Class Notes Winter 2022
1970s
Preparations are underway for the Class of 1973’s 50th Reunion! Reach out to David Vineberg (’73) if you are interested in helping to organize.
Barbara Stanton (’76) graciously hosted a dinner celebrating the Army & Anna Fund. Among those in attendance were Bill & Anna Armstrong, Trevor Culley, Lizzie Peters (’75), Jeff Silverman (’76), Spafford Robbins (’77), Kim Robertson (’77), Christian Fulghum (’77), and Tom McNutt (’77). Jessica Klein DiStefano (‘95) co-hosted.
Cebert Noonan (’79) is a long-time resident of New York City. We caught up over a meal at Arturo’s Italian in the West Village, and shared stories about Overlake, art, and literature.
1980s
Susan Roberts McMaster (’81) joined Alex Smith (’81) in organizing a joint reunion for the classes of 1981 and 1982 on Seafair Saturday in August. Among those in attendance were Andy Baker (’81), Doyle Douglas (’81), and Gavin Morrison (’82). Thanks to Alex and Ange Smith for hosting!
Leigh Ann Hines (’85) hosted the Class of 1985’s pandemic-delayed 35th Reunion at her beautiful home near Overlake in July. Among those attending were Gretchen Carlson Kimbell (’85), Mark Hedges (’85), Cyrina Thurman Keller (’85), Sam Keller (’84), Julie King Hately (’85), Chris Peterson (’85), and Jim Suor (’85), along with former faculty Janet Rothfels and Roger Murray.
1990s
Greg Bamford (’92) hosted his classmates Laura Graham (’92), Jennifer Mathews (’92), Shannon Ginn Robinson (’92), Nel Sesnon (’92), plus Jason Jennings (’91) at Pomegranate in Redmond for their 30th reunion.
Congratulations to Allison Elliott Barto (’94), selected as the Distinguished Alumni Award honoree for 2022! Allison is an engineer at Ball Aerospace, where she spent 17 years working on the James Webb Space Telescope. She addressed the entire student body, faculty, and staff on November 4.
Jessica Klein DiStefano (’95) collaborated with Barb Stanton (’76) to celebrate the success of the Army & Anna Fund with a garden party at Barbara’s home in late July. Jessica operates Hobart Family Farms Nursery in Maple Valley with her husband Ricco.
Jessica Gigot (’97) recently wrote an editorial for The Seattle Times urging policy changes designed to support more first-generation farmers. She also recently published her new book of prose entitled A Little Bit of Land, from Oregon State University Press.
2000s
Adam Nordin (’02) reports that his family recently moved to Los Angeles after five years in London.
Divvy founder Blake Murray (’02) announced that he is stepping down from day-to-day operations at Divvy and Bill.com to spend more time with family. He plans to get in some trout fishing and then return to an advisory role helping build great companies on the Silicon Slope in Salt Lake City.
Hilary Pentz (’02) hosted the 20th reunion of her class in her home in north Seattle in July.
Congratulations to Beckley Mason (’04) on his recent marriage. He and his wife are dividing their time between New York City and Sag Harbor. He will be co-hosting the NYC area Owl Reunion on February 1, 2023. Beckley has recently moved from sports television production to a nutritional supplements company from New Zealand called Athletic Greens.
Calla di Pietro (’08) will co-host the NYC Owl Reunion on February 1, 2023. Thank you, Calla!
Alumni Board members Kate Berry (’08) and Chris Faulkner (’10) both joined in a spirited game of GOLA as part of the celebrations at our All-Alumni Reunion in July.
Special thanks to Isabel Runge (’12) for hosting the 10th Reunion of the Class of 2012 at Citizen Café in Uptown. Dean Poplawski (’12) was among those in attendance.
2010s & 2020s
Dylan Reynolds (’14) and Meike Buhaly (’15) both ended up presenting at the International Mountain Conference in Innsbruck, Austria in September. #OverlakeOwlsareEverywhere
Congratulations to Usman Moazzam (’18), who recently completed his internship at Microsoft. He will return to Microsoft as a Software Engineer next summer.
Congratulations to both Felix Huang (’19) and Kara Cho (’20) on being among just four winners of the Charles J. Dirksen Prize awarded by the Santa Clara University Leavey School of Business. The award is for highest cumulative GPA among juniors at the business school. Felix is an economics major and business analytics minor. Kara is an accounting information systems major. Go Owls!
Faculty & Staff
The long and distinguished coaching and teaching career of Bob Bristol was celebrated at the first All-Alumni Reunion since 2018 in July. Alums from all eras were in attendance, including many players from Bob’s championship teams over the years. Retired Middle School Social Studies teacher Dave Bennett was also on hand to celebrate and visit with former students and colleagues.
Congratulations to Jenni Baldwin on receiving an Outstanding Educator Award from the University of Chicago, thanks to Diya Mishra ('22)’s nomination.
Though the October Voyageurs Reunion has been postponed, Jean Orvis still plans to make a special trip to Seattle to join her co-hosts Kim Robertson (‘77) and Laura Stusser McNeil (‘78) when we have a new date. Voyageurs was an Overlake program which took high school students to Europe in the 1970s and 1980s.
Special thank you to our Development Alumni Intern Catherine Huang (’21), who was invaluable in helping us with innumerable projects this summer. We are so grateful to you!