William Gilder Litchfield ’46

On a lucky day for '46, an Army medic discharged Litch for allergies to GI boots. Back on campus in July 1944, he spent countless hours at 305 Nassau Hall as our corresponding secretary, writing classmates everywhere. One later said, "Bill, we were friends before we ever met." Dean Frisco Godolphin said Litch "did more than anyone to hold your class together."

This always quick, often outspoken, sometimes outlandish guy loved us "fiercely" (his word). That loyalty kept his phone busy calling '46ers and Choate classmates. When friends threw him a 50th-birthday party, 200 people showed up. For the last 20 years in Albany, N.Y., Bill was "Lord Mayor of Willett Street." After his death from cancer Apr. 27, 2003, an Albany Times-Union columnist wrote, "Friends remembered the witty and acerbic Democratic political operative in Albany's Center Square neighborhood as generous to friends and relentless with those with whom he disagreed. He earned his moniker holding impromptu political debates on the steps of his apartment facing Washington Park."

Litch leaves niece Sandra Clarke Walter, nephew George M. Clarke, several grand-nieces and nephews, Albany admirers who made his memorial service standing-room only, and an army of '46 friends.

The Class of 1946