Class Notes

Austin Palmore (Col ’15, Com ’16 CM) recently completed a two-year clerkship at the Court of Appeals of Virginia, where he was a judicial law clerk to the Honorable Randolph A. Beales (Law ’86 CM). Palmore is now a litigation associate with the broad-based civil practice law firm Christian & Barton, LLP in Richmond, Virginia.

Ted Weihe (Arch ’79) published his book, What Is Lost with the Demise of USAID: Personal Reflections. The book discusses what is lost with the demise of USAID, reflecting on its impact on American leadership, poor and rural communities and humanitarian relief efforts. It includes chapters covering the voter registration campaign in Chile that defeated Pinochet and the successful formation of cooperatives in Poland, Albania, Barbados, South Sudan and Uganda. Weihe has written 12 self-published books which cover ancestry, sailing, chocolate and cooperative development, among other topics.

Randy Stephens (Arch ’86 CM) retired from a fulfilling, 40-year career in architecture. His career began with WRT, a Philadelphia-based, multi-discipline firm responsible for the design of the Atlantic City Convention Center and Rail Terminal. After 15 years in private practice, he transitioned to higher education, serving as campus planner and project manager for Miami University, and then as university architect for Montana State University. Stephens concluded his career as planning manager for the state of Montana, preparing the portfolio of capital projects for the governor’s budget. Along the way, Stephens was a visiting instructor at Miami University, was named honorary Coach of the Week by the late football coach Terry Hoeppner, and presented at national and regional meetings for the American Institute of Architects and the Society for Collegiate and University Planning. His plans for retirement are to stay connected, to explore, to learn and to serve, including being an A-School alumni mentor this year! Stephens and his wife, Barb, live with their two dogs in Jefferson City, Montana, where he has spent much of his free time hiking and catch-and-release fishing for trout.

Nakita Reed (Arch ’06) and Ryan McEnroe (Arch ’09) have both been promoted to associate principal at Quinn Evans, an award-winning national design firm.

Reed’s past projects include the revitalization of Baltimore Penn Station. She is also the host of the Tangible Remnants podcast, which seeks to demystify the process of transforming historic buildings into thriving spaces that honor the past while serving the present. She is a member of the Association for Preservation Technology, a co-chair of the of the Zero Net Carbon Collaboration for Existing and Historic Buildings, and a past president of the Baltimore Architecture Foundation.

McEnroe has contributed to the design of the Bird House at the National Zoological Park and the National Native American Veterans Memorial at the National Museum of the American Indian, both in Washington, D.C., for the Smithsonian Institution. He was elevated to the American Institute of Architects’ College of Fellows in 2023, is a member of the National Architectural Accrediting Board and is a co-founder of AIA|DC’s Christopher Kelley Leadership Development Program.

Will Overman (Col ’17) releases his second record, Stranger, September 26, and will tour Virginia with the band Holy Roller in November, making stops in Roanoke, Harrisonburg, Norfolk and Charlottesville. Singles on the album include “Virginia is for Lovers,” “Held Up by a Woman” and “Landlocked Heart.” Much of his record was inspired by and written in Virginia during a tumultuous time in his life. Overman, a working singer-songwriter, is currently based in Nashville, but he grew up in Virginia Beach and spent many years in Charlottesville, giving him a lifelong love of both Virginia’s coastlines and the Blue Ridge Mountains.

Jena Crisler (Col ’86) is running for the Virginia House of Delegates, District 35. She is campaigning against assaults on civil rights, the repeals of women’s rights to bodily autonomy, the lack of due process, and budget cuts designed to eliminate basic health care. Crisler has a 25-year career as an internal medicine physician and seeks to use her experience and knowledge of the inner workings of the healthcare landscape to make a difference. She has been endorsed by the Virginia Democratic Women’s Caucus and the Democratic Party of Virginia Rural Caucus. Virginia District 35 includes large swaths of Augusta County and Rockingham County, as well as parts of Bath County and Highland County.

Peter M. Page Jr. (Col ’88 CM) and his daughter, Anne Page (Col ’17, Darden ’23 CM) celebrated their 60th and 30th birthdays at Grand Teton summit August 10. Joining them were fellow ‘Hoos Lyons Brown (Col ’82, Darden ’87 CM), Kayde Schwabacher (Col ’19 CM), Emma Whelan Page (Grad ’22, ’26), John Hughes Page (Col ’20), Valerie Newton Page (Col ’88 CM) and Turner Bredrup (Col ’88, Darden ’94 CM).

Deborah E. Sheetenhelm Hammond (Arch ’82 CM) has been selected as the regent of the William Henshaw chapter of the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution (NSDAR) in Martinsburg, West Virginia. Hammond traces her ancestry to Peter Mantz of Frederick, who aided independence efforts in the Revolutionary War. She has also recently become a member of the Captain James Gibson chapter of the United States Daughters of 1812, being descended from soldiers who fought in the War of 1812.

Hammond continues her second career as a novelist, with a new novel, Death in a Perfect Village, due in the autumn. Her previous novel, Death in Lewes, is a murder mystery set in Lewes, Delaware. All of her novels are available on Amazon.com in both Kindle and paperback versions.

Lewis “Sandy” Rock (Col ’66, Med ’70, Res ’72 CM) published a memoir, The ADHD MD — A 70’s Memoir. Written over a period of thirty or forty years, the book begins with the author’s honorable discharge from the Medical Corps of the U.S. Navy as a conscientious objector before covering his decade as a physician in a U.S. Navy hospital, a rural Virginia pediatric mobile clinic, the Lower Ninth Ward of New Orleans, and ultimately the Appalachian portion of Southwest Virginia. Along the way, he built a house, raised two sons and twenty-two Great Danes, made house calls on horseback, got divorced, got married, got divorced again, and picked and grinned on guitar and banjo with a group of locals and “local outsiders.” Central to the book is the author’s experience with ADHD, as he gradually realizes how the disorder both benefitted and challenged him throughout his journey.

Daniel Cooper (Col ’00, Law ’05) has joined Sterlington as a partner and head of its private wealth practice. Cooper is known for his deep experience advising clients on wealth preservation, estate and gift tax planning, family business succession and philanthropy. He is recognized by the Chambers High Net Worth Guide for private wealth law in Pennsylvania.

Kenneth Malcolm Holland (Grad ’71) was awarded a Fulbright Specialist Program grant by the U.S. Department of State. He will travel to Tashkent, Uzbekistan, in fall 2025 to complete a four-week project at the Institute for Advanced International Studies, an institution that trains diplomats, supports curriculum development in American studies and fosters institutional partnerships. Holland is an adjunct professor of political science at the University of Utah and previously served as president of the American University of Afghanistan. He had previous Fulbright Awards in Japan and Burma (Myanmar).

Charlene Wang (Law ’15) will publish her debut novel, I’ll Follow You, in October through Mindy’s Book Studio, actress Mindy Kaling’s book and development imprint with Amazon Publishing. Wang’s psychological thriller explores the complex and dangerous friendship of two young women looking to escape their dead-end town.

Desmond Cormier (Col ’73) has retired from a 26-year career as an art teacher in Charlottesville City Schools. He and his wife are spending their retirement raising sheep, chickens and bees on their farm in Keswick, Virginia. Along with working on the farm, he is also working on a children’s book and teaching at the Center at Belvedere, a senior community in Charlottesville. Last year, he published a memoir, My Summer Vacation on the Cambodian Border, which explores his years as an adolescent in Vietnam.

Stephen C. Mercado (Col ’84 CM) recently published his second book, Japanese Spy Gear and Special Weapons: How Noborito’s Scientists and Technicians Served in the Second World War and the Cold War (Pen & Sword Military, 2025). He is also the author of The Shadow Warriors of Nakano: A History of the Imperial Japanese Army’s Elite Intelligence School (Brassey’s, 2002), a dozen articles and several dozen book reviews on intelligence and other subjects.

Olyvia R. Christley (Col ’11, Grad ’17, ’22 CM) joined the faculty of Washington State University’s School of Politics, Philosophy, and Public Affairs as an assistant professor. She previously held a tenure-track line at Florida Atlantic University. Her research focuses on the intersection of nationalism, xenophobia and gendered attitudes and their influence on public opinion and political behavior across Europe and the United States.