STATE Magazine, Spring 2018

Page 120

Bill “Cotton” Dunn, ’61 accounting, a PGA golf professional, died October 7 in Plano, Texas, after a long battle with congestive heart failure. As a boy, he worked as a caddy and learned the game of golf; by his teen years, he was a member of the three-time state championship high school golf team in Duncan, Oklahoma. In 1955 at 17, he was both the Oklahoma Junior and United States Golf Association Junior National Champion. That same year, he competed on the U.S. Junior Team that defeated the British in a Ryder Cup-format match. As the first person in his family to go to college, Cotton started at the University of Houston before transferring to Oklahoma State University, where he became an NCAA All American and graduated with an accounting degree in 1961. He married his college sweetheart, Jerry Ann Lewis, and they recently celebrated their 57th wedding anniversary. After working two years for Texaco Oil Co. as a junior accountant, he chose professional golf as his true career path. Mr. Dunn competed on the PGA Tour, was a teaching and playing professional at the Apawamis Club in Rye, New York, and enjoyed 13 years as the director of golf and head professional at Kernwood Country Club in Salem, Massachusetts, before serving as the head professional at the Hamlet Country Club in Delray Beach, Florida. Mr. Dunn then spent 25 years as director of golf and head professional at the Prestonwood Country Club in Dallas. He is survived by his wife, Jerry Ann; two daughters, Sonya Hodson (Jim) and Marianne Hailey; four grandchildren, Hayley and Jonathan Hodson and Holt and Ben Calder; two sisters, Joanne Gallup and Mary Daggs; and numerous cousins, nieces and nephews. William Cecil Brown, ’62 zoology, ’73 master’s degree in business administration, ’75 master’s degree in natural and applied sciences, died November 22, 2017. He was 77 and married to Sharon (Payne) Brown for 56 years. He was a second lieutenant in the Army from 1962-1983 and was awarded the Bronze Star Medal, Meritorious Service Medal, Joint Service Commendation, Army Commendation Medal, National Defense Service Medal, Army Service Ribbon, Overseas Ser vice Ribbon, Vietnam Service Medal-4 Bronze Star, Republic of Vietnam Commendation, Vietnamese Cross

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of Gallantry W Palm, and Republic of Vietnam Civil Actions Honor Medal. Upon military retirement, Mr. Brown went into accounting. The couple retired in 2000 and returned to Stillwater. He served as the business manager at Elite Repeat and manager of the storehouse at First United Methodist Church, a member of the OSU Emeriti Association, OSU Alumni Association and Methodist Men. He was also an Eagle Scout and served as a district officer for the Exchange Club. Mr. Brown is survived by his wife, Sharon; daughters, Dana Mallett (Don), and Tammi Pitts (Robert); son, Danny Brown; three grandchildren; two great-grandsons, sister, Bobbye Amos (L.B.) and Patricia Sharp (Jim); brother, Richard Brown; sister-in-law, Sandy Winfrey (Gary); brothers-in-law Mike Payne and Pat Payne (Judy), and many nieces and nephews. David Wagner, ’64 industrial engineering and management, lost his long struggle with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease on January 10, 2018. He was 76. After obtaining his degree, he moved to Rochester, New York, to begin his career at Kodak. He continued at Johnson & Johnson in Sherman, Texas, in 1966 and Spartan Healthcare in Spartanburg, South Carolina, in 1972. He eventually moved to El Paso, Texas in 1979 to work at Convertors, where he became director of technical services. At his retirement in 2005, he received an award recognizing his lifetime achievements with the company. Along the way, he met and married the love of his life, Alice Jeanne Adkins. In 2011, they moved to Austin, Texas, to be closer to family. He is survived by a large and loving family, including his wife, Jeanne; four children and their spouses; nine grandchildren; and his sister, Judy, and brother-in-law, Jack, and two nieces.

In Memoriam  F A C U LT Y Peter M. Moretti died of cancer on July 8, 2017, in Fort Worth, Texas. He was born in Zurich, Switzerland on April 13, 1935. His family moved to Santa Barbara, California, when he was 14. He graduated from the California Institute of Technology with bachelor’s and master’s degrees in mechanical engineering and was a Fulbright Scholar in Darmstadt, Germany, after graduation. He earned his doctoral degree in mechanical engineering from Stanford University. After working in Germany and Pennsylvania for several years, Moretti became a professor of mechanical engineering at Oklahoma State University from 1970 until his retirement in 2006. He also served as chairman of the Faculty Council at OSU. He served as an assistant scoutmaster for the Boy Scouts and in many volunteer roles at First Christian Church in Stillwater and Ridglea Christian Church in Fort Worth. He enjoyed singing in barbershop quartets and cars, building a roadster when he retired at 71. He is survived by his wife of 39 years, Johanna Tate Moretti, and five children, eight grandchildren, one great-grandson and 14 nieces and nephews. Robert Thomas Radford died January 26, 2018. He wa s 85. Af ter receiving his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at Baylor University, he began teaching at an elementary school in Indiana. From there, he taught at Caney Junior College in Kentucky before pursuing a doctoral degree in philosophy. Radford spent the rest of his career as a member of the philosophy department at Oklahoma State University. He was preceded in death by Nevalee Jones Radford, his wife of 42 years, and his daughter, Patricia Radford. Dr. Radford is survived by his companion, Janice Murray; son, Robert G. Adams; and daughter, Louise Payne. Other survivors include cousins, grandchildren and many friends.

Evan Alva Tonsing, a retired OSU music professor, passed away on June 6, 2017, in Tulsa, Oklahoma. He was born June 21, 1939, in Valley Falls, Kansas. Tonsing was raised in Topeka, Kansas, and attended Kansas University where he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in cello performance. He began his career as a professor at Amarillo College in Texas, where he conducted the orchestra and taught cello and music theory and composition. He came to OSU to teach cello, string base and music theory and composition. An accomplished composer, Tonsing created more than 400 pieces for combinations of instruments and voices. While at OSU, some of his compositions were used for a short film, Felice. The film won the 1972 Oklahoma State University Film Festival Award. Tonsing composed music for many other award-winning films in his career and was considered a pioneer in the use of synthesizers. His most well-known composition was brought about by a home robbery in which his house was stripped of its furnishings, leaving only the grand piano and a small, toy piano. He wrote a concerto for piano and toy piano which he performed often. Tonsing received the Distinguished Service Award for Programming for the National Public Radio series of programs on world music called, What in the world, from KOSU-FM in Stillwater. Tonsing was interested in exotic instruments and early recordings of music from various Native American tribes. He was present during the 1998 homecoming of the Pawnee Nation in Pawnee, Oklahoma, where it was revealed to him that much of the music and teachings of the early members of the Pawnee tribe had been lost. Finding only a few native Pawnee speakers were alive, he made recordings of them to preserve the language. Tonsing also provided copies of early recordings of music made between 1890 through the 1930s that he had been collecting to any tribe member who wanted one. Through Tonsing’s efforts, a great Native American cultural heritage has been preserved.


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