1930s
Ruth Gahnberg Miller: BA, 1938
Ruth Miller is a former reporter for the Yakima Daily Republic and The Seattle Times. She is proud to report that she is now 88 and still writing.
Mort Lachman: BA, 1939 Journalism
2004 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Beginning as a writer for Bob Hope in the late 1940s, Lachman continued his career in television as a producer for numerous acclaimed series including: All in the Family, One Day at a Time, and Kate and Allie.
1940s
Dorothy Bwelow Fribrock: BA (Journalism), 1944
Dorothy Fribrock is retired and has written a 500 page book, “Sockeye Sunday and Other Fish Tales,” about her 70 years in Snug Harbor, Alaska.
Edwin Guthman: BA, 1944
2005 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Reporter and editor (Philadelphia Inquirer, Seattle Star, The Seattle Times, and the Los Angeles Times). He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1950 for National Reporting while at The Seattle Times for his series on the clearing of Communist charges against Professor Melvin Rader, who had been accused of attending a secret Communist school. He served as press secretary for Senator Robert F. Kennedy. Guthman died Aug. 31, 2008 at his home in Los Angeles. His obituary was printed in The Seattle Times and by Columns Magazine.
Gerald Hoeck: BA, 1944
2008 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Gerald Hoeck was a founding partner of a Seattle advertising agency: Miller, McKay, Hoeck and Hartung. The agency was well known for its innovative creative work; its clients included Rainier Beer, Bar-S Meats, KING Broadcasting, MD Tissue, West Coast Airlines, and Bardahl. He also worked on Warren Magnuson’s Congressional and Senate campaigns and helped Congressman Henry M. Jackson in his U.S. Senate race. In 1960 he served as the advertising manager of the Democratic National Committee. He played a major role in the 1964 election of four Washington state congressmen: Tom Foley, Brock Adams, Lloyd Meeds, and Floyd Hicks. In 1972 and 1976, he worked on the Jackson presidential campaigns.
William (Bill) Galbraith: BA, 1946 (Journalism)
Bill Galbraith worked 13 years for the United Press as an editor and a reporter covering a variety of federal agencies including the State department and the White House. For the following 25 years he worked for CBS News as news editor of the Washington Bureau. He closed his career with CBS as Director of News Operations in Washington.
Marilyn Turner Adams: BA, 1946 (Journalism)
Ms. Adams retired as a Public Relations manager from US WEST and previously worked as a reporter for the Seattle Post Intelligencer and the Bellevue American (now King County Journal). She was a member of Women In Communication (it was Theta Sigma Phi in those days!), International Association of Business Communicators and remains an active Pi Beta Phi alumnae.
Jack Greenewald: BA 1947, Journalism
Mr. Greenewald spent 25 years as owner of newspaper, printing and publishing companies, then purchased a travel agency and traveled throughout the world for thirty years.
Harold (Hal) Zimmerman: BA, 1947
2009 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Hal Zimmerman worked as news editor of the Sedro Woolley Courier-Times and as editor-publisher of the Cowlitz County Advocate in Castle Rock before buying the Camas Washougal Post-Record in 1957 and publishing the paper for the next 23 years. The Post-Record won first place in the nation in 1960 for community involvement and won many awards for news, editorials, advertising, and community service. He also served as president of the Washington Newspaper Publishers Association. Among the many leadership roles he had were serving as president of the Lions Club and a Chamber of Commerce officer in Castle Rock and president of the Kiwanis Club and Chamber of Commerce in Camas. For his many years of community service, he was named as the “Citizen of the Century” for Camas. He served 22 years in the Washington State Legislature, had leadership roles in both the House and the Senate such as serving as Chairman of the Legislative Budget Committee in 1987 and sponsored key pieces of legislation, such as the state’s first Solid Waste Act in 1969 and its first tough oil spill bill in 1970. He resigned from the State Senate in 1988 when Gov. Booth Gardner appointed him to the state’s Pollution Control Hearings Board. As one of the three full-time hearings board members in the Environmental Hearings Office, he heard appeals on air and water pollution, shorelines appeals and helped coordinate officers of two other appeals boards.
Wallie Funk: BA, 1948
2008 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Wallie Funk had a successful and prolific career in journalism and photography that spanned more than four decades. He graduated from Anacortes High School in 1941, but his university education was interrupted by his military service during World War II. He subsequently graduated from the University of Washington in 1948. Funk served as president of his graduating class and received four honoraries, including one for journalism. In 1950 he, along with his personal friend and fellow UW student John Webber, purchased the Anacortes American newspaper. 1964, Funk and Webber purchased the Whidbey News-Times and the South Whidbey Record on Whidbey Island. They jointly owned, published, and operated these newspapers until 1989. Funks’ first editorial in the Anacortes American was a front-page plea to his fellow citizens for help in preserving local history. Funk’s personal photographic efforts are prolific. Funk’s activity in his community included a wide range of interests. A short list includes: the Navy League (Oak Harbor Council President, Washington State President and National Director), the Washington Newspaper Publisher’s Association, Washington State trade missions (China in 1980, the Middle East in 1983, and Thailand in 1985), the Washington State Arts Commission, the Anacortes Community Theater, the Whidbey Playhouse, Skagit County Pioneer Association, the Museum of Northwest Art, and the Anacortes Museum. During his retirement, Funk continued to document the history of his community, writing articles through 2001, and taking photographs up until 2002.
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James King: BA, 1948 Journalism
2004 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
James (Jim) B. King, retired Seattle Times executive editor and senior vice president, died Oct. 17, 2012, a few days after suffering a stroke. He was 89. King was a Pulitzer Prize winner and a member of the UW Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame. Read more about King and his remarkable life in the Seattle Times. Under his leadership, The Seattle Times grew from a strong Washington daily newspaper into a paper that was nationally recognized as one of the best in the western United States.
Don Kraft: BA, 1948 (Journalism)
2005 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Don Kraft, a longtime advertising executive in Seattle, has served as secretary-treasurer of the American Association of Advertising Agencies, chairman of the AAAA Western Region and of its Puget Sound Council, international chairman of the Affiliated Advertising Agencies International and as a board member of the Advertising Association of the West and the Seattle Advertising Federation. His achievements include: president of the Rotary Club of Seattle, president of the University of Washington Alumni Association (receiving its Distinguished Service Award); chairman of the UW Tyee Board of Advisors and of the UW Development Fund Board; prime minister of the Seattle Seafair; the fiftieth King Neptune in 1999; campaign chair of United Way of King County in 1994. Kraft was instrumental in starting the Department’s Fred Baker Endowment for Professional Education in Advertising and Public Relations.
Dan McDonough: BA, 1948
Winner of the 1981 Pulitzer Prize (Local General or Spot News Reporting) with fellow alumni Linda Wilson (BA, 1979) and Laurie Smith (Attended, 1994 and 1995) for their coverage of the Mt. St. Helens story for the Longview (Washington) Daily News.
Herbert F. (Herb) Robinson: BA, 1949 (posthumous)
2010 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Herbert F. (Herb) Robinson was an award-winning television and newspaper journalist in Seattle who served as lead editorial writer for The Seattle Times from 1977 to 1989 and as anchor, news director, and on-air host at KOMO Television in the pioneering years of 1953 to 1965. As a UW student, he was the campus correspondent for The Seattle Times. His college career was interrupted by World War II, where he saw combat in Burma. He left the service as a captain and returned to the UW to earn his degree in journalism. In 1954, television was a new medium on the scene and Robinson joined KOMO-TV to host a daily news program called Deadline. The show received a Sylvania Television Award in 1956 for outstanding local and special-events programs. Robinson left television and returned to The Seattle Times where he wrote editorials. Over 20 years, he produced thousands of pieces. The Municipal League honored him in 1983 and the Washington State School Directors Association in 1973 for his contributions to understanding public policy issues. After retiring in 1989, Robinson turned to writing novels. In 1993, he enrolled in a fiction class at the University of Washington. He became a regular at writing-practice sessions held twice weekly at Tio’s (renamed Louisa’s) Cafe on Eastlake Avenue in Seattle. He wrote there for 10 years. Robinson was in the process of seeking an agent and publishing venues for his fiction when he died in 2003.
Stanton Patty: BA, 1949; MA, 1958
2008 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Stanton Patty covered the state of Alaska for most of his 57 years as a reporter. He was a former assistant travel editor of The Seattle Times and on staff at the Times from 1954 to 1988. Before that, he was a reporter for the Longview Daily News, working there from 1949 to 1954. Patty’s Alaska stories for the Times have included the fight for statehood, construction of the trans-Alaska oil pipeline, the campaign for settlement of Alaska natives’ aboriginal land claims, the Good Friday earthquake of 1964, and the Exxon Valdez oil spill. He was lead reporter for coverage of the Seattle World’s Fair in 1962. Patty was twice runner-up for the Society of American Travel Writers Lowell Thomas Grand Award. He is the author of “Fearless Men And Fabulous Women: A reporter’s memoir from Alaska & the Yukon” (Epicenter Press, 2004)
Wanda Zackovich Larson: BA (Journalism), 1949
Ms. Larson lives, writes and publishes in Portland, OR. Her Blue Unicorn Press, Inc. recently published Cain’s Daughters, by Phyllis K. Collier (MFA, University of Washington). Ms. Larson’s own recent book is narrative poetry of Sacajawea’s journey, Blue Woman/Mojave.
1950s
Cecil Webb: BA (Journalism), 1950
Cecil Webb retired in 1989 after 37 years in advertising, TV and radio sales, news, and management-ownership. An active reporter for his stations, Cecil won the Associated Press Mark Twain Award for best broadcast news operation in California in 1978.
Joseph Slate: BA, 1951 – Journalism
2010 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Joseph Slate is a successful children’s-book author. His newest children’s book, I Want to be Free, with illustrations by Caldecott honoree E.B. Lewis, will be published by Putnam in 2009. Also in 2009, a musical based on Slate’s best-selling Miss Bindergarten series will tour 19 cities. The schedule is on his website: www.josephslate.com. Slate was editor of the UW Daily. Then he worked as a reporter for the Seattle Times before becoming an editor for Foreign Broadcast Information Service. It was then he decided he wanted to be a painter and went to art school. While in art school, he sold his first short story to The New Yorker.
Dolores Sibonga: BA, 1952, Journalism
Hall of Fame: 2007; Distinguished Alumnus: 2010
After graduating from the UW, Dolores Sibonga went to work in the fast-paced world of radio and television news in both Spokane and Seattle. In 1968 she and her husband purchased the Filipino Forum. Years later, facing her husband’s layoff from Boeing, Sibonga went back to school to pursue a degree in law. Sibonga became the first Filipina-American lawyer in Washington state. In 1973, the Washington State Bar admitted her, making her the first Filipina-American woman member as well. After graduating, Sibonga went to work as a public defense attorney and then worked for the King County Council as a legislative analyst, later moving to the office of civil rights. In 1978, she became the first minority woman to serve on the Seattle City Council. Sibonga was in office for 12 years, serving three terms. In 1989, she ran unsuccessfully for mayor. After leaving politics, she returned to being a lawyer. Over the years she has served on many different public commissions, notably the Horse Racing Commission for two years and the Human Rights Commission for five years. Sibonga remains an active community member, serving on the boards of the Wing Luke Asian Museum, the Art Institute, Inter*Im, Port Jobs, and the King County Board of Tax Appeals and Equalization and the Community Advocacy Outreach Committee board. She was once arrested at a Civil Rights Movement demonstration at Sea-Tac Airport, and also involved in a fight against the building of the Kingdome. She interned as public defender during her junior year of law school, then became director of the Washington State Human Rights commission.
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Joanne Sussman Arfin: BA, 1953
Ms. Arfin Moved to San Francisco right after graduation, determined to make her name in advertising, but found incredible stereotyping and a reluctance to let her do more than be a secretary. She worked for a weekly newspaper in San Francisco (Jewish Bulletin), raised a family, and then returned to work as secretary to the president of Stanford University.
She had this to say about her 50th college reunion in 2003: “We could have spent much more time visiting the Department but the little time we did spend there made me (as well as the others on the tour) realize that much has changed since 1953. In fact the Communications building was barely completed that year and already there has been at least one major remodel. At Lewis Hall we were a relatively small group of 50 or 60 journalism majors (divided by editorial or advertising groups) involved with taking all our classes together during our junior year and busy putting out The Daily in the afternoons. Those were intense and rather stressful times for us but also a lot of fun. My big disappointment in 1952 was getting permission to stay out all night (not easy to get in days of sorority standards) to help cover the national election only to find out that Eisenhower had won even before our western polls had closed! Today you have modern technology and TV (I Love Lucy was still in it’s prime back in ’52) and digital media not to mention all sorts of computer aids. Truly, the visit was an awakening for me.”
Tom Koenninger, B.A. 1953
2005 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Tom Koenninger, Editor Emeritus for The Columbian, died September 30, 2010, after battling cancer. Koenninger retired as editor and vice president of The Columbian at the beginning of 2001. He continued to write a weekly column, serve on The Columbian‘s editorial board and serve as moderator of The Columbian‘s reader Advisory Council until his death. He served a four-year term (2001 – 2005) as chairman of the Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges. He received the state trustee award for leadership in 2003. He also served on the board of the Vancouver National Historic Reserve Trust; Lewis and Clark Steering Committee, and board of the Friends of the Ridgefield National Wildlife Refuge. He was president of the Clark College Alumni Association and a member of its board, and co-chairman of the stewardship campaign for St. Luke’s Episcopal Church. He served as chairman of the Vancouver School District’s Management Advisory Task Force and was a member of the Visiting Committee of the UW Department of Communication.
Robin Worthington: BA, 1953
During her career as a reporter, Ms. Worthington worked at various newspapers, including the San Jose Mercury News doing mostly features work. She is also an artist.
She had this to say about her 50th college reunion in 2003: “The friendships formed in J School have lasted more than half a century. That’s as important as where to put the semicolons. It’s a truth of journalism that everyone has a story. I knew my friends’ stories, but I’d forgotten many of the twists and turns, so it was touching to hear them. At the {reunion} party, people were talking about what they’d taken with them from school. Some agreed it was the ability to produce under pressure. And we all retain a lively sense of curiosity. I’d add to that the firm belief that I have a right to knowledge. Sometimes the San Jose Mercury persona kicks in when some minor bureaucrat is holding back on me.”
Jon W. Stewart: BA (Journalism), 1954
Mr. Stewart retired 31 December 1988 as Senior Foreign Service Officer, United States Information Agency. Except for one four-year tour in Washington, D.C., his career was spent at posts in Arab and/or Muslim countries of the Middle East, North Africa and Southwest Asia. He currently resides in Bothell.
Harold E. Carr: BA, 1955
2006 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Harold Carr retired from The Boeing Company in June 1997 after serving as vice president of public relations and advertising since May 1986. He served in the same role as director of the function beginning in 1984. Carr’s career at Boeing began in September 1962 when he joined the public relations news bureau. In addition to his responsibilities of directing the company’s communications (both external and internal) and advertising functions, Carr was responsible for the company’s historical archive and the companywide weekly newspaper, Boeing News. Carr was a member and on the board of the Public Relations Seminar, a nationwide organization for senior public relations executives. He was named a Public Relations “All Star” by the magazine, Inside PR, in 1996. Carr was also active in the San Francisco Academy, an organization devoted to providing advanced training for upper-level corporate public relations professionals. He also served as president of the academy. In 2004, the Puget Sound Chapter of the Public Relations Society of America selected Carr as the recipient of the Jay Rockey Lifetime Achievement Award in public relations. Carr served on a number of Seattle nonprofit boards. These included Goodwill Industries, 5th Avenue Theater, the Tyee Club, Seattle-King County Sports Council, Downtown Seattle Association, Henry Art Gallery, the Museum of Flight and PONCHO, Seattle’s premiere fund-raising organization for the arts. He also represented Boeing on the Seattle Chamber of Commerce and chaired its communications committee.
Rolf Glerum: BA, 1955
Glerum started his professional career in 1959 as promotions specialist for the West Coast Lumbermen’s Association, later to merge with Western Pine Association to form Western Wood Products Association. His responsibilities with WCLA included news and feature writing, trade show coordination, builder and architect relations, do-it-yourself news articles, and other related activities.
Read more about Rolf Glerum >>
Richard Ossinger: BA, 1955
Richard Ossinger is healthy, happy and semi-retired. As of 2005 he has been married 42 years, has 3 children and 10 grandchildren. He runs an Internet business and massage practice on the Southern Coast of Oregon and has a vacation home west of Marysville, WA. He does some public speaking on goals and attitudes.
Ted Van Dyk BA, 1955 Communications
2006 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Ted Van Dyk has been active in national policy and politics for over 30 years. Van Dyk received his MS from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1956. He worked as a sports reporter and editor for the Long Island (N.Y.) Daily Press and as a reporter and editor for United Press. He was most recently an opinion columnist for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. In mid-1957 he began military duty as a U.S. Army intelligence analyst. Van Dyk subsequently served as a Soviet specialist and intelligence analyst at the Pentagon; as deputy and acting director of the European Communities’ (now European Union) Washington, D.C., office (1962-64); as senior assistant to Vice President Hubert Humphrey; as vice president of Columbia University (1968-69); as president of his own Washington, D.C., consulting firm (1969-76 and 1985-97); and as coordinator of foreign assistance programs in the Carter Administration’s White House and State Department. He additionally served as a vice president of the Weyerhaeuser Company, president of the Center for National Policy (1981-85), Washington, D.C., and executive vice president of The Milken Institute (1997-99), Santa Monica, CA. In national politics, Van Dyk served as a senior political and policy advisor to presidential candidates Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, Jimmy Carter, Ted Kennedy, Walter Mondale, Gary Hart and Paul Tsongas. He has been principal author of the Democratic national platform on several occasions. Van Dyk is a board member of the Roosevelt Institute, Hyde Park, NY; the Humphrey Institute, University of Minnesota; the Jean Monnet Institute, Washington, D.C.; the Committee for Study of the American Electorate, Washington, D.C.; and is a member of the national program committee of the Council on Foreign Relations, New York, and coordinator of its Seattle book-study program. He continues to write for local and national publications.
Robert Keatley, B.A. 1956
2006 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Robert Keatley is founder and currently is editor of the Hong Kong Journal, an online quarterly hosted by the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and devoted to articles about political, economic and social issues relating to Hong Kong and its neighborhood. It is intended to provide background information for those concerned about the territory and its development. He has served as editor of three newspapers during his career in journalism in the U.S. and overseas. After earning degrees from the University of Washington and Stanford University, he joined the Wall Street Journal, where he spent most of his career. He was a reporter in San Francisco, New York and Hong Kong, and became the Journal’s diplomatic correspondent in Washington. Keatley was the paper’s foreign editor in New York in 1978 before becoming editor of the Asian Wall Street Journal in Hong Kong in 1979, and concurrently publisher in 1983. In 1984, he was named editor of the Wall Street Journal Europe in Brussels, Belgium. He returned to Washington in 1992 to serve as a writer and editor specializing in international political and economic issues. He retired from the Journal in 1998 and returned to Hong Kong, where he was editor of the South China Morning Post, the leading English-language daily in the SAR. After completing his tour with the SCMP in 2001, he returned to Washington. He is a director of the Washington Institute for Foreign Affairs.
Neil McReynolds: BA, 1956
2005 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Directly after graduating from the UW, Neil McReynolds went to work for the Bellevue American newspaper (now the King County Journal) and was there 11 years, the last seven years as editor of the paper. During his last five years as editor, the paper led the state in the number of awards won. Because of his journalistic accomplishments and civic service, he was selected in 1965 as one of the three honorees by a program called the Three Outstanding Young Men in the State of Washington. In 1967, Gov. Dan Evans recruited him to be press secretary, a position he held for six years. He has been chair of the board or president of many major organizations in the Seattle-King County area over the years, including Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, Bellevue Community College, Seattle-King County Economic Development Council, and Downtown Seattle Rotary Club. In the electric utility industry, he was president or chairman of the several Pacific Northwest and national organizations. In December 2003, he was presented with the Lifetime Achievement Award of the Public Relations Society of America.
Read more about Neil McReynolds >>
Read about his guest presentation in the Department’s News Lab>>
Doug Ramsey: BA, 1956
Ramsey has written about jazz for Down Beat, Jazz Times, The Washington Post, the Los Angeles Times and the Dallas Morning News. He is also an author. In 2005, he released “Take Five: The Public and Private Lives of Paul Desmond.” The book was named the Best Book About Jazz by the Jazz Journalists Association in 2006, and was the winner of a 2006 ASCAP Deems Taylor Award (Ramsey’s second such award), which recognizes outstanding print, broadcasting and new-media writing about music. Ramsey received his
first Deems award in 1997 for the essay accompanying the Bill Evans boxed CD set “The Secret Sessions.” Ramsey’s first novel, “Poodie James,” was released in 2007 and he writes a popular jazz blog titled “Rifftides: Doug Ramsey on
jazz and other matters.”
Diane (Williams) Read: BA (Journalism), 1956
For over a third of her life, Read has been writing science pieces for research organizations in the San Francisco Bay Area. These pieces include grant applications, newsletters, and annual reports. In addition, Read continues her freelance work, but has devoted much of her time to
volunteering in poorer neighborhood schools in the San Francisco area, as well as dedicated her time to the San Francisco Symphony. Before living and working in San Francisco, Diane lived in Washington, D.C., and wrote for the Secretary of the Navy, as well as the Washington Post. As an undergraduate, Read was Campus Correspondent and a part-time reporter for The Seattle Times. After graduation, she was a reporter for the Bremerton Sun, then returned to the UW as assistant public information officer for the Division of Health Sciences. While living at Subic Bay, Philippines, she spearheaded a successful effort to establish a Sister City relationship with Bremerton, and wrote a series of articles for The Sun.
Guy W. Farmer: BA (Journalism), 1957
Mr. Farmer writes a Sunday political column for the daily Nevada Appeal of Carson City, NV. In October of 2003, he won a columnists’ award at the annual convention of the Nevada Press Association.
Sharon LeeMaster: BA, 1957
Sharon LeeMaster CFRE, became a third generation graduate of the University of Washington in 1957. Her grandmother was in the first class from the current campus, 1894. (Grandma Helen rode the street car from downtown Seattle where her family lived and boarded the barge to take her to the emerging campus. She was also the first woman to receive an advanced degree — Pharmacy!) Sharon’s husband, a UW graduate, wears Helen Anthony Carey’s class ring as his wedding ring.
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Mike Peringer: BA, 1957
2007 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Mike Peringer graduated from Roosevelt High School and the University of Washington. After attending law school and graduate school, he entered the business world in Seattle and has been a successful marketing executive for more than four decades. He is currently VP-Marketing/Sale for Process Heating Company, a pioneer manufacturer in the SODO industrial area south of downtown. It was at PHCo that he founded the SODO Business Association in 1992 to represent the 2,000 businesses and 50,000 employees in SODO. It was in his capacity as president of the association that he founded ArtWorks to assist in cleaning up the area and removing graffiti. Over 5,000 at-risk and other youth have gone through the ArtWorks program since it was started in 1995. Peringer serves and has served on countless committees and councils over the years and as a result has been the recipient of numerous awards for his civic duties including the prestigious Jefferson Award, Sustainable Seattle and the Seattle Police Department’s annual Citizenship honor. Other awards resulting from his involvement with ArtWorks are: Seattle Public Utilities Anti-graffiti Award, Non-Rotarian Person of the Year, SODO Chapter, and Pemco Insurance/KOMO-TV Hometown Hero. Over the years, ArtWorks has been the recipient of awards from various civic and business organizations. He is the author of “Good Kids: The story of ArtWorks” and all proceeds from the sale of his book go to Art Works. He also published “Lifeline To The Yukon,” a history of the Yukon River, and has authored numerous articles.
Frank Garred: BA, 1958
2007 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Frank Garred served a year in Korea as a lieutenant after graduation, then joined the Aberdeen, Wash., Daily World in 1960 as a bureau reporter covering Pacific County. In 1962, he was hired as editor of a new weekly newspaper near Tacoma with the mission of challenging the strong family-owned Tacoma daily, the News-Tribune. The economic and ownership uncertainties of the suburban newspaper led Garred to form a coalition with two other Washington state community newspaper owners to buy the Port Townsend Leader. From 1967 to 2002 he retained ownership and management of the independent Leader. Concerned that the Leader might leak into corporate ownership if a crisis sale of his newspaper was forced, in 1989 he recruited a junior partner and created an equity contract with the commitment to transition ownership, which he did 12 years later. In 1998, he purchased an interest in a neighboring newspaper publishing company and assumed the role of publisher for The Gazette and other publications of the company. Garred has served as president of the Washington Newspaper Publishers Association and sat on its board for nearly 16 years. He served on the board and as an officer of the National Newspaper Association, and was president of that organization in 1993. He served in the same capacity with the National Newspaper Association Foundation, representing the organization on the Accrediting Council for Education in Journalism and Mass Communications for seven years following his presidency. He is a past president and board member of the International Society of Weekly Newspaper Editors, an organization that supports the creation and development of strong editorial voices among the world’s community newspapers. He also has served in numerous capacities on community-service and nonprofit organizations. In 2003, he began teaching as an adjunct instructor for journalism reporting at Western Washington University. For three years he was executive director of the Washington Coalition for Open Government, an educational and advocacy nonprofit group committed to maintaining and improving transparency in government at all levels. Since January 2005 he has been a journalism instructor (reporting and writing) and Advisor to the student newspaper at Peninsula College, in Port Angeles.
John Komen: BA, 1958, Communications – Radio, TV
While a senior at the UW, Komen worked full time for The Associated Press in Seattle (he was recommended for The AP job as a radio-news writer by one of his School of Communications professors); worked for The AP in Seattle, transferring to Olympia in 1961 to cover state-house and political news; hired by KOMO-TV news in 1963 as a field reporter, became KOMO-TV News night anchorman and later 6 p.m. anchorman/news editor (director); hired by ABC-TV news in 1967 as correspondent based in New York City, covered 1968 presidential campaign assigned at various times to campaigns of Richard Nixon, George Wallace, Hubert Humphrey, Spiro Agnew (also covered 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Republican National Convention in Miami, Robert Kennedy death watch in Los Angeles, crash of nuclear-armed bomber in Thule, Greenland, various protest marches and city riots), colleagues in New York City included Peter Jennings, Sam Donaldson, Marlene Sanders, Ted Koppel, John Scali; returned to Seattle in late 1969 as 11 p.m. news anchorman for KING-TV news; hired by the Tacoma News Tribune newspaper in 1976 as chief editorial writer, became associate editor, then managing editor, promoted to editor, retiring in December 1995 as editor of the editorial page after 19 years with the News Tribune.
1960s
Mary Daheim: BA, 1960
2008 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Seattle native Mary Daheim has been fascinated by story-telling since early childhood. A journalism major at the University of Washington, she was one of the first female editor of The Daily where she attracted national attention with her editorial stance against bigotry. After getting her BA, she worked in newspapers and public relations, but in her spare time she tried her hand at novels. In 1983, Daheim’s first historical romance was published, followed by a half-dozen more before she switched genres to her original fictional love, mysteries. “Just Desserts” and “Fowl Prey,” the first books of 24 in the Bed-and-Breakfast series, were released in 1991. A year later, the Emma Lord series made its debut with “The Alpine Advocate.” The 19th, “The Alpine Traitor,” was published in early 2008. Daheim has also written several short stories for mystery anthologies and magazines. She has been an Agatha Award nominee, winner of the 2000 Pacific Northwest Writers Association Achievement Award, and her mysteries regularly make the USA Today bestseller list and the New York Times top thirty.
Jody Deering Nyquist: BA, MA; 1960, 1967 Speech Communication
2004 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Jody Deering Nyquist is Associate Dean Emerita of the UW Graduate School and an emeritas member of the graduate faculty of the UW Department of Communication. She was the University’s director of the Center for Instructional Development and Research from 1984–2000. Both her undergraduate and graduate work was completed at the University where she has been a faculty member since 1969. In the Department of Communication, Nyquist taught undergraduate and graduate courses in interpersonal and instructional communication, interviewing, small group facilitation, public speaking, and media. Most recently she was PI for two major grants, from The Pew Charitable Trusts and the Spencer. In addition to over 70 articles and book chapters, she has edited six books and co-authored “Working Effectively with Graduate Assistants and Re-envisioning the Ph.D.: What Concerns Do We Have?” Nyquist has received numerous awards for her work in her discipline and in higher education from the UW and from national and international organizations. She was president of the Western States Communication Association in 1984 and later received its highest award, the Distinguished Service Award. In 1992, she served as a Fulbright Senior Scholar in New Zealand. In 1996, she was awarded the prestigious Robert J. Kibler Award and in 2002, the Samuel L. Becker Award, the highest award given for scholarship, teaching, and service by the National Communication Association. Nyquist has served on boards for over 50 universities, organizations, independent schools, and nonprofit agencies. She has served on the editorial boards of nine journals and as an outside reviewer for ten universities. She has lectured at over 20 universities in the United States, Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and Saudi Arabia. She was visiting professor at Nagoya University from September 5 to December 5, 2008.
Martin “Marty” Thompson: BA (Radio-Television), 1960
Thompson retired in 2003 after a 37-year career with The Associated Press. From 1988 until 2003, he was based in New York and served as managing editor and as the news service’s first director of state news. In the latter position, he led strengthening of state bureau news coverage through improved planning and execution and story selection to increase AP’s role in breaking original news stories. Earlier, he was chief of bureau in San Francisco and Los Angeles, after working as a reporter and editor in Seattle, Reno and San Francisco. Before joining the AP in Seattle, he was news director of KREW, Sunnyside, Wash., and a newsman at KEDO in Longview, where he was raised. Thompson and his wife, Janet, live in Santa Rosa, Calif.
Terence Todd: BA Radio-TV, 1960; MA Communication 1961
Martin H. Arnold: BA, 1964 (Journalism-Advertising)
Martin Arnold is retired from ITT after a 37-year career in public relations. For the past 15 years, he has taught communications at University of Connecticut and Iona. Arnold earned his MA in Communications from Fairfield University (’83) and an MBA from the University of New Haven (’97). He also took a certificate from the UW advanced management program in 1977.
Ruth Pumphrey: BA, 1964
Pumphrey worked for the news affiliate King TV for 20 years, moving up to the position of assignment editor before retiring in September of 2007. Since retirement Pumphrey fills her time with personal pleasures such as gardening and bird watching. She is also an avid clay sculptor, making abstract forms of art. She is one day hoping to get some of it shown in a gallery.
Read more about Ruth Pumphrey >>
Ron Sudderth: BA, 1964
Commercial real estate brokerage and investments, Seattle and Bellevue.
Harry Anderson: BA, Journalism, 1967
Harry Anderson retired in 2008 as Senior Vice President of Corporate Communications at Tenet Healthcare Corporation, a publicly traded operator of general hospitals nationwide. His retirement was the culmination of a career of more than 36 years in journalism and public relations. Harry spent more than 18 years at the Los Angeles Times (1972-1990) as a reporter, copy editor, deputy business editor and columnist. From 1990 to 1997, he held a variety of public relations positions, including Vice President of Corporate Communications for Paramount Pictures in Hollywood. He spent the last decade of his career at Tenet, in charge of public relations, employee communications and corporate marketing. He also has taught courses in journalism at California State University, Northridge and the University of Southern California. He continues to teach a graduate seminar in crisis corporate communications at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. He lives on Whidbey Island.
Bill Chamberlin: BA, 1967; PhD, 1977
Bill Chamberlin has been the Joseph L. Brechner Eminent Scholar in Mass Communications at the College of Journalism and Communications of the University of Florida since 1987. He now serves as Director of the Marion Brechner Citizen Access Project. He also is an affiliate professor of the UF College of Law.
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David Marriott, B.A. 1967
2005 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
David Marriot is a prominent public relations practitioner and mentor to students. He specializes in crisis management, crisis communication, labor communications, litigation support and media training. Marriott is 30-year public relations professional, nationally accredited by the Public Relations Society of America, and a member of its Counselors Academy. His career spans broadcast journalism, politics, corporate and agency public relations. He currently serves as a member and past president of the Centrum Foundation board, a member and past chair of the Seattle Center Advisory Commission and a member and marketing committee chair of the Seattle Repertory Theatre board of trustees. He has also held board positions with Earshot Jazz Society, University of Washington School of Music Visiting Committee and the Seattle King County chapter of the American Red Cross.
William H. Brubaker: MA, 1968
William Brubaker is a Snohomish County Councilman (2 terms), President of the Puget Sound Regional Council, Co-Chair of the Regional Transit Authority and Chairman of the Snohomish Transportation Authority. He is a former Emmy award-winning anchor-reporter for KOMO Television News. He also worked at KXLY Radio and TV in Spokane, WA; KPOJ Radio in Portland, OR and ABC West in Los Angeles. A retired Captain, United States Naval Reserve, he is the author of “Never as it Seems” and “A Fine Time to Rhyme.” He also contributed to “Wings at the Ready, a History of the Naval Air Reserve.” Mr. Brubaker is the 1991 recipient of the Freedom Foundation Award for Public Communications
Patricia Fisher BA, 1968 Communications
2006 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Patricia Fisher was a longtime area journalist and a mentor to many writers, particularly to young African American journalists. She was the first woman and the first African American to write editorials for The Seattle Times and she was a co-founder of the Black Journalists Association of Seattle. Patricia Fisher died in early 2006. Her Seattle Times obituary (2/13/06), begins: “Open doors lead to open minds. That’s the way Patricia Fisher saw things. And for untold numbers of Northwest journalists, she proved a willing mentor, who not only took on but sought out such responsibilities.”
Jack Hart: BA, 1968 Journalism
Jack Hart is a managing editor at The Oregonian, the Pacific Northwest’s largest daily newspaper. He also has served as the newspaper’s writing coach and staff development director, as editor of its Sunday magazine and as a general assignment reporter. He previously worked as a reporter at the Eugene Register-Guard and the Whidbey News-Times.
Leo Jeffres: M.A., 1968
Leo Jeffres is a professor in the Department of Communication at Cleveland State University, where he has also served in a variety of administrative roles, including chair of the Department of Communication, graduate director, and the director of the Communication Research Center.
Jeffres’ research focuses on mass communication theory and methodology, neighborhood and urban communication systems, communication technologies, ethnic communication, as well as audience analysis. He also works with students on the content analysis of the “watchdog function” of the press.
Among his many accomplishments, in 1983 Jeffres traveled to the University of the Philippines as a Visiting Fulbright Associate Professor where he taught courses in culture and communication and conducted research on development communication. While in the Philippines he also taught a graduate seminar at the Asian Institute of Journalism in Manila.
More recently, Jeffres was named a fellow of the Midwest Association for Public Opinion Research in 1998. He was also a recipient of the “most prolific communication researcher” for the period of 1996-2001 by Communication Research Reports, as well as for the period of 1980-1985 by Journalism Quarterly.
Robert Merry: BA, 1968
2004 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Robert Merry is the publisher of STRATFOR, the world’s leading publisher of global intelligence serving more than one million licensed individual and enterprise users in corporations, academic institutions and government agencies. Merry was president and editor-in-chief of Congressional Quarterly for 12 years. Under Merry, CQ became a pioneer in Internet publishing and more than tripled its revenue before the company was sold to Sage Publications and Roll Call, a Washington-based subsidiary of the Economist Group of London. Merry is an author of several critically-acclaimed books, including the recently released “A Country of Vast Designs: James K. Polk, the Mexican War and the Conquest of the American Continent.” Merry was also a Washington correspondent for The Wall Street Journal for ten years and served in U.S. Army Intelligence.
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Eric Nalder: BA, 1968
2004 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
Eric Nalder is a senior enterprise reporter for Hearst Newspapers and has served for chief investigative reporter for the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. Nalder was awarded the 1990 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting for an investigative series that exposed the weak regulation of oil tankers following the Exxon Valdez oil spill. In 1997, he received a second Pulitzer for Investigative Reporting for a series of stories about corruption and waste in the federal government’s Native American housing program. For a 1993 investigation of U.S. Sen. Brock Adams, Nalder shared an Investigative Reporters and Editors award, the Associated Press Managing Editors Award, the Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting, the Worth Bingham Prize for Investigative Journalism and the Headliner Award. Nalder’s other awards include a 1996 Society of Professional Journalists Excellence in Journalism Investigative Reporting Award and the 2001 Clarion Award Investigative Reporting. Nalder and the P-I investigative team won the 2008 John Jay Award for Criminal Justice Reporting. In 1994, he received the Investigative Reporters and Editors book award for his book, Tankers Full of Trouble. He has taught interviewing and investigative reporting workshops in five countries and has been a reporter for 36 years. He has lived in Norway, France, Lebanon and Afghanistan and has also worked for The Seattle Times and The San Jose Mercury News.
Christine Gregoire: BA, 1969 Speech Communication
2004 Department of Communication Alumni Hall of Fame
2004 Department of Communication Distinguished Alumna
The honorable Christine Gregoire is Washington’s 22nd governor. Prior to serving as governor, Gregoire served three terms as attorney general, the first woman to be elected to the position in Washington. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2003 WA State Physicians for Social Responsibility Award and the 2001 College of Arts & Sciences Distinguished Alumna award.
Rob Harper: BA 1969
When natural disasters hit Washington, many are left shaken, distressed and emotionally drained.
For Rob Harper, it’s a long day at work – and a way to make a difference.
The 1969 broadcast journalism alumnus is a public information officer for the Washington state Emergency Management Division. During emergencies and natural disasters, he helps the community to respond effectively.
Robert Laing: BA, 1969; MA, 1972; PhD, 1975
After over twenty years working in foreign countries, Laing returned States’ side in 2006 as in currently working as a diplomat in residence for the State Department at Arizona State University doing lectures, speaking at career fairs and talking to students. Although Laing is 61 years old, he is uncertain about retirement as he’s trying to decide whether or not he’s going to serve another tour. However, in the end he wants to retire back in Seattle where it all began.
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Cliff Porter: BA, 1969 (Speech Communication)
Since graduation, Mr. Porter has worked as a radio announcer and in retail sales. In his response to the Communication Alumni Newsletter, spring, 2006 edition, he reports that his interests are railroading, writing and art.
Catherine Shannon Stevens: BA, 1969
Catherine graduated from the UW with a degree in Journalism/Advertising. She is married to Craig Stevens, also a 1969 UW graduate from the School of Communications. She is a principal at The Marketing Partners, Inc., a Bellevue, WA marketing, advertising and public relations agency specializing in helping regional companies effectively market their products. Catherine is the President-elect of the Seattle Professional Chapter of Association for Women in Communications.
