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Part I - Basic Info

First Name (required)

Katherine
Last Name (required)

Hyde
Nickname

Katherine Hyde
Current Hometown

Ridgewood, NJ
Your Residential College

Berkeley
Other Colleges Attended

Vassar; NYU Law School
Your Major at Yale

Religious Studies
Yale Activities and Clubs

I wrote one, only one, short article for YDN. That’s it. No choral groups, no environmental activism, no politics. No sports (not a surprise to my friends). Kind of embarrassing how long in life it’s taken me to become comfortable with doing a little bit in the public eye, so to speak.

Part II - Personal Updates

Tell us about your professional life/ career

Secretary/Assistant and then Production Editor for science and math textbooks at W. W. Norton’s college division (my first job in New York)
NYU Law
Debevoise corporate department (my favorite deal was a new mutual fund)
Shereff Friedman (now merged into Dechert) (venture capital, M&A, public and private offerings)
Two kids; home with them until our older son was 8
In-house counsel at Hanover Direct, catalog company in Weehawken, NJ
NYU School of Continuing and Professional Studies, where I ran noncredit programs in finance, accounting and law (incidentally a great place to take a course or two for people who are new to the city, or want to fill in gaps from their undergrad or MBA programs)
For the past several years: my own consulting business doing business writing, marketing, publicity. In spare moments working on a project on the math of subprime finance, tentative title Subprime Toys.
Publications

To see many of the articles I’ve written for Japan Society in New York, see the organization’s website, japansociety.org
Tell us about your personal life these days...

See below (my personal life is my family). We moved to NJ in 1981. Dana practices commercial real estate law at a 30-lawyer firm near us in Bergen County.
Family

Married to Dana Cobb ’70 (Silliman) since 1973. Two sons in their early 30s, Dan Cobb, who works in admin at a law firm, and John Cobb, who is a tax lawyer at Steptoe in DC and got married almost two years ago to a wonderful woman who is a federal prosecutor.
How often do you visit New Haven?

Occasionally, though four times in the past three years.
Most influential book?

Independence Day by Richard Ford, which I read for the first time when it came out 15 years ago. The novel is beautifully written, and set in a suburban New Jersey that is depicted in a lush, romantic way. It conveys an amazing sense of being at peace with the conflicts and uncertainties of life. When I wonder if it’s OK to accept and enjoy the quirks and turns of my life, I often think of this book.
Best Yale Course?

Worldliness and Otherworldliness in Early Christianity and Its Milieu
What's been your most memorable life experience since Yale?

Birth of our kids
What the most memorable trip you've taken since Yale?

Back to Napa Valley where I grew up
If you could relive your Yale experience, is there anything you'd do differently?

Oh, absolutely. I would do the readings more diligently, avoid skipping class, and take courses that I didn’t think I’d do well in (Vincent Scully’s art history for example).