Alumni Association Honors Five Standouts, Including Two Nobel Prize Winners
The diminutive Village of Hastings-on-Hudson, New York (pop. 8000) occupies less than two-and-one-half sq. miles of Westchester County real estate along the Hudson River about 25 miles north of New York City but has been home to a remarkable number of highly-accomplished citizens, including six Nobel laureates -- two of whom graduated from its public High School, part of a rambling 100-year-old school complex, which includes a playing field on the former estate of Florenz Ziegfeld, Jr. and his wife, Billie Burke (the Good Witch of the West). Total High School enrollment is less than five hundred students a year.
This year, the local Hastings-on-Hudson Alumni Association decided to highlight this legacy by asking alumni from the decades of the 1940s, 1950s and 1960s to nominate, through their Class Representatives (each class has two), classmates that have gone on to distinguish themselves in a manner that reflected positively on themselves and their hallowed school. The size of a nominee's bank account was not to be a factor, nor was sports achievement--as the high school has a separate Athletic Hall of Fame. Only five places would be open to 2009's first-time honorees.
Well the ballots have been tallied and the results appear to prove what Hastings High School enthusiasts have been saying all along. Their Hall of Excellence choices include former Korean Ambassador Hon. Don Gregg -- HHS 1945, Dr. Edmund S. Phelps (Professor, Columbia University) Nobel Prize in Economics -- HHS 1951, Rear Admiral Ronald H. Jesberg USN (RET) -- and member of the Navy's Golden Eagles -- HHS 1953, Mrs. Mitzi (Mallina) Wertheim (from Peace Corps to Naval Analyst, with much in between) -- HHS 1955, and Dr. Robert C. Merton (Professor, Harvard Business School) Nobel Prize in Economics -- HHS 1962.
Planning is underway to honor these eminent alumni at a Hall of Excellence Induction Dinner in October of this year on the High School's Homecoming Weekend. Hastings High School Alumni directors have voted to fund an academic scholarship designated the "Hall of Excellence Academic Scholarship' to be presented annually to a gifted Senior Class student, of modest means, in the name of these and future Hall members. Provision will be made to open the scholarship fund to outside donations from Hastings High School alumni, friends and benefactors, with details to be announced well before the October 17th Installation Dinner at the Riverview. "There will be tough times ahead for students looking to enter college," the Alumni Board acknowledged, "and we want to do the best we can for our Best and Brightest."
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Asked if he could provide a bit more information about each of the honored Alumni, Mr. Robert H. Gersky, the Chairman of the Selection Committee and a Hastings Alumni Association director said, "Of course, there are some great stories here."
"Former U.S. Ambassador Don Gregg grew up in Hastings-on-Hudson. He graduated from Hastings High School in the Class of 1945, which makes him the senior member of our Hall of Excellence inductees. After high school, Don entered the U.S. Army serving from 1945 to 1947. Williams College came next, and a degree in Philosophy (cum laude) in 1951. He entered the Central Intelligence Agency immediately upon graduation from Williams College and for the next twenty-five years handled assignments in Japan, Burma, Vietnam and Korea. In 1975 Don was decorated by the Korean government. In the years that followed Don Gregg served on the National Security Council staff (1979) where he was in charge of intelligence activities and subsequently, Asian policy affairs. He became National Security Advisor to then Vice President George Bush, and traveled to sixty-five countries . . . his areas of support being foreign policy, defense and intelligence. Upon retirement from the CIA, Don Gregg was awarded the Agency's highest decoration, the Distinguished Intelligence Medal. From 1980 to 1989 Don lectured at Georgetown University at the graduate level on "Force and Diplomacy." Then in 1989 Don was asked to serve as Ambassador to Korea, which he did with great distinction until 1993. After a forty-three year career Don Gregg retired, receiving the Department of Defense Medal for Distinguished Service, a decoration from the Prime Minister of Korea and an honorary Ph.D. from Sogang University. You might think that was enough, but Don went on (in 1993) to become President and Chairman of The Korea Society (in New York City), where you can find him at his post today, still going strong in his eighth decade." Don told us recently that two or three times a year, on his way to or from of New York, he swings through Hastings and drives past his old home on Villard Avenue. "Hastings is still on my mind", he told us, "and I've got the highest respect for Hastings High School and the education I received there."
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"The thought that Edmund S. Phelps (HHS 1951) is a Nobel Prize winner (Economics) is a source of great pride to his classmates," Mr. Gersky said. "Ned (to his classmates), went through twelve years of elementary and high school in Hastings. Most of his school friends remember him as a musician, as do I. Ned played trumpet in the High School dance band - The Harmony Men -- which was a great band with a very distinctive sound! His musical interests also included band, orchestra and chorus. None of them could have guessed that his field of expertise would be economics because Hastings High School in those days did not offer a single course in economics. Edmund Phelps earned a B.A. degree from Amherst in 1955 and PhD. from Yale in 1959. Early appointments included Yale and its Cowles Foundation. He then joined the Columbia University faculty in 1971 where, after a long and distinguished career, he is now Columbia's McVicker Professor of Political Economy. He is also director of the Center on Capitalism and Society. Dr. Phelps won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2006. In 2008 he was named Chevalier of the Legion of Honor and awarded the Premio Pico della Mirandola and the Kiel Global Economy Prize. He holds many honorary doctorates and professorships."
In a brief autobiographical note Ned Phelps stated, "The main thrust of my work in economics was to put people, as we know them, back into economic models to account for the incompleteness of their knowledge and to study the effects of their beliefs on market workings. We adopted this perspective in studying unemployment and inclusion, business swings and economic growth."
Other sources tell us that Dr. Phelps and his wife, Viviana (an interpreter fluent in four languages), have lived for more than thirty years in a large apartment overlooking Central Park in New York. Among their other interests they love to travel, including trips to Argentina, his wife's native country, where there is a Phelps Chair in Dr. Phelps' honor at the Law School of the Universidad de Buenos Aires. Our newly-formed Hall of Excellence is truly honored by his Induction.
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When asked about Rear Admiral Ronald Jesberg, Mr. Gersky said, "Ron was another Hastings student that went all the way through the Hastings School System from K to 12. I knew him well because we were classmates in the Class of 1953. After graduation he went off to college, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, to major in civil engineering, but two years into college he was offered the opportunity to enter the U.S. Naval Academy and he jumped at it. Upon graduation from the Naval Academy he reported for flight training at Pensacola, FL and was designated a Naval Aviator in 1960. His early assignments took him to the Arctic and Antarctic on Ice Breakers; and to the tip of Africa where his unit served as back-up for a John Glenn's space flight. Following this tour Ron reported to the U.S. Naval Post Graduate School in Monterey, CA where he received his Master's Degree in Aeronautical Engineering. Subsequent assignments with a helicoptor antisubmarine squadron took him to the Mediterranean, Caribbean and South America. He was a Lieutenant Commander when he was assigned to duty with Commander, Naval Air Force U. S. Atlantic Fleet. In July of 1971 he Graduated from Armed Forces Staff College and was sent to Viet Nam as Officer-in-Charge of a squadron of helicoptor gunships, where he flew 428 combat missions and was early-selected for Command. After a short time in the U.S., he was sent back to Vietnam to assist in the mine clearing operations at Haiphong Harbor, which was a requirement for the release of American POW's. In 1985 Captain Ron Jesberg was put in command of U.S. Naval Forces Central Command, with responsibility for Naval Operations in the Persian Gulf. He told us it was surreal at times to have his family in Honolulu and his 'boss' in Tampa, FL, while he worked in the Persian Gulf. It was as Admiral Jesberg that he took over as Commander, Helicoptor Wings, Atlantic with responsibility for operational readiness, training and logistical support of four helicopter Wings, composed of twenty-squadron's of aircraft stretching from bases in Pensacola and Jacksonville, FL to Norfolk, VA. Rear Admiral Ronald Jesberg retired from the U.S. Navy on September 1, 1990. In 1996 he was inducted into the Early and Pioneer Naval Aviator Association - THE GOLDEN EAGLES - an honor conferred upon only 200 of America's ground-breaking Naval Aviator's over the long history of naval aviation. Included among his medals are The Legion of Merit, Bronze Star with Combat V, Defense Meritorious Service Medal, Air Medal and Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry. What an illustrious life and what a wonderful classmate!" Mr. Gersky added, "Admirals, like Nobel Laureates, are not new to Hastings-on-Hudson . . . Admiral David G. Farragut and his family lived here on Washington Avenue (and other houses) during the Civil War (1861-1865) and the broad street that runs by the High School is named Farragut Avenue. It was Farragut that shouted the famous words, 'Damn the torpedoes -- Full Speed Ahead!' at the Battle of Mobile Bay."
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"Mitzi (Mallina) Wertheim, was active in everything in her high school years . . . and no one could accuse her of being shy or reticent! Her first job out of college was Administrative Assistant to the Dean of the Harvard Law School. She spent almost a decade in the Peace Corps filling a series of responsible positions including Deputy to the Peace Corps Director. As a Peace Corps wife in Brazil she provided counseling to other volunteers. She was the Senior Program Officer for a major Washington, D.C. foundation's grants program, and then helped staff the Carter - Mondale Administration, followed by a stint as Deputy Secretary of the Navy. After that she crossed-over to the corporate world with computer-giant IBM, pressing for the success of President Ronald Reagan's Star Wars program. Since the late 1990's Mitzi has been a moderator and manager with the Center for Naval Analysis (Washington D.C.) while also co-founding Energy Conversation, a collaborative network for sustainable energy programs and policy. Mitzi's obviously well connected with the Who's Who in Washington, D.C. and lived a life that might make a movie script - but many of her Hastings High friends remember another story. When classmate Jeanne Clark was dying of cancer, Mitzi promised to take care of her children, Athena and Anthony. She kept that promise for almost twenty years, seeing them through high school and college and remaining their watchful friend to this day," "As you can see," Mr. Gersky added, "the Hall of Excellence Selectors considered much more than titles and medals."
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"The second of our Nobel Prize-winning Inductees is Robert C. Merton HHS '62," Mr. Gersky continued. "Dr. Merton is currently the John and Natty McArthur University Professor at the Harvard Business School. He received a PhD. in Economics from MIT in 1970, and served on the finance faculty of MIT's Sloan School of Management until 1988 when joined the Harvard faculty. Professor Merton is past President of the American Finance Association, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He received the Alfred Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences in 1997. A long list of Honorary Degrees, Academic Appointments and Awards attests to his impressive accomplishments."
An autobiographical piece suggests it all grew out of a childhood interest in baseball, poker and the stock market. From an early interest in the relationship between the stock market, warrants and convertible securities, his career path put him on an intersecting course with future Nobel Laureates Myron Scholes and Fischer Black, and their combined ground-breaking work on stock option pricing and hedging and it's application to corporate finance. The vast bulk of Dr. Merton's research has been in mathematical finance theory.
Robert Merton has said that 'the local public school provided a fine education opportunity. In a graduating class of only some 90 (students), I nevertheless was able to take mathematics through calculus and five years of science (two in physics including a MIT-designed course). Among my classmates were the sons of the Columbia physicists and Nobel laureates, James Rainwater and Jack Steinberger. Other long time Hastings residents were (Nobel) laureate in economics, Max Theiler, and laureate in Economics, William Vickery, as well as sculptor Jacques Lipchitz.' Mr.Gersky related that Robert Merton had written a short note to say that induction into the Hastings Hall of Excellence would be an honor of special significance to him. He said that "although I live in Cambridge, I continue to have deep roots in Hastings. My sister lives in the house I grew up in, her son graduated from HHS, and her daughter is a senior. My daughter also lives in Hastings and my three granddaughters are or will be going to Hastings schools." In a world where so many are quick to 'run down' their public schools, this was a very refreshing commentary - especially from a Nobel Laureate!
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Commenting on the Village's attraction for its multiple Nobel Prize winners, Mr. Gersky said, "On a per capita basis Hastings should probably be in the Guinness Book of Records." He mentioned that a former staff writer for New York's Daily News, Julian Kesner, had written an article in 2006 speculating that 'Hastings-on-Hudson must have something in the water - something that flows into the town's small public school' Kesner had referred to Hastings as 'Smartytown'. "We were never happy with that label," commented Mr.Gersky, "but we loved the water!"