Class Notes
The 1950s and ’60s featured a Winter Weekend hosted by the junior class, which included all sorts of winter fun.
1973
Gary DiCamillo shares, "We look forward to seeing our fellow 1973 classmates at the reunion dinner on Friday, October 13th. President Marty Schmidt '81 will be the guest speaker."
Posted 2023-09-19
Posted 2023-09-19
George Spagna, M.S. ’82, Ph.D.’ 86, retired after the spring 2021 semester after 35 years at Randolph-Macon College. His daughter, the Rev. Amy Spagna, is rector of St. James Episcopal Church in Woodstock, Vermont. Daughter Kimberley Cruz Esq. is currently at D.C. Superior Court but in line for appointment as administrative law judge in D.C. Grandson Evan Cruz is 2 1/2!
Posted 2023-02-27
Gary DiCamillo has updates to share on some classmates: “Bob Koch retired as regional sales manager at Mechanical Dynamics and Analysis Co. Sam Thomas was honored at graduation last May (2022) with the RPI Scholarship Award recognition. Rod Pettigrew has been elected to the RPI Board of Trustees. Our old friend Rich Boroway passed away in August 2020. Bob Baker celebrated his 50th wedding anniversary in 2021 and is living in Gloucester, Massachusetts. John Lonski celebrated 37 years at Moody’s and now is president of “Thru the Cycle,” his own economics commentary and forecasting firm. Steve Anderson has lived in Germantown, Tennessee, for 37 years and sold his home inspection service a few years ago. John Zywar held several Zoom meetings over COVID with Phi Sigma Kappa brothers that included musical performances of acts that appeared at RPI over the years. Len Poch continues to work from home at the Binghamton University NYS Research Foundation. Send more news: garydicamillo@gmail.com.”
Posted 2023-01-17
This year reminds me of our freshman year at RPI when the Hong Kong flu was an epidemic. We did not shelter in place back then and most of us were not “social distancing.” That flu turned out to be pretty bad as well: an estimated 2 million deaths world-wide and approximately 115,000 in the U.S. between 1968 and 1970. Three waves. We are handling this flu with more science and experience this time around. Hope the second and third waves are less active than the Hong Kong flu. — garydicamillo@gmail.com
Posted 2021-02-26
Arnold Woo retired from Ericsson in 2017 and is now occupying himself taking classes at Rutgers, enjoying sailing, and flying radio-controlled planes for fun. He has stayed in touch with Edmond Chin.
Posted 2021-02-26
Thomas Gooding of Niskayuna and his dog, Lili Ann, won first place at last February’s Westminster Kennel Club Masters Agility competition (20-inch division). Tom and his wife, Nancye, run Gooding Skin Systems in Latham and travel to dog shows all over North America.
Posted 2021-02-26
Engineering
Gary DiCamillo writes: RPI started the 2019-2020 school year strongly with the largest freshman class in history (almost 1,700 freshmen) and with the highest average SAT scores ever (1410). I attended a board meeting in October and we celebrated Shirley Jackson’s 20th year as RPI President with Josh Groban providing the entertainment...great talent with a strong philanthropic bent.
Posted 2020-05-19
Business
Also in October, the Rensselaer Alumni Association held its annual awards program, honoring the most active and loyal RPI alums. This year our classmate John Hamilton was awarded the Albert Fox Demers Medal, the second highest award the association gives out. John has been the longtime president of the Dallas alumni chapter and is now the longest serving club president in the country. John frequently travels back to RPI for homecoming, presidential dinners, and the Big Red Freakout. One nominee characterized John as “a tireless volunteer whose dedication to serving alumni and students of RPI is unmatched.” The Dallas alumni chapter won the 2008 Most Improved Chapter of the Year Award under his leadership. Congratulations, John!
Posted 2020-05-19
Engineering
In other news, we heard that Jim Ballard was elected to the A-TEK (McLean, Va.) board of directors last summer. Jim currently serves as chairman of Preferred Systems Solutions (PSS) and previously was president and CEO of this government services company. Under his leadership, PSS grew from $57M to $650M in annual revenues with services spanning IT, engineering, and program management to the Intelligence Community and Department of Defense. Jim was a naval officer holding command and leadership roles in naval shipyards, the Naval Sea Systems Command, and the Program Executive Office Submarines. A-TEK is comprised of a team of experts in managing the data that drives federal missions and is a 23-year partner to government agencies including the NIH, Homeland Security, Justice, and Commerce. Great work, Jim.
Posted 2020-05-19
Engineering
Gary DiCamillo writes: As always, you can check out the Class of ’73 website at www.rpi73.org and check in.
Posted 2020-05-19
Gary DiCamillo I continue to serve as an RPI Trustee (my 24th year) and recently have been serving as chair of the Board’s Finance Committee. I am happy to report that the ’tute’s finances are in very good shape, with a balanced income and expense budget each year, plus an improving balance sheet with lower debt and an increasing endowment. Moody’s (where our classmate John Lonski has been the top economist for many years) rates RPI A2 and S&P BBB+, both with stable outlooks. With a lot of misinformation out there, feel free to email me with any questions I might be able to answer for you.
Posted 2019-10-01
There was a write-up in the Texas Medical Center News. In it, classmate Roderic Pettigrew describes how engineering and medicine, which for years have been taught in separate silos, are now converging. He cites the growth of wearable technologies, biomedical devices, and digital health, which require increased integrated training. The News also announced the selection of Roderic as the executive dean at Texas A&M’s inaugural Engineering Medicine Program. The school will establish a dual degree program and joins other well-known universities (like Duke, Stanford, Columbia, and Dartmouth) in establishing this degree track.
Posted 2019-10-01
Ned Cleland was awarded the Medal of Honor by the Precast/Prestressed Concrete Institute in February. The Medal of Honor is PCI’s most prestigious award. Recipients have made a highly significant contribution to the industry and have demonstrated a sincere continuing interest in the institute.
Posted 2019-10-01
Unlike previous years, we did not have a strong turnout at last fall’s 45th Reunion. About 13 alums showed up, which is less than half of most previous reunions. Good to hear that our friends Lee Cogansparger and Dave Yaney were there. Steve Norton continues to do a great job with our Class of ’73 website and published a few choice photos of the event. Steve also points out that we now have our fourth recipient of the Class of ’73 scholarship, which we endowed a few years ago. New donations are welcome; the scholarship goes to a deserving student with demonstrated need.
Posted 2019-10-01
Finally, although our 45th Reunion was thinly attended, we did learn of Alfred Li’s honor as an Albert Fox Demers medal winner. Alfred was honored at the RAA Awards banquet on October 11. I also caught up with Michael Eckstut, who writes: “We relocated to Princeton, N.J., after 20 years in the SF Bay area. I’ve had a chance to go to several Princeton-RPI hockey games (with Mark Schwartz) and will occasionally run into Bob Vanderbei, who was Class of ’76, and now teaches at Princeton.” Michael continues to work and is leading a turnaround of a drug development software provider. He is looking forward to Steve Norton’s annual visit as of this writing.
Posted 2019-03-10
There was an interesting article in last summer’s Buffalo News about Bill Greco, an avid yearbook collector and resident of East Amherst. He collected some of the most interesting artifacts of western New York’s famous citizens, including Tim Russert, Bob Lanier, Joe Ehrmann, Warren Spahn, and Sidney Farber (father of modern chemotherapy). Bill retired from careers in cancer research at Roswell Park Cancer Center and as a teaching professor at the University of Buffalo. It’s a neat article…with some interesting exchanges with Deborah Wright Dawson, who is now a county legislator. Look it up in the Buffalo News archives for more on Bill and his collection.
Posted 2019-03-10
Tom Iovino was a 2018 inductee into the American Road and Transportation Builders Association Foundation Hall of Fame. As many of you know, Tom founded Judlau Contracting and grew it into one of the country’s leading civil engineering construction companies, completing more than $3.5 billion in projects, including the Second Avenue Subway in NYC. Tom is a former trustee of RPI; we hope he’s enjoying his retirement.
Posted 2019-03-10
Architecture
Jon Jackson, one of the principals of Bohlin Cywinski Jackson (BCJ), the architecture firm that designed RPI’s Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies, passed away on August 17. He had recently retired from the firm and was a highly respected figure in both the western PA and national design communities, and his life’s work helped propel BCJ’s rise to national and international prominence. His work on the Biotech Center was emblematic of his excellent work in academic spaces and laboratories. Jon designed buildings for Carnegie Mellon, University of Pittsburgh, Dartmouth, University of Washington, Caltech, University of Illinois, University of California, and Yale, in addition to RPI. He won numerous awards for workplace design and set the stage for collaborations with Pixar, Disney, Apple, and others. In the words of the late Dick Rittelmann ’60, another well-known RPI architecture alum, “the breadth and complexity of BCJ’s work over the years is a testimony to the skills of Jon Jackson as not only a great individual architect, but a manager, mentor, motivator, and collaborator.” Jon was a longtime resident of Pittsburgh’s Chatham Village, where he helped earn the community’s listing in the National Register of Historic Places. We all will miss this very talented alum.
Posted 2019-03-10
Mark Keough writes: As more of us retire, expect to see more notes about our interesting side trips and experiences. We recently had a family wedding in Cleveland and took advantage of the opportunity to visit the National Museum of the U.S. Air Force at Wright-Patterson in Dayton, Ohio. A huge museum, rivaling the Smithsonian’s museums, we spent the entire day there and didn’t see all of it. The newly restored B-17 Memphis Belle was brought into the museum in May 2018. While in the rearmost building, I was very surprised to come across the Teal Ruby satellite sitting in the cargo hold of a Space Shuttle mockup. This satellite was designed to detect the heat signatures of enemy aircraft crossing the polar region during the cold war, along with detecting missile launches and other events. Our good friend and RPI alum Jack Haberle ’73 wrote code for this satellite for at least five years. Due to the Challenger accident and budget issues, the satellite was never launched, but is now proudly on display!
Posted 2019-03-10
Finally, our old friend Michael Eckstut commented on Robert Bochnak’s LinkedIn blog recently on the most important qualities of board members. Michael says it’s important to “not try and run the business”...recognizing that only in rare instances will you know more than management about specific business issues. Good advice.
Posted 2018-10-10
Engineering
Well, RPI certainly has a following at the Yale School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS). Our ’73 classmate Mitchell Smooke recently was named acting dean of Yale SEAS, succeeding Kyle Vanderlick, RPI Class of ’81. Mitchell is the Strathcona Professor of Mechanical Engineering and professor of applied physics and has served as chair of the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science for over 12 years. He is a widely recognized expert in computational studies of combustion...especially investigating methods of quantifying combustion-generated nanoparticles from land- and air-based systems. I’m sure you have all been wondering what happens to those nasty nanoparticles when they are spewed in the air. Mitchell has developed models to know where they go and why. Congrats to Mitchell on his appointment.
Posted 2018-10-10
I was looking forward to seeing many of you at our 45th Reunion in late September. We’ve been having a great time catching up...check www.rpi73.org for updates. —Gary DiCamillo ’73; garydicamillo@gmail.com
Posted 2018-10-10
In other news, the Rensselaer Outing Club had a 40ish reunion of sorts with several members of our Class of ’73 present. (Yes, they went camping...of course!...to the Mojave Desert at the Joshua Tree National Park). Campers included classmates Roger Harris, Carlos Barraza, Ginny Kania Solla, and Ginny’s daughter, Victoria, RPI ’11. No rain was reported, as it hasn’t rained in the Mojave Desert in years.
Posted 2018-10-10
Gary DiCamillo reports that, like some of his classmates, he too is back at work, as president and CEO of Universal Trailer Corp., a mid-sized horse, livestock, and cargo trailer company with seven plants in six states. Gary offers that if anybody needs a new pig trailer, to just give him a call and he'll be happy to give the “friends and family” discount. Gary apparently also has motorcycle and snowmobile trailers, if that’s more your style!
Gary also encourages more folks from the Class of 1973 to send in more info, saying, "You’ll want to amaze your classmates on how many grandchildren you have and how many new patents you’ve received since graduation!" In closing, Gary suggests checking out the Class website and to let Steve Norton update your profile, and says that he's looking forward to the Class' 45th Reunion in September. Posted 2018-03-15
Gary also encourages more folks from the Class of 1973 to send in more info, saying, "You’ll want to amaze your classmates on how many grandchildren you have and how many new patents you’ve received since graduation!" In closing, Gary suggests checking out the Class website and to let Steve Norton update your profile, and says that he's looking forward to the Class' 45th Reunion in September. Posted 2018-03-15
Marc Bellotti was named to the board of directors of SpineOvations, a California-based medical device company developing minimally invasive therapies for spinal disc problems. Marc is also a partner at Fuel Source Partners, a management consulting firm in the medical device industry. Previously VP of research and development at Sonendo Inc., Marc previously held senior management positions at Baxter Healthcare and Johnson & Johnson. Classmate Gary DiCamillo observes: "Great career Marc...many of us might like to try the SpineOvations product to help our ailing backs."
Posted 2018-03-15
Tom Iovino has retired from his company, Judlau Contracting, after 35 years there. Tom sold his company a few years ago to OHL North America and he stayed on as CEO until last July. A large civil contracting company headquartered in Queens, N.Y., Judlau has completed more than $3.5B in projects for the NY Metropolitan Transportation Authority.
Posted 2018-03-15
