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UC Davis Magazine

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 1980s

1980Edwin Portugal was appointed executive director of the Crane Institute for Music Business at State University of New York, Potsdam. There he is helping establish a partnership between the music products industry and SUNY Potsdam's Crane School of Music. Since 1993, Portugal has been a professor of economics at the university, where he's been honored for his outstanding teaching. He lives with his wife, Susan, and two sons in Rouses Point, N.Y., where he was mayor from 1986 to 1989. (appeared in the Summer 2000 issue)   John Meyer, former Davis city manager, joined UC Davis in July as vice chancellor for resource management and planning--the campus's top financial and facilities planning position. He had served as Davis city manager from 1990 to 2000 and as deputy city manager from 1987 to 1989. After graduating from UC Davis, Meyer received a master's degree in public administration in 1985 from the University of Southern California. (appeared in the Fall 2000 issue)    Gail Schwall, D.V.M., does cancer research, working on drug development. She and her husband, Ralph '77, live in Pacifica with their two children. (appeared in the Fall 2000 issue)    Lenore McKerlie is an artist, teaching painting and drawing at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs, and working on an M.A. in art/painting at Adams State College in Alamosa, Colo. (appeared in the Winter 2001 issue)    Laurie Armstrong was named to the Travel Industry Association of America's Communications Council. Armstrong is vice president of public relations for the San Francisco Convention & Visitors Bureau. (appeared in the Fall 2001 issue)    After receiving an M.D. degree and completing a residency at the University of Oklahoma, Lorenz "Larry" Ramseyer has been in practice in Enid, Okla., doing diagnostic radiology at St. Mary's Hospital and Integris Bass Baptist Hospital. He was also elected president of the Oklahoma State Radiological Society this year, after previously serving as vice-president and treasurer. He and his wife, Chris, have three sons, Theo, Timothy and Martin. He writes that "Chris enjoys our horses, chickens, cows and mule. It seems we are more Aggie now than ever." (appeared in the Fall 2001 issue)    Wesley Avery was named a partner of Sulmeyer, Kupetz, Baumann & Rothman, a firm he joined in 1991. Avery serves as a judge pro tempore of the Los Angeles County Municipal Court and is a licensed real estate broker. He is also a major in the U.S. Army Reserve and was recently awarded the Meritorious Service Medal for his service in support of the U.S. mission in Bosnia. Avery lives with his wife and children in Valencia. (appeared in the Summer 2001 issue)    James Oerding, certified travel specialist and chair of Escapes Unlimited in Greencastle, Penn., was selected to be included in the 2002 edition of Who's Who in the World. (appeared in the Winter 2002 issue)    Paul Newitt was curator of an exhibition at the UC Davis Design Museum this winter titled Reality to Fantasy: The Evolution of Theme Park Design. Newitt, who has done free-lance work in graphic design, writing, photography and scale-model construction, is chiefly interested in museum, corporate, trade show and exhibition design. In 1999, he created a science fiction museum in Old Sacramento, called Travels Through Time (see UC Davis Magazine, winter 1999). (appeared in the Spring 2002 issue)    Bill O'Neill is vice president and general manager of Frontier, a Citizens Communications company, an independent telephone company. O'Neill manages the firm's Western region, which stretches from North Dakota to Northern California. O'Neill, his wife, Carol, and their two children live in Walnut Creek. (appeared in the Spring 2002 issue)    Lenore Foss McKerlie received a Colorado Artists Fellowship--her second, having also received one in 1996. McKerlie has been teaching drawing and painting and art history at the University of Colorado in Colorado Springs for the past two years. (appeared in the Fall 2002 issue)    Pat Flynn was named senior editor for sports and business at the San Diego Union-Tribune. He has also worked for papers in Sacramento, Woodland, Ventura and Virginia, as well as for the Aggie. He lives in Escondido with his wife, Robin, and three children. (appeared in the Winter 2003 issue)    Heidi Bekebrede had one of her ceramic artworks featured in the 16th annual Feats of Clay ceramic show in Lincoln. It was one of 70 pieces selected from among 1,130 entries. She is a member of the Artery, an artists' cooperative in Davis, has taught at the Davis Art Center since 1990 and has been narrator for the performance group Voice of the Wood since 1991. (appeared in the Summer 2003 issue)    Christine McFadden, D.V.M. '82, donated $250,000 to the UC Merced library in honor of her four children who were slain by her ex-husband. She founded the McFadden-Willis Memorial Foundation to raise money for college scholarships and other causes. (appeared in the Summer 2003 issue)    Marjorie Sandor has written Portrait of My Mother Who Posed Nude in Wartime (Sarabande Books). She has published collections of her essays and short stories, and her short fiction has appeared in a number of anthologies and journals. Sandor teaches creative writing and literature at Oregon State University in Corvallis. (appeared in the Summer 2003 issue)    K.L. "Dan" Wong is a senior transportation planner with the San Francisco Airport Commission, where he has worked since 1988. He was a panelist at the American Planning Association's 2003 National Conference in Denver. (appeared in the Summer 2003 issue)    John Danielson is city manager of Elk Grove. Before working in government, Danielson ran fruit-tree farms in Washington and Oregon and grew wheat in Saudi Arabia. He and his wife have two children. (appeared in the Fall 2003 issue)    Nancy Vanderlip was named director of employment law for the Parker-Hannifin Corp. and will be located in Irvine. She had served as assistant general counsel and assistant secretary for the corporation in Cleveland, Ohio, for the past 10 years. Vanderlip and her husband, Jim, have two children, Emily, 11, and Matthew, 8. Her former classmates can reach her at nvanderlip@parker.com. (appeared in the Fall 2003 issue)    Elaine Seyman has been promoted to director of the massage therapy program at Georgia Medical Institute, Dekalb, in Atlanta. For the past four years, she has also run her own massage therapy company, Centerpoint Therapeutic Massage Inc. (appeared in the Winter 2004 issue)    John D’Arrigo, president of D’Arrigo Bros. Co., a fruit and vegetable grower in Salinas, and past chair of the Grower Shipper Association of Central California, was elected chair of Western Growers, an association for enhancing and protecting the fresh fruit and vegetable industry in California and Arizona. (appeared in the Spring 2004 issue)