Summer 2013
FROM THE PRESIDENT “You have been an intellectual oasis in Mississippi for a long time and have provided an inspiration to many of us. We are indebted to you: the students, faculty, and alumni of Millsaps College.” – Former Mississippi Gov. William Winter at November 30, 2012 event “Celebrating Education Reform: Thirty Years Later”
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Rob and Phoebe Pearigen with a Midtown youngster at this year’s annual Midtown Millsaps Block Party.
overnor Winter is right. Millsaps has been, and continues to be, an intellectual oasis. We are pleased to be a place where the academic culture is defined by rigorous and open-minded inquiry and where ethical reflection informs intellectual and professional pursuits. Being an oasis does not mean, however, that we seek to separate ourselves from the world beyond our gates. Those of you close to the College know that Millsaps takes community engagement seriously. Our new strategic plan, Across the Street and Around the Globe: Partnerships and Influence at Millsaps College, builds on our location in the heart of Mississippi’s capital city and the College’s historical focus on freedom of thought, social justice, and reflection on life’s most important questions. As you will see in this issue of the Millsaps Magazine, our legacy challenges us not only to send our students into the community to learn, to engage, and to serve but also to develop opportunities here on campus—to be a modern-day public square— where students, local citizens, community leaders, and others can
reflect collectively. Governor Winter also rightly noted that Millsaps’ reputation is not the product of a single person or group, but is the result of countless students, faculty, alumni—and, I’d like to add, staff, trustees, and other friends of the college. In this issue, you will read about members of the Millsaps community who have pursued excellence in their personal and professional lives and who embody the sort of engaged citizenship that Millsaps celebrates and seeks to cultivate in her students. In addition to stories of community engagement and partnerships in Jackson, these are a few of the other items included in this edition of the Magazine: • A rising senior who will be studying sub-atomic physics in Amsterdam this summer because of a prestigious National Science Foundation fellowship; • A 2013 graduate who is moving to New York City to pursue a master’s degree in voice at Juilliard; • Recent graduates who have decided to become physicians in under-served rural areas of Mississippi; • Alumni attorneys who have recently received the Mississippi Bar’s Lifetime Achievement Award, the highest honor given by the Bar; • Faculty who have organized workshops sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities that commemorate the 50th anniversary of the assassination of Medgar Evers; • Spring sports successes, including our baseball team that was one of eight teams in the nation to play in the College World Series. Reading this magazine will, I hope, remind you not only what Millsaps has meant to you and our community but also reveal something of what Millsaps’ mission is moving forward.
MILLSAPS Magazine
Executive Editor Kenneth Townsend* Special Assistant to the President
FEATURES
Design Kelley Matthews Publications Manager Nell Luter Floyd Contributing Editors Jason Bronson*, Naomi Freeman, Dan Griffin, Lucy Molinaro*, and Sophie McNeil Wolf Student Assistants Katie Greer and Allie Jordan Contributing Photographers Greg Campbell, Allie Jordan, and Sophie McNeil Wolf Executive Staff Dr. Robert W. Pearigen, President Dr. S. Keith Dunn, Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Dean of the College Dr. Robert Alexander, Vice President of Enrollment and Marketing Louise Burney*, Vice President for Finance Terri Hudson, Vice President for Institutional Planning and Assesment Michael V. Hutchison, Vice President for Institutional Advancement Dr. R. Brit Katz, Vice President for Student Life and Dean of Students Kenneth Townsend*, Special Assistant to the President Board of Trustees J. Thomas Fowlkes*, Chair; The Rev. Jerry Bostick Beam*; The Rev. Zachary C. Beasley; Paul T. Benton*; The Rev. Warren Black*; William J. Bynum; James A. Coggin; Robert H. Dunlap*; WillIam R. Flatt*; Mark R. Freeman*; Gale L. Galloway; The Rev. Elisabeth Anne Garvin*; Dr. Cristina P. Glick; William F. Goodman III*; Judge James E. Graves Jr.*; Maurice H. Hall Jr.*; Monica Sethi Harrigill*; The Rev. Heather K. Hensarling; Richard G. Hickson Jr.; William R. James; William T. Jeanes*; Peder Johnson*; Earle F. Jones; The Rev. W. Geoffrey Joyner*; Charles R. Lathem*; R. Eason Leake*; Robert N. Leggett Jr.*; John L. Lindsey; J. Con Maloney Jr.*; Jean N. Medley*; Vaughan W. McRae; Richard D. McRae; Michael T. McRee; Richard H. Mills Jr.*; Dr. Don Q. Mitchell*; P. Cooper Morrison*; Robert R. Morrison Jr.; Robert W. Pittman*; Donna Ruth Else Roberts; Dr. Robert C. Robbins*; E. B. Robinson Jr.; Nat S. Rogers*; Mary Todd Sanders*; The Rev. J. Joseph Shelton*; Steven W. Smith*; Mike P. Sturdivant Jr.*; Bishop James E. Sawnson Sr.; Rowan H. Taylor; J. Murray Underwood*; J. Mack Varner*; John C. Vaughey; Ruth W. Watson*; Leila C. Wynn; William G. Yates III
*Denotes Millsaps Alumni Millsaps Magazine is published by Millsaps College, 1701 North State Street, Jackson, MS 39210, for distribution to alumni, parents of students, and friends of the College. For the online magazine, visit www.millsaps.edu/magazine.
32 Four Lawyers
The Mississippi Bar recognizes Millsaps graduates who are pillars of the legal profession.
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Community Partners
Community Engagement
Educational opportunities extend beyond our classrooms.
Programs and events reflect a commitment to our local community.
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SPORTS
BEYOND CAMPUS
ALUMNI
10 Research 12 Creative Endeavors 15 Myrlie Evers
21 Rural Physicians 24 Juilliard Scholarship
FACULTY & STAFF
46 College World Series 49 Golf Accomplishments 51 Basketball Players Give Back
52 Meet Alums 72 Class Notes 77 In Memoriam
28 New Chaplain 31 Else Executive-in-Residence
On the cover: Jayson Porter, B.A. 2013, and a Brown Elementary student enjoyed the festivities at the 2013 Midtown Millsaps Block Party.
COMMENCEMENT COMMENCEMENT
Student excellence was the theme of our Commencement.
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wo-hundred-seven students received undergraduate degrees and 50 students received graduate degrees from Millsaps College during the 119th Commencement on May 11 at Christ United Methodist Church in Jackson. Rain prompted a move from the traditional location of the Bowl, but oversized screens featured an image of the beloved green space in the spring. Continuing a tradition that began in 2011,Taylor Brittany Scyster of Destrehan, La., recipient of the Founders’ Medal, delivered the commencement address. The Founders’ Medal is awarded to the graduating senior with the highest grade point average and an excellent on comprehensive examinations. During her address, Scyster reminisced about mo-
ments members of the Class of 2013 shared during their years at Millsaps and read the poem, “If I had My Life to Live Over Again,” by 85-year-old Nadine Stair, who penned the verse after someone asked how she would have lived her life differently if she had the chance. “What I have taken away from her words is a personal challenge to live a life full of moments as I begin my own life after college, a challenge not to become so fixated on our next steps, whether it is starting a career or attending graduate school, that we do not allow ourselves to have moments…We must not remain stuck in our past but must allow ourselves to have new moments in order to succeed in this next phase of life,” Scyster said. “Here’s to having a life full of moments. Congratulations Class of 2013!” Also during the ceremony, Victoria Amanda Wheeler of Carrollton, the recipient of the Frank and Rachel Anne Laney Award, read a portion of her award-winning essay that reflected upon the value of
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a Millsaps liberal arts education. Wheeler related in her essay the connections between a study abroad trip to the Galapagos Islands, an English class in which she tutored Sudanese refugees, and other experiences at Millsaps. James Russell Morrison of Vicksburg, recognized as the Outstanding M.B.A. graduate, spoke on behalf of graduate students from the Else School of Management. He challenged graduates to do things that scare them for the opportunity to reach beyond their comfort zone, to develop strong relationships, to find a mission and support it with their gifts and talents, and to be life-long learners. Millsaps Professor of Art Sandra Murchison, whose latest series of work responds to the historical markers along the Blues Trail in the Miss. Delta, received the Distinguished Professor Award. The award recognizes faculty members who inspire students through their excellence as teachers and whose writing, research, and artistic accomplishments are of the highest quality and serve to enhance their teaching and their students’ learning. Chelsey Lynn Overstreet of Oxford was named the recipi-
ent of the Don Fortenberry Award, which recognizes the graduating senior who has demonstrated the most notable, meritorious, diligent, and devoted service to the College with no expectation of recognition, reward, or public remembrance. Katherine Lynn Wilson of Diamondhead was recognized as a finalist for the Fortenberry Award. The College conferred honorary doctorate degrees on three individuals for their accomplishments and service to their communities: Dr. Aaron Shirley, a long-time physician and civil rights activist; the Rev. R. Edwin King, a retired Methodist minister and civil rights activist; and Seetha Srinivasan, director emerita of University Press of Mississippi. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD
Millsaps Magazine | Summer 2013
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Honorary degree recipients embody engaged citizenship that Millsaps celebrates.
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illsaps awarded honorary degrees to the Rev. R. Edwin King, Dr. Aaron Shirley, and Seetha Srinivasan during the 119th Commencement ceremony on May 11. While each honoree has excelled in different fields, all three have strong ties to Jackson, and all have embodied the engaged citizenship that Millsaps celebrates and nutures in its students. A 1958 graduate of Millsaps College, King has dedicated his adult life to promoting civil rights. A man of thought and action, King has endured prison, beatings, and death threats because of his work. A legend of the civil rights movement, King worked closely with the movement’s most wellknown figures and has played a significant role in many of the movement’s most iconic moments: his eulogy for the three civil rights workers slain outside Philadelphia, Miss., channeled forgiveness even while denouncing the evils of racism; the images cap-
turing his efforts to integrate the Woolworth’s lunch counter in Jackson captivated a nation, revealing the personal suffering produced by segregation; and his founding of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party guaranteed a voice of conscience to a nation at war abroad and riven by social conflict at home. King has received numerous awards that include the John F. Kennedy Freedom Award, the United Methodist Church of Mississippi Conference Award, the Mississippi Religious Leadership Conference Founders Award, and the Freedom Award given by the National Civil Rights Museum. He has also been recognized by the Catholic Council of Civil Liberties and by Harvard Divinity School as a Merrill Fellow. He was the Boston University School of Theology Alumnus of the Year in 2010 and the Millsaps College Alumnus of the Year in 2011. The Reverend Ed King Leader of Values and Ethics Award at Millsaps is given in his honor to undergraduates who have shown extraordinary commitment to social justice. Born in Gluckstadt and raised in Jackson, Shirley has spent his professional life working to improve access to quality healthcare in his home state. A product of the segregated South and for many years Mississippi’s only black pediatrician, Shirley under-
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The Rev. R. Edwin King
Dr. Aaron Shirley
stands problems of racism, poverty, and healthcare disparities more personally and more directly than most. During the 1970s, Shirley was active in the development and organization of numerous service agencies and projects, including Mississippi Action for Progress, the Mississippi Association of Community Health Care for the Poor, and the Jackson-Hinds Comprehensive Health Center. In partnership with the Milton S. Eisenhower Foundation, he established a clinic at Lanier High School in Jackson that became a national model for health and counseling services for teens. Shirley is widely admired for his pragmatic idealism, his tireless determination, and his ability to see opportunity when others despair. Shirley developed and implemented a vision for the Jackson Medical Mall, a ground-breaking, communitybased venture that not only provides health services to underserved populations in Jackson but also has created jobs and helped sustain an historic Jackson neighborhood. His muchcelebrated current work adapting Iranian models of rural healthcare for use in Mississippi reflects Shirley’s understanding that local problems often require creative and, at times, unorthodox insights from around the globe. A native of Bangalore, India, and a resident of Jackson since 1969, Srinivasan is a model global citizen. Since moving to Jackson, Srinivasan has been deeply committed to the city, even while maintaining—and sharing generously with
Seetha Srinivasan
others—valued elements of her Indian culture and heritage. Her warm smile, soft voice, and a spirit that has been characterized as “emanating sweetness and light” make Srinivasan a truly beloved figure in the local community and beyond. Chief among Srinivasan’s many civic and professional accomplishments was her leadership in bringing the University Press of Mississippi from relative obscurity to a nationally recognized press. As director, Srinivasan selected and edited scholarly pieces while also developing for publication general interest works from authors and artists including Stephen Ambrose, Eudora Welty, and Toni Morrison. Srinivasan has been a guest lecturer on Hinduism for the Department of Religious Studies at Millsaps College, and has worked with Millsaps faculty on a series of lectures on Indian culture and religion, a project that has fostered relationships between Millsaps and the Indian community in Jackson. Among the awards Srinivasan has received are the Jim Livesay Service Award from Millsaps College (1998), the Constituency Award for service to the university press community from the Association of American University Presses (2002), and the Publisher’s Award from the Toni Morrison Society (2008). BY KENNETH TOWNSEND
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MEET A STUDENT
Austin Deskewies, of Olive Branch,
majored in biology and embraced life to the fullest at Millsaps. He graduated in May and plans to attend graduate school to study biology or chemistry.
Q: What activities have you been involved with at Millsaps? A: I have worked as a residence hall director and on the Inter-Fraternal Council as co-chair of the Greek Life Conduct Board. I served as vice president of Pi Kappa Alpha and participated in the Millsaps Singers, theatrical productions, and the Major Melodies show choir. I completed my honors thesis in biology dealing with linker histones and leukemia cancer cells under the direction of Dr. Naila Mamoon, Dr. Wolfgang Kramer, and Dr. Sarah Lea Anglin. I’ve taken part in tarantula field research with Dr. Brent Hendrixson. I was a Ford Teaching Fellow for the introduction to cell biology class taught by Dr Mamoon.
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Q: You received a scholarship from the Order of Omega, a leadership honorary for members of Greek organizations. Your award pushed the organization over the one million dollar mark for scholarships. What was that like? A: I submitted the application hoping to just receive a response. I was a bit overwhelmed when Dean Brit Katz informed me I would receive a scholarship. I used it to pay for GRE examinations and graduate school applications. (Millsaps also received $1,000 from Order of Omega.) Q: What at Millsaps has made the biggest impact on you? A: Millsaps, as a community and academic establishment, has taught me not to attempt to be better than everyone else necessarily, but to become better than myself. My extracurricular and academic opportunities have put me in a position, personally and professionally, to chase that which my convictions lead me to attempt and to go for the goal, regardless of what the odds may be.
ON CAMPUS
MEET A PROFESSOR
Dr. Wolfgang H. Kramer, an
associate professor of chemistry and biochemistry and currently the director of the Honors Program, has been a member of the Millsaps faculty since fall 2003. After earning his M.S. and Ph.D. from the University of Cologne in Germany, he spent almost three years at Arizona State University as a post-doc. His main teaching focus is Biochemistry I and II. He has also taught General Chemistry, Organic Chemistry, Organic Spectral Analysis, Senior Seminar, and Advanced Organic Chemistry. Q: What do you like about chemistry? A: Chemistry explains a lot of everyday principles in simple terms, such as: Why do oil drops form when suspended in water? How do simple organic reactions in metabolism provide energy so we can move? Asking “why” in chemistry can lead you to an answer that is satisfying and can be made understandable on a qualitative level. Then you can go back and get a quantitative answer.
Q: What attracted you to Millsaps? A: I had been looking for a college or university where I could work closely with students on projects in research laboratories, extending the classroom learning experience. I was also hoping for a residential campus, as commuter colleges just don’t have the same atmosphere. Q: What do you enjoy about teaching at Millsaps? A: Because we are a small campus, students involve professors in what they learn in other classes, and we regularly have discussions about those topics. Learning from colleagues and students and seeing them learn is fascinating. Q: What are your interests outside of teaching and research? A: I grow tropical plants, read, run, and like all kinds of sports. For exercise, I ride my bicycle to campus, trying to take different, longer routes to cover extra miles. It’s my little workout in the mornings and evenings. I closely follow the Millsaps track team and the baseball team, and I have been traveling with them to away events.
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ON CAMPUS
ON CAMPUS Campus Visitors: Scholars,
authors, and musicians were among visitors on campus during the spring semester.
The Millsaps Arts & Lecture Series hosted a discussion by Jeff Seabold, a local architect, and Todd Sanders, an architectural historian for the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, in January. They spoke about the historic architecture of Jackson and how city planning is impacted by current movements of sustainability and smart growth.
Dr. Tamar Gendler
The Millsaps Visiting Writers Series presented in February Robert Olen Butler, dubbed by one critic as the “best living American writer,” and Tyrone Jaeger, assistant professor of English/creative writing at Hendrix College, along with writers Alan Michael Parker and Sheryl St. Germain. Dr. Tamar Gendler, professor of philosophy at Yale University, presented the annual Dunbar Lecture in Philosophy, given in honor of Dr. Robert Bergmark in March. She spoke about “The Costs of Unintentional Racial Bias”. Using empirical studies from moral psychology, Gendler examined the unacknowledged evaluations human brains make about people from other racial backgrounds. She also considered the costs of these assessments, which happen almost automatically and which often disagree with what one consciously believes. Three actors from Stanford University, Courtney Walsh, Angela Farr Schiller, and Rush Rehm, presented staged readings of three Eudora Welty stories in March. The program was presented by the Eudora Welty Foundation and the College. Printmaker and performance artist Kara Dunne displayed her work in April at the Lewis Art Gallery. Dunne, an installation artist from Providence, R.I., gave a gallery talk and also conducted a performance workshop in March.
Dr. Nicholas Buccola
Public management students brought Dr. Nicholas Buccola, assistant professor at Linfield College, in April to speak about his book, The Political Thought of Frederick Douglass: In Pursuit of American Liberty, and to be in a panel discussion. Dr. John Kaltner, professor of Muslim-Christian relations at Rhodes College in Memphis, spoke about “Biblical Characters in the Qur’an,” in April. He appeared as part of the annual Summers Lecture, which is endowed by a gift from the Rev. Lemuel C. Summers and the Reiff-Lewis Endowment Fund. The Arts & Lecture Series hosted gardening expert Felder Rushing and Robin Mather, a former Clarion-Ledger food editor who is now senior associate editor at Mother Earth News, in April. They discussed the topic, “You Say You Want a (Food) Revolution?”
108 www.millsaps.edu www.millsaps.edu Felder Rushing and Robin Mather
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Syllabus: Innovation class combines lessons in creativity with revitalization efforts.
Dr. Penelope Prenshaw believes innovation and creativity are key to business, and she proves it in her Entrepreneurship 3010: Innovation class. The class is required as part of the entrepreneurship concentration, though many students take it as an elective because they are interested in the combination of creativity and business. Broken into two sections, the class emphasizes reading and theory and requires a development project. “In the last two years, we have had a significant social entrepreneurship component that has been focused on the Midtown neighborhood. Last year the class focused specifically on revitalization efforts in Midtown and how we could support those development efforts,” said Prenshaw, professor of marketing. Students meet twice a week, initially reading and discussing creativity and how creativity supports the innovation process. The second half of the class includes the application of the readings and discussions about creativity and the development of a concept for a project. This year, students in the class worked on a real estate development plan that focused on the northeast corner of campus, which was formerly occupied by a Texaco service station, and West Street, which runs in front of Murrah Hall where the Else School of Management is housed. “This project is focusing more on commercialization along West Street and the northeast corner of campus,” said Prenshaw. “Whatever happens at the northeast corner of campus will likely need to appeal to students. Students know the campus, what it’s missing, and what they’d like to see.” The class of 17 students took walking tours of the area and many were surprised by what they discovered. “We did it all in about 40 minutes and they couldn’t believe it. I also wanted them to see some significant development in Midtown along Millsaps Avenue off West Street. They were so surprised to see Murrah Hall right down the block,” said Prenshaw. The final project for the course is a presentation of concepts for development of the area with graphical displays, mock-ups, and 3-D models. BY SOPHIE McNEIL WOLF
PROFESSOR: Dr. Penelope Prenshaw is a professor of marketing at Millsaps College. She holds a B.B.A. and an M.B.A. in marketing from the University of Southern Mississippi and a Ph.D. in marketing, with a minor in social psychology from the University of Houston. A member of the faculty at Millsaps College since 1994, Prenshaw currently serves as the director of the Business Administration Program and on the ELSEWorks Entrepreneurship Team. She has held the Selby and Richard D. McRae Chair of Business Administration, and has served as director of the International Business Program and as director of the M.B.A. Program. Prenshaw has consulted with various clients in the areas of innovation strategy, branding strategy, market entry, and professional sales training. Before her academic career, Prenshaw worked as an account representative for Nestle Company and MicroAge Computers. Prenshaw teaches Principles of Marketing, Innovation, Buyer Behavior, and the Entrepreneurship Practicum at Millsaps. She has been published in many academic journals. She is a member of the American Marketing Association and the Academy of Business Education. PREREQUISITES Marketing 3000: Principles of Marketing READINGS Various assigned readings
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RESEARCH
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ON CAMPUS
A physics/mathematics major is selected for prestigious research program in Amsterdam.
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ichael Bell, a Millsaps senior majoring in physics and mathematics, will spend his summer working with some of the finest theoretical physicists in the world at The National Institute for Sub-atomic Physics in Amsterdam. He was chosen to participate in a prestigious National Science Foundation International Research Experience for Undergraduates during the summer of 2013. The Research Experiences for Undergraduates program supports participation by undergraduate students in areas of research funded by the National Science Foundation. Bell, who is from Luling, La., submitted his application for the University of Florida’s International Research Experience for Undergraduates last December. “Roughly two and a half months after submitting the application to the University of Florida, I was asked to interview via Skype,” said Bell. “Within 24 hours I had completed the interview and within 48 hours I was sent a congratulatory e-mail offering me the position to study in Amsterdam. I was beside myself!” Participation in the program includes a $4,800 stipend, travel health insurance, and an allowance for round-trip travel from the University of Florida in Gainesville to the host institution in Amsterdam. Bell will work on a project entitled “Analyzing Neutron Stars with Advanced Gravitational Wave Detectors.” Using Einstein’s Theory of General Relativity, he will theoretically model subtle effects, propagating across vast expanses of space and time, that arise from the remains of massive stars after they have suffered a rapid collapse and violent explosion known as a supernova. Bell said he looks forward to applying the mathematical techniques he has learned to theoretical research in gravitational physics. “I feel privileged to have earned the opportunity to work alongside experts in the field as an undergraduate and look forward to graduate study in
physical cosmology. Beyond research I’m excited to check traveling to and around Europe off my bucket list. I intend to visit a number of historic cities and travel to CERN to observe the Large Hadron Collider if possible.” Bell is independently studying general relativity with Dr. Shadow Robinson, associate professor of physics at Millsaps. To prepare for the summer, Bell has been asked to study new mathematical material such as Fourier analysis and Bayesian statistics, as well as learn a number of scientific programming languages including MATLAB, C, and Python. Robinson, who is chair of the Physics Department at Millsaps, said he encourages students to find opportunities outside of the campus. “This is a
” remarkable opportunity for Michael,” he said. “The physics he will be researching is related to material we covered in several courses,” Robinson said. “In particular it is discussed briefly in my non-majors course Introductory Astronomy and again more mathematically in my junior and senior astrophysics course. Michael has taken both courses. Michael and I also did an independent study course on tensors last semester, which is the mathematical prerequisite for studying Einstein’s theory of General Relativity.” Bell is a member of Omicron Delta Kappa, Phi Mu Epsilon, the Physics Club, the Math Club, and the Millsaps International Buddy System. He is a residence hall director, mathematics tutor, and physics tutor. He served as second vice president for the Student Body Association in 2012 and was an Honor Council member in 2011. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD
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ON CAMPUS CREATIVE ENDEAVORS
Kirsten, or Broken Winged by Suzanne Glémot
Student’s work receives Award of Excellence in Mississippi Collegiate Art Competition. w
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uzanne Glémot pushed the boundaries of printmaking to communicate psychological-based content in her work, Kirsten, or Broken Winged. “Being able to create an image that is both beautiful in its simplicity and unsettling in subtle ways was very significant to my artistic process,” said Glémot, a May graduate. Glémot’s efforts earned a Juror’s Award of Excellence at the 2013 Mississippi Collegiate Art Competition, which attracted 1,052 entries from 10 of Mississippi’s four-year colleges and universities. Juror Sarah Marshall, professor of art at the University of Alabama, selected 188 works—including Glémot’s print and art by Millsaps student Claire Aime—for exhibit at the Mississippi Arts Center in Jackson. Born in Paris, Glémot has lived abroad for most of her life, an experience she draws upon while creating works that comment on the universal human condition and the dichotomy between the diversity of cultures and human emotional unity. A studio art major and museum studies minor, Glémot considers art an integral way to experience life. “I
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love that art allows me to take in, think about, re-work, and ideally re-shape all and any parts of the world that I experience. I love the challenge of always trying to better communicate my meaning and intentions using a visual language that I construct for myself and others.” She has shared her knowledge of art history with youngsters at the Mississippi Children’s Museum during the “Meet Matisse” workshop she taught. Participants used paper shapes and glue to produce art just as Henri Matisse did. Glémot said she selected Millsaps because of its close student-faculty relationships. Also, the College’s friendly atmosphere was important because she was moving a long way from home in order to attend college, Glémot said. Glémot’s father, Pierre, is a 1988 graduate of Millsaps, and her mother Mary is an alumna of the College. She has worked as a Ford Teaching Fellow and chaired the Honor Council. She was a member of Delta Delta Delta sorority and president of Kappa Pi, the international honorary art fraternity. Glémot plans to pursue a Master of Fine Arts in painting. “Ultimately, I want to teach studio art at the collegiate level, which would allow me to stay in the world of academia, while also producing art of my own design…in my eyes, the best of both worlds.” In July Glémot will begin working as an admissions counselor at Millsaps. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD
ON CAMPUS
Newsworthy Notes: Salute the spirit of the College,
and read this news.
Else Ranking The most recent issue of CEO Magazine has ranked the Else School of Management at Millsaps College in its top tier of North American M.B.A. programs. The Else School is the only Mississippi business school listed in the top tier, which includes 20 programs. Developed by the International Graduate Forum for CEO Magazine, the rankings are based on the quality of an M.B.A. program’s in-class experience and teaching faculty. Smaller class sizes, student work experience, international diversity within the classroom, faculty-to-student ratios and faculty qualifications, both academic and professional, are important in the rankings. Also included in the most recent issue of CEO Magazine is the article, “Teaching Future Business Leaders to Become Great Thinkers,” which is an interview with Dr. Kim Burke, dean of the Else School. She emphasizes that the Else School graduate programs focus on the development of each student, stress rigorous critical thinking and communication skills, and connect students to the business community. Shelley Brown Floyd, director of strategic planning for Brown Bottling Group, provides her perspective as a current M.B.A. student in a sidebar article. She commented: “The student-to-teacher ratio is very low, which allows an increased amount of interaction, and every one of my professors had a career in the business world before becoming a professor. This puts a new dimension in the curriculum.” Ryan Cole, senior vice president of sales and marketing at Trilogy Communications Inc., also provides an alumnus perspective in a sidebar article. “The MBA program at Millsaps has had a significant impact on my career. The knowledge gained from the program has allowed me to help build a better company by making smarter decisions,” Cole commented. The Else School of Management is one of the only AACSB-International accredited business schools in the nation to be located at a liberal arts college with a Phi Beta Kappa chapter.
Pulitzer Prize winner Former Newsweek editor and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Jon Meacham signed copies of his most recent work The Art of Power, a biography of Thomas Jefferson, at Lemuria Books on Dec. 11, 2012. After the book-signing, Meacham spoke to a group of friends and supporters of Millsaps at the home of Nora Frances and Vaughan McRae. In his comments to the crowd, Meacham celebrated Millsaps’ strong liberal arts legacy, connecting it with both Jefferson’s theory of education and the present-day role of the liberal arts. Below is an excerpt of Meacham’s comments: The liberal arts are needed as much now as ever before. Today’s world requires leaders— whether in politics, business, medicine, or the arts—who can find the connections between things not obviously connected. Helping make such connections is a key quality of a liberal arts education. Thomas Jefferson understood especially well that the life of politics could not be separated from the life of the mind. He recognized that his own Enlightenment project depended upon a particular type of education. A liberal education, for Jefferson, was the best way to combine reason with reflection, the best way to ensure inquiry is informed by integrity. This is exactly what a liberal arts education—what a Millsaps education—provides at its best. By incorporating service and self-reflection into the academic program, both liberal arts and service benefit. Its urban environment, diversity of people, and abundance of opportunities make Millsaps the envy of other liberal arts colleges. This was Meacham’s second visit to Jackson during the last three years. In October 2010 he gave a speech at the inauguration of President Robert W. Pearigen, who was the dean of men at The University of the South during Meacham’s undergraduate days at Sewanee and with whom him he has stayed in touch through the years.
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The Deans Recommend... Looking for a good book to
Dr. George Bey, associate dean for international education Professor Moriarity: The Hound of the D’Urbervilles by Kim Newman (Titan Books, 2011) This is a fun read about Sherlock Holmes’ arch-nemesis. Told by Moriarity’s “Watson,” a scoundrel named Col. Sebastian Moran, it provides the other side of the story as well as a series of cases that connect Moriarity to about every major literary figure of the period. Dr. Kimberly Gladden Burke, dean of the Else School of Management Thinking, Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2011) In this book, Kahneman expands on how we think using both our fast system—the one that operates automatically—and our slow system, the one that operates intentionally on complex issues. While we like to think that our slow, more intentional thinking defines us, Kahneman demonstrates the myriad of ways in which our fast, intuitive system and all its related biases shape our choices and decisions.
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Alfred A. Knopf
Moody Publishers
Random House
Random House
University of California Press
Little, Brown & Company
read? Check out what is on the bookshelves of our deans.
Dr. David C. Davis, associate dean for arts and humanities The Judas Field by Howard Bahr (Picador, 2007)
Dr. Brit Katz, vice president of student life and dean of students The Six Wives of Henry VIII by Lady Antonia Fraser (Phoenix, 2009)
The Judas Field, by Mississippi writer Howard Bahr, is the most moving novel I have read about the Civil War. Bahr chronicles the journey of three veterans to the scene of their last battle in Franklin, Tenn. It is all the more poignant because of the role that Major Millsaps played in this battle, one of the last and bloodiest of the war.
Following the success of the TV series, “The Tudors,” I wanted to confirm historical details of the period. Thus, I read The Six Wives of Henry VIII. The intrigues remind us that TV need not revise history for dramatic impact. The pressures placed upon the monarch, notably to procreate a male heir to the throne, provoked royal decrees that yielded a schism with Roman Catholicism, created the Church of England, and set the stage for Elizabeth I.
Dr. S. Keith Dunn, senior vice president of academic affairs and dean of the College In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson (Crown, 2011) This book is an interesting look into pre-World World War II Nazi Germany through the eyes of the inexperienced American ambassador to Germany, a history professor and expert on the old American South, and his promiscuous daughter with ties to the communist Russian intelligence agencies. It shows the personal side of some of the major players in Hitler's regime before they became truly powerful.
Dr. Tim Ward, associate dean for sciences The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest by Stieg Larsson (Vintage Books, 2010) This is the third and final installment of Swedish author and journalist Stieg Larsson’s Millennium Trilogy. Previously I suggested reading Stieg Larsson’s debut thriller The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo. Larsson’s characters are memorable and strong, and his story telling, while complex, keeps its momentum to the end. This novel is more of a thriller rather than a mystery like the first book The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, but the story of Lisbeth Salander remains intriguing.
ON CAMPUS
Myrlie Evers reflects on her husband’s death during the 2013 Rabbi Perry Nussbaum Lecture.
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ivil rights icon Myrlie Evers filled the Robert and Dee Leggett Special Events Center in the A. Boyd Campbell College Center on April 5 for the 2013 Rabbi Perry Nussbaum Lecture Series, urging students to embrace and recognize the history of social justice at Millsaps College, while remembering her past in the capital city. “Millsaps has stood tall since the very beginning of (civil rights) dialogue sessions in Mississippi,” she said. “For those of you that are students here, enjoy each and every moment and take in all the knowledge that is provided to you.” The lecture series, which is dedicated to men and women who have stood against racial bigotry and religious prejudice, was endowed by Dr. John D. Bower, a renal pioneer, in 2008 in honor of Nussbaum, rabbi at Beth Israel Congregation in Jackson from 1954 until 1974. Evers is perhaps best known as the widow of Medgar Evers, the Mississippi state field secretary for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People who in 1963 was gunned down in the driveway of his home in Jackson. She waged a painstaking battle to keep her husband’s memory and dreams alive and valiantly lobbied to bring his killer to justice. Her diligence eventually paid off when the assassin was brought to trial for a third time and finally, in 1994, was found guilty of the murder of Medgar Evers, more than 30 years after the crime. Remembering her years in Jackson, Evers reflected on her husband’s murder and the legacy he left for others after him. “The 50th anniversary of Medgar's assassination will take place on June 12. I can hardly believe it's been 50 years,” she said. “But, I look and I see changes and I realize a price had to be paid, not just by him but also by so many people to move us forward to where we are. Where we can have dialogue with each other and not be afraid that our differences will keep us from communicating.” The widow could have let anger take over after
the events of that night in 1963, but her strength and faith didn’t let her live a small life. Evers says she recognized that hatred is dangerous and destructive. The family moved from Mississippi to California to get away from the reminders of Medgar’s death, including a bullet hole in the refrigerator, and Evers knew revenge had to come in forms other than of rage. With a smile, Evers spoke about the poetic justice of learning that her husband’s killer, Byron De La Beckwith, had a jail cell window facing a post office with Medgar Evers’ name on it. “If you must get back at people, do it by love and success. Reach out to others and help them understand that hatred is a killer,” she said. Myrlie Evers continues to work closely with the Medgar Evers Institute, its name having been changed by the board of directors in 2012 to the Medgar and Myrlie Evers Institute to recognize Myrlie Evers’ own work in social justice and equal rights. She is
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spearheading the 50th Anniversary Commemoration of the Assassination of Medgar Evers in June. In January 2012, she assumed the position of distinguished scholar-in-residence at Alcorn State University in Lorman, the college where she and Medgar Evers met. She was selected by President Barack Obama to offer the invocation at his second presidential inauguration on Jan. 21, 2013, the first woman and first lay person to be so honored. In addition to Myrlie Evers, the series honored four other Nussbaum Laureates for their contributions to the civil rights movement in Mississippi and beyond. They are: • Dr. Jack Geiger, who has dedicated most of his career to the issues of health, poverty, and human rights. From 1965 until 1971, he was director of the first urban and first rural health centers in the U.S., in Boston and in the Mississippi Delta in Mound Bayou. • Dr. Alton B. Cobb, who served as Mississippi’s chief health officer from 1973-1993. During his tenure, he and his staff at the Mississippi State Department of Health enacted the nation’s most efficient way of getting
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baby formula into the hands of mothers who couldn’t afford it. Also, during that time the state had the highest immunization rates and the lowest tuberculosis rates. • The late Joshua Morse III, dean of the University of Mississippi School of Law in the 1960s. He admitted the school’s first black students, a move that led to the desegregation of Mississippi’s legal profession and judiciary. • The late Robert Quarles Marston, a leading medical educator and researcher, who became dean of the University of Mississippi School of Medicine in 1961. During his administration, the first black medical students were admitted and the first black professors were hired, which provided precedents for the peaceful racial desegregation of southern medical schools and teaching hospitals.
BY SOPHIE McNEIL WOLF
ON CAMPUS
Musical icon shares his zest for life and knowledge with Millsaps community during performances.
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omposer/musician/Renaissance man David Amram spent a week in February in residence at Millsaps, and what a week it was. He performed concerts on campus for the Arts & Lecture series and the general public, spoke during a Friday Forum, held master classes, sat in on a jazz session with local musicians, and visited classes at Brown Elementary in Jackson. Amram is known as an engaging, dynamic humanitarian whose music has bridged many cultures and causes through his active curiosity and open-hearted understanding. As a musician, he has worked with the most esteemed performers and institutions in classi-
cal, jazz, theatre, and film, while standing on the front lines of folk with legends such Woody Guthrie, Bob Dylan, and Pete Seeger. Multilingual and highly aware of indigenous American cultures, he is the quintessential modern American musician and an ambassador of culture and peace. Amram has conducted more than 75 of the world’s great orchestras, composed more than 100 orchestral and chamber music works, written two operas, and produced scores for Broadway theatre and film. Among his compositions are the scores for the films Splendor in the Grass and The Manchurian Candidate. In addition to conducting, he has performed with symphony orchestras as a soloist on instruments from all over the world, combining jazz, Latin American, Middle Eastern, Native American, and folk music alongside European classics. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD
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Best-selling author provides words of wisdom about writing and insight into her novels.
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ovelist Ann Patchett, who was named in 2012 by Time as one of the World’s 100 Most Influential People, discussed writing and publishing during her visit to Millsaps College earlier this year as the 2013 Eudora Welty Visiting Lecturer in Humanities. Patchett demonstrated her storytelling genius as she recalled, often in a humorous fashion, key moments in her career and offered practical advice for aspiring writers. In her impromptu remarks, Patchett stressed the very idea about which she had more formally written in The Getaway Car: A Practical Memoir About Writing and Life: “Art stands on the shoulders of craft, which means that to get to the art, you must master the craft. If you want to write, practice writing. Practice it for hours a day, not to come up with a story you can publish but because you long to learn how to write well, because there is something that you alone can say. Write the story, learn from it, put it away, write another story.” Patchett is the author of six novels: The New York Times bestsellers State of Wonder and Run; The Patron Saint of Liars, which was a New York Times Notable Book of the Year; Taft, which won the
Janet Heidinger Kafka Prize; The Magician’s Assistant; and Bel Canto, which won the PEN/Faulkner Award, the Orange Prize, the BookSense Book of the Year, and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award. She is also the author of two works of nonfiction: The New York Times bestselling Truth & Beauty and What Now? Patchett has written for many publications, including The Atlantic, Harper's Magazine, Gourmet, The New York Times, Vogue, and The Washington Post. Two years ago, Patchett teamed up with two veteran booksellers to open Parnassus Books, a muchcelebrated independent bookstore in Nashville. The Welty Lecture was established in 1982 to bring to the College distinguished scholars, writers, artists, and critics who have made significant contributions to the understanding and appreciation of southern culture. The endowment honors Eudora Welty, the distinguished writer and lifelong resident of Jackson, who for many years served on the Board of Trustees of Millsaps College. Welty was a Pulitzer Prize and National Book Award winner and recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom and the French Legion of Honor. Notable writers and scholars such as Cleanth Brooks, John Shelton Reed, Ellen Douglas, and Clyde Edgerton have visited Millsaps as part of the Welty lecture program. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD
ON CAMPUS
Dr. Robert Shive
Dr. Claudine Chadeyras
Community Celebration offers professors an opportunity to reflect on student-centered accomplishments.
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illsaps College professor Dr. Robert Shive majored in both mathematics and French at Southern Methodist University, but math is the subject responsible for his 43-year mission. Shive, who went on to spend his entire career at Millsaps after teaching an initial class in 1967, retired in December. His love of mathematics—and the pride he took in his students—led him from the classroom to administration, then back to the classroom again. “In a sense, it was predictable, but it was unpredictable because so many things had not been discovered,” Shive, a professor of mathematics and computer science, said of his early interest in mathematics. “I like math because it’s so useful and applicable in so many ways and because of its structure.” He is joined in retirement by Dr. Robert Kahn, associate professor of romance languages, who completed 37 years at Millsaps in May, and Dr. Claudine Chadeyras, assistant professor of French, who completed 25 years at Millsaps. Chadeyras said her years at Millsaps allowed her to continue learning. “I am a generalist at heart who
Dr. Robert Kahn
welcomed the challenge of exploring new topics,” she said. Her accomplishments include the 1999 creation of the French Summer Program in Paris and Nice, and her involvement with the Alliance Francaise de Jackson, an organization that brought French luminaries to campus, and cultural incursions into unfamiliar territory such as French medieval literature, French film, the European Union, and Francophone literatures. Chadeyras has taught undergraduate courses in the French language at all levels, elementary and intermediate Spanish, and an English class about French film. She has also team-taught in Dr. Steven Smith’s course introduction to Film Studies. “I taught French and Spanish in the Adult Degree Program, the Millsaps French Summer Program in Paris and in Nice, and the Millsaps Spanish Summer Program in Costa Rica,” she said. Kahn has taught Spanish at all levels as well as basic and intermediate French, but he is most proud of his success as director of the College’s program in Costa Rica. “It’s rewarding to see how much the students learn and grow while abroad. Since they live with local families, they become Costa Ricans for the time they are there. Consequently, they do not observe the culture from the outside, but they become part of it.” Kahn credits his ability to speak French and his degrees in Spanish with ensuring his hire at Millsaps in 1976. “I got the job because I was qualified in
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Dr. Keith Dunn, senior vice president for academic affairs and dean of the College, presents gifts to the retiring professors.
both languages. I tell students that speaking Spanish may be the one extra thing that gets them employment. It can be a plus.” Kahn’s enthusiasm and playful demeanor made it a joy to learn to speak Spanish, said Kyle Doherty, B.A. 2008, who earned a master’s degree in Latin American studies from the University of Florida in 2011 and currently works as a paralegal in Katy, Texas. “His exacting methods have stuck with me through the years, and I still think of his voice if I find myself misusing the subjunctive tense. Professors like Dr. Kahn make Millsaps the special place that it is.” Shive was still completing his doctorate in mathematics from Iowa State University, after receiving bachelor’s and master’s degrees in math from SMU, when he agreed to teach a mathematics class at Millsaps. He quickly went to work helping Millsaps acquire its first computer in the early 1970s. In 1976, Shive teamed with other Millsaps faculty and staff to begin a campus-wide computer system. “It was one computer, but we put terminals all over campus,” he said. “It was the beginning of multiple people in offices having access to computers.” From there, Shive helped organize a Computer Studies Department. He became an administrator, ensuring the campus was wired with optical fiber to keep it a leader in computer technology. But in 1995, he returned to the classroom. “I never went into administration to escape teaching,” Shive explained. His students, he says, are what make him proudest. “I didn’t go into teaching to get rich,” Shive said. “You do it because you love to teach, and because you love your students.
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A faculty member caring can really make a difference.” Shive made a lifelong impression on Dr. Steven Jenkins, B.S. 1977, who took Shive’s advanced calculus class. “Bob Shive was, next to my father, the most important male role model in my late adolescence and early adulthood,” said Jenkins, an engineer in the California Institute of Technology’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory. “Bob built a culture of excellence in which high performance didn’t require explanation or justification; it was expected.” In retirement, Shive plans to spend more time with his wife Lynda and their three children, all Millsaps graduates. Chadeyras will begin her retirement in Auburn, Ala., where she will settle with her college sweetheart. “We eventually plan to move to Florida.When given the opportunity, I will enjoy teaching French part-time,” she said. In retirement, Kahn will teach Basic French II in the fall and continue in his role as senior consultant to International Education. He will co-direct with Dr. Priscilla Fermon, associate professor of French, the Spanish language programs in Costa Rica and in Yucatán in 2013 and 2014. “Although I am officially retiring, I still will be devoting a lot of time to Millsaps,” he said. BY RUTH CUMMINS, FREELANCE WRITER
Photo by University of Mississippi Medical Center
BEYOND CAMPUS BEYOND CAMPUS
Summer Bailey, Marlaina Berch, and Emily Brandon
Millsaps alumni find Rural Physicians Program helpful.
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ummer Bailey is among Millsaps College graduates who want to make sure Mississippi’s rural residents have access to medical care. A 2012 alumna, Bailey is a second-year medical student at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine, and a Mississippi Rural Physicians Program scholarship recipient. The program was authorized by the Mississippi Legislature in 2007 to help address the challenges of Mississippi’s health care crisis. The scholarship provides $30,000 a year during the four years of medical school. For every year of scholarship money a student receives, he or she is expected to practice in a rural area of Mississippi. Bailey’s goal is to practice medicine in her hometown of Lorman, which she jokingly describes as having more cows than people.
“I feel more comfortable in a smaller place than a city,” she said. “My parents are from the town that I am from, my grandparents are from this same town, and I can show you the house where my great-grandparents lived. Lorman and Jefferson County are where my roots are.” Like many of the 54 scholars currently in the program, Bailey has lived in a rural area of Mississippi and is already familiar with the disparities in medical care in the state. “When I was growing up, I thought it was normal to travel 45 minutes to go to the dentist or to go for medical help,” she said. “Then I got to Millsaps and saw where there are numerous medical options just around the corner.” Bailey said she feels a strong commitment to her hometown and her state. “For me the scholarship means getting a free ride to do something you should do and what a lot of us want to do—give back to our communities,” she explained. She is considering pediatrics for her specialty.
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Getting a
“
Rural Physicians Program
scholarship certainly solidified my decision about my future...The program empowers people to pursue their
”
dream of rural medicine.
–Dr. John Russell McPherson, B.S. 2008 Dr. John Russell McPherson, a 2008 Millsaps alumnus, graduated in the top 10 in his medical school class at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine. “Getting a Rural Physicians Program scholarship certainly solidified my decision about my future,” he said. “The program empowers people to pursue their dream of rural medicine.” A native of Inverness, McPherson misses the small town way of life. “I like that I will be able to know my patients and their families,” he said. “I feel like I am being encouraged to do what I want to do. That means a lot.” An avid outdoorsman, he also looks forward to living near areas where he can hunt and fish regularly. Janie Guice, executive director of the Rural Physicians Scholarship Program from its establishment unti her retirement in January, said about 20 students from 70 applicants are selected each year for the undergraduate portion of the program. “Most of these individuals are from rural areas and want to raise their families in a small town environment where family, church, and community are especially valued,” she said. According to Guice, 72 of the 82 counties in Mississippi are medically underserved. The state ranks last in physicians per capita while leading the nation in obesity, hypertension, cardiovascular illnesses, diabetes, teen pregnancy, and infant mortality. Half of the counties in the state also lack a physician for obstetrics and gynecology. “These factors dictate why our state has major financial and educational challenges,” Guice said. “Rural health is rural wealth.” Within five years, however, Wahnee Sherman, executive director of the Rural Physicians Scholarship Program, anticipates there will be 50 new physicians practicing in rural Mississippi. “This program will be providing a solid footprint for progress in rural health care,” she said. From November until mid-February each year, Sherman’s
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schedule will include visits to college and university campuses in Mississippi. She will encourage sophomore pre-med majors to apply to the program. “We are looking for top-notch students who have the potential to be competitive medical school applicants,” she said. Two Millsaps students are in the undergraduate program: Sophomores Hunter McLendon from Hernando and Chelsie Wright from Pearl. During their junior and senior years, program participants are involved in enrichment activities that explore five primary care specialties—family medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, pediatrics, medicine and pediatrics, and general internal medicine. Students are also required to do 40 hours of rural physician shadowing while involved in the undergraduate portion of the program. In simulation labs at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine, students also learn how to deliver a baby, suture wounds, and set up an intravenous infusion. “They are getting experiences that college students don’t normally get,” Sherman said. “Plus, if they successfully complete the scholarship program enrichment activities, keep their grades up, and score reasonably well on the MCAT, they earn direct admission consideration to the University of Mississippi School of Medicine.” Based on funding, scholarships also may be available for enrollment in the William Carey University College of Osteopathic Medicine in Hattiesburg. Direct admission consideration, however, is an option only at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine. After participants have graduated from college and been accepted into one of these two medical schools, a five-week summer program gives them a head start on a successful transition to medical school. “Participants are taught and tested just like medical students and have gross anatomy and bio-chemistry experiences that undergraduates don’t receive,” Sherman said. “They get to improve their dissection skills and create their study groups. All of this builds confidence and camaraderie, which is important because medical school can be very intimidating.” The enrichment activities continue when participants are in medical school during “Gab and Grub” sessions. The meetings are usually held after a class or a lab to give program participants the opportunity to share their experiences and support one another, Sherman explained. Sherman noted that the average cost of medical school is $150,000-$225,000 here in Mississippi. Many graduates also have undergraduate loans to re-pay. “The Rural Physicians Scholarship Program literally can change a young person’s financial future,” she said. “Many of our program participants are the first generation in their families to go to college or medical school. This program is
BEYOND CAMPUS
Photo by William Carey University
Mississippi Rural Physicians Program Scholars from Millsaps University of Mississippi School of Medicine • Second-year medical student Summer Bailey from Lorman • Second-year medical student Marlaina Berch from Sturgis • Third-year medical student Emily Brandon from Starkville • Second-year resident Dr. John Russell McPherson from Inverness William Carey University College of Osteopathic Medicine • Second-year medical student Moumita Biswas from Brandon
Chelsea Rick
especially a blessing for them.” There are three steps to the application process: an online application, interviews with practicing rural physicians who serve on the scholarship program’s governing board, and interviews with the admissions committee at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine. “We are looking for individuals who want to make a longterm commitment to rural areas of the state,” Sherman said. “We also are making sure that primary care is a good fit for them and in line with their career goals.” Of the 525 medical students at the University of Mississippi School of Medicine during the 2012-2013 acadenic year, 46 were Millsaps graduates. Graduates who are scholars in the Mississippi Rural Physicians Program are second-year students Summer Bailey from Lorman and Marlaina Berch from Sturgis, third-year student Emily Brandon from Starkville, and secondyear resident Dr. John Russell McPherson from Inverness. At William Carey University, six of the 306 medical school students are Millsaps alumni, and two are in the Mississippi Rural Physicians Scholarship Program. They are second-year students Moumita Biswas from Brandon and Chelsea Rick from Fulton. Millsaps graduates consistently do well in medical school, according to Guice. “They have excellent critical thinking skills, a diverse education, are curious, and value lifetime learning, which is critical to growing a lifelong physician,” she said. Millsaps earns high marks from Guice for embracing the
Moumita Biswas
• Second-year medical student Chelsea Rick from Fulton
program and providing easy access to students. “Millsaps has rolled out a double-thick red carpet when I have visited,” she said. “The pre-med advisors and science faculty are open, engaging, and eager to have information about the Rural Physicians Scholarship Program shared with their students.” Bailey also has praise for her alma mater. “You get a lot of help from your professors, and the course loads prepare you for medical school,” she said. “A lot of people in medical school have not shadowed doctors, but I had that in the Millsaps Medical Mentoring Program. If you have not shadowed a doctor, how do you know you want to be a doctor?” Bailey said her immediate goal is to excel in medical school. “The Rural Physicians Scholarship Program Scholarship is a big honor,” she said. “People see potential in me, and I want to show them that I have that potential.” To learn more about the Mississippi Rural Physicians Scholarship Program and access an application, visit http:// mrpsp.umc.edu or contact Wahnee Sherman at 601-815-9022 or wsherman@umc.edu. Funding for the scholarships is provided through the combined resources of the Mississippi Legislature, the Medical Assurance Company of Mississippi, the Selby and Richard McRae Foundation, and the Madison Charitable Foundation. BY PEGGY HAMPTON, FREELANCE WRITER
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BEYOND CAMPUS
“
It [Juilliard] is a great honor, and as an alumnus of
The Juilliard School and her teacher, I couldn't
”
be more proud of her. –James Martin
Student selected to study classical voice at Juilliard.
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iffany Townsend, B.A. 2013, has been accepted as a student at the highly selective Juilliard School, located at the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts in New York. She plans to complete a Master’s of Music in classical voice. After submitting a taped audition and an application with letters of recommendations, Townsend was invited to New York for a live audition. “They do not invite many students out of the hundreds, dare I say thousands, who apply each year,” said James Martin, a Juilliard alumnus and teaching artist-in-residence at Millsaps who discovered Townsend’s gift as a vocalist. During her freshman year at Millsaps, Martin overheard Townsend singing gospel tunes in a piano practice room while she was taking a break. Impressed by what he heard, he asked her to sing for him in his studio. “I suggested that she begin voice lessons at Millsaps,” he said. She followed his advice and soon expanded her concentration as a music major to include voice as well as piano—with impressive results. In 2011, she placed second in two categories (classical voice and musical theatre) at the southeast regional competition of the National Association of Teachers of Singing. Townsend, a member of the Millsaps Singers and the Chamber Singers, had to accomplish so much in a short period of time, Martin said. “She has taken off beyond my wildest dreams. Not only was she accepted into Juilliard (as well as Mannes
College, The New School of Music and Manhattan School of Music, also top music conservatories), but also she has been awarded the prestigious Irene Diamond Scholarship to Juilliard,” he said. “It is a great honor, and as an alumnus of The Juilliard School and her teacher, I couldn’t be more proud for her.” Townsend, who grew up in Jackson, began her formal music instruction as an elementary student through private lessons, and then in the fourth grade enrolled in the Jackson public schools’ Academic and Performing Arts Complex (APAC). Continuing her music studies as part of the APAC, she attended Peeples Middle School and graduated from Murrah High in 2009. Her voice training and experience came through the Mississippi Girlchoir and the Murrah Madrigals. Townsend said her intentions when she enrolled at Millsaps were to complete the pre-requisites for entrance into pharmacy school. “Had I not come to Millsaps, I wouldn’t have become interested in voice,” said Townsend, whose career options include becoming an opera singer. Last summer, Townsend and Jordan Hammons, B.A. 2013, spent three weeks in Italy studying at the Florence Voice Seminar. Townsend and Hammons performed for one of the seminar instructors, Benita Valente, who was a visiting artist at Millsaps in January 2011. A big honor for the Millsaps music majors came near the end of the seminar when they were among five students selected to participate in a master class taught by James Conlon, music director of the Los Angeles Opera. They also performed with all seminar participants in two concerts at St. James Episcopal Church in Florence. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD
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FACULTY & STAFF
FACULTY
& STAFF
Accolades: Millsaps faculty members spend time in the
classroom, but that’s nowhere near all that they do. They find time for research and creative endeavors, and they participate in professional activities that expand their knowledge and enhance their teaching. Our staff members stay busy, too. Here are some of their recent professional activities.
Damon Campbell, assistant professor of management information systems, had his article, “Operationalizing Multidimensional Constructs in Structural Equation Modeling: Recommendations for IS Research,” published in Communications of the Association for Information Systems. Jovanni-Rey de Pedro, visiting assistant professor of music, made his Carnegie Hall debut March 31 after receiving a first-place award at the 2013 American Protégé International Piano and Strings Competition. Jonathan Ferrell, associate dean of admissions and director of recruitment, has accepted a three-year term on the board of directors of the Southern Association for College Admission Counseling. He will oversee planning of the group's annual conference. Richard Freis, professor emeritus of classics, is author of the recently published novel Confession. He has published widely, both locally and nationally, as a literary and performing and visual arts journalist and scholar. He has also published translations and written librettos for a cantata and an opera. His poetry has appeared in Poetry, The Southern Review, Drastic Measures, and other magazines and anthologies.
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Nola Gibson, director of continuing education, served as Mississippi Humanities Council evaluator for a Feb. 21 program at the Old Capitol Museum. The program was “We Shall Not Be Moved: Stories and Heroes of the Jackson Woolworth Sit-in.” Kristen Brown Golden, associate professor of philosophy, delivered her paper, “White Racial Bias: Freud, the Unconscious and Neural Psyches,” at the 2012 national meeting for the Society for Phenomenology and Existential Philosophy in Rochester, N.Y. Golden also organized the paper’s panel: “White Racism, Willful Ignorance and Existential/Life Philosophies.” Brent E. Hendrixson, assistant professor of biology, published an article entitled “An exploration of species boundaries in turret-building tarantulas of the Mojave Desert (Araneae, Mygalomorphae, Theraphosidae, Aphonopelma)” in the journal Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution. He is also serving as the scientific consultant for the children’s book, Inside the Tarantula’s Burrow, by Natalie Lunis expected to be published in 2014. Mike Hutchison, vice president for institutional advancement, served as the CASE IV Conference program chair in Fort Worth, Texas. The conference had the largest attendance in District
IV history. CASE is a national organization committed to assisting professionals in higher education and independent schools focusing on development, marketing/communications, alumni relations, and advancement services. Molly McManus, associate librarian and coordinator of public services, has been selected to participate in the Mississippi Library Leadership Institute. Thirty librarians statewide were selected for this new program sponsored by the Mississippi Library Commission and funded by the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Molly Morin, assistant professor of art, and Sandra Murchison, professor of art, are among 36 artists with work accepted into the Mississippi Museum’s Inaugural Juried Art Competition in conjunction with the 2013 April in Paris fundraising gala. Artists selected to compete in the juried competition were chosen by a panel of experts including Tom Rankin, photographer and director of the Center for Documentary Studies and associate professor of the practice of art and documentary studies at Duke University; Kathleen Varnell, Mississippi Museum of Art curatorial associate; Beth Batton, Mississippi Museum of Art curator of the collection; and Dea Dea Baker, Mississippi artist and a member of the Jackson Watercolor Group.
FACULTY & STAFF
Ann Phelps, interim director of the Faith and Work Initiative and the 1 Campus 1 Community Program, led workshops on vocational discernment for recent retirees during the 2013 Bowen Conference at Kanuga conference center in Hendersonville, N.C. She performed during the conference as vocalist with the Theodicy Jazz Collective. Andrew Paxman, assistant professor of history, will see his first book, El Tigre: Emilio Azcárraga y su imperio Televisa, republished with a new preface by Random House Mexico in July. Co-authored by Claudia Fernandez, this biography of a Latin American media mogul was Mexico’s best-selling work of non-fiction in 2000. Lynn Raley, associate professor of music, played a solo recital of piano music by American composers at the Taipei International New Music Festival on Oct. 6, 2012. In April and May, he played a series of recitals around the island, featuring new music by Taiwan composers. The concerts, funded by the Taiwan National Culture and Arts Foundation, were in Taipei, Hsinchu, and Kaohsiung. Bennie Reynolds, visiting assistant professor of religious studies, presented a paper entitled “Visionary Poetics Between Prophecy and Apocalypse: The Case of Daniel” in Chicago at the annual meeting of the Society of Biblical Literature. He presented another paper entitled “The End is Near(ish): Methodological and Pedagogical Reflections on Reading Ancient Mediterranean and Modern American Apocalypses” at the Southeastern Commission for the Study of Religion. He published a review of The Dead Sea Scrolls and Contemporary Culture: Proceedings of the
International Conference at the Israel Museum, Jerusalem in the Journal for the Study of Judaism. He also published the essay “Symbolic and Non-Symbolic Visions of the Book of Daniel in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls” in the book, The Hebrew Bible in Light of the Dead Sea Scrolls. Elise Smith, professor of art history and Sanderson Chair in Arts and Sciences, gave an invited talk in February on “Dora Carrington and the ‘Crisis’ of the English Landscape” at the conference, “Disciples of Flora: Gardens in History and Culture,” at the University of Florida. Steve Smith, professor of philosophy and religious studies, presented the paper, “The Impossibility of Negating Historical Meaningfulness,” at the American Philosophical Association-Central Division meeting in New Orleans on Feb. 23. Smith’s film, “Pearl River Suite,” was screened at the 2013 Crossroads Film Festival in Jackson. The film combines original music with kayaklevel photography of waterways at the north end of the Ross Barnett Reservoir. Drew Swanson, postdoctoral fellow in environmental history, published the essay, “From the Big House to the Trailer: Reflections on a Southern Landscape,” in Interdisciplinary Studies in Literature and Environment. He also signed advance contracts with Yale University Press for his next book, a study of tobacco culture in the American South, A Golden Weed: Tobacco and Environment in the Piedmont South, and with the University of Georgia Press for The Nature of Appalachian History: Environments Past and Present in the Southern Mountains.
Pat Taylor, professor of economics, and Ray Grubbs, professor of management, have published an article, “Who Has the Most Skin in the Game? A Stake Owner Theory of Tenure.” in the most recent issue of Academy of Educational Leadership Journal. Kenneth Townsend, special assistant to the president and assistant professor of political science, graduated from Leadership Greater Jackson leadership development program in May. Upon completion of the program, he was named to the organization’s board of directors. Cory Toyota, assistant professor in chemistry and biochemistry, has a manuscript that appears in the April issue of the Journal of Bacteriology: “YfdW and YfdU Are Required for Oxalate-Induced Acid Tolerance in Escherichia coli K-12.” Authors include Elise Fontenot, B.S. 2012; Karen Ezelle, class of 2015; Lauren Gabreski, B.S. 2011; Ellie Giglio, class of 2014; John McAfee, B.S. 2013; Allie Mills, class of 2014; Maryam Qureshi, class of 2015; and Kristen Salmon, B.A. 2013. David C. Yates, assistant professor of classics, has published “The Persian War as Civil War in Plataea’s Temple of Athena Areia” in Klio. His review of D. Lyons’ Dangerous Gifts: Gender and Exchange in Ancient Greece was published in Classical Review.
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FACULTY & STAFF
New chaplain will facilitate a multi-faith and ecumenical community at Millsaps.
O
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pen hearts, open minds, open doors. That is the motto of the United Methodist Church and the one that the Rev. Chris Donald lives out as chaplain at Millsaps College. From serving as a representative of the United Methodist Church to providing pastoral care for the campus community and facilitating a vibrant multi-faith and ecumenical community, Donald believes his job is to enhance all facets of life on campus. “The chaplain has a role, in partnership with academic and student life leaders, in helping Millsaps College live as an intentional community that promotes human thriving for our students, faculty, staff, and neighbors. A vibrant spiritual life on campus contributes to the overall richness of the educational experience,” Donald said. Donald began work in January after serving as project director for the Compassionate Care Initiative at the University of Virginia School of Nursing and as an ordained elder in the United Methodist Church Virginia Conference. He earned a bachelor’s degree in
history and government from the College of William & Mary and a Master of Divinity from Duke University. Since arriving in Mississippi, Donald has been surprised at how tight-knit and intimate the campus is. “I don’t think I was prepared for how close the people on this campus are and how they will go above and beyond to help and support one another. Talking about ‘Mother Millsaps’ is truly appropriate, because the culture of this place is like a family,” he said. Donald conducted an Ash Wednesday service on campus and also the baccalaureate service that was part of commencement. Through conversations with students, Donald has heard overwhelming support for weekly worship services, which he expects to begin in the fall. That, he says, is what he is looking forward to most. “I can’t wait to begin that weekly worship service to help students and faculty connect with God and one another in the midst of this community,” he said. “That is good news for me, because I enjoy planning worship and creating space for people to reflect on their lives and their relationship with God.” BY SOPHIE McNEIL WOLF
FACULTY & STAFF
Alumna who is a professor mentors students just as her professors once mentored her.
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eturning to Millsaps as a faculty member is an important part of Dr. Stephanie Rolph’s life story. “Millsaps inspired me to spend my career mentoring students the way I was mentored during my time here,” said Rolph, B.A. 1999, who returned to the College in 2010 as a visiting professor of history and is now an assistant professor of history. “What motivates me is not just mentoring college students, but mentoring Millsaps students and continuing the unique mission of this institution. Millsaps encourages creativity, collaboration, and local investment in a way that I’m not sure I could find at another institution.” She intended to attend law school after graduation but her plans changed when she had trouble imagining anything but a classroom career. “It became impossible for me to envision anything else,” she said. Rolph, whose expertise is in the civil rights movement, said she avoided southern history while in graduate school at Mississippi State University for fear of being pigeonholed into provincial topics that had been covered.
“I can honestly say that I didn’t choose civil rights. It really just unfolded before me as a much more interesting story than I ever expected. The work in Mississippi and the entire South was a product of global events and its contributions were not nearly as provincial as I once believed. That realization has become the focus of my scholarship.” Rolph recently secured an advance contract from Louisiana State University Press to publish a book based on her dissertation for her doctorate that she received at Mississippi State University. The manuscript, “Whiting Out the Movement: Organized Resistance to Civil Rights and the Rebirth of Conservative Politics,” looks at white resistance to civil rights in the South in order to capture the re-appropriation of race through the conservative movement of the 1960s. Focusing her research on the Citizens’ Council of America, a Mississippi-born organization that is as an example of white resistance to civil rights, Rolph now works just over a mile from the Mississippi Department of Archives, where she conducts research, and within minutes of other sites of historic significance. “Being in Jackson is really beneficial for me because it keeps me very connected to the environment where the civil rights movement took place,” she said. Millsaps faculty members have the opportunity to continue their educations by cultivating expertise in new fields, and that’s especially appealing to Rolph.
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FACULTY & STAFF
“ creativity,
Millsaps encourages
collaboration, and local investment in a way that I'm not
”
sure I could find at another insitution. –Dr. Stephanie Rolph, B.A. 1999
“For me, those fields have included community engaged learning and public history, two things that I’m passionate about even though I haven’t had a real background in them. Millsaps has been an ideal place for me to partner my individual expertise with practical opportunities in the Jackson area and in our state. I want our students to be able to describe Millsaps in the same way.” She has shared her knowledge of research with students in her Afro-American Heritage class as part of a community engaged learning opportunity. Her students researched in 32
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partnership with the University of Richmond the movement of slaves from 1861until 1865. With funding from the University of Richmond and the National Endowment for the Humanities, the research has potential to be a multi-year project, she said. Looking through newspaper articles at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, Rolph and her students looked for news about what slaves were experiencing during the Civil War. “Are they tending to run away when the war breaks out? Are they staying at home? Are they running away to Union lines? Are they being sold? Are they being passed down through probate court? All of that is being tracked in the newspapers.” The research is a slow, pain-staking process, but the work is very meaningful for students, she said. In all that she does, Rolph said she keeps in mind how as an undergraduate she enjoyed the College’s collaborative learning experience where faculty valued students as developing scholars. “To this day, I often refer to my students as scholars instead because that's how I see them,” she said. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD
FACULTY & STAFF
Else School of Management welcomes business leader as new executive-in-residence.
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teve Rogers, managing member of Rogers and Associates, LLC, joined the Else School as an executive-in-residence earlier this year. Rogers and Associates, LLC focuses on providing specialized solutions for principals and institutional owners in the real estate industry and board level advisory work on a local and national basis. Dr. Kimberly G. Burke, dean of the Else School, said Rogers brings a wealth of business experience and also an interest in developing young business leaders. “We are extremely fortunate to have Steve serve as an executive-in-residence,” she said. Rogers teaches in the Executive M.B.A. program and assists Else School faculty and students, who are involved in the creative economy initiative under way in the Midtown neighborhood. As part of that initiative, the Robert N. Hearin Foundation awarded the College a $300,000 grant to assist in the development of a business incubator in Midtown. Rogers also works with the College on strategic initiatives regarding its real estate.
Howard L. McMillan Jr., current executive-inresidence and a former dean at the Else School, said Rogers has a wealth of knowledge and contacts across the country. “He is an invaluable asset to our faculty and students,” he said. Before establishing Rogers and Associates, Rogers led Parkway Properties as president and chief executive officer from its early development through its move to the New York Stock Exchange and the S&P 600 Small Cap Index with assets under management having nearly two billion dollars in value. He currently serves on the boards of RREEF America REIT, First Commercial Bank where he chairs the Investment Committee, and the Walker Companies. He received a Bachelor of Arts magna cum laude from the University of Mississippi and a Master of Business Administration with first year honors from Harvard Business School. Rogers has served in a leadership capacity for numerous community, political, and business organizations. He has served as co-chair of the Mississippi Museum of Art, chair of the State YPO and president of the Andrew Jackson Council of the Boy Scouts. Former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour appointed Rogers finance chair of the Capitol City Convention Complex. BY NELL LUTER FLOYD AND NAOMI FREEMAN
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FEATURE
MILLSAPS COLLEGE GRADUATES EARN MISSISSIPPI BAR’S
LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT AWARD They credit the College with encouraging social justice, freedom of thought.
By Ruth Cummins, Freelance Writer
ome of Mississippi’s most esteemed attorneys are linked by more than their years at Millsaps College. Four of the last five recipients of the Mississippi Bar’s Lifetime Achievement Award have been Millsaps graduates. Harold D. “Hal” Miller Jr., B.A. 1957, of Ridgeland, and Circuit Judge James L. Roberts, B.A. 1967, of Pontotoc, both received the award for the 2011-2012 year. Jack F. Dunbar, B.A. 1954, of Oxford was recognized for the year 2010-2011, and William F. “Bill” Goodman Jr., B.A. 1949, of Jackson, for the year 2008-2009. Larry Houchins, executive director of the Mississippi Bar, said the award is the Bar’s highest honor. “Only lawyers who have made major contributions to the system of justice and the legal profession receive this award,” he said. “It recognizes devoted service to the public and profession over the span of a professional career, not just one specific achievement. I consider the recipients of this award the pillars of the legal profession in Mississippi.” Citing rigorous classroom experiences, personal mentoring, and the nurturing that comes from Millsaps’ intimate setting, all four award recipients credit Millsaps College with giving them the tools they needed not only to navigate through law school, but also to build careers based on sound decision-making and critical thinking. And they call on the College’s heritage of social justice and commitment to freedom of thought, standards emphasized in the College’s current strategic plan, as they daily uphold
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FEATURE
“open attitude
Millsaps just had an
back when attitudes weren’t open...That’s geared me to live with an open attitude. –Hal Miller Jr., B.A. 1957
Hal Miller Jr.
and apply the law. “Millsaps just had an open attitude back when attitudes weren’t open,” said Miller, who retired in 2010 from Butler, Snow, Stevens, O’Mara & Cannada in Jackson after a 50-year career there specializing in mediation and arbitration. “That’s geared me to live with an open attitude.” Roberts, whose many years in service include being Mississippi’s director of public safety, said his career also was shaped by his Millsaps experience. “You have a sense that the world is a much larger place, and your role is undefined,” Roberts said of his undergraduate years. “You’re looking for what your role should be.” Goodman literally grew up at Millsaps, where his mother, Marguerite Watkins Goodman, was a member of the English Department faculty for three decades. He remembers a pivotal conversation he had as he approached graduation with Dr. Marion Lofton Smith, the College’s president from 1938 until 1952. “Dr. Smith asked me about going into the ministry. I told him my plan was to go into law. He said, ‘We need good
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”
people there, too.’” Millsaps provided the freedom they needed to explore new ideas but also the guidance necessary to make ethically responsible life choices, according to the four award recipients. Miller graduated from the University of Mississippi School of Law in 1959 and joined Butler, Snow, O’Mara, Stevens & Cannada when the now 275-member firm had just a handful of attorneys. He retired in 2010 and formed Miller Mediation and Arbitration Services. He served as president of the Jackson Young Lawyers, was a Fellow of the Young Lawyers, and was a member of the Board of Commissioners. He was chair of the Mississippi Bar Ethics Committee, drafting initial advertising rules, chair of the Mississippi Bar Law Office Economics Committee and Section, and was first chair of the Bar’s Alternative Dispute Resolution Section. Miller served as the president of the Hinds County Bar Association, the Mississippi Bar Foundation, and the Transportation Lawyers Association. He was the first recipient of the Hinds County Bar Association’s Professionalism Award. Goodman, admitted to the Mississippi Bar in 1951, was also admitted to the Mississippi State Courts in the same year. He was admitted to the federal district courts and the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in 1953 and to the Supreme Court of the United States in 1970. He said he has “done everything” as an attorney, with many years spent in appellate practice, banking, class action suits, and complex business litigation. The 1951 University of Mississippi law graduate served as a first lieutenant in the Army before joining Watkins and Eager in 1953; that year, the firm had but six lawyers, and today has about 75, Goodman said. Goodman is a member of the 2010 inaugural class of the University of Mississippi School of Law Hall of Fame and was
FEATURE
“
I'm a big fan of a liberal arts education. That fits my personality more than I can imagine.
I wouldn’t trade my Millsaps
degree for anything in the world.” –James Roberts, B.A. 1967
James Roberts
the 1997 Millsaps Alumnus of the Year. He has received the Professionalism Award from the Mississippi Bar Foundation and the Capital Area Bar Association, and his many national awards include his listing in The Best Lawyers in America from 1983-2012 and being cited for general commercial litigation from 2008-2011 by Chambers USA-—America’s Leading Lawyers for Business. Roberts, a judge in the 1st Circuit Court District in Mississippi, fondly recalls his years at Millsaps during which he also worked full time at Kennington’s Department Store in downtown Jackson. “I would attend my classes in the morning and go directly after class to work. I worked my way up to be head of marking and receiving when I was 19 or 20,” he said. During Roberts’s time at Millsaps, the president of the College Dr. Benjamin Graves taught a course to undergraduates, a tradition that has been re-started by Millsaps’ current president Dr. Robert Pearigen, who teaches constitutional law every fall semester (and in whose class Hal Miller was enrolled as an auditing student two years ago). Roberts reflects fondly on a class he took with Dr. Graves that met in the president’s
home, and he still recalls the names of many favorite professors. “Forty years after you leave home you finally understand what your parents tried to teach you,” he said. “I feel that way about Millsaps. I learned a lot there. I’m extremely proud of my Millsaps experience, the students I met, the professors I had. It has impacted my life.” Roberts said he regrets he was a mediocre student at Millsaps, but he credits his education at Millsaps with providing a solid foundation for further education. He earned his M.B.A. from Mississippi State University in 1968 and his J.D. from the University of Mississippi in 1971. He practiced law in Pontotoc from 1971 until 1984, simultaneously serving as county prosecuting attorney and youth court prosecutor. Roberts served as Mississippi commissioner of Public Safety from 1984 until 1988. He served as Chancery Judge from 1988 until 1992 for the First Chancery Court District of Mississippi. From 1992 until 1999, he served as a Mississippi Supreme Court Justice for the Northern District of Mississippi. In 2000, he was appointed an adjunct professor of criminal justice at the University of Southern Mississippi, where he taught until 2006. From 2006 until 2007, he served as a Municipal Court Judge for the city of Pontotoc. He has been a member of the Mississippi Juvenile Justice Advisory Committee since 2006, serving as chair from 2006 until 2007. Mississippi Supreme Court Chief Justice William Waller Jr. appointed him to a five-year term on the Mississippi Commission on Judicial Performance. After graduating with a degree in political science in 1954, Dunbar began night law classes at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., while working days at the FBI as a clerk in domestic intelligence. It was at the height of the McCarthy era when U.S. Sen. Joseph McCarthy unjustly accused many
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The value of a
“
liberal arts educa-
tion has really helped me professionally and personally...I was blessed to have
”
that opportunity at Millsaps. –Jack Dunbar, B.A. 1954
Jack Dunbar
Americans in government of being Communist. He returned to Mississippi about a year and a half later, finishing at the University of Mississippi School of Law in Oxford in 1957. He is a fellow of the American College of Trial Lawyers, the American Bar Foundation, and the Mississippi Bar Foundation, and received the Mississippi Bar Foundation’s Professionalism Award in 2010. Dunbar has served as president of the Mississippi Bar Association and the Southern Conference of Bar Presidents, and he was a member of the American Bar Association’s Board of Governors and House of Delegates. He’s been listed in The Best Lawyers in America and was named one of the state’s top 50 lawyers in Mid-South Super Lawyers. Lessons learned during his days as a member of the Millsaps Players theatre group gave him a boost in the courtroom, Dunbar said. “I learned a lot about stage presence, which helped me as a trial lawyer,” Dunbar said. “I made sure not to block the witness from the jury. I used stage right and stage left.” Dunbar also gives credit to the late Millsaps philosophy
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professor Dr. Robert Bergmark, establishing the Dunbar Lecture Series on the Millsaps campus in Bergmark’s honor. The endowed lecture series brings speakers to campus to discuss a range of moral, philosophical, and legal questions. The spring 2013 lecture featured Dr. Tamar Gendler, chair of the Yale University Department of Philosophy, who spoke about “The Costs of Unintentional Racial Bias.” True to the spirit of both Dunbar and Bergmark, the lecture series has frequently engaged interdisciplinary questions of law and morality. Recent lectures have included the Naval Academy’s George R. Lucas speaking on “New Rules for New Wars: Military Ethics and Irregular Warfare” and University of California Berkeley’s Pheng Cheah discussing “Necessary Strangers: Law's Hospitality in the Age of Global Migration.” The College’s Wesleyan heritage has also helped these leading lawyers reflect on questions of ethics, morality, and justice—influencing, for example, Miller’s decision to pursue arbitration and mediation as a law specialty. “It was kind of a religious approach. I felt like there was a better way to resolve disputes than doing it in the courtroom,” Miller said. Goodman has performed legal work for his alma mater for more than 50 years, and during that time, he’s watched the campus grow in beauty and in its role in the community. Campus improvements—whether reputational or aesthetic—don’t happen overnight. Goodman knows that from a hands-on perspective. “I’ve had more connection with campus beautification than you’d think,” he said. “My sweet mother loved that place. Many afternoons after school, she would enlist the aid of Joe Lee Gibson. They built flower beds around Major Millsaps’ tomb.” That began his lifelong relationship with Gibson, a beloved Millsaps employee who worked for the College 70 years until
FEATURE
“
Dr. Smith asked me about going into the ministry. I told him my plan was to go
‘We need good people there, too’.”
into law. He said,
–Bill Goodman, B.A. 1949
Bill Goodman
his retirement in 2006. “Mr. Joe Lee” died in 2007. “If you walk down the sidewalk at Murrah Hall, past the Christian Center, you’ll find a little garden area and a plaque
Law preparation at Millsaps in brief • On average, more than 30 Millsaps graduates begin law school every year. (This includes seniors and alumni returning to school during the 2006-2007 to 2010-2011 reporting years). • Millsaps’ “Writing Across the Curriculum” focus ensures that students in all majors are well prepared for the rigors of writing in law school. • In the 2012-2013 academic year, representatives from 15 law schools from across the United States visited Millsaps’ campus to recruit our students. • The Millsaps Debate Team provides an opportunity for students to hone skills prior to law school.
dedicated to Joe Lee,” Goodman said. “My wife and I provided that plaque.” The four attorneys agree that Millsaps gave them the passion to serve their fellow citizens through the practice of law and that Millsaps helped them view being an attorney not just as a career but a profession—a profession that allowed them to integrate their values into their work. “The value of a liberal arts education has really helped me professionally and personally,” said Dunbar, a partner with Holcomb Dunbar. “In the South, we grew up with a lot of conventional thinking. Critical thinking, though, is very important, and I was blessed to have that opportunity at Millsaps.” Roberts agrees. “I’m a big fan of a liberal arts education. That fits my personality more than I can imagine. “I wouldn’t trade my Millsaps degree for anything in the world.” • With 20 members and in only its second year, the Millsaps Mock Trial Team won three Best Witness Awards and the Spirit of AMTA award for the 2013 Regional Tournament. The Spirit of AMTA is given to the team that exemplifies honesty, civility, and fair play. • More than 10 percent of current Millsaps students identify an interest in attending law school. • Millsaps applicants to law school represent all disciplines across campus. In 2013, applicants had majored in accounting, anthropology, business administration, history, political science, psychology, public administration, and religious studies. • The Millsaps’ curriculum offers undergraduate courses in business law, constitutional law, and civil liberties and civil rights.
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FEATURE
Katherine Landry
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Brown Elementary Student
FEATURE
Zoo Keeper Jessie Davis
Airriel O’Banner
Students work with community partners to extend the classroom. Engaged Learning provides meaningful ways to embrace the College’s neighbors.
A
By Nell Luter Floyd
irriel O’Banner visited the Jackson Zoo countless times as a child and teenager, but never did her visits give her an appreciation for what goes into ensuring the well being of the animals until she enrolled in a conservation biology class at Millsaps College. Working as a volunteer alongside zookeeper Jessie Davis, O’Banner, a sophomore during the spring semester, got an idea of the dirty, sometimes smelly, and physically demanding work that is involved in caring for the animals, cleaning their enclosures, and preparing their diets. She sliced apples and bananas, chopped sweet potatoes and carrots and prepared corn for the chimpanzees, raked up after the messy macaques, and assisted the zookeeper in making sure the chimps, the tapir, and other animals were inside for the night. “It made me as a biology major look at animals in a different way. It gave me a greater appreciation for all the work that goes into operating a zoo,” she said. Discussing conservation biology in the classroom is one thing, but working with a community partner to see firsthand what is involved provides an even richer learning experience, said Dr. Markus Tellkamp, assistant professor of biology at Millsaps. O’Banner is among Millsaps students who during the 2012-2013 year participated in engaged learning opportunities that connected them to the state’s business, cultural, educational, and political hub. The Mississippi Department of Archives and History, the Mississippi Museum of Art, the Mississippi Natural Science Museum, the Clinton Community Nature Center, an after-school program known as Operation Upward, a shelter for women named Lizzy’s House, and Brown Elementary are some of the community partners. Community engaged learning is not simply volunteerism but pairs academic learning with fieldwork. Community engaged learning at its best enhances the classroom experience, prepares students for a life of engagement, and cultivates citizenship in students, said Dr. Stephanie Rolph, an assistant professor of history who is in charge of community engaged learning at Millsaps. “It’s a great way for students to learn concepts that they’re studying, make connections, and discover posMillsaps Magazine | Summer 2013
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Katie Greer
sible internships. Our goal is to embed community engagement in the Millsaps experience,” Rolph said. Community engaged learning experiences at Millsaps date to the 2002 spring semester when two courses were offered under the umbrella of the Faith & Work Initiative. When Dr. Darby Ray, then an associate professor of religious studies at Millsaps and now director of the Harward Center for Community Partnerships at Bates College, began to integrate community engaged learning, it was similar to what Education Departments had been doing for years. During the spring semester, students in Field Research in Reading, taught by Dr. Marlys Vaughn, tutored students in reading at Brown Elementary four hours per week for the semester. Millsaps student Katherine Landry credits her fieldwork at Brown Elementary with taking her out of the comfort zone of her private school education, preparing her for a career in education, and showing her how she would like to use her career. “From working in the reading program at Brown Elementary, I decided I wanted to be a reading interventionist, which is someone who works one-on-one with a child to get
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him on the correct reading level. Without my experience at Brown I might not have figured that out.” Dr. Stacy DeZutter required students in her Human Development in Cross Cultural Perspective class to volunteer 15 hours for an agency or organization that serves those with developmental needs in some way. Katie Greer, B.A. 2013, combined her service learning component with a mission trip to a small community on a mountain overlooking Barahona, Dominican Republic, during her senior year. “Creating an academic outlet through a mission trip just made sense to me as throughout my four years as a communication studies major, I’ve been taught to always take the opportunity to share the stories of others. So, that’s what I did. I served families and children, building relationships with them, playing with them, and mostly just giving them my time. “In my research, I mainly focused on presenting what I learned about children ages 8-12. Selecting an age group was a part of Dr. DeZutter’s service learning requirement as a way of narrowing each area of study. Throughout the trip, which was funded largely through the McNair Fund for Christian
FEATURE
David Pharr, B.A. 1992, discussing the Capri Theatre with Else School students.
Missions, I was able to not only spend time with children and their families, but also distribute over 200 rice and bean packets and spread the word of Christ. Even more, I was able to accomplish all of this while simultaneously maintaining an academic lens that Millsaps provided me.” Abe Hutcheon, then a senior in the Many Dimensions of Poverty class taught by Dr. Louwanda Evans, volunteered with the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which assists low-income individuals and families so they can buy food. “You start the class with a mindset of what you believe poverty is, but by the end the class your mindset is completely different. We learned from Cynthia Wilson of SNAP what her job is like,” he said. Wilson, coordinator for SNAP, said Hutcheon assisted in enrolling individuals who qualify for the program. It was heartwarming to see how Millsaps students care about the greater world around them, she said. Else School of Management students offered their expertise for projects involving the Capri Theatre in Jackson, a neighborhood association known as LeFleur East Foundation, and a Midtown business known as Soul Wired Café. Alex Wills, B.B.A 2010 and M.B.A. 2013, a student in Dr. Ray Grubbs’ Strategic Management Concepts and Applications course during the spring semester, and others in the class worked with the LeFleur East Foundation to grow the organization financially and suggest best practices. “Working with a non-profit was an amazing, eye-opening project,” Wills said. Megan Hebert, a student during the spring semester in Consumer Behavior taught by Dr. Penelope Prenshaw, worked with David Pharr, B.A. 1992, who heads up the initiative to redevelop the Capri Theatre in Jackson. “It’s one thing to read about marketing in class, but it’s completely different to do that yourself,” Hebert said. After surveys and focus groups, the students determined that a locally owned theater with good
food and comfort was important. Haley Brown, a student in Afro-American Heritage taught by Rolph during the spring semester, was part of a semesterlong research project in partnership with the University of Richmond’s Visualizing Emancipation digital history site. Using newspaper microfilms from the Civil War era, students tracked slave movement in Mississippi between 1861and 1865. Research was conducted at the Mississippi Department of Archives and History, and the class engaged with faculty at a sister Associated Colleges of the South school. The students’ work will be a permanent part of a digital project that is open to the public and provides evidence of a period that has been understudied in African-American history. Students enrolled in the Piano Pedagogy II course taught by Dr. Jovanni-Rey de Pedro, visiting assistant professor of music, led group piano classes for adults from the Midtown neighborhood during the spring semester. Millsaps students gained experience in how to manage a class of adult learners. The Baroque Art class taught by Dr. Elise Smith, professor of art history, took a step toward developing a pamphlet or booklet that will be published by the Mississippi Museum of Art as a way to engage children in philosophical inquiry about the visual arts. Millsaps students Liz Allen and Madeleine Calcote developed questions that elementary to middle school students could understand and use to discuss art. They also selected specific works at the museum and developed questions that could be used to discuss the works. Rolph credits the College’s new strategic plan with reinvigorating interest in community engaged learning institutionwide and making the 2012-2013 year the most successful for community engaged learning. Rolph would like to partner with the College’s alumni for future projects. If you would like to discuss a partnership for community engaged learning, contact Rolph at 601-974-1290 or rolphsc@millsaps.edu.
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Guided by our new
strategic plan, community engagement efforts thrive. by Kenneth Townsend
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n its seventh year in existence, the 1 Campus 1 Community (1C1C) program at Millsaps has firmly established itself as the campus coordinator of local community engagement efforts, focusing especially on the Midtown neighborhood west of campus. Established in 2006 by former religious studies professor Dr. Darby Ray, 1C1C is currently managed by recent Yale Divinity School graduate Ann Phelps. This year’s annual Midtown Millsaps Block Party, an event in which the Millsaps’ west gates are opened for a day of fun, food, and celebrations, drew approximately 1000 participants, about 600 of whom were residents of Midtown, according to Phelps. What impressed Phelps most about this year’s Block Party was “the way in which the event was less about creating relationships and more about revealing the relationships that already exist between Millsaps and Midtown.” Phelps credits developments in the Wellspring program for many of the successes reflected by this year’s Block Party and other 1C1C efforts. Wellspring is a living-learning community in which first-year students—and, starting next year, sophomores as well—live together in a residence hall, volunteer together at various sites in Midtown, and then reflect together on how their experiences in the community inform their academic and vocational pursuits. While Wellspring has been active for five years, the 2012-2013 academic year was the first in which academic credit was awarded for the course. Wellspring’s civic reflection sessions provide an opportunity for students to connect their own personal, concrete community engagement experiences with the experiences of others and, in the process, to reflect on the systemic and structural issues that influence the particular communities in which they work. “Ideally,” according to Phelps, “students bring what they’ve learned together about economic, social, and political systems back into the community. This sustained process of engaging, reflecting, and engaging again separates Wellspring from the more common service-based programs at other colleges that strive to simply address problems that are the result of injustice, rather than reflect on ways to eliminate prejudice and poverty, which are the sources of injustice.”
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FEATURE
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Jackson City Council
The Millsaps’ curriculum will soon show even more clearly the College’s commitment to community engagement and social justice. A strategic plan committee has developed a proposal to offer a series of courses dealing with social justice during the 2013-2014 academic year. Among other things, the initiative will connect current students with Millsaps alumni who have worked in various social justice contexts. “Linking current and former students in this way is designed not only to help current students understand better the opportunities available for Millsaps graduates but also to assist the College in documenting and celebrating the good work being done by Millsaps alumni,” said professor of art history, Dr. Elise Smith, who has spearheaded the social justice initiative. In addition, Millsaps will be joining in summer 2013 the Shepherd Higher Education Consortium on Poverty. The program, which includes a group of selective liberal arts colleges, “integrates rigorous academic study and direct service to disadvantaged communities” with the intention of “preparing students for lives aimed at diminishing poverty and enhancing human capability,” according to the Shepherd Consortium website. Millsaps’ commitment to the local community has also been reflected in various public events in recent months. The Jackson City Council, for example, held at Millsaps its first meeting of 2013, which was the first time in history the Council met outside City Hall. Millsaps President Robert W. Pearigen explained, “Holding the City Council meeting at Millsaps was a win-win arrangement for the College and the Council. We benefited from having the opportunity to share the Millsaps story with local leaders, and our students profited greatly from observing local government in such a hands-on way.” Many students attended the City Council meeting, including several who arrived early to meet one-on-one with City Council President Tony Yarber and Mayor Harvey Johnson. Chris Bell, B.A. 2013, suggested to the mayor that more be done to offer employment opportunities for college graduates in the Jackson area. As a result of Bell’s suggestion, a city-wide Talent Retention Career Fair 46
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was held in April to inform recent college graduates about jobs in the metro area. In order to help students better understand how government works, members of the City Council periodically paused their official business to explain to members of the audience, especially students, the history and implications of their deliberations. The Council outlined, for example, the process required by the U.S. Department of Justice for re-drawing Jackson’s precinct boundaries following the most recent national census. Millsaps student Grace Williams, B.A. 2013, noted the educational value of the Council meeting: “As a typically idealistic liberal arts college student, I have found it easy to dismiss local and state leadership, but getting to see the Council in action helped me realize the complexities of the political process in a more tangible way than I had before.” Recent public forums at Millsaps have further connected the College with the community and have helped establish Millsaps as a place for serious reflection on important matters of public concern. A Nov. 30, 2012 discussion entitled “Celebrating Education Reform: Thirty Years Later” included former Gov. William Winter; members of his staff known collectively as the “Boys of Spring,” including Dick Molpus, John Henegan, David Crews, and Andy Mullins; and Charles Overby, The Clarion Ledger editor whose work covering the Act resulted in a Pulitzer Prize for the paper. Overby, a 2012 Millsaps honorary degree recipient, returned to campus on April 15 to moderate a panel “The Future of Newspa-
Gov. William Winter
FEATURE
The spring semester 2013 saw a series of events and discussions at Millsaps focused on race. Guided by the College’s commitment to reflecting on important social issues, these conversations have also informed elements of the College’s strategic plan that aim to better understand and promote diversity on campus. Recent special events include: • The annual MLK Day celebration held in conjunction with Tougaloo College. Alumnus Judge James Graves was the featured speaker. • Millsaps alumnus, Vassar College professor, and author, Kiese Laymon, who was hosted with Jackson State University, for the two-day series entitled “Necessary Tension,” which focused on race, art, and identity on college campuses. • A screening Booker’s Place, a film that examined the injustices experienced by black people in the
Kiese Laymon
Mississippi Delta during the 1960s. • The Dunbar Lecture in Philosophy by Yale University’s Dr. Tamar Gendler, who spoke on the topic, “The Costs of Unintentional Racial Bias.”
MLK Day Program
• The Ross Moore History Lecture by financial historian Gene Dattel, who spoke on the topic, “Cotton and Race: What Mississippians Need to Know about American History.”
• A discussion of The Political Thought of Frederick Douglass: In Pursuit of American Liberty with the book’s author Dr. Nicholas Buccola of Linfield College. • The Rabbi Perry Nussbaum Lecture given by Myrlie Evers, wife of civil rights leader Medgar Evers.
In July, Millsaps professors Suzanne Marrs and Stephanie Rolph will host two one-week workshops for eighty school teachers focused on the year 1963 in Jackson, Mississippi, particularly the murder of civil rights leader Medgar Evers and its aftermath. The “One Time, One Place” program is part of the Landmarks of American History and Culture Workshop for School Teachers and is sponsored by the National Endowment for the Humanities.
pers: The Clarion Ledger’s Pulitzer Prize 30 Years Later,” a discussion that featured Fred Anklam, operations editor of USA Today; Bill Nichols, managing editor of Politico; Ronnie Agnew, executive director of Mississippi Public Broadcasting; Brian Tolley, executive editor of The Clarion-Ledger; Rick Cleveland, executive director of the Mississippi Sports Hall of Fame; and Pat Thompson, director of student media at the University of Mississippi. Millsaps public forums such as these will be expanded in the future in part because of the generosity of an anonymous alumni couple who recently established a $100,000 endowment in honor of Elise and William Winter. The gift, held at the Community Foundation of Greater Jackson, was made following the muchcelebrated November education reform public forum. In his introductory remarks at that November education reform discussion, Winter noted, “What more appropriate place to gather for a discussion of education than Millsaps College? You have been an intellectual oasis in Mississippi for a long time—and have provided an inspiration to many of us at times when the lights were flickering out there and we were wondering if Mississippi was going to survive the sixties. But we did, thanks to you and your predecessors. We are indebted to you: the students, faculty,
and alumni of Millsaps College.” Later in the forum, the panelists charged the audience not only to celebrate past victories but also to explore how the public spiritedness that produced the 1982 Act can be more fully and finally realized today. An alumni couple in the audience took Winter’s comments and the panel’s charge to heart. The Elise & William Winter Speaker Series honors the spirit and determination of Elise and William Winter in their decades-long fight for a better Mississippi and will help ensure that Millsaps can continue and expand opportunities for students, Jackson citizens, community leaders, and others to discuss together matters of public significance. “Millsaps College is deeply grateful to the donors for establishing a fund that will help ensure continued success of our public forums and that will reinforce a key component of our strategic plan Across the Street and Around the Globe: Partnerships and Influence at Millsaps College,” Pearigen said. “We at Millsaps believe that our location in the heart of the capital city provides us with the opportunity and responsibility to bring important topics and speakers to the public’s attention. We’re especially pleased and honored to have our name linked with that of Elise and William Winter through this major gift to the Community Foundation.”
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MAJOR SPORTS MAJOR SPORTS
Millsaps Majors compete in the NCAA College World Series for the first time.
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he Millsaps Majors baseball team capped its most successful season ever with a first: a trip to the Division III NCAA College World Series in Appleton, Wis. The experience was awe-inspiring, despite the team’s 2-1 loss to the Southern Maine Huskies and a 5-2 loss to the Ithaca Bombers, said baseball coach Jim Page, B.S. 1986. “I was devastated to lose the first game 2-1 in 10 innings,” he said. “We were so close. It was the most painful loss I’ve ever had, but the overall experience was so strong. As we hugged and the tears flowed after the game, there was a sense of accomplishment, a pride in doing something that no one else had done here. The emotions were mixed, but a life-time of memories were made this season.” The College World Series appearance provided a fitting end to a year marked by a series of individual and team accomplishments. En route to the World Series, the Majors defeated conference rival BirminghamSouthern College in the Southern Athletic Association championship series. Game 1 of the conference championship series featured a wild, 13-inning thriller that the Majors won on a suicide squeeze by Jerrod Myers driving in William Chenoweth in the bottom of the 13th inning. Late-game heroics continued into the NCAA South Regional in Millington, Tenn. where the Majors faced a series of tough opponents for the opportunity to advance to the College World Series. The Majors defeated Salisbury University in the South Regional championship game with a walk-off single by Isaac Glenn in the bottom of the ninth inning. With runners on first and second, two outs, and a 1-2 count, Glenn fouled off
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a couple of tough pitches before he found a pitch to drive into left-center field for the win and for a spot in the World Series. Page said he expects team members will push themselves in their individual workouts in preparation for next season, make fall practice more intense, and be extra ready to compete, all because of their experience this season that culminated in the College World Series. “I know it’s going to happen,” he said. The team’s success this season came from the way it pulled together, Page said. “We won a lot of nail-bitters, extrainning games, and come-from-behind games. Sometimes it was because of the top of the order, sometimes the bottom of the order. Sometimes it was because of the starting pitching, and sometimes it was because of the outfielders.” In addition to the team’s success, several Majors were recognized this season for their individual accomplishments on and off the field. Stephen Gates and Kevin Wall were named to the Region’s All-Academic Team. Wall was also selected for the SAA All-Sportsmanship Team and was named All-American Honorable Mention. Keith Shumaker was named SecondTeam All-American, South Regional Player of the Year, and SAA Player of the Year. Wes Perkins received First-Team All-
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American honors, and Stephen Gates was selected Third-Team All-American. Coach Page, who has won over 600 games in his 25 years as coach at Millsaps, was named SAA Coach of the Year. Page suggested that the Majors’ World Series appearance validates what many at Millsaps have known for a long time, namely, that Millsaps appeals to players who want to compete on a national level and be in a solid academic setting. “Our guys want the best baseball program and a great education that will set them up for the rest of their lives, and that’s what they get,” he said. While in Wisconsin, Page said he heard repeatedly from the team’s host family to conference officials about how much respect team members showed for others. “While there was the devastation of a loss, we left a lasting impression on the people of Appleton, Wis. I don’t know if it gets any better. Next year we will do that again and try to bring home the trophy.” The Majors ended the season with a 38-14 record and ranked No. 8 in the nation. BY KENNETH TOWNSEND
MAJOR SPORTS
Majors golf team notches back-to-back tournament wins.
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ust three seasons ago, the Millsaps Majors’ men’s golf team rated an unimpressive No. 230 in the National Collegiate Athletic Association golf rankings. And last year, there was just one female golfer at Millsaps. Millsaps Majors head golf coach Eddie Brescher knew he faced challenges when he took over two years ago, but he rallied around one goal. “I just want to make sure our players have a great college golf experience,” he said. Brescher has watched that happen. The men’s program has risen to No. 37 in the NCAA golf rankings and boasted two top-five golfers in the nation during the course of the 2012-2013 season. The Majors won their own tournament, the Millsaps Collegiate, for the second straight year, the first time since 1992-1993 the Majors have had back-to-back seasons with a win. The women now field a full team of golfers. Freshman Lauren Durbin recorded the College’s first win ever at the Hal Sutton Intercollegiate when she fired a 73 in the final round to force a play-off, which she won on the first hole. She recorded the school’s first hole-in-one at the Rhodes Collegiate. Lauren Barattini, the lone golfer last year, shot an 84 at the Southern Athletic Association Championships, her best round to date. Brescher had a simple philosophy to his approach: good facilities, good instruction, and good competition. He established a relationship with Deerfield Country Club in Madison County, where the Majors call home. Each golfer spends 10-15 hours a week practicing.
Next year, the men will field 12 golfers for six travel spots. Golf is such a fluid game that success one week doesn’t mean there will be success in the next. “I want to establish friendly competition between my players, to constantly push each other and get better as a result," Brescher said. The Majors host just one tournament out of 18 each year, so travel is a must. Brescher prepares his players week in and week out for tournament play by making no travel spot a guarantee. Brescher knows a thing or two about tournament play. He teed it up for Division I Southeast Louisana before turning pro. Brescher spent two seasons on the National Golf Association and Adams Golf tours. Unlike the PGA tour where the money comes mostly from sponsors, the NGA tour operates like a poker tournament, and golfers play to win back fees. If a golfer is in the top half of players at the end of the second round, he makes the cut and is “in the money.” Miss the cut, and the golfer will pay his entry fee. From that experience, Brescher knows how to instill a champion mentality in his players. “It comes back to the fluidity of golf,” Brescher said. “Success is not guaranteed shot to shot, let alone round to round. Our players understand that and my job is to get consistent success.” With men’s golf rising 200 spots in the polls in just two years and women’s golf winning tournaments, success for Millsaps golf is becoming the norm. BY DAN GRIFFIN
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Millsaps Majors show what a force they are during spring season.
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t was not just the Majors’ baseball team that made it known during the spring 2013 season that they will be a force to be reckoned with in the newly formed Southern Athletic Association (SAA). The Majors’ softball team stormed through the SAA Tournament. Millsaps defeated Birmingham-Southern College (BSC) 8-4 to win the tournament. The Majors defeated host school Centre College, top seed Berry College, and BSC twice. Senior pitcher Emily Collins was named tournament MVP after posting a 0.91 earned run average (ERA) over 23 innings. The Majors’ team ERA was 1.50. Juniors Kaitlyn Doles and Caroline Thompson were named to the All-Tournament team. Doles led the tournament with seven runs driven in and five runs scored, and her three-run home run led the Majors to the title series. Thompson led the tournament with seven hits over five games and hit a sizzling .545 with runners on base. The Majors’ Abbie Joiner made First Team All-Conference after hitting .314 during the season and playing gold-glove caliber defense. Joiner made just two errors in center field and had three outfield assists. The Majors placed six players on the All-Conference team. Millsaps’ lacrosse teams have made great strides this season as well. Men’s lacrosse made the conference quarterfinals as it wrapped up the most successful season in program history. Hunter Stevison led all attackers in the conference with 40 goals, including 10 in a win over Oglethorpe, and goaltender Chris Hood led the confer-
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ence in saves. The Majors placed four players on the All-Conference team. The women’s team also posted the most wins in program history and earned a spot in the conference semifinals. First Team All-Conference Jamie Blair Page led the conference, recording 79 points over the 14 games. Midfielder Sarah Hawthorne also earned First Team All-Conference status after leading the team in caused turnovers and ground balls. The Majors placed seven players on the All-Conference teams and enjoyed the first winning year in school history. The Majors men’s and women’s tennis teams also enjoyed their best seasons in recent history. The men’s tennis team posted the first winning record since 2007. The Majors were led by senior and SAA player of the year Malte Schick, who went undefeated in conference play and faced each school’s best player. Fellow senior Adam Tilly, named First Team All-Conference, went 5-1 in the conference, and joined Schick in a perfect 6-0 in doubles. The Millsaps’ women’s team also enjoyed a winning campaign, the first since 2006. Sophomore Deena Li Kam Wa from Mauritius went undefeated this season, going a perfect 17-0 and 6-0 in conference and earning First Team All-Conference honors. Junior Callie Creekmore went 14-4 in the regular season and 5-1 in conference, earning her Second Team honors. Creekmore and Li Kam Wa teamed up to go 16-1 as a doubles pair. Millsaps track and field earned fourth-place finishes on both the men’s and women’s side, and won a combined 15 medals, at the SAA Conference Championships hosted by Sewanee. The Majors were headlined by track and field Captain Kasey Laird, who earned a pair of gold medals when she won the discus and shot put. BY DAN GRIFFIN
Photo by Methodist Specialty Care Center
MAJOR SPORTS
Robby Scucchi, Jorrick Battle, Samantha Perez, and Elizabeth Sigafose
Majors are winners on and off the basketball court.
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he Millsaps Majors women’s basketball team believes in paying it forward. Every season the team spends its off-day afternoons visiting with residents at Methodist Specialty Care Center in Flowood, a division of Methodist Rehabilitation Center in Jackson. Millsaps students Elizabeth Sigafose and Samantha Perez were recognized for their efforts—and those of their teammates—and also Millsaps student Jorrick Battle earlier this year. Sigafoose, Perez, and Battle were recipients of Methodist Specialty Care Center’s Outstanding Volunteer Award for 2013. “Each of the recipients of the award has provided services to not only improve the lives of residents in the facility, but have individually given many hours to help with filing in the office, addressing and stuffing birthday cards for staff and volunteers each month, helping out with other non-profit events outside of Select Specialty Care, while still mantaining a hectic school schedule,” said Robby Scucchi, volunteer director at the center. Women’s basketball head coach Chuck Winkelman said the team’s work with the center is important. “When I talk about service and being a part of something bigger than oneself, I get more excited with the team’s success doing something like this than anything it does on court. This is a part of the DNA within our
program.” Sigafoose has volunteered at the center ever since former Majors teammate Janice Okeke, B.S. 2012, encouraged teammates to do so. Sigafoose, in turn, suggested her teammates make time for visits with residents at the center. Teammates Perez, Lovie Love, Beverly Holmes, and Miah Brooks joined Sigafoose. The team members got to know residents at the center by talking with them about movies, sports, and other topics of the day. They also spoke about playing for the Majors, which led to heated debates about their favorite NBA teams. Many of the residents are sports fans, and there is hope they will be able to attend a Millsaps game next season. Methodist Specialty Care Center is Mississippi’s first residential facility designed for the severely disabled. The 60-bed facility serves individuals with a variety of medical conditions ranging from severe brain or spinal cord injuries to diseases such as ALS or cerebral palsy. Each resident receives his or her choice of an iPad, a laptop, or a desktop computer that is customized according to need to facilitate communication with friends and family. BY DAN GRIFFIN
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Rev. Lisa Garvin, 1993
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Former Millsaps chaplain and alumna of the College journeys into the hearts and minds of students at Emory.
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look on all the world as my parish,” John Wesley famously said. And it is from that perspective that the Rev. Lisa Garvin, B.A.1993, former Millsaps chaplain and now associate dean of the chapel and religious life at Emory University, journeys not only into the hearts and minds of students on campus but also into some of the most strife-torn regions of the globe. For instance, central to her Emory role is Journeys of Reconciliation, in which participants can witness on foreign soil stories of pain, liberation, hope, and healing—and seek wisdom outside university walls. A recent tour of Israel, Jordan, and the Palestinian territories produced a meeting with President Jimmy Carter, an Emory University distinguished professor. “He encouraged us to be proactive in sharing the stories we heard and encouraged us to communicate with President Barack Obama,” said Garvin, a Millsaps trustee. “We copied Secretary of State John Kerry on that letter, which we wrote as a group.” One faculty member kept a blog for Emory’s Atlanta neighbor CNN. That the Hattiesburg native’s interest in world affairs would intersect with her religious vocation seems natural. After all, she was the first Millsaps student to graduate with a degree in European Studies, introduced in 1991. “I can remember in the fourth grade writing essays on the Soviet Union and being fascinated with communism in general,” she said. “The Berlin Wall came down while I was a freshman at Millsaps. Communism fell. The Soviet Union collapsed. When they developed the European studies degree, that program allowed me to intertwine my original major, history, and political science and explore all that was happening globally at that time, from Eastern Europe to the first Gulf War.” “As a teenager Lisa always talked about becoming president of the United States,” said her childhood friend and Millsaps roommate Leigh Ann Cox Travis, B.A. 1993. “But those of us who knew her well had a feeling that her life would take a spiritual path.” Garvin admitted that she actively resisted the call
to ministry during her years at Millsaps. “I knew her as a very serious and thoughtful, probing student, but I did not have the feeling that here was a person who was working through her own understanding of the Christian faith,” said the Rev. T.W. Lewis, B.A. 1953, professor emeritus of religious studies, who would become a mentor and close friend. Although Garvin’s attraction to global politics might have put her on track to joining the diplomatic or foreign press corps, her Millsaps thesis on Christianity in Russia—“which essentially focused on ways in which the church was exploding there”—may have been a clue to her destiny. Immediately after graduating from Millsaps, Garvin attended law school for one year. Serious soul-searching must have followed, because it was not until six years later that she enrolled at Candler School of Theology at Emory, receiving a Master of Divinity degree. It was a milestone for the College when the Rev. Don Fortenberry, B.A. 1962, whose long tenure at Millsaps was intricately woven into its progressive identity, announced his retirement in 2005. And thus it came to pass that just as Garvin, had been Millsaps’s first European studies major, she was also to become its first female chaplain. Fortenberry has been an enthusiastic witness to Garvin’s spiritual evolution. “When Lisa was a member of the Campus Ministry Team at Millsaps, a large, student-led organization that coordinated much of the campus ministry program, there was a kind of studied, contemplative style that would blossom into the competent, progressive, justice-sensitive and globally aware person she is today,” he said. “She is a jewel now in a setting that will allow those qualities to shine. It is a gift to have worked with her.” For Garvin, who gives faithfully to the Annual Fund each year and has donated to the College a life insurance policy, following Fortenberry must have been daunting. “She did an admirable job of coming in after this man who was so beloved and meant so much to so many people,” Lewis said. “She was the first woman to occupy the position. Lisa established herself as a woman who was effective in the position, making it more accessible to the next woman who came along.” That turned out to be Rwth Ashton, who served from 2009 until 2012. It may have been Lewis’s New Testament course that lit the fire of faith in Garvin’s heart. “I loved my class with T.W., and I still refer back to the journal I had to keep,” Garvin said. “In the opening entry, I acknowledge my apprehension about studying the
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Bible academically, rather than through the lens of faith. I had some fear of what that said about the validity of the faith that I held so dear. But T.W.’s comments challenged me to consider, What is it that determines validity or would make some things not valid?” According to Lewis, that course “pushed students into scripture and dialogue with scripture,” as well as with others in class. “It got students to go more deeply into their understanding of the text. Lisa had thoughtful, probing responses to what she had heard and what she had read.” In one journal entry, Garvin pondered whether God called people to work in areas other than ministry, such as law or politics—those secular fields that so strongly attracted her at the time. “T.W. didn’t let on in his comments to me, but I suspect he knew, even then, that I’d eventually end up in ministry,” she said. In another, she reflected on a Summers Lecture that focused on homosexuality and the church. “I vividly remember that day, which included a panel discussion,” she said. “What I did not remember is my own mind opening up on the ordination of homosexuals. As a college chaplain, at Millsaps and at Emory, I’ve spent a lot of time talking with and walking with gay and lesbian students, some of whom have been called to ordained ministry.” Garvin likes to challenge boundaries. She and Dr. Darby Ray, former professor of religious studies, conceived 1 Campus 1 Community, a nationally recognized program designed to bring the College community out from behind its gates. “Her commitment to social justice and community engagement was central to her identity, and that commitment was essential to the development of IC1C,” said Ray, director of a community engagement program at Bates College in Maine. Ray said 1C1C, which reaches out to the off-campus community
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to develop mutually beneficial relationships and projects, “has grown into a highly regarded program that is front and center to Across the Street and Around the Globe, the College’s strategic plan.” While Garvin may gravitate toward community and global action, she also knows how to connect on a deeply personal basis. “One Millsaps student who will always be dear to me is John Forrest Douglas,” she said, “who I think knew as a student that ministry was his vocation, and that led us to many heart-to-heart conversations.” Douglas can testify to her impact on his life. “Lisa was a very important mentor to me while I was discerning my own calling to the ministry,” said Douglas, 28, a 2007 graduate with a degree in religious studies. “Faith was a struggle for me during college. I felt blessed that Lisa was always there with an open door, willing to talk to me about whatever theological crisis I was having. She never gave cheap, easy answers to hard questions, but rather she modeled openness and acceptance. Lisa is now more than my mentor; she is my dear friend.” So dear, in fact, that Garvin participated in Douglas’s April ordination in Washington, D.C. His first pastorate will be in Long Beach, Calif. “It’s interesting,” Garvin said. “If you’d asked me about meaningful moments and places where I would have had impact, I don’t always remember the specifics. You often in this work don’t know the kind of impact you’re having. You’re just with people. You journey with them. You don’t know what kind of influence you’re having, but you’re just being there.” Being there, indeed, from war-torn areas of the Middle East to the Millsaps Bowl. “Theologically, God is always with us,” she said, “and as clergy we represent that in a tangible way.”
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Alumni Experience in Yucatán We invite you to join us for an alumni adventure in Merida, Yucatán on November 8-14, 2013. Merida is located in the northern part of the Yucatán Peninsula, about 20 miles from the Gulf of Mexico. This seven-day trip includes spacious accommodations at Casa Millsaps (casamillsapsmerida.com), a tour of Uxmal, a tour of Millsaps College Kaxil Kiuic Biocultural Reserve, a day of cooking authentic cuisine, and time for exploring Merida. Contact the Office of Alumni Relations at 601-974-1031 or alumni@millsaps.edu to reserve your space. There is a 10 person minimum to make the trip. The cost per participant is $1,650, which does not include air fare.
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Photo by Texas Medical Center
ALUMNI
Dr. Bobby Robbins, 1979
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Alumnus leads world’s largest medical center as president and chief executive officer.
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hen Dr. Bobby Robbins, B.S. 1979, was coming of age in a small south Mississippi town, he dreamed of a career in football. As quarterback for his high school football team, he longed to play for the University of Mississippi and then, of course, turn pro. “Growing up in Ellisville, my role models were my sports coaches and teammates,” the Millsaps College trustee said. “But I injured my knee, and that gave me time to reflect on what I was going to do with the rest of my life.” As it turns out, the young man did indeed turn pro but in a non-athletic field: he became a consummate professional in scrubs instead of shoulder pads and with a scalpel instead of a football. So widely admired is his professionalism that he has been named president and chief executive officer of the largest medical center in the world, the Texas Medical Center in Houston. A renowned cardiothoracic surgeon, Robbins is sought out by colleagues at medical centers around the world for advice on treating complex cardiac diseases. You can’t rise much higher in the ranks of medicine, and Robbins credits Millsaps with instilling in him the discipline to survive medical school and embark on his astonishing career. “Millsaps’ level of an all-doctoral faculty, the rigor of its curriculum, the small classes, and the challenging, comprehensive atmosphere of the College prepared me well for the work we did in medical school,” said Robbins, whose résumé includes two years as a clinical associate at the National Institutes of Health and six months as a postdoctoral fellow in cardiothoracic transplantation at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. Robbins said the formidable trio of Dr. James P. McKeown, professor emeritus of biology, Dr. George Ezell, professor emeritus of chemistry, and Dr. Al Berry, the late professor emeritus of chemistry, left an indelible impression on his young mind, adding that Dr. McKeown “set the benchmark” for the expectations Millsaps students would have to meet
to excel in medical school. “Well I’d say he set the benchmark for me,” McKeown responded with a laugh. “He was just a wonderful student not only to have in class but also to be with outside of class. He wanted to be challenged. It was fun to see those students do things they didn’t think they were capable of doing. All of a sudden they fall in love with the challenge. They learn to love learning and form a camaraderie among themselves and with the faculty, as well.” Among Robbins’ comrades in Millsaps’ pre-med Class of 1979 were Dr. David Hassell, a Mobile radiologist, and Dr. Samuel Crosby, director of a family practice in Hattiesburg. They attended the University of Mississippi School of Medicine together and have remained friends since. “Dr. McKeown, Dr. Ezell, and Dr. Berry, who was then chair of the chemistry department, were just incredible professors,” Robbins said. “They instilled in us the culture and expectations of how hard you needed to work in medical school, and instilled habits that carried forward into medical school.” Carry forward they did. After receiving an M.D. from the University of Mississippi Medical Center, Robbins completed his general surgery internship and residency there, going on to a cardiothoracic surgery residency at Stanford University, where he was chief resident. He completed postdoctoral fellowships in pediatric congenital heart surgery at Emory University in Atlanta and Royal Children’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. Robbins said that since his years at the College its pre-med numbers had remained steady at between 20 and 30 students. “I think the whole pre-med curriculum is outstanding,” Robbins said. “I don’t know what the specific requirements are now, but when I was there we were already ahead of the curve.” For instance, he said Dr. Timothy J. Ward, associate dean of the sciences and professor of chemistry, had been aggressive in helping the College win the kinds of grants that lead to opportunities for student research. In May 2012, Millsaps received a $1.4 million grant from the prestigious Howard Hughes Medical Institute to redesign its science curriculum. The new curriculum is designed to
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increase the number of students interested in a pre-medical education and to deepen scientific training for all students. “Our interdisciplinary classes will teach undergraduates how to apply knowledge from one science discipline to another, which is essential for a successful medical career,” Ward said. “We will be educating future physicians so they will be able to think from a number of perspectives and treat patients holistically.” Robbins said the many perspectives from which Millsaps encouraged him to view the world helped shape the scope of his life’s work. “Not only was my time at Millsaps focused on its rigorous pre-med curriculum, but completing the broad, true liberal arts program prepared me for a large worldview and helped me in my interactions with people, to be a critical thinker, and to consider many different viewpoints,” he said. “The Friday seminars brought in people from all over the world—including former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Dr. Henry Jay Heimlich, inventor of the Heimlich maneuver, who talked about what it meant to be a good citizen of the world. I especially remember a symposium on altruism. It was a rich environment that helps me even today.” Leadership often emerged as a theme of those seminars, and if Millsaps emphasized leadership, then Robbins has lived out that ideal to the fullest. At the helm of the Texas Medical Center, he oversees more than 50 medical institutions, including 15 hospitals, three medical schools, four nursing schools, and schools of dentistry, public health, pharmacology, and
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other health-related fields. Before being named to his current post, he directed Stanford University’s heart-lung and lung transplantation programs, as well as its cardiothoracic transplantation laboratory. Robbins has pioneered research in stem cell therapy for the treatment of congestive heart failure, in genetic determinants of disease, in personalized medicine in which treatments are tailored to each patient’s genetic profile, and in regenerative medicine in which blood vessels are engineered and grown. But as much as Robbins advocates biotechnological advances in medicine, he is also devoted to the human factor. “It’s important as we get to be more high-tech, as we rely more on MRI’s and genetic tests, that we take the time to listen to patients,” he said. “They want to know what limitations they will have in their lives. I think that takes sitting down and listening to a patient's story.” Roberts’s own story includes his 28-year marriage to attorney Debra Mullen, a Jackson native and graduate of Mississippi State University, and their sons Craig, a freshman at the University of Mississippi, and Clay, a junior at Dartmouth College. And as for those long-ago Ellisville dreams of football? Robbins’s son Clay is a wide receiver for Dartmouth College. BY JOHN WEBB, FREELANCE WRITER
THE OFFICE OF ALUMNI AND PARENT RELATIONS WOULD LIKE YOU TO
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the NOV.
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MILLSAPS MAJORS VS. BERRY VIKINGS Mark your calendars now for Homecoming Weekend, November 1-3, 2013. Reunions will be held for the classes of ’63, ’68, ’73, ’78, ’83, ’88, ’93, ’98, ’03, and ’08. Homecoming 2013 Alumni Board Sponsors are: Teresa Bailey & Tom Hamrick (1963) • Eugene Countiss & Tom Murrey (1968) Sarah Neville Darsey & Whit Waide (1973) • Faith Cotton & Cord Campbell (1978) Alan Ferguson & Susan Frazier (1983) • Tom Shima & Chris Cheek (1988) Alan Neuhoff & Elizabeth Black (1993) • Ryan Beckett & Kirk Kinard (1998) Brooks Brower & Brittani Johnson (2003) • Chris Spear & Cree Cantrell (2008)
FOR MORE INFORMATION, CONTACT US AT ALUMNI@MILLSAPS.EDU Millsaps Magazine | Summer 2013
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Cindy Griffin, 1982
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M.B.A. graduate applies business sense to Habitat for Humanity.
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hen Cindy Griffin was working on her M.B.A at Millsaps College, she knew the skills she was learning would someday be important to a successful career in business, but she had no idea that business success would be measured in smiles rather than profits. Griffin, M.B.A. 1982, is executive director of the metro Jackson affiliate of Habitat for Humanity, a nonprofit, ecumenical Christian housing ministry. She does all the business tasks of a construction and financial operation—planning and organizing, setting priorities, managing construction, securing financing, making loans, but she also gets to watch volunteers build a house together and experience a family’s excitement when they move into a quality, safe home of their own for the first time. “We’re a multi-faceted operation. First, we’re a construction company as well as a mortgage company because we build the homes and finance them through a zero-interest mortgage.” said Griffin. “We are a public relations firm and a volunteer-driven organization requiring us to raise public awareness for support. Ultimately though, we are a ministry moving families out of substandard housing and empowering them through successful homeownership. We call it ‘love in action.’” Griffin uses the managerial and critical thinking skills taught in her M.B.A. classes to ensure the affiliate is financially healthy and able to sustain itself and to keep abreast of trends in mortgage lending, the construction industry, and the housing market. “At Millsaps my studies were case-based and that was invaluable in preparing me to think critically, make decisions, and analyze projects,” she said. “Habitat for Humanity/Metro Jackson is an independent affiliate, and we have to raise our budget locally every year through fundraising projects, donations, grants, and in non-traditional ways such as new market tax credit transactions.” Dr. Walter Neely, professor of finance at Millsaps who taught Griffin in both 1980 and 1981, recalls her as a committed student and that she and her husband were members of the College’s first M.B.A.
class. “She works with banks like BancorpSouth and BankPlus in obtaining funding from the Federal Home Loan Bank of Dallas,” he said. “Making the cases for grants and loans is one of those things she is good at. In our M.B.A program, we focus on making the case for proper financing decisions in concert with the overall goals of the organization.” Griffin isn’t just about business decisions, Neely said. “She seems to care as much about the individuals she helps to provide new homes for as she cares about the overall Habitat organization,” he said. Habitat first captured Griffin’s heart during a presentation at her church, Northminster Baptist in Jackson, and she became a volunteer. “My first job was digging a foundation trench for a house,” she said. She credits her M.B.A. with opening the door in 2000 for her to become the Jackson affiliate’s director of special projects, a job that included property acquisition, grant administration, loan originations, fundraising, publicity for special events, media relations, board development, and Web page management. “I had been a stay-at-home mom for 18 years. Having an M.B.A. on my résumé made people look at me in a more serious light,” Griffin said. She has a bachelor’s in marketing from Louisiana State University and had worked as a district sales manager responsible for multi-branch and multi-state management for an electronic parts wholesaler. Recalling her time at Millsaps, Cindy praises the critical-thinking skills she garnered from favorite professors that include Neely and then Else School Dean Jerry Whitt. Griffin became executive director in 2005 and currently serves as vice chair of the U.S. Advisory Council to the Habitat for Humanity International Board of Directors, and chair of the U.S. Finance and Resource Development Committee. “All the roads that led me here prepared me for this work,” she said. She had been executive director for only six months when Hurricane Katrina hit, pushing the Jackson affiliate into rebuilding in Hancock County. The Jackson affiliate was the only Habitat of any size and capacity as well as the only one with electricity between Jackson and the Gulf Coast. “Three days after the hurricane I was watching Millsaps Magazine | Summer 2013
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CNN and the ticker tape across the bottom of the screen said, ‘If you want to help call…’ and it gave the Habitat for Humanity/Metro Jackson number,” she said. “We were launched in a big way into the rebuilding effort. That took this organization to the next level, and I’m proud of the role we were able to play in that rebuilding.” From 2005-2007, while maintaining its core community work in Jackson, the affiliate led the effort in the construction of 70 houses in Hancock County as part of rebuilding after Hurricane Katrina. Oprah Winfrey’s Angel Network joined in the efforts. “We carried out two one-week, 18-house blitzes in Jackson funded by NBA All-Star and Boston Celtics forward Kevin Garnett through the Angel Network,” she said. “These homes were for Katrina survivors wanting to relocate to Jackson.” “Housing is such a basic need that it has been at the center of every community crisis in recent years,” she said. “Families can’t succeed if they don’t have a good place to live.” In addition to her work renewing communities ravaged by Katrina, Griffin has witnessed numerous milestones for Habitat. In 2011, the Jackson affiliate held an event celebrating its 25th anniversary, commemorating the 500th house built in the Jackson community, and honoring Mrs. Elise Winter, a friend of Millsaps and one of the Jackson affiliate’s founding members. The Jackson affiliate is ranked 21st overall out of 1,356 affiliates nationwide. Since its establishment, the affiliate’s approach has grown even more strategic. “At first, we worked primarily in the Midtown neighborhood. Based on this successful model of neighborhood revitalization, the affiliate expanded its work to multiple challenged neighborhoods around the city,” she said. The affiliate’s most recent and largest project to date transformed Englewood Gardens, a west Jackson neighborhood that had become an unofficial dumping ground, with the addition of 27 new houses. “Englewood Gardens is the model for neighborhood transformation,” she said. “Habitat for Humanity/Metro Jackson affects change by reclaiming abandoned derelict properties and creating tax revenue through homeownership. The affiliate also creates public safety by putting legitimate eyes on the street and neighborhood. The homeowners are paying a mortgage and building a net worth, which is life-changing for families.” The affiliate is no longer focusing only on building houses from the ground up, but is also doing critical repairs of homes in existing neighborhoods that it serves. “The repair program follows the same empowerment model as our home owner-
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ship and requires the resident to put in sweat equity and contribute financially,” she said. “We can do a new roof, replace some windows, do siding repair. We see critical repairs as a way to deepen and broaden our impact on reducing substandard housing in challenged neighborhoods. You’ll see us doing that in a big way in 2013 and beyond.” Currently, more than 550 families in Jackson live in houses built by Habitat for Humanity/Metro Jackson. “We build 30-50 homes a year,” Griffin said. “What may be surprising is the economic impact the affiliate’s work has on our Jackson community. Every dollar donated to Habitat for Humanity/ Metro Jackson generates $1.70 into the local economy. Collectively, our work annually generates $9.5 million for the economy and creates more than 50 full-time equivalent jobs.” Founded in 1986, Habitat for Humanity/Metro Jackson still faces the common misperception that it’s a give-away program, Griffin said. Homeowners must invest time into building in their homes, attend classes about budgeting and do-it-yourself repairs and pay a 20- to 30-year, zero-interest mortgage. The Jackson affiliate’s foreclosure rate is less than 2 percent, a testament to its empowerment model. “Habitat for Humanity/Metro Jackson is a successful ministry for children and families as well as for our community because it has stayed true to its principles of putting ‘love in action,’ Griffin said. “In this ministry, when we build a roof we build hope for a brighter future. When we raise walls, we share in the joy that awaits our neighbors. When we say a prayer for the family in their new home, we find grace as we come together, united by a common belief that everyone deserves a decent place to live. I’m grateful for the skills that the Millsaps M.B.A. gave me to be a part of this beautiful work.”
BY NELL LINTON KNOX, B.A. 2010, AND NELL LUTER FLOYD
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THE MILLSAPS COLLEGE MBA AND EXECUTIVE MBA NEXT STOP, WHEREVER YOU WANT.
Located in Jackson, Mississippi, The Else School of Management at Millsaps College offers two distinct MBA programs taught by nationally ranked faculty. Let us help you continue your journey. For more information about the MBA or Executive MBA program at Millsaps College, visit millsaps.edu/mba. Millsaps Magazine | Summer 2013
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Dharius "Morshun" Daniels, 2001
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Former basketball player builds on life lessons gleaned at Millsaps and establishes a church that is thriving and growing.
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fter founding Kingdom Church in Ewing, N.J., in 2005, Dharius “Morshun” Daniels grew to realize the similarities between his mission and what he learned at his alma mater, Millsaps College. “It taught me how, in a real sense, to live in different worlds,” said Daniels, 33, who graduated from Millsaps in 2001 with a major in political science and a minor in religion. “I formed relationships with people from different countries. We were involved in multicultural affairs at Millsaps College every year. We had that type of diversity in such a small setting.” It’s that global experience and influence—a key emphasis in Millsaps’ strategic plan—that helped set into motion Daniels’ quest for church leadership and service. Daniels leads a non-denominational, multi-faceted ministry with a mission to be a “breath-taking, cuttingedge, faith-filled body of Christ followers,” its website, kcnj.org, says. “We wanted to create a culture that every age range could see themselves in, but we target the generation of 18-45,” Daniels explains. The 6,000 members of Kingdom Church are diverse—black, white, Hispanic, highly educated, middle to lower class, high school dropouts, and affluent professionals. “It’s a mixture of two worlds,” Daniels said of his church, where he serves as senior pastor. “We’re like a pot of gumbo. We have a little bit of everything.” Daniels said he knew as a Millsaps sophomore that he wanted to serve the church. However, he had no idea where that road would take him. “It was not until my senior year that I even decided to go to seminary. I didn’t even apply until my second semester,” said Daniels, a Kilmichael native who received a Master of Divinity degree from Princeton Theological Seminary after leaving Millsaps. His Millsaps family, Daniels said, gave him the encouragement he needed to take that step. Those supporters included then-basketball coach John Stroud, on
whose team Daniels played for four years. “During the season, when we’d have Sunday games, Coach Stroud would allow me to miss breakfast so that I could go to a local worship service,” Daniels said. “He was very encouraging to me when I decided to go to seminary.” Millsaps athletic director and head basketball coach Tim Wise was an assistant under Stroud when Daniels was on the team. “He went by his middle name—Morshun, or Shun,” Wise remembered. “His maturity was beyond his years, compared to most college kids then,” Wise said. “He had a sense of purpose about what he did. He certainly developed a calling to serve God through establishing a church. He had a devotion and a love for God and those in need, and he put their wants and needs and cares above his own.” One of his most important mentors at Millsaps, Daniels said, was religious studies professor Dr. Darby Ray. “She was the one who taught me an extremely important lesson,” Daniels said. In short, that lesson was: Don’t limit yourself. “I was considering going to a very theologically conservative school,” Daniels remembered. “Many people would have respected your choice there, but she said, ‘Dharius, it’s harder to go from narrow to wide than from wide to narrow.’ ” “That showed me that you don’t have to be this, or that. You can be this and that. You don’t have to be boxed in,” Daniels said. “That describes me. I speak at conventions, at other churches. Our church is a reflection of that diversity. That life lesson stuck.” Daniels’ other Millsaps activities also helped cement his faith and give him direction. A member of Alpha Phi Alpha fraternity, he joined the Black Student Association. “We formed a choir, and we recorded an album,” Daniels said. “My involvement in that choir was more than singing. It was very formative. I developed relationships with people who were very supportive of my decision to go to seminary.” Attending a top school such as Princeton Theological Seminary was daunting, Daniels said. But, he found himself prepared, thanks to the support and the breadth of education he received at Millsaps. “Dr. Iren Omo-Bare, my political science professor, was very challenging,” Daniels said. “I’d turn a paper
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in, and he’d say, ‘Dharius, this is good, but you can do better.’ He taught me not to settle on getting by.” Omo-Bare remembers Daniels as a studious researcher and writer. “I never knew him to give up his quest for an answer,” Omo-Bare said. “He evidenced a strong moral character and integrity, as well as high personal, academic, and professional values, which I suspect is serving him well in his position as a pastor,” Omo-Bare said. “He is a very engaging personality, which was reflected in his ability to get along with fellow classmates.” Daniels said he only had to show a Princeton professor his syllabus from Millsaps to be immediately waived from some classes. “The way we were taught on an undergraduate level at Millsaps was consistent with their graduate level,” he said. “The rigor at Millsaps positioned me to succeed.”
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Married and the father of two sons, Daniels has embarked on a building project for Kingdom Church, which attracted 1,500 to its first service and had to operate from a warehouse in its early days. He’s growing Kingdom Church not just physically, but spiritually through relationship building. “There are people from inner-city Trenton who have relationships with Ph.Ds from Princeton. Those two worlds may not have collided had they not been sitting in the same sanctuary,” Daniels said. “It would be my hope that, if I’m anything, I’m an example to my congregation. As Darby Ray told me, you don’t have to be this or that. You can be this and that.” BY RUTH CUMMINS, FREELANCE WRITER
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Alumni Association President: Chris Cheek When Chris Cheek’s son, a rising senior, became the third generation in his family to enroll in Millsaps College, it stirred a new emotion in the Bay St. Louis businessman. “It brought back to me the importance of what this school has done for me,” said Cheek, who earned his business administration degree from Millsaps in 1985, followed by his M.B.A. in 1989. “It made me want to reconnect with the school, and to give back to a school that has given so much to me.” Cheek got involved in alumni affairs and began to see the importance of keeping up that connection. On July 1, he begins a two-year term as president of the Millsaps College Alumni Association. Unlike at some colleges, all Millsaps graduates are automatically Alumni Asssociation members, and there is no membership fee. “Over the last few years, a really remarkable structure has been in the making to engage alumni in a more meaningful way to help the College grow, and to help it become more of what it can be, and more of what it should be,” Cheek said.
Among its pillars: Recruiting not just new Alumni Association members to become active in the association’s work, but communicating Millsaps’ message to the best and brightest high school students. “That’s what we’ll be doing,” Cheek said. “We're working with the recruitment office, and much of their efforts are beyond the three-state area. We’re working hand in hand with them.” Not just raising awareness and re-engaging alumni, but attracting more dollars to Millsaps is an association goal, Cheek said. A Jackson resident when he became a Millsaps student, Cheek served as a student senate member and joined Kappa Alpha fraternity. He also belonged to Omicron Delta Kappa. He remembers fondly two pivotal professors who taught him lessons he uses today as president of SentryCare Inc., a corporation he formed in 1993 to provide retirement living and long-term nursing care to senior citizens. “Dr. Walter Neely taught finance, and Dr. Carl Brooking taught quantitative management and economics,” Cheek said. “They had a way of teaching beyond the classroom, and beyond the textbook, into the real world. I still use, on a daily basis, what I learned from them.” “There’s so much that we as alumni can offer the College,” he said. “People need the platform to connect. We need to provide that format.”
Homecoming volunteer: Eugene Countiss Millsaps alumnus Eugene Countiss wants alumni to embrace their Millsaps legacy by making Homecoming an annual experience. “Millsaps is more than a part of your past, and you have a part to play in its future,” he said. Countiss is helping build a following for events such as Tailgating at the Tents during Homecoming, which is Nov. 1-3. In a survey after Homecoming 2012, alumni ranked Tailgating at the Tents as their favorite activity. Visitors and their families enjoy food, drink, music, and mingling with faculty and staff.
It is that input that is helping Countiss to breathe new life into the Homecoming ritual and to give alumni a forum for reconnecting with the College. “On Friday evening, we’ll have our annual alumni meeting where you’ll hear about the state of the College from our president, Dr. Rob Pearigen, and we’ll have an all-alumni reception immediately following,” said Countiss, B.A. 1970. Countiss is shepherding formation of reunion committees for each class. “Please contact the alumni office and tell them you’d like to be on your class committee,” he said. Countiss’ Millsaps ties are strong. His grandfather graduated from Millsaps, and so did his father. “This year, my son Christopher will become the fourth generation of the Countiss family to graduate from Millsaps,” said Countiss, who founded and owned Countiss Travels in New Orleans and is a manager with World Market.
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Recognized for their contributions to Millsaps College during the 2012 College Alumni Awards are from left, Lynne Pickett, B.A. 1965, who received on behalf of the Class of 1965 an award for the highest participation in annual giving; Teresa White Bailey, B.A. 1994, president of the Memphis Alumni Chapter, which was named Alumni Chapter of the Year; Luther Ott, B.A. 1971, Alumnus of the Year; Louise Chandler, B.A. 2005, Young Alumnus Award; the Rev. Deacon Jay Biedenharn, B.A. 2005, Young Alumnus Award; Maud DeLes Gober, B.S. Ed. 1984, Dr. Will Sorey, and Marti Sorey, Jim Livesay Award.
Recipients of 2012 College Alumni Awards are named. 2012 Millsaps Alumnus of the Year Luther Ott, B.A. 1971 Luther Ott, an Episcopal priest and lawyer known for his dedication to improving the community where he lives, was named the 2012 Millsaps College Alumnus of the Year. Ott, a 1971 graduate of Millsaps, earned a law degree from the University of Mississippi School of Law and practiced law for more than 20 years before he and his wife, Janet, 1970, returned to school to earn their Master of Divinity degrees at Episcopal Divinity School, Cambridge, Mass. Currently interim rector at the Chapel of the Cross in Madison, he has served as curate and assistant rector at St. Philip’s Episcopal Church in Jackson, rector of the Episcopal Church of the Creator in Clinton, and interim rector at St.
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Paul’s in Meridian and the Church of the Holy Trinity in Vicksburg. He was executive director of Stewpot Community Services, an interfaith social services agency in Jackson, from 1997 until 2002. Ott served on the Millsaps College Board of Trustees from 1991 until 2012, and was a member of the Development, Student Life, Investment, and Trustee Selection Committees. As chair of the Academic Affairs Committee, he worked to secure financial resources to develop and sustain distinctive and transformative programs, all with a rigorous appreciation for the College’s stated vision of excellence. His work in support of the 1 Campus 1 Community initiative and his efforts to grow the College’s international programs so that they embrace service learning have fostered the mission of the College in terms of good citizenship, good deeds, and a practical appreciation of service to others. Luther and Janet are the parents of two children, Luther S. Ott II, B.A. 1993, and Sara Katherine Ott Beckett, and grandparents of six.
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2012 Young Alumnus Award Louise Chandler, B.A. 2005 The Rev. Deacon Jay Biedenharn, B.A. 2005 Louise Chandler, an attorney, and her husband, The Rev. Deacon Jay Biedenharn, curate at Saint John’s Episcopal Church in Memphis, hold the top offices in the Millsaps Young Alumni Association in Memphis. She is founder and president, and he is vice president. Chandler, an associate attorney at the HF Law Group, PLLC in Memphis, received her B.A. in political science with a minor in art history in 2005. At Millsaps, she was active in student government and Chi Omega. She earned her J.D. at the University of Memphis in 2009, where she received the CALI Award in Torts, was a member of the Moot Court Board, and the Duberstein Bankruptcy Moot Court Competition Team. While in law school, she clerked for Judge John R. McCarroll, Circuit Court, Division 1, and served in an externship for Judges David S. Kennedy and Paulette J. Delk at the United States Bankruptcy Court, Western District of Tennessee. She is a member of numerous organizations related to her profession and is a pro bono volunteer with Memphis Area Legal Services and the Community Legal Center. She is a volunteer with the Junior League of Memphis and is active in its Girls, Inc. and GROW Memphis Placement programs. At Millsaps, Biedenharn majored in history, played varsity football, was an athletic trainer, and a member of Kappa Alpha. He received his Master of Divinity from Candler School of Theology at Emory University in 2008 and was a licensed pastor on the Walnut Charge of the New Albany District, Mississippi Conference of the United Methodist Church from 2008 until 2010. He became a postulate for holy orders in the Episcopal Church in 2011, was ordained a deacon in 2012, and has held the curacy at Saint John’s since June.
Jim Livesay Award Winners
The Jim Livesay Award honors the spirit of commitment in which Jim Livesay (1920–2001) served the College as an alumnus, a member of the College administration, and as a volunteer.
Maud DeLes Gober Lancaster, B.S.Ed. 1984
lege Alumni Board. She served on the Parents Council for six years, the Alumni Board for five years, was a member of the recent Presidential Search Committee and is the founder and coordinator of Tasting at the Tents, a Homecoming event. At Millsaps, she was active in Kappa Delta, Omicron Delta Kappa and Sigma Lambda. She was selected homecoming queen for two years and was the Major’s Lady her senior year. She majored in elementary education and graduated cum laude. She met her husband, Ken, B.B.A. 1984, now vice president at Trustmark National Bank, Corinth, when they were members of the Millsaps Singers and Troubadours. She is board president of the A.M.E.N. Food Pantry, volunteer coordinator for Corinth Habitat for Humanity and the Downtown Main Street Association, and chaplain and charity ball chairman for the Junior Auxiliary of Corinth. She serves on several committees at Corinth First United Methodist Church and sings in the Chancel Choir. The Lancasters have three children: Darrington Lancaster Ludlam, B.A. 2009; Liz Lancaster, B.A. 2011; and Neal.
Dr. Will Sorey and Marti Sorey Dr. Will Sorey and his wife, Marti, served on the Millsaps Parents Council from 2006 until 2012 and as co-chairs of the council from 2010 until 2012. Will Sorey is a professor of pediatrics at the University of Mississippi Medical Center and division director of Ambulatory Pediatric Service at UMMC’s Blair E. Batson Hospital for Children. A 1978 graduate of Ole Miss, he received his medical education at UMMC, as well as his internship and residency training in pediatrics. He completed a post-residency fellowship in adolescent medicine at UMMC in 1987. He has received numerous honors and awards. Marti Sorey had a long career as a medical technician before she became a science teacher at Jackson Prep. A native of El Paso, Texas, she graduated from Mississippi State with a degree in general science-chemistry before earning a medical technology degree at the University of Texas El Paso. She returned to Mississippi State in 1999 and completed a master’s degree in geoscience. During the 2012-2013 academic year, Marti Sorey was instrumental in reviving the Wesley Fellowship at Millsaps. The Soreys have three daughters: Mary Rogers, B.S. 2009; Katie, B.A. 2011; and Laura, B.S. 2012.
Maude DeLes Gober Lancaster, co-owner of Soiree’ Events, Floral and Design, is a former president of the Millsaps Col-
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The Robert M. Hearin Support Foundation was inducted into the Millsaps College Founders Society, which recognizes individuals and organizations who have given $1 million or more to the College. From left are Mike Hutchison, vice president for institutional advancement; Matt Holleman, Robert M. Hearin Support Foundation trustee; and Dr. Robert W. Pearigen, president of Millsaps College.
Millsaps celebrates 123rd anniversary of its founding.
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uring Founders Day 2013, the Robert M. Hearin Support Foundation was inducted into the Millsaps Founders Society that recognizes individuals and organizations that have given $1 million or more to the College, forever linking their names with those of Founders, Millsaps, Galloway, and Murrah who are commemorated on the Millsaps Tower. “The Robert M. Hearin Support Foundation is a leader in transforming lives that transform communities throughout the state of Mississippi,” said Dr. Robert W. Pearigen, president of Millsaps. “The Foundation has generously supported Millsaps by funding scholarships, innovative academic and experiential learning programs, and supporting faculty development. It is with great appreciation that we honor their work and generosity.” The annual Founders Day celebration recognizes the philanthropy of three groups of people—members of the Founders Society, Heritage Society, and those who establish endowed funds to support scholarships,
programs, and faculty—and honors the distinctive educational experience their gifts provide for Millsaps students. In his remarks, Pearigen recapped the College’s new strategic plan and its role in continuing the Founders’ vision, stating, “One of our commitments to our founders is to regularly review how to advance the institution, how to anticipate future trends in higher education, and how to ensure the faithful use of the support of our benefactors.” In keeping with that commitment, one of the key components of the College’s new strategic plan, Across the Street and Around the Globe: Partnerships and Influence at Millsaps College, is the expansion of experiential learning opportunities for students both locally and abroad. According to Pearigen, “We are expanding partnerships ‘across the street’ to create more intentional opportunities that connect students to the state’s economic, health care, political, and cultural hub. We want our students to have engaged learning opportunities at hospitals, community centers, Capitol Street offices, the Legislature, and at nonprofit organizations. “We need to fully leverage our location to the benefit of our students and the advancement of the institution. Every street you cross when you leave this
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What truly changed my life was how
Millsaps was involved in my study abroad.
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–Jennifer Goebel, B.B.A. 2013
campus, there’s something meaningful and important to do. Millsaps, to our great benefit, is located in the heart of the city, in the heart of the state with opportunities that are unique to our place and time—opportunities that no other college can match. “We are also expanding partnerships ‘around the globe’— not just in Europe but in countries and regions that will be central players on the world stage in the 21st century: Africa, China, and Latin America. We’re working to attract more international students to Millsaps and further embed global perspectives even more deeply across the curriculum.” Jennifer Goebel, who was then a senior business administration and accounting major from Plano, Texas, gave life to the president’s remarks by sharing her Millsaps story. During her time at Millsaps, Goebel founded a show choir, led the College dance team, worked multiple campus jobs, studied international business at the University of Liechtenstein, learned about international law in the Yucatán, and interned as a production assistant for one of the country’s top radio stations. She also managed a creative economy project in the Midtown neighborhood where she served as consultant to a local small business owner, helping her develop a business plan, create financial statements and grant proposals, and restructure her business to turn it around and make it successful. When talking about her international experience in particular, Goebel said, “While I can tell you that studying abroad changed my life, I want to be careful to not give too much credit to the travel or countries themselves. Because what truly changed my life was how Millsaps was involved in my study abroad. The academic connections, the experiential, hands-on learning opportunities, the faculty and staff support,
the transformative difference we, as students, are encouraged and enabled to make are unique. “Millsaps gave me the chance to take what I learned in Liechtenstein about social entrepreneurship, expand it, and connect my international experience to the unique community of Midtown in Jackson. I don’t know if that could have happened for me at any other college or university. This is what makes the Millsaps experience life-changing, and this is what makes Millsaps different from other colleges. “I will be forever grateful to Millsaps and to the people who made all of this possible for me. I have benefitted from the Charles W. and Eloise T. Else Endowed Scholarship, the Robinson International Fellows Program, the Robert M. Hearin Foundation’s support of the Creative Economy Initiative in Midtown, and so many other programs that exist for Millsaps students because of the generosity of those who support the College.” According to vice president for institutional advancement Mike Hutchison,“Jennifer’s inspiring story is just one example of the unique and outstanding experiences Millsaps students have because of gifts from alumni, parents, and friends. By providing generous scholarships for undergraduate students, funding for our Business Advantage Program and the ELSEWorks initiative in the Else School of Management, and funding for entrepreneurial training and support for a business incubator to help retain creative talent and promote small business growth in the Midtown community, The Robert M. Hearin Support Foundation is an important partner in Millsaps’ quest to graduate students who are making a difference in the communities they touch.” BY SUSAN WOMACK
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Classnotes Photos: 1. Hazel Hollingsworth Powell, B.A.1938 2. Bob Weems, B.S. 1959 3. Dr. Marcia M. Wofford, B.A. 1976 4. Scott Tracy Griffin, B.S. 1988 5. Lee Mitchell, B.B.A. 1994 and M.B.A. 1997 6. Dawn Abuso Balash, B.A. 1995 7. Thomas Temple, B.B.A. 1995 8. Sandi Pullen Beason, B.A. 2000 9. George Bradley Bennett, B.B.A. 2000 and M.Acc. 2001 10. Zao Wang, B.S. 2001
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11. Taylor Allee Harter, B.A. 2008 and M.B.A. 2009
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CLASS NOTES CLASS NOTES
Millsaps Magazine prints only information sent in specifically for Class Notes. In the past, material was gleaned from newspaper clippings and other sources. The change was made to protect the privacy of alumni and to simplify the editing process. We would like to encourage all alumni to send in their news items, whether big or small, personal or professional, to Nell Luter Floyd, Office of Communications, Millsaps College, 1701 North State Street, Jackson, MS 39210-0001. Fax : 601-974-1456. Phone: 601-974-1033 or 1-86-MILLSAPS (1-866 - 455-7277). Email: communications@ millsaps.edu. Please include your name, address, phone numbers, email address, graduation year and degree, and any news you want to share. Appropriate items include births, weddings, advanced degrees, awards, job promotions, etc. Photographs are also welcome. If you are aware of alumni who are not receiving the magazine, please send us their names and addresses.
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Hazel Hollingsworth Powell, B.A.1938, of Woodstock, Ill., traveled with 85 World War II veterans from Chicago to Washington, D.C. on Oct. 3, 2012, as part of Honor Flight Chicago. Honor Flight is an all-volunteer organization that arranges for World War II veterans to visit at no cost the World War II Memorial and other war memorials, as well as some other sites of interest. After graduation from Millsaps, she worked a few years for Boyd and Jim Campbell at Mississippi School Supply Co., before she heard her country’s call as World War II broke out. She enlisted in the Navy WAVES, went through training, and after hearing the commissioning address from Eleanor Roosevelt, she was assigned to coding and decoding top secret messages in Miami, where she met and married naval officer E.S. “Sky” Powell. Early one morning she decoded a message that Sky’s destroyer escort had been damaged in an encounter with a German U-boat, which it rammed and sank, and that they were heading for port for repairs. They took a zigzag course across the Atlantic to evade attack, and it was only after three weeks when Sky was able to send a cable from Ireland that Hazel realized that she was not a widow.
Jim Walton, B.S. 1957, of Granbury, Texas, recently donated his book, My Friends Call Me Moon, to the MillsapsWilson Library. Set in Mississippi and New Orleans, the novel is a first for Walton. “It’s exciting to think I have a book in the library where I went to college,” he said. Walton retired in 2002 as a dealership management consultant for the National Automobile Dealers Association. Before joining the association, he owned a Buick, GMC truck, and John Deere dealership in Port Arthur, Texas, for 15 years.
1959 Bob Weems, B.S. 1959, of Oxford, a long-time professor at the University of Mississippi School of Law recently retired. He has been on the law school faculty for 36 years and has trained thousands of lawyers in his torts, evidence, and wills courses. To commemorate his legacy, the law school has established the Robert Weems Lectureship for Outstanding Teaching and honored him with the naming of the Robert Weems Auditorium-Room 1078 Weems, a Jackson native, graduated first in his class from the Ole Miss law school and was assistant editor of the Law Journal. He spent a brief time prac-
ticing law in Vicksburg before beginning his career at the Ole Miss Law School in 1977 as associate professor. Since 1989, he has been the Butler, Snow, O’Mara, Stevens and Cannada Lecturer in Law. He is the author of numerous books on wills and estates and has taught Torts, Wills and Estates, Evidence and Trial Practice. He has been chosen Outstanding Law Professor four times, and he won the Elsie Hood Award for outstanding teacher at the university in 1994.
1968 Kay Pritchett, B.A. 1968, of Fayetteville, Ark., has received the South Central Modern Language Association 2012 Book Award for the best book of criticism. Her book, In Pursuit of Poem Shadows: Pureza Canelo’s Second Poetics, was published by Bucknell University Press, which has posted an interview with Pritchett on its website (bucknell.edu/universitypress). The award was presented at the association’s conference in San Antonio, Texas in November 2012.
1976 Dr. Marcia M. Wofford, B.A. 1976, of Winston Salem, N.C., associate professor of pediatrics at Wake Forest School of Medicine and section chief of pediatric hematology/oncology at Brenner Millsaps Magazine | Summer 2013
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Children’s Hospital, was named the new associate dean for medical education, effective April 1. She will oversee the entire undergraduate medical curriculum and will collaborate with the associate deans for student services, admissions, academic accreditation, and others. She will lead faculty committees and educators in student and course assessment, faculty assessment, and development and monitor the overall success of the undergraduate medical curriculum. Wofford received her medical degree from the University of Mississippi School of Medicine, where she also completed an internship and a residency in pediatrics. She completed a fellowship in pediatric hematology and oncology at Wake Forest School of Medicine before joining the Wake Forest School of Medicine faculty in 1988.
1984 Anna Walker Crump, B.S.Ed. 1984, of Washington, D.C. is the policy director of the District of Columbia’s Domestic Violence Coalition. In this position, she oversees the coalition’s policy agenda and develops and implements advocacy initiatives focused on legislative and systems change to support victims of domestic violence. She was recently elected to serve on the Public Policy Committee of the National Network to End Domestic Violence.
1988 Scott Tracy Griffin, B.S. 1988, of Santa Monica, Calif., is the author of Tarzan: The Centennial Celebration (Titan Books), which commemorates 100 years of Tarzan tales, television, movies, and memorabilia. The book explores the 24 original novels and the many appearances of Tarzan on stage, screen, and in
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print. Dubbed “the leading bibliographer of Edgar Rice Burroughs” by filmfreakcentral.net, Griffin has contributed to periodicals including the Burroughs Bulletin, Mississippi Magazine, Femme Fatale, Cinefantastique, and Film Fax. He has served as a consultant on numerous Tarzan documentaries and been interviewed numerous times as a Tarzan expert.
1994 Lee Mitchell, B.B.A. 1994 and M.B.A. 1997, of Jackson, was named the 2012 Associate Member of the Year by the Home Builders Association of Mississippi. Mitchell, a senior vice president of Trustmark Bank who manages residential construction lending, has been in the banking business for 18 years. He currently serves as the associate vice president of the Home Builders Association of Mississippi Executive Committee. A member of the Home Builders Association of Jackson, he has served on numerous committees including Membership, Parade of Homes and the Associates Council. He was the association’s associate vice president from 2008-2010, served on the association’s Executive Committee in 2008-2009, and has served on its board of directors since 2007. He also serves the Homebuilders Association of Mississippi as its associate vice president and as a member of its Executive Committee and the Planning and Mortgage Finance Committees. Mitchell serves on the Single Family Subcommittee and the Associate Outreach Network for the National Association of Home Builders and its board of directors.
1995 Dawn Abuso Balash, B.A. 1995, of New Orleans, and Doug Balash welcomed their son, Jeffrey Thomas, on July 24, 2012. Dawn works for Entergy Services, Inc., in New Orleans as senior counsel-corporate and securities. Laurin Stennis, B.A. 1995, of Birmingham, had her linoleum block relief print selected in a juried competition for auction as part of the Mississippi Museum of Art’s “April in Paris” fundraising gala on April 5. Stennis said her work is inspired primarily by Southern flora and fauna, especially birds. She sketches her subject in reverse onto a block of linoleum, then carves away the negative, or white space, to create her signature textures and effects. “I roll ink over the surface of what’s left and hand-press the image onto fine paper made of mulberry bark or cotton,” she said. “Each one is unique.” Thomas Temple, B.B.A. 1995, of Baton Rouge, La., has been elected to the Management Committee of Breazeale, Sachse & Wilson, L.L.P. Temple joined the Baton Rouge office in 1998 and became a partner in 2004. Temple is head of the Insurance Industry Team and a member of the firm’s casualty litigation section.
1998 Paul Thompson, B.A. 1998, of Portland, Ore., graduated from the University of Oregon School of Law in 2011 and is a sole practitioner at Thompson Law, LLC, a general practice firm serving the greater Portland area.
CLASS NOTES
1999 Lauren Stamps Moore, B.S. 1999, of San Antonio, Texas, and husband Mark Moore welcomed their first child, Nicole Elizabeth Moore, on Dec. 15, 2011.
2000 Sandi Pullen Beason, B.A. 2000, of Byram, recently received national, state, and local awards for her work in the communications field. Beason has served as the public information officer for the Clinton Public School District since October 2008. During the 20122013 school year, she was named one of the National School Public Relations Association’s Top 35 Under 35 school public relations practitioners, and she also received the Mississippi School Public Relations Association’s highest honor, Communicator of the Year. In February, she received the Emerging Practitioner of the Year award from the central chapter of the Public Relations Association of Mississippi. In February, the Clinton Public School District was selected for a site visit by First Lady Michelle Obama and a taping of the Rachael Ray TV show. Beason worked to coordinate and publicize the event with the First Lady’s staff, Rachael Ray’s production team, Secret Service, the school district department heads, administrators, faculty, staff, and parents. She and her husband Mark Beason have one daughter, Adeline. George Bradley Bennett, B.B.A. 2000 and M.Acc. 2001, of Northampton, Mass., graduated Aug. 4, 2012, from the University of Alabama with a Doctor of Philosophy in Accounting. He worked at KPMG LLP and Millsaps College before entering the Ph.D. program at the University of Alabama. In April
2012, Bennett successfully defended his dissertation, finishing the Ph.D. program with a 4.0 GPA and as recipient of the 2012 Beta Gamma Sigma Outstanding Doctoral Student Award. During his four years at the University of Alabama, he taught undergraduate auditing to senior accounting majors and completed two successful research studies in addition to his work on his dissertation. His research papers have been accepted to The Accounting Review, the American Accounting Association’s annual and Audit section meetings, and the International Symposium for Audit Research in Quebec City, Quebec, in 2011. In September 2012, Bennett began his academic career as a full-time, tenure-track assistant professor at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, Mass. He teaches financial accounting and auditing at the undergraduate level and audit behavioral research is his primary research focus.
2001 Zao Wang, B.S. 2001, of Brooklyn, NY, had his film, Honeymoon Suite, premier at the 2013 Tribeca Film Festival. Commissioned by a boutique hotel in China and made by a team of international filmmakers, the film was the only entry from China at Tribeca this year. Wang studied physics and philosophy at Millsaps before attending New York University’s graduate film school, where he received his M.F.A. in directing. He has worked closely with producers both in China and the U.S., making short films and commercials. He has directed several feature documentary series for Shanghai TV/SMG, including a six-part documentary series on the future of creative fields around the world. His films have been selected for several international film festivals, including
the LA Shorts Fest, Shanghai International Festival, Pusan International Film Festival, and the New York International Asian-American Film Festival.
2004 Joye Cox Anestis, B.A. 2004, of Hattiesburg, received a Doctor of Philosophy in clinical psychology from Florida State University in December 2012. Along with her husband, Mike, she is currently employed as a faculty member in the department of psychology at the University of Southern Mississippi.
2008 Taylor Allee Harter, B.A. 2008 and M.B.A. 2009, of San Francisco, married Shane Harter in a small ceremony at San Francisco City Hall on Dec. 31, 2012. Taylor Harter is a project manager with Spencer Technologies, and Shane Harter is a senior software engineer at Trulia. com.
2010 Katie Tebo, 2010, of Baton Rouge, La., is pursing a master’s degree in counseling psychology at the University of Tennessee. She was recently inducted into Chi Sigma Iota, the international honor society for academic and professional counseling. She will receive her M.S. in August 2014.
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IN MEMORIAM IN MEMORIAM
Any submissions for In Memoriam received after April 12, 2013 will appear in the next issue of Millsaps Magazine.
Dr. Jeremiah Henry Holleman, B.S. 1939, of Columbus, died Nov. 7, 2011. Holleman received medical degrees from the University of Mississippi and the University of Tennessee medical schools. He served in World War II with the U.S. Army’s 89th Infantry in the European Theater until VE Day. In 1951, he returned to service and was commanding officer of the 8055 MASH unit in Korea. His MASH unit was the first to use triage, and its members helped in development of vascular surgery. He and his team saved the lives and limbs of more than 5,000 soldiers. He was awarded the Bronze Star and the Order of the British Empire Medal from Queen Elizabeth. His service was memorialized in the book, movie, and TV series “MASH,” and he served as the role model for the character of Dr. Henry Blake. Holleman began in 1950 a surgical practice in Columbus that spanned 44 years.
Stars.” She had lead roles in several Mississippi Opera productions and served as president of the Mississippi Opera Guild in 1981.
International, Boy Scouts of America, the West Alabama Chamber of Commerce, Tuscaloosa Homebuilders, and the Tuscaloosa Board of Realtors.
Catherine E. Herring Lindsey, B.A. 1947, of Collierville, Tenn., died Feb. 15, 2013. She was a retired accountant and music teacher.
Edna Fay Standerfer Hamilton, B.A. 1948, of Huntsville, died Jan. 6, 2013. Hamilton taught piano for many years. She was an Airstream trailer enthusiast and a member of the South Huntsville Kiwanis Club, Buttercup Garden Club, Antique Club, and the Music Study Club.
Margaret McLaurin McDaniel, B.A. 1947, of Houston, Texas, died June 23, 2012. She enjoyed moving around the world with her husband, George, as he pursued his career with Dow Chemical.
The Rev. Martin Luther McCormick Jr., B.A. 1947, of Gautier, died Dec. 12, 2012. He served in the Navy and completed graduate work at Emory University. He was secretary-comptroller at Hardin’s Bakeries Corp. in Meridian. He began his ministry at Kingston United Methodist Church in Natchez and served at Richland UMC, Justice Heights UMC in Laurel, Magnolia UMC, Prentiss UMC, Caswell Springs UMC, and Gautier UMC. In 1992, Orange Grove UMC and Pecan UMC asked him to be the supply minister, and he worked to merge the congregations. He served as chair of the Board of Global Ministries for the Mississippi Methodist Conference. In 1984, he was named Jefferson Davis County’s Outstanding Citizen of the Year.
Evelyn Walker Herm, B.A. 1947, of Jackson, died Oct. 20, 2012. She was a recipient of the Founders’ Medal given at graduation. She served as a soloist for more than 70 years in the Sanctuary Choir at First Baptist Church of Jackson. She sang professionally with the Maurice Thompson Singers on the TV show “Hymns at Home” and had her own radio program, “Reaching for the
Aubrey Elton Buchalter, 1948, of Tuscaloosa, Ala., died March 3, 2013. He was a V-12 alumnus. He graduated from the University of Texas in 1946 with a degree in naval science and business administration. He became a contractor and established The Buchalter Company, Inc., now known as Capital Growth Properties, Inc. He was active with the Tuscaloosa Symphony Guild, Shriners
Charles Milton Cecil Jones Jr., 1948, of Washington, D.C., died June 3, 2012. He was a V-12 alumnus. Jones joined the U.S. Marine Corps as an infantry officer and served in Korea from 19501951 as a platoon commander with the Anti-Tank Company, 5th Marines, 1st Marine Division. He survived four major campaigns. His military billets included stints as inspector-instructor, division staff officer, executive manager, and he achieved command of the 4th. Zig Ziglar, 1948, of Plano, Texas, died Nov. 28, 2012. He was a V-12 alumnus. Ziglar traveled the nation and world for more than 40 years as a motivational speaker, stirring groups with his wit and wisdom and encouragement to see the bright side of life. He also reached people through his books, cassette tapes, podcasts, and personal presentations. Frank Boswell Jr., B.S. 1949, of Picayune, died Nov. 21, 2012. He served in the Navy from 1944-1946 and received an Asiatic-Pacific Campaign Ribbon and
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Philippine Liberation Campaign Ribbon, each with a battle star. Boswell graduated from Tulane University School of Medicine and completed his internship at Charity Hospital in New Orleans in general medicine. He practiced in De Kalb before completing a residency in ophthalmology. He was in private practice for nearly 40 years in New Orleans. Winston Carrington Lill, 1949, of Picayune, died Nov. 1, 2012. Lill was director of public relations for the city of New Orleans during the administrations of Mayors Chep Morrison and Moon Landrieu. He was the first director of Total Community Action from 1965-1970. The Rev. J. Wesley Youngblood, B.A.1949, of Ridgeland, died Jan. 4, 2013. He was a hospital corpsman in the U.S. Navy during World War II. He served as a pharmacist mate and operating room assistant onboard ships in the Pacific Theatre. He was a United Methodist minister who served churches in Duck Hill, Carrollton, Grenada, Moorhead, Eupora, Olive Branch, and Sardis and later was a chaplain at Methodist Hospitals in Memphis, where he served until retirement in 1985. He then served as minister of visitation at First United Methodist Church in Senatobia and St. Matthew’s United Methodist Church in Madison. Patricia Busby Clark, B.A. 1951, of Tupelo, died Sept. 30, 2012. She was the first administrator of the Renal Dialysis Unit at North Mississippi Medical Center. Clark later worked as administrator of the Central Dialysis Unit in Jackson until retirement. She was a member of St. Luke United Methodist Church in Tupelo.
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Lacy Rees Baker, 1952, of Jackson, died Jan. 3, 2013. A graduate of Shurtleff College in Alton, Ill., Baker received a master’s degree from Mississippi College in 1971. She was a longtime teacher in the Jackson public schools. Carolyn Love Baria Johnson, B.A. 1954, of Berlin, Md., died Dec. 26, 2012. She was a long-time member of The Community Church at Ocean Pines in Berlin, Md., United Methodist Women, the Red Hat Ladies Society, Beta Sigma Phi, and CASA of the Lower Shore. She was known for her love of travel and the beach. Paul Atlee Wiggins, B.S. 1954, of Jackson, died November 30, 2012. He was a member of First Baptist Church of Jackson. George Woods Elliott, 1955, of Madison, died Jan. 10, 2013. He received a bachelor’s degree from Belhaven University. He was a general agent and belonged to the Million Dollar Round Table at Andrew Jackson Life Insurance Co. He served as a bailiff in Hinds County Chancery Court. He was a founder of Madison Ridgeland Academy, a charter member of River Bend Hunting Club in Rodney, a Madison County election commissioner, and a member of the Lions Club of Jackson. He belonged to Broadmoor Baptist Church in Madison. John Reed Hubbard, B.S. 1956, of Jackson, died Oct. 4, 2012. Hubbard graduated from the School of Banking of the South at Louisiana State University and the American Society of Association Executives Advanced School at the University of Santa Clara. He was executive director of the Mississippi Bankers Association for 17 years. He held senior officer positions at banks
in Jackson and Meridian and operated Hubbard Insurance Services. He served as chairman of the board of trustees for the School of Banking of the South and president of the Southern Conference of State Bankers Associations. He was active in Friends of Educational Television and Public Radio in Mississippi, the Jackson Chamber of Commerce, the Salvation Army, the Mississippi Museum of Art, and the Newcomen Society in North America. Thomas Herbert Naylor, B.S. 1958, of Charlotte, Vt., died Dec. 12, 2012. Naylor earned a B.S. in industrial engineering from Columbia University, an M.B.A. in quantitative business analysis from Indiana University, and a doctorate in economics from Tulane University. He was professor of economics at Duke University from 1964-1993, teaching economics, management science, and computer science. Naylor was an international management consultant, advising major corporations and governments in more than 30 countries. Naylor was executive director and founder of the L.Q.C. Lamar Society. The society’s 1972 publication, “You Can’t Eat Magnolias,” was a manifesto for change and growth in the modern South. He published more than 30 books. William C. Wall Jr., B.S. 1958, of Jackson, died Oct. 14, 2012. Wall worked for the Mississippi Highway Department for 27 years as a computer programmer and systems and procedures manager. He served as president of the Highway Exchange Engineering Program. He was a U.S. Air Force veteran. Frederick McKinney Belk Jr., 1959, of Holly Springs, died Sept. 29, 2012. A graduate of the University of Mississippi School of Law, he was an attorney
IN MEMORIAM
in Marshall Country for 47 years and served as Marshall County prosecuting attorney for 31 years. He was a Mississippi state senator, president of the Marshall County Bar Association and the Mississippi Prosecutor’s Association, was a member of the Governor’s Criminal Justice Planning Commission, chairman of the City of Holly Springs Planning Commission, director of Marshall County Civil Defense, president and director of the Holly Springs Jaycees, president of the Holly Springs Chamber of Commerce, and co-owner/editor of The Marshall Messenger. Cecil Q. Copeland Jr., B.A.1960, of Jackson, died Feb. 22, 2013. He majored in history. Robert Edward Aldridge, B.A. 1962, of Cedar Rapids, Iowa, died Jan. 27, 2012. He earned his master’s degree at Mississippi State University and pursued
graduate work in theatre at the University of Wisconsin, earning his Ph.D. in 1979. From 1973-2001, Aldridge served on the arts and humanities faculty at Kirkwood Community College. Sandra Graves Guess, B.A. 1963, of Madison, died Nov. 12, 2012. Guess taught English and Latin in the Jackson public schools. She served as president of the South Jackson Civic League, chairman of the Cancer Drive for the city of Jackson and president of the Central Medical Auxiliary, and she was a past delegate to the American Medical Alliance. She was active in Alta Woods United Methodist Church and Parkway Hills United Methodist Church. She was a member of the board of directors of Jackson Preparatory School and secretary of the board of directors of Mississippi Ballet Theatre.
Jean Thickens Francis Cooper, 1965, of Tupelo, died April 21, 2012. Cooper was an artist. Joel Gill, B.S. 1973, of Pickens, died Oct. 18, 2012. Gill and his brother assisted in the operation of the family’s cattle business, Mississippi Order Buyers, Inc. He was mayor of Pickens at the time of his death and served on the Pickens Board of Alderman from 19891993 and from 2005-2009. He was choir director and administrative council chair at Pickens First United Methodist, a director of the Holmes County Chamber of Commerce, and a member of the Mississippi Beef Council. Paul Maass Sumerall, B.A. 1976, of Long Beach, Calif., died Dec. 20, 2012. Sumerall received his master’s degree from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. He served in the Peace Corps in Tunisia, where he
Faculty The Rev. Robert E. “Brother Bob” Anding, B.A. 1949, of Florence, died March 17, 2013. A graduate of Mississippi State University and Candler School of Theology at Emory University, Anding taught religion, sociology, and ministerial studies at Millsaps, where he mentored several generations of Mississippi pastors. A minister in the United Methodist Church, Anding served in Jackson at Galloway Memorial United Methodist Church and Capitol Street United Methodist Church and at churches in Bolton, Monticello, and Florence. After retiring from Millsaps, Anding taught Bible and religion at Hinds Community College. He was a veteran of the U.S. Army and received the Bronze Star for service in World War II.
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met his wife, who was serving as an English teacher. For most of his career, he worked in banking, which took him to Europe, Russia, and Africa. He was managing director of Merchants Bank of California. Rex Moak, B.S. 1981, of Moss Point, died March 7, 2013. He was a professor at Mississippi Gulf Coast Community College and also taught at Pascagoula High School. He had a Master of Education from the University of Southern Mississippi and was working on a Doctor of Philosophy degree at USM. Wade Anderson Young, B.S. 1983, of Tuscaloosa, Ala., died Oct. 9, 2012. Young received his medical degree from Tulane University School of Medicine and completed his internal medicine residency at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Young completed an
oncology fellowship at Vanderbilt University Hospital. He spent his medical career in practice at the DCH Cancer Center in Tuscaloosa. Erin Kathleen Quinn, B.A.1995, of Lexington, Va., died Feb. 17, 2013. She was a business analyst for Healthcare Management Systems.
Friends Helen Quillin Cain, of Little Switzerland, N.C., and Jackson, died March 23, 2013. She was the widow of Dr. Gene Cain, emeritus professor of chemistry. Helen received her undergraduate degree from Duke University. While Gene distinguished himself in chemical research and teaching at Millsaps, Helen became an expert in the history and restoration of furniture and served as a consultant to the Mississippi Governor's
Mansion. In 1984, she co-authored An Illustrated Guide to the Mississippi Governor’s Mansion, published by the University Press of Mississippi. Memorials may be made to the C. Eugene Cain Chemistry Pre-Medical Fellowship c/o Millsaps College, 1701 North State Street, Jackson, MS 39210. Bessie W. Harmon of Ridgeland died Feb. 12, 2013. She was the wife of Dr. George Marion Harmon, president of Millsaps from 1978 until 2000. She was a registered nurse and graduate of the Baptist School of Nursing in Memphis. She served as a nurse in many subspecialties, including surgery, labor and delivery, trauma, and geriatrics.
Friends Nathaniel J. “Jack” Golding, of Gainesville, Fla., died on April 12, 2013 in Gainesville, Fla. After he earned a degree from Georgia Institute of Technology in aeronautical engineering, he served as an officer in the U.S. Navy during World War II. He spent his professional career employed by McDonnell Douglas Corporation (Boeing) where he became an innovative missile-systems engineer. His designs led to critical weapons platform applications for the Navy’s fighter jets as well as the submarine-launched Harpoon cruise missile. After serving as deputy program manager for the Tomahawk missile project, he was named staff vice president of McDonnell Douglas Missile Systems Company. He endowed in April 2008 the Jennie Carlisle Golding Chair in philosophy at Millsaps with a million-dollar gift in memory of his wife, a supporter of education and charitable giving. The Goldings also endowed additional scholarships at Millsaps.
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