Class reunion: Yale to the chief
President hosting picnic for former classmates, some of whom will stay away because of issues with his presidency
05/28/2003
By G. ROBERT HILLMAN / The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON - The party buzz began long before the formal invitations arrived, featuring a sketch of the White House with a huge "Y '68" banner strung beneath the Truman Balcony and with Eli the Bulldog sitting on the South Lawn, clenching a Yale pennant between his teeth.
Thursday evening, just before he heads off on a weeklong trip to Europe and points farther east, George W. Bush, Yale Man of '68, is hosting his 35th class reunion at his Washington home, the White House.
Nothing too fancy, mind you. Just a picnic for a thousand or so on the South Lawn and a chance, undoubtedly, for some updated class photos.
There'll be plenty of song, too, by three of Yale's finest ensembles: the Whiffenpoofs, '03 and '68, and the Baker's Dozen.
"It's very exciting," said Daniel Yergin, a Pulitzer-prize winning author and eco-energy expert who's no stranger to the White House. "It's great ... terrific."
Still, there's controversy.
Some classmates are staying away because they differ with the president on Iraq, the environment and a litany of other issues.
"I just felt uncomfortable trying to pretend to be nice, given my feelings about his policies, starting with the war in Iraq," said Jacques Leslie, a California author who's staying home.
Some who are not fans of the president plan to go anyway.
"I wish it were under different circumstances," said Harold Erdman, a California software engineer, who bluntly dismisses Mr. Bush as "the worst president" of his lifetime.
But it's nothing personal, Mr. Erdman said, promising to be a good guest. "He's just taking the country in the wrong direction."
And so it has gone. Former President Bill Clinton and first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton had blazed the recent trail by hosting their undergraduate classmates from his Georgetown and her Wellesley. But times change, even from back-to-back administrations.
"We're making clear that it has nothing to do with policy, person or fund-raising ? or anything translated into those in any way," said Jim Latimer, a Dallas businessman who's the class secretary. "There are certainly those who are coming who are in agreement with the president's policies. Obviously, there are some who are not."
In any case, one thing is certain, he said: "This is hands-down the largest coming together of this class since graduation day."
It's also pay-as-you-go, with the alumni picking up the tab ? about $150 per guest.
Already, Garry Trudeau ? a fellow Yalie, but not a classmate ? has picked up the megaphone in this week's Doonesbury, musing loudly that Mr. Bush was looking forward to his class reunion even though he "still has issues about the phony intellectualism he encountered as a Yale undergraduate."
If nothing else, William Baker, a Chicago lawyer who's the reunion chairman, sees a "very nice picnic" Thursday night and a nice ride by chartered train Friday up to New Haven, Conn., for a full weekend of other reunion doings.
"I've never met the president," Mr. Baker said. "But maybe he'll recognize my face."
Mr. Latimer ? who counts Mr. Bush as a college acquaintance, not a close friend ? remembers him as "quite a gregarious member of the class."
They played baseball together, he remembers, though "neither he nor I made it to senior year."
Mr. Bush, who saluted the World Series champions Anaheim Angels on Tuesday in the Rose Garden, remembers it much the same way. A huge baseball fan, he acknowledges in his autobiography, A Charge to Keep , that "my talent never matched my enthusiasm." So he moved on to rugby.
"Rugby is a great game," he decided, "a game of hard knocks with a tradition of post-game camaraderie."
All in all, Mr. Bush professes fond memories of Yale, though there have been issues over the years. And for better or worse, his roots run deep there.
His father, the 41st president, went there. So did his grandfather Prescott, who was a senator from Connecticut. One of the president's twin daughters, Barbara, is a student there now.
He followed in the family footsteps, too, joining Skull and Bones ? the "secret society so secret," he wrote, "that I can't say anything more."
And he hasn't.
He was also a frat boy back then, a DKE, joining Delta Kappa Epsilon, known as a hard-partying, if not hard-charging, fraternity house.
Mr. Bush recalled a "not-so-proud moment" before one Christmas when he and a few buddies got caught stealing a wreath they thought would look much better at the fraternity house than at the downtown hotel.
"We were apprehended for disorderly conduct," he wrote. "We apologized, and the charges were dropped."
Mr. Bush was born in New Haven in 1946 when his father was a student there, and the family moved to Midland, Texas, two years later.
After prep school in Andover, Mass., he went to Yale and then Harvard, where he got his MBA.
At Yale commencement two years ago, Mr. Bush was greeted with cheers and jeers when he told it as he remembered it.
"If you're like me, you won't remember everything that you did here," he joked, hitting a strong graduate chord. "But there will be some people and some moments you will never forget.
"I studied hard. I played hard. And I made a lot of lifelong friends," he said, explaining that he was never quite sure what a "Yale man" really was.
"But I do think that I'm a better man because of Yale," he concluded.
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