Winter - 1980

Frank Hrkach (now deceased)
123 East Greenwich St.
Bethlehem PA 18018

We attended a class correspondents conference in November.  It was a great joy meeting correspondents from other classes.  We reviewed and discussed procedures improve our columns.  A great deal of emphasis was placed on hearing from classmates so let's respond you guys or your wives.

We were informed to promote this year's reunion on June 6-7 if we were a reunion class.  We are not a reunion class, but it is a pleasure returning with the Back-Every-Year Club (B.E.Y.C.).  We do have a dinner, dance and social for classes not being in reunion years.  Let's see you there.  Watch your mail for details.

The University and Wally Field wish to thank each of you who pitched in to help Lehigh and the class financially in the past year.  53% of the class contributed to either the Annual Fund or new Century Fund-a new record for the Class.  $53,235 was contributed by the class through Annual Giving.  This places us Number One among classes between 1949 and 1958 with whom we primarily compete.

Uniroyal Tire Co., a division of Uniroyal, Inc., has been reorganized to "strengthen its replacement and equipment tire business," it was announced by S. Salzman, newly appointed president of Uniroyal Tire Co.  In this reorganization, Bob Horning (deceased) has been appointed V.P., Marketing.

Donald B. Herterich, of Brookside NJ, has been elected a senior V.P. of Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company.  He entered the bank's management program in 1955 and joined the Corporate Trust dept. a year later.  He was elected V.P. in 1966.  A specialist in railroad financing, he is a director of the Texas Mexican Railroad Co. and president of the National Railroad Co. of Mexico as well as president and director of the Atlantic and Gulf Petroleum Co., New York.  Don earned his LL.B. degree from the Univ. of Virginia Law School.  He also has completed the advanced management program at Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration.  Manufacturers Hanover Trust Co., the fourth largest bank in the U.S., is the principal subsidiary of Manufacturers Hanover Corp.

Jack Kurtz (deceased) is chief operating officer of the Kurtz Precast Corp.  The Kurtz family started its concrete business in the 1880's in Ephrata PA.  It has since blossomed and prospered into an ongoing family affair.  Jack's cousin, Jake, is chairman of the board of Kurtz Precast Corp. in Denver PA.  Jake's grandfather, Abraham, started the Kurtz family in the concrete business.  The Kurtzs found out that they could mix limestone powder with stones, sand and water to produce rock-like objects in almost any shape.  The early cement finishers were called "cement gangs."  The firm progressed in all forms of cement production.  In the 1930's, the precast business expanded into septic tank and concrete burial vault business . In 1949, soffit block floor and roof system was produced.  The Kurtz business philosophy has always been to furnish a quality product at the lowest possible prices and to still earn a reasonable profit.  This policy has served the operation well.

Prior to the C. W. Post football game, Nancy and I attended a delightful brunch at the Wine Cellar prior to the game.  It included steak, eggs, whiskey sours and bloody Marys at a moderate rate.  Maybe next year more of us could make arrangements to attend one session.

George Pitsilos (deceased) is as at home in the card and gift business as he is in his native Bethlehem where his business is located.  Straight out of Lehigh, he opened his first shop, taking over a bankrupt store and making it the first loop in what has become a small chain.  The Spinning Wheel shops are an interesting mixture.  Four serve local residents in the Allentown / Bethlehem area, while two are located in Hershey, home of Hershey chocolate, and one in the Poconos at the Pocono Hershey Resort.  The latter three are much frequented by tourists.  The merchandise mix Is, however, basically the same in all the shops.  The shops handle primarily cards and gifts.  The shops lean toward better, higher-priced merchandise.  Further expansion is a possibility.  Twenty-five years in business have not dulled George's taste for a challenge.

Robert Rodale (deceased), president of Rodale Press and son of the founder, says no other company is organized the way they are.  The system is very unorthodox.  One person will be building a better thermos bottle, another toiling over a contraption roughly resembling an exercise bike as it shreds grain and another is harvesting a crop of catfish in a backyard swimming pool.  2.25 million people swear by Rodale's Prevention Magazine and more than a million readers subscribe to Organic Farming.  In January, Rodale came out with New Shelter, a home improvement magazine he felt confident would attract 250,000 readers initially. Rodale publishes a couple dozen books a year (on how to raise goats in your backyard, for instance). Some of the books sell more than half a million copies in hardcover. Rodale manages to reap annual revenues of $60 million and to make a satisfactory profit.  The company claims sales growth of 15% to 20% a year.  But, the people at Rodale Press have assumed a much higher mission than simple money making.  They want to make the world a healthier place to live in.  The people with the firm have always had an organic mission foodwise.  Rodale wants to do more than report the news; they want to make the news.  They are now exploring the possibility of cable television.

A Liberty High School senior was crowned Northampton County Junior Miss for 1980 before a capacity audience at the Nazareth Area Junior High School auditorium.  Kathryn Zug, 17, daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Charles Zug III, not only took the top award but was presented with a silver plate as winner of the Youth Fitness Category.  Miss Zug plans to enter the medical field, possibly as a pediatrician.

Deaths (click for picture and details):

•  Howard Troy