MYRA JANCO DANIELS

Myra Janco Daniels, who died in June at age 96, graduated in 1948 from what is now Indiana State University.

She blazed a trail for female executives in advertising and became a benefactor for the arts, building and running a $20-million arts center in Naples, Florida, after retiring.

She was a top executive of a Chicago ad agency in the 1960s, managing men at a time when that was unusual. An advertising star named Draper Daniels purchased the agency. He was part of the inspiration for Don Draper’s character in the television series “Mad Men” and creator of advertising icons such as the Marlboro Man.

Draper made Janco president and CEO. After about two years, in 1967, they were married. They stayed married until Daniels’ death in 1983.

After she and her husband moved to Florida, Janco Daniels started from scratch and built the Artis-Naples arts center, a venue the Wall Street Journal called “a breathtakingly elegant cultural showcase.”

Janco Daniels’ obituary in the Wall Street Journal told the story of how she worked for Meis Brothers department store in Terre Haute while in college. She had a fulltime job for the company and was eventually head of advertising while also working on her degree.

One of her successful ads described new cotton dresses as “cool as lemonade.” She started her own agency in Terre Haute before teaching at Indiana University and then moving to Chicago.

Janco Daniels received ISU’s Distinguished Alumni Award in 1966.

“Myra Janco Daniels lived an extraordinary life,” ISU President Dr. Deborah J. Curtis said. “She came to Indiana State from Gary, Indiana, and through the force of her talent and determination became an example of achievement not just to women but to all Sycamores.”

FREDA LUERS IS GRAND MARSHAL OF HOMECOMING PARADE

BY DIANNE FRANCES D. POWELL

Freda Luers, whose 27-year career at Indiana State University touched countless Sycamore students, will be Grand Marshal of the Blue & White Parade on Saturday, Oct. 22, of Homecoming week.

“Freda Luers is an ISU treasure who has made such a great impact on our campus over the years,” said President Deborah J. Curtis. “We are delighted to honor her as the grand marshal of the 2022 Homecoming Parade.”

Luers, who retired in August after 42 years in higher education, said she is grateful and honored to have been selected. “I look forward to being a part of this tradition and I know firsthand the incredible number of hours and work the Student Homecoming Committee and Advisors put into planning and implementing all Homecoming week events, especially the Parade,” she said.

Kevon Christian, Associate Director of Campus Life, said Luers’ selection was in recognition of her work over the years in Student Affairs. “Part of this work included assisting with the Homecoming Parade, so it was only right that upon her retirement we honor her with being named the Parade Grand Marshal,” he said.

The parade starts at 9 a.m. at 9th and Cherry, proceeds west on Wabash and north on 5th. The Homecoming football game is at 1 p.m. at Memorial Stadium against Illinois State.

“I encourage our campus and greater Wabash Valley communities to participate or be spectators,” Luers said. “After the parade, everyone should plan to head to Memorial Stadium to watch our beloved Sycamores take on the Redbirds.”

Registered student and Greek-affiliated organizations will have tailgating west of Memorial Stadium from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturday. The ISU Alumni Association will have its tent near the main entrance to Memorial Stadium. Alumni Association members will enjoy lunch and family-friendly activities including face painting, a 360-photo booth, and glitter tattoos. A cash bar will be on site. A membership registration booth will be open for Alumni and friends during the day.

A Black Alumni Reception will take place on Saturday from 6-8 p.m. at the Charles E. Brown African American Cultural Center.

MONDAY, OCTOBER 17

11 a.m.-1 p.m. Homecoming Kickoff 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sycamore Blood Drive

TUESDAY, OCTOBER 18

11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sycamore Blood Drive 7 p.m.

Sycamore Sync (doors open at 6:30 p.m.)

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 19

11 a.m.-1 p.m. Homecoming Tye Dye/Campus Games 7:30 p.m. Blue Light Party Dede Plaza Lawn (Rain–HMSU, Dede I) HMSU, Dede II & III

HMSU, Dede II & III Hulman Center

Dede Plaza Lawn (Rain–HMSU, Dede II) Campus

THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20

7 p.m. Thursday Night Entertainment HMSU, Dede I, II & III

FRIDAY, OCTOBER 21

11 a.m.-1 p.m. Blue and White Spirit Day 12-2 p.m. Black Alumni Networking Panel

4 p.m. 7 p.m. Sycamore Tricycle Derby

NPHC Stroll Off (presale $10/at the door $15)

Dede Plaza Lawn (Rain–HMSU, Dede II) C.E.B. African American Cultural Center Simmons Student Activity Center & Rec East Track Tirey Hall, Tilson Auditorium

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 22

9 a.m.

Homecoming Blue & White Parade 10 a.m.-12 p.m. College Open Houses

11 a.m.-1 p.m. Homecoming Tailgate (free & open to all)

1 p.m. 6-8 p.m. ISU Football Game Black Alumni Event Downtown Terre Haute Various Locations on Campus Memorial Stadium Memorial Stadium C.E.B. African American Cultural Center

SUNDAY, OCTOBER 23

BY DR. LLOYD W. BENJAMIN III

One of the most prolific architectural families this past century in Terre Haute was the Miller family and no single architect did more to shape the Indiana State University we see today than Ewing Miller II.

Miller, who died in 2021, designed or contributed to the design of 31 buildings and developed a master plan for the campus from 1955 to 1973.

In 1954, two friends encouraged Miller, then 31, to settle permanently in Terre Haute, where his family of architects had earned a solid reputation. Miller was skeptical. One friend wrote to him: “Well, you ought to come back and try it one more time because Indiana State’s beginning to grow, and we really think the university is going to expand considerably.”

The campus had a limited number of buildings clustered about the quad. These included Old Main, North Hall, the Vocational building, Normal Library, Science building, Parsons, Reeve and Tirey Halls, and the Fine Arts and Commerce Building. The most recent buildings were Dreiser and Gillum Halls.

The Miller and Yeager architectural firm, having started in 1910, was firmly established in Terre Haute when Ewing II settled there. Predating Ewing joining the firm, his family was responsible for several landmark buildings in Terre Haute, including the Elks Lodge, the Federal Building (now home of the Scott College of Business), Woodrow Wilson School, and, on the ISU campus, Tirey Hall and the Arts and Commerce Building.

College campuses of the 19th and early 20th century were conservators of historical styles such as the Romanesque, Neo Gothic, Neoclassical, and Tudor, etc. At the Normal School, the first name for ISU, a classical style was adopted for Normal Library — a building elevated on a base with appropriate classical elements (columns, pediments, etc.) and an interior stained glass dome with a figure of Philosophy in the center drawn from Raphael’s representation of the same subject in the Vatican Apartments in Rome. It suggested a noble grandeur associated with antiquity, the liberal arts, and connection with other elite universities in larger cities.

Adjacent to the campus, Fairbanks Library was built in a similar style. By contrast, at Indiana University, the Student Services Building and Maxwell Hall were done in Gothic and Romanesque Revival styles.

Gillum (left) and Dreiser (right) Halls

Normal (Library) Hall (left) and Fine Arts and Commerce Building (right)

Prior to Ewing Miller’s campus designs, all of the buildings, with the exception of Dreiser and Gillum Halls, were constructed in revival styles. Ralph Yeager Jr., Miller’s professional partner, was a graduate of the University of Illinois where early interest in a modern idiom of building was practiced. President Tirey favored his work and the commissions for Gillum and Dreiser grew out of that relationship. What, one might ask, was modern about these two buildings located on the quad that differed noticeably from the other nearby buildings that were done in revival styles? The modern elements Miller pointed to were the glass blocks incorporated in the façades used for illuminating the stairways and the small portecocheres that off-set the starkness of the brick boxes. Miller referred to the style derogatorily as “Mussolini Modern.”

A brief discussion of several of his buildings that exemplify the modernism Miller introduced on campus follows:

Burford, Erickson and Pickerl Halls

The growth in the number of students necessitated the expansion of campus housing and the Miller firm designed Burford, Erickson, and Pickerl Hall. All three buildings were 6 stories high, built in an L-shape and shared common dining facilities. Miller once remarked that the profit margin from dormitory design and construction didn’t favor stylistic innovation. To distinguish Burford from costsensitive public housing he inserted glazed tile on the building surface under the windows—a feature he had seen in England.

Sycamore Towers (Blumberg, Cromwell, Mills and Rhoads Halls)

Sycamore Towers were conceived as an integrated group of high-rise buildings that were completed in the mid-1960s. Enrollment growth necessitated additional housing for women and, eventually, men shortly after Burford, Erickson and Pickerl Halls had been completed.

Building high-rise housing represented a new development in campus architecture. The twelve story Towers doubled in height the previous three dormitories. Miller explained that the decision to go higher was influenced, in part, by the cost of land. But the overarching influence, he stated, was the desire of the trustees to have iconic tall buildings visible at a distance that would signify ISU was a modern urban campus in contrast to housing at IU and Purdue.

Cunningham Library

Cunningham Library was dedicated in 1974. It was a boldly modern statement, one which pleased Miller, who said, “…the library is the best building we did…” He described it as a “formalist building” with its concrete exterior (a modern international feature) noting its minimalist classic simplicity.

“(Former ISU President) Alan Rankin also felt that the library was the statement of the University,” Miller said. “We wanted a building where the mass and the breadth of the building carried it as an important building and you get that best by being more formalist.”

Ewing Miller (continued)

Enrollment growth had driven the need for a much larger library to replace the older Normal Hall which could only accommodate about 4% of the student body while the new library was designed to meet the needs of 25% of the student population at any given time. Miller, I believe, saw the building as a sculptural object that deserved to be seen from the front and sides in a park-like setting. Miller had intended for the covered walkway in front of the building to continue south past Holmstedt Hall to connect with the quad but street closure issues intervened.

Rankin Hall (Link Building)

Rankin Hall was dedicated in 1972. This was the last major “modernist” architectural statement on campus. It was named the Link Building because it joined the Elks Building to the south with the Tirey Hall facilities to the north.

Miller thought of it as a monumental gateway to the quadrangle off 7th Street. The circular design and unadorned exterior limestone slab walls continued his interest in formal monumentality.

Miller had the rare honor of being elected as a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects and was the recipient of numerous distinguished awards including the Indiana American Institute of Architects President’s Award 2008 and the first Indiana AIA Gold Medal in 2013 for his exemplary practice as architect and designer. For his military service he received the Purple Heart and Prisoner of War Medals.

His wife, Donna Barnard Ari, described him lovingly: “Always a gentleman, Ewing endeared family, friends, and strangers with the twinkle in his eye, his humor, wisdom, steadfastness, intellect, warmth and bow ties.”

Dr. Lloyd W. Benjamin III served as Indiana State University’s tenth President from 2000-2008.

On behalf of his family, Bud Perry (center), accepts the Max and Jackie Gibson Award from Indiana State University President Dr. Deborah J. Curtis (right) and Director of Athletics Sherard Clinkscales (left) at the second annual Tried & True Gala.

Indiana State Athletics honored The Oakley Foundation and Bud & Annie Perry at the second annual Tried & True Gala for their decades of support for Indiana State University and the Terre Haute community.

A crowd of 200-plus turned out on August 5 at Hulman Center for the event as The Oakley Foundation and the Perrys were honored with the Max and Jackie Gibson Award. The award recognizes an athletic supporter who has made a significant and lasting impact on Sycamore Athletics through special service or major philanthropic giving. The honor is the highest recognition given to donors or friends of the program. “Bud and Annie Perry exemplify the true Sycamore Spirit of philanthropy and generosity,” ISU President Dr. Deborah J. Curtis said. “This event gave us the opportunity to lift up two very humble people and thank them for their kindness and altruism.”

The evening included a video tribute to the Foundation and the Perry family with speakers including Indiana State Senator Jon Ford and former chair of the ISU Board of Trustees Mike Alley.

“When I think about Bud and Annie, and the Oakley Foundation, it’s really all about what servants they are to our community,” Ford said. “They really help so many people in a wide range of areas and have really done it quietly.”

Said Alley: “When I heard that the Perrys were receiving this award, I was so excited. It’s remarkable the impact they have had on the Wabash Valley. They have certainly helped ISU in a number of ways, but that assistance and the leadership (extends) to the Children’s Museum, to Ivy Tech, to Rose-Hulman, to their support of Riverscape. Bud and Annie are right there supporting it and you have the Oakley Foundation that is bringing forth that support as well. It has really impacted ISU and Terre Haute in a great way.”

In his closing remarks, Bud Perry said he was “overcome” by the honor.

“We don’t expect to be singled out as givers to the university,” he said. “There are so many good people that are helping the university out. We’re delighted. Annie and I are both happy for ourselves and for the university that we could help out.”

ISU Director of Athletics Sherard Clinkscales said numerous people made the event a success.

“I am grateful for another strong turnout to honor the Oakley Foundation and Bud & Annie Perry as we get ready to kick off another athletic season,” Clinkscales said. “I want to thank our title sponsor, Dorsett Automotive, and all of our sponsors and attendees for their support in this event. Our athletics staff, along with our campus partners Sodexo and Hulman Center, put on a tremendous event this year and I look forward to continuing this tradition for years to come.”