Page 5 - Alumni Horae: Vol. 94, No. 2 Winter 2014

5
1984 Hockey
Thirty winters have passed since the SPS
boys hockey team went on a historic run
that has been unmatched in the years since.
The 1984 squad, coached by former Rector
Bill Matthews ’61, remains the only Inde-
pendent School League boys hockey team
to go through a league season unbeaten
and untied.
“It’s remarkable,” said Matthews, who
attended a team reunion at St. Paul’s in
January to celebrate the 14-0 season. “But
I think the ISL is the best high school league
in the country, so in a way it surprises me
and in a way it doesn’t.”
Matthews and assistant coaches Matt
Soule ’77 and Fred Quistgard returned to
the School for the gathering, organized
primarily by Dave McCusker ’84, who co-
captained the ’84 team with fellow blue-
liner Don Sweeney ’84, who went on to a
16-year career in the National Hockey
League. Both McCusker and Sweeney
were in attendance, as were teammates
Dave Dobrowski ’84, Luke Smith ’84, Cal
Bussey ’85, David Clark ’85, Ed Krayer ’85,
Mitch Murphy ’85, John Potter ’85, and
Billy Matthews ’86. Carl Lovejoy ’74, who
was the SPS athletic director at the time,
attended with his wife, Cari.
Coach Matthews and some of his charges
believe that team chemistry – in addition
to raw talent and a little bit of luck – was
a primary factor in the undefeated season.
And though most do not recall specific
highlights of the campaign, the coach re-
members Sweeney’s game-winner in over-
time against Nobles, while Dobrowski,
Krayer, and Clark point to the ISL finale
at Lawrence Academy, attended by an
enthusiastic contingent of SPS students.
“We shared a really special experience,”
said McCusker, who was named along
with Sweeney, Bussey, Krayer, and Kevin
Powers ’85 to the 1984 all-league team.
“What I remember about this team is the
culture and the leadership from which we
all benefited. The guys put the team first.”
Bug Nights
Michele Tremblay breathes a sigh of relief
as she shares the news: In nearly two dec-
ades of testing and evaluating the aquatic
invertebrates of the Merrimack River
through the Upper Merrimack Monitor-
ing Program, the group has yet to find a
rat-tailed maggot.
“That would be a real red flag,” explains
Tremblay, who co-chairs with Steve Landry
the Upper Merrimack River Local Advisory
Committee. “You can take a water-quality
sample and, depending on the day, can get
a snapshot of whether the water quality
is good or bad. The thing about inverte-
brates is that they are in the water all the
time; they are the long-term determiners
of water quality.”
While the rat-tailed maggot and its
snorkel-shaped, telescoping breathing
siphon has thankfully eluded the group,
the quality and diversity of invertebrates
in the river is telling. And on many Wednes-
day evenings during the Winter and Spring
Terms, the ecology lab of the Lindsay Cen-
ter for Mathematics and Science is home
to the Concord-based group charged with
studying them. The evenings – informally
dubbed “bug nights” – are open to all SPS
community members wishing to parti-
cipate. SPS students, faculty, and staff
already are among the weekly attendees,
including Hasna Rtabi ’16.
Bug nights are not a new thing; they are
currently celebrating their 20th year –
nearly all of them since 1995 taking place
in the labs of St. Paul’s. Samples are col-
lected by volunteers in the summer and
preserved for analysis in the winter.
The nights represent what Tremblay calls
“citizen science” at its best. The data gath-
ered by volunteers is reported to state and
federal agencies for use in water-quality
reports and, says Tremblay, can impact
Congressional funding in the state, depend-
ing on the findings.
“It’s important; it’s real science,” she
says. “And there wouldn’t be bug nights
without St. Paul’s School.”
Jeremy “Re-programmed”
David Vald és landed his first teaching job
at Milwaukee High School of the Arts. It
was there that the SPS theatre director
formed close bonds with many of his stu-
dents, three of whom – Ernest Miller, Curtis
Straughter, and Anthony Sears – later
became victims of serial killer Jeffrey
Dahmer. The three gay students, Vald és
said, had been the victims of incessant
bullying and ended up trusting a person
who manipulated them with kindness.
“I pushed it out of my memory for many
years,” says Valdés, who is in his sixth year
at St. Paul’s.
As part of his reflection on a well-docu-
mented tragedy that struck him personally,
Valdés spent the last few years searching
for a play that deals with bullying.
“I wanted something that would show
what an impact words have on people,”
he says. “Theatre is such a great medium,
to get up and show the impact of these
issues on our community.”
Valdés found a good fit with Maine play-
wright Bobby Keniston’s The Re-Program-
ming of Jeremy, which the SPS Theatre
Program staged at the end of January.
Jeremy is a 17-year-old whose parents
send him to a camp to “straighten” him
when he reveals that he is gay. He leaves
the experience understanding that he is
just fine, but he decides to end his own
life. Jeremy speaks to the audience from
the grave, while his friends and family
struggle to come to terms with his loss.
Valdés sees in the play a way to spark
the conversation about bullying, and the
impact our words can have on others
– intentionally or without malice. “Some-
times,” he says, “bullying is just a slip of
the tongue. There are varying degrees.”
“My experience with Jeremy has helped
me reevaluate the way I interact with people
daily,” says Benjamin “Reath” Neilson ’15,
who played Jeremy. “The show forces you
to see the impact you could have on a
person, even in the littlest interactions.”
JANA F. BROWN
KAREN BOBOTAS