University of Portland Magazine, Fall 2020

Fall 2020

TOWARD TRUTH

FEATURES

2 ON THE BLUFF 3 Visiting Voices 4 The Experts 5 The World We Want 6 En Route 7 Campus Briefs 8 Dream Teams

40 CLASS NOTES 44 In Memoriam 49 For the Love of It

10 The Truth about Alonzo

by Walidah Imarisha Inspired by a University of Portland Civil Rights Immersion, Taylor Stewart ’18 started the Oregon Remembrance Project, which aims to honor and memorialize Alonzo Tucker, Oregon’s only documented victim of lynching.

24 Encounter

by SimonMary A. Aihiokhai A personal reflection on the new icon of the Ugandan Martyrs commissioned for the chapel in Shipstad Hall.

Fall 2020 Vol. 39, No. 1 President Rev. Mark L. Poorman, C.S.C. Vice President Michael E. Lewellen Editor Jessica Murphy Moo Designer Darsey Landoe Associate Editor Marcus Covert ’93, ’97 Contributors Danielle Centoni, Roya Ghorbani-Elizeh ’11, Anna Lageson-Kerns ’83, ’14, Patricia McDonald, Hannah Pick, Celeste Robertson, Amy Shelly ’95, ’01 Cover Taylor Stewart ’18 (center), Coos Bay, Oregon; photo by Margaret Jacobsen Portland is published three times a year by University of Portland.

Copyright © 2020 by the University of Portland.

All rights reserved.

Editorial Offices Waldschmidt Hall, 5000 N. Willamette Blvd., Portland, OR 97203-5798 Email jmurphymoo@up.edu Online up.edu/portlandmagazine

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Don’t Sit Down Now That You’ve Come This Far

Meet the Martins

by timone davis A song and spiritual encouragement for continuing to work toward God’s kin-dom.

by Jessica Murphy Moo The first in a series about the Franz River Campus. Biology professor Katie O’Reilly and five undergraduate scientists have created new habitat for a colony of Purple Martins.

Printed on 10% recycled and FSC-certified paper in Portland, OR. Third-class postage paid at Portland, OR 97203. Canada Post International Publications Mail Product—Sales Agreement No. 40037899. Canadian Mail Distribution Information—Express Messenger International: PO Box 25058, London, Ontario, Canada N6C 6A8.

Opinions expressed in Portland are those of the individual authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the University administration. Postmaster: Send address changes to Portland Magazine, University of Portland, 5000 N. Willamette Blvd., Portland, OR 97203-5798.

EDITOR’S LETTER

Follow the Music, Find the Story WITH CLASSES ONLINE due to the pandemic, the campus has been oddly quiet. I give you this context so you understand why the sound of someone playing the trombone outside caught my attention.

It was evening, late summer, before the September wildfires.

My family and I had just finished a picnic dinner on campus.

Afterwards we walked near the bluff and looked out over the Willamette River and the shipyard, and we heard the music coming from behind Bauccio Commons. We saw an individual playing trombone, facing out toward Forest Park. My “work hat” wanted to go over and interview him right on the spot. But my “human hat” stopped me in my tracks. I’ve missed listening to live music during these months of the pandemic, the surprise of it, the stretch of it, the emotions music allows me—sometimes pushes me—to feel. And so my human hat won the moment; I let my heart dwell in the music. Later, after a little sleuthing and help from our music faculty, I found the student who has been living off campus and sometimes comes to The Bluff to play outside.

I hope you don’t miss his reflection at the end of this issue. Listening to music as you read through these pages might not be a bad idea—timone davis’s spiritual essay also uses a song as inspiration— because this issue does ask you to look straight at some tough truths: In 2018, The Beacon, UP’s award-winning student newspaper, wrote a piece about a Civil Rights Immersion in Montgomery, Alabama, hosted by UP’s Moreau Center for Service and Justice. There was a photo of then-student Taylor Stewart ’18 and the sentence, “Currently, Stewart is working on creating a historical marker in Coos County, Oregon, home to Oregon’s only recorded case of lynching.” I wondered how his work was going, so I reached out.

Two years later we have a story for you, written by Walidah Imarisha, about the racial justice work Stewart has been persistently achieving in partnership with the Equal Justice Initiative, the Coos Historical Museum, and the City of Coos Bay. His work memorializes Alonzo Tucker, a man who was a boxer and a mail carrier, also a man who was brutally murdered and lynched in 1902. This truth is a hard truth—about the state of Oregon, its laws, its founding, and about the history and legacy of racism and lynching in this country. Stewart believes that reconciliation and change can only happen when we are honest about the past. The memorial event occurred on February 29, 2020, and a group of us from UP drove to Coos Bay in support of Stewart. His work progresses.

Also in this issue is a beautiful reflection on the newly commissioned icon of the Ugandan Martyrs for the chapel in Shipstad Hall. I called Simon Aihiokhai, UP theology professor, who teaches a class about religious icons, to talk about the new work. He spoke of a whole context for the history of these Catholic martyrs that also included Anglican and Muslim martyrs, and he offered a reflection on his own journey toward “a Christ who finds Blackness as a worthy embodiment of the divine.” Because you can’t come to campus to see this icon for yourself right now, we’re bringing it to you.

This issue does ask you to look straight at some tough truths.

You’ll also find our first installment in the Franz River Campus series. This issue focuses on biology professor Katie O’Reilly and her student-researchers’ work to create new habitat for a colony of Purple Martins. I am inspired, not only by the beauty of these birds (and yes, by the chatter of their song), but also by the dedicated professors who are finding and creating research opportunities for UP students during these challenging days.

The people of this place are remarkable. Do we have work to do to be better, to stretch and improve? Yes, we do. Of course we do. To which I can only say that I hope we continue to do the work.

And finally, if you receive this issue before November 3, a friendly reminder to vote.

Jessica Murphy Moo, Editor

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TO THE ENDS OF THE EARTH, DONALD JACKSON WITH CONTRIBUTIONS FROM ANDREW JAMIESON AND SALLY MAE JOSEPH, COPYRIGHT 2002, THE SAINT JOHN’S BIBLE, SAINT JOHN’S UNIVERSITY, COLLEGEVILLE, MINNESOTA USA. USED BY PERMISSION. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

PORTLAND

ON THE BLUFF VISITING VOICES

Science, Mystery, and Awe The 2020 Zahm Lecture, which launches the new academic year, took place virtually in September. Dr. Gintaras Duda, Catholic cosmologist and chair of physics at Creighton University, presented “From the Big Bang to The Saint John’s Bible: The Role of Astonishment in a Scientist’s Journey to Integrate Faith and Reason” to more than 200 attendees from around the globe. This excerpt is taken from the Q & A session with Dr. Duda.

Our last question brings us full circle to the beginning of our evening together. The question notes the last line of the Mary Oliver poem that we used to introduce you: “Observe, be astonished, tell about it.” How might the arts serve to effectively communicate and celebrate the scientific and religious awe and astonishment that you’ve been talking about this evening?

I think The Saint John’s Bible is a perfect example of that. Its beautiful integration between theology and science is done through art. I can say it has personally touched me. I’ve taken students to see our edition at Creighton, and they were in awe of the artwork. For example, in the Gospel of Matthew, when you’re given the genealogy of Jesus, you have DNA double helices coming down the page. It really is a Bible for the 21st century, and art has a role to play in that; it heightens the imagination and ties these kinds of ideas together.

There’s a great quote from physicist Richard Feynman where he talks about artists who think we physicists kind of ruin things by getting to the nitty-gritty of fundamental particles. [“Poets say science takes away from the beauty of the stars—mere globs of gas atoms. I, too, can see the stars on a desert night, and feel them. But do I see less or more? The vastness of the heavens stretches my imagination. Stuck on this carousel, my little eye can catch one-millionyear-old light.”]. Feynman said no, that physicists and scientists may sometimes see more. And that’s not a bad thing, right? I think physicists look at things in a very different light. I can look at an equation and see beauty. I can look at symmetries of nature and see beauty. And I’d love to see that artistically rendered, maybe more than I have.

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ON THE BLUFF THE EXPERTS

ADAM GUGGENHEIM

RON SCOTT HVAC Technician

HVAC Is Cool IT’S NOT EASY to track down UP’s heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) guru, Ron Scott, who has kept each and every campus heating or cooling contraption running or at least limping-for-now these past 38 years. Ron finally took our call on his work phone and, as it turned out, we interviewed him while he was checking an air handler on the roof of the Clark Library—just another mission out of thousands he’s logged in his long career on The Bluff.

Starting in summer 1982 as a part-time grounds crew roustabout, Ron worked his way through campus boiler rooms, steam plants, anything that required mechanical prowess and ingenuity. From clunking, hissing, ancient steam radiators to state-of-the-art LEED-certified industrial heat pumps, Ron has been the one to call when rooms are too hot or too cold, from the president’s suite to the cavernous Chiles Center down to the humblest dormitory study room.

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He’s as busy as ever in times of COVID-19 and the dense wildfire smoke, which enveloped the mostly empty UP campus this fall.

“Oh, I’ve seen it all,” he says now. “One time the AC died in Buckley Center, and Billy (Vandervelden) and I had to run it by hand with me straddling that crazy thing. Back then we had to squeeze every bit of life out of those machines. We’ve done some, how should I say it—constructive construction around here! We made things work that shouldn’t have.”

One of the things he loves most about his job is the oftensolitary nature of his rounds, clambering over and under campus buildings. “That’s where the heating and cooling machines are,” he says. “I like working by myself and being left alone to do my thing.” But don’t get the wrong idea—Ron is a consummate team player and enjoys the company of his coworkers. “I do love working here. HVAC is cool! Something new every day. Once I get all the buildings figured out, they put up a new one! Keeping up on all this crazy technology is fun.”

ON THE BLUFF THE WORLD WE WANT

Introducing UP’s New Provost HERBERT MEDINA, University of Portland’s new provost, has been on the Camino de Santiago de Compostella 12 times (eight on foot, three on bike, and one as a volunteer pilgrims hostel worker).

The famous pilgrimage, which consists of a network of routes across Europe that ultimately meet at the tomb of Saint James in the northwest of Spain, has taken him anywhere from four to nine weeks. He has made the trek solo. He has made the trek with students. “All you have with you is your backpack,” he says. He values the simplicity, the balance of the spiritual and physical exercise, and he values the human interactions, meeting a person where they are at along the journey. One step, then the next, toward a collective destination.

At University of Portland, the destination is a revitalized curriculum, increased student retention and graduation rates, more opportunities for undergraduate research, and meaningful steps toward greater diversity and equity among students and faculty.

“I’m a first-generation immigrant and first-generation college student,” he says. He moved to Los Angeles from El Salvador with his family when he was eight years old. “Both of these aspects play a role in every day of my life. That experience of otherness has shaped my priorities, and I’m open about that.”

He is bringing his priorities to UP’s academic curriculum, one aspect of which is a new ethnic studies minor and major.

“Students—and students of color in particular—are asking for context to understand their American experience. This is a priority and will continue to be a priority.”

He is also open to being challenged because he thinks it’s a way to create change.

“As dean I tried to listen to students. I encourage them to challenge us.” Using the language of mathematics, his academic discipline, he says, “Ask us why we are doing x and not doing y.”

And he has further encouragement for students. “Shoot from the hip. When you’re 18 to 20, you shouldn’t have a fully cogent argument. It’s part of the educational growth process.

It’s important to ask: Why can’t we do that? Why can’t we do this? We need to meet students where they’re at. We have to.

We can look back at history. A lot of young people ask for something that might have seemed ridiculous at the time, but they creatively challenged the status quo and sometimes changed an institution’s or society’s direction.”

Medina knows it’s the professors, not the deans or the provost, who are crucial to student retention. In the long term, students remember their professors, the courses taught by them, the engaging conversations with them, and the undergraduate

Provost Herbert Medina, on a pilgrimage in Spain

research experiences they were able to explore with those professors. The classroom and interactions with faculty is where the magic happens. “I’m not the protagonist in that story,” he says. “It’s the faculty showing up to do the work.”

Before becoming dean of the College of Arts and Sciences here at University of Portland, he was associate dean and among the math faculty at Loyola Marymount University.

Before that he was a student seeking the guidance of his own professors. In high school, he says, he “wasn’t a great math student,” but he got some encouragement and realized that he liked how mathematics could be used to describe complex phenomena and ideas.

Two examples: He received an email from the Census Bureau in 2010 that said someone was using one of his published papers to solve a problem. Medina’s paper was about using the arc tangent function to approximate a geometrical area, and approximating a geometrical area is something the Census needs to do.

And get this one: The next person to contact him about that same paper was applying his arc tangent approximation to fingerprint technology. Think about a fingerprint as a map, as a “geometrical object.” Better approximation of the angles and shapes of that fingerprint would mean greater accuracy for the technology.

Medina has written in Portland’s pages about math being the universal language of God, as he sees it. And he also expands: “Math is the language of nature, the language of God, the language of fingerprints.” His main goal as provost is to ensure that faculty are supported so that students have access to the many “languages” present at University of Portland.

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ON THE BLUFF EN ROUTE

Your Vote Matters SOME ANSWER THE call of the wild.

Tate Harris ’23 answers the call of the wildfires. And search and rescue operations. Oh, and the COVID-testing crisis too. As a volunteer member and certified trainer in the Sacramento fire department’s civilian emergency response team, Harris never hesitates to lend a hand whenever needed. And this November’s election is no different.

“There is a national shortage of poll workers,” says Harris, a sophomore in UP’s School of Nursing. “They’ve traditionally been senior citizens, but due to COVID-19 that’s not happening, so it’s really important for young people to get involved.”

After learning of the shortage and the need for bilingual workers, Harris, who’s fluent in Spanish, immediately applied.

“Even though mail-in voting is standard in my state (California), not everybody prefers to vote by mail. There’s so much weighing on this election that people don’t want to take their chances.”

A shortage of poll workers means a shortage of polling places—one more hurdle (or excuse) that could keep people from voting. And Harris is doing everything possible to make sure no one who’s

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eligible has an excuse not to vote—and that includes becoming a one-person get-out-the-vote campaign.

“There’s a bipartisan app called Vote with Me. You upload your contacts, and it’ll show you the elections they voted in, which is public record,” Harris says. “I get in touch with those folks and talk to them about voting. I do it in a party-neutral way. I’m not trying to push an agenda.

But it’s kind of surprising how often people are very politically active on social media but haven’t voted in 10 years.”

Harris says people usually claim they were too busy, but the worst is when they say they didn’t think their vote mattered.

“Even if it feels like nothing comes of voting, it’s important to put our choice out there,” says Harris. “It’s a record of where we stand.”

After growing up with a politically active mom, tagging along on door-todoor campaigning, this is the first year Harris, who’s also running for vice president of ASUP, will finally be old enough to vote in a presidential election. “As a trans person, it feels especially dire that I vote and get people to vote right now. I need to know I literally did everything I could.”

—Danielle Centoni

ON THE BLUFF CAMPUS BRIEFS

Noteworthy Numbers from U.S. News & World Report

Regional Universities—West

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University of Portland is now ranked second out of 127 institutions listed in the “Regional Universities—West” classification according to U.S. News & World Report magazine.

In the 2018 and 2019 rankings, the University placed sixth in the same “Regional Universities—West” category. This ranking marks the 26th consecutive year the University has received a Top 10 ranking.

Retention and Graduation Rates

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Among notable measures in the U.S. News & World Report methodology is the University’s 90 percent average first-year-to-second-year retention rate for the past several years and six-year graduation rates of 82 percent and 84 percent for the last two student cohorts.

Best Engineering Schools

In addition, the University’s Donald P. Shiley School of Engineering’s reputation for excellence continues.

This year, the engineering program was ranked 33rd nationally among engineering schools whose highest degree is a bachelor’s or master’s.

GATES SHINES AGAIN

Sociology and social work professor Alice Gates is the 2019–2020 recipient of the Distinguished Contribution to Sociological Praxis Award from the Pacific Sociological Association. The award honors sociological work that has made a positive impact on social institutions, improved organizational performance, contributed to community betterment, and eased human suffering. Gates was recognized for her applied scholarship and student engagement efforts, which have focused on advocacy for mothers, caregivers, and undocumented and Latinx communities in Oregon. In a letter announcing Gates’ award, the association said, “We found your portfolio to be quite impressive!

Your work is especially necessary and timely, and we thank you for your service to the community.”

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ON THE BLUFF DREAM TEAMS

Women’s Right to Vote­— A Centennial Examination Portland faculty created the Public Research Fellows Program.

They made Women’s Suffrage the theme and catalyst for their new collaborative venture. Along with undergraduate fellows, these teams aimed to bring humanities research into the public sphere. Here are some examples:

KARL MARIA STADLER, POSTER FOR WOMEN’S DAY, MARCH 8, 1914, DEMANDING VOTING RIGHTS FOR WOMEN (CROPPED)

THE NINETEENTH AMENDMENT, ratified one hundred years ago in August 1920, states that “the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of sex.” In celebration of the 100th anniversary of this amendment, University of

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Images of Women’s Suffrage in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland (1907–1971) Student fellow Athena Hills ’20 and dean Laura McLary examined women’s suffrage in the German speaking world. According to Hills, “The most startling example lies in Switzerland, where women were denied the vote until 1971, questioning the idea that progress of women’s rights was or even still is strictly linear. In these posters (one pictured left), dating from 1907 to 1971, we draw attention to the double standards and ideas that continue to undermine the effort for women’s liberation.”

White to Vote? Racism and Xenophobia During and After the Women’s Suffrage Movement History professor Christin Hancock and student fellow Maggie Loft ’21 explored the truth that 2020 is actually the centennial of white women’s suffrage. Black American, Asian American, and Native American women (as well as immigrant women) had to wait decades to be fully enfranchised, if at all. According to Loft, “We wanted to examine…how they [white women] capitalized on their racial similarity with white men and took advantage of anti-immigrant and racist political rhetoric to push their cause forward.”

Teen Suffrage: Exploring Proposals to Lower the Voting Age to 16 Student fellows Sam Barrett ’21, Erick Berrelleza ’20, Francesca Chicoine ’20, Mackenzie Mitchell ’20, and Brian Phan ’20 teamed up with sociology and social work professor Alice Gates to explore the history of age-related voting restrictions and the ongoing debate over lowering the voting age from 18 to 16. They also produced Teen Suffrage: The Podcast, broken into episodes like “Is 18 a Magic Number?” and “Voting and the Teenage Brain.”

Voting (In)Justice: Disenfranchising Adults in Custody Civic participation such as voting is often denied to inmates and parolees, disproportionately impacting communities of color. Communication studies professor Vail Fletcher led student fellows Jaden Anderson ’21, Sage DeFreitas ’21, and Clare Kessi ’20 in a study of “the intended and unintended effects related to the systemic civic disenfranchisement of individuals in the U.S. correctional system.”

Black Women in US Politics The culmination of the first year of the Public Fellows Program was keynote speaker Brittney Cooper, who gave her talk, “Trust Black Women: The Importance of Black Women in US Politics,” via Zoom on September 4 to more than 300 attendees. Cooper, a tenured professor of Women’s and Gender Studies and Africana Studies at Rutgers University and author of Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower, is a public scholar, meaning her research and writing intentionally addresses audiences both inside and outside of academia.

She spoke on the struggle for Black women’s suffrage, voter suppression, and the historical role of Black women’s vote. She also spoke to the “deeply pragmatic” nature of Black women voters as a whole and what happens when Black women show up. A selfdescribed optimist, she encourages young people to think about the “longer view of history” when choosing a candidate and to recognize how progress in civil rights has always been followed by a backlash. She asked probing questions, including: “What happens when you can’t occupy the place where decisions are made?”

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After visiting The National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama, Taylor Stewart ’18 returned to the Northwest determined to advance racial justice in the present by looking squarely at the racism of Oregon’s past. His first goal was to honor and memorialize a man named Alonzo Tucker.

THE TRUTH ABOUT ALONZO

B Y WA L I DA H I M A R I S H A E V E N T P H O T O S B Y M A R G A R E T JA C O B S E N

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On the last day of Black History Month, February 29, 2020, Taylor Stewart stood on a small traffic island in Coos Bay, Oregon, addressing 200 people.

They had all gathered on this particular site, sandwiched between the bustling 101 South highway and where the old Coos Bay City Hall used to stand, because an atrocity had been committed on that soil more than a century ago. Here the harrowing nightmare commenced for Alonzo Tucker, a young Black man who in 1902 was murdered by a white lynch mob. Now, more than 100 years later, people congregated to mourn his loss and commemorate his life.

Taylor Stewart had worked tirelessly for more than a year to make the memorial event happen, founding the Oregon Remembrance Project, partnering with the Equal Justice Initiative and the Coos History Museum, and garnering support from the City of Coos Bay. Breana Lamkin, representative from the Equal Justice Initiative (EJI), had flown out to Oregon from Alabama to attend because the recognition of lynching victims is central to EJI’s mission. Founded as a civil rights organization 30 years ago to provide legal assistance to folks on Alabama’s death row, EJI has broadened to shine a light on the racialized roots of the larger system of mass incarceration. In 2018, EJI opened The Legacy Museum: From Enslavement to Mass Incarceration and The National Memorial for Peace and Justice, which honors the thousands of victims of lynching in this country.

Supporting the creation of local memorials across the country is part of EJI’s community initiative.

“What we memorialize says something about what we value,” Lamkin told the crowd gathered in Coos Bay. Just three days before the memorial for Alonzo Tucker, the House of Representatives finally approved legislation categorizing lynching as a federal hate crime. It took more than 120 years and almost 200 attempts to address lynching

on a federal level. Despite majority support in the House, there was still opposition to its passage. As of this writing, the Emmett Till Antilynching Act is still being held up in the Senate by one individual, Senator Rand Paul (R-KY).

For centuries, this country has failed to address lynching as unequivocal white supremacist violence, even as law enforcement and white vigilantes continue to murder Black people. The global surge of Black Lives Matter protests in May is part of a continuous Black freedom struggle, most recently a response to the murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor at the hands of police, as well as the murders of those whose names are not as well known. In February of this year, 25-year-old Ahmaud Arbery was hunted, shot, and killed by three white men who filmed the murder. It was not until the video went viral in May, resulting in public outrage, that these three men were arrested and charged for murder.

In light of these events, Stewart’s work to honor Alonzo Tucker is both pressing and personal. “When you talk about why is this particular thing so important,” Stewart states, “I’m a young African American male; the only thing separating me and Alonzo Tucker is 100 years. There’s nothing different besides 100 years.”

If you are Black, 1902 is just a breath away from today.

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PICKI NG U P TH E BATON

Stewart first learned about Alonzo Tucker and the efforts of the Equal Justice Initiative in 2018 through the University of Portland. He took part in the Civil Rights Immersion, offered by the University’s Moreau Center for Service and Justice, and he had the opportunity to visit EJI’s museum and memorial, located in Montgomery, Alabama.

This trip set the path for the work he is doing now. “None of this would have happened if I didn’t go on that UP trip,” he says.

Currently attending Portland State University’s Masters in Social Work program, Stewart was born in Portland and has lived here his entire life.

It was in college at University of Portland when he came to both activism and a deeper understanding of race and racism and their importance in society.

“It’s in fact the cornerstone of our civilization,” he says. “So having my eyes opened to all of that completely changed my whole perspective.”

On the immersion trip, Stewart was most moved by learning that it was the work of everyday Black people fighting collectively in the civil rights movement that made it successful. He realized he had a role to play in that same Black freedom struggle as it manifests today.

“It truly does mean a lot to me to be part of this legacy,” he says. “You’re standing on the shoulders of giants. I was moved by all I saw, the people who came before.

It motivates you to run your leg of the race so that you can hand off the baton to the next generation.”

So Stewart founded the Oregon Remembrance Project, Oregon’s chapter of EJI’s Community Remembrance Project. The project has three stages, what EJI calls “the phases of remembrance”: a public soil collection, the installation of a two-sided sign, and the placement of a monument, the twin of which stands at EJI’s National Memorial.

The February 29 event in Coos Bay was Oregon’s first stage. Those present placed the soil in two jars. The soil had been previously collected from the multiple sites where Tucker was tortured and lynched. One jar will stay in the Coos History Museum for inclusion in a future exhibit; the other will be displayed at the Legacy Museum, the National Memorial, or EJI offices in Montgomery.

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U NCOVERI NG TH E TRUTH

Historians have not found any written records left by Alonzo Tucker. The little that is known about his life has been pieced together from a white perspective and must be sifted through to remove, as much as possible, the racial bias and assumptions of the day. This bias and erasure are regular barriers to the accurate histories of communities of color in this nation.

Originally from Maryland, Tucker moved from the Sacramento area to Coos County, less than two years before his murder. He was a prize fighter, and newspapers reported one of his Sacramento fights in 1900 as “the best ever seen in that section of California.”

Articles from the Sacramento Bee do detail Tucker being arrested on one earlier occasion while still in California, but it seems he interfered to stop a fight, and he was found not guilty by a white jury.

Twenty-eight years old and married, Tucker might have originally come to work in the mines in the nearby town of Libby like the majority of Black men who came to the area, but then moved into Marshfield (now Coos Bay). He was an industrious man with many occupations: boxer, boot black at a local barber shop, mail carrier, and business owner of a small gym called The School of Physical Culture housed in a building formerly occupied by YMCA. According to Harry Walker, who was an eye witness to Tucker’s lynching and offered testimony in the local newspaper The World, Tucker used to exercise every day by running the six miles total between Marshfield and Libby, training for upcoming boxing matches. To make extra money, he also would carry mail between the two towns on his runs.

Witnesses from that time said there was another reason he took that route so often—it is where he would meet Lizzy Dennis, a white woman, for consensual romantic trysts. Lizzy Dennis’s accusation of rape resulted in his lynching.

A wall of soil collected from lynching sites around the country, collected and displayed at the National Memorial in Montgomery, Alabama.

The official story at the time was that, on the morning of September 17, 1902, Lizzy Dennis, wife of a local coal miner and mother of two, three, or four children (records vary), was attacked and assaulted

by Tucker on her way to Libby, near the bridge and the cemetery. Tucker was incarcerated by marshal Jack Carter that evening. Meanwhile, angry white men gathered into a mob of 200 and marched to the jail intent on kidnapping and murdering Tucker.

Tucker supposedly escaped from the marshal who was trying to help him. He hid all night, was found in the morning, and was shot multiple times. He died on the way to the bridge. The mob, which had grown to 300, then hung him and left his body for hours.

So many elements in this “official” story are suspect or categorically false, as shown by the 1974 World interview with three white community leaders who witnessed the lynching as boys. They all agreed that Dennis and Tucker were having an affair and would meet almost daily on his run to Libby. That particular day, the trio said Tucker and Dennis were spotted together by the town doctor. They suggested Dennis leveled the accusation of sexual assault to avoid the affair coming to light. Some local media at the time also expressed doubt about the accusation.

Martin Steckel had seen Tucker right after the alleged assault: “I don’t think he had attacked any woman…as nonchalant as he was. He didn’t seem to have a worry in the world. He just come over the hill there and down in sight of us and they made up that mob and never asked no questions.”

Tucker was arrested without struggle and placed in jail by the marshal, protesting his innocence throughout the entire ordeal. When the mob came to the jail to administer what they called “Southern justice,” marshal Carter was not prepared to protect Tucker. Carter decided to try to take Tucker on a boat to another town, though whether this was for Tucker’s safety or the marshal’s own convenience is unclear.

The story that Tucker ran away from custody also appears to be false and served to further criminalize him. In reality, when the mob came to the docks, marshal Carter was again completely unprepared, and there was no boat there for Tucker to escape in. When they were

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THE LOS ANGELES DAILY TIMES, JULY 1, 1901

Alonzo Tucker (right) featured in the Los Angeles Daily Times on July 1, 1901, training with boxer Hank Griffin, under a headline “Griffin and Tucker on the Beach.” Tucker was training for an upcoming match against Jim Tremble.

spotted by the armed mob, Tucker tried to save his own life, fleeing not custody (which he had willingly submitted to earlier) but a murderous mob. Carter most likely could not have protected Tucker from the mob violence, and Carter’s actions indicate he was never inclined to protect Tucker.

Carter’s sympathies certainly lay with the lynchers, as he not only refused to identify any of the mob but also repeatedly used the n-word to refer to Tucker.

Carter testified that he left Tucker—still alive though badly injured—to be hunted by the mob while Carter went to find the coroner. He left a murder in progress.

The mob closed off the town and set up armed patrols, and Tucker could not escape. He ended up hiding under the wharfs over night, but he was found in the morning under a store by two young boys.

Tucker ran after being discovered, only to be shot in the thigh, hitting a major artery, which a doctor at the time said

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would have killed him in 10 minutes. It speaks to both Tucker’s strength and his fear that he managed to run into a local store, Dean & Co.’s, pleading for help to uncaring ears. Steckel was in the store as a boy and recounts hearing Tucker say, “Lord have mercy on a colored man.”

But there was no mercy to be had.

Tucker was shot again in the upper back by another young boy, and yet still he struggled and resisted as the mob continued to attack and terrorize him, his life ebbing. He was thrown into a truck, and they put a noose around his neck and drove him to the site of his alleged assault against Dennis. The doctor at the time said Tucker died on the road, but the mob still lynched his body, as a “public spectacle.”

This all happened during the day, with nobody hiding their identities. In fact, a local newspaper at the time reported, “Not a masked man was in the [mob] and everything was done in broad

daylight.” Despite this, an inquest found his death justified and said it happened “at the hands of parties unknown,” even though it was well known around town who participated in the mob violence.

No one was ever arrested.

TH E MYTHS OF LYNCH I NG

Tucker’s lynching is not the only lynching in Oregon history, though it is the one that had the documentation that EJI requires.

Twenty years after Alonzo Tucker’s lynching, another Black Marshfield resident, Timothy Pettis, was found murdered and mutilated in the bay in 1924, leading the NAACP’s Portland chapter to declare, “Marshfield is infested with the Ku Klux Klan.” Oregon is believed to have had the highest per capita Ku Klux Klan membership in the country in the 1920s, and the Klan reached into the highest echelon of city, county, and state government.

Timothy Pettis’s murder was never solved.

Dr. Darrell Millner, one of the foremost historians of the western Black experience, cites a number of lynchings of Black people as well as Native Americans in the Oregon territory during the Civil War era. Andie E. Jenson, author of multiple Coos County history books, agrees in his book Law on the Bay: Marshfield, Oregon 1874–1944, reporting a total of four Black men lynched within the state.

Dr. Millner also cites multiple instances of pseudo lynchings or “practice lynchings” at the Klan’s height in the 1920s.

They bore the same structure of an actual lynching: identify a victim, capture and take them to a remote location, then “stringing them up….” The victims would not be killed but told to get out of town or face a real lynching. “That’s part of the lynching record as well,” Dr. Millner explains.

Tucker’s lynching and lynchings in general are not about punishing the supposed wrongdoing of one person but about terrorizing communities. “I don’t think you leave someone’s body hanging …for several hours if the intent wasn’t to send a message,” Taylor Stewart says.

“These were more than just extrajudicial killings; they had a cultural impact, and much of that was to instill fear and to be able to sustain white supremacy in a world without chattel slavery. So lynching was always meant to send a message.”

Lynchings are often spoken of retroactively, as if they happened under the cover of night, with no knowledge of who was responsible. This is challenged by the actual photos of lynchings, in which one sees in some cases hundreds of white people—posing, pointing, sometimes smiling. This was not something white people were ashamed to be part of.

Lynchings have always had widespread support from a variety of local and national elements. Law enforcement was almost always complicit, if not in the actual lynching, then by ensuring no one was ever punished for it.

And the overwhelmingly positive white media coverage—both locally, statewide, and nationally—shows how sanctioned this form of racist terror violence was. The number of articles supporting the mob and vilifying Tucker are truly staggering. Weekly Coast Mail described the lynch mob as “quiet and

orderly, and it is safe to say that no such lawless proceeding was ever conducted with less unnecessary disturbance of the peace.” Multiple newspapers described Tucker as a “black fiend” who got the death “he so thoroughly deserved.”

There has been a thriving Black press in Oregon for 124 years. The New Age, Oregon’s first Black newspaper, covered the murder. The New Age was the only newspaper that not only decried mob rule but advocated for prosecuting the lynch mob so that something like this would not happen again in Oregon.

One of the biggest myths about lynching propagated at the time was that it was done to protect white women, as Black men were accused of having sexually assaulted them.

It is important to examine the complexities of race and gender and recognize that white women’s participation by lying about sexual assault by Black men either was about their own self-preservation (at the cost of their lover’s life) in the face of violent white patriarchy or was active participation in a brutally violent system of white supremacy. That is not to say sexual violence allegations are to be doubted; truly, they are underreported, especially for marginalized and oppressed people like women and transgender folks of color. Nonetheless, such allegations have historically been weaponized in service of white supremacy, as in the murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till in 1955 (for whom the antilynching bill is named).

He was accused of flirting with and accosting a white woman, then her husband and friend admitted to brutally mutilating, beating, and murdering him.

In a 2017 book, the white woman admitted the allegations were not true.

In fact, both EJI and Black organizations at the time found Black people (including Black women and Black children) were most likely to be lynched because of economically competing with white people or not showing white people “proper respect.”

Many folks, specifically white folks, I talked to lamented that Tucker never received a “fair” trial and so we will never know if he is innocent or guilty. Even if Tucker had gone to court, his race would have been far more important than factual evidence in determining his punishment. According to an EJI report,

“Neither lynching nor ‘legal execution’ required reliable findings of guilt, and complicit law enforcement officers handed over prisoners to the lynch mob.”

“In no way do I believe he would have gotten a fair trial,” Stewart says firmly.

“He was going to get lynched regardless.

The only difference is if it was outside as opposed to inside.”

A “fair” trial for Tucker was never a real possibility at that time and more than likely not in our own either. The current criminal legal system disproportionately incarcerates people of color, especially Black folks (who make up roughly half of the US prison population despite committing “crimes” at levels commensurate with population numbers of 14 percent). Oregon currently incarcerates Black people at 6 times the rate of white people, which reflects the national average.

The legal system has been one of the key ways white Oregonians have maintained their dominance. “The things that happened to him [Tucker] over 100 years ago at the turn of 20th century could very well have happened to him at the turn of the 21st century in a slightly less violent form,” says Dr. Millner.

Stewart says challenging the racist foundations of our legal system today is key to honoring Tucker. “If we were to really remember Alonzo Tucker, we would erase our still existing modern connection to lynching via the death penalty,” says Stewart.

BLACK I N COOS COU NTY

Coos Bay’s current demographics mirror the state-wide racial demographics of Oregon: 84 percent white and 3 percent Black, making Coos Bay the whitest community to undertake the Community Remembrance Project, according to Stewart. The reasons for these demographics are rooted in history.

The Oregon territory (Oregon, Washington, Idaho, and parts of Wyoming and Montana) was engineered to be a racist white utopia, and the white colonizers built into the foundations of this state and region—through policies, practices, laws, ideologies, and culture—white supremacy and the exclusion, containment, and exploitation of communities of color.

This institutional oppression happened through many different means,

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like the Oregon Donation Land Act of 1850, which gave away 2.5 million acres of Indigenous land for free to white settlers, building this white supremacist fantasy on top of Indigenous communities and histories. There were three Black exclusion laws passed. The first banned Black people from living in the Oregon territory, criminalizing Blackness, and included the Lash Law, which said Black people would be publicly whipped up to 39 lashes every six months until they left the territory.

Oregon was the only state admitted to the Union with a racially exclusionary clause in its constitution. That Black exclusion law language was not removed from Oregon’s Constitution until 2002, despite continuous efforts by the Black community to do so for almost a century. There was also significant opposition in the 21st century from white Oregonians to take the language out.

So why did Black people come here?

Because Black communities are varied, the truth is that there were many reasons.

One major one was work. But the promise of work wasn’t ever what it seemed.

In 1894, dozens of experienced Black West Virginia miners and their families were recruited to work in Coos County coal mines. They were promised five to seven dollars a day, comfortable quarters, and good treatment, according to an 1895 statement by G.W. Anderson, one of the Black miners’ leaders.

Instead, when they arrived at Roseburg, they were told they would have to walk more than 60 miles to their final destination, only to find after this long trudge the only shelter offered them was in leaky railroad boxcars. Their pay was at most 90 cents a day, and they found out they had to pay the company for their board and lodging. Working conditions in the wet mines below sea level were hazardous and unsafe. When they rightfully complained to the company, they were accused of trying to start a strike and ordered to pay what they owed and leave.

Dr. Millner says this treatment of Black workers was not unique, citing Black communities recruited to places like Maxville in Wallowa County to work in the timber industry, and says the best-known example of this exploitation of labor was from World War II

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in Portland and Vanport shipbuilding.

“The presence of Blacks in Coos Bay is just a part of that larger pattern or dynamic of exploitation of Black labor when it is useful or beneficial,” Millner says. “The reason they are not there today, of course, is the same thing always happens when their labor is not needed; they are encouraged in many ways to depart Oregon.”

The treatment of the remaining Coos Bay Black community after the turn of the 20th century attests that white communities exploited and then brutally expelled Black people when their labor was no longer needed.

Two days after Tucker was lynched, a local newspaper ran a story under the headline “Run Them Out,” advocating pushing out all Black people in the area through violence if necessary. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure, and while the lynching of one n***** would not repair the damage that he has wrought, the removal of the entire colored population would let us all rest easier when our wives are alone.”

The next year saw less than half as many Black people left in the area. The terrorizing of the Black community was largely successful.

Once the horrific details of Tucker’s brutalization are known, the question shifts from “Why did the Black people leave?” to “How did any of the Black community find strength and courage to stay in the face of such brutality?”

That courage is still needed to be Black and live in Oregon today.

For more than a year, Stewart took the eight-hour round-trip drive to Coos Bay multiple times. And always his father, Trent, was by his side.

Trent, who worked in inclusion and diversity for almost 20 years before retiring, used the drives down as strategy sessions with Taylor. But more than that, Trent said he went to ensure his son’s safety. When asked how he would have felt about letting Taylor go on his own, Trent just shook his head emphatically, saying, “There was no way, just no way.”

This highlights the dangers for Black people and other folks of color doing this work around the state. Even as Stewart and his father were going to honor a Black man murdered by white supremacists, they themselves were ever aware of their own vulnerabilities in 2020.

Attendees at the memorial event in Coos Bay on February 29, 2020, fill two jars inscribed with Alonzo Tucker’s name. The soil was collected from the multiple sites where Tucker was tortured and lynched. One jar will go to an EJI exhibit in Montgomery, Alabama, and the other will stay at the Coos History Museum.

That Black exclusion law language was not removed from Oregon’s Constitution until 2002, despite continuous efforts by the Black community to do so for almost a century.

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That courage is still needed to be Black and live in Oregon today.

Breana Lamkin (center of photograph to the right), an EJI project manager, flew from Alabama to Oregon for the event. Pictured here with Senator Arnie Roblin (left).

ALWAYS MOVI NG FORWARD

According to the EJI Community Remembrance Project, an official EJI marker with historic and educational information is the next step in the process after the soil collection. Originally, the City of Coos Bay would only commit to installing a smaller brass plaque at the base of an unrelated pedestal.

Despite repeated requests for an interview to multiple officials for this essay, there was no response to get to a full understanding of this decision to divert from the EJI outlined process by not using the larger two-sided marker or committing to install the final monument. OPB reported that City Manager Rodger Craddock (also the former police chief) explained: “The city did that in order not to add insult to injury to the others in this community. Here we have one incident involving Alonzo Tucker, but many incidents for many of our other past ancestors.”

Instead of shifting blame and responsibility onto other communities of color, the city could have committed to honoring Tucker in a more substantial way and committed to honoring others harmed by racial violence. The initial

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decision not to follow EJI’s process seemed to speak more to protecting their image than doing the right thing.

Historically, people in the city held the same priorities. A local newspaper that gleefully reported on Tucker’s murder in 1902 said the biggest concern was the damage to Coos County’s reputation: “Perhaps the worst feature of the affair is the black eye which may be given to this community in the estimation of the outside world.”

However, the surge of Black Lives Matter protests and organizing has changed the national narrative, as well as the one in Coos Bay. Hundreds have taken part in multiple protests in Coos Bay, including almost 400 in two-day June protests. That a man was arrested for allegedly pulling a gun on these peaceful protesters highlights the ongoing threat of white supremacy, alongside this changing narrative.

The renewed protests and demands for justice have contributed to a cultural shift, and according to Stewart, the City has agreed to more than the small plaque. Planning continues.

Stewart feels it’s also vital to have the conversation of Tucker’s murder con-

nected to larger conversations about institutional violence that has been done and is being done to the Black community not just in Coos Bay, but also in Portland.

“If we have this conversation about restorative justice in Coos Bay, we would be remiss if we didn’t also talk about restorative justice that has to happen in a city like Portland with a long history of redlining, gentrification, displacement.”

He will work with the Oregon Historical Society and other community partners to plan how this will happen.

TH E IMPORTANCE OF ALONZO TUCKER

Some may ask why Tucker’s case is relevant and useful to society now. What can this teach people about the world today?

“One of the most important things we have to do if we are to recapture the true history of how whites came to dominate the area, we have to go far beyond the wagon train stories and understand the role violence played in that. Alonzo Tucker is a good gateway for that. His story is a clear representation of the role violence played for whites to become dominant in this area,” Dr. Millner says.

Stewart agrees and says that this truth-telling about Tucker and the larger

history is foundational to any movement forward: “Bryan Stevenson, the Executive Director of the Equal Justice Initiative, says that truth and reconciliation are sequential. And so in order to get that reconciliation we have to first tell the truth about lynching and the truth about our past as Oregonians.”

The highlight of the Coos Bay event was the soil distribution. Memorial attendees were invited to help transfer the soil from the sites of Tucker’s torture and murder into the two containers, one of which will be sent to Montgomery to be part of their display of soil jars collected from lynching sites across the country, and the other will be used as part of a future Coos History Museum exhibit.

Even though the majority of those in attendance were from Coos Bay, there was also broader Oregon representation from Portland, Eugene, Medford, Salem, Newport, and beyond. A contingent of students, staff, and faculty from University of Portland attended to support both the cause and their alum Taylor Stewart. Two state senators and one state representative were also present.

Yuri Hernández Osorio, UP’s Coordinator for Diversity & Inclusion Programs,

grew up in Coos Bay and was surprised but heartened that the memorial took place in her hometown. “As a person of color from this community, I was pessimistic about this happening, but I’m glad they are doing this. I’m glad they acknowledged how Alonzo Tucker’s lynching impacts communities of color and how they feel about being here in Coos County.”

Both off and on stage, there was a strong showing of youth from high schools and the local community college.

Particularly powerful was the contingent from Marshfield High School, as the school’s soccer field is the former site of the bridge where Tucker was lynched.

Part of the reason for that representation is Steve Greif, a trustee on the Coos History Museum Board, who opened and closed the event. Greif, a historian and former high school teacher, said he always included Tucker in his curriculum to prevent the community from forgetting.

Greif also did the initial soil collection, which was blessed at the memorial

by Reverend Israel Jurich of Faith Lutheran Church. Greif made a point of explaining that he gathered soil for the event from three sites. These three sites show the trail of pain and terror that

stalked Alonzo Tucker in his final hours.

The first was the old City Hall, where the memorial was held. It is where Tucker was arrested and imprisoned. It is also where the white mob of 200 originally came for him. The second batch of soil came from an estuary under the docks, where Tucker spent a horror-filled night hiding from the mob. The final site of soil collection was the site of the bridge where his dead body was hung in front of hundreds and left for hours.

Stewart recognized this event as an important beginning, but only a beginning. He offered a poignant reflection for attendees as they moved the soil into the two containers: “And so as you place this soil in these jars, ask yourself, ‘How can I pursue reconciliation?’ Ask yourself, ‘How will I be different after today?’”

WALIDAH IMARISHA is an educator and a writer. She has published four books and has traveled Oregon for years facilitating programs on Oregon Black history and other topics. Imarisha has taught at Stanford University, Portland State University, and Oregon State University, among others.

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Don’t Sit Down Now That You’ve ComeThis Far We’ve come this far by faith, Leaning on the Lord.

Trusting in His holy Word.

He’s never failed us yet.

Oh, can’t turn around, We’ve come this far by faith.

—Chorus one of “We’ve Come This Far by Faith,” lyrics and music by Albert A. Goodson, composer in the African American gospel tradition, 1956, Chicago, IL

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“BEYOND THE WAVES,” PORTLAND ARTIST JENI LEE, ACRYLIC AND RAINDROPS ON CANVAS

BY timone davis A RT BY J E N I L E E

THE “SIGNS OF THE TIME” could cause one to lose hope, to think all is lost, to just give up and stop trying, but I have good news to share: God is still loving us and that love is saving us. Before my father died, I used to preach at his church on a monthly basis. Before the preaching event, the choir would lead the congregation in the same song, “We’ve Come This Far by Faith.” In my first year of hearing this tradition, I was like Really? Again? Don’t you know another song? Then one Sunday it clicked. We have made it to this point. We have done it—but only with God. So when I think about what is happening now, this song comes to mind and reminds me that we have made it through other trials and we can make it through these, if we don’t sit down.

“We’ve Come This Far by Faith” is about a collective arrival. We’ve journeyed to this point. We’re here. It’s about banding together, so we can achieve what God calls us to: God’s kin-dom.

In Isaiah 58:1–3, God calls us to shout out, to use our voice for justice, but not in the way we have in the past. God is calling for us to stop serving our own needs and instead to serve the needs of us all. Our inability to do what God asks of us does not stop Christ from still calling us forward to immerse ourselves in God’s gift of love so that we are transformed in a way that seeks to address the needs of the hungry, the naked, the homeless, and the oppressed.

But for many of us, the sentiments in “We’ve Come This Far by Faith” are the signal to stop, to sit down, and say, “The LORD got me this far, He’ll do the rest, while I rest.”

We fail to see our role in the journey. We fail to realize that all our journeys are connected. Too often we forget that our existence begins in God, not each other. Knowing that we have been created in God’s image, we can’t rest; we can’t sit down now.

Embracing a life outside our comfort zone is so hard for most of us.

But not for Jesus. I’m ecstatic that Jesus wasn’t hindered by what He had never done before. That dying on the cross thing was a definite move out of His comfort zone. Going that far only made Him see how much farther He had to go.

“Can’t turn around; we’ve come this far.” We can’t turn around; we can’t sit down. Have we forgotten that the man we are named for didn’t sit down?

Knowing that we are sinners, we can’t sit down.

Knowing that the Church leadership does not reflect the diversity of the world, we can’t sit down.

Knowing that the Church, in all her interactions, does not fully reflect Jesus, we can’t sit down.

Knowing that we live in a world where the gospel is spoken of through the screens of hatred, discrimination, racism, and oppression, we can’t sit down.

Knowing that we are not living the sacred lives God has called us to, we can’t sit down.

Knowing that we have not reconciled ourselves with one another, we can’t sit down.

Knowing that people are out there waiting on us to show them the glory of God, we can’t sit down.

We’ve come this far by faith. We can’t sit down. We can’t sit down. We can’t sit down. We must stand. Stand through the struggle. Stand through the storm. Stand up for our rights.

There’s too much to do.

Stand now if you’re willing to work for the LORD.

Christians are called to be Christ for others. On that we can agree. Christianity should not be a title, but a way of life.

We must stop our voicelessness and become Christians.

Can you speak out against injustices? Better yet, can you stop participating in injustices? Following Christ is about seeing the struggles and becoming involved in order to fix them. The words we speak must manifest themselves in our actions. If we are asking someone to believe in a righteous God, we must be righteous people.

Stand now if you know you need the LORD to lead you.

A Christian lifestyle is not about being comfortable.

Wherever there is discomfort, a Christian should be uncomfortable. Our movement to help others should be quick just like we want God to be when She comes to help us. We don’t want God taking His time. Nor do we want God to stay in a comfort zone.

Stand now if you’re in need of prayer.

Stand now if you know you’ve been sitting on what God has asked of you.

Stand up and ask the Holy Spirit to embrace you, hold you, lead you where you need to be.

In You, God, we find the peace that surpasses all understanding.

timone davis runs a business that blends clinical counseling and spiritual companioning and works as an assistant professor in the Institute of Pastoral Studies at Loyola University Chicago.

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ALL PHOTOS BY BOB KERNS

A N E W I CO N O F T H E M A RT Y R S O F U G A N DA

I C O N B Y M A RY K AT S I L O M E T E S - R E I N B O L D

Encounter B Y S I M O N M A RY A . A I H I O K H A I

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hen I look at the new icon of the Martyrs of Uganda in the Shipstad Chapel, I immediately notice that the figures of Christ and the 22 Catholic martyrs are represented as Black persons. For those familiar with seeing the image of Christ represented as a white man, this image may be unsettling.

But icons are meant to unsettle and surprise us. They are meant to mediate encounters between the viewer and the divine.

Allow me to share an example from my own experience of an icon that unsettled me and pushed me to new understanding.

Growing up in Nigeria, I never saw an image of Christ that spoke to Blackness. I never even knew I had internalized a Christianity that could not help me to appreciate my identity as a Black person until an experience I had in 2004. I have called this experience my graced-gift of rebirth.

The Los Angeles parish where I was working that year wanted to commemorate Thanksgiving Day by celebrating a liturgy that affirmed the different cultural realities of the parish community—68 countries in total, including my home country Nigeria. Through music and ritual symbols, we were going to be intentionally pluralistic.

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What is an Icon?

Icons are a hot topic in monotheistic religions because of the fear that they can end up becoming sources of distraction from the one God. Islam, for example, has always prohibited any form of iconic usage in relation to devotion to Allah, for fear that Muslims might fall into idolatry. In the Hebrew Bible, the second commandment specifically forbids the production and worship of images. But even with these prohibitions, Judaism is saturated with iconic representations of the unique relationship God has with the Israelites. For example, the Star of David, also known as Magen David in Hebrew, speaks of an iconic representation of God’s shield of protection over David and the Jewish people.

Christianity also struggles with a proper understanding of the meaning of icons. The fear of idolatry in the usage of icons within the Christian faith is real. Canon 36 of the Synod of Elvira (305–306 C.E.) specifically prohibits the placement of pictures in churches to ensure that they do not become objects of worship. Nonetheless, the usage of an icon as a medium for devotion has flourished in Christianity for millennia (in spite of the destruction of many ancient icons within the domain of the Eastern Roman Empire under the reign of Byzantine Emperor Leo III the Isaurian (717–741 C.E.)).

When I teach students about icons in my theology class, I often start with signs and symbols—how they mean different things and how an icon aims to be both sign and symbol. Both symbols and signs communicate and mediate meanings. However, a sign mediates meaning that is singular and thus predictable. Think of a traffic sign. There is only one meaning for a red light or a green light. A sign draws attention to itself and to its single meaning. God can’t be a sign alone, because God must always invite encounter with the divine.

A symbol, on the other hand, is saturated with meanings. With a symbol, there is always something new; there may even be an element of surprise. Theologically, symbols speak of the transcendent nature of God and of all that God has made.

Signs and symbols are not opposed to each other. They are two sides of the same coin.

They both allow for relational encounters.

Christians believe God, in Jesus Christ, became human; God became both sign and symbol; God became an icon. We, as humans made in the likeness of God, are icons as well.

All of creation is iconic, created for encounter.

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The Martyrs of Uganda: A Brief Ecumenical History The new icon depicts the 22 Catholic martyrs of Uganda. But there are two other untold stories of martyrdom in Uganda (or what was then called the Kingdom of Buganda). Twenty-three Anglican martyrs died alongside the 22 Catholic martyrs between 1885 and 1886, and, ten years earlier, 70 Muslim martyrs were killed in 1875. Together, these martyrs of Uganda tell an ecumenical story of religious faith resisting oppression.

The martyrdom of the 70 Muslims is closely linked to the growing impact of Islam on the way of life in the Kingdom of Buganda. Islam arrived in Buganda centuries before Christianity through Swahili traders in East Africa and later through the Arab slave traders from the slave station of Zanzibar in the early part of the 1700s, after Zanzibar became part of the Omani Sultanate.

Islam became an intricate part of the cultural and social life of the Kingdom of Buganda, but Kabaka Mutesa I (1856– 1884), though converted to Islam, refused to embrace publicly a ritual custom—circumcision—mandated by Islam.

Officials of his court wanted him to protect and preserve the primacy of African Religion. At this time the colonial interests of the British and Germans were taking shape in the region. Fearing the growing influence of Muslim Egypt in the region, Mutesa I suppressed all forms of resistance to his rule, even by his fellow Muslims. Thus, he ordered the killing of 70 Muslims who were the leading voices calling for his complete embrace of the ritual practice of circumcision.

To balance the power of religious and political influence in his kingdom, in 1862, Mutesa I admitted Christian missionaries and British explorer John Hanning Speke into his kingdom. The first batch of missionaries from the Church Missionary Society (Anglican) arrived in Buganda in 1877. Two years later, members of the Society of the Missionaries of Africa (Catholic) arrived as well. Court officials, along with other subjects of the monarch, embraced the Christian faith. In 1884, Mutesa I died, leaving his eighteenyear-old son, Mwanga II, as his successor.

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As we processed into the church, my pastor informed me that he had placed an icon of a Black Christ on the altar to celebrate the few Black members in the parish.

Looking up at the altar and seeing the icon, I immediately uttered the words that came from my subconscious: “That is not Jesus. Jesus is not Black.”

I then realized that my microphone was on.

Members of the community heard me, a Black person, uttering these alienating words. Did I really mean that I couldn’t see myself, my Black identity, in Christ? Hadn’t I instructed people entering the Catholic Church for 19 years that we are all made in the image and likeness of God? Why couldn’t I see my Blackness in Him? At that moment—my graced-gift of rebirth moment— I realized a hard truth: I had been colonized and not Christianized. My understanding of God prior to that moment was self-alienating. It never was able to make space for my very existence as a Black man rooted in concrete socio-cultural and political contexts.

I came away from this moment with new questions: What images do we have of God in our minds, and how do these images speak to us in the concreteness of our existence as creatures of history, context, and culture? I bring this question to my students all the time. I ask them: Who do your images of God include? Who do they exclude? And why?

“That is not Jesus. Jesus is not Black.” I then realized that my microphone was on.

The Ugandan Martyrs did not encounter a white God. Rather, they encountered a God who had become human like them in the very embodiment of their being as Black Africans living at a very precarious time in their collective history. Depicting the Ugandan Martyrs surrounding a Black Christ speaks of a Christ who finds Blackness as a worthy embodiment of the divine.

For me, encountering this new icon, I am reminded that God identifies with all that it means to be Black in our world—then and now. This artistic representation of Christ as Black is most relevant for our times as our world grapples with systemic racism and how it has defined our collective imagination in ways that deny the innate human dignities of Black persons.

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Mwanga II ascended to the throne of Buganda at a time when the European scramble for Africa was at full speed. Attempting to control the influence of Muslims, Anglicans, and Catholics in his kingdom, as well as curb the growing presence and power of the Germans and the British who wanted to take possession of his kingdom as part of their territorial possessions in East Africa, Mwanga II embraced a stricter policy towards his Muslim, Anglican, and Catholic subjects. He chose not to convert to Islam.

His Muslim subjects began to reject his authority. His Christian subjects condemned his practice of polygamy, and his pages, who converted to Christianity, refused his advances. Fearing his loss of absolute authority in his kingdom, he decided to act decisively against all forms of perceived rebellion. From 1885 to 1886, Mwanga II ordered the killing of 23 Anglicans and 22 Catholics. The first to be killed was Joseph Mukasa, an Anglican, for opposing the murder of Joseph Hannington, the first Anglican Bishop of East Africa, who had entered the Kingdom of Buganda without the permission of the monarch and with the intention to evangelize. The youngest to die was the fourteen-year-old Kizito, who is among those depicted in the University of Portland’s icon. Most of the Christian martyrs—Anglican and Catholic—were ritually killed by being burned alive in the town of Namugongo on June 3, 1886. Even after their death, the tensions and power struggles between religions and colonial powers and African powers continued.

The Catholic martyrs were beatified on June 6, 1920, by Pope Benedict XV and then later canonized on October 18, 1964, by Pope Saint Paul VI. The story of the Ugandan Martyrs, when told within the larger story of European imperialism and colonial ambitions in Africa, forces us to engage with the complex realities facing the continent of Africa. These martyrs were not just victims of anti-Christian sentiments; they were also victims of political and cultural struggles between the ruling class of Buganda and the European colonial powers.

As we reimagine what our country and world ought to look like, it is important that we intentionally embrace our diverse realities.

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Anyone who encounters this icon is invited to a deeper understanding of ourselves and our world.

Jesus Christ, as a historical figure, lived in Judea during the imperial domination of the region by the Persians, the Greeks, and eventually, the Romans. He had to navigate the realities that defined his society.

But to Christians, Jesus Christ also means more than the historical figure. Jesus is the gift for the possibility of new imaginations on how and what it means to be fully human in God’s world. To Christians, Jesus Christ, as enfleshed divinity, is an icon of God for all times. What God has become in the humanity of Jesus Christ is always revealing new ways of God’s interactions with creation. The humanity of God in Jesus Christ is an invitation to a new kind of encounter, one where we, too, are both sign and symbol of God, where we can embrace a new way of living in God’s world.

As I reflect on my microphone moment, I realize that this context was lacking in the way I was evangelized into the Christian faith. European and American missionaries, who evangelized many parts of sub-Saharan Africa during the era of colonial rule by the European colonial powers of the 19th century, had given me a rigid representation of Christ.

Though icons speak to us in our particularities, they also transcend them. In this transcendence lies the possibility for new imaginations and new encounters. While the icon of the Ugandan Martyrs showcases a Black Christ surrounded by Black persons, it cannot speak only to Black people. Anyone who encounters this icon is invited to a deeper understanding of ourselves and our world.

As we encounter this icon, let us be intentional in seeing how it invites us to open up ourselves to new horizons for inclusivity.

As we celebrate our diversity, may we not also forget our oneness—Ut unum sint (“That they may be one” —John 17:21).

SIMONMARY A. AIHIOKHAI is an assistant professor of theology (systematics) at University of Portland. His research explores religion and identity; African philosophies, cultures, and theologies; religion and violence; comparative theology; and interfaith studies.

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Franz River Campus

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BOB KERNS

University of Portland’s land near the Willamette River holds many stories.

The first in a series on its present, past, and future.

MEET THE MARTINS

BY J E S S ICA M U R P H Y MO O P H O T O S B Y B O B K E R N S A N D U P S T U D E N T- R E S E A R C H E R S

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Franz River Campus

Due to habitat loss, climate change, and pesticides, the Western Purple Martin is a “sensitive-critical” species in Oregon and may soon be listed as threatened or endangered in Washington. So biology professor Katie O’Reilly and five science majors created new habitat—the gourds pictured on the previous page—for the Purple Martins to build new nests on University of Portland’s River Campus.

ALL PHOTOS ON THIS SPREAD BY BOB KERNS

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The research was well-suited to times of social distancing.

In May, the team kayaked along the shore to examine the pilings and dolphins—remnants of an old shipping dock— to count Purple Martin nesting pairs. When development of the River Campus begins again, these structures will be removed. The team of researchers—Abby Knott ’21, Gabby Casentini ’21, Emily Hosoume ’21, Ellie Winkelmann ’21, Sabrina Baioni ’20—was eager to establish new habitat for the Purple Martins. “We need them to know this is a great place for them to come back to every year,” says Knott, who is on her second year studying this bird population.

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Franz River Campus GABBY CASENTINI

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GABBY CASENTINI

The older, more experienced males got first dibs on the established habitat in the pilings. The younger males went for the next best thing: the new gourds. The birds seemed to like the new habitat. About the size of a soccer ball, with enough room for a clutch of up to six chicks, the shape of the gourds derives from the actual gourds that Native Americans used to provide as habitat for this native species. The squat opening is the perfect size for these birds, which are the largest swallow with the shortest legs. They can shimmy on through the opening and their competitors—European starlings, among others—cannot.

(Birder lore says that European starlings—a non-native species—were introduced to the US by a man who wanted all of Shakespeare’s birds in New York’s Central Park. Whether or not Shakespeare was the motivation, this is a cautionary tale about the consequences of introducing non-native species.)

EMILY HOSOUME

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Franz River Campus Purple Martins are fun birds to observe. They interact in colonies, meaning they nest near each other for protection. They’re noisy. They’re social. When sitting on the eggs, they will poke their head out of the peekhole. They are aerial feeders, meaning they catch their food—dragonflies, butterflies, mayflies, among others—midair and bring them back to their young. The male and female birds swap places when tending to eggs and chicks. Once a week during the spring and summer, the researchers pulled the gourds down and unscrewed the caps and peeked inside. The appearance of cottonwood leaves meant the birds were making a nest. Then came eggs. Then…chicks! By mid-August all chicks had fledged. The birds will head to Forest Park across the river and then on to South America. If they return next year, O’Reilly and her team hope to band the chicks, so they can track them with even greater accuracy.

ALL PHOTOS ON THIS SPREAD BY BOB KERNS

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CATHY CHENEY ©PORTLAND BUSINESS JOURNAL

Rising to Our Humanity Kaia Sand ’94, executive director of Street Roots, the awardwinning weekly social justice newspaper, admits she’s an “all-in” kind of a person. A poet and a journalist, she looks at the poet-physician William Carlos Williams as an example— someone who did house visits for patients and wrote poetry on prescription pads. Since 2017 the people that Sand has walked with most closely in her writing are Portland’s community of individuals living with homelessness. With the pandemic, her organization has had to respond quickly and with creativity. The vendors of the newspaper now go through COVID-19 public health training and serve as public health ambassadors to others in the homeless community. Street Roots offices had to find a way to get government relief checks

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safely to individuals, and her vendors can also now accept cashless payment through Venmo. Then came the wildfires.

“What a horrible choice we face,” she wrote in a recent editorial. “[T]he healthiest place to be in COVID-19 is outside, and the healthiest place in these fires and smoke? Indoors.” (Street Roots suspended the newspaper for a week so that vendors could stay safe from hazardous air.) But Sand presses onward, and in spite of these challenges says she still loves how people—their tenacity, their compassion—never cease to surprise her. “As even more people are suffering now in these tragic months of pandemic and fires, it is a challenge for all of us to rise to our humanity.” Thank you for naming that challenge, Kaia, and thank you for your advocacy.

CLASS NOTES

50s 1956

Here’s a note from John Archer ’56, who writes: “Greetings, I noticed the latest issue of Portland magazine’s alumni news started with the ’60s, and I wanted you to know that there are a few of us ’50s still around. My wife, Jacquelyn (Gilliam) Archer ’56 and I are proud parents of four daughters and one son. We have 13 grandchildren and six greatgrandchildren. Our eldest daughter, Patricia ’79 and her late husband Euen Anderson ’79, our granddaughter Alexa Redmond ’16, and her husband, Will Gunnels ’16, and our granddaughter Mathea Redmond, hopefully class of ’24, are all proud Pilots.

Jackie and I now live in an adult community, but unfortunately Jackie now has Alzheimer’s’ disease and lives in that specialty unit.” Thanks so much for writing, John, and we’ll all say a prayer for Jackie.

70s 1977

We received the following note from Marilyn Catherine McDonald ’77, who writes: “I am 87. I raised eight children while working on my undergrad degree during my first marriage and received a BS in arts and letters from PSU in 1975. I had a one-year teaching fellowship and earned my MA in communication at UP in

1977. So long ago. Since that time I had a full-blown career in corporate communications, marketing, and PR, and retired in 1998. I had 22 years between marriages, with my second marriage in 1999 I moved to Central Oregon. We traveled the world and lived winters in Mexico for 15 years. That dear man, Harry Taylor, passed in 2018. I have been living in a one-bedroom apartment at Hearthstone at Murrayhill for 18 months, trying not to act my age. My five books— including An Unforgettably Marvelous Chicken Named Oscar and Mother of Eight Survives Population Explosion, are available at Amazon, and I’m working on number six. This virus has us all finding new ways for living in the present and with the guidance of our Higher Power. I love Zoom.

Wherever you all are in your education and personal growth, I wish you God speed. Enjoy the journey.”

Fine advice, Marilyn, and we look forward to book number six.

1979

A note from Janet Crabbs Turner ’79, pointing out a rather embarrassing goof on the CN editor’s part: “Thank you for the nice write-up for my mother, Marilyn L. Crabbs, in the Class Notes section of the latest Portland. Only one little comment though— it noted that I am the director of Financial Aid at UP. The other Janet Turner, who is the one working at UP, might not fully appreciate the mix-up. My family and friends, though, are certainly getting some mileage out of it! Thought you might want to know.

On another note, I absolutely loved your story, ‘If You Build It…’ about Joe Etzel and the evolving baseball stadium. You really captured it. Excellent!! Thanks again and take care! Janet (Crabbs) Turner.” Yes, Janet(s), our bad, thank you for your gracious message.

80s 1983

Mohammed Al Muallem ’83, CEO and managing director of DP World/UAE Region, was interviewed

by The Business Year, a global media group that has been providing investors, businesses, and governments with first-hand insights into the world’s most dynamic markets in the Middle East, Latin America, Central and Southeast Asia, Africa, and Europe. His past responsibilities include serving as chairman of the executive merging team of Dubai Ports Authority, Dubai Customs, and the Free Zone in 2000, and as executive coordinator for the Terminal 2 development at Jebel Ali Port in 2004.

1985

Judy (Piatz) Carbone ’85 received an Emmy Award at the 51st Annual Lower Great Lakes Emmy Awards virtual ceremony in June 2020. The award is a regional Emmy given out by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences Lower Great Lakes Chapter.

Judy is senior producer for WRTV in Indianapolis and has been with the ABC affiliated station for 29 years. She currently produces their 5 o’clock newscast. Judy was the executive producer for the entry “WRTV: 70 Years Together” in the Historical/ Cultural Program or Special category. This is the second Emmy won by Judy at WRTV.

1986

Heidi Wissmiller ’86 was appointed to the board of directors for Nature’s Sunshine Products, Inc., effective August 1, 2020.

She has worked for the past 25 years at companies including Rodan + Fields skincare products, Micro Analytical Systems, PepsiCo, E & J Gallo Winery, and RJR Nabisco. She earned a Board Readiness Certification from Yale University School of Management and a Finance for Executives Certification from the University of

SEND US YOUR NEWS Share the latest on your family, career, or accomplishments. Even a failure or two would be fine. We just want to be in touch.

Send updates to mcovert@up.edu

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Chicago after earning her bachelor of science degree in communication management from UP. Congratulations, Heidi, and feel free to share your stories with your alma mater!

90s 1995

Here Comes the Sun

Within the bustling halls of a Los Angeles hospital, a popular Beatles song plays over the intercom.

The uplifting melody has become an anthem of hope for School of Nursing alum Bailey Saleumvong ’08. “‘Here Comes the Sun’ would play every time a COVID patient was discharged. As the days would go by, we would hear that song playing over the intercom throughout the day,” he says.

After years of experience in neuroscience, emergency, cardiac, and ICU units, Bailey decided to become a travel nurse. With this job, Bailey gets the opportunity to live and work in different cities and hospitals around the country but chooses to take jobs primarily in California and Washington.

Currently based in Los Angeles, Bailey is helping treat critically ill patients who are suffering from the coronavirus.

Since the pandemic began, Bailey and his fellow nurses have been working tirelessly to help patients and their families through this difficult time.

“It’s been a very stressful time for nurses around the country. When the pandemic started, we didn’t know much about the virus or how much danger we were in caring for these patients. It was a very sobering moment in my career.”

He has also seen signs of hope. “As time went by, we were able to find what treatments our patients were positively responding to. We were happy to finally send our patients down to the regular units from the ICU,” he says.

Outside of work, Bailey keeps busy by taking classes for a master’s degree in nursing informatics, going on hikes, and adding to his houseplant collection.

—Roya Ghorbani-Elizeh ’11

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William T. Gibbs ’95 has been named to the 2020 Lawdragon 500 Leading Plaintiff Consumer Lawyers, a list of the top 500 consumer lawyers nationwide. He is currently a partner with Corboy & Demetrio of Chicago, IL. Joining four other legendary Oregon athletes in the 2020 Class of the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame: Tiffeny Milbrett ’95.

She is a three-time AllAmerican and scored 103 career goals, was a twotime WCC conference player of the year, and, under the tutelage of Clive Charles, led the Pilots to the 1994 Final Four. Who can forget her August 1, 1996, Olympics performance with Pilot teammate Shannon MacMillan ’95, when they each scored in the 2-1 US victory over China? Tiffeny played in three World Cups for the US national team and was goal leader the year of their 1999 victory over China—a watershed event for US women’s soccer. Tiffeny’s accomplishments and awards have come in a steady stream both during and after her playing years, including UP’s 2005 Contemporary Alumni Award, which reads in

part: “There may never have been a more exciting student-athlete at the University, nor an alumna who spoke so honestly from the heart. Tiffeny Milbrett has carried the best of the University around the planet, and the entire University community is deeply grateful.” Amen to that.

00s 2001

We heard recently from Kara (Seil) Smith ’01, who writes: “I wanted to let you know that I graduated from Dominican University of California in May 2020 with a master of arts in humanities. I started my graduate studies back in 2011 but took some time off after I got married to my husband, Tyson, and gave birth to my daughters, Lucy (5) and Aria (2).

I decided to go back this semester, and I was able to finish even with the switch to online classes for the second half of the semester. I also visited Iceland for ten days in March for a biology class I was taking. It was an incredible experience, and we made it back to the US right before the shelter in place started.

My family and I currently live in Petaluma, CA. I miss Portland so much and I hope to make it up there one of these days after life returns to ‘normal,’ and we can travel safely. Thank you and keep up the great work on the magazine!”

Thank you, Kara, we could

all use a little normalcy right about now.

BOB KERNS

2006

Thank You, Teacher

Renee Espinoza ’09 teaches second grade at Astor Elementary School, mere blocks from the UP campus. She is a few weeks into her second semester of distance learning. So far so good. She writes: “I have 18 students in my class this fall, and attendance has already been much better than last year. I feel a lot more prepared, and I am actually teaching. We have a set schedule for our day that includes a lot of read-alouds that tie in conversations about diversity, perspective, empathy, and justice.

“Class discussions are not the same as in the classroom.

Students have to stay muted because many have a lot of background noise going on. Although the year is already more structured than last year, it will never be the same as in-person. I only have a certain amount of time with my students, and it doesn’t allow wiggle room. It is Hispanic/ Latinx Heritage Month, and I would like to do more with my class, but there just isn’t enough time.

“Although I miss being in the classroom, I know that virtual learning is the best choice right now. I would much rather be doing this than putting our lives at risk. Virtual learning is not ideal, but my students seem excited to join our live sessions, and that’s all I can ask for right now.”

Thank you, Renee, and thank you to all of our dedicated UP educators out there navigating this challenging time.

Eric Freeman ’06 was named assistant principal at La Grande High School in March 2020. He taught sixth- and seventh-grade math and science at Fremont Middle School for 15 years before taking his position as dean of students and an instructional and behavioral support specialist at La Grande in 2018. Freeman grew up in Cut Bank, MT, and earned a master’s degree in teacher leadership at UP. Sara Gerontis Wyffels ’06 was named as one of five finalists in the running for the 2021 Arizona Teacher of the Year Award. Sara teaches Spanish at Chandler High School and earned her bachelor of arts in Spanish from Western Washington University and a master of arts in teaching from University of Portland.

According to a press release, “The ignition for her language learning journey was sparked by her study abroad experience in college. She is passionate about teaching the power of human connections through the Spanish language. Wyffels learned Spanish as a second language, which has shown her the power of human connections, adventure, and the beauty of the human spirit, which are themes integrated in her Spanish classes.” Congratulations, Sara, we’re proud of you and all of our UP teachers around the world!

We heard recently from Melissa Harteloo-Bassett ’06, who writes: “I hope all is well—despite how crazy the world is right now.

I wanted to send a quick update for Portland magazine. My husband Jeff Bassett and I were married at The Grotto on September 14, 2019. Fr. Ed Obermiller was our officiant, and our bridal party included fellow Pilots Jared Brown ’06, ’16; Trevor Coolidge ’06; Ashley Hartmeier-Prigg ’06; Geoffrey Hazelett ’06; Justin Meyer ’06; Theresa Faessler Mudrick ’06; Annie Pettycrew Proud ’12; and Brandon Schneider ’06.

We were joined by 17 additional Portland alums for our special day!” Thanks for sharing Melissa, and congratulations, and boy do we miss you around here.

10s 2016

Humber Design Group promoted Madeline “Maddie” Muller ’16 to the position of senior project designer in February 2020. She performs managerial duties and offers solutions to a wide range of clients with an equally wide range of needs and expectations. She is a certified engineering intern and a member of the Society of Women Engineers.

20s 2020

Maddie Pfeifer ’20 wrote about how small businesses in Portland’s St. Johns neighborhood are surviving in the midst of COVID-19 shutdowns for the Portland Business Journal.

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CLASS NOTES IN MEMORIAM

Our heartfelt prayers and condolences go out to the families of the following individuals. Requiescat in pace.

L. W. “Bill” Barnes ’48 CP passed away on April 18, 2020. Bill worked in sales early in life, and upon moving to Spokane, he started a trucking firm and built a trucking warehouse. He was a very active man and loved golf especially, as that is how he met his wife, Judie, with whom he spent the last and best eighteen years of his life. According to his son, “Bill always loved dogs, especially Foxie, although a cat named Louie also captured his heart.

Watching the sunrise or sunset, puttering around the yard, and enjoying a drink and a steak dinner would bring a smile to his face.”

Frank H. “Bud” Fields ’48 died on June 30, 2020, in Portland, OR. He worked at Abstract Title Insurance Co. and then as a realtor with Allison Dean Realty. He could always be found at his daily workouts at the Multnomah Athletic Club, where he was a regular fixture for more than 70 years. According to his family, “Bud was known for his sense of style, a wonderful sense of humor, and his ability to tell a great story!” He is survived by his sister, Ditsy, and many nieces and nephews.

Patrick J. Fisher ’50, of rural Woodburn, OR, died at home from multiple health issues on June 27, 2020. He was the son of Leonard and Marie Fisher of Mt. Angel, who owned the Mt. Angel Drug Store for many years.

He served four years in the US Air Force and then worked in Seattle for 28 years at Lynden Transport. He married Christl in 1978, and she died in 2000.

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He rekindled a romance from post-military years and married Carole Schneider Lake in 2002. He is survived

by Carole, four siblings, and many nieces and nephews.

Donations can be made in Patrick’s memory to The Wounded Warriors Project or the Benedictine Sisters Abbey Foundation of Oregon.

Charles Ingham ’50 passed away on June 29, 2020, at home with his wife and sons by his side. He joined the Navy in 1944 and was honorably discharged in 1946. Chuck was employed at Brod & McClung PACE Company from the early 1950s until he retired as vice president in 1989. He was an avid sailor and an accomplished downhill skier, and he loved flying around in his powered parachute— and Chuck didn’t give up the latter two pastimes until his 80th year. He married the love of his life, Lorraine McCrea, in 1947, and she died in 2007 after 60 wonderful years.

He married the second love of his life, Joanne, in 2008, and they celebrated their 12th anniversary shortly before his death. According to his family, “Chuck was always supportive, never critical, never complaining.

He was a great role model for his family.” Survivors include Joanne, three sons, seven grandchildren, and Joanne’s three children and three grandchildren.

Robert R. La Du ’50 died at his home surrounded by family in Portland on July 2, 2020. After graduating from Central Catholic

High School, he traveled to Mexico and studied Spanish, received a PhD from the University of Washington, became associate dean at Marquette University, and then academic dean at Marylhurst College. Survivors include seven children, 20 grandchildren, and one sister. In lieu of flowers, please send donations in his name to the Downtown Chapel of St. André Bessette to benefit the homeless.

Elaine A. Winderl ’50 passed away on July 17, 2020, after an almost decade-long battle with Alzheimer’s. She was 93 years old. She met the love of her life, Harold W. Winderl, and was married in June of 1949 in Minot, ND. They both became schoolteachers, and they moved to Washington and California for their careers. Along the way, they had their son, Jack, who was born in Vancouver, WA, in 1953. Her husband died suddenly at the age of 47, and Elaine worked hard to help her son overcome the loss of his dad and attend college, and it was one of her biggest thrills when he graduated from Santa Clara University and passed his CPA. Survivors include her son, two grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.

According to her family, “We have lost a wonderful person who taught not just her students but all of us to be better at life.”

Sam Collier “Frank” Franklin ’54 passed away on November 27, 2019, surrounded by his family at Holy Cross Hospital in Mission Hills, CA.

He enlisted in the US Coast Guard at the age of 16 to fight in World War II. “Frank” was stationed aboard the Hunter Liggett and partook in the legendary invasions of Guadalcanal and Bougainville. He earned his engineering degree on The Bluff while working nights at a gas station and went on to work for RCA while earning his master’s degree at Drexel University. He was proud of his contribution to the Apollo rocket control system (“Yes, his work was key to putting men on the moon,” says his family). Survivors include his wife, Jody; three sons; grandchildren; and great-grandchildren.

Raymond Charles Neubig Jr. ’60 died on April 1, 2020.

He married Elsie Knope in 1955, then taught for 26 years at Carlton Elementary School, where he passed on his passion for math and science to his students.

Being a teacher provided him the opportunity to spend summers sport and commercial fishing with his children.

In 1984 Ray married Coreen “Kay” Johnson. After retiring from teaching he did home repairs and remodeling, then built a home in Bay City with the help of family and friends. Ray served nearly 30 years in the Coast Guard Auxiliary Flotilla 63. Survivors include one brother, four children, three stepchildren, 15-plus grandchildren, and a whole flotilla of great-grandchildren.

David Rausch ’62 passed away on March 27, 2020, in Spokane, WA. He received

his degree in business and journalism from University of Portland, and it was there that he met his beloved late wife, Ellen Adele McGovern ’62. He worked at Pendleton Woolen Mills and then went to serve with the Air Force in Vietnam. He married Dorothy (Froehlich) Dinius on May 3, 2003. Dave was an avid golfer, gardener, and Gonzaga women’s basketball fan.

Survivors include Dorothy, his four children, one stepchild, and eight grandchildren. If you wish, please make a donation to St. John Vianney Poverty Fund.

Richard Larsell

October 10, 1922–April 4, 2020 Dick Larsell ’49 died on April 4, 2020, at the Edward C. Allworth Veterans’ Home in Lebanon, OR. According to his family, the cause was complications from coronavirus. In a wonderfully written obituary in OregonLive.com, his family says: “By all accounts, he lived a long and charmed life surrounded by a loving family who crack up with laughter when they recall the family patriarch. He was always telling a story, sometimes the same one over and over. It never bothered anyone though, because boy, could he tell a story.” After losing his wife Betty in 2009, his children put on their matchmaker hats, and before long Dick met and married Ferne Ballard. He was a decorated World War II veteran, one of thousands of returned soldiers who flooded UP after the war thanks to the GI Bill. He owned a heating and air conditioning business and sold it to his son when he retired. COVID-19 made it necessary for his family to rally around him from outside the veteran’s home and hold “I LOVE YOU GRANDPA” signs outside his window; eventually his granddaughters were allowed to enter Dick’s room and hold his hand as he slept.

Even with pandemic rules for funerals, the city of Albany turned out to see him off on his journey to Willamette National Cemetery, saluting their fallen hero as he passed by. The pandemic has changed the rules for funerals and memorializing the dead, but the city of Albany made sure Dick Larsell received a proper send-off. Survivors include Ferne, two sons, one daughter, eight grandchildren, and eight great-grandchildren.

Jane Anne Rickards ’62 died on June 20, 2019, with her beloved family by her side. “She adored and was extremely proud of her grandchildren,” says her family. “She was known for her generosity, compassion, and kindness as well as her beauty, humility, and wit.

She had a heart for those hurt and suffering, especially animals and children.

She was known and loved by many, and she will be missed by all.” Survivors include her husband of 55 years, Bob; their two daughters; two granddaughters; and one sister.

Philip Michael Hurley ’64 died on June 30, 2020. He earned his master’s degree from Southern Oregon University and worked at Grants Pass High School from 1964 to 1996, teaching thousands of students and earning multiple teaching awards.

He also served in many civic activities, including local theater and community concert programs. According to Philip’s family, “He was recognized for his friendliness and listening skills that helped many.” In retirement Philip and his wife, Justina,

moved to Waldport, OR, and thoroughly enjoyed the Oregon coast lifestyle.

He is survived by Justina; his brother and sister; his children Noelle, Nicholas, and Noah Hurley; and his favorite grandchild, Eloise.

You can still show your support by planting a tree in memory of Philip Hurley.

Dave Vuylsteke Sr. ’64 passed away on March 2, 2020, in Folsom, CA, after a brief illness. He was a loving husband to Virginia (Virgie); a loving father to Dave Jr., Mike, and Lisa; and an adoring grandfather to Sydney, Olivia, and Erin Vuylsteke. Dave was a natural-born engineer and worked for Chalmer Tractors before his long career with Morton Salt. “Dave’s incredible ability to fix or build anything continued throughout his retirement,” Virgie recalls fondly, “helping family, friends, and neighbors with home repair, remodeling projects, and other things that needed fixing. He was always eager to help anyone, never expecting anything in return. He lived a long, productive, kind, and loving life and is being rewarded for this with God in Heaven.”

Beloved UP alumnus and supporter Larry L. Fleckenstein ’67, ’68 passed away on July 23, 2020, at the age of 76. He enjoyed a long career as a teacher, principal, and district office administrator before retiring in 1998. A gifted athlete, Larry received a baseball scholarship from the University of Portland and also played basketball for the Pilots. He married Hazel Catherine McKinney in 1964, and they raised their family in Vancouver.

Larry and Hazel celebrated their 40th anniversary just prior to her death in 2004.

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Richard N. “Dick” Wahlstrom ’69 died on May 20, 2020.

He taught industrial arts education in Sweet Home, OR, then served as a juvenile delinquent case worker for Multnomah County from 1968 to 1975. His third career was as a church pastor and counselor at Hinson Baptist Church until his retirement in 2000. “He made a profound spiritual impact on countless singles, couples, and families through his counseling,” according to his family.

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“He was also passionate about his artistic handcarved wood sculptures that he created for over 40 years.”

Survivors include his loving wife, Susan; two children; and four grandchildren.

Deeta Theresa Lonergan ’70, loving mother, grandmother, sister, counselor, dancer, runner, and animal lover, began a new journey, comfortably and peacefully, from her dream home in Anchorage, AK, on March 9, 2019. A German major at UP, Deeta took part in the newly established Salzburg Program. She joined the faculty of Anchorage Community College from 1974 to 1987, and the University of Alaska. Anchorage as a counselor from 1987 to 1995.

She opened her counseling business, Career Transitions, in 1989, and left UAA in 1995 to focus on career transition counseling full-time.

Survivors include her three brothers, two children, and three grandchildren.

Sr. Suzanne Snyder ’70 died on June 28, 2020. She was a Sister of the Holy Child Jesus for 64 years. She taught in New Jersey, California, and in Portland at St. Charles School (1964–1966) and Holy Child Academy. She brought great compassion along with a wonderful sense of humor to all she was involved in throughout her life. Sr. Sue worked in prison ministry and founded and directed the Social Service Center of Holy Cross Parish in South Central Los Angeles. She became a court-appointed special advocate in San Diego and an arm of Voices for Children, and she was enormously effective in her ministry with at-risk children. Survivors include one sister and two brothers.

JIM GRELLE. 1950. UNIVERSITY PHOTOGRAPHIC COLLECTION. A_ATHTF_MENS1960S_0069.

SPECIAL COLLECTIONS & UNIVERSITY ARCHIVES, UNIVERSITY OF OREGON LIBRARIES, EUGENE, OREGON.

In 2007, he married LuClaire Lanning Brateng after a high school reunion rekindled their friendship.

Larry never passed up an opportunity to serve his community and alma mater.

Youth athletics was one of his great passions, and programs he established with Portland Parks and the public school system still thrive today. He was particularly proud of his youth basketball program with the Portland-Guadalajara Sister Cities program, taking teams to Mexico and New Zealand for games and cultural exchange. He received a Lifetime Service award from Portland Parks and Recreation and threw his heart and soul into working with underserved populations of students. According to his family, “He was a fierce but honest competitor in all he did, and he truly enjoyed teaching and helping people achieve their potential.”

Larry was devoted to his family, church, and his beloved Yankees. Survivors include his wife, LuClaire; his four children Lisa Whitten ’90, Sara Fleckenstein ’92, Todd Fleckenstein ’97, and Larry Fleckenstein ’97; stepchildren Carla, Debbie, and Shawn; and 13 grandchildren. Thank you, Larry. You are missed.

September 30, 1936– June 13, 2020 We are saddened to report the passing of the great Jim Grelle, world-class runner and Olympian and star of the Golden Age of the sub-fourminute mile. He passed away on June 13, 2020, at the age of 83. Jim coached star-struck student-athletes at the University of Portland from 1965 to 1972 and quickly made it clear to his charges they were to “Call me Jim”—the title of a 2012 feature story by Robin Cody in Portland magazine.

It could be said as well that many of his runners called him “Dad,” in particular Mike McCabe ’70, Don Bowler ’69, and Jim Nuccio ’72, as Grelle also had a way of taking on the role of father figure. His athletes learned not only to run competitively but to comport themselves with dignity, grace, and purpose as they went out into the world. While Jim was undeniably one of the most accomplished runners in the world—he set a state record in the half mile as a high school kid, graduated from University of Oregon as a three-time All-American, made the 1960 Summer Olympics, and held the longest record of sub-fours in the USA well into the 1970s—you wouldn’t know it from the quiet way he lived his life. Family first, integrity and humility a close second, he waved off all that “great Jim Grelle” nonsense and happily changed the subject to his family members and the exemplary lives they’ve lived. Sorry, Mr. Grelle, you were one of the greats, and we acknowledge that here and now, now and forever. Amen.

Jim Grelle

Michael Zokoych ’73 died on May 10, 2020, following a long and courageous battle with pancreatic cancer. A native of Chicago, he opened his Portland restaurant Michael’s Italian Beef and Sausage, which became known for authentic Chicagostyle Italian sandwiches and other favorites. Michael was committed to the quality of his recipes, and he devoted himself to managing his restaurant until succumbing to his illness. “He was resilient, opinionated, colorful, and leaves behind loyal customers and employees as well as many friends including Sinoun, Simon, and Sonny Sim,” according to his obituary.

George Kosovich ’74 passed away on July 5, 2020, in Rockville, MD, of complications related to Alzheimer’s disease. George attended Blessed Sacrament Grade School, Central Catholic High School, and Portland State University, then received a master’s degree in counseling from University of Portland and later a degree in administration and supervision of programs for hearing impaired from CSU Northridge. George worked as a counselor in a juvenile center in Portland and for 12 years as a counselor for the Oregon Department of Vocational Rehabilitation.

In 1990 George moved to Washington, DC, to take a job with the US Department of Education as a vocational rehabilitation specialist in the Deafness and Communicative Disorders Branch. He had hearing loss from early childhood, and he spent much of his career working with programs to assist individuals who are deaf or hearing impaired. Survivors include his longtime

partner, Lise Hamlin, and extended family.

Michael “Mike” Gerard McDonald ’75 passed away in his Missoula home on June 21, 2020, from heartrelated complications. During his senior year of high school, while riding his motor scooter, Mike was hit by a drunk driver. This life-changing event would continue to impact Mike’s health at many levels. Once scouted by college football teams, including Michigan State, his athletic potential was gone. Surgeries and health issues would challenge him throughout his life. He thrived at UP, forging lasting friendships. His junior year was spent at the University program in Salzburg, Austria, and he graduated in 1975 with a degree in biology.

He enjoyed a 20-year career as a wildlife biologist for the Alaska State Department of Fish and Game. Survivors include his son, Jason McDonald, and two siblings.

Garrett James Morgan ’86 died peacefully in Gresham, OR, on May 23, 2020. He is survived by his loving husband, Walter Roy Bayless; three children; one grandchild; his parents; and one sister. He began his career as a CPA at Arthur Andersen & Co. He traveled the world as a US Treasury officer for the Air Force and Department of Defense. After returning to Portland, Garrett was controller and personal assistant to philanthropist Jordan Schnitzer and then became director of finance for the Portland Archdiocese under Archbishop John G. Vlazny. He then served as controller for the Oregon Health & Science University Foundation. Garrett suffered from acute forms of Fibromy-

algia and Lyme disease, living in intractable pain for more than 30 years. According to his wishes, contributions may be made in Garrett’s name to Multnomah County Animal Services.

Lynn C. Guild ’95 of Battle Ground, WA, died on June 29, 2020, after a short battle with pancreatic cancer.

Lynn was a homemaker when her children were young and decided to go to college to become a teacher once they were older.

She taught at McLoughlin Middle School in Vancouver, WA, for 22 years. “She was very social and had a wide group of friends,” according to her family. “Lynn was always the perfect hostess and loved to entertain. She considered herself to be a very spiritual person, which showed by the way she lived her life with love, kindness and selflessness.” Survivors include her parents, four brothers, three children, and 11 grandchildren.

FACULTY, STAFF, FRI EN DS Grace Vidal Delumpa Jackson died on April 26, 2020, in Seattle, WA. According to her family, “Grace was, first and foremost, a loving and compassionate mother to Oliver and Sophia. She was also a passionate writer, voracious reader, mean Scrabble player, and a one-person karaoke bar, bursting into song anywhere and everywhere.” She worked in the alumni office at UP from 1993 to 1994 and worked in an art gallery and published a literary journal, Stories with Grace. Survivors include her children, three sisters, extended loving family, and a long list of good friends and colleagues.

Sister Alberta Dieker, O.S.B., died peacefully at Queen of Angels Monastery in Mt. Angel, OR, on June 14, 2020, just shy of her 100th birthday. She moved with her family to Mt. Angel in 1938 at the age of 18, enrolled in Mt. Angel Normal School the following year, and soon met the Benedictine Sisters. She entered Queen of Angels Monastery in 1939 and made her profession of vows on February 10, 1942. Sr. Alberta began her career as an elementary school teacher in Silverton and Mt. Angel and went on to teach at every level imaginable, including college. She was a teacher and historian extraordinaire and, most importantly, a faithful Benedictine woman who marked 78 years of monastic profession on February 10, 2020. She was admired and loved by her many students. Sr. Alberta is the author of A Tree Rooted in Faith: A History of Queen of Angels Monastery (2007).

She served as president of Mt. Angel College, prioress of her community (1983–1987), president and founding member of the Oregon Catholic Historical Society for nine years, and executive secretary of the American Benedictine Academy for six years. Among many other awards, on May 5, 2019, Sr. Alberta was awarded an honorary degree and was the recipient of the University’s highest honor, the Christus Magister Medal, given in recognition of her life and work in 2019. Survivors include four siblings as well as her beloved Benedictine community. Gifts to the Benedictine Sisters Retirement Fund are graciously accepted in Sr. Alberta’s memory.

Sad news from UP theology professor Michael Cameron: “With sadness we report the

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CLASS NOTES IN MEMORIAM

BENJAMIN BRINK, 2009, THE OREGONIAN

death of Fr. Jim Dallen, 76, from pancreatic cancer on March 13, 2020. Fr. Jim taught in the theology department’s Master of Arts in Pastoral Ministry program (MAPM).

A priest of the diocese of Salinas, KS, and longtime professor of theology at Gonzaga University, he was the author of The Reconciling Community (1986). His participation in MAPM dates to the time when it was a yoked program of UP and Gonzaga. He continued to participate after MAPM became a UP-only program in 2010, making the trip from Spokane to Portland every other summer to teach his course, most recently in 2018. Fr. Jim was a great friend of UP, known for his clear style, kindly manner, and sharp wit.”

Genevieve Nelson

March 1, 1952–August 19, 2020 The indomitable Genevieve “Genny” Nelson, cofounder of Portland’s Sisters of the Road Café, died at the age of 68 on August 19, 2020. According to Genny’s obituary, “She was a sister, mother, grandmother, aunt, writer, friend, lifelong learner, and a passionate advocate for justice in the Portland community, especially with homeless persons.” Sisters of the Road Café, founded in 1979, offers a safe dining space based on core principles of gentle personalism, non-violence, and the practice of dining with dignity. Genny earned an honorary degree from University of Portland in 2010. As word of Genny’s death circulated within her vast community of admirers, supporters, colleagues, and friends, it seemed impossible to imagine a loss so profound at a time when her inherent compassion and unswerving advocacy is needed so desperately. Former Portland commissioner Erik Sten captured the essence of her work: “Genny taught me that at its core, homelessness is a failing of our souls—a severing of the human connection between society and the person on the street. Every day she restored that connection, and in doing so healed all of us.”

Genny is survived by her son, Dorian; daughter, Joanna; three grandchildren; siblings; nieces and nephews; and of course many thousands of fellow humans whose lives were touched in ways that will radiate out to the world for generations to come.

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Marilynn Hope (née Morris) Lynn passed away on March 7, 2017 in Hemet, CA, after a short illness. She was born in Hollywood, CA, but moved to Washington state in 1976 with her husband, Theodore Lynn (d. 2013) and children. Marilynn, as thousands of UP alumni will recall, worked in the College of Arts and Sciences as a personal assistant to the dean for about 33 years.

In that capacity Marilynn served as gatekeeper, greeter, den mother, unofficial counselor (to both students and faculty), and all-around beloved person. If she ever forgot a name or face, it would be a newsworthy event. After retirement Marilynn and Ted divided their time between Washington and Arizona on the Snowbirds circuit before settling in Arizona. She moved to Hemet in 2015 to be closer to family. Survivors include her children Dale, Russell, and Colleen; six

grandchildren; and two great-grandchildren. Farewell, Marilynn, and thank you.

We are saddened to share news of the passing of Barbara Stallcup Miller, at the age of 100, on July 21, 2020, in Coos Bay, OR. She was born on a cattle ranch near Mt. Shasta in 1919 and began her journey toward The Bluff by earning a bachelor of arts in journalism at University of Oregon in 1942, but veered back to California when she married Lee Miller in 1946. When Lee got his first job after college, it took the couple and their two children to Portland, OR, where they added two more kids to the family and set down roots for the next 63 years.

She was director of public relations and fundraising for the Portland Area Council of Girl Scouts when, in 1967, Barbara took the position of student publications adviser and professor of communications at UP. Administrators— not least of whom was University president Rev. Paul E. Waldschmidt, CSC, an uncanny judge of talent and potential— took notice, and Barbara became director of public relations in 1972. In 1977 she became director of development, and in 1979 she was executive director of development. As pointed out by her family, “She now held the fourth-highest position at the University.” Even after moving on to St. Vincent Medical Foundation in 1983, she was remembered fondly and with great respect by her many colleagues, students, and friends on The Bluff. Survivors include her daughters, Paula Bechtold and Alison Wallis ’83; son, Dan Miller; four grandchildren; five great-grandchildren; and one great-great-grandchild. Barbara’s husband, Lee, and daughter Susan Miller preceded her in death.

ADAM GUGGENHEIM

FOR THE LOVE OF IT

Vantage Point I’VE PLAYED TROMBONE since my freshman year of high school. Trombone is the only instrument I can get to bend to my will. If I’m happy, it sounds happy, and if I’m sad, it sounds sad. When I’m confused or angry, it all comes through. I’m able to put intent and emotion into the music. Some days it doesn’t sound the prettiest, but it feels good.

I practice some days, and I play on others. Playing for me is about self-expression.

If it’s a nice day, I go outside to play. The air feels fresher.

I like the acoustics. I can hear a note I play echo across the river and come back to me. It’s cool. It’s easier to relax outside as well. I’m just “being” there; I’m not trying to accomplish anything. Stress from academics, professional and community obligations, and being waist deep in campus and national politics make self-care and coping a daily endeavor; playing music is an outlet I plug into. I like playing into wide open

spaces, too. I like to envision sound going a long distance and imagining it dissipating. I imagine the song filtering through the trees and diffusing. I love high vantage points. I’m always looking for roof access, getting up as high as I can to look out.

It’s cool to play out there, and when I do, I play the songs I’ve memorized. Sometimes I play John Coltrane’s “In a Sentimental Mood” or “Quiet Nights of Quiet Stars (Corcovado)” by Antonio Carlos Jobim. I always start and end with “Black Orpheus” (Vince Guaraldi), a slower version to start and another more upbeat version of it to close.

SHARIF MORTON ’21 is president of UP’s Black Student Union and manager of the University Jazz Ensemble. The BSU’s podcast Black on the Bluff can be found at Spotify; subjects include “Becoming Aware of Race” and “Black or African American.”

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5000 North Willamette Blvd.

Portland, OR 97203-5798 Change Service Requested

Non-Profit Organization U.S. Postage PA I D Portland, Oregon Permit No. 188

This illumination, “The Genealogy of Jesus,” opens Matthew’s Gospel in The Saint John’s Bible. The double helix of human DNA is woven in among the branches of the menorah, as well as cosmic images from the Hubble telescope. Both the women and the men are named in this artistic rendition of Jesus’ family tree. Notice Hagar’s name written in Hebrew, English, and Arabic.

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G E N A LO G Y F J E S U , DONALD JACKSON, COPYRIGHT ffff, TH E SA I N T J O H N’S B I L E , SAINT JOHN’S UNIVERSITY, COLLEGEVILLE, MINNESOTA USA. USED BY PERMISSION. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Fun fact: there’s so much gold leaf on this page that it requires two leaves of paper to hold the weight.