Financial-aid thanks

Reading the article on the increase in tuition and fees (Notebook, Feb. 24) inspired my first letter to PAW. The rise, to $52,180 in costs for next year, brought to mind what it cost me to attend Princeton just after the war. How times have changed! Still, financial aid remains vital.

After considering my scholarship, student jobs, and summer employment, it cost my widowed mother $500 the first year, $1,000 the second, $1,500 the third, and finally $2,000 for my senior year — a total of $5,000 for my Princeton education.

When considering what all the ­assistance from the University meant to me, I am truly thankful for all that everyone contributed. It became possible for me to become, among other things, a lawyer, a colonel in the Army, a federal judge, and now to attend my 60th reunion. Donations to Annual Giving and chairmanship of a class mini-reunion have helped to repay that obligation. Student assistance does make a great life for people like me possible.