Education

Joseph B. Mountjoy Ph.D. '63
Professor of Anthropology
University of North Carolina at Greensboro

At his UNC-Greensboro website, Professor Mountjoy writes:
"Since 2001 I have been excavating selected valleys in the western highlands of Jalisco, Mexico, between Guadalajara and Puerto Vallarta. This research has focused on the registration rocks with petroglyphs, burial sites, and one ceremonial site where a copper/bronze bell with a figure of an Aztec God of Death (Mictlantecuhtli) was unearthed by looters in 1961. Several spectacular petroglyph sites have been registered, including one canyon (the photograph) which appears to record the kind of sacred deer hunt carried on by the nearby Huichol Indians in modern times."

"In 2001 I began excavating a burial site dated to ca. 800 B.C. in western Jalisco, funded by the National Geographic Society. To date (2003) remains of over 130 individuals have been recovered, along with about 300 burial offerings. Some of the offerings show distant relationships with places such as Guatemala and Peru."

Kelly Cox '43
First Athletic Director
Stevenson High School, Lincolnshire, IL

As Robert Channick wrote in his Tribune obituary of August 2005, Brother Cox was an important figure in Illinois high school athletics.

Lauded athletic director – U. of I. alumnus was Stevenson High School's 1-man athletic department when it opened in the 1960s

When Kelly Cox was hired 40 years ago as the inaugural athletic director for Stevenson High School, the playing field was far from level for the fledgling program. "It wasn't an athletic field, it was just a field," said Harold Banser, 77, the school's first superintendent. From grading the earth to painting the lines, Mr. Cox planted the seeds that would take the Lincolnshire school's teams from undermanned newcomers to perennial state contenders.

Mr. Cox was an accomplished athlete himself, playing football, basketball and tennis at Hoopeston High School, from which he graduated in 1938. He went to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and played football for a year before enlisting in the Army Air Forces in 1943. Mr. Cox served in Okinawa during World War II. His brother Wilbur, an Air Forces pilot, was shot down and killed over Europe during the war. After Mr. Cox's discharge, he returned to school, graduating in 1947.

He began his career as head football and basketball coach at Cullom High School near Kankakee. Other stops included Libertyville and Milford High Schools. A coach at Ela-Vernon High School in Lake Zurich when it spun off about 500 students to start Stevenson in 1965, Mr. Cox went to the new school as a one-man athletic department. "I was happy that he agreed to come with me when we opened Stevenson, and he never let me down," Banser said.

In addition to his duties as athletic director, Mr. Cox also served as a multisport coach and physical education teacher. "Stevenson was a pretty tiny school then, and some of our classes had 10 students, so if there was a softball game or touch football game or soccer game, the two of us usually played because we didn't have enough kids to play," said George Griffith, 70, who joined Mr. Cox the following year.

Lacking traditional rivals and a conference affiliation, early Stevenson teams traveled great distances to play Kankakee Eastridge, Hebron and St. John's Military Academy in Delafield, Wis., among others. "We just played absolutely all over, and Kelly knew people at all those places," Griffith said. "Without him, we probably would have had a hard time getting a schedule going." In 1973, Mr. Cox began working as guidance counselor at the school and continued until he retired in 1985.

His wife of 50 years, Kathleen, died in 1998. Many former colleagues and students stayed close with Mr. Cox in recent years. "He touched a lot of lives," said his son, Wilbur. "He was invited to reunions at almost every school he worked at. Time doesn't seem to fade these relationships."

Mr. Cox was inducted into the Lake County High School Sports Hall of Fame last year.

"He was so good at coaching anything," Griffith said. "Kelly was pretty much of a legend around the area."

John B. Lord, Sr., Ph.D. '39
Professor of English
Washington State University

Brother Lord was a member of the English Department at Washington State from 1951 to 1981, having graduated from Illinois with not only his bachelor's, but also his MA and Ph.D. According to a class notes entry he made in the Evanston High School "Keep In Touch" Newsletter, Professor Lord, "published many books and articles in scholarly publications, mostly on the linguistic structure of poetry." Some of these titles include:

The paragraph: structure and style – Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1964

Experiments in diction, rhetoric, and style – Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1955

Upon his passing in 2002, a memorial to his life wrote, "he is remembered by those of us who loved him as a lover of language, biblical scholar, and willing Professor of Shakespeare. Foremost among his other talents and hobbies, he was a bountiful baker of bread, artful embroiderer extarodinare, watcher of birds, fabricator of fabulous fudge, lithe tongued limerist, beloved father, and fine friend."

Alvord L. "Al" Boeck '27
Professor and Director of the School of Business
Texas Christian University

The Omicron Arrow from April 1938 reports the following about Alvord L. "Al" Boeck '27: "We were glad to hear recently from Alvord L. "Al" Boeck '27, who is professor and director of the School of Business Administration of Texas Christian University, Fort Worth, Texas. The Boeck home is located there at 2803 Greene Street. Besides taking work at the University, Brother Boeck attended Southern California, receiving his MA degree in 1930, and his Ph.D. degree in 1933, and Southwestern Law School from 1933-34. He is the author of "Economic Essentials of World Peace" published by the University of Southern California Press. Married, Al has a daughter, Mary Jean, six years old. Mrs. Boeck is a Tri-Delt from Southern California."

Roger L Rainwater, the Special Collections Librarian at TCU's Mary Couts Burnett Library, writes:
"In addition to being head of business school, Boeck was appointed Director of the Evening College in May, 1936, a position he held until 1942. In October, 1936, he was elected president of the Texas Association of University Instructors in Accounting. In 1939, he was appointed an advisor for the National Association of College and University Chambers of Commerce.

Boeck was elected vice president of the Association of Evening Colleges in 1940 and president of the same organization in 1941. He became a Chartered Life Underwriter in September, 1940.

In May of 1942 he was appointed principal price specialist of the Office of Price Administration in the regional office in Dallas, Texas. He resigned from the faculty at that time, although he was listed as "on leave of absence" in September 1942. He did not return to TCU after the was and there were no other mentions of him after 1942."

Information courtesy of TCU's Mary Couts Burnett Library

Earl W. Anderson Ph.D. '18
Professor and Chairman, Department of Education
The Ohio State University

Member of the class of 1918, Brother Anderson was a fixture on the Ohio State faculty for 35 years and upon his death in 1965, the university's Board of Trustees made a resolution noting he was a "significant contributor to teacher education and higher education." Today, Brother Anderson's legacy lives on in the form of an annual scholarship given at Ohio State.

While a Psi U, he was captain of University of Illinois basketball team, earning All-Conference honors his senior year. Brother Anderson lettered in track as well as basketball and was a member of the Tribe of Illini.

After Brother Anderson took is bachelor's degree from Champaign, he took his master's and doctoral degrees from Teacher's College, Columbia University in 1926 and 1927 respectively. He did post-doctoral work also at Columbia in the mid 20s and 30s, fitting in a job as Superintendant of Schools in Charleston, Illinois from 1919-24. His university teaching career began as an Associate Professor of Education at the University of Kansas in 1926-27 before he began his long association with the Buckeyes. At Ohio State University he was Associate Professor of Education from 1927-33; Professor of Education from 1933-62; and Chair of the Department of Education from 1956-62.

As his university biography noted:
Professor Anderson's specialization was in the fields of higher education and teacher education. He was president of the Association for High Education in 1951 and served on its executive committee in several capacities. In 1937 he was elected president of the National Institute of Teacher Placement. He was active in local and state professional organizations and served as president of the Ohio Council on Education in 1950. In the same year he was awarded an honorary degree of Doctor of Pedagogy from Eastern Illinois State College [now university].

Brother Anderson was author or contributor to six books and penned over 180 scholarly articles over his career. He was called upon by the states of Oregon, Washington, Michigan, Ohio, and West Virginia to help improve their school systems at various times, and he was a frequent speaker to professional and civic groups throughout the nation.

Information courtesy of The Ohio State University Archive, Biographical Files.