East Winter 2006

Winter 2006

East

THE MAGAZINE OF EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

Maynard’s Midas Touch inside:

Bui ldi ng the Future In Thei r Footsteps Bounci ng Back

View Finder

Do u ble Majo r?

Identical twins Casey and Michelle Higson were among the approximately 2,200 East Carolina University students 足participating in winter graduation 足ceremonies. The psychology majors are from Greenville. Photo by Forrest Croce

Winter 2006

East

THE MAGAZINE OF EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

F E AT U R E S

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MAYNARD’ S MIDAS TO UCH

By Suzanne Wood The Golden Corral restaurant chain attracts millions of ­hungry people each month because the food is great and because founder James Maynard ’65 knows the secret to making his 12,000 employees love serving others.

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B UILDING T H E FUT URE

By Steve Tuttle Surging enrollment that has propelled ECU to the third-largest in the UNC System necessitated a massive expansion— now nearly completed—that has seen six new buildings constructed or renovated on campus in the past five years at a cost of more than $200 million.

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IN T H E IR FO OTST E PS

By Marion Blackburn A fourth generation of the “Magnolia Belles” graduates from ECU, continuing a tradition begun when women had to overcome major obstacles to go to college.

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B O UNCING B ACK

By David Droschak Ricky Stokes faces a big challenge rebuilding ECU’s ­basketball program after eight straight losing seasons. But he’s beaten other long odds, such as when, as a 5-foot-9 guard, he was deemed too small to play for a Virginia team that competed in two Final Fours.

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B O O M B OX

By Marion Blackburn You can hear an eclectic range of music on ­campus radio station WZMB but what listeners don’t see are ­students working behind the scenes who are learning ­marketable skills.

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D E PA R T M E N T S

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T H E E CU RE PO RT

FRO M T H E CLASS RO O M

CLASS NOT E S

UPO N T H E PAST

From The Editor

I

t might surprise some that the new editor of this magazine didn’t go to school here.

But my wife, Gayle McCracken ’75, and many of my friends did. Here’s one example.

Shortly after I accepted this job, we had about 20 friends and neighbors over to our house for a deck party. When I asked, 11 raised their hands that they had graduated from ECU, their spouse or one of their kids did.

Gayle gave the party a Pirate theme with ECU flags and banners decorating the deck.

Once the party started, she beckoned me over to a circle of ECU graduates, including good friend Rick Fanney ’75 of Smithfield and neighbor Marilee Marshall Tilley ’80. They wanted to teach me the “EC, EC, you look so good to me” chant. I hated to dampen their school spirit but I had to tell them I had checked and found there was no alumni chapter in our county. After maybe three seconds, they all said, “Then we’ll start one,” and began rattling off the names of friends and old classmates who would join.

I turned from that conversation to talk to another neighbor, Don Waugh, with his son, Donald, who will graduate from ECU this spring. Donald, I learned, had driven a convertible in the Homecoming Parade bearing 93-year-old W. Eric Tucker ’33, the oldest-living ECU letterman.

A couple of weeks later, the Fanneys came with us to the last home football game of the season. Walking up to our seats inside Dowdy-Ficklen, I bumped into Doug Byrd ’69, the state Department of Commerce official who I have known for many years through his work in economic development. Doug chairs the Board of Visitors. Our wives are Delta Zeta sorority sisters.

During the game, I joined in yelling “Pirates” after each first down and even attempted a few “aarghs” after big plays. I introduced myself to Chancellor Steve Ballard when I saw him walking by and could tell he’s a big fan. He was munching on a box of popcorn when ECU intercepted a pass to seal the 31-23 victory over UAB. The chancellor gave out a big whoop that sent popcorn flying.

Gayle wanted to drive around campus after the game and was surprised at how much ECU and Greenville have grown. Garrett, where she lived her freshman year, looked the same, as did the DZ house and pretty much all of Fifth Street. However, Ricky thought his old fraternity house, Theta Chi, was a little worse for wear.

Having just written the story on ECU’s recent growth spurt (see “Building the Future,” page 12), I enjoyed sharing my knowledge of the new buildings and ­explaining the huge investment the university has made in providing state-of-the-art facilities for students and faculty. Gayle and Ricky were impressed but still a little ­disappointed that some of their old haunts were gone, including the Elbow Room and other off-campus hangouts.

Back at work, I finally got around to reading the information the university ­provides new staff members and was pleasantly surprised to learn we’re allowed to take one course each semester for free. I quickly availed myself of that opportunity, which I suppose means that my transformation to a Pirate is well under way. So I need to change what I said at the beginning of this column. I didn’t go to school here. I am going to school here.

Still, I will need your help to continue producing a quality magazine for the ECU family, so please send me your ideas and suggestions. Call me at 252-328-2068 or email me at tuttles@ecu.edu.

East THE MAGAZINE OF EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY Winter 2006 Volume 4, Number 2 East is published three times a year by East Carolina University Division of University Advancement 2200 South Charles Blvd.

Greenville, NC 27858

h EDITOR Steve Tuttle ART DIRECTOR Brent Burch PHOTOGRAPHER Forrest Croce CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Marion Blackburn, David Droschak, David Hein, Suellyn A. Lathrop, Nancy McGillicuddy, Suzanne Wood CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS Ann Holland, Cliff Hollis, Marc J. Kawanishi, Jean-François Molliere CLASS NOTES EDITOR Franceine Rees

h DIRECTOR OF UNIVERSITY MARKETING Clint Bailey

East Carolina University is a constituent institution of The University of North Carolina. It is a public doctoral/ research intensive university offering baccalaureate, ­master’s, specialist, and doctoral degrees in the liberal arts, sciences and professional fields, including medicine. Dedicated to the achievement of excellence, responsible stewardship of the public trust, and academic freedom, ECU values the ­contributions of a diverse community, supports shared ­governance, and guarantees equality of opportunity. ©2006 by East Carolina University Printed by The Lane Press 60,500 copies of this public document were printed at a cost of $31,661.78 or $.52 per copy.

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The ECU Report Play ball!

Thirty-five games at Clark-LeClair Stadium, including the third annual Keith LeClair Classic, highlight East Carolina University’s 2006 baseball schedule, which begins Feb. 10 with a three-game homestand against Maryland. The 54-game season will conclude May 24 with the Conference USA tournament in Houston, Texas.

It will be a tough baseball season for ECU, which will play 23 games against eight different teams that participated in the 2005 NCAA Tournament. However, the Pirates, who made their seventh consecutive trip to the NCAA Regionals last year, return 15 lettermen from a team that finished fourth in C-USA. This year’s Keith LeClair Classic will be Feb. 24-26. Atlantic Coast Conference ­members N.C. State and Virginia Tech will join ECU, UNC Wilmington, West Virginia and Penn State in the three-day event. The Pirates will square off against N.C. State three times in 2006 with ECU hosting the Wolfpack on April 12 and the Pirates traveling to Raleigh for a pair of games on March 29 and April 18.

The Pirates head to California March 10 for their first road trip of the season against 2004 national champion Cal State Fullerton.

ECU will play the second of three games against in-state rival UNC Wilmington on the road March 15, before wrapping up the series in Greenville on March 22.

Tickets for the 2006 baseball season are available online at www.ecupirates.com or by calling the ECU ticket office at (252) 328-4500.

Pirates beef up nonconference schedule Tailgating never looked better with news that N.C. State, North Carolina, Virginia and West Virginia are coming to Dowdy-Ficklen the next two seasons. The Pirates will play a total of five games against ACC opponents the next two years and begin a series of nine games against Virginia Tech.

In addition to the full slate of Conference USA opponents, the Pirates will have road games this fall against N.C. State in Raleigh and against Navy in Annapolis, Md. Perhaps the most surprising news from ECU Director of Athletics Terry Holland is that ECU will play Virginia Tech nine times over the next decade. The Hokies have emerged as a perennial Top 10 team.

The Wolfpack will host the Pirates in Raleigh during the 2006, 2009 and 2013 seasons while N.C. State will play at DowdyFicklen in 2007, 2010 and 2016. The Hokies and Pirates, who were originally

scheduled to play next season in Blacksburg, will now push back their series ­renewal to 2007 at Charlotte’s Bank of America Stadium. Virginia Tech will make the first of four visits to Greenville in 2009.

ECU and N.C. State will play three times each at Dowdy-Ficklen and Carter-Finley Stadium while Virginia Tech will travel to Greenville four times, host the Pirates in Blacksburg on four occasions and meet once in Charlotte in 2007. In the four seasons from 2007-2010, ECU will play three ACC teams each year.

That certainly doesn’t leave room for lightweights on ECU’s football platter, giving the school one of the toughest nonconference schedules in the nation.

The exact dates of next fall’s football games haven’t been released yet, nor have the prices for season tickets, which were $125 last year. For more information, call the ECU Athletics Ticket Office at 1-800-DIAL-ECU or go online at www.ecupirates.collegesports.com.

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The ECU Report Surgeons reduce aneurysm treatment to overnight stay Repairing an aortic aneurysm usually entails major surgery, a long hospitalization and months of convalescence, but vascular surgeons at the Brody School of Medicine have developed a technique that transforms the procedure into a one-hour operation and an overnight hospital stay.

Up to now, the procedure required surgeons to cut a 14-inch opening in a patient’s chest. Recovery required a week’s hospitalization and months for full recovery.

The new, minimally-invasive treatment doesn’t require opening the chest; instead, surgeons thread a small tube through the femoral artery in the groin and use X-rays to position a graft at the site of the aneurysm to reinforce the weakened artery.

Among the first patients to benefit from the new technique was a woman in her mid60s. ECU vascular surgeon Dr. Michael Stoner performed the procedure in late October with assistance from Dr. Frank Parker, ECU vascular surgeon, and Dr. Curt Anderson, ECU cardiothoracic surgeon. The patient was under general anesthesia about an hour; she spent one night in the hospital and was expected to return to normal activities in two to three weeks.

Stoner, Anderson and their ECU colleagues are working to establish a center for the treatment of patients with complex aortic problems under the auspices of the Eastern Carolina Cardiovascular Institute directed by Dr. W. Randolph Chitwood Jr., chief of the Division of Cardiothoracic and Vascular Surgery at the medical school and senior associate vice chancellor for health sciences at ECU. Chitwood said this latest treatment option for patients with aortic aneurysms is another step forward in treating all types of cardio­ thoracic and vascular needs in eastern North Carolina. “Our goal is to be a national leader in the treatment of patients with these complex aortic disorders, and we are doing it by attracting highly trained individuals like Dr. Stoner, Dr. Anderson and Dr. Parker,” he said.

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Dr. Frank Parker, center, uses the new minimally invasive procedure to repair an aneurism dur­ ing a recent surgery at Pitt County Memorial Hospital.

Biologist explores connection between plant protein, oxygen A three-year, $280,000 grant from the National Science Foundation has enabled East Carolina University biologist Cindy PutnamEvans to explore how a protein found in plants reacts and splits water molecules during photosynthesis. “This reaction is very important because it is ­virtually the only source of molecular oxygen in the biosphere and almost all life depends upon this oxygen source for survival,” Putnam-Evans said. Her work could prove useful for agricultural applications, as well as for possible synthetic ­oxygen production.

In other research news: ■ East Carolina University physicist Yongqing Li is making headlines again with an instrument he developed that allows researchers to “trap” a live human cell in a laser beam for quick analysis. The physicist called the laser beam technique “Raman tweezers” and said it allowed doctors to identify tumor cells in humans at the singlecell level. Now Li and ECU biologist Thomas McConnell are ­collaborating with colleagues in the Brody School of Medicine to improve the Raman tweezers to give it the image-forming ­abilities of a microscope. This project will modify the spectrometer to identify normal and cancerous cells, Li said.

■ More than 2,000 people watched from their computers as surgeons from ECU performed gastric bypass surgery at Pitt County Memorial Hospital. Dr. Kenneth G. MacDonald moderated the surgery for online viewers as Dr. William H. Chapman III operated. The hospital received more than 150 e-mails during the live webcast on Nov. 15. “As more and more patients learn about the potential benefits of gastric bypass surgery, we hope that this webcast will encourage potential candidates to talk to their doctors about whether the procedure is appropriate for them,” MacDonald said.

New debit card eliminates long lines at cashier’s office One unpleasant memory many alumni have is standing in long lines at the university cashier’s office to pick up financial aid refund checks at the beginning of each semester. It’s a timeconsuming chore that even current students have endured.

But beginning this semester that

process became a thing of the past when the university initiated a program that issues a debit card to every student. Mom and dad also will be able to go online and transfer money to Junior’s debit card. The MasterCard-backed debit card can be used anywhere—not just on campus. There is no monthly fee or minimum balance requirements.

East Carolina contracted for the service through Higher One, a Connecticut-based company specializing in customized financial services for universities nationwide. UNC Wilmington is the only other North Carolina school to join the program. Higher One says most universities using its debit card system realize substantial savings through lower administrative costs.

“In discussions with our Student Government Association, one of our goals has been to eliminate the need for students to stand in line to pick up their refund checks,” says Chuck Hawkins, senior associate vice chancellor for financial services at ECU. While the new ECU debit card is issued through MasterCard, it’s not a credit card.

The card is a debit or check card, so there’s no worry about credit card debt. Also, the debit card does not replace the university’s One Card system, which most students use for meals and other purchases on campus.

The ECU debit card will offer students three methods to receive financial refunds from their school—as a deposit to OneAccount, the free checking account associated with the card; as a direct deposit to another checking account; or as a paper check delivered by mail. The ­system also allows students to track their refund history and change their preference online at any time.

Officials said the university

Marc Kawanishi

Cliff Hollis

The ECU Report

SGA President Cole Jones listens to UNC System President Erskine Bowles during lunch in West Dining Hall.

expects to expand the current One Card ID system in a couple of years to incorporate financial aid refunds. The university mailed the debit cards to each student’s primary address. For more information, visit www.

ECUcard.com.

Bowles to ECU: “I want to be your champion” Erskine Bowles acknowledged that East Carolina has gotten short shrift in the past from the University of North Carolina System and promised that will change in the future. “I want to be your champion to help you get the resources to meet your goals,” Bowles, who took office Jan. 1 as the new president of the 16-campus university system, said during a day-long visit to Greenville in November. He met with senior administrators and deans, representatives of the Faculty Senate and Staff Senate, students, trustees and community leaders.

“I see my job as to be helpful. What can we do to help?” Bowles asked. Bowles told the Board of Trustees that “for too long, this

u­ niversity has been treated like a second-class citizen. These are not things you are going to have to worry about in the future.” A Charlotte investment banker and former chief of staff to President Bill Clinton, Bowles is a UNC Chapel Hill graduate. He succeeded Molly Corbett Broad, who retired in December.

Magazine welcomes Tuttle as editor With this issue, East ­welcomes a new editor who brings years of publishing and writing experience to the job. Steve Tuttle, 55, came aboard the first of Novem­ber and arrives at East from North Carolina Magazine, the monthly business magazine published in Raleigh by NCCBI, the state chamber of commerce.

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The ECU Report Tuttle edited that magazine for 15 years, during which its circulation doubled and it won three straight Sir Walter Awards for journalism excellence.

He replaces Nancy Behrns Gray, who left to accept a teaching post in the College of Communications.

After 15 years in the same job, Tuttle said he wanted a new challenge and was intrigued by the idea of editing a university publication.

“There’s no better place to work than on the campus of a major university,” he said.

He didn’t attend ECU—he’s a Mountaineer from Appalachian State—but his wife and dozens of friends did. His wife, Gayle McCracken Tuttle ’75, is director of public relations and external communications for Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. They have three children, including a high school junior who is considering ECU for college.

After 10 years working in daily newspapers in North Carolina and Alabama, Tuttle moved to Washington, D.C., in 1980 to become managing editor of Television Digest, where he covered the Federal Communi­ cations Commission and the emerging cable TV industry. He then became vice president of public affairs for the National Cable TV Association in Washington.

Tuttle moved to New York in 1986 and worked four years there as editor and ­associate publisher of CableVision magazine, a national trade industry bimonthly. He returned to North Carolina in 1990 to take the North Carolina Magazine job.

“East already was a quality magazine and my challenge will be to continue that tradition and build on it,” Tuttle said. “I invite suggestions about how we can improve East and would love to hear from readers.”

Tuttle can be reached at 252-328-2068 or at tuttles@ecu.edu.

Janette Fishell and Colin Andrews

St. Paul’s organ dedicated Dr. Janette Fishell, professor of organ and sacred music, waited 10 years to give the concert dedicating the $1.4 million C.B. Fisk Opus 126 pipe organ at St. Paul’s Episcopal 6

Church in Greenville. That’s how long it took for planning, fund-raising and building the space to house the instrument. Her ­dedicatory concert last fall capped eight

months of work installing and fine-tuning the pipe organ.

An appreciative audience that filled St. Paul’s warmly received her concert and

The ECU Report remarks she gave explaining the intricacies of the pipe organ. Her husband, Colin Andrews, accompanied Fischell, who had been left somewhatweakened by recent surgery for ovarian cancer.

The new instrument was christened the Perkins and Wells Memorial Organ in ­recognition of two local foundations that donated a combined $650,000 toward its purchase. The church has granted ECU ­perpetual use of the organ for practice, ­performance and education.

Online programs ranked tops in nation GetEducated.com has ranked ECU’s online MBA and computer science degree programs No. 1 nationally and the university’s online ­education degree program No. 3 in the nation. The organization, which employs ­college experts to review online programs of ­universities across the country, deemed all three of ECU’s online offerings as “Best Buys.” Elmer Poe, associate vice chancellor for

A rts

C alendar

Jan. 10-Feb. 4—Emerge Gallery in Greenville hosts an ­exhibition of photo­graphy by Dr. W. Randolph Chitwood Jr., chief of the Division of Cardio­thoracic and Vascular Surgery at Brody School of Medicine, and Ann Holland, wife of ECU Director of Athletics Terry Holland. The gallery will host a ­reception honoring Chitwood and Holland on Jan. 20 from 6-9 p.m.

Jan. 26-31—The ECU/

academic outreach at ECU, said one thing in particular seemed to impress the experts at GetEducated.com: “ECU’s online ­programs are taught by the same faculty who teach on campus and often the online students are in the same virtual classrooms as the campus students.” ECU offers more than 50 under­graduate, graduate, and ­certificate programs away from campus, and is north Carolina’s leader in distance education. About 3,700 off-campus ­students are enrolled in these programs.

Singers and ECU School of Music ­students. All performances in A.J. Fletcher Recital Hall.

Tickets are $10 for individual performances.

March 9—The Black Watch and the Band of Welsh Guards present an evening of military music, pomp, and pageantry at Wright Auditorium at 8 p.m. Tickets are $30.

March 24—The Russian At Emerge Gallery: Magnolia

Loessin Playhouse presents Dance 2006, ­mixing classic ballet, modern dance, tap and jazz styles during six performances in McGinnis Theater. Featured are works by Laura Dean and Nicholas Pupillo. Tickets are $12.

Feb. 16-21—The ECU/Loessin Playhouse presents six performances of Godspell in McGinnis Theater, including a Sunday matinee. Tickets are $17.50.

Feb. 19—ECU’s Four Seasons Chamber Music Festival makes its New York debut with a concert performance

at Weill Recital Hall at Carnegie Hall.

Works by Debussy, Mendelssohn and Dvorak highlight the concert, which begins at 2 p.m.

Feb. 25—“Unforgettable: The Nat King Cole Story,” performed by Andre Demps, Monroe Kent III, Edison Herbert and Fumi Tomita in Wright Auditorium at 8 p.m. Tickets are $30.

March 1-6—Sixth annual New Music Festival featuring performances by the ECU Symphony Orchestra, the Verdehr Trio, soprano Louise Tuppin, pianist Ursula Oppens, the ECU Chamber

National Ballet, one of two ensembles created by the legendary Bolshoi dancer Sergei Radchenko, presents Petipa’s La Bayadere, a tragic tale set in India of a temple dancer (la bayadere) and her lost love. Tickets for the 8 p.m. event in Wright Auditorium are $38, $10 for students.

Ann Holland

April 8—Vocalist and comedienne B.J. Ward performs Stand Up Opera, a spoof mixing arias by Verdi, Puccini and Dvorak with slapstick comedy.

Winner of three Ovation awards, the show is directed by Gordon Hunt, father of Helen Hunt. The single performance begins at 8 p.m. in Wright Auditorium.

Tickets are $24, $10 for students.

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Maynard’s Midas Touch James Maynard ’65 built a billion-dollar business by satisfying America’s appetite for good food served right

By Suzanne M. Wood

A

t first glance, the slender gentleman in the navy blazer with salt and pepper hair looks like many of the business people and office workers spilling out of their cars

at lunch time and into the buffet lines at the Golden Corral restaurant in Raleigh. Like everyone else he waits in line to pay for his meal before carrying his tray into the dining area. Then it starts. “Hello, Mr. Maynard,” says a waitress. “How are you, Mr. Maynard,” says a manager. More restaurant employees call out greetings when the gentleman visits the cold buffet and later when he finds a table. It makes one wonder whether this “Mr. Maynard” is some local luminary or perhaps one of the restaurant’s lunchtime regulars.

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­ arket. Success on such a scale often brings m invitations to some pretty exclusive places, but most days Maynard still makes the short drive from Golden Corral’s headquarters to the company-owned restaurant on Glenwood Avenue, near Crabtree Valley Mall, where he chats warmly with the staff and keeps in touch with customers.

Not that he has to be this hands-on. As chairman and majority owner of Investors Management Corp., the holding company that owns Golden Corral, Maynard, 65, has about 200 people at headquarters who keep things running smoothly, not to mention the 13,000 who cook, serve, run cash registers and clean up at the restaurants. It’s just hard to change a work ethic that’s been more than 50 years in the making.

“I truly have the best of worlds,” he says.

“I can get up and decide to travel or do something with my family, or I can come to the office. But I usually work every day.”

He’s been working nearly every workday— and, when he was younger, weekends too— since he first started helping his dad, Benn, with his contracting business in Jacksonville.

One of his first weekend ­assignments as a teenager was to visit his dad’s customers and collect the receivables, which taught him a valuable lesson in cash flow, salesmanship and negotiation. Those skills later would all prove invaluable when he and a partner were trying to open their first restaurant in the early 1970s.

Learning Life and People

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n a way, James Maynard ’65 is both. As co-founder and chairman of the company that runs the Golden Corral restaurant chain, Maynard has become an institution in the American restaurant industry. Known for his financial acumen, Maynard’s deal-making savvy and vision helped transform a single steakhouse in Fayetteville into a chain of nearly 500 restaurants with annual sales of more than $1 billion. Golden Corral now is No. 1 in the family-style buffet restaurant industry with a 40 percent share of the

Maynard was still working for his dad when he entered East Carolina University in 1959. Benn Maynard had contracted to do the mechanical work on Jones Residence Hall. In fact, Maynard worked so much that it took him almost six years to graduate.

But he still managed to enjoy his major— psychology—and thinks it has benefited him as much as a business degree.

“I thought it would be interesting, and I found it was interesting, although my primary ambition was to get in my four years and go to work. Later I realized how much I had learned,” recalls Maynard. “Dr. Clinton Prewett, who ran the psychology department, really made an impression on me as far as how to get along in life and how to under-

stand people. As it turns out now, this is a people business—we find talented people and try to work well with them.”

When he wasn’t working on construction sites or other odd jobs, Maynard was courting, and then being a young husband, to Connie Mizelle Maynard ’62, an elementary education major. Maynard says meeting her was the best thing to happen to him at ECU—or anywhere else, for that matter. The two met at the campus soda shop where Connie worked. The couple, which recently celebrated their 45th anniversary, have two children. Daughter Easter Maynard, 34, is a former social worker, full-time mom to 2-year-old Lila and a literacy advocate. She is married to John Parker. Son Quinton, 26, is a financial analyst who recently joined the company’s real estate and finance division.

Working from New York, he scouts potential sites for future Golden Corrals.“I don’t expect (Quinton) to have a long career here, but because I think it’s a good opportunity for him to learn that side of the business I said, ‘Give it a year,’” recalls Maynard. “I’ve really tried hard to let both of my children find their own way while always assuring them that they were welcome to come to work here. Otherwise I think it’s too much pressure on your kids.”

Even though his daughter has chosen her own path and his son’s tenure with the company may be brief, Maynard is still surrounded by many associates who’ve known him so long that they’re practically family. His executive assistant, Doris Baldwin, has been with him for 29 years. And the executive suite and management ranks at Golden Corral could almost qualify as an ECU alumni chapter.

Gene Aman ’65, the holding company’s vice president, has known Maynard for nearly 50 years. Irwin Roberts, another vice president, also is an ECU alum, as is Louis W. Sewell Jr., who sits on the board after having worked at Golden Corral until his retirement. Further down the organizational chart are several younger managers who fly the purple and gold flag. And of the first six investors who took a chance on Maynard and his first partner, the late Bill Carl, four were ECU alumni (including Sewell and Aman). Other ECU ties include Maynard’s sister, Llew Jean White ’65, her husband, George ’65, and Connie’s 9

A James Maynard/ Golden Corral Smorgasbord His companies: Investors Management Corp., parent ­company of Golden Corral Corp; Maynard Capital Partners, a ­venture capital firm.

Company headquarters: Raleigh Number of Golden Corral units in 2005: 470 in 40 states.

Golden Corral sales in 2005: $1.43 billion (estimated). The chain serves about 2.8 million customers each week.

Key business successes: Surviving the recession of the early 1970s; transforming Golden Corral in the late 1980s-early 1990s from a steakhouse to a buffet-style restaurant with a variety of healthy hot and cold foods.

Key ECU affiliations/awards: Board of Trustees, 1980-89; benefactor of four scholarships; 1980 Outstanding Alumnus of the Year Key restaurant industry honors: 1981 Restaurateur of the Year, N.C. Restaurant Association; 1993 Thad Eure Jr. Hospitality Industry Award, N.C. Restaurant Association; 2005 Excellence in Education Award, N.C. Restaurant Association; 2005 Educational Foundation College of Diplomats Award, National Restaurant Association.

Key business/civic award: The Newcomen Society Award for Outstanding Business Leadership, 2002 (shared with Ted Fowler, president and CEO of Golden Corral Corp.); Order of the Long Leaf Pine, Gov. Mike Easley/State of North Carolina, 2003.

Quotable quote: “We have a belief that you will be ­rewarded in direct proportion to the ­service and value you provide others.”

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sister, Mary Latham Waters ’66 and her husband, Harold ’66.

“One of the great things about ECU is that we were all from eastern North Carolina.

It was pretty easy to be friends because of the ties we all had. I like the idea that eastern North Carolina is the focal point of all these relationships. One of the great things about this business is doing it with friends who become business associates or partners, and then there are the business associates or coworkers who become friends. I see the company as a great place to build a future. Land, buildings—those are just the necessary tools.

The real deal is to find people who love serving others. We have a motto here that goes ‘If you have the attitude, you can train the skills’” Another friend and ECU alumnus is Raleigh developer Roddy Jones ’58. Jones had the opportunity to work with Golden Corral as it kept growing and needing land. Today, he and Maynard are good friends.

“I think he’s a visionary,” says Jones. “He sees things before they happen. For instance, he decided to change the company’s concept (in the late ‘80s) because he thought that people would quit eating steaks. Under their new family-buffet model, which requires bigger stores and a bigger menu, they’ve become even more profitable. That’s hard to do.”

How It all Started

Back in the steak-happy heyday of the early ’70s, Maynard had vision but not much else. Specifically, he needed money, which he and partner Bill Carl discovered was not readily handed over to two young men with little business experience. Maynard and Carl met when they both worked for Burroughs Corp. in Palm Beach, Fla. The two friends knew they wanted to start a business together, so they set out to acquire a franchise in one of the growing family-style restaurant chains.

Their lack of capital and restaurant experience, however, did not exactly impress the companies to which they applied; they were turned down by every major franchisor. So like the puffy yeast rolls for which Golden Corral would eventually become famous, Maynard and Carl created a restaurant from scratch. A friend in the steakhouse business agreed to teach Carl the restaurant side of

things, and Maynard, familiar with running a construction business, took on the financier and developer roles. He raised $20,000 from family and friends—including a few ECU alumni—and borrowed $20,000 from the bank. Still, they were short of what they needed to get their own steakhouse off the ground.

In an early display of his deal-making acuity, Maynard invested all his stockholders’ money in Carolina Wholesale Florist, a small public company that had capital but no earnings. He then persuaded the floral company to partner in the Golden Corral venture, with the understanding that Investors Management Corp. would take control of the floral company, sell the assets and use the proceeds to get the restaurant started. Two years and $50,000 later, the first restaurant finally opened Jan. 3, 1973, on Bragg Boulevard in Fayetteville as a family-style steakhouse.

Golden Corral was profitable the first month.

But the golden touch did not seem to reach the second and third restaurants which opened nine and eighteen months later.

“By the time we opened our second restaurant in 1973, the price of beef had nearly tripled. To make matters worse, President Nixon froze the price of cattle, and the supply of steaks available to restaurants totally dried up,” says Maynard. “It nearly broke us. We literally could not buy sirloin for our restaurants. We had to go to Canada to buy a truckload of beef, use what we needed, and sell what we couldn’t use to others. We survived by the skin of our teeth.” It also helped that Maynard’s father, Benn, was the contractor who built restaurants No. 2 through 50, freeing Maynard from construction-related worries and allowing the two to work together once again.

But the company did survive and slowly came to thrive. “The success we’ve had is the outcome of hard work and James’ persistence, ability to overcome adversity, and his keen financial and analytical skills,” says Ted Fowler, president and CEO of Golden Corral Corp., who joined the company when it had just 20 locations. “He really has a growth orientation. Plus, to know James is to like him. He can treat people from a truck driver to a mayor as if they are distinct, unique human beings. When you’re with James, you

feel like you’ve got his full attention.”

Maynard’s college friend and early investor, Gene Aman, also points to Maynard’s complement of business skills and solid character traits as being crucial to the company’s success. “He’s committed to seeing things through. He doesn’t have a driving desire for money. People are more important to him than money. He believes in God, and he believes that if you say you’ll do something, you’ll do it.”

Valuing education

One of the things Maynard has committed to do over the years is helping educational causes. Part of the reason he lends his support to education is as a tribute to Connie, who taught second grade for six years. And then there’s this: “We have this great heritage of turning out great educators at ECU. I don’t think there’s anything more important than helping children get a good education.”

Maynard and his wife have funded several scholarships at ECU, including one in memory of his brother, Benn, an accomplished musician who died from rheumatic fever when he was 16 and James was 13. The scholarship benefits promising music majors at ECU who attended Jacksonville High School, Maynard’s alma mater. Another scholarship honors Connie’s mother, Jeannette. Maynard also started a program at Elizabeth City State University that offers scholarships to young men who agree to teach in public schools in northeastern North Carolina. He also donates his time to educa-

tion, having served on the ECU Board of Trustees from 1980-1989.

Then there’s the ChildTrust Foundation, which Maynard’s company established in 2003 with an initial grant of $3.5 million.

The ChildTrust Foundation supports literacy programs and has already made more than $300,000 in grants to educational organizations in North Carolina. Eventually, grant opportunities will be available to organizations wherever Golden Corral has a franchise.

And in 1987, the Golden Corral Corp. established the Connie M. Maynard Education Fund, which provides interest-free college loans to Golden Corral employees. Now run and funded by the company, the fund has distributed more than $1 million to its workers nationwide.

Last year, the N.C. Hospitality Education Foundation—which is run by the N.C. Restaurant Association—named Maynard its first-ever recipient of the Excellence in Education award. It’s just one of many ­honors and awards that are listed on his resume. He won’t bring them up himself, but if asked he says one of the honors he’s most proud of is induction into the Order of the Long Leaf Pine, which Gov. Mike Easley presided over in 2003. It’s one of the highest civilian honors awarded by the State of North Carolina.

The Man Behind the Menu

These days, though, his biggest honor is being called “grandpa.” Pictures of his granddaughter, Lila—whom he calls “the light of

our lives”—adorn his office. She and her parents live only a mile away from the Maynard home, so James and Connie can spoil her anytime the fancy strikes. “I like to take her to the restaurant and give her vegetables and watch her eat them,” Maynard says with a grin. There are other tokens of Maynard’s family in his office, including a large portrait of a young Easter and Quinton with their border-collie mix, Sparkle.

Family pictures occupy prominent places in his office, as does a painting of wild ponies on a sand dune. At first the painting seems like just a nice decorative touch, but it turns out to have a family association, too.

When Maynard was a boy he begged his father for a horse so often that his dad relented and paid $10 for a wild pony that had been rounded up from Shackleford Island, where a herd of the sturdy, fuzzy ponies has thrived for generations. Armed with boyish enthusiasm and a home-study course on horsemanship that he had ordered through the mail, Maynard was able to turn “Tony” into his trusty steed, riding him through the neighborhoods of Jacksonville until was old enough to get his driver’s license. At that point, Tony was “regifted” to another horsecrazy young boy. The scene depicted in the painting is very much like the view that Maynard has when he looks out the window of his vacation home in Beaufort, where the family often relaxes and recharges.

Maynard may enjoy his seaside fishing, boating and water skiing weekends and ­vacations, but he’s not yet ready to transition into a permanent life of leisure. He’s got plenty to keep him busy and future-oriented, including Golden Corral expansion plans that include adding several new units this year and overseeing his investment firm, Maynard Capital Partners, which is managed by Gene Aman. “I don’t see James retiring anytime soon,” says Aman. “He enjoys the process too much.

If and when he does retire, there’s a good chance you’ll still find James Maynard going through the lunch buffet at the Golden Corral on Glenwood Avenue on any given weekday. He will be the one all the servers East know by name.

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In the mind’s eye of most alumni, the East Carolina University ­campus hasn’t changed, pictured just as it looked during senior year. But in fact, the campus has grown by leaps and bounds recently as ­enrollment and academic programs have surged, swelling by about 5,000 students in just the last five years.

Bui

A period of rapid expansion transforms the campus to reflect ECU’s mission as a major research university

By Steve Tuttle Photography by Forrest Croce 12

uilding the Future

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As the fastest-growing campus in the UNC System, ECU has had to race just to keep up with enrollment growth that has made it the third-largest campus in the ­system. About 23,200 students were enrolled as of the fall semester, up from about 18,000 just 10 years ago. The expansion has seen six new buildings constructed or renovated on campus since 2000 at a cost of more than $200 million, including expenditures of $57 million last fiscal year, a record.

Several other projects under construction or on the ­drawing board will raise the total tab for the current building boom to about $300 million.

The construction and renovation projects, mostly funded by state higher education bond

money, have swelled the main campus to more than 3.5 million square feet of ­academic, research and residential space in 124 buildings. Of the $3.1 billion in bonds for UNC System campuses and the state community colleges approved by North Carolina voters in 2000, $190 million went to East Carolina, and it’s mostly been spent.

The higher education bond issue was the largest in the history of the United States and was approved by voters in all 100 counties.

Most of the improvements around campus are readily visible but some are unseen, ­hidden in the wiring of existing buildings and in underground utility vaults. About $3.6 million was spent on technology upgrades for web-based and other

computer-assisted modes of instruction in Austin, Bate, Brewster, Rawl, Rivers and Speight. In ­addition, the basic infrastructure of the ­campus—electrical wiring, heating and ­cooling—has benefited from $16.3 million in improvements, mainly to meet the demands of the growing student body.

According to Chancellor Steve Ballard, the campus construction boom is ­“unprecedented…allowing East Carolina to have facilities we need for the kind of ­significant work we are doing and intend to do. We’re building the future as we go.”

And the building isn’t done, because ­officials already are planning for the decade ahead when another wave of construction will position ECU for more tomorrows.

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SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY BUILDING 14

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Perhaps the most visible change on campus has been construction of the new Science and Technology Building. The 273,000-squarefoot brick and glass structure is home to a number of high-tech programs, including the Department of Chemistry that for decades attempted to make do in the historic Flanagan Building. Sci-Tech, as it’s known, opened in the fall of 2003 at the corner of Tenth Street and Fountain Drive. Its $68 million cost was funded by state bond money. The facility ­provides modern laboratories for teaching and research, an expansive two-story construction bay complete with a robotic manufacturing installation, state-of-the-art classrooms as well as offices for the College of Technology and Computer Science and the Department of

FLANAGAN BUILDING

Chemistry. It’s now the largest building on the central campus.

Completion of Sci-Tech allowed the university to begin a wholesale renovation of the 1930s-era Flanagan Building, one of the oldest and most majestic structures on campus.

At the end of a two-year, $13.8 million project, Flanagan reopened in January 2005. It now houses the departments of anthropology, ­geology and science and math education. The Ph.D. program in Coastal Resources Manage­ ment and the Institute for Coastal and Marine Resources are also located in Flanagan. The structure provides 21 classrooms and ­laboratories and 70 offices surrounding a beautifully-restored open-air central courtyard.

The Science and Technology Building occupies an area of campus that previously was the site of Davis Arboretum, seen just below center in this image taken by an unknown photographer in 1958. The Flanagan Building is the large building just to the left of the woods.

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Ask any student on campus today to name the one new building that’s dearest to their hearts—or at least their stomachs—and they likely will mention the new West End Dining Hall. Anchoring the northwest corner of the central campus, the 600-seat dining hall, which opened spring semester of 2004, resembles the food court at a major mall.

Diners can choose from several themed ­serving stations ranging from traditional ­cafeteria fare to Italian, Mongolian, barbecue and a rotisserie. Or they can munch their way through a long salad bar.

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Erected at a cost of $12.7 million and paid for through student fees, the dining hall replaces the cafeteria facilities in Mendenhall Student Center. A large plaza fronts the ­dining hall and visually ties it to the adjacent Greene, White, Clement and Fletcher ­residence halls. The facility also contains a convenience store and a Subway restaurant.

The old cafeteria in Mendenhall has been converted to a quick-food restaurant called Destination 360 serving sandwiches, pizza and the like. Mendenhall also now offers a specialty coffee shop.

The West End Dining Hall occupies land that once was the site of the Flanagan Sylvan Theater shown in this photograph by Marianne Baines taken in 1972.

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On the northeast ­corner of campus, the Rivers Building has undergone an $11.9 million ­renovation and ­expansion providing much-needed classroom and ­faculty office space for the College of Human Ecology and the School of Nursing.

The 38,000-squarefoot addition and ­renovation, which was completed in September 2004, was funded with bond money. The project included a three-story, 35,000-square-foot addition and ­renovation of 4,000 square feet in the original structure.

RIVERS BUILDING 18

FLETCHER MUSIC CENTER

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A 17,000-square-foot expansion of the Fletcher Music Center on the southwest corner of campus is scheduled for completion this summer. It will provide badly needed rehearsal and practice space as well as an expanded recital hall. The renovated Fletcher will offer three large rehearsal rooms, seven general classrooms, a recording studio, a keyboard laboratory, a computer/keyboard laboratory, an electronic music studio, a music library, administrative offices, 48 faculty offices/studios, 50 practice rooms, 23 graduate assistant offices, and larger storage areas.

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Clark-LeClair Stadium, the 3,000-seat baseball facility that opened for the 2005 season, has raised expectations that ECU will soon host NCAA regional and super-regional baseball tournaments leading up to the College World Series. The $11 million cost of the stadium was raised from donors, including about $9 million through the ECU Educational Foundation, better known as the Pirate Club.

Just beyond the end zone of DowdyFicklen Stadium, the 52,475-square-foot Murphy Center houses the strength and conditioning facilities for the ECU athletics 足program. Built at a cost of about $13 million, the Murphy Center also contains banquet rooms, sport memorabilia and an academic enhancement center. The center, which opened in the fall of 2002, is named in honor of Pete and Lynn Murphy of Rose Hill, N.C.

MURPHY CENTER 20

The athletic fields moved off the main campus in the late 1960s. Murphy Center now stands adjacent to the football stadium, shown under construction in this ca. 1969 photo by an unknown 足photographer.

Tyler Residence Hall also was under construction near the site of a new residence hall that will open this year.

COLLEGE HILL RESIDENCE HALL

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Over on College Hill, a new $31.5 million, 488-bed residence hall is expected to open for the 2006 fall semester. Going up beside Todd Dining Hall, the residence hall is configured in four-person suites. Each suite offers two bedrooms, two private baths, a kitchenette, data ports and cable in the living room and noise resistant walls and floors. On each floor will be a full kitchen, as well as recycling and laundry facilities. East Carolina’s 15 residence halls already house more than 5,100.

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Cliff Hollis

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Also expected to open this spring is the $55 ­million health sciences complex, which will house the School of Allied Health Sciences, the School of Nursing and the Laupus Health Sciences Library. As-yet unnamed, the 300,000-square-foot facility, dubbed the “learning village,” sits on a 25-acre site adjacent to the Brody School of Medicine. It will bring the university’s Health Sciences Division units together in one location and provide the infrastructure and facilities for a true academic medical center. If the facility were a separate institution it would be the 12th largest campus in the UNC system. Money from the higher education bonds is paying for the construction. The Belk Building, which has housed many of the departments that will move to the new Health Sciences facility once it is completed, will be converted to general classroom use.

The new health s­ ciences complex stands on what was farmland behind the Brody Build­ ing, seen in this 1968 photo by Jim Woltjen.

Cliff Hollis

HEALTH SCIENCES COMPLEX

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ECU At A Glance Student Body

ECU is the third-largest campus in the UNC System in terms of enrollment at more than 23,000. That compares with 26,900 students at UNC Chapel Hill and 30,000 at N.C. State. UNC Charlotte is fourth largest with 20,000 students and UNC Greensboro is fifth with 15,300 students.

Student Demographics

90% are full-time students, 15% are from out of state; 59% are female, 79% are white, 14.7% are African-American, 6% are other minorities; 201 students are from 60 foreign countries.

Tuition

In-state, $13,294; out-of-state, $23,508.

Costs include tuition, fees, books, dorm room and full meal plan.

Main Campus

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As those facilities near completion, the university is gearing up to begin other projects. The largest of those on the central campus is the planned $35 ­million renovation and expansion of Mendenhall Student Center and the ­adjacent Ledonia Wright Cultural Center. That project is expected to begin in April 2007 and be completed three years later.

East Carolina is developing several sports fields on a 129-acre site just north of the city at the intersection of Greenville Boulevard and U.S. 264.

The $6 million project, scheduled for completion in the summer of 2007, includes fields for intramurals and club sports, a large lake for boating and swimming, roadways, infrastructure, parking and support facilities.

On the medical campus, the university expects to break ground soon on a the new Cardiovascular Institute. This $60 million project will be the home of the new cross-disciplinary effort aimed at reducing the incidence of cardio­ vascular disease in eastern North Carolina. At 180,000 square feet, the Institute will complement a new $170 million cardiovascular bed tower planned at Pitt County Memorial Hospital, the teaching hospital of the Brody School of Medicine.

Also on the drawing board is a new facility to replace the Family Medicine Center. The $30 million facility, which will be situated next to the Cardiovascular institute, will encompass about 90,000 square feet. Nearby, the university plans to erect a $2.5 million Geriatrics Center, a 10,000-square-foot clinic with exam rooms, support spaces, offices, patient services and building support spaces.

What’s next? Officials say campus growth and renovation will continue as ECU prepares for the critical decade ahead. One major expansion that the Board of Trustees is exploring is a new dental school. There currently is only East one in the state, at UNC Chapel Hill.

Spreads across 520 acres containing more than 3.5 million square feet of academic, research, and residential space in 124 ­buildings.

Health Sciences Campus

The Brody School of Medicine covers about 205 acres with nearly 750,000 square feet of academic and research space in 39 buildings.

West Research Campus

About 650 acres with an administrative and several support buildings that house the North Carolina Institute for Health and Safety in Agriculture, Forestry, and Fisheries, the Queen Anne’s Revenge conservation lab, and other programs.

Libraries

Joyner Library now holds nearly 1.2 million bound volumes, 2.4 million pieces of ­micro­ form, 530,000 government documents, more than 2,900 periodical subscriptions, and more than 12,000 journals in electronic form. The Music Library, a branch of Joyner, houses more than 62,500 items. The Laupus Library has 155,616 bound volumes, 29,147 microform volumes, and about 1,500 serial titles.

Note: All statistics are for the 2004-05 school year.

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s

In Their Footsteps A fourth generation of the ‘Magnolia Belles’ continues the tradition by graduating from ECU

By Marion Blackburn

F

ew women were able to attend college in the 1920s and for those of modest means in eastern North Carolina, it almost was out of the question. Among those early pioneers were four determined sisters who made their way to East Carolina Teachers College—on horseback part of the way—and created a legacy that lives today.

Born in Magnolia, N.C., in rural Duplin County to a mill owner and hat maker, the sisters all eventually graduated and led ­exciting lives. They called themselves the “Magnolia Belles.” As the decades passed, at least one woman in every succeeding ­generation also found her way to Greenville.

Last year, the fourth generation of the Belles—Marion Suzanne Stotesbury ’05—earned her ECU diploma.

It was a proud moment for Jacquelyn “Jackie” Owens Dotson ’90, mother of Suzanne and founder of a scholarship ­memorializing the original Belles. “When my grandmother passed, I wanted to set up a small scholarship in their honor,”

Eloise Catherine McArthur Owens

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says Dotson, who represents the third ­generation of the Belles. “It will honor the women who set this fine example for the rest of the family.”

The strongest-willed of the original Belles was Mary Shelton McArthur, who earned a job at the Library of Congress after graduation. “She pulled herself through school and kind of pushed her sisters,” Dotson says.

“It was very honorable what they were able to do,” Dotson adds. “They did this when it was hard, when you rode a horse to get to school. The family did not have a lot of money. They were able to support themselves, to meet people and, in the end, have different lives.”

Another of the four sisters was Eloise Catherine McArthur Owens ’30, grand­mother of Dotson and great-grandmother of Stotesbury. She later married Edward L. Owens, who served as a North Carolina state senator.

Dotson remembers her grandmother as vibrant and intelligent. She taught geography for

Suzanne Owens Cunningham

Jacquelyn “Jackie” Owens Dotson

many years until retiring, then embarked on years of travel to places she once taught about.

She became a member of the Circumnavigators Club, whose members have traveled around the world. She died in 1997 at 88. The scholarship was established soon after.

Dotson’s mother, Suzanne Owens Cunningham ’64, was a painter who majored in art history and interior design. She ­completed a three-panel mural at Bertie High School that remains there today.

She died in 1994.

Dotson enrolled in 1986 after working for many years as a nurse. “At that time, I didn’t realize that my family had all gone to East Carolina,” she says. “But I was determined to have a four-year college degree to set a good example for my daughter. It was as if I was driven to do it. I had to work and go to school, too. But it was worth it because later, she went, too.”

By the time her daughter enrolled, Dotson knew the story. She also lost her grandmother, who for many years was an example for her.

Today Stotesbury, who earned her ­bachelor’s degree in communications, works at the Enterprise, a twice-weekly newspaper in Williamston. Despite the long hours, she enjoys her first reporter’s job. Dedication is her hallmark, too. “I’ve been told I’m obsessive about things,” she says. “It’s an inner drive to do the best I can.”

The Magnolia Belles scholarship offers $600 to a female student from Washington County in eastern North Carolina to attend ECU, commemorating the McArthur sisters.

East

Marion Suzanne Stotesbury and Jacquelyn “Jackie” Owens Dotson

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Bouncing Back

By David Droschak

Few would argue that Ricky Stokes faces a big challenge trying to rebuild East Carolina University’s basketball program. Eight straight losing seasons is a hard sell for anybody. But Stokes has faced similar tests before. Like when, as a 5-foot-9 guard, he was deemed too small to compete in the Atlantic Coast Conference, yet worked his way up a crowded Virginia depth chart against long odds, eventually playing in two Final Fours and a school-record 134 games for the Cavaliers.

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erhaps the most useful ­quality Stokes brings to the job is his ability to focus on the job at hand without worrying about things he can’t control. Case in point: He was informed in the middle of his first year as a head coach at Virginia Tech that the program would be switching from the Atlantic 10 Conference to the powerful Big East. He recruited hard and successfully, coached with grit and flair but was fired in 2003 after just four seasons.

In other words, few things ­basketball-related can ruffle the feathers of one of the coolest ­customers in college coaching.

“Ricky doesn’t concern himself with things he can’t control,” says South Carolina basketball coach Dave Odom, who gave Stokes, 42, his first big break in coaching when he hired him as an assistant on his first Wake Forest staff in 1989.

“He doesn’t get stressed out on those types of things like a lot of us do. (Many coaches) spend all of our time trying to change things we can’t change. Ricky says, ‘OK, that’s the situation, we’ll work through it.”’

The situation for East Carolina men’s ­basketball has been disapointing for close to a decade. The Pirates haven’t finished higher than 11th in Conference USA since 2001 and haven’t won 20 games in a season since 1954.

Still, Stokes jumped at the opportunity to replace Bill Herrion when his old college coach and friend—ECU Director of Athletics Terry Holland—came calling this past March.

Why? “The No. 1 thing for me here is the leadership at the top,” says Stokes. “With Chancellor Steve Ballard and Terry Holland you know things are going to be done the right way and there is vision. As a head coach, that’s all you can ask for, to be given things to be successful. And the fan support is great here. We have super loyal fans.”

Why Greenville?

Odom, who was East Carolina’s head ­basketball coach from 1979-82, understands 28

why Stokes was drawn to Greenville. “Terry Holland and Ricky Stokes have been friends for a long time, longer than Ricky and I have been friends,” says Odom, who was an ­assistant to Holland at Virginia and helped tutor Strokes as a player. “They have an extraordinary relationship. Terry is going to do everything in the world he can to help Ricky and Ricky in return will do everything he can to be loyal and reward Terry for his confidence in him.”

Holland’s search for a coach who would give the struggling program some direction was extensive and lasted several months. As he scoured the country for the right man, he kept coming back to Stokes.

“We said, ‘Look, we know this guy, we know he understands what we’re trying to accomplish here, we know his track record as an assistant coach is as good as there is, why would we take someone else who we didn’t know?”’ Holland recalls.

Stokes had another selling point, ­according to Holland. If hired, he could bring in former Chattanooga and Virginia

Commonwealth head coach Mack McCarthy to be his top assistant.

“The ultimate compliment for any head coach is who is willing to work for that person,” Holland says. “Mack is a very savvy basketball guy and he’s not going to hitch himself to someone whose star is fading. Ricky said, ‘Hey, we’ll come to the press conference together.’ That pretty much won me over. So I guess Ricky’s first recruiting trip was to see Mack McCarthy.”

Recruiting enough good players to compete in the tough Conference USA has been a ­stumbling block for the program since switching from the Colonial Athletic Association in 2001.

Strokes, who grew up outside of Richmond, Va., plans to build the program with mostly North Carolina-based players and others from nearby states. “Recruiting is the lifeblood of a program,” Stokes says. “I enjoy it.” The personable Stokes likes recruiting because he’s good at it. While at Wake Forest under Odom, Stokes helped recruit such stars as Tim Duncan and Rodney Rogers.

He believes being in ACC country actually is a positive for the ECU program. “ACC schools go national and we encourage them to do that,” Stokes says. “That’s great for us because we have tremendous high school basketball talent in North Carolina. The more the ACC schools go out of state, it continues to leave players available for East Carolina.”

“Listen, kids want to play in the ACC, that’s a given fact. But not all of them can.

We can’t get upset by that or get impatient.

The ACC will string kids along a little bit, but at a certain time we’ve got to go as hard as we can at them and let them see the difference in who really wants them. Who really wants you is the place you need to go.”

Holland said Stokes understands how important it is not to just bring in so-called “mercenaries” for a quick fix. “We need to bring in kids that our fans can identify with if we’re going to build a fan base,” Holland

says. “We need people to have a very personal interest in our program and part of that is recruiting kids from the general area, whose families will come to see them play, who will bring their friends to see them play and who our fans can feel good about supporting.”

Next year’s recruiting class already includes 6-8 Gabe Blair of Kings Mountain, 6-9 John Fields of Fayetteville, Hillary Haley of Fort Washington, Md., and 6-11 Chad Wynn of Marietta, Ga. “We need to get our name out there,” Stokes says. “We’ve got to bring enough guys in who believe and want to work to turn this thing around and have a vision with me.”

boys would find time after homework for hoops, lots and lots of hoops.

“We played from sunrise to sunset,” Stokes said. “We laugh when we look back because my dad actually bought a playground hoop, so we had the nicest one around. Maybe he had some connection at school and got five baskets for the price of four.”

While Bobby Stokes was a hot-shot scorer in high school, averaging 40 points a game, Ricky was a quick point guard who made his mark on defense. Ricky Stokes was realistic about his college choices, and figured he would end up playing at Virginia Commonwealth or Richmond. But Virginia was stocked with big guards at the time and began a national search for more quickness. Stokes’ name surfaced.

“We spent the summer months on the camp circuit,” recalls former Virginia assistant coach Craig Littlepage, who is now the school’s athletic director. “It was sort of an ironic exercise because the guy we eventually felt could do even more than some of the higher ranked players with bigger reputations

was Ricky. He was recruited because he could handle the ball and nobody was going to take it away from him and he could defend any ballhandler. His speed and quickness could be disruptive at either end of the floor.

“He was a very heady player, a very pesky player and a guy who seemed to get under the skin of opposing ballhandlers.”

Almost Quitting

While Stokes’ college career was filled with many great moments, he came close to leaving Virginia the first few weeks of basketball practice. He remembers calling his father and Lancaster and telling them he was behind about six or seven other guards and Lighting Up the Room was considering transferring.

One thing is certain; Stokes is believable.

“The only thing I said to him was that if He lights up a room with his personality you want to prove to yourself you are the and energy. He naturally makes people feel best then you need to be among the best and ­comfortable. play against the best and compete against the “People gravitate to Ricky,” says George best and the best will always come out of Lancaster, who coached Stokes at Highland you,” Lancaster says.

Springs High School in Richmond, Va. Stokes ended up staying at Virginia and “Ricky’s personality is such that settled into a role as a sixth man, a people want to be close to him. He guy who came off the bench to team Ricky Stokes scores against an Ohio State defender during the 1980-81 season when Virginia went to the has always had people root for him, with other small guard Othell Wilson Final Four. Virginia coach Terry Holland, now ECU’s even as a player. People identified to form the now famous “Blitz ­athletics director, is at lower left. Photo by Ann Holland with the little guy because the little Brothers.”

“We would throw both of them in guy is the average guy. Like David there and say, ‘Change this game, we and Goliath, and you and I know that don’t like the way it’s going,”’ Holland David was the hero and not Goliath.” remembers. “And they would blitz the Lancaster first saw Stokes as a other team’s guards. They literally 10-year-old and instantly thought he chased one of our conference would be a great baseball player. “He opponents—and I won’t name him so had those quick hands and speed. He I won’t embarrass him—to where it would have been a natural shortstop looked like on film that he just gave of second baseman.” But Stokes up and said, ‘OK, take the ball if you gravitated toward basketball, a sport want it that badly.”’ his older brother Bobby also played.

“We played one-on-one growing Seeing Stokes’ inner drive to success, up every day,” says Stokes, whose despite his lack of size, has always brother was the captain of Virginia’s stuck with Holland and Littlepage.

“Ricky has that competitive nature, 1976 ACC title team. “He literally how to figure out how to use your beat me every day until I got to strengths, whatever they may be,” college and he was in medical school.

Holland said. “He was always able to I finally beat him and we never played turn a weakness into strength, a one-on-one again.”

Academics were an important part challenge into an opportunity. That is of the Stokes household when Ricky something that I can pretty much was growing up, considering his count on Ricky doing.” father was a principal and his mother “Ricky could understand his role, was a teacher. Still, the two Stokes accept his role and then effectively 29

execute his role day to day,” Littlepage says.

“He kept working and working and never allowed himself to get frustrated. He won the hearts of the Virginia fans and to this day he is still one of the most popular players among the Virginia faithful.”

If Stokes had left Virginia early he would not have met his wife, Karen, who was introduced to him by star center Ralph Sampson. “He said he knew a girl that liked me and I said, ‘No thanks,”’ Stokes remembers. “Then he said he hadn’t dated her and I said, ‘OK.’ I saw her in the fall and it took me until the spring to ask her out.”

The Stokes have one daughter, 9-yearold Sydney, who loves soccer, basketball and swimming. “She loves the gym,” Stokes says.

“Kind of reminds me of myself.”

Planning for the Long Run

Stokes has time to think about the East Carolina program on his daily runs around the Greenville campus. He began running with Odom and the rest of the Wake Forest assistants 15 years ago and has run in the Richmond Marathon. He recently had knee surgery, so his runs have been shorter than normal, but Stokes would one day like to run in the Boston Marathon.

“Running is a great stress reliever and it’s great for your mental health,” Stokes says. “There is nothing like running a marathon. It just goes to show you that if you train and discipline yourself you can do anything.”

Building the East Carolina program could be more like a marathon than a short sprint, but Stokes has dug in for the long haul. “Ricky is as good a judge of people and as good a judge of basketball talent as I’ve been around,” Littlepage says. “Ricky has an uncanny ability to understand a player’s skills and how those skills are going to be developed into a college environment.”

“I want guys playing for me here who have a vision with me,” Stokes says. “But more importantly, winning solves everything. I have learned patience and humility. We have to come up with a strategy to give your team that best available chance to win East and we’ll do that here.”

Ricky Stokes, Billy Godwin, Skip Holtz, and Terry Holland 30

New Baseball Coach Completes Terry’s Team T

erry Holland, East Carolina’s athletics director, has ­completed his team of coaches in major sports with the hiring of Billy Godwin to lead the Pirates’ baseball team.

Godwin had been named acting baseball coach when Randy Mazey was suspended last fall.

Godwin was hired as an assistant baseball coach last June after six seasons as head coach of Louisburg College. “My whole life I’ve tackled things head on,” Godwin said. “When this ­situation came up, I tackled it with a positive attitude, and I can tell you our program is in good shape.”

“I cannot tell you how comfortable I am at this time of turning the reins over to this gentleman,” Holland said. “He will absolutely build a program that is built on trust and mutual respect that all of us can be proud of.”

Godwin has agreed to a three-year contract that will pay him $85,000, rising to $100,000 in the third year. The contract also includes bonuses for reaching the NCAA tournament, the NCAA Super Regional and the College World Series.

At Louisburg, Godwin posted a 262-85 overall record. He was named North Carolina College Coach of the Year in 2002.

He also had coaching stints at North Carolina Wesleyan College, Enfield Academy and Cary Academy.

“Our coaches are building a foundation for success both on and off the court,” Holland says. “An example is what Ricky Stokes and his staff are doing with the basketball program. Their hands on approach to the team’s ‘study hall’ has already moved the team GPA from less than a 2.0 to over 2.5. The recruiting class that is already signed for fall of 2006 shows that we can expect the same kind of improvement on the court as well.”

31

A L L

H A N D S

O N

D E C K !

get your tickets today.

C-USA Saturday Basketball Package

2006 Pirate baseball season tickets

Act now to take advantage of this special package, which includes all four Saturday home C-USA basketball games.

The Pirates will play thirty-seven games at home this season, including games against:

• Tulsa • Houston • Marshall • Tulane

• Maryland • Penn State • Virginia Tech • NC State

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• UNC Wilmington • Duke • Houston

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www.ecupirates.com 1-800-DIAL ECU

Jean François Molliere

Badiane’s Back in France But Still Banging the Boards

M

oussa Badiane, one of the most popular players on East Carolina University’s basketball team until his graduation last year, is back in his native France and playing pro ball in one of Europe’s top leagues. Badiane has landed with Nancy Sluc of the French ProA league, which is considered among the top five in Europe. He played with the Nancy junior squad before coming to ECU. “Before I went to East Carolina, Nancy told me they wanted me back,” says Badiane, who left Greenville after averaging 12 points, eight rebounds and nearly three blocked shots per game last season. After graduation he tried out with the Dallas Mavericks but didn’t make the team. “Nancy called me after I got back to France and told me they were still interested. So we worked out the details, and they seem pleased with me so far.”

Nancy, with a population of about 410,000, is in northeastern France. Considered the capital of the Lorraine region, the city is known for its art nouveau architecture. Badiane’s Senegal-born parents still live in the south ­suburbs of Paris. His brother, Cleveland State grad Pape Badiane, also plays in the ProA league in Roanne, which is a bit further south. “I feel really good being back home. My family is closer, and I’m getting paid to play basketball—something I love to do.”

This season Badiane has had his share of starts both in the French league and in the FIBA

The Power of One

Within all of us there exists The Power Of One…each of us performing as individuals and initiating action for the greater good. At the Pirate Club, we believe that you, too, possess that Power Of One that will help put East Carolina University into moments of greatness.

In athletics. In scholarship. In pride.

Please help in our effort to create The Power Of One by joining the Pirate Club now and contributing to the legacy of East Carolina. Itʼs easy. And itʼs empowering. You can become part of the team and the Power by logging on to www.ecupirateclub.com.

EAST CAROLINA UNIVERSITY

EuroCup — a European-wide club competition pitting some of the strongest teams in Europe’s various leagues against each other.

Two other former ECU ­basketball players have landed roster spots with European pro teams. Erroyl Bing is playing in France and Evaldas Jocys is playing in Germany.

“I love playing in different places; flying to other countries; and seeing other levels of basketball,” says Badiane, who has played against EuroCup teams in Italy, Lithuania and Belgium.

“For a rookie, it’s really hard to get a job here like mine. But since they knew me I didn’t have to start at the bottom and prove myself like most other college grads do.”

Playing at ECU was his ticket into the European leagues, he says. “I definitely improved a lot while I was there. It’s an experience I will never forget,” the 24-year-old says. “For French guys who go to the States, they don’t always have that good of an experience. But I’m proof that good things can happen for French players in the U.S. as well.”

—By David Hein

ECU Educational Foundation Ward Sports Medicine Building East Carolina University Greenville, NC 27858-4353 Telephone: (252) 328-4540 ecupirateclub.com

today, tomorrow.

A gift a gift

BEQUESTS HAVE ALWAYS BEEN an important source of support for East Carolina. They are used to create scholarships, build new facilities, and support research.

East Carolina’s future depends on you — our friends and alumni who remember the university in their estate plans. Your bequest to the university will help to ensure East Carolina’s continued excellence.

Contact us today about including East Carolina in your estate plan.

Lyne S. Gamble Jr., Director of Planned Giving East Carolina University, Greenville, NC 27858-4353 252-328-9566 office, 252-328-4904 fax, gamblel@mail.ecu.edu Visit us on the Web at www.ecu.edu/devt/ and click on the Planned Giving link.

33

x o B m o o B Why today’s Captain Zero may be tomorrow’s captain of industry

By Marion Blackburn

Carson Johnson aka Captain Zero

34

x

I

t’s 2 p.m. and a young man steps out of a basement room in Mendenhall Student Union. One knee peeks through a hole in his jeans and a playful mustache can be seen under his baseball cap. He looks much like thousands of other guys on the East Carolina University campus but many ­students will quickly identify him as soon as he opens his mouth. Meet Captain Zero, aspiring writer and host of the Blue Note Café, one of the more popular shows on the campus radio station.

Last year he was known as Marvin Gardens but most of the time he is simply Carson Johnson, 22, an English major and one of about 25 student announcers at WZMB 91.3 FM. “It’s a lot of fun,” he says. “There are so many different personalities, but there is always a common thread running through us. The DJs all have a real passion for the music they play.”

Saying the WZMB playlist is eclectic is an understatement. Listeners can hear Sundaymorning gospel on “Inspirations,” weeknight dance music on “Club 91” and weekends of reggae, rock and punk music. After midnight there’s “Music to Annoy the Narrow Minded,” a show whose genre defies definition.

Where commercial stations have cash giveaways and catchy jingles, WZMB has spunk and heart. There are no official ratings so it’s hard to know how many people listen. The station broadcasts with a power of 282 watts and can be heard throughout Pitt County.

Anecdotal evidence suggests the audience varies with the program, but there are a lot of callers, whose requests are obliged as long as they fit the format of the hour.

Johnson began at the station four years ago hosting a world music program and today has two shows playing standards old and new, from Miles Davis to Diana Krall. You hear a lot of Eric Clapton and Jimi Hendrix during his classic rock program. “This is music with real feeling,” he says. “This is real stuff.”

WZMB provides a taste of real-world broadcasting and communications that thrives on the particular brand of creativity, spontaneity and humor found among college students.

For ECU, with about 1,100 students enrolled in communication programs, it’s a good fit.

Ken Robol is faculty adviser for WZMB and other student media including the East Carolinian, Rebel, Expressions and the Buccaneer yearbook, which is being resurrected (see page 48). He also is ECU’s director of student engagement and communications instructor.

“WZMB is an outlet for news and information, plus it’s a training ground,” he says.

“We don’t have to worry about the pressures some other stations would have, but we treat it as a real radio station.”

Demands include scheduling announcers, developing news stories, responding to record companies and entertaining listeners—while staying clear of Federal Communications Commissions violations.

“My role is to help engage them, to help them when they have a situation they need advice on,” he says. “It’s very important in communications to have a practical background to become a successful broadcaster.

That’s what the students need.” If they are learning, they also are flourishing. The ­students’ majors vary as much as the music.

“WZMB is a big melting pot,” says Dominique Womack, 22, also known as Chip Chaos, a senior communications major who co-hosts the Drive at Five show.

“The first thing they look for when they ­interview you is your personality. We’re tight Dominique Womack

knit and we go out everywhere.”

Those many voices unify the station, says general manager Tia White, 21.

“Diversity is extremely important,” she says.

“The more ideas you have, that’s great. To me, it’s one of the most important things we can have. We have so many types of listeners and shows—almost every genre you can think of.

When you don’t have diversity, some things get overlooked. People who are into different things can enlighten others.”

WZMB has served the ECU community since the late 1950s, when it first came on the air as WWWS. It was the brainchild of thenlibrarian Wendell S. Smiley.

“One of his goals was to establish a radio station at ECU,” says Jim Rees, professor emeritus and adjunct professor of communication. “And he did it.”

For several years it operated as a public radio-type station, with classical and popular music, sportscasts of football and basketball games and student programs.

When a windstorm ripped the transmission tower from the Joyner Library roof in the early 1960s the station disappeared, Rees says. The tower fell where the cupola sits today.

Campus radio moved to AM 570 and was known as the “Big 57.”

“You plugged your AM radio into the wall of a dormitory and the signal was on the power line,” Rees says.

It reemerged in 1982 on the original FM frequency with new call letters and under direction of the ECU Media Board, a student organization. Last fall, a reunion brought together many of the people who had worked with campus radio over the years.

In addition to music programs, talk shows serve up candid views on sports, minority viewpoints and campus concerns. Expect straight-from-the-hip conversation from hosts who aren’t worried about ratings. Everyone is paid, typically at a rate of $4.20 an hour.

“We’re all friends,” Womack says.

Some advantages come with the job, she adds.

“There are perks to being in the limelight,” she says. “It has my name written all over it.”

East

Read more online at www.wzmb.ecu.edu 35

From the Classroom

Why Conservative Values Often Yield Liberal Court Rulings

E

ast Carolina University political science professor Tinsley E. Yarbrough’s new biography of Supreme Court Justice David H. Souter helps answer the question vexing political pundits in Washington: Why do many supposedly conservative nominees for the U.S. Supreme Court become fairly liberal once they don the black robes?

As the author of nine books on American jurisprudence, Yarborough has been asked that question on C-SPAN and other talks shows examining nominees Harriett Miers, John Roberts and Samuel A. Alito Jr. He responds by pointing to Justice Souter, the rock-ribbed New Englander appointed to the high court by the first President George Bush. In the years since then, Souter shocked ­conservatives by developing a moderately liberal voting record. In 15 years as a justice, Souter has voted 63 percent of the time with the liberal Justice John Paul Stevens and only 31 ­percent of the time with conservative Justice Antonin Scalia. He even dissented in part from the court’s controversial decision to end the Florida vote recount, which handed the election to the second President Bush.

In his new book, David Hackett Souter: Traditional Republican on the Rehnquist Court, Yarbrough argues that if conservatives had done their homework they would have known what would ­happen. In his 1990 confirmation hearings, Yarbrough points out, Souter repeatedly stressed his respect for precedent. Souter said he “preferred the approach of the late Mr. Justice Harlan above all ­others.”

Frequently a dissenter on the Warren court, John Marshall Harlan is remembered chiefly for his adherence to the Supreme Court’s past decisions—the concept of stare decisis. It was Souter’s respect for ­precedent, Yarbrough says, that motivated his vote in the Planned Parenthood v. Casey case, the 1992 decision that declined to overrule Roe v. Wade.

Perhaps because of the current interest in Supreme Court ­nominees, Yarbrough’s book has been widely reviewed. A speech he 36

gave on the subject in October at the Woodrow Wilson international Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C., has been rebroadcast several times on C-Span 2’s Book TV ­program. The review in Publishers Weekly notes, “At a time when the Supreme Court is once again being remade, this biography opens up the world of one of the court’s most ­intriguing members.”

Yarbrough treats Souter respectfully and blames the first Bush Administration for failing to ­comprehend the fundamental concept of judicial restraint. In casual conversations, Souter sounded ­conservative, so “they may have heard what they wanted to hear,” Yarbrough says.

In other words, Yarbrough says, it’s often less ­important to focus on how a Supreme Court nominee voted in the past than why he or she voted that way. His book’s account of Souter’s Senate confirmation hearings is ­particularly salient given the nomination of Alito, a ­conservative judge who ­professes profound respect for Supreme Court precedent.

Yarbrough was not able to interview Souter or his clerks for the book, which isn’t unusual because Supreme Court justices rarely grant personal interviews. But he is able to paint a clear ­picture of the man underneath the robes through extensive ­interviews with some of Souter’s close friends.

This is Yarbrough’s ninth book on major figures in American jurisprudence. His other works include The Rehnquist Court and the Constitution; The Judicial Enigma: The First Justice Harlan; John Marshall Harlan: Great Dissenter of the Warren Court; Mr. Justice Black and His Critics; A Passion for Justice; and Judge Frank Johnson and Human Rights in Alabama.

For additional information, contact Tinsley Yarborough at 252-328-4136 (office), or yarbrought@mail.ecu.edu.

—Steve Tuttle

DAVID HACKETT SOUTER Traditional Republican on the Rehnquist Court

By Tinsley E. Yarbrough Oxford University Press, 311 pp., $29.95 Excerpt from the book:

A

t issue in Boy Scouts of America vs. Dale (2000) was the BSA’s decision to fire an openly gay assistant scoutmaster despite a New Jersey public accommodations provision prohibiting discrimination on the basis of sexual preference. Citing, among other things, portions of the Scout Oath and Law obliging scouts to be “morally straight” and “clean,” (Chief Justice William Rehnquist) concluded for a 5-4 majority that the BSA’s philosophy included opposition to homosexuality and that requiring the Scouts to include gays in their membership would significantly impair the group’s expression of that viewpoint.

Justice Souter joined a scathing (Associate Justice John Paul) Stevens dissent ridiculing the evidence on which the Court based its conclusion. But in a ­separate dissent, Souter felt obliged to clarify one observation Stevens had made. His ­colleague had noted what Souter termed the “laudable decline in stereotypical thinking on homosexuality.”

Characteristically, Souter thought it important to point out that “the right of expressive

association did not, of course, turn on the popularity of the views advanced by a group that claims protection. Whether the group appears to this Court to be in the vanguard or ­rearguard of social thinking is irrelevant to the group’s rights.

“I conclude that BSA has not made out an expressive ­association claim … because of its ­failure to make sexual ­orientation the subject of any unequivocal advocacy, using the channels it customarily employs to state its message….

“No group can claim a right of expressive association ­without identifying a clear position to be advocated over time in an unequiv­ocal way. To require less, … however expressed and however consistently claimed, would ­convert the right of expressive association into an easy trump of any anti­ discrimination law.”

The justice also dissented in 2003 when the Court upheld ­provisions of the Children’s Internet Protection Act, requiring public libraries that receive ­federal funds to use Internet filters blocking obscene or pornographic images and preventing minors from accessing harmful material. Souter agreed with Justice Steven’s contention in dissent that the blocking ­requirements imposed an unconstitutional condition on the receipt of federal funds. But he also agreed that the rule required actions that would violate free speech if taken by libraries acting alone. …

Souter found “no good reason … to treat blocking of adult enquiry as anything different from the censorship it presumptively is.”

East Carolina Annual Fund Shape the future.

When you give to the East Carolina Annual Fund, you answer the university’s call to serve. You enhance ECU’s degree offerings.

You support undergraduate scholarships and graduate fellowships.

You keep research and technology on the leading edge.

When you give to the Annual Fund, you raise the quality of ­education for tomorrow’s leaders. Visit us online to make your gift today. It’s quick, easy, and secure. www.giving.ecu.edu 252-328-9579

Joinyour fellow“Pirates”—

And come home to Ironwood to live, play and relax.

The standards of excellence being set by our University and the ECU Alumni are reflected in the growth of our University, our award-winning healthcare and health care research facilities and the City of Greenville.

At Ironwood, we share those same standards of excellence. Ironwood is the address of choice for East Carolina University Alumni, providing residential excellence, championship golf and devoted members.

Join your fellow “Pirates” and come home to Ironwood!

For more information on Ironwood and our exciting growth, contact Jackie Britt at 252.752.4653 or 800.343.4766 and visit our website at www.ironwoodgolf.com.

200 Golf Club Wynd, Greenville, NC 27834 252.752.4653 / 800.343.4766 • www.ironwoodgolf.com

Pirate Connections Go Cruising with the Chancellor

Furnished

The Alumni Association is pleased to offer a unique opportunity for alumni and friends to meet Chancellor Ballard and his wife, Nancy.

The Ballards will participate in an alumni cruise to Alaska aboard Holland America’s “Zuiderdam.” This is a great chance to ­experience the beauty of Alaska from ship and shore while sharing the adventure with fellow Pirates. This round-trip, seven-night cruise departs from Van­­­couver, British Columbia, on July 1.

The Alaska cruise is one of events planned this year for the Chancellor’s Tour, which sends Ballard throughout the country to help alumni stay connected with East Carolina.

At each event he will talk about the growth of ECU and detail his vision for the future.

Stops on last year’s tour included visits to Raleigh, Atlanta and Beverly Hills. One was held in the home of Emmy award-winning alumnus Velton Ray Bunch. Other stops on this year’s tour include visits to eastern North Carolina and Florida.

For rates and booking information, ­contact Quixote Travel at 800-346-6158 or visit PirateAlumni.com. A portion of all bookings supports student scholarships.

Upcoming Alumni Events Jan. 24 Chancellor’s Tour, Washington, NC Jan. 28 Alumni Adventures in Art, N.C. Museum of Art, Raleigh

Jan. 31 Triad Chapter social and ECU Symphony Orchestra recital, Greensboro

Feb. 2 Durham/Orange County chapter ­meeting, Piper’s Deli, Durham

Feb. 2 Chancellor’s Tour, Charlotte Feb. 6 Chancellor’s Tour, Kinston Feb. 7 Black Alumni chapter, Stevens Center, Winston-Salem

Feb. 15 Greater Greenville chapter meeting, McAlister’s Deli

Feb. 22 Chancellor’s Tour, Edenton Feb. 22 Central Florida chapter, ECU vs. UCF basketball game

March 14 Chancellor’s Tour, Wilson/Rocky Mount Visit Events.PirateAlumni.com for more information on these and other ­alumni events.

Nominate a Worthy Alumni

The Alumni Association annually awards Outstanding Alumni, Distinguished Service and Honorary Alumni awards. Visit the “Awards” section of PirateAlumni.com for a list of this year’s recipients and details on how to attend the spring Alumni Awards Ceremony. Award nominations are accepted year-round, so if you know of a worthy Pirate of any age, download a nomination form from PirateAlumni.com.

Pirate Alumni Network

A great tailgate season was possible thanks to the Alumni Tailgate partici­ pants and sponsors ARAMARK, Chico’s, O’Charley’s, Mutual Distributing, Pepsi, and Honey Baked Ham Co. Look for registration for Tailgate 2006 starting in July.

The Pirate Alumni Network, also known as PAN, is a mentoring program that gives ­current students and recent graduates an opportunity to talk with Pirate alumni about their occupations, local work environments, and to ask for guidance on preparing for a career. Alumni PAN members provide a valuable resource to ECU’s future leaders. The Career Center manages the PAN ­database and works with students to connect them to PAN volunteers. If you are inter­ested in learning

more about PAN and would like to make a big difference in the life of an ECU Student, visit PirateAlumni.com and click “Get Involved” or call the Career Center at 252328-6050.

Alumni Volunteer Spotlight

Ernest M. Silver ’00 of Greenville is one of 218 alumni members of the Career Center’s mentoring program, the Pirate Alumni Network (PAN). Silver has more than 12 years of internal auditing experience in the healthcare and banking industries. He began working at BB&T after receiving his M.B.A. from East Carolina and currently serves as a business insurance agent. He moved to the insurance division in February 2005.

Silver’s job is to help business owners better understand insurance and risk management needs, and to develop programs that will best fit the needs of the individual business.

Silver says that “the most gratifying part of my job is knowing that the program we design for my client is one that will truly secure the client’s assets and protect the client’s future.” He is originally from Enfield, N.C., and was the first of nine children in his family to attend college.

Silver serves as vice president of the Pitt County United Way and treasurer of Pitt County Care Inc. He was a participant in the Pitt County Chamber of Commerce Leadership Institute in 1997 and is an active volunteer with East Carolina’s Career Center.

39

Class Notes 2005

KYLE BRADLEY NICHOLS of Winston-Salem, 18, was accepted by the Wake Forest University medical school and will begin studies next July.

2004

JENNIE EILEEN KOONTZ is associate project manager for the Wake Forest University Department of Family and Community Medicine. MATTHEW GILLESPIE has begun doctoral studies in music composition at the University of Pittsburgh.

LINDSAY HALE is on the staff of the School of Theatre at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. MATTHEW ROBERT ­SCULLY of Greenville joined the New Orleans Opera Chorus. LESLEY SUEANN SHIRES of Fayetteville performed professionally as “Rosy” in Chicago and played in Cats in Ithaca, N.Y. JERMAINE SMITH of Winston-Salem was accepted into the master’s degree program in vocal performance at the New England Conservatory of Music in Boston.

BRIANNE ­BEVERLY YOUNG of Virginia Beach toured with the National Players as a cast member in Romeo and Juliet. ­LAUREL WHITNEY MOULTON of Pleasant Hill, Ore., was hired by jazz organist Sarah McLawler to play bass.

CATHERINE ANNE ­MORRIS of Fairfax, Va., is working for WR Systems in support of the Drug Enforcement Administration.

2003

MYERS WESTON ­CHANDLER of Greenville was promoted to banking officer at BB&T. KATIE MAUREEN SLAGLE was named a coordinator in the student life department at Catawba College in Salisbury. ALLEN COLEMAN SMITH has joined the staff at the Greenville-Pitt County Chamber of Commerce as vice president of operations. ANTHONY AMMIRATI was appointed a forest ranger at Goose Creek State Park in Beaufort County. TAMMY LEE of ECU’s College of Education received a Distinguished Service in Science Education award from the N.C. Science Teachers Association.

She was cited for her work for the N.C. Partnership for Improving Mathematics and Science, which serves 17 counties and for her service as a teacher and professional development leader. DANIEL LEON HARRELL of Elm City completed an orchestral work which was read by the University of Louisville Orchestra. ANDREA LYNN PETERSON of Wilmington had some of her illustrations selected for inclusion in the first 3x3 Student Illustrators Annual. RACHEL ANNE PURMORT of Bethel Park, Pa., accepted a six-month contract as a dance performer with Holland Cruise Lines out of Hawaii. SARAH DIANNE WARD of Tyner is director of college relations at Chowan College in Murfreesboro. ­JEFFREY SCOTT WILKINS of Greenville is pursuing a teaching license in high school history while attending graduate school at ECU. He is married to KATRINA JOY “KATIE” STAIB ’01, a nutrition management graduate.

HOLLY MATTHEWS WARREN is attending medical school at ECU’s Brody School of Medicine.

2002

PAIGE DAVIS CLARK was accepted to medical school at the Brody School of Medicine at ECU. BRITTANY ANN SMITH of Greenville is co-owner of a new Arlington Village business, Out of the Box Designs. DR. SUSAN ANN SCHMIDT of Winterville has joined the ECU medical faculty as a clinical assistant professor and assistant residency director in the Department of Family Medicine. SAMANTHA DEE “MANDEE” FOUSHEE (’02, ’05) was named project manager for ECU’s Center for Survey Research. COLLIN DAVID BATTEN of New York has joined forces with WILLIAM “BILLY 40

SHARPE IV ’91 to develop a theatre company of New York City-based East Carolina alumni interested in writing and ­producing plays. OLIVIA GODWIN HILL of Raleigh is a public information officer for the N.C. Department of Commerce’s Division of Community Assistance. DR. RACHEL ELIZABEH RAAB of the Bronx, New York, is a fellow in hematology/oncology at Albert Einstein College of Medicine and Montefiore Medical Center. TARA REBECCA LILLEY SETNER of Greenville was promoted to banking officer at BB&T. CHRISTIAN KENNETH ROBINSON was promoted to assistant vice president at BB&T. JOI MICHELLE FLOWERS of Memphis is a training specialist for the Department of Human Resources at the University of Memphis. JASON ARTHUR LOWRY of Greenville is enrolled in the master’s degree program in public administration at ECU.

2001

BERNICE GALE BAILES ’01, ’04 of Ashburn, Va., is a budget function analyst with the Office of Budget at the U.S. Department of Interior in Washington, D.C. SEAN ELLIOTT BERG of New York is director of concert operations for Manhattan Concert Productions in New York City and operations director for Artist Alliance International. BRIAN THOMAS RICE ’03 performed as bass soloist in a recent Manhattan Concert Productions show. ALLISON STEWART HARDESTY BERNAUER and husband Korey of Beaufort welcomed twins Callie Margaret and Max on March 12, 2004. LAURA JEAN JETT has rejoined the staff at Cypress Glen Retirement Community, Greenville, as director of Memory Care. ­NELIDA BURGOS GULINO of Winterville is a partner in Trade Winds, a new retail outlet in Greenville. KATHRYN ELIZABETH LENNOX of Winterville has joined the Carolina Centre for the practice of adult, adolescent and family psychotherapy. SARAH JAMES McCREIGHT graduated from the 33-day Army ROTC Leader Development and Assessment Course “Operation Warrior Forge”)at Fort Lewis in Tacoma, Wash. JAMI REBECCA RHODES of Beulaville was hired by the Central City Opera to perform as part of their Young Artists Studio for the 2005 season. JEREMY WAYNE WOODARD of Garner performed in the first national tour of Hairspray on an Actors Equity contract. DR. NELSON LEE JENKINS ’97, ’01 and DR. ­SHANNON BAIRD JENKINS of Greenville are moving to the Northeast.

Nelson will begin a hand and microsurgery ­fellowship at the University of Massachusetts Medical Center, where Shannon will be a hospitalist physician. DR. STEPHANIE ANJA WITT of Charlotte is an emergency physician at Piedmont Emergency Medicine Associates.

2000

DR. CAMMY RENAE BENTON ’96, ’00 is a physician in practice with Lakemont Family Medicine in Lincolnton. DR. SHETAL HARSHADRAY PADIA of Charlottesville, Va., is an endocrine fellow at the University of Virginia. JAVIER CASTILLO JR., president of Castillo Language Services Inc., has passed the U.S. Department of State Spanish Seminar Interpreting Exam. CHRIS DAVID BLICE, in his third year as principal of Louisburg High School, was recognized as Franklin County’s Principal of the Year. MARYBETH ­PETTEWAY EASON was promoted to assistant vice president at BB&T.

1999

LAWRENCE STROUD “LARRY” SPELL JR. (’99, ’01) was elected to the Greenville City Council in municipal elections. A music teacher at Pitt Community College, he is married to CYNTHIA

LYNNE “CINDY” MILLER SPELL (’02). ANGELA MARIE WARLICK HOWARD of Greenville has become a new home consultant for Bill Clark Homes in the Langston Farms community. KATE ALLEN CUBBAGE-SHEPHERD of Salisbury, Md., married Robert Shepherd on July 24. ­AMANDA “MANDY” CAIN GAMBRELL and husband Joseph of Greenville, S.C. welcomed a baby son, Joseph Dylan, on Feb. 17. NICOLE ANN “NIKI” KREEL DOWNS and husband Quinn of Sanford, Fla., welcomed John William II into the world on Sept. 30. MEGHAN SUE MOSER of Athens, Ga., was accepted into the MFA program at the University of Georgia’s Lamar Dodd School of Art to study fabric design. JUDITH EMERY “JUDY” MEINEKE COOGAN was awarded Certified Diabetes Educator status after completing a certification exam and other requirements.

BRENT WILLIAM ANDERSON of Winterville was ­promoted to vice president at Evolve Inc.

1998

CAROLYN ANN WILBURN was named director of the eastern region Small Business and Technology Development Center at ECU. JENNIFER SHELTON LICKO of Greenville has recorded five CDs, including a collection of Celtic lullabies sung in Gaelic and English. ERICKA MARIE HEDGECOCK is assistant professor and international programs coordinator at UNC-Greensboro. CARRIE MAUD BURKERT KELLEY owns and operates a violin and viola studio in Concord.

SCOTT REYNOLDS FORBES of Mooresville is an attorney in the firm of Mills and Levine, Mooresville. DR. BRYAN TODD EDWARDS is a major in the Air Force stationed at McDill Air Force Base in Tampa. He and his wife, JULIE ELLEN HALLOCK EDWARDS ’97, have three daughters. DRS. TINA BURLESON STEWART and CHRISTOPHER WADE STEWART are living in Cary. He is practicing internal medicine at Coast Medical Clinic, and she is with Oberlin Road Pediatrics in Raleigh.

1997

TRACEY HILL ALLEN, CPA ’97, ’99 was admitted as a partner in the Greenville accounting firm of Sullivan, Shearin & Co. AMY ANN JONES EDWARDS was named a partner at the Greenville law firm of Mattox, Davis, Barnhill & Paysour. AMANDA ABIGAIL WALL SMITH and ANDREW BRIAN “ANDY” SMITH ’96 of Concord are the proud first-time parents of twin daughters, Morgan Abigail and Carter Cadence, born Dec. 16, 2004. DR. MELANIE ANNE CHESSON SULLIVAN is employed part-time by Durham Regional Hospital as a hospital physician. CHRISTOPHER ROBERT BARRON of Washington, D.C., political director for the National Log Cabin Republicans, debated Alan Keyes on ABC-TV during the Republican National Convention.

1996

STEPHEN ROBERT FLIPPIN of Arlington, Va., is director of federal affairs for CSX Corp. TERESA WALLACE WINSLOW of Ayden, a family nurse practitioner, has joined the clinical staff at the ECU Physicians’ Firetower Medical Office. DR. ALEX RAY KIRBY of New Bern is an interventional cardiologist in a ­single-specialty practice in New Bern with offices in Jacksonville and Morehead City. His wife, DR. MARY BANASZAK KIRBY, is a physician with New Bern Family Practice. DR. TAMEL SADEK of Goodyear, Ariz., has a ­private solo medical practice and is the owner of a medical spa and ­wellness center.

1995

DAVID EDWARD REID III of Hilton Head, S.C., a market executive with RBC

Class Notes Centura Bank, received one of the company’s annual Leo Awards. JULIAN HOLT KORNEGAY of Louisburg, Franklin County Library system director, participated in the Oxford Round Table at the University of Oxford’s Pembroke College. DR. PHILIP MICHAEL BROWN JR. of Wilmington has relocated to a private vascular surgery practice, Wilmington Health Associates. CARL JAMIESON REES of Greenville is working with the city’s West Greenville redevelopment plan. He is married to MELISSA JANE DUVALL REES ’90, ’02, a lecturer in ECU’s child development program. DR. WENDY JONES ’95, ’00 has joined the medical staff at Carolina Women’s Physicians in Greenville.

DR. IRENE MACE HAMRICK of Greenville is an assistant professor in the Brody School of Medicine. She was appointed geriatric fellowship director last year. DR. PATRICK EVERETTE KAVANAUGH of Chapel Hill is a physician with Triangle Family Practice, Duke University Affiliated Physicians, in Durham. He and wife Alison became first-time parents when Ella Grace was born last August. DAVID WILLIAM REICHELT of Chubbuck, Idaho, sports director for KPVI-TV, is the radio voice for Idaho State University.

1994

KEVIN SCOTT HALL of Des Moines, Iowa, is sports director and anchor for KDSM Fox 17 in Des Moines and KFXA Fox 28/40 and KGAN CBS 2 in Cedar Rapids. DOROTHY JAYE WEEKS HUGHES of Bethel and husband LEON WESLEY ­HUGHES JR. ’03 announce the birth of their first child, Bailey Jayne, who arrived March 14. STEPHEN ROBERT BRODIE is the new project manager at the corporate office of WIMCO Corp. in Washington. LINDSEY ALLEN CRISP, a CPA, was named president and chief operating offi-

cer of Carver Machine Works Inc. in Washington, N.C. FRANCES LOUISE CREECH PRICE ’94, ’00 and WALTER LOUIS PRICE ’87 of Nashville welcomed baby daughter Lindsey Victoria on Jan. 12. TRACY DIANE PROCTOR DANIELS and husband Eric of Rocky Mount announce the birth of daughter Elizabeth Faye on Feb. 2.

CHERYLE FAY NABERHAUS of Bonita Springs, Fla., performed as principal horn in Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 with the Southwest Florida Symphony in Fort Myers. HEIDI REBECCA NICHOLS POPE ’94, ’00 of Wilson is working at Barton College as director of alumni programs and the annual fund. DR. KAREN ELIZABETH CURTIS LESLIE of Abbeville, S.C., is a part-time family physician at Due West Family Medicine. DR. ERIK ALEXANDER MANRING of Raleigh is an attending emergency physician for Duke Health of Raleigh Hospital. He and wife Christina have three children, Kayla, Jake and Abby. DR. CRAIG STEPHEN SELF of Chesapeake, Va., is a staff ophthalmologist at the Naval Medical Center in Portsmouth.

1993

ROBERT SAMUEL “SAM” MATHENY JR. of Zebulon is general manager of News Over Wireless/Capitol Broadcasting Company New Media, based in Raleigh. He is married to TAMARA ABBOTT MATHENY ’94. STANTON EDWARD BLAKESLEE of Greenville is founding principal of Eye Integrated Communications. KEVIN EUGENE VARNER of Greensboro was a featured actor with the N.C. Shakespeare Festival last season. Kevin completed Harvard University’s MFA program in acting at the American Repertory Theatre in Cambridge. DONNA PAIGE BOYKIN HILL of Winterville is principal at Greenville’s Elmhurst Elementary School. DR.

Make a Note

JUDITH LAWRENCE OUTTEN is practicing community psychiatry in Phoenix and has completed a children’s book and a gospel CD. RABIAH MARYAM BARODOFSKY HODGES of Manteo is master weaver for the studio Endless Possibilities. BRANDON JAMES MacGILLIS of Washington, D.C. is director of communications for the National Environmental Trust.

1992

THOMAS JAMES “TOM” SPAULDING JR. of Castle Rock, Col., is founder and CEO of Leader’s Challenge. RENEE ELAINE CUNDIFF ­NAUFUL of Sunrise, Fla. and husband Jeff welcomed their second child, Ciara Catherine, on Feb. 8. JAMES ­WINFIELD “JIM” PARKER of Greenville has joined the estimating staff at WIMCO Corp. CASSANDRA ­DARDEN BELL of Winterville, former news anchor at WNCT-TV, Greenville, is the author of After the Storm and Mississippi Blues, novels featuring African-American women overcoming domestic and personal difficulties. AMY LEE HINSON of Wilmington, a music teacher at Virgo Middle School, has earned National Board Certification in music. She plays oboe and English horn with the Wilmington Symphony.

DR. JONATHAN HARRIS TAYLOR of Norfolk is a resident at Eastern Virginia Medical Center. DR. D. SCOTT DONALDSON of Hendersonville, with Western Carolina Urological Associates, is part of a group who have purchased Camp Arrowhead, a summer camp for disadvantaged, innercity boys in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

1991

DR. WILLIAM ALFRED KREMER of Greensboro is a practicing physician at Medcentral in High Point. He and his wife BARBARA

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41

Alumni Association President Layton Getsinger, Dr. Deitra Lowdermilk, Clay Walker, Conwell Worthington, Chancellor Steve Ballard, and James Cromartie

2005 Outstanding Alumni The Alumni Association named four winners of the Outstanding Alumni Award for 2005 during Homecoming in October. They are James Cromartie ‘66, one of America’s leading historical artists; Dr. Deitra “Dee” Lowdermilk ‘66, a nationally recognized expert in obstetrical nursing; Clay Walker ’89, a top executive at the licensing and marketing arm of the National Football League Players Association; and Conwell S. Worthington II ‘72, a producer and director of live theatre and entertainment events on Broadway and other venues.

The award, which dates to 1940, recognizes alumni who have shown outstanding and uncommon achievement in their profession, civic affairs or politics.

Cromartie is credited with introducing a style of painting called “Hard-Edge Realism” to the art world in 1968. Cromartie painted the official White House portrait and has been commissioned to paint significant historical landscape portraits such as the U.S. Capitol, Smithsonian Institute buildings and the Cape Hatteras lighthouse. Cromartie’s rendition of the U.S. Capitol is featured as an example of symmetry and balance in Art Talk, a Time-Life art history textbook for high school students.

After receiving her B.S. degree in nursing from ECU, Lowdermilk later received a M.Ed. and Ph.D. from UNC Chapel Hill where she works today in the School of Nursing as a clinical professor. Certified in In-Patient Obstetrical Nursing, Lowdermilk began her career in public health nursing in 1970 and has worked in a variety of maternity and women’s health care clinical settings. She is co-editor of two maternity and women’s health textbooks and a leader in the North Carolina section of the Association of Women’s Health, Obstetric and Neonatal Nurses. Lowdermilk is one of North Carolina’s Great 100 RNs for Excellence and is a Fellow in the American Academy of Nursing.

Under Walker’s management, the revenue generated from sales of Players Inc. licensed merchandise has grown from $350 million in 1994 to $750 million.

Walker had the foresight to encourage the development of licensing fantasy football when no other sports leagues were doing so. Walker received a B.A. in English from East Carolina in 1989, an MBA from Colorado State University, and a M.S. in Labor Relations from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He was named to the Advancement Council for the School of Health and Human Performance at East Carolina University and serves as an adjunct professor of sports management at George Washington University. He is a director of the National Council of Youth Sports and USA Football. Walker recently was selected

by Street & Smith’s Sports Business Journal as a recipient of the Forty Under 40 award, which annually honors the 40 most influential people in sports business under the age of 40.

Worthington is co-president and chairman of Cornerstone Entertainment International in California. After earning a B.F.A. degree in theatre management and directing from ECU in 1972, he joined the Walt Disney Company in 1988 and held various leadership roles, including producer of such musical stage shows as “Beauty and the Beast.” He produced more than 1,000 special events at Disneyland and Disneyworld as well as national tours and Los Angeles shows.

More recently, Worthington co-directed the critically acclaimed one-woman comedy, Vatican II: What the Hell Happened, and was associate producer of Dirty Dancing, the stage musical in Sydney and Melbourne, Australia. Next he will

direct a new Broadway show about the American Civil War entitled, Crossroads to Freedom.

42

HARRIS KREMER ’88, ’91 have two young sons, Jacob, 5 and Benjamin, who arrived last August. GRADY COLEMAN BAILEY JR. ’91, ’93 of Farmville is the 2005-06 WachoviaPitt County Schools Teacher of the Year. MARILYN ­VIRGINIA BROWN GIBSON of Greenville has joined the Pitt County Community Foundation as an affiliate coordinator. ISAAC WESLEY ROBINSON JR. ’91, ’95 of Willow Spring received an MBA from Strayer University. STACEY ANN HEDDLESTON ROSE and husband Albert C. “Pete” Rose III of Litchfield, Ohio, announce the birth of their ­second daughter, Charlotte Ann, on Sept. 28, 2004. The baby joined two-year old Emily Caroline. CARRIE JANE ­ARMSTRONG BANKS of Montgomery, Ala., is communications director for the Alabama League of Municipalities.

1990

DR. JAMES PHILIP GRIGGS JR. of Charlotte is a practicing physician at Carolina Health Care Systems. ANDREW DAVID SCHMIDT ’90, ’97 of Greenville is sales and marketing manager of the Pitt County Convention & Visitors Bureau.

JAMES MICHAEL “JIM” BAZLUKI ’90, ’93, head athletic trainer at Cary High School, was selected the N.C. Athletic Trainers Association’s Secondary School Athletic Trainer of the Year. NANCY LEE CORBY CROMIE of Chattanooga, Tenn., and her husband, allergist Dr. Marc Cromie, are the parents of three young children. CHRISTOPHER CHARLES BRADFORD joined the Stoehr Companies Inc., a construction firm in Eldersburg, Md., as vice president of operations. ELIZABETH MAE “BETH” HASSELL of Fayetteville has established dual citizenship with the Republic of Ireland and is a full-time writer and part-time historian for the Department of Defense. SCOTT COTTON SNEAD of Greenville is a real estate agent with Aldridge and Southerland Realtors.

1989

ALICE ELIZABETH ZINCONE ’89, ’98 collaborated on a CD of original and traditional bluegrass music released in June and accompanied the Apple Chill Cloggers during their appearance at an international folk music and dance festival in Narni, Italy. ­DEBORAH NADINE “DEBBIE” TARVIK FRANK and husband David of Bowling Green, Va., welcomed their second child on Dec. 22, 2004. MALLORY LAWRENCE “TRIPP” LILES III of Roswell, Ga., is the creative director at JRM Publishing in Atlanta. DR. KAREN DENISE COWARD of Tarboro is a family physician and medical director of the Tarboro Clinic.

1988

DR. JOSHUA SONETT, an associate professor of surgery at Columbia University in New York, led the surgical team which operated on former President Bill Clinton to remove scar tissue that had built up around Clinton’s heart following a quadruple bypass operation.

He also directs the lung transplant program at New York Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center.

PATRICK JOSEPH KEOUGH exhibited his work at a oneartist show at the Council for the Arts in Jacksonville this summer. DR. JOHN CARSON ROUNDS of Wake Forest is president-elect of the N.C. Academy of Family Physicians.

DR. ROBIN DENISE ADAMS ’88, ’92 of Winterville is a practicing physician with Pitt Family Physicians in Ayden.

1987

DR. JAMES R. STEVENS of Cary has established Carolina Family Practice and Sports Medicine. KEXI LIU is conductor of the Missouri Southern State University orchestra.

1986

MARK ANDREW WILLIAMS of Schenectady, N.Y., was elected president of the Hudson-Mohawk Professional Geologists’ Association and to the board of directors of the New York State Council of Professional Geologists. DR. RICHARD L. GILBERT JR. is the senior partner in Burlington Family Practice. DR. JAMES

Class Notes GREGORY “GREG” NELSON of Rocky Mount is president of the N.C. Orthopedic Association. DR. CATHERINE DINAH POPKIN-DONOWAY of Weston, Fla., is president of the Center for Gastroenterology and Nutrition in Pembroke Pines. DR. PATIENCE ELIZABETH BOSLEY STEVENS of Cary is chairing the Copernicus Group Independent Institutional Review Board.

1985

MARK JOSEF SHANK of Holly Springs has received a doctor of education degree from N.C. State University. JAMES WILLIAM BOITER of Belmont, principal/partner for all graphic design and branding in Bolt’s Charlotte and New York Offices, was selected by Charlotte Metro as one of its “40 under 40.” He is married to CAROLYN HUNTER BOITER ’83. WLLIAM ALLEN CONGDON is traveling with the national tour of Mamma Mia. MARK GLENN RABON of Saratoga was promoted to vice president of BB&T. DR. KEITH VAN ALLEN NANCE of Raleigh is an associate pathologist at Rex Pathologists and Associates and an adjunct associate professor of pathology at the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Medicine.

1984

LT. COL. REGGIE SELBY retired from the Air Force at Peterson Air Force Base, Col., after 21 years of service as commander of the 21st Contracting Squadron. He is the son of ROY SADLER SELBY ’73 of Greenville. WILLIAM CALVIN “WILL” SANDERSON JR. ’84, ’88 of Greenville is principal of Pitt County’s South Central High School.

1983

MARK RICHARD KEMP, author of the recently published Dixie Lullaby, is entertainment editor at the Charlotte Observer. LESA CAROLYN ROGERS BROADHEAD of Stow, Ohio, is artistic director/ choreographer for the Manchester Dance Ensemble of Akron.

1982

ALISA FAY EVANS DEBNAM, dean of health programs at Fayetteville Technical Community College, was elected to the board of the ­Association of Junior Leagues International. DANIEL NOLAN “DAN” NEIL, a columnist for the Los Angeles Times, won the 2004 Pulitzer Prize for journalistic criticism. AMY CELESTE FORMYDUVALL MEMOLO of Lugoff, S.C., is a third grade teacher in the Kershaw County schools.

RHESA DAVIS TUCKER ’81 of Greenville is CEO of the Greenville Convention Center.

1981

KEVIN PATRICK McCOURT of Los Angeles is a legal analyst for the City of West Hollywood. BETH ANN HIGNITE CARTER of Yorktown, Va., is the new regional director for St. Leo University’s central region. RAMONA SEALE “NONIE” SHANNON HANSON of Edmond, Okla., was program planner and moderator of two seminars sponsored by the Oklahoma Bar Association.

BOWLIN ’03 is now attending law school. SUSAN DYANNE JARRETT BANKS of Greenville, clerk to the Pitt County Board of Commissioners, was recognized as Outstanding Clerk of the Year by the N.C. Association of County Clerks.

1978

LORETTA ANN ADAMS PIZZILLA of Greenville, a fifth grade math and science teacher in the Pitt County schools, has earned National Board Certification in the Middle Childhood Generalist area.

WANDA GAIL TURNAGE ELKS, Greenville city clerk, received the Master Municipal Clerk designation through the International Institute of Municipal Clerks.

1977

RICHARD EUGENE “DICK” ­BRADSHAW of Washington, D.C., is a ­partner in Stirling Strategic Services. DANIEL W. “DAN” VAUGHN of Grand Rapids, Mich., a faculty member at Grand Valley State University, was named Outstanding Educator for the past academic year. DR. FREDERICK CARL MAUTE III ’77, ’82 of Danville, Va., is president of Danville Women’s Clinic.

1976

PATRICIA “PATTY” HILE YEWCIC of Chesapeake, Va., is a special education teacher in the Chesapeake Public Schools. Her son Steven is a freshman at EC. EDWIN JEROME “JERRY” BRETT of Greenville was promoted to senior vice president of East Carolina Bank. LEONARD WAYNE JONES, CPA, of Morehead City is 2005-06 president of the N.C. State Board of Public Accountant Examiners. GLORIA FISHER SNEAD ’76, ’94 of Greenville is principal of Whitfield Elementary School.

1975

JANICE VERTUCCI SCHREIBER of Greenville, an actress, theatrical director and teacher, participated in a summer program at the Chekhov Theatre Institute in Maine, a Broadway teaching lab in New York and the Hands-on Shakespeare for Teachers program at the N.C. Shakespeare Festival. BILL G. PAGE of Chapel Hill has completed a book and CD-ROM software program that is sold online.

1974

JERRY STEPHEN CRIBBS of Wilmington has retired from the New Hanover County schools. He taught elementary music and high school chorus and directed arts education. He conducts the Cape Fear Chorale.

1973

TIMOTHY ALLEN GILLAND of Charlotte has expanded his company, Environmental Graphic Design, to Sarasota, Fla., and Danville, Va. DOUGLAS L. GOMES of Greenville, vice president of sales and marketing for Grady White Boats, has joined the board of the Pitt County United Way.

1972

TIMOTHY MICHAEL HEALY of Raleigh was promoted to vice president of estate planning for Moore’s Creek Capital Partners LLC. DUANE CURTIS GROOMS was named director of the Barton Society, a donor-based organization supporting Barton College in Wilson.

1980

DENSE JONES PITTMAN of Goldsboro, a fifth grade teacher in the Wayne County schools, is cited in the ninth edition of Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers. RICHARD LEE TUCKER of Greenville has joined the Utilities Construction division of the New Bern-based James L. Cayton Associates as senior project ­manager.

1979

CARL WAYLON JOYNER of Greenville has joined Old North State Trust LLC in Rocky Mount as senior financial adviser and trust officer. DR. JANE MARIE GLEASON ’71, ’77 of Cary was promoted to full professor in the Meredith College School of Education.

PHILLIP RAY “PHIL” DIXON of Greenville was appointed to the UNC Board of Governors by the N.C. Senate. Dixon served from 1993 to 2001 on the ECU Board of Trustees, the last two years as chairman. J. CRAIG SOUZA ’71 of Raleigh is the only other ECU alumnus currently on the UNC board.

MARK ALAN HOLMES of Greenville was named president and CEO of Select Bank & Trust. GRACE FLANDERS SCOTT of Edgewood, N.M., has retired from her military career in the U.S. Marine Corps Reserve. JO ELLEN FOX GILBERT of Jacksonville, Fla., was nominated as the Speech-Language Pathologist of the Year by the Duval County Public Schools. JANET PAIGE ENNIS of Phoenix is working as a graphic artist-designer for the Arizona Diamondbacks. DANIEL LEE BOWLIN of Huntington Beach, Calif., is chief financial officer for Cable Exchange in Santa Ana. His daughter, JESSICA ANN

1971

1970

ROBERT WADE EDWARDS of Rocky Mount has joined Old North State Trust LLC as a senior financial adviser and trust officer. He is dean of the Southeastern Trust School at Campbell University.

WILLIAM LEE “BILL” DeBRUHL JR. of Greenville has joined the staff at First Flight Federal Credit Union.

EDWARD J. BROWN JR. of Hilton Head Island, S.C., is president of the Mortgage Bankers Association of the Carolinas.

1969

LINDA TETTERTON CONLEY of Pleasant Hill, Calif., has established the Mike Conley Track Scholarship Fund in honor of her husband MICHAEL J. CONLEY ’68 who died in January. During his ECU years, Mike ran track and cross country and represented ECU on the nationally televised intercollegiate quiz competition, College Bowl. LYDIA KAREN “K” WOOLARD of Washington received one of ECU’s Founders Awards last spring in recognition of her service to the university. FRANKIE CAROL RAINS TALTON of Goldsboro has retired after 33 years as a music teacher with the Wayne County schools. JOHN CLIFFORD ANEMA JR. ’69, ’71 of Greenville has established Creative Life Solutions Inc. STEPHEN C. ­MORRISETTE of Richmond is president of the Virginia Health Care Association. JOE SPEIGHT TRIPP of Hickory was named regional president for Catawba Valley Bank.

1968

WILLIAM C. BAGGETT of Greenville was appointed to the Pitt County advisory board of directors for Wachovia Bank and to the board of directors of Washington-based Carver Machine Works. Baggett is a former member of the ECU Board of Trustees. CHARLES COLUMBUS “CHARLIE” MARTIN JR. of Greenville is president of the ECU Parents Council. He also serves on the ECU Board of Visitors and the ECU Medical Foundation board.

1966

ALTON WAYNE HOLLOMAN of Greenville was elected chairman of the Pitt County-City of Greenville Airport Authority. He succeeds retired ECU Chancellor Richard Eakin. Since retiring from the apparel industry in 2001, he manages Holloman Properties, a commercial and residential real estate rental ­company founded in 1980.

1959

EDNA HILDA TEDDER JOYNER has retired to live in Cary after teaching music in Chicago-area public schools and maintaining a piano studio for 30 years in Bethesda.

1942

CHARLES THAYER “CHARLIE” FUTRELL is still doing Triathlons at the age of 85. He trains two hours daily—swimming, biking, running and working out on fitness machines. Since turning 72, when he competed in the first of six consecutive Ironman Triathlons in Kona, Hawaii, he never placed worse than third in the world for his age group. In October he achieved a longheld goal: to win the age group World Championship in the International Triathlon Union’s Olympic Distance Triathlon.

He’s now the world champion.

1934

MYRTLE GRAY HODGES BILBRO and her husband, A. Tyson Bilbro, are memorialized in a Rose High School Teaching Excellence Award ­sponsored by the Bilbro Educational Fund. The fund was established by Robert Bilbro and Myrtle Bilbro Davis in honor of their parents. The $10,000 award is given every three years to an outstanding teacher at Rose.

43

In Memo­­riam ’03 JESUS LEONARDO GONZALEZ JR. of Greenville died July 23. He was employed by NACCO Materials Handling Group in sales administration. ’02 JASON MAX KELLY MASON of Greenville died July 2. He was an aviation electronics technician airman in the U.S. Navy and was employed at DSM as a computer software validater. ’99 MALCOLM ROBERT “ROB” McLEOD of Isle of Palms, S.C. died Nov. 9. He was a restaurant manager in Charleston. ’96 MATTHEW DAVID “MATT” PATTON of Winterville died Oct. 11. He taught Spanish for nine years at Cox Middle School, where he also coached soccer. ’94 LISA NICOLE KIDD of Winterville died March 13.

She worked in law enforcement with the Pitt County Sheriff ’s Department and the N.C. and Mississippi State Bureaus of Investigation. ’90, ’94 EBERN EARL ALLEN of Graham died March 10.

A Methodist minister with divinity degrees from Duke University, he had served Phillips Chapel in Haw River. ’90 LAURA KAY DREISBACH TAYLOR of Raleigh died Feb. 27. A computer specialist, she had worked at Bell Northern Research and Nortel. ’85 SHARON McCAULEY MERCER of Jacksonville died July 2. She was a member of Chi Omega sorority and a kindergarten teacher at Parkwood Elementary School. ’85 JOHN VAUGHAN COLSTON II of Greenville died Sept. 20. ’84 RICHARD EUGENE BROWN of Goldston died April 19. A dedicated animal lover, he supported For the Love of Dogs, headquartered in Wilson, as well as the Wayne County SPCA. ’83 ALLEN COURTNEY HOLDEN of Wilmington died Feb. 21. A certified public accountant, he held positions with hospitals and medical practices in Pinehurst, Albany, Ga., and Wilmington. ’82 CLIFTON BRENT STOCKS of Greenville died March 21. He was a general contractor in residential construction and had served as a volunteer fireman and paramedic. ’80 ANNE WHITEHURST NELSON of Robersonville died March 15. She taught at Rose High School in Greenville for 30 years, retiring in 1997.

’73 BARBARA IRENE GEER DAVIS of Semora died Oct. 16. Before coming to ECU, she received an undergraduate degree from Wake Forest University and was a retired librarian with the Durham schools. ’73 BERNARD HASELRIG of Greenville died Feb. 17. He was chairman of the Pitt County Board of Elections and taught at South Ayden School and held principal positions at Bethel Union School and Bethel Elementary Schools. ’73 BONNIE LITTLE EVANS of Greenville died Feb. 5.

She had been a law enforcement officer with Memorial Hospital, Chapel Hill, and a state probation officer, and later worked for the Pitt County Probation and Parole Department. ’69 JOSEPH EDWIN “JOE” JONES JR. of Snow Hill died Aug. 29. He was a graduate of the New York Stock Exchange Institute and was a retired stockbroker with E.F. Hutton in Kinston. ’68 MARTHA LEE MOYE of Greenville died Dec. 22, 2004. She was formerly a mathematics professor at several universities, then operated a dress boutique in Greenville until her retirement in 2001. ’68 GEORGIA ELIZABETH “LIBBY” YELVERTON of Greenville died Feb. 16. She formerly taught home economics at Farmville Central High School, then worked as a district manager for Avon cosmetics. ’68 JANE COX CRAYTON of New Bern died Sept. 2. A professional artist, she owned The Mailbox Lady, a business offering hand-painted mailboxes to customers throughout North America and Europe. ’65 NANCY MUDGE BARDEN of Lancaster, Pa., died May 17. She was a retired art educator, serving schools in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and North Carolina. ’64 GINNIE ROSE RIVENBARK of Wilmington died April 1. She taught fourth grade at Cumberland Mills School in Fayetteville until her retirement in 1990. ’64 MILDRED BRADLEY MALLOY of Fuquay-Varina died Sept. 7. She taught elementary school in Harnett County for more than 30 years and was an avid traveler, having made several visits to Ireland.

’79 CINDY MOODY GRIESEDIECK of Plymouth, formerly of Wake Forest, died July 18. She was a nurse at Rex Hospital, Raleigh, and later coordinator of the kidney transplant program at Pitt County Memorial Hospital.

’63, ’64 BRAYOM E. ANDERSON JR. of Greenville died Feb. 3. He had taught and served as a guidance counselor in Edgecombe County and at Sandhills Community College before joining the ECU Division of Continuing Education, then became a financial consultant

’77 KIMBERLY SIMPSON HALL of Winterville died Nov. 6. She was a pediatric physical therapist at Duke University and later a therapist in the Pitt County Memorial Hospital neonatal ICU.

’63 JO ANN BAKER SMITH HALL of Edenton died Sept. 26. She worked more than 40 years in social services, serving in Beaufort, Pitt and Hertford Counties as well as for the state.

’77 REBECCA SMITH “BECKY” BARNES of Virginia Beach, Va., died May 31. She was a teacher in Murfreesboro, Washington, D.C. and Norfolk, Va. Schools.

’63 REBECCA ANN SMITHWICK CONGLETON of Smithfield, Va., died Feb. 6. After graduation she received a master’s degree from Old Dominion University and taught business for 30 years in the Newport News school system.

’75 PAULA HART BREWER of Chapel Hill died July 16.

She had traveled widely and after graduation worked for several years at the UNC-Chapel Hill newspaper, Daily Tar Heel.

44

’74 WILLIAM THOMAS “TOM” MICHEL of Greenville died March 21. He had played professional football with the Minnesota Vikings and the Washington Redskins and later completed 35 years with the U.S. Postal Service.

’62, ’64 SAM DOUGLAS “DOUG” MITCHELL of Greenville died April 8. A U.S. Navy veteran, he taught

English and drama in Ayden and also acted in many plays at ECU. ’61 CARROL SAUNDERS ROBERSON of Rocky Mount died Nov. 1. He was retired operator of Carrolton Management Co. and a board member of Community Home Care & Hospice. ’60 DR. HAROLD LATHAM TYER of Washington died March 7. After his retirement from an active career in Christian ministry and education, he served as interim pastor to various eastern North Carolina churches. ’60 ROBERT G. “BOB” BRUCE of Winter Park, Fla., died Feb. 5. An Army veteran, he taught and coached several sports in Farmville, later moving to Florida where he was a school administrator for more than 30 years. ’59 NANCY ANN CALDWELL BLADES of Elizabeth City died Feb. 1. She taught music and drama for more than 20 years in Craven, Currituck and Pasquotank counties and in Seaford, Del. She worked as director of education at Tryon Palace. ’58, ’59 THELMA “TEDDY” MARTIN READ of Halifax died March 29. She was a teacher and administrator in the Halifax County school system for 35 years. ’58 ERNEST LEE WHITE JR. of Raleigh died July 9. He was an Air Force veteran and had retired from Xerox Corp. after 25 years as a sales representative. ’58 GERALDINE SMITH McGLOHON of Rocky Mount died Nov. 22, 2004. She taught elementary students for 30 years and also was a site coordinator for ECU’s N.C. Teacher Academy and an adjunct instructor at Nash Community College and N.C. Wesleyan College. ’57, ’60 CATHERINE RAPER DAVENPORT of Plymouth died July 2. She was employed in public schools of Maryland and North Carolina for 34 years. ’56 JULIA SPEARS HOYT of Hilton Head Island, S.C., died Feb. 10. She was a retired elementary school teacher and enjoyed the beach and playing bridge. ’56 OLLIE WHITE EDWARDS of Kinston died Dec. 8, 2004. An active supporter of community interests, she was recognized as a Paul Harris Fellow by Rotary International and as a James E. West Fellow by the Boy Scouts of America. ’56 DOROTHY JEAN BARNES VALSAME of Garner died Oct. 19. She was a teacher or librarian in Stanly, Orange, Brunswick, Richmond and Wake Counties for many years. ’56 ANNIE LOIS GRADY BRITT of Mount Olive died June 5. Serving 34 years with the N.C. Cooperative Extension service and in public relations for Murphy Fam­ily Farms, she was a past president of the N.C. Agribusiness Council and former member of the UNC Board of Governors. ’55 ERNEST CLEVELAND “E.C.” AVERETTE JR. of Winterville died Oct. 5. He was a farmer for many years and worked as a rural mail carrier. ’53, ’59 MARY JO JOHNSON MANN of Coats died July 21. She was a teacher and supervisor for the Harnett County school system and a member of Delta Kappa Gamma society for women educators. ’52 WADE GIBSON McDOUGALD of Fayetteville died

In Memoriam

Dr. Andrew A. Best Dr. Andrew A. Best, a respected Greenville physician and former member of the UNC System Board of Governors who played a key role in founding East Carolina University’s ­medical school, died Dec. 7 at age 89. A native of Kinston, he received his medical degree from Mcharry Medical College in Nashville, Tenn., in 1951. He began practicing medicine in Greenville in 1954 and continued seeing patients until ­retiring in 2004. During the 1960s he was the only African-American doctor practicing at Pitt Memorial Hospital.

Appointed to the UNC System Board of Governors in 1971, Best worked closely with then-ECU Chancellor Leo Jenkins in lobbying for creation of the Brody School of Medicine.

Best persuaded six minority members of the university system’s medical education sub­ committee to vote in favor of a medical school at ECU. “Without us, it would not have been,” he said in a newspaper interview in 2000.

Best previously had teamed with Jenkins to successfully integrate the ECU campus.

East Carolina was one of the few major North Carolina universities to integrate without a court order. Best recruited Laura Leary of Pitt County to apply to ECU in the fall of 1963.

The next year she was joined by 10 other African-American students on campus. She became the first minority to graduate from ECU in 1966.

Best was awarded the Purple Heart and Bronze Star for his Army service during World War II. He was active in civic and community affairs in Greenville and Pitt County for decades; he was a past president of the Pitt County Interracial Committee and a past chairman of the Greenville Human Relations Council. Best was a driving force in achieving integration, ­particularly in the delivery of medical services. He was widely known for securing scholarships for minority students to attend college.

For the past 15 years, the Greenville Human Relations Council has held an annual banquet to honor the joint efforts of Best and Dr. Marlene G. Irons to desegregate Pitt Memorial in the 1960s.

Dr. Chia-yu Li Dr. Chia-yu Li, 64, chairman of East Carolina University’s chemistry department since 1988 and a faculty member since 1973, died Dec. 14.

A native of Shanghai, China who received his Ph.D. from Wayne State University, Dr. Li was known for his research in electroanalytical chemistry and separation science, and ­published more than 20 articles in scientific journals. He also was an expert in the ­development of pulsed amperometric ­detection and was working on developing trace electroanalytical methods for amino acids in small cyclic-peptides He was the recipient of several ECU awards, including the 1996 Teaching Excellence Award, the 2005 Founders Day Service Award and the 2005 Educator Hall of Fame Award.

A scholarship in his name was established some years ago by friends, students and ­colleagues in recognition of his dedication and service to the department of chemistry and to the university. Memorial contributions to the Dr. Chia-yu Lie Scholar­ship Endowment Fund should be sent care of ECU Gift Records, 2200 South Charles Blvd. Suite 1100, Greenville, N.C. 27858.

Sept. 17. He was a retired civil servant and had worked at Fort Bragg in the educational system. He was also a Korean War veteran. ’51 BENJAMIN THOMAS “BEN” HARPER of Snow Hill died Nov. 11. He was a Navy veteran of World War II and had retired as a buyer and supervisor with Liggett-Myers Tobacco Co. ’51 CHARLES HENRY “C.H.” EDWARDS of LewistonWoodville died April 3. He was a tax accountant in Rocky Mount, then an executive for Harrington Manufacturing Co. He was a Bertie County commissioner for 40 years, the last 22 as chairman. ’51 MAYHUE EDWARDS of Washington died April 6. He was a CPA for more than 40 years and had served in the Army during World War II. He was a member of the Improved Order of Red Men. ’50 LUCY CUMMINGS DAUGHTRIDGE of Rocky Mount died May 17. A former teacher and principal, she was an avid supporter of Braswell Memorial Library and other institutions. She was a member of the Daughters of the American Revolution. ’49, ’60 JOHN L. ROBERSON of Newport, formerly of Wanchese, died April 24. He was a teacher and administrator, serving in Broadway, Robersonville and Manteo. He was a 32nd Degree Scottish Rite Mason and a Shriner. ’47, 58 HANNAH HUMBLES ALLEN of Ayden died April 20. A retired teacher, she had taught business education for 30 years in Pitt and Greene County schools. ’47 ALDINE EARLY SNIPES of Menola died Feb. 15.

During her 38-year teaching career, she taught English, history and French in the Bertie County school system. ’47 MARY ALICE DAVIS RIVES of Enfield died Nov. 5.

After graduation, she became a first grade teacher in Enfield.

She was an avid traveler and a Sunday school teacher at Enfield Baptist Church. ’46, ’63 JESSIE MAE HORNE of Pendleton, Va., died Feb. 12. She taught for 46 years in eastern North Carolina and in Norfolk, Va. She was a member of Alpha Delta Kappa honor society for educators. ’46 GLADYS DAVIS PATE of Greenville died Oct. 28. Her 30-year teaching career included positions in Hallsboro, Kinston and Greenville. She was a member of Alpha Delta Kappa society for educators. ’46 GEORGIA KING JENKINS of Fairfax, Va., died March 28. She taught mathematics at Wakefield High School in Arlington until her retirement in 1980. ’44 JANE HARDEE NASH of Dunwoody, Ga., formerly of Greenville, died Feb. 6. She was a member of the Dunwoody Woman’s Club and Kingswood United Methodist Church. ’43 MARGARET WHITE “PEGGY” BYRUM MERCER of Edenton died Sept. 4. She worked as a teacher, telegraph operator and sewing machine salesperson. Later she joined the Crownsville, Md., State Hospital’s vocational rehabilitation program.

’42 RUBY GRANT BENNETT of Rocky Mount died May 30. For many years, she managed Peddler’s Village in Rocky Mount. She also was a 50-year member of the Daughters of the American Revolution and former regent of the Rocky Mount chapter. ’42 WALTER L. TUCKER of Greenville died Feb. 7. A World War II Army Air Corps veteran, he was district officer of the North Carolina Veterans Commission for 40 years, managing the Wilson and Greenville offices. ’42 MARTHA RICE MATKINS of Burlington and Chapel Hill died Sept. 25. She was a teacher in Roanoke Rapids and Raleigh and a director of the UNC-Chapel Hill Student Union. She also was an accredited Master Flower Show Judge. ’42 KATE “KITTY” FOLEY GRADY of Greenville died June 12. She taught for several years in Elizabeth City, later working for more than 20 years as a client representative with the Pitt County Department of Social Services. ’41 ETHEL STEPHENSON BRILEY of Raleigh and Alexandria, Va., died Nov. 12. In between teaching assignments in Ash and Raleigh, she worked for Wachovia Bank. Later, she and her family moved abroad for service with U.S. AID in the Philippines and Pakistan. ’41 CHARLEY J. FRAZELLE of Fayetteville died May 20.

He was decorated for service in the Ardennes campaign during World War II and later completed 32 years in civil service with the Navy and the Army Corps of Engineers. ’40 VIRGINIA DARE WHITE LITTLE of Raleigh and Fayetteville died May 23. A longtime teacher in Maryland as well as at schools in Lexington, Fayetteville and Fort Bragg, she enjoyed collecting antiques and gardening. ’40 VIRGINIA WILLIAMS FORREST of Ayden died May 1. She taught in Greene County schools for 31 years and was a member of Delta Kappa Gamma honor society for educators. ’40 BETTY NEAL CREDLE of Greenville died April 14.

She taught in elementary schools in Hyde, Pitt and Franklin Counties and was a member of the Retired Teachers Association. ’38 MARY ANNA CLIFTON DIXON PARKER of Trenton and New Bern died July 8. She was a teacher for 20 years and a member of the Quaker Neck Country Club bridge group and the Forever Young Club. ’38 HOWARD PRIMROSE CARPENTER SR. of New Bern died March 12. An Army captain during World War II, he had retired from 50 years as owner-operator of Carpenter’s Florist. He also was a 50-year member of St. John’s Masonic Lodge No. 3. ’38 HAZEL WILKERSON TICKNOR of Greenville died March 3. She was a retired calculator with Newport News Shipbuilding before moving from Tidewater to Greenville, where she was a member of St. Paul’s Episcopal Church. ’38 IDA WOOTEN MEWBORN TRIPP of Greenville died June 10. She was a retired writer and farmer and belonged to the Greenville Writers Club and the Pitt Community College Creative Writing Class.

’43 RUTH M. TUCKER LUCAS of Lexington, S.C. died June 9. She and her family had lived all over the Southwest, residing in Houston for 37 years until their recent move to Lexington.

’37 RUTH SMITH WATSON of Greenville died March 28. She had lived in the Falkland and Belvoir communities for the past 35 years and was a member of Falkland Presbyterian Church.

’43 GRACE HUMBLES CARRAWAY of Greenville died March 13. Her 33 years as an educator included positions in Belvoir, Greenville, Durham and Rockingham. She was a former member of the Greenville Service League.

’36, ’38 ZAZELL COSTELLO LOUGHLIN JOHNSON of Raleigh died Feb. 20. She had been a fifth grade teacher in Fuquay-Varina and was an enthusiastic gardener. ’36, ’38 MARY LILY BEST LITTLE of Grimesland died 45

In Memoriam Feb. 20. A retired teacher in Pitt County schools, she was a former member of the Pitt County Homemakers Extension Club. ’36 MARGARET HILBURN DAWSON of Raleigh died Jan. 11. She taught nearly 30 years in Southern Pines and Raleigh and was a member of Delta Kappa Gamma honor society for educators. ’35, ’37 VIOLA SMITH BABCOCK of Tarboro died Feb. 25. A career teacher in the Tarboro schools, she was a member of Calvary Episcopal Church and the Liberal Arts Club. Last year she established the Howard J. McGinnis Memorial Scholarship at ECU. ’33 MARY CARSON NORMAN of Robersonville died March 6. She was a member of the First Baptist Church of Robersonville, where she taught Sunday school, and a charter member of the Order of Eastern Star Chapter #244. ’31, 54 MARIAM ANNA MABRY of Hollister died Aug. 2. She was co-founder of the Tri-County Health Center for which she served as treasurer and board member for many years. She also was a member of Harris Chapel Baptist Church. ’31 HAZEL CARSON ROUSE of Greenville died May 2.

She formerly worked at the Walter B. Jones Alcoholic Rehabilitation Center. She also was a member of the Greenville Women’s Club and the Greenville Garden Club. ’30 MILDRED WINSTEAD DAWSON of Zebulon died March 3. During her teaching career, she taught primary grades at schools in Bath and Zebulon.

46

’28, ’30 MARY WINIFRED ROUSE DAWSON of Snow Hill died April 30. She was a former teacher and farmer and an active member of many educational, cultural and historical societies. She traveled extensively in North America, Europe, Asia and Australia.

FACULTY DEATHS PROF. WILLIAM DAVID BULLOCH of Enfield died Oct. 28. After 30 years as director of publications for Bell Telephone Laboratories, he became a Distinguished Visiting Professor in the English department.

DR. RICHARD LEONARD CAPWELL of Durham died Sept. 30. He was a member of the English faculty and dean of the College of Arts and sciences from 1969 to 1980. He retired as professor emeritus of English in 1985.

DR. WILLIAM EDWARD LAUPUS of Greenville died Feb. 15. A specialist in pediatrics, he was founding dean of ECU’s medical school, continuing as dean until his retirement in 1988.

DR. JARLATH MacKENNA of Apex died July 6. A former member of the ECU medical faculty, he was a high risk maternal-fetal specialist with a fellowship from Duke University.

DR. ROBERT MAIER of Green Bay, Wisc., died Oct. 24. In 1979 he was appointed vice chancellor of academic affairs at ECU, then became director of the Trace Elements Center at the medical school. He also held faculty appointments in biology and political science.

DR. MARY PASCHAL of Wake Forest died March 7. She was a former instructor of Spanish in ECU’s foreign languages department.

MR. THOMAS LUCAS EVANS of Greenville died July 2.

He held two art education degrees from ECU. He was a School of Art faculty member for 27 years, serving as media center director and student teacher supervisor.

DR. FLORA McDONALD “RONNY” VanSANT of Greenville died Sept. 3. She was a retired faculty member in the English department and served several years as director of the N.C. Teaching Fellows Program at ECU.

DR. MARY BETH FOIL of Greenville died Feb. 17. She was a member of the first graduating class of the ECU School of Medicine where she also performed her residency in general surgery and served as chief resident. Later she taught and worked in the ECU School of Medicine.

DR. JACK WINFIELD WILKERSON of Greenville died Nov. 13. A specialist in general medicine, he was a leader in the founding of the ECU medical school and served as the first chairman of the Department of Family Medicine.

DR. JAMES LEWIS HUGHES of Greenville died May 28.

From 1981 until 2000 he taught pediatrics in the ECU School of Medicine and was a clinician in the ECU Developmental Evaluation Clinic.

DR. MELVIN JOHN WILLIAMS of Greenville died Nov. 1. He was a former chair and founder of the graduate and undergraduate programs of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology.

Arrrrrgh!

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Upon the Past

“We are not here to destroy the old and accept only the new, but to build upon the past…”—Robert H. Wright, Nov. 12, 1909

From his inaugural address and installation as East Carolina’s first president.

Students in charge of the various sections of the 1954 edition of the Buccaneer gather around Co-editor Mildred Reynolds to check page layouts. Student editors of that edition of the yearbook included Jane Kanoy, Susie Marshall, Betty McGowan, Shirley Manning, Mary Packer, Jean Davenport, Ann Siler, Tommie Lupton, Mona Toler, Justus McKeel, Elsie Harrelson, Jessie Ann Rice, Lannie Crocher, Hattie Wilson and Barbara Moore. Source: ECU Archives

buccaneer

F

ifteen years after changing tastes led to its demise, the Buccaneer yearbook will return this fall with students again at the helm.

“The staff is lined up and it’s just a matter of getting to work,” says Ken Robol, faculty adviser and director of student engagement.

Work will wrap up in April or May, with about 2,000 copies ­printed.

The yearbook will cost about $30 to $40.

The 2006 edition will offer a look at campus life, focusing on ­seniors, sports, fraternities and sororities. It also will review changes of the past 10 years or so to recap innovations, new buildings and construction, says Genevia Windley Hill, assistant director of student engagement. “This first edition will mesh the old and new,” she says.

“We hope to have lots of photographs showing what has happened since the last yearbook was published.”

48

sails

again

A survey about two years ago showed students wanted to bring back the yearbook. That, coupled with more demand for magazinestyle projects, led the Student Media Board to revive the Buccaneer.

Students working on the yearbook will gain practical experience in publishing and earn about $4.20 an hour for their work.

The Buccaneer last appeared in 1990 after several years of declining student interest. The first yearbook was published in 1923 by East Carolina Teachers College and was called the Tecoan—short for “teachers college annual.” By 1953 the institution was known as East Carolina College and the yearbook was renamed the Buccaneer, ­reflecting its Pirate mascot.

—Marion Blackburn

ECU Gallery

A stand of loblolly pines protects a slumbering tobacco barn resting beneath a soft winter sky along a stretch of rural road near Pactolus, N.C. Photo by Forrest Croce

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