DTD at MC #48

Hello everyone,

It has been a while since I have written anything and I don't know where to start with this. So let's start out and see where we get.

On a personal note, I have closed on my house in Marietta. So I will be moving home as soon as the new Walgreen's is ready to open. I'm getting pretty excited about it, so I hope that nothing happens to delay the move. At present, it is supposed to be the first of the year. To all of you in the Marietta area, I'm looking forward to seeing you. My new address will be **removed for privacy reasons** Stop by to see me when I get there.

Hartsy sent me a note concerning my move:

Hi Rick,
Good to hear you’ll be in Marietta again. You can help Ferg keep Dole out of trouble.

Enjoy that dry Arizona heat while you still can. Then again, ovens are dry, and they cook turkeys!!!
JH

I don't know about keeping Dole out of trouble, you have probably noticed that Ferg is white-headed, I suspect that came from Dole. Concerning the Arizona heat, my air conditioner died yesterday, so I had to replace it with only about 4 months to go before I leave. Pissed me off, that was $250 that I didn't want to have to spend.

Shortly after I sent out my last email, I got a letter that kind of upset me. It was from Genworth Life Insurance Co. wanting to sell me long term care insurance. The mail was covered by a note from Jim Russell of our International Headquarters. I wrote to Jim asking for the reasoning behind this. He responded with the Fraternity's thinking. I will include our conversation here:

Hello Jim,

Today in the mail I received something that was of major concern to me. It was a letter from Genworth Life Insurance Co. wanting to sell me long-term care insurance. This letter had a cover sheet with your signature. Now granted, this is a service that I may need to consider in the future, and the price for it is skyrocketing out of control.

However, I find it very disconcerting to think that DTD would sell my address to anyone, for any reason. I don't think that this action fits very well with the "Four Fundemental Principals of Delta Tau Delta." Specifically Faith. I have faith that DTD will protect my privacy.

If this is a policy of DTD to help generate revenue to help the Fraternity in it's mission, I feel it is short-sighted. However, if necessary, I would like to request that my name and address not be released for this purpose in the future.

Fraternally,
Rick Neel,
Marietta College '73

Jim's response:

Rick,
Yes, the Fraternity does share its mailing list with selected vendors on a very limited basis. It has done so for several years, just as college and university alumni associations do. This is also true for professional associations and other membership groups.

The Arch Chapter has reviewed, given its approval and delegated this responsibility to the Central Office staff under the direction of the executive vice president. Delta Tau Delta works with a third-party source, Affinity Marketing, which also represents a number of other national fraternities and sororities. Affinity Marketing reviews and screens prospective vendors for Delta Tau Delta and we provide final approval. Only those vendors who meet the required criteria are accepted. Obviously, there are some vendor categories deemed not to be appropriate at all by Delta Tau Delta and other fraternal clients.

The revenue derived from this partnership goes to the Delta Tau Delta General Fund which helps to support the programming needs of the Fraternity. We believe this is a reasonable trade-off and has not been viewed negatively by our members. In the 5+ years I have served as the executive vice president, I believe you are only the second alumnus member to express concern about this practice directly to me.

Please be assured we will continue to conduct this program with care and respect to our members. Per your request, I also will ask that your name be deleted from future solicitations from outside the Fraternity.

Thank you for bringing your concerns to my attention.

Fraternally,
Jim Russell

My return to Jim:

Jim,
Thank you so very much for your response and explanation of the use of the Delt mailing list. I also appreciate your willingness to remove my name from said uses.

With your permission, I would like to include my email to you and your response in my next email (and subsequent posting on our Blog-http://mcdeltalumni.blogspot.com/).

With your help a couple of years ago and MC Delts forwarding addresses to me, we have developed an email address book of over 200 EU brothers, which is about 65% of the membership.

We are making plans for our 40th anniversary on the Marietta campus which will occur in October of 2008, and I would like to invite you to Marietta for the occasion. We are anticipating quite a turnout for the weekend.

I hope you can work us into your schedule.

Fraternally,
Rick Neel

Jim responded thusly:

Rick:
You are most welcome to include my response to you in your blog as you see fit.

I look forward to being in Marietta in October 2008 for the chapter's 40th anniversary. There will be plenty to celebrate.

Fraternally,
Jim

So there you have it. And I hope that you all noticed that Jim Russell will be joining us in Marietta for our 40th anniversary. Please come and introduce yourselves to him, he is a super individual and a great example of what a Delt should be.

Speaking of our 40th Anniversary, Matt have you gotten a firm date from the college yet? Seems to me that we were waiting for the OAC meetings that are scheduled for this summer to firm up the date. Check on that for us will you? Thanks.

As I wrote in email #47 we are still looking for people to contact brothers and encourage them to come to the festivities. Also, please send your stories to Shawn Selby, so he can get the booklet together. This is what I wrote last time:

Plans are beginning to shape up for our 40th anniversary. If there is
anything special that any of you would like to see included in the weekend, please let me know.

I'm looking for volunteers to get in personal contact with all of us. My thinking is that one or two people could get together and chase down all of the brothers in a given 1/2 decade. For instance, someone for the 60's, someone for 1970-1974, someone for 1975-1979, and so on. Please don't be shy, step forward and volunteer.

Also, don't forget to send your stories and memories to Shawn Selby sselby@crain.com for inclusion in the booklet he is working on for that weekend. Time is running out, remember, it takes time to put that type of thing together.

One of the things that we are kicking around is to rent the Valley Gem Sternwheeler for a night. We can keep the price reasonable if there is enough interest, but we feel that we should get a feeling from the group as far as interest. Please let me know what your feelings are.

On the same lines, we are 40 years old now so we have people on all ends of the economic spectrum, what do you feel is a budget that we can all live with for this event? Please let me know what your feelings are on this also.

Some news from our brothers; Craig Sundstrom sent me the following note, please check it out. It is pretty special that two Delts got to make Jewett Orations at the same Commencement.

Hey Rick,
Just wanted to let you know that both Dan May's and my own Jewett Commencement orations are posted on the school's Web site. It was definitely a treat to share the stage with a Delt brother at the ceremony.

As soon as I know my new contact e-mail for law school, I'll be in touch. I hope all is well.

Fraternally,
Craig Sundstrom '07

Richard Wolf sent me the following note, I wanted to point out that when we get older, we have to switch to Lite beer so we can keep our gut hidden!

Hey you old poop!!!! Have you relocated to Marietta yet?

Just checking in with you ... have a couple of things to update you on but meanwhile I am out with friends on lovely Lake Hamilton working on polishing off a 30-pack of icy cold Miller Lite.

Holler at me if you get a chance.

Richard

He hasn't sent me the update yet (perhaps it was the Miller Lite???) but he did let me know how his wife and daughters were doing:

Rick:
Running this business has been a 24/7 challenge ... not much playtime the last 2 years.

Sarah received her Master's and is employed as a Human Resources Generalist at a hospital in Waterbury, CT.

Megan will be a junior in the fall but is leaving for Australia on July 10 to do her first semester at a university in Perth; should be home mid-December. She is also studying for the MCAT which she will take this Friday.

Patsy is the rock ... 28 years on July 28.

Thanks for asking ... Very anxious to see you again at some point in the future ...

Richard

That's pretty special, 28 years of marriage. Congratulations to the 2 of you! May you make it another 28.

I got the following note from Dave Silverstein giving me an address change. Bruce Miller also sent me a new address. Be sure to update them in your records, and I hope I sent them to you Hops, if not you have them now! We didn't get any new addresses this time, so I'll throw some new ones at you. Help me out if you can.

Please change my e-mail address to **removed**

Thanks,
Dave Silverstein '79

BAM's new address is: **removed** He is also in contact with Ric Gough and is working on getting us his address. Don't forget Bruce!

All right then, that is all the news that I have for this week. Here are some names for you to try to locate for me. Remember, we need them for the anniversary. This week I am giving the names of the past presidents that we are missing. Help me out with them will you?

Mark Russell '74, Ken Weaver '75, Jeffrey Myers '81, Duke Weller '82, Steven Bennett '84, Adam Pyles '85, Jeff Gardner '86, and Mike Conaty '89.

Have a good week and come see me in Marietta next year!

Rick Neel '73