Holding on

Dear Editor:

It is very sad to drive around the city which I have lived for almost 40 years and look at the yards that I remember with lush grass turned into gravel pits with weeds—excuse me, gorgeous succulents. I am trying to hang on to my grass and don’t want to feel guilty about it. I will do whatever it takes to keep my investment in my lawn.

Droughts come and go, and I can remember the canyon by my home being blessed with a huge waterfall some years ago after heavy rains for three weeks. Now, it is a drain pipe. However, I can hope that El Niño will come this winter and maybe my lawn will be saved with a belt from nature.

Jacqueline Mahoney

Claremont

The Casters

Information regarding the article: “From friends over the pond,” COURIER, July 17.

Dear Editor:

Doris and Edward Caster were members of the Scripps faculty for many years. Doris Caster was director of the Scripps Chorus and her husband Edward Caster was a professor of biology and psychology. They were both killed, I believe, in 1958, as a result of an automobile crash. They were on their way to a college “Surprise Day” event out of town with several students as passengers in their car, when they were struck by a truck as they were turning onto Mountain Avenue from Arrow Highway. Dr. Caster died instantly and his wife a few hours later. I believe the students lived. 

People in the college community were overcome with shock, grief and disbelief as the Casters had been a vital part of our lives. It is nice to think that a memorial bench that they contributed exists in England! Perhaps Scripps or the COURIER could establish a site where funds might be donated to replace the old bench.

Diane Divelbess

Scripps alumna

Class of 1957

Caster benches

Dear Editor:

In the July 17 COURIER, you asked for information on the Casters. Jay Edward Caster taught biological sciences at Scripps from 1935 until 1960. Doris Buriff Caster was director of the Scripps College Choir from 1936 until 1960. They were killed in an automobile accident in March 1960.

In those days, Scripps observed a Surprise Day each spring when the entire community skipped classes for a day and went on an outing to the desert, beach or other informal destination. The Casters and three student passengers, who were unhurt, were part of a caravan heading out to the desert.

It appears that the benches in Dorchester-on-Thames were in memory of the Casters, so someone must have given them after March 1960. They had no children, so the donor could have been a former student or other friends who were involved in the upkeep of the cathedral there. The Casters lived in Padua Hills and, living in Claremont for so many years, no doubt had many friends as well as decades of Scripps alumnae who remembered them

Judy Harvey Sahak

Director, Ella Strong Denison Library

Scripps College