“Other” Class Notes

James McDermott (Law ’85) has published his debut novel, Bitter is the Wind (Cune Press). The book is a coming-of-age story set in upstate New York in the 1970s. Mr. McDermott is a business litigation attorney based in Portland, Oregon, where he lives with his wife and two daughters.

Richard Forsten (Com ’85, Law ’88 CM) will serve a second five-year term on the Appoquinimink School Board in New Castle County, Delaware, where he currently serves as board president. A partner in the Wilmington law offices of Saul Ewing, Mr. Forsten practices in commercial real estate and business litigation. In addition to serving on the school board, he has spent the past year serving as president of the Delaware State Bar Association.

Jennifer Myhre (Col ’84 CM) has published her first children’s book, A Chameleon, a Boy, and a Quest (New Growth Press), a magical realist novel set in Africa. Her second book will be published later this year. She and her husband, Scott D. Myhre (Col ’83 L/M), live with their family in East Africa, where they have worked as missionary physicians for 22 years.

George Collins (Col ’84, Darden ’92, Grad ’87, Law ’92 CM) and his wife, Marketa, welcomed a daughter, Stella Frances, on Dec. 1, 2015. Stella joins sister Julie Marie, 3. The family resides in Prague.

Michael McLernon (Engr ’83) has spent 15 years working with MathWorks, makers of the MATLAB technical computing language and the Simulink model-based design environment. He oversees the company’s development of communications and software-defined radio products. Mr. McLernon is a senior member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers and a co-author on seven patents. He and his wife, Patty, have been married for 31 years and have six children: Nicole, Luke, Siobhan, Bailey, Connor and Kelsey.

John Howard (Col ’83 CM) has released White Sepulchres: Palomares Disaster Semicentennial Publication (Publicacions de Universitat de València). The book is a collection of recent photographs of the Spanish town of Palomares, the site of a 1966 American military plane crash and nuclear disaster. Mr. Howard is a professor of American studies at King’s College London.

Rick Kingsbury (Arch ’19 CM) has retired from the practice of landscape architecture. He and his wife, Laurie McLain, also a retired architect, will be residing in the Languedoc region of France.

Deborah Hammond (Arch ’82 CM) has published her eighth book, Someone to Watch Over Me. The book is a military romance novel set during the war on terror. Ms. Hammond was a featured author at the 2016 West Virginia Chocolate Fest and Book Faire in Martinsburg.

Lee Ann Clements (Col ’81 CM) was recently appointed associate provost for assessment and academic operations at Jacksonville University in Jacksonville, Florida, where she has been a professor and administrator for 27 years. During her career at Jacksonville University, Ms. Clements has served in a number of roles, including chair of the division of science and mathematics and director of the environmental science and marine science departments. In addition, she has served on the board of trustees of Jacksonville’s Museum of Science and History since 2010. Ms. Clements lives in Jacksonville with her husband, Jeffrey Clements (Col ’81 L/M). In her spare time, she directs a church choir and sings in a community chorale.

Jill Tietjen (Engr ’76 CM) has been named by Women’s eNews as one of that organization’s “21 Leaders for the 21st Century.” The awards honor advocates for women and girls in sectors including teen education and women’s philanthropy. In 1991, Ms. Tietjen nominated pioneering computer scientist Grace Hooper for the National Medal of Technology, and Ms. Hooper became the first woman to receive that award. Ms. Tietjen has since nominated women for other awards in the science, technology, engineering and mathematics fields as a strategy for encouraging women to enter those fields. She has successfully nominated 25 women from the STEM fields to the National Women’s Hall of Fame and was the Hall of Fame’s CEO in 2015.

Page Nelson (Col ’76) has retired from the Loeb Library at Harvard’s Graduate School of Design and returned to Charlottesville. His poems and prose have recently appeared in Writer’s Eye, Antiphon, Fiddler Crab and other journals. Branches on a Wire, his second collection of aphorisms, was published last year by Another Sparrow Press.

Mary Love (Col ’74, Law ’78 CM) received the 2016 Jacksonville Bar Association’s Justice Raymond Ehrlich Trial Advocacy Award. She is the first woman to receive the honor. The annual award recognizes an exemplary trial lawyer from the Jacksonville, Florida, area. Ms. Love worked at Mathews Osborne Ehrlich McNatt Gobelman & Cobb from 1978 until 1988, when she co-founded the firm Gobelman & Love. She has served as of counsel at Marks Gray since 2011.

Robert Hilliard (Col ’74 CM) released The Circus Is in Town: A Baseball Odyssey (Outskirts Press) in November 2015. The book provides a detailed account of Mr. Hilliard’s role in bringing professional baseball to New Jersey as president of a St. Louis Cardinals Minor League affiliate and developer of Skylands Stadium, in addition to a personal history of the events that led him to table his business career to pursue his love of the sport.

Ray Robbins (Educ ’94, Grad ’73) recently published Poster Art Nights (Unsolicited Press), a collection of poems featuring lyrics, satires, narratives and haiku.

Samuel Crosby (Col ’73 CM) recently received the University of Alabama School of Law’s 2016 Sam W. Pipes Distinguished Alumnus Award. The award is given annually to an outstanding alumnus of the law school who has distinguished himself or herself through service to the bar, the University of Alabama and the School of Law.

Elizabeth Napier (Grad ’73, Grad ’79) published Defoe’s Major Fiction: Accounting for the Self (University of Delaware Press) in March 2016. The book focuses on the concern with narrativity and self-construction that marks Daniel Defoe’s first-person fictional narratives. Ms. Napier is a professor of English and American literatures at Middlebury College.