Newsroom Stories

Sara L. Johnson, associate dean and academic coordinator in the College of Arts & Sciences, died Monday, May 17, 2004 of metastatic neuroendocrine cancer. She was 47.

In honor of a very special couple, $1.5 million has been raised by friends and colleagues to establish the Geraldine J. and Robert L. Virgil Professorship in Accounting and Management in Washington University’s John M. Olin School of Business. Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton announced the gift, which includes $300,000 from the University’s Sesquicentennial Endowed Professorship Challenge. Mahendra Gupta, Ph.D., professor of accounting in the John M. Olin School of Business, will be appointed as the first holder in a ceremony planned for later this year.

Photo by Joe Angeles/WUSTL PhotoCommencement 2004 at Washington University in St. Louis will feature more than a dozen distinguished speakers, both at the All-University Ceremony (May 21) and at individual school diploma and recognition ceremonies (May 19-21).

Carl Frieden, Jeffrey I. Gordon, John F. McDonnell and Carl Phillips can now stand proudly beside Ben Franklin, George Washington, Albert Einstein and Winston Churchill. Those four from Washington University in St. Louis have joined those four from history as being elected into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

KemperThe Board of Trustees of Washington University in St. Louis met Friday, May 14, at the Charles F. Knight Executive Education Center and elected David W. Kemper, president and chief executive officer of Commerce Bancshares Inc., as chairman of the board for the 2004-05 fiscal year, according to Mark S. Wrighton, chancellor. The trustees elected John F. McDonnell, retired chairman of the board of McDonnell Douglas Corp., and Stephen F. Brauer, chief executive officer of Hunter Engineering, as vice chairmen of the board.

FriedmanThomas L. Friedman, a three-time Pulitzer Prize winner, best-selling author and foreign affairs columnist for The New York Times, will deliver the 2004 Commencement address at Washington University in St. Louis, according to Chancellor Mark S. Wrighton. The university’s 143rd Commencement will begin at 8:30 a.m. May 21 in Brookings Quadrangle on campus. During the ceremony, Friedman will also receive an honorary doctor of laws.

In an experiment that demonstrates how maps of the genetic codes of simpler organisms can shed light on human disease, a computerized comparison of the complete genetic codes of a type of algae, a weed and humans has led medical researchers to a gene linked to a human illness.

Avante jugglers Passing Zone toss chainsaws and Chia Pets May 6 and 7.Like a good vacation, filled with the sights and sounds of different lives, different heritages and different cultures, Edison Theatre’s 2004-05 OVATIONS! Series will take audiences on a journey through some of the world’s great music, dance and theatre traditions.

In 1954, Chancellor Ethan A.H. Shepley and the University privately launched a three-year, $20 million Second Century Campaign, the second-largest capital fund drive conducted by any U.S. university at the time. When the campaign went public with a four-day convocation in February 1955, it was thought that some of the campaign funds should be used […]

Photo by Mary ButkusWUSTL science majors volunteer each week to mentor an after-school science club for kids at Webster Middle School in North St. Louis.