Maddenation
School Spirit
The ND club of North Jersey had a networking luncheon today and the speaker was Paul DiGaetano, a 1975 alumnus who is a former New Jersey State Senate Majority Leader. Last year, he ran unsuccessfully for governor. He spoke about the impact that Notre Dame has had on his career.
After he won his first election to the Passaic city council, a local newsman commented that he had won by garnering 90% of the Italian vote and, by virtue of his Notre Dame education, 100% of the Irish vote. Later, when the FBI was investigating corruption that had formerly plagued Passaic, they called him in to have a talk. Uncharacteristically, he showed up without a lawyer, figuring they just wanted to chat. When he asked them why they had selected him for the meeting, the agents told him they saw he was from Notre Dame and figured he was one of the “good guys.”
He said that the network of ND alums was probably the strongest brotherhood (personhood) in the country; stronger even than the Marine Corp. That hasn’t been my experience, but then I’ve never tested it. Nonetheless, I still like hearing about it. Especially the part about being the “good guys.”
Dad • Connections • 03/18/06 • 2 comments
Comments
Dan • 03/21/06 • 3:36 PM:I’m doing work for an ND grad because he’s definitely one of those guys who keeps a lot of ND contacts and goes to all the alumni functions and stuff. He needed a designer for his CD company so he went on Irishonline, found Robert’s name, called him up and asked if he had any recommendations, and then referred the guy to me. So that’s good. And I’ve been to a couple football-game-watches out here and there’s a lot of ND people schmoozing. It’s not really a part of the Madden demeanor, but sometimes it can come in handy. I’m trying to learn. We’ll see.
Patrick • 03/21/06 • 10:51 PM:I’ve never once done an ND-spirit-alumni thing, but lemmetellya, when I publish a book, I’m going to make sure I get a write-up in the Cafe du Lac section of ND Mag.
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