- Jeff Kohlman '66

Ruth Koehler Bergerson '66 has served as class agent for nearly 30 years now, and has helped organize reunions for nearly that long. Grinnellians form close bonds, and perhaps this was more so in the '60s and before, when the school was more cloistered than it is today; no Internet, no cars, or for that matter, no Interstate 80. We even had Saturday classes! Our classletters have related a history rich with intimate details, beating any TV soap opera hands down. I asked Ruth what has kept her going at this, and here is what she said:

What I have discovered doing the letter over the years is that we are all far more alike than different. The struggles that people go through are almost universal: problems with kids, dying parents, losses of one kind or another, retirement, weddings, grandchildren, and on and on. I think sometimes it is easier to deal with life's difficulties knowing that others have gone there before. If you read about how someone has coped with a dying parent or some such loss, it can be helpful. It can also put our own problems in perspective.

Is there any more that needs to be said to describe why this spotlight shines on Ruth? But here goes anyway.

Ruth came to Grinnell from Minneapolis after an on-campus visit with an older high school friend and the results were positive from day one. Meeting Ruth is making an automatic friend, and that started with freshman orientation, where I can still remember sitting next to her. Her girlfriends started with freshman dorms and grew to a close-knit group of eight or so, all of whom are still remarkably close. Of course, it also should be mentioned that she met her husband, John Bergerson '65, on campus. Her work holding us all together started on campus where she served on Student Council, as a house president, and worked on The Cyclone. She came to her epistolary skills honestly, even as a teenager loving the art of letter-writing. While most of us were calling home (remember those pay phones in the first floor closets of the dorm?), Ruth was regularly writing letters. Even before she became a class agent, her group of girlfriends remained connected, no matter how far flung, by Ruth's letters. It was just th e na tural expansion of things for Ruth to take over the class agent job and continue to connect us together all these years.

Ruth was a history major and also earned a teaching certificate. Upon leaving Grinnell, she taught social studies and has served as a board member for a company and foundation first organized by her great-grandfather. Volunteer work begets volunteer work. Her modest claim to be only a housewife and mother is belied by her volunteer work as a PTA member and president, and her other school-related volunteer work: coaching the Future Problem Solving Competitions, and serving as a member of the Curriculum Committees. Only a housewife? Yeah, yeah…

Ruth's son, John, is a Grinnell grad class of '92. I wonder if he writes letters home, or has succumbed, like the rest of us, to e-mails and cell phones? I'll bet his mother writes to him.

Ruth, you have kept us all connected. Thank you.

July 2009 Honoree: Michael Schaffer '70
May 2009 Honoree: Ron Lavender '50
March 2009 Honorees: Carl Adkins '59 and Catherine Foster Alter '60
January 2009 Honoree: Ruth Koehler Bergerson '66
November 2008 Honoree: David V. Evans '64
September 2008 Honoree: Samantha Massingale Gerth '91
July 2008 Honoree: Audrey "Bunny" Howard Swanson '43
May 2008 Honoree: Emily Westergaard '02
March 2008 Honoree: David Rosenbaum '78
January 2008 Honoree: Beverly Burd Stubbee '48