Class Notes Archive 1931-2014
Class Notes are searchable back to our spring 2000 issue. You can browse the notes by decade (click on a decade to view its class notes):
Class notes from the 1970s
| 1977Rolf Benirschke received the Contribution to Amateur Football Award from the Sacramento Valley Chapter of the National Football Foundation and College Hall of Fame in March. He was also the keynote speaker at the awards ceremony. Benirschke, a former place kicker with the San Diego Chargers, retired as the NFL’s third most accurate place kicker despite battling the debilitating intestinal disorder ulcerative colitis. He was the 1983 recipient of the NFL Man of the Year award and is the author of an inspirational autobiography, Alive and Kicking. (appeared in the Summer 2005 issue) • Jerry Okikawa was named senior director of product development for MAP Pharmaceuticals in Mountain View. Previously, Okikawa has held management positions in other pharmaceutical companies and served as technical director at Children’s Hospital in Oakland, managing the hospital’s respiratory therapy department and pulmonary function laboratory. (appeared in the Summer 2005 issue) • John Striffler, Ph.D., recently joined the scientific research team of PhytoMedical Technologies Inc. in Vancouver, British Columbia, to further ongoing studies on the beneficial effects of cinnamon on insulin resistance and diabetes. (appeared in the Fall 2005 issue) • Calvin Dooley received an Award of Distinction from the UC Davis College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences. Dooley is a San Joaquin Valley farmer, president and chief executive officer of the Food Products Association and a former member of the U.S. House of Representatives. (appeared in the Winter 2006 issue) • Ralph Schwall died in August 2005 at the age of 49 after a 15-month battle with colon cancer. Dr. Schwall, an oncology researcher with the biotech company Genentech in San Francisco, had survived a battle with Hodgkin’s lymphoma 15 years earlier. That experience increased his dedication to his work and to the cancer community. Dr. Schwall spent a week each summer as a counselor at Camp Okizu, for children with cancer. He is survived by his wife, Gail Colbern Schwall ’80, D.V.M. ’82; his son, Kevin; and his daughter, Katie. (appeared in the Winter 2006 issue) • Robin Lynde is one of 17 artisan farmers featured in Outstanding in their Fields: California’s Women Farmers (University of California Small Farm Center). She runs Meridian Jacobs Sheep Farm near Vacaville, where she raises 50 Jacob sheep and teaches classes in spinning, dyeing and weaving. (appeared in the Spring 2006 issue) • Mark Mandeles, M.A., has written The Future of War: Organizations as Weapons (Potomac Books). Mandeles is the president of the J. de Bloch Group, a defense consulting firm. In a long career as a defense analyst, he has been a professor at the American Military University and has written two other books. He lives in Fairfax, Va. (appeared in the Spring 2006 issue) • Ray Hart has been promoted to chief operating officer at GEI Consultants, a national water resources and geotechnical firm headquartered in Boston. He and his wife live in Folsom. Their two children are both graduates of UC Santa Barbara. (appeared in the Summer 2006 issue) • Robert Paige Jr., M.S., Ph.D. ’80, was named a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Paige is the founding director of the School of Life Sciences at Arizona State University in Tempe. Previously, he was on the faculty at UC Davis for 15 years, serving for five years as chair of the Department of Entomology. (appeared in the Summer 2006 issue) • Rand Herbert, M.A.T., and Stephen Wee, M.A. ’85, are partners in JRP Historical Consulting, a Davis firm that provides historical research services to clients needing information on topics ranging from old water rights to the impact of development on historic buildings. The firm’s success was touted in a Sacramento Business Journal article in June. (appeared in the Fall 2006 issue) • Daniel Mandel has returned to Northern California and established a Jewish funeral home to serve the region, Mandel Funeral Services of Northern California in Vallejo. For the past 25 years, he had been working in his great-grandfather’s funeral home in Chicago. (appeared in the Fall 2006 issue) • Julie Noyes has been teaching at a girls’ school in Richmond, Va., called St. Catherine’s School, but she writes that she plans to change careers and work as an art therapist with special needs children and perhaps go back to school to become a nurse. (appeared in the Fall 2006 issue) • Martin Bannon, a colonel in the U.S. Air Force, was recently assigned to the U.S. Embassy in Malaysia to serve as the air attaché. Bannon lives in Kuala Lumpur with his wife, Sharon, while his three children, Martina, Megan and Sean, attend universities in Montana. (appeared in the Winter 2007 issue) • Arturo Fallico IV is a teacher, special educator and mail-artist living in Santa Clara County. Mail art is a variety of artwork that involves the postal system as a medium and form of transmission. (appeared in the Winter 2007 issue) • Larry Halstead was an unsuccessful candidate for Barstow City Council in the November election. Halstead has spent decades as a community activist and is founder of Earth Haven Foundation for Kids, a nonprofit organization that represents children who are victims of substance abuse. He and his wife are foster parents who have adopted eight such children. (appeared in the Winter 2007 issue) • Stephen Meyers has been president of the Merchants National Bank of Sacramento for nearly 30 years. He and his bank were profiled in a Sacramento Business Journal article in October that noted the bank still offers such “old-time service” as no-fee checking accounts and phones answered by people and that Meyers sits at a desk in the lobby and knows many customers by name. (appeared in the Winter 2007 issue) • Todd Strumwasser was named chief of staff, elect, for the Swedish Hospital Medical Center in Seattle, Wash. Strumwasser is an anesthesiologist with Physicians Anesthesia Service Inc. He met his wife of 28 years, Kim Armstrong, at UC Davis in 1974. They are the parents of two children, Aaron and Valerie, both of whom attend college on the East Coast. (appeared in the Winter 2007 issue) • Christopher Waddell has taken a position as general counsel for the San Diego City Employee’s Retirement System, a $3.6 billion trust fund. Waddell had been general counsel for the California State Teachers’ Retirement System. (appeared in the Winter 2007 issue) • Joan Zerkovich is senior vice president of information technology at International Catastrophe Insurance Managers in Boulder, Colo. After graduating from UC Davis, she spent 19 years working for the campus’s medical center, medical school and information technology unit, and also served as technical director for the California Digital Library. (appeared in the Winter 2007 issue) • Frank Carber retired in October as a captain in the U.S. Navy after 23 years of service. After receiving his J.D. from Seattle University, Carber joined the Navy as a judge advocate. During his career, he received an M.A. in strategic studies from the Naval War College and an LL.M. in ocean and coastal law from the University of Miami School of Law. Living in Memphis, Tenn., he now plans to take a sabbatical from work and spend time with his wife and three children before starting his next career, possibly working in the field of adoption law. (appeared in the Spring 2007 issue) |