Business has always been good to Brian Baker ’84, MBA ’89 – whether he was running his own company or helping fledgling entrepreneurs to succeed as executive director of UMW’s Small Business Development Center (SBDC). His longtime commitment to the area’s business development recently earned him the Prince Woodard Leadership Award from the Fredericksburg Regional Chamber of Commerce. In nearly 20 years guiding the SBDC, Baker has helped launch more than 550 small businesses, creating or retaining almost 8,000 jobs. Under his leadership, Mary Washington’s SBDC ranks among Virginia’s five top small business development organizations. … [Read more...]
In Memoriam
Sara Nervilla Boggs ’42 Katharine F. Nutt ’42 Margaret Lewis Draper Eckenrode ’43 Marjorie Martel Balius ’44 Susie Walder Wanner ’44 Anna Roberts Ware ’44 Virginia Lipsy Brooks ’45 Amy Charlotte Thomas King ’45 Mavis Bradder Larson ’45 Lois Coleman Bowman ’46 Joyce Weed Butler ’46 Dorothy Mae Kiger ’46 Alta Clark Cline ’47 Mary Nuckols Haydon ’47 Jean Wilkerson Hopkins ’47 Frances Cox Etienne ’48 Mabel Royar Loflin ’48 Una Hayes Fleischmann ’49 Alta Towe Fogelgren ’49 Dawn McElrath Gill ’49 Ginny Downer Williams ’49 Virginia Dowler Dickhoff ’50 Jane Lee Dreifus Martin ’50 Patricia Teasley Mulligan ’50 Margaret Fox Vaden ’50 Jacqueline “Jackie” Lightner Haney ’51 Miriam Kay Oleinik ’51 Norma Resnikoff Sater ’51 Mildred “Millie” Jones Bonner ’52 Barbara “Bobbie” Burgess Goldsten ’52 Charlotte Wilkinson Larson ’52 Elizabeth Ranney Moran ’53 Mary Bird Dellett ’55 Lena Sheetz French Fuller … [Read more...]
Producer’s Puppy Bowl Is a Wagging Success
Dog-lovers who enjoyed watching Animal Planet’s Puppy Bowl XVI might only have had eyes for the cute competitors who wagged their way through the canine version of the Super Bowl. But they also were unwittingly appreciating the work of Jordan Kyler ’15 – an associate producer for the show, working with colleagues on the booking, scheduling, coordinating, and problem-solving that happens behind the scenes. The studio arts major also is a contract associate producer on National Geographic’s Secrets of the Zoo. With a master’s degree in photographic and electronic media, Kyler has worked in television production for three years. … [Read more...]
Obituary
John N. Pearce, former senior lecturer in historic preservation and director emeritus of the James Monroe Museum and Center for Historic Preservation, died Oct. 14, 2019, after a long illness. During 27 years of service at Mary Washington, Pearce taught courses in the Department of Historic Preservation, played a key role in developing the museum studies curriculum, and expanded and enhanced the James Monroe Museum. Pearce served on the boards of the Fredericksburg Area Museum, the Memorial Foundation of Germanna Colonies in Virginia, and the Historic Fredericksburg Foundation. His many honors included the History Award from the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution, for his lifetime contribution to American history. He contributed articles to numerous publications and authored American Painting 1560-1913, published in 1964 by McGraw-Hill. A son and a daughter survive him. … [Read more...]
Alumna Has Devoted Her Life to Service
Florence Overley Ridderhof ’50 learned two lessons early on that have guided a lifetime of serving her community and the world. Growing up in a house on Cornell Street in Fredericksburg, she learned from her mother that it wasn’t enough to talk about a need; you had to try to find a solution. And on the Mary Washington campus in the late 1940s, her psychology professors taught her not to judge or generalize about people. Those principles, instilled in Fredericksburg, helped Ridderhof bring about a meaningful change in the region’s attitudes about domestic violence. In the 1970s, when a local elected leader publicly stated that what a man did in his home was his business, Ridderhof and a group of like-minded women helped open the area’s first domestic violence shelter – and ultimately changed a community’s perspective. Today, Empowerhouse operates a 10,000-square-foot facility serving scores of women and children across five Fredericksburg-area localities. Ridderhof … [Read more...]
Marine Corps Led Alumna to Extraordinary Career
When Karen Laino Giannuzzi ’71 arrived at her office at Camp Lejeune in 1977, she found pink curtains hanging from the windows and a sign posted on her door: “Woman Commanding Officer – Do Not Use Bad Language.” Then a captain, she was taking her first command, Lejeune’s Headquarters and Service Company, 2nd Radio Battalion, Fleet Marine Forces Atlantic, at a time when there weren’t many women in the Marine Corps, let alone female officers. She could lose the froufrou décor, but it wasn’t uncommon for male colleagues to test how tough she was. Not long after she arrived, one young Marine thought it would be funny to drop his trousers in front of her. He did not enjoy the disciplinary process that followed, she said. “A lot of men hadn’t seen a woman Marine,” recalled Giannuzzi, who was the first female officer in the field of signals intelligence and electronic warfare. “I was first of a lot of things. Every time you went to a duty station, you might be the only woman there, … [Read more...]
Doctor Supports Veterans, the Underserved
As a pre-med student at what was then Mary Washington College, Anthony D. Jones ’99 volunteered at the nearby Lloyd Moss Free Clinic, shadowing doctors as they provided care to low-income residents, including patients with HIV/AIDS. The experience helped set him on a path of serving the underserved. “Back then, having HIV was more or less a death sentence,” Jones recalled. “The physicians at the clinic showed a whole lot of compassion taking care of HIV patients. That left a good impression on me.” Today, the physician is chief medical officer of the Military Entrance Processing Station at Fort Lee, Virginia, and works for Veterans Evaluation Services in Richmond, where he conducts compensation exams for veterans. He also volunteered at a Virginia Department of Health men’s clinic focused on sexually transmitted diseases, including HIV. Through the nonprofit Minority Health Consortium, he has provided HIV testing and assisted with care coordination for newly diagnosed HIV … [Read more...]
Scientist Leads Bio Materials Repository
Raymond D. Stapleton Jr. ’92 has been named president and chief operating officer of ATCC, the world’s premier biological materials resource and standards organization. Headquartered in Manassas, Virginia, ATCC is a nonprofit repository and distributor of materials such as cell lines, molecular genomics tools, microorganisms, and bioproducts, for use in research, academics, and industry. ATCC provides research and development standards to help scientists ensure safety and quality, conducts independent research, and more. Before joining ATCC, Stapleton had more than 20 years’ experience at Iovance Biotherapeutics, Synthetic Biologics, and Merck and Company. Stapleton majored in biology at Mary Washington and earned a Ph.D. in microbial ecology from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. A member of the American Society for Microbiology, he has served as a peer reviewer for scientific journals and has coauthored 17 peer-reviewed manuscripts. … [Read more...]
Kerri Barile’s Entrepreneurship Celebrated
Historic preservation consultant Kerri S. Barile ’94 has been recognized as a 2020 Enterprising Woman of the Year, an honor for female entrepreneurs who also support their communities. Enterprising Women magazine was to have celebrated Barile and the other winners at a March ceremony in Clearwater Beach, Florida; the event was postponed to a later date. Barile co-founded Dovetail Cultural Resource Group in 2005. The firm now employs nearly 50 preservation professionals in offices in Fredericksburg and Wilmington, Delaware. Many of Dovetail’s employees are UMW graduates. In 2019, Barile’s firm generously established an endowed scholarship in historic preservation at UMW. It also gives 10 percent of its annual profits to charitable organizations. Read more about Barile and Dovetail in this feature from the spring/summer 2019. … [Read more...]
Ultimate Apparel Line Has Roots on Campus
Making T-shirts for friends from his UMW residence hall, Todd Curran ’06 built skills that would help him start a company that now is poised to become the premier outfitter for ultimate teams in the United States and beyond. Curran’s Savage Apparel Co., founded in 2009, recently announced its merger with apparel maker Five Ultimate and disc manufacturer ARIA Discs to create XII Brands, of which Curran is CEO. “Our goal is to be the No. 1 apparel provider in the sport of ultimate,” said Curran, who played on UMW’s ultimate disc team as a student. The company also provides custom gear to teams in other sports, including soccer, spikeball, quidditch, dodgeball, and disc golf. The Savage Apparel team includes four other UMW alumni. Daniel Curran ’09, Todd’s brother, is vice president of production; Dan Lee ’06 is vice president of sales; and Austin Bartenstein ’11 heads international sales from an office in London. Todd’s wife, Erica Jackson Curran ’07, is director of … [Read more...]