, worked in the Psychological Studies lab with Professor Frederick Gaudet—and made his life. Despite his family’s request that he come home and start a business, Shim made the U.S. his home, had a successful career as an engineering manager, retired early and later spent two years at Jiatong University in China teaching English.
While members of the Class of ’58 had the most chances over the weekend to meet and catch up on each other’s lives, other reunion classes also held special gatherings. The Class of ’63 marked its 45th anniversary with a well-attended dinner cruise along the Hudson River. Stevens Vice President Maureen Burke Weatherall and husband Jim Weatherall, both of the Class of ’78, hosted a cocktail party at Pollara House, their home on campus, for their class, as it celebrated its 30th anniversary.
And in a quiet corner of the Williams Library, about a dozen members of the Class of ’48 and their wives shared memories of Stevens and America more than 60 years ago. The feeling was warm, reflective.
Steve Mallard ’48 remembers a class not of young school boys but mostly men—veterans who had survived World War II and brought a sense of seriousness of purpose to the campus.
“We were in the wake of World War II. Things were tumultuous,” he says. “Many of us came to class wearing parts of our Army uniform.”
The war meant that those students called to serve their country had to temporarily leave Stevens or finish their studies at an accelerated pace, through the Navy’s V-12 program. Indeed, memories of those times, of long commutes to Stevens, of family and careers dominated this gathering.
They would never say it, but this group showed their extraordinariness this day, from their service in two wars, to traveling from as far as North Carolina and Maryland for this day, to having among its ranks men still working in their field.
Lou Shook ’48 of North Carolina—bicyclist, hiker, president of Shook Construction—may have said it best.
“I’m the same SOB I was 65 years ago,” he said with a grin.
The weekend ended for most with the Alumni Dinner Dance inside its new venue—Canavan Arena, which was transformed by soft-colored light, fabric and music into a near ballroom.
As alumni couples floated across the dance floor, Fernando Pertuz ’68 and his wife, Veronica, took a break at their table. They had flown in from their home in Colombia because they had promised friend Marty Valerio ’68 that they would. Fernando reflected on leaving Colombia for Stevens at age 16, embracing American college life, enthusiastically taking classes in U.S. history and government because “I decided that that if I was going to be here, I was going to make my focus here.”
He later returned to Colombia, enjoyed a successful 25-year career as an engineer and manager with IBM and raised two sons with Veronica.
The excitement of the weekend was still with him, as he recalled seeing his old friends and, incredibly, his former humanities professor, Dr. Silvio Laccetti, Hon. M.Eng. ’96, after so many years.
“He saw me; he said, ‘Fred!’” Pertuz says with his great laugh.
Surely, for the reunion classes—and particularly the 50th anniversary class—the weekend was a time to treasure the moment.
“This is a real high for me,” said Nick Mestanas ’58. “The ’58 Reunion Committee worked for 18 months; I think (they) did an outstanding job.
“It’s just grand.”
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