Well I have to relate one of his stories, before the next mystery in my life arrives. Many of Richard's stories have names that make you wonder, like- maybe that was Gus Morin's great aunt or . . .

But the one that got to me was about the Twin Pusher. In the 1920's and 30's, some kids made airplanes with sleek bamboo frames, oil soaked paper, and rubberband powered- handcarved spruce propellers. The craftsmanship of Richard's Twin Pusher sounded like it was extensive, but he admitted that it never flew very well.

This is the second Twin Pusher that I have heard about. The first one that I heard about was built to fly in a state-wide rubberband powered airplane competition at Boston Garden during the 1920's. The boy who built it had advanced from a previous competition at a county fair where his plane had caught a thermal and never came back. This set a record for time aloft. Even a policeman riding on his motorcycle was unable to catch it. At the Boston Garden, The boy's newly constructed Twin Pusher flew straight up into one of the speakers above the Celtics' basketball court. Technically, he once again set a record for time aloft, but the judges did not agree.

Life had different dimensions then.

Oh, that Richard Whitcomb! Yes, I have met him because they live in P'ville where the Stover's live.

Yes, Doris is Tom's Mom, they used to live in Perkinsville at the end of Quarry Road. My Mom lives at the beginning in Baltimore.........have been there over 35 years...........time sure does fly. I remember Cherry, Halley's sister (I think). She was in my violin class. We used to meet at Park Street School on Saturday's. Our teacher came over from Claremont, wow that was a LONG time ago. Does anyone know Tom's whereabouts? There are quite a few well-known names in Springfield..........would be interesting to look into..............I wonder who founded Springfield? Any ideas, anyone? I'm a late comer to Springfield, and lived out of town............

Yes, it does seem pretty amazing that there are that many Richard Whitcombs! Maybe you're all related and you don't know it.

That was Deke Whitcomb that was married to the music teacher. Richard Whitcomb lived over the hill near Spencer Hollow and just below Fergie's Pits. His daughter is Ann Germaine who took over the farm with her husband for the last 30+ years. Richard Whitcomb's first wife died and he re-married. He is now married to Doris (?) Stapleton. Is that Tom Stapleton's mother (yes it must be)?

But hey, Richard Whitcomb Stover, just how many Richard Whitcomb's are there????

Hey Richard, My husband's name is Richard Whitcomb Stover but we didn't get any memoirs! How do you rate????? HA HA! He has his mother's maiden name. Is this the Richard Whitcomb whose wife was the music teacher in Spfld. forever? Halley's dad? Just wondering.......

I am a true believer that things happen for a reason,,,,,,we are the ones that choose the outcome of some of the circumstances. I hope things work out for you Richard. I think Mr. Whitcomb wanted you to have his memoirs for a reason, he must have felt that you would appreciate them for what they are.

I really don't know why he sent it to me. It is a great gift. My only interaction ever with Richard Whitcomb was being introduced to him on a cub scout visit to his farm. It was mentioned that my middle name was Whitcomb. (I'll diagram this for you) That makes me Richard Whitcomb Loveless. It seems a little obscure that this would be why I get his memoirs 38 years later. I don't feel a deep need to understand it, I will write a note to thank him, and I may even post "unusual facts" that I find here, as well.

Watch out for ghosts in the corners everbody out there!!

How did Mr. Whitcomb's memoirs happen to come to you? That's a great gift, the history of our hometown. It really is quite a place. The times of struggle that have passed through there and still the town survives. In no small part I'm sure due to The Tavern, Polidors and places like that. I remember the nightthe Adna Brown Hotel burned down. We were living on Chester Rd at the time I think. My mom and Dad and I sat in the coffee shop across the way and watched. What a weird event for a family outing.

Thanks, you are all perceptive. There may be a natural progression. I received an inquiry today from a company that has some tough engineering problems that thay want a consultant to help with. They requested my resume. I sent it, so now I will now see if my mother taught me anything about writing (enough to get the call).

On another topic, I just received the memoirs of Richard Whitcomb, signed and dated. He was a longtime farmer in Springfield who has written about everything from Lindberg's visit to Springfield, to the utility of safety pins. It seems that safety pins were the backbone of the town until zippers and velcro came along. And I thought it was The Tavern that held Springfield together. I can't believe he sent it to me because I only met him once in 1964. Did anyone else receive this book?

Richard, My prayer for you is peace, and clarity of mind. I know great things are in store for you, but it's not our time, so the time spent waiting is very nerve wracking and draining. Miracles happen everyday, I pray for peace for you to wait for it, and the clarity of mind to see it when it comes.

Richard, I'm sorry about your job situation. I am in the process of looking for a new job down here. I have the luxury of waiting until I can find one that I want, though. have you ever thought of being a independant consultant? It sounds like you need to be your own boss........I'm not sure what you do, but it seems like there might be a need for someone like you to go in and solve their design problems.......

Thanks, I love this website!

Richard, it doesn't sound like they deserve a miracle!

Hi Lori, First you need to know that I hate tech talk and especially acronyms. People that don't know the code always end up feeling uncomfortable and why should they? So, I had mentioned to you that the Chief Technology Officer from Switzerland was coming to review my design work. I picked him up at 8:00 AM and by 10:00 I thought I was dying- no give and take, tempo, joy. By 12:00 he realized that one of my inventions could double our sales revenue in North America. At 2:00 he came to the realization that my new design work was under a company process that the Swiss have designated as the B-2 process. Roughly translated, it means "the process that can double sales revenue really fast". He went on to say that the process I had been hired to do was the B-4 process which roughly translated means, "the process that you wish would double sales revenue, but it never does!" And one does not just change like this, it violates a proper sense of order.

All the protocol frustrates me. In my company's current position it truly is like re-arranging deck chairs on the Titanic. I was spiritually drained for two days.

Before leaving, he gave me a short list of miracles to attempt to complete before December when they will let me go. There was no indication if miracles would save my #@!? I think they have run out of process designators to describe me. I think that no process designator means no job. I am going to try smiling again tomorrow and start all over again.

Richard, what's B-2 and B-4? (in simple English!)

Same for me, maybe Blogger is under some construction.

Can anyone explain why the official web page postings only go to Sept.15th? Is it just my computer? Me?

Hi Eileen, Great to see you here. Come back often and soon. It was a shame you couldn't make it to the reunion, hope everythings o.k. now. When I look at our first communion photos who would have thought you'd have become a judge and not a nun? We were so so sweet back then.
Colin, our youngest (19) is moving away from home next weekend. He's still going to school and working in a local restaurant but he'll be renting a house with a couple of other hoodlums about 15 minutes away. So basically he won't be sleeping here any more. I'm trying to pretend that he's moving into the dorm and will be home on weekends and holidays. Boo Hoo. I'll be getting out the Chambourd to drown my sorrows Karen.
High School is out for a month on Harvest Break starting next Monday. Life in "The County" is different from any place else. There is really good money to be made working on a potato harvester though.

A little dull?!?! The flaming microwave takes the cake!

Hi guys, I am still here, just have been a bit busy with moving and kids. My 19 year old son left today to go back to the University of Cincinnati......and I cried, of course. We still have lots of boxes everywhere. My goal is to declutter and have a major unloading of "stuff". Didn't have time to do it when we left Lexington. Richard, so sorry to hear about the employment woes, hope things will look up soon. Can't believe I gave anyone a good idea.......I could use a few for myself. We just passed our 25th wedding anniversary this summer and were too busy to do anything to celebrate. My 16 year old just passed his license and wants a car, my 13 year old cut two fingers with an exacto knife last week and had stitches. My 21 year old daughter called from college last week and had to hang up on her father because she set her microwave on fire with bagel bites and the fire department responded to the alarm!! Other than that.........life is really dull here. Happy fall! Eileen, way to go......I am so impressed by the accomplishments of so many of you. I haven't decided what I want to be yet.....................

Jerry Bolio,
Dave Merrill here yes the Roth concert was a tad loud and Roth and his crew were asses. I don't think Roth will play the Burlington area again. Little louder than the Barber Shop Quartet I sing in. I preferred the Sammy Hagar portion.

Jerry Bolio,
Dave Merrill here yes the Roth concert was a tad loud and Roth and his crew were asses. I don't think Roth will play the Burlington area again. Little louder than the Barber Shop Quartet I sing in. I preferred the Sammy Hagar portion.

I would be wound too if I picked three juries, (I think). Did you pick all white juries? It is really great that you connected. I used to get some really great ideas here until Karen stopped being able to connect. That "go to a bed & breakfast" idea probably saved my marriage. OK, just kidding. But it was fun- my marriage is one of the things that seems like it is going OK.

I sat with a Swiss executive all day today, who drew the conclusion that I have been working in the B-4 process, but that I have been actually contributing in a B-2 process kind of way. So, was that before and now this is B-2? I love technology, not!

As a result of the re-invitation I joined. Now if someone will talk to me. I just finished picking three juries and I am wound so I decided to play on the computer. I;ll check in again.

Eileen Hongisto

I just sent a re-invite to everyone on the list who hasn't come on board yet, Keep your fingers crossed, maybe we'll get some new neighbors!

Good morning folks, I know it's early for some of us but let's try to put our heads together and help out with an editing issue. Karen (Millay) Stover has a new e-mail address and I'm trying to edit her profile per the instructions in the Blogger help menu which say : in the team section click on the name and then click on the edit/profile button. I can't find the edit profile button. It's probably right in front of me but I don't see it. We all have administrative access so if anyone figures it out please go for it! the new address is stoverMI@aol.com. Thanks for the help and have a nice day :-)

How come I don't see my note from Sept. 15 when I open the blog, but I do see it now as I'm writing this new note? Did it get posted or not? Technology, technology...can't they make it simpler---e-mail for dummies or something like that.

Thanks for the explanations, Patti and John! Still sounds scary to me--I don't like losing control! It's like these viruses have a life of their own.

It's still hot here, Patti, but not humid like in Maine. I've been swimming in our pool for exercise. When it gets cooler, I'll go back to my walking, but as long as it's hot, I prefer swimming. Sounds like you have a nice garden. The only edible thing we have in our garden is mint leaves that we put in tea or salad. Oh, and our neighbor's fig tree leans into our yard.

Lori, to help clairfy what the KLEZ virus does. There are a variety of KLEZ and what it does is sends out mail to all your people in your address book plus it has a few hundred addresses that it attaches along with it. If you get the virus it will attach your address to the list along with the 200 so that when other people get the virus your name will be among the 200 in the list and it just keeps going. It is hard to find out who they are comming from because one of the ways that it works is that it picks somebody randomly in your address book and makes it look like the virus is comming from that person in reality it is comming from you... So it is very hard to trace on who has the virus. But who ever you have in your address book like Pat for example then she would probably see the klez virus every time you boot up your machine. But it won't look like it's comming from you it will look like its comming from somebody else. It does not send your information inside of email it only uses the addresses and has it's own subject and email information. Hope this helps...Okay gotta run.....

Hi Lori, so far your's are clean. the first one I got was from Brad coyle. In fact I received 6 messges fromhimwith the klez virus attached. I wrote to him and he told me had not "written to me" and that's exactly how this virus works. If I understand what I have ben reading, once you have the virus in your system, your computer writes to people in your address book. My Norton anti virus has quaranteened each of the messages that we have received with the virus so I assume that it's not being spread by my computer. I hope not anyway. We received it from other people we know and people we have never heard of. If the attachement says anythng about a jungle background don't open it. That's only one of the many ways it is coming through.

so anyway, how you doing out there? My pumpkins are turning orange and it's 40 degrees out. (6:30 a.m.) Last week Monday and Tuesday were so hot with the humidilty that we had kids throwing up in the bathrooms and having trouble breathing. It was 89.9 degrees in the 7th grade math room which is just across the hall from my computer lab. Now we're cold. that's life in county!

Patti, I was just wondering if that Klez virus was attached to any of my e-mails? Once our computer had some kind of virus that attached random things to our letters to people, and some of those things were personal. It was embarrassing. So I'm a little paranoid now. I hope nothing weird is attaching itself to my e-mails.

Is any else getting a lot of messages with the Klez virus attached. I seem to get them daily. Luckily my Norton anti-virus takes care of it but it's a pain. I've gotten it from a lot of people on the class e-mail list so I guess it must have gone through someone from the class of 72's address book.

I saw Brian yesterday. He was only half awake. He has been working all-nighters this week and really long hours for the as long as I can remember. He said that he hasn't been able to check out Blogger for a couple of months, but probably would sometime soon.

After a brief ceremony around the school flag pole, I spent my day working around trying to teach while kids kept leaving my lab for "school picture day". Then fiddling around with iBooks that for one reason or another aren't functioning properly. Over 200 people including all 7th and 8th grade students were assigned laptops this week. Every 7th grader in the state of Maine now has one to work with while at school. 3 schools including ours have them for all 8th graders as well. I'm a pc kinda girl so I'm still learning the ins and out of the Mac. I know Brian is a Mac guy. Where do you suppose he's hiding out these days?

Also, has anyone heard anything about Ron's Y's health post reunion?

So, December 21st I will yield to the Swiss authorities, hand over all innovation produced by my group, walk out the door screaming "Kill your cell phone," and party like a rock star. There are predictions that Telecom will remain in the depths for 2 more years and I thought I could change all that. Is it the water I drink?

I've been asked to report with my design group to the President's office at 1:30 (20 minutes from now). How do you prepare for a day like this? I sat on the deck at 5:30 this morning and just sat. I cried in the car on the way to work about the World Trade Center. I laughed with my design team as we considered the mechanical process that we will now go through; realizing that it all has everything to do with us and nothing to do with us.

Hi Everyone....just came up for air, busy times here with the fiscal year ending.......yes, my sister told me about the noise violation......we went to see Aerosmith at the Meadows here last week and she got her wish of seeing Kid Rock. I told her he needed to get a larger vocabulary..........still don't like him, but there is someone for everyone........we were in the lawn area and there was a stage set up for Aerosmith to come out and sing for us.......it was neat......I sure was tired, though. Not used to the late nights, I guess. On a more serious note, please take a moment of silence for the 9/11 rememberance.....I got choked up this morning seeing my neighbors flag at half staff at 6 am in the morning..........it had a floodlight on it and looked so somber.......................more later........back to the grind........Nancy C

Richard...good luck...I was laid off from my last job as a personnel supervisor for Manpower Inc at the IBM plant a year ago last week...had a phone interview a few weeks prior for an hr position at your place....

Robin I'll give you a call soon. There is probably going to be another work shake-out happening for the next week that will surely prove to be sad, difficult, and all too typical. I don't know the details yet and especially where it will all leave me.

Jerry...I live about a mile or so down the road from the fairgrounds and heard quite a bit of the ahh...concert. Of course I play in a band which sounds more like a combination of Sheryl Crow and Bob Marley so the hard rock stuff kind of grates on what's left of my hearing. (I sound like one of the seniors my agency works with.."those damn kids and that rock and roll noise". Richard, give me a jingle some time, I'ld love to catch up with ya. My daughter is well into the terrible twos...though having recently gone through the teenage daughter out with the car and not back by curfew thing, kind of puts that stuff into perspective...oh, the name of our band is Yankee Pot Roast...no double entendres there...no officer not at all...take care 72'ers.

Mike you got one of those good jobs. Travel Travel Travel...... I'm lucky if I get out of Chester now. But I like the quietness here after spending 10 plus years in Spfld. MA and Boston...Hey Jerry was the volume a tad bit high or the was David a tad bit high. I had to ask that question since I believe the answer was both.
Well just thought I would drop a line and say hi to all. How lucky to be in California Lori..... Always seem to get the sunny days out there.
Gotta get back to work...... See ya...

Good to see you on the blog again, Jerry! And hello to all you golfers. Anyone else out there? I'm looking out the window at another sunny California day...

Hi everyone. Time to drop in again. If we're going to the Springfield Plaza, are we going to hit the Ames going-out-of-business sale? I found some 6 volt batteries at the Nashua store for my big flashlight at a decent price with the 25% off on them. Mike, is that Paige who's down in Atlanta? I know I was around you for a bit on Alumni Day, but I forgot where you might have said your family members are. Did any of you Greater Burlington people go to the Champlain Valley Fair? I heard that David Lee Roth had the volume cranked just a tad bit high, and the town of Essex Jct. handed the Fair a $5,000 fine. Ouch! Well, got to go vote tomorrow for Governor, U.S. Senator and U.S. Representative in the primary tomorrow. And the Patriots open up tonight at the new Gillette Stadium in Foxboro against the mean Steelers. See ya next time.

I would love to caddy and can handle two bags. My rates are reasonable.

Karen - I had some chambourd and champagne while camping this weekend. Very yummy. It's awfully good in coffee too, with a little whipped cream on top! How was your trip to southern Maine?

Hey Mike. I didn't know you played golf. Maybe we can play a game at Rockingham......

Is there anybody out there? I must be listening to the Floyd.

There are many, many trees at the Plaza. Have you seen it lately? The only ones I saw hanging out at the Plaza were Woodsy Owl and Smokey the Reefer (whoops, I mean Bear). . . . but "he" may be right about this place here!?!

So how is your daughter? I eat lunch every day and I will still buy you a sandwich to find out. If your "zone" we can balance, weight-watchers- we'll count points, AA- we'll just have water, AAA- we'll call a tow truck, GAY- I'll give you 30 minutes to cut that out. Oh, behave!!!

hmmmm he wonders...is this the cyberspace version of hanging out at the Plaza?

Hi Richard, Just got in from camping in NH. We're about 4 hours from Quebec City. You'll want to bone up on your french, they are primarily french speaking and many folks won't even try to help you if you aren't bi-lingual. the Quebecquois (I'm spelling that wrong) attitude of sepatation makes travel in the area a challenge. However, it's beautiful and we do travel there now and again. Not as far up to see the whales though. We've talked about it and it's not really that far. Wanna plan a trip? We'd love a reason to finally go up!

Hey Pat, I was looking at Presque Isle on a map and it does not seem that far from Quebec City. It also looked like a "you can't get there from here." How far is it to get there? We talk about going there sometimes. Do you ever go paddle around with the whales in the St Lawrence?

You are good! That was surprisingly quick but not unexpected.

oooh, a reference to a Steven King novel. The Shawshank Redemption. Great flick

Hey Jerry, It is still bad at work with no relief in sight. I cope by fantasizing that I will finally be able to escape through a secret tunnel in the men's room that I have been digging behind the Marilyn Monroe poster. I hope you survived the church treasurer's report review!! It's great weather for a hike- in case you didn't notice and need a stress reliever.

Hi, Jerry. Yes, we miss you when we don't see you here on the blog. I know every time you write something, I'll learn something new either from what you say or from the answers others give to your questions. Can I ask what happened to your wife? I hope I'm not prying into something you'd rather not talk about.

River of Long Tides - that's what Kouchibouguac means. "Or something like that", says Dave. The Native American tribe is the Micmac tribe. We have many local Micmac indians here in P.I. Several of my students are living in the Micmac community across from my school.

Happy to see you here again.

I am happy when ......... classmates from the Class of '72 check up on me. I do still have a pulse. The heat wave got to me, and I'm not feeling any good local connections. Say, Mike, where on Cape Cod is that Cuddles and Bubbles place? Maybe if I had someone to share it with, I'd go there, too. In 1996, I did spend my first wedding anniversary at a nice place in Orleans, but there weren't any Cuddles and Bubbles there. We were back there for our second anniversary, also, but it wasn't very happy as we knew what would be happening in a matter of months. And Patty, that campground in New Brunswick, is that long name Native American in origin? And Richard, hope it wasn't too bad at work today. Hi Lori and others who've visited recently. I've got to present a treasurer's report with a growing deficit to the church Council tomorrow night. Money is a little slow during the summer weeks. Gee, I haven't been disconnected here yet. I don't want to push my luck! Bye for now.

I haven't heard from Jerry either here or in my mail. Frankly I'm a litttle concerned. Jerry are you out there???????

I'm not happy to be back at work, Monday morning, yeeeeeesh! Where is Jerry, has he been on vacation?