Loyal Alumnus Gordon Loves Nixon and Segal

Al Gordon. chairman of the Harvard College Fund, is a name for loyal alumni to take pride in. Gordon is a physical fitness enthusiast, chairman of one of Wall Street's most prestigious financial concerns, an Overseer of Harvard, and an ardent admirer of Erich Segal and President Nixon.

Gordon frequently walks from his home in the upper East Eighties to Wall Street offices of Kidder, Peabody, Inc., at the foot of Manhattan, a walk that could kill most middle-aged executives. His son. John Gordon '71, starting halfback on the soccer team, gives him a slight head-start in a three-and-a-half mile race and has trouble beating him.

Bubble

Gordon's love of track both provided Harvard with its indoor track "bubble" and introduced him to Segal, author of America's favorite novel, Love Story. Segal was on the Harvard track team with Gordon's son Albert N. Gordon '59, who was, needless to say, captain of the team.

"Segal's a terrific fellow, terrific," Gordon said, "and his book is the greatest thing that has happened to Harvard in recent years. I saw a preview of the movie. It's an unbelievable tear-jerker. And I met Ali McGraw there. Said I was a friend of Segal's and buttered up to her. She said. 'You run in the Boston Marathon with Segal, don't you?' Made me feel great."

Gordon is so enthusiastic about Love Story that he sent out 593 copies to the major donors of the Harvard College Fund "as a token of thanks for their generosity."

Gordon likes President Nixon almost as much as he likes Segal. He describes himself as a "staunch Republican." The penholder on his desk bears a plaque inscribed to Gordon from his "friend, Dick Nixon."

Far From a Quaker

"I think Nixon is doing a great job. Most people have not fed into their thinking on Nixon that Nixon was brought up a practicing Quaker. I'm far from being a Quaker, but Quakers are anxious to be good to others in a practical way. Quakers are for peace, and they're humble people. They like to go by their deeds and not just their words. You notice that Nixon uses the word 'I' very little. And remember, President Hoover was a Quaker, too."

Gordon's fondness for Love Story and Push Comes to Shove does not extend to all examples of Harvard in print. He is reported to be less than impressed with some of the recent ideological tendencies of the Harvard Bulletin, the University alumni magazine.

Wall Street Blues

Since September, Kidder, Peabody has cancelled a full-page ad it ran on the back cover of every Bulletin for the past few years, and the College Fund has cancelled 400 subscriptions it had purchased for its national organizers. Gordon said, however, that the ad was cancelled for financial reasons, and the subscriptions went because of a lack of favorable response.