Class Notes S HA RE YOUR NEWS Submit your Class Note at pingry.org/classnotes, or mail it to Greg Waxberg ‘96, Editor of The Pingry Review, The Pingry School, 131 Martinsville Road, Basking Ridge, NJ 07920.
Alumni in Literature
1954 PETER THORNE writes, “On April 1, 2016, I began serving as a missionary in the FamilySearch Library in Salt Lake City, UT. It is the largest family history library in the world. There, I helped guests do research and fill out their family tree. The library closed in March 2020 due to COVID-19, but in January, a new virtual program began and I became a virtual genealogist. I now help people all over the world, using Zoom. The library reopened on July 7. It’s good to work with live people as well as on Zoom. If anyone would like help with their family tree, I would be glad to help. I live with my older son in Saratoga Springs, UT, where I manage a 20x80-foot garden for the family and neighbors. I’ve been blessed with five grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.”
The late war correspondent and author RICHARD TREGASKIS ’34 is the subject of a new book, Ray E. Boomhower’s Richard Tregaskis: Reporting Under Fire from Guadalcanal to Vietnam (High Road Books, an imprint of the University of New Mexico Press). This book is the first to tell Mr. Tregaskis’ life story, concentrating on his reporting during World War II. Fleet Admiral WILLIAM F. “BULL” HALSEY, JR., Class of 1900, is the subject of an article in the July 2021 issue of PROCEEDINGS, published by the U.S. Naval Institute. The article, Hit Hard, Hit Fast, Hit Often! (Halsey’s motto), by Commander Robert McFarlin of the U.S. Navy, offers five lessons for Naval leaders, based on Admiral Halsey’s five-star leadership: leaders plan ahead, leaders never stop learning, leaders build teams that win without them, leaders endure failure, and leaders know people matter most.
1960 ROB GIBBY, JR. P ’87 writes, “In late July, Joe Wortley asked me if I’d like to help officiate at the U.S. Senior Women’s Open golf tournament at the Brooklawn Country Club in Fairfield, CT. For more than 30 years, Joe has been officiating at Professional Golf Association major meets. He now has a team of seasoned pals who help keep score, and he asked me to be a ‘helper’s helper.’ I worked with Joe and his crew on Thursday and Friday of the fourday tournament. Complete with a fancy USGA shirt, hat, earphones, and a handheld computer, I (almost) looked like someone who knew what he was doing. Joe described this competition as a ‘low-key event.’ He took me into a goodsize room filled with folks hovering over computers. It looked like Launch Central
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at Cape Canaveral! He explained to me that there were about 350 volunteers needed to run this event. The U.S. Men’s Open requires over 3,000! With each threesome of players, a scorer walks behind, recording every stroke. They enter the totals after each hole, which then would show up on my handheld computer. My job was to make sure they entered the strokes before the players started the next hole. I watched diligently all day on Thursday and again on Friday. It wasn’t until the end of the day on Friday when the group, with the eventual winner, came down, that I finally had something to do! The walking scorer didn’t put in the scores! As the players were halfway up the next fairway, I hit the red
Rob Gibby, Jr. ’60, P ’87 and Joe Wortley ’60.
