Monthly Archives: January 2019

Classmates live on camera 50th Reunion, June, 2018

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Click to view: 1968 live on camera Reunion 2018

Dennis Reeder arranged the production of a video featuring classmates and companions – some eloquent, all interesting, many misbehaving – on the night of the class dinner during the 50th reunion, June, 2018.

Is this Sundance?  Cannes?  No, it’s not.  It is authentic 1968, Great ’68 memories and entertainment.

Notice that you can add your own comments.  Please go ahead.  Fill a bluebook.  And when you see Dennis, say thank you for the hours and the funds he invested in the work.

 

Class notes submitted January 17, 2019

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True Always

Keenan Hall residents prepping for St. Mary’s panty raid, Spring, 1965

Periodically, journalists begin turning to favorite words and phrases with the regularity of Fed Ex packages heading to Memphis. Examples from recent years include eponymous, iconic and bespoke. Now, there’s true freshman, which, it turns out, means something other than the people we were in the fall of 1964. Or does it? Weren’t our roommates true freshmen? Sure, at age 21 and a former Marine, Larry “Monk” Forness appeared borderline at first, an outlier able to help the true sophomores of Zahm Hall obtain alcohol. But he soon fell into step as a true freshman acquiring knowledge with everyone else of the Norton Anthology and the schedule of buses from Barat or St. Xavier’s. Paul Stulgaitis, Jerry Maglio, Dick Bertel, all of us lived as true freshmen with access to a proper Gilbert’s wardrobe and timed payments. Brien Murphy, equally true, eschewed that look for a sweatshirt with sleeves ripped – or with Brien, bitten – off. Who were truer freshmen than Class President Tom Weyer, Tiger Schaeffer and Chuck Grable as they belly-flopped onto the icy mud of the North Quad? Open our heavily redacted yearbook to any headshot and remember the true freshmen squirting shaving cream beneath doors or getting excited about Ara: Gary Olney, Dave Vecchia, Tom Sherer, John Myers, Paul Widzowski. And what about the poor rectors – Father Matthew Miceli, CSC, and Father Robert Austgen, CSC, for example – who tried to ride herd over the likes of Charlie Schmitt and Brice Parker?

True freshmen must progress to become true sophomores. To their dying days, Chuck Wordell and Eddie Kurtz probably made it no farther than that. As for true juniors, maybe Thomas D. McCloskey, Jr., James Leger, Jr., Thomas L. Bush, Jr., Daniel W. Casey, Jr., Frank Chuck, Jr., and Robert Wildes, Jr. held that station, while Christopher Murphy III, William M. Dewey III and Joseph A. Schwartz III over-achieved.
True seniors are impossible to imagine. Impossible. Jeff Keyes’ liking for 4 pm dining only makes him fiscally prudent, ready for his long true sophomore phase. Even after a half century and some, who can think of one true senior? Senior Class President Mike Minton? Fred Ferlic? Thomas F. McKenna? Boyish John Flemming? Nope.

True is an apt word, just the same: true friendship, true spirt and heart, the Great 68. This includes true loss, the death of Dave Kabat at the end of 2018, shortly after a fall in Michiana led to a rousing reception in South Bend as physicians Fred Ferlic and Steve Anderson led a line of visiting well-wishers; Gene Cavanaugh, Joe Kernan, Bryan Dunigan, and Tom Cuggino.

Dave “Lunch” Kabat

On November 13, 2018, we also lost Dr. Jim Fticsar, USN (ret) of Chesapeake, VA.

Jim Ftiicsar

Bob Ptak flew from FL and Brian Gormley from VA for Dave’s New Buffalo, MI funeral, where friends included Sheila and Tom Gibbs, Mary Ann and Tom McKenna, Mary Pat and Rock McKenna, Skip Strezlecki, John Walsh, Bridget and Pat Herald, Jean and Roger Guerin, Mary and Tom Weyer, Mary Lou and Dennis Toolan, and Patty McPartlin, while Dr. Rick McPartlin tended his own hospital patients. Where did Dave pick up the nickname Lunch? Bryan Dunigan explained: “Often times, Dave, who was manager of the Notre Dame baseball team, could not be located and the team would say he was ‘out to Lunch’”.

Gene Cavanaugh sent news of former Government Professor Donald Kommers’ death December 21, 2019 at Holy Cross Village. The South Bend Tribune obituary appears in a following post.
True also joins with service and brilliance. In a following blog item, read about (mandated) retiring Traverse City, MI Judge Tom Phillips and the wise programs he began for offenders, including drug addicts.

Joe Kernan’s health is not good but the impact of his government service and kindness is powerful. Matt Walsh and Joyce, Class President Tom Weyer and Mary will be among many classmates attending a March screening in South Bend of a PBS documentary about Joe’s life.

Ted Bratthauar, Tom Curtin, Mike Moore and Mike Obiala

During the Christmas season, when Mike Obiala and Marilyn visited their DC daughter Julie, they had an evening of reunion with Ted Bratthauar, Tom Curtin, Mike Moore and their wives.

Tom Culcasi found levity in texts exchanged during Notre Dame’s game with Clemson: “Mike Moore, Tom Curtin, Tom Phillips and I have had a texting conversation going for a year now for each game. Mike starts the countdown by being the first to own and wear the year’s spirit shirt. He then gives us regular updates as to the start of the season. Mike stands and paces for the entire game unless he is at Tom Curtin’s house. There Curtin duck-tapes him to a chair until the end of the game. We start texting each other mid morning of game day with coaching tips etc. Moore is the eternal optimist–we could be down by 30 with 10 seconds on the clock and he still thinks we can win. The rest of us are not quite as positive.. The closer the game, the poorer we play, the more texts fly back and forth during the game. (Judy thinks we are worse than teenage girls with our texting, a feeling that Curtin’s wife also supports). We don’t have a name for our group yet, but it sure made the season even more fun. Almost like having 4 seats together in one of those fancy new skyboxes.”

Tom Fitzharris’ Warm Winter oil

Tom Fitzharris’s art secured another honor, presence in a January, 2019 show put on by the Blue Mountain Gallery Winter Show, Chelsea, NY.

Jim Schindler sent regrets from St. Louis about missing two reunions last year: the 50th and then the Marching Band’s fall reunion. You can imagine his year 2019 resolutions.

True or not, please send news and photos, epiphanies and fatwahs to Tom Figel, 1054 West North Shore, Apt 3E, Chicago, IL 60626, tfigel@reputecture.com, tel. 773-764-4898.

Death of Dave Kabat Dec. 29, 2018

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Kabat, David
David Lee Kabat

Born: July 6, 1946

Died:

December 29, 2018
Some of the notes from Dave’s friends:
Hadn’t seen my old roommate for almost 50 years until the gathering in June of “The Great 68”. So happy that we connected then. And to Bryan: so pleased for both of you that you had good communication after his fall.

Mark Kush On Dec 30, 2018, at 12:51 PM, J. Michael Burman <jmb@reidburmanlaw.com> wrote:

God bless him and his family.

J. Michael Burman, Esq.

On Dec 30, 2018, at 10:26 AM, Mick Hyland <mick4sox@live.com> wrote:
Truly one of the ” Greatest ” of the GREAT 68  !!!!

David Lee Kabat, 72, passed away peacefully on Dec. 29, 2018. He was born on July 6, 1946, in Chicago, Illinois, to parents Leo and Eleanor (DeTrana) Kabat.

David is lovingly remembered by his wife, Leslie, and their children, Lindsey (Larry) Montgomery, Jonathan (Jenny), Allie and Jessie; and his four cherished grandchildren, Taylor, Anabelle, Emma and Bodin. He is also survived by his mother, Eleanor; sister, Betty Ann (Tim) Shanley; numerous nieces, nephews, and dear friends. David was predeceased by his father, Leo and sister, Mary Ellen Barron.

David attended high school at Loyola Academy before earning degrees from the University of Notre Dame and Notre Dame Law School, where he made many lifelong friends. As he began his law career, David also served in the Army Reserves for six years during the Vietnam era. Among other things, David was admired for his humility, honesty, work ethic, and unwavering commitment to his loved ones. David focused his legal career on construction law, commercial real estate law, and banking law, with noted skills in contract negotiation and litigation. He achieved an AV® Preeminent rating from Martindale-Hubbell, in which peers rank a lawyer at the highest level of professional experience.

A Funeral Mass will be held on Wednesday, Jan. 2, at 11 a.m. CST / 12:00 EST at St. Mary of the Lake Parish, 718 W. Buffalo Ave., New Buffalo, MI 49117.

In lieu of flowers, donations in memory of David may be made to Support for People with Oral and Head and Neck Cancer, where he volunteered his support to others for many years: https://www.spohnc.org/donate-to-spohnc/.

Arrangements have been entrusted to Geisen-Carlisle Funeral & Cremation services, located at 613 Washington St. Michigan City IN 46360.

To sign guestbook or leave condolences, please visit: www.Carlislefh.com. (219) 874-4214.

Death of Professor Donald P. Kommers

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Thanks to Gene Cavanaugh for informing all of us of Professor Kommers’ death Dec. 21, 2018
Donald P. Kommers Obituary
Donald P. Kommers

August 26, 1932 – Dec. 21, 2018

NOTRE DAME, IN – Donald Paul Kommers, a political scientist and legal scholar well known for his writings on German law and politics and his pioneering work in the field of comparative constitutional studies, died Friday, December 21, 2018, at his home in Holy Cross Village, Notre Dame, Indiana. He was 86.

The eldest son of Donald M. Kommers and Gladys Janet (nee Braun), Don was born August 26, 1932, in Green Bay, Wisconsin. He grew up in Stockbridge, a small town near Green Bay, where his father ran a grocery store serving hundreds of farmers in the surrounding area. He attended St. Norbert High School in DePere, on what is now the campus of St. Norbert College. He graduated from Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. In his senior year, after a debating contest at Harvard University in 1953, he was set up on a blind date with his future wife, Nancy Ann Foster, of Boston, Massachusetts, to whom he was married for almost 64 years. After college, Don served for two years in the United States Marine Corps. Honorably discharged in 1956, he went on to earn M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in political science at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Don joined Notre Dame’s faculty in 1963. He taught a wide variety of courses on American and comparative politics until turning most of his attention to the constitutional systems of both Germany and the United States. He received the Joseph and Elizabeth Robbie Chair of Political Science in 1991. Over more than forty years, thousands of students took his popular undergraduate course in American constitutional law. In addition to teaching, Don served as the Director of the West European Studies Program; the Director of the Notre Dame Law School’s Center for Civil Rights, during which time he served as an advisor to President Carter’s Commission on the Holocaust; and the Co-Director of the Notre Dame Law Center in London. He was also the editor of The Review of Politics for eleven years. His more than 100 publications include 10 books and dozens of major articles and book chapters on constitutional and political themes in both the United States and Germany.

During his extensive career, Kommers was the recipient of many awards and honors, including: several senior fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, along with major fellowships and grants from the Rockefeller Foundation, Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, Alexander von Humboldt Foundation (Germany), Max Planck Society (Germany), German Marshall Fund of the United States, Fulbright Scholar Program, American Philosophical Society, and Social Science Research Council; Germany’s Alexander von Humboldt Prize for Senior U.S. Scholars; the Berlin Prize from the American Academy in Berlin; the Distinguished Service Cross of the Federal Republic of Germany; and the American Bar Association’s Silver Gavel Award. In 1998, Germany’s Heidelberg University awarded Kommers an honorary doctor of laws degree in recognition of his published work on Germany, up to then only the fourth such honor conferred on an American since World War II. In 2007, he was the recipient of a second honorary doctorate from St. Norbert College, where he also delivered the commencement address.

In addition to his loving wife Nancy, Don is survived by his brother, James J. (Mary) Kommers of Reedsburg, Wisconsin; his sister, Kathleen Kommers of Hortonville, Wisconsin; three children, Cynthia Ann (Mark) Jordan of Seattle, Washington, Theodore Foster (Karen Hagnell) Kommers of Lake Bluff, Illinois, and Kristin Elizabeth (Paul) Czarnecki of Georgetown, Kentucky; and five grandchildren, Anne-Marie Kommers, Benjamin Kommers, Sophie Kommers, Nikolas Jordan, and Jack Jordan. His daughter Kristin Mary Kommers died in 1961.

Don will be greatly missed by his family, friends, and colleagues.

Funeral Mass: Monday, January 21, 2019, 9:30 a.m. at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart at the University of Notre Dame.

In lieu of flowers, memorials may be made to the University of Notre Dame, in memory of Professor Donald P. Kommers, either online at giving.nd.edu, by phone at (574) 631-5150, or by mail: University of Notre Dame, Department of Development, 1100 Grace Hall, Notre Dame, Indiana 46556.

Info: www.kaniewski.com or 574-277-4444.

Published in South Bend Tribune from Jan. 13 to Jan. 14, 2019

Judge Tom Phillips reflects on his service

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Retiring Judge Reflects On Drug Court And More

By Patrick Sullivan | Dec. 26, 2018

This Friday (Dec. 28), 86th District Court Judge T.J. Phillips will hang up his robe and retire after presiding one last time over the “drug court,” which is fitting, because he started the specialty court in 2016 in response to the opiate addiction epidemic.

Drug court diverts hardcore drug users who face less-than-delivery charges away from prison and gives them a chance to get treatment and have their felony conviction reduced to a misdemeanor.

Phillips also helped establish a community outreach court to serve the homeless population and an eviction diversion program to help people who might their homes. The Ticker sat down with him to talk about his time on the bench and how he looked for ways to help rather than punish many of the people who came before him in court.

Ticker: Does it make sense to you that judges cannot run for reelection once they turn 70 in Michigan?
Phillips: I think I’ve done some of my best work after I hit 70. I started the drug court after I hit 70. I started the homeless court, the community outreach court after I hit 70. Started the eviction diversion a little bit before that. So, I mean, I think it is kind of ageism. If someone is doing a good job, why kick them out?

Ticker: Tell me about eviction diversion.
Philips: It brings together various agencies and nonprofits that can help provide rent payments. And if the person can show they can sustain paying their rent, that they just got behind for a little while, then the agencies are willing to pay the rent and the tenants can stay in their homes; they don’t become homeless. And the landlord gets paid, so everybody wins.
 
Ticker: Since you’ve been a judge, what insights have you had about how the criminal justice system should work?
Phillips: You know, I have a job where most people don’t want to be there. And let’s say we have someone who works as a cook in town, and they get in trouble, and I’ll talk to them and I’ll ask, “What do you cook?” I always asked them, “What’s your signature dish?” I think then, you can bring it down to just two people talking. I think they’re more relaxed, and then get treated better by the system. You talk to them as individuals. They don’t want to be there. They’re scared. But you can reach out to them and make progress.

Ticker: Is that something that happens in drug court, or can that kind of interaction happen in any kind of proceeding?
Phillips: I think it can happen in any kind of proceeding, usually criminal proceedings, because most of our stuff is criminal, 88 or 85 percent. I think it is important people have a good experience. It’s important to treat people with respect. I think that you should do it because it’s the right thing to do but it’s also the best thing to do. So maybe if the judge is nice to them, they will look inward rather than at the crappy old judge that came down on them.

Ticker: How did the drug court originate?
Phillips: We have to respond to things, and we had to respond to the overdoses we were seeing. And the specialty courts had been successful in other areas, so it was time to get it up and going. Drug court is very different than my other courts, because in drug court, you kind of act like a cheerleader. You act like Oprah where you interview people and talk to them and see how they are doing. And you still have to act as a judge, too.

I have a lot of admiration for people that are trying to change their lives. Probably 75 percent of people feel they should lose 10 pounds, and they’re motivated to lose 10 pounds, but very few of those people ever lose those 10 pounds. That’s something they want to do, they are motivated to do, and yet it doesn’t happen. And here are people that have a terrible disease of addiction and they are motivated to do something that’s very hard. So, I hold them in high esteem, because they are trying hard.

Ticker: How successful has it been? Do you measure long-term results?
Phillips: We haven’t reached that level yet, because we don’t have our first graduate. We’re getting close, probably within the next three or four months we’ll have a couple graduates, and then we will review how they do. The state will as well. They want to see what the rate of recidivism is for our drug court. Right now, we measure it on a day-to-day basis, because they are tested twice a day for alcohol, at least in the beginning, and eight times a month for drugs. So, every day we are seeing how they do and then twice a week we meet with them. Every week I hope no one messes up, and we are doing pretty well.

Ticker: Have very many people failed out of drug court so far?
Phillips: We’ve had some people fail out. Usually they fail out in the first month or two because they just weren’t motivated. After they make it past that, they’re pretty good. We want to be open to the hard cases in drug court, so we should not be surprised that some of them don’t make it through, especially in the first couple of months. But sometimes the hard cases are the ones that surprise you the most.