Class Notes

Courtney Jones Hamlett (Col ’12 CM) and Christian Hamlett welcomed their son, Campbell Edward, on March 28, 2023. Campbell is the couple’s first child. The family lives in Richmond, Virginia.

Kim Curtis (Col ’00 CM) has accepted a position as director of communications & outreach at Rare Book School at UVA. Rare Book School provides continuing education opportunities for students from all disciplines and skill levels to study the history of written, printed, and digital materials with leading scholars and professionals in the field.

Winkfield F. “Wink” Twyman, Jr. (Col ’83 CM) has published Letters in Black and White: A New Correspondence on Race in America. The book, co-authored with Jennifer Richmond, chronicles Twyman’s experiences as a child of the New South in the 1970s suburbs, a place and time all but forgotten in modern discourse.

Born in Richmond, Virginia, Twyman lived on Twyman Road in then-Chesterfield County until the age of eight. Everyone living on Twyman Road was a Twyman. He writes of a time in a southern suburb when the things people shared in common mattered more than racial differences.

An Echols Scholar driven by the goal of attending Harvard Law School, Twyman also writes about what happened to his American dream 40 years later. 

A former law professor, Twyman lives in San Diego with his wife. They have three children – a first-year student at Stanford Business School, an entering graduate student at San Diego State University, and a sophomore at Yale. 

Coleman Bigelow (Col ’97, Darden ’05 CM) has published In Rare Cases and Other Unfortunate Circumstances, his first collection of flash fiction, with Alien Buddha Press.

Divided into four parts: (Siblings, Lovers, Parents and Mourners) these stories take us on a journey through the formative stages of life’s relationships. With a keen eye for detail and a sharp sense of humor, Bigelow captures the nuances of human experience in all its messy, complicated glory.

Adam Titrington (Arch ’06) became a partner at Estes Twombly + Titrington Architects in Newport, Rhode Island. Since joining the firm in 2015, Titrington has designed contemporary homes across New England and Long Island, with an emphasis on simple, innovative design­­­ that integrates healthier, low-energy, fossil-fuel free solutions. His work has received awards from the American Institute of Architects AIA Rhode Island & New England. The Quahaug Point home was recognized by Residential Design Magazine with a 2023 citation award.  The Cape Cod Hemp House, completed this year, was built with hempcrete insulation in the roof and walls, drastically lowering embodied carbon. Titrington lives in South Kingstown, Rhode Island with wife Laura Erban (Col ’06) and their two children.

Zayde Antrim (Col ’95 CM), professor of history and international studies at Trinity College, has received a fellowship from the Institute for Advanced Study. She will spend the spring and fall semesters of 2024 in residence as a member of the School of Historical Studies. 

Antrim’s UVA thesis was “Remything Africa: Perceptions of Precariousness and Illusions of Power in the Literature of Sarah Bowdich.”

John M. Stewart (Col ’65 CM) enjoyed celebrating his 80th birthday with family and friends, including daughters Jennifer Crone (Col ’94) and Catherine Lochead (Col ’97 CM); Goddaughter Kendra Lee Carberry (Col ’91 CM), Phi Gamma Delta brother Thomas Nardi (Educ ’65, ’66) and his daughter, Chris Nardi; and Jennifer Murray Moskowitz (Com ’88).  An impressive gathering of Wahoos in Naples, Florida. 

Dr. Jill Garrett (Col ’01), a licensed psychologist with extensive specialty experience in perinatal mental health, has founded Motherhood Feels, a platform to share information and evidence-based strategies on maternal mental health for new, expectant and seasoned moms.

Dr. Garrett has over ten years of experience as a practicing psychologist, and is the founder of the maternal mental health service line at the hospital where she practices, as well as the founding psychologist and program director of a perinatal-specific day program for the same hospital system.

 Dr. Garrett created Motherhood Feels to support more moms and families in the pregnancy and postpartum period.

Motherhood Feels: Before Baby Boot Camp, is an online course designed to support moms to healthily cope in pregnancy and the postpartum period. 

Motherhood Feels: Hindsight is 20/20 is a podcast where Dr. Garrett engages with seasoned moms on their motherhood reflections to learn what they wish they had known ahead of mom life and how, in hindsight, they would have supported their “motherhood feels” differently. 

The Motherhood Space is the maternal mental health program at Baptist Medical Center in Jacksonville, Florida that Dr. Garrett founded.

Virginia Frischkorn (Col ’06 CM) was recently named one of the top 10 innovators in the event tech industry by Bizbash, for her work on Partytrick, a web-based platform that provides anyone with the tools and confidence to host exceptional experiences.

Hajar Yazdiha (Col ’05) has published The Struggle for the People’s King: How Politics Transforms the Memory of the Civil Rights Movement with Princeton University Press.

In the post–civil rights era, wide-ranging groups have made civil rights claims that echo those made by Black civil rights activists of the 1960s, from people with disabilities to women’s rights activists and LGBTQ coalitions. Increasingly since the 1980s, white, right-wing social movements, from family values coalitions to the alt-right, now claim the collective memory of civil rights to portray themselves as the newly oppressed minorities. The Struggle for the People’s King reveals how, as these powerful groups remake collective memory toward competing political ends, they generate offshoots of remembrance that distort history and threaten the very foundations of multicultural democracy, fracturing our collective understanding of who we are, how we got here, and where we go next.

Alex Rothenberg (Col ’04 CM) is this year’s recipient of The Daniel Patrick Moynihan Award For Teaching and Research, the highest honor given to untenured faculty at Syracuse University’s Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs. An assistant professor of economics, Rothenberg is senior research associate in the Center for Policy Research. His research focuses on the effects of urban transport policies on commuting outcomes in Jakarta, Indonesia; long-term growth and development outcomes in Indonesia’s outer islands; the impacts of rural migration programs on diversity and identity; and how transport improvements affect firm entry and employment. 

Rothenberg joined Maxwell in 2018 after serving as an economist at the RAND Corporation in Washington, D.C., as well as a professor at the Pardee RAND Graduate School. He and his wife, Sarah King, live with their two children in Manlius, New York.

Alden Abbott (Col ’74 CM) has published Trade, Competition and Domestic Regulatory Policy, coauthored with Shanker Singham. 

Trade, Competition and Domestic Regulatory Policy presents a combination of analysis of both international trade and investment policies, and competition and regulatory policies. This book contains a detailed treatment of how property rights protection, including intangible property rights, is a critical element of ensuring open trade and competitive markets. The book examines how property rights have developed over time and how they have been integrated into trade and competition policy, all while providing a comprehensive analysis of international trade theory and other failures to protect various kinds of property rights. 

Marcie Dickson (Col ’06) has joined the executive leadership team of National Arbitration and Mediation, one of the nation’s leading providers of Alternative Dispute Resolution services. She will serve as President of Tapestry ADR, a new division of NAM formed to accelerate the development and promotion of strategic initiatives including expansion in key markets, new services and technology solutions, DEIAB and strategic partnerships. 

Marcie is an industry veteran, and she is a staunch promoter of diversity, equity, inclusion, access, and belonging in ADR. 

Ryan McEnroe (Arch ’09) has been elevated to the American Institute of Institute’s (AIA) College of Fellows. The honor recognizes architects who have “achieved a standard of excellence in the profession and made a significant contribution to architecture and society on a national level.”

McEnroe’s work at Quinn Evans includes designing several renewal projects at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Zoological Park, the new National Native American Veterans Memorial at the National Museum of the American Indian and the U.S. Botanic Garden Production Facility for the Architect of the Capitol. 

McEnroe has been active with the AIA’s Young Architects Forum, where he served as national chair in 2020. He’s also previously served as the knowledge director and regional director. 

McEnroe holds a Masters in Architecture and a Masters in Landscape Architecture from the University of Virginia.

Cheri Pridgen (Com ’83 CM) has recently accepted a position as General Manager with Curtis Media Group, the largest privately owned broadcast company in the state of North Carolina. Curtis Media Group owns and operates several radio stations in Raleigh and throughout the state of North Carolina, as well as providing Digital and Event Marketing services to their clients. 

Danielle Childress MacRae (Col ’16, Batten ’17 CM) and James MacRae (Engr ’14 CM) welcomed a daughter, Ivy Katharine MacRae, Feb. 6, 2023. Ivy is the couple’s first child and named after the Ivy area in Charlottesville. The family lives in Los Angeles.

Owen Howlett (Arch ’07) has been promoted to associate principal at Pickard Chilton, an award-winning architecture studio. Owen is currently leading design teams for several large-scale, mixed-use master plans including the Le Coeur project — a complex repositioning of existing and new buildings on one of the most prominent sites in Düsseldorf, Germany — and CoStar Group’s new corporate campus in Richmond, Virginia. Owen received his Master of Architecture degree from Yale School of Architecture and a Bachelor of Science in Architecture and minor in Landscape Architecture from the University of Virginia. 

Anwar Allen (Col ’08) and Laura Allen (Col ’06) have recently been recognized as a Virginia Wine & Country Life Artisan for their baking business, Allens Scottish Shortbread. The magazine shared Anwar and Laura’s new flavor announcement and the details of their exciting collaboration across the pond with Harney & Sons Fine Teas to create unique tea-infused shortbread flavors. 

Rusty Allen (Col ’81 CM) has published his debut novel, Ella’s War, a journey amongst women and men whose lives are deeply altered by the circumstances of WWII.  

It’s 1943 on the American home front, and Ella’s pent-up common-law husband finally decides to leave their farm and enlist. Ella must either depart their seafaring town in coastal Delaware to pursue other dreams inland or try to save their farm. Their grade-school son, Reese, won’t budge, and Ella sees that farmers have a patriotic duty to stay on the land.

The bay and ocean waters before them have been preyed upon by German U-boats, and their village has become a refuge for survivors. When an officer from a surrendered German submarine is sent to her as part of POW farm labor, can Ella embrace the help in order to survive? And what happens when Dieter becomes more than a hand to her, amid prying eyes and under her beloved but conflicted son’s watch? How will she choose when her explosive husband returns from Europe wounded from infantry duty against the Germans?

“Beautifully wrought, heart stopping, spirit lifting…. What a human brew!”
     –– Ron Suskind (Col ’81) Pulitzer Prize-winning author of A Hope in the Unseen

Allen lives in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania, and can be reached through his website: www.rustyallenauthor.com

Carolina Ferrerosa Young (Col ’09 CM) and Daniel T. Young (Col ’07 CM) welcomed their second child, Gabriel Miguel, on Jan. 22nd, 2023. Ms. Young is economic policy adviser to U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown in Washington, D.C., and Mr. Young is an appellate counsel in the Office of the General Counsel for the Securities and Exchange Commission in Washington, D.C. The family lives in Reston, Virginia. 

Dr. Lee Ann Clements (Col ’81 CM) is retiring from teaching after 34 years on the faculty at Jacksonville University in Florida. During her tenure she served as chair of the Department of Biology and Marine Science, chair of the Division of Science and Mathematics, chair of the faculty, associate provost, interim dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, and interim provost. She was named Professor of the Year in 1995, chaired JU’s Southern Association of Colleges and Schools accreditation process, and served as a board member of the National Conference for Undergraduate Research and Jacksonville’s Museum of Science and History. Dr. Clements was granted emerita status and will continue to serve as JU’s director of academic integrity.

Warren McCarty (Law ’13) of Dallas-based Caldwell Cassady & Curry has been recognized on the 2023 Texas Super Lawyers Rising Stars list of the state’s top young lawyers based on his work in intellectual property. You can read more about McCarty in this announcement: https://caldwellcc.com/2023/03/attorneys-from-dallas-caldwell-cassady-curry-named-among-best-in-texas-4/

Lettie J. Bien (Batten ’19 CM) has received the 2023 Military Hero award from the American Red Cross, Central Virginia Chapter. The “Military Hero” has been awarded to individuals, veterans, and civilians whose body of work to support active-duty military members, their families and veterans in our community and has made a significant impact. 

The award will be presented to Colonel Bien at the 2023 Help Can’t Wait-Celebration of Heroes breakfast April 20.

Mary P Harper (Educ ’75) has published her memoir, The Sound of Her Voice: My Blind Parents’ Story, which examines the challenges faced by both of her parents as they navigated life without sight. Her father was the first blind graduate of the Notre Dame University Law School, practiced law, and was elected Judge three times. Her mother raised four sighted children and ran the household. Kirkus Reviews called it “an inspiring story that avoids becoming saccharine…”

Ameena Gill (Engr ’04) leads Lyft’s Global Operations team based in San Francisco, CA. She and her team manage operational performance metrics across Lyft’s multiple business units including customer satisfaction and loyalty, efficiency and productivity, revenue and engagement and diversity goals. 

Megan Sirna (Col ’99 CM) was recently named senior vice president of Human Resources for Georgia-Pacific. She focuses on advancing the company’s culture and helping supervisors empower employees to achieve their full potential. Sirna has devoted her professional career to advising businesses on leadership, talent and culture matters. 

Sirna joined Georgia-Pacific in 2006 as an attorney in the company’s law department and moved to Human Resources in 2014. She has held various leadership positions supporting HR across several departments, including manufacturing, sales, supply chain and finance. 

Born in Washington, D.C., she has a bachelor’s degree from the University of Virginia and a law degree from the University of Texas at Austin. 

Frances Keene (Educ ’02) has been named vice president for student affairs at Virginia Tech, after serving as interim VPSA since July 2022. She will continue to lead a division known for facilitating robust and comprehensive student life experiences. 

Keene deeply values her work with students and educators who prioritize student learning and development in a residential context. She was honored in 2016 as a recipient of the Aspire! Award recognizing her commitment to embracing Ut Prosim (That I May Serve). 

Student Affairs at Virginia Tech oversees more than 3,000 employees, 20 departments and critical student life programs — including dining and residential life, student organizations, counseling, health and well-being, international student services, student conduct, and learning partnerships. 

Keene earned a Ph.D. in higher education from Virginia Tech, a master’s degree in counselor education from the University of Virginia and a bachelor’s degree in psychology from the College of William & Mary. 

Patrick O. Gottschalk (Law ’83 CM) was awarded a life membership in the Virginia Economic Developers Association at the December 2022 annual membership meeting. Gottschalk has served as pro bono legal counsel for the organization for over 20 years, and he has been a member of VEDA since 1989. Gottschalk is the seventh person to receive the award in the 40 year history of the Association.

Charley Johnson (Com ’69 CM), chief executive officer, OptiCat, LLC, received the Triangle Award from the Motor and Equipment Manufacturers Association.

The Triangle Award is given periodically to a person or organization to honor selfless contributions to the vehicle supplier industry. Johnson was presented the award in September at his office in Maryland.

“Charley’s decades of exceptional leadership and dedication to the supplier industry embody the spirit of the Triangle Award,” said Bill Long, president and CEO of MEMA.

From its inception, the Triangle Award was not intended as an annual award.  It is presented when truly deserving candidates are found — those who have worked tirelessly, behind the scenes, out of the spotlight and whose contributions have advanced the supplier industry. 

Richard E. Katholi (Med ’68 CM) has published Reflections Off a Vietnamese Moon: In Country or Boots on the Ground, a book about his experiences in Vietnam. Katholi recounts the year (1970-1971) he cared for patients in a war zone, describes the day-to-day outpatient care of troops, as well as the comprehensive military network of medical care provided by MASH units. The book title was inspired by how he reflected thoughts off the moon at night when he was walking back to his living quarters. 

Richard F. McGonegal (Grad ’75) has published The Forget-Me-Knot, a mystery novel. His book is the third in the Sheriff Francis Hood mystery series, preceded by Sense of Grace and Ghoul Duty.

McGonegal received a Master’s degree in English literature at UVA in 1975, where he was a student in Peter Taylor’s creative writing class. He and his wife, Kristie, live in Jefferson City, Missouri, and are the parents of two adult daughters, Heather and Jane.

Anthony J. Romanello (Col ’92 CM) has recently published The Girl Who Lived on the Third Floor, the story of how his fifth child came to live with their family.  All book proceeds go to Hope Tree Family Services, Inc. 

Stephen Lee (Col ’85 CM) has joined the firm JP Morgan Chase as Vice President, Agility Lead. Stephen works in the Chicago office where he helps development teams plan, execute and deliver software and system enhancements using modern, iterative development processes. Stephen has worked in software development for over two decades.

David Meredith (Com ’03) was named on Comparably’s Best CEO 2022 list in the largest company category for his work at Boomi. The annual ranking derives from 15 million anonymous ratings from employees across 70,000 companies. 

In 2022, Comparably also awarded Meredith Best CEO for Diversity, and recognized Boomi for Best Company Culture, Best Company Career Growth and Best Company Happiness. 

Meredith previously ranked in the Top 50 for Best CEO 2020 also in the largest company category during his tenure as a NASDAQ public company CEO in the Russell 1000 Index.   

Anne Holub (Col ’99) has published her first chapbook of poetry, 27 Threats to Everyday Life. The poetry book was a semi-finalist in the press’ New Women’s Voices Chapbook Competition, and the collection includes the poem “Mudslides,” which was chosen as runner-up in the 2021 Mountain West Writers Contest by the Western Humanities Review. After attending UVA, Anne earned a MA from Hollins University and a MFA from the University of Montana in creative writing. She now writes and lives in Montana. 

Dr. William T. “Bill” Sheahan, MD (Engr ’81, Med ’85 CM) has published A Doc Who Jots: The More you Know About Your Patient’s Story, his fourth collection of unique, uplifting or funny patient encounters. Proceeds will be donated to the Fisher House Foundation, which builds comfort homes at military and VA medical centers so families can stay free of charge while a loved one is in the hospital receiving treatment.

First-year suite mates Jordan Lasker (Col ’14 CM) and Julia Monahan (Com ’14 CM) competed together on The Price is Right in Los Angeles. The episode aired in January 2023. Unfortunately, the only one in their group “called down” was Jordan’s brother – a Hokie.

Jeremy Ebrahim (Com ’00 CM) and Alexandra Hume Ellen Ebrahim (Col ’00 CM) welcomed a son, Westley Tucker Hume Ebrahim, on October 24, 2022. Westley joins big brothers Jameson, Preston, and Carter. The family lives in Chatham, New Jersey.

Allison Raymond (Nurs ’11 CM) and Michael Raymond (Grad ’22) welcomed their son, Luke Christopher, on March 3, 2023. The couple lives in Boston.

Rachel Kessler (Col ’22 CM) has joined the Walt Disney Company as a conservation guide at Epcot. She has delivered hundreds of conservation messages about sustainable agriculture, wildlife conservation, and the Disney Conservation Fund to guests from around the world while bringing the magic of nature to life. 

Ted Koerth (Col ’99 CM) has joined Uber as senior counsel -autonomous mobility & delivery within Uber’s Chicago office. He will focus on commercial transactions and building strategic relationships with alliance partners within the autonomous vehicle industry.

Kirsten Randall (Col ’95) has joined the Law Office of Beverly Allen in Tacoma, Washington as a paralegal, specializing in immigration and family law.