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Bennett CerfBennett Cerf
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“Walk down Fifth Avenue with me.” This was about five o'clock. So I walked down Fifth Avenue with Donald Klopfer and on the way he began telling me about the troubles he was having with his girl, a 16-year-old little devil, very rich and spoiled within an inch of her life. I then had a habit, which I still have, of listening with one ear. People don't think I'm listening, but I hear. This always astounds my wife Phyllis because she thinks I'm not listening, but I hear--I know what's going on--and I heard what Donald was saying about his girl. I couldn't care less, but it registered somehow or other. And we bought the tickets, and then after that we'd say hello to each other around the campus. But he was headed for Williams the following fall and I didn't see much of him.

That summer there was a Fourth of July dance at a country club I belonged to in Woodmere, Long Island, and there I met an absolutely beautiful young girl. She was with some klunk. I started dancing with her, and finally persuaded her to drop her sad sack and let me take her home. She was 16. She was going to enter Vassar that fall. I was about 20. Of course I tried to kiss her the minute we got home, but she said she couldn't kiss me because she was in love with a boy who was a counselor at a camp, and she thought it wouldn't be fair to kiss somebody else while he was away. I said, “Who is this boy? You're making all this up.” She began describing the boy, and for some reason or other (I don't know why), I said, “I bet I know the boy.” She said, “That's ridiculous.” I said, “His name is Donald Klopfer.” I was right! Wasn't that





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