47
MERCERSBURG MAGAZINE SPRING 2007
Shirley Jayakumar married David Dopson March 18, 2006, in Pittsburgh. The wedding party included her sisters, Minna ’85 and Nita ’89; brother, Richard ’97; and Rachel Brull Tuer. Colby Riblet ’97 was also in attendance. Shirley completed a residency in internal medicine in 2005 and served as chief resident at a hospital in Philadelphia until June 2006. She and David live in Charleston, South Carolina, where she has a fellowship in nephrology at the Medical University of South Carolina. Elgin Marsted writes that she and her husband have moved from Vieques, Puerto Rico, to Denver, Colorado. She is vice president of business development for Braddock Financial, and loves seeing the Mercersburg girls at least once a year. Last March, she joined Danielle Dahlstrom, Jackie Crane Peacock, Alyson McKee Humphries, and Ali Foster Fortmann at Sarah Smith’s house in Deerfield Beach, Florida. Kevin McCormack is happy to report the birth of his first child, Dylan, June 5, 2006. Dylan was born at 11:59 p.m., avoiding the dreaded 6/6/06 birth date by a single minute. Kevin lives in Atlanta with his wife, Sarah, and is senior website manager for the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks and the NHL’s Atlanta Thrashers. Rusty Parks and his wife moved to Los Angeles from Dallas in June 2006 with their two children, Reilly (3) and Katy (1). His email is russell.parks@gmail.com. Erin Ryan Pedersen lives in Chicago with her husband, Steve, whom she married August 20, 2005. Rob Pitts lives in Washington, where he regularly hosts wine tastings with fellow alumni Molly Marino ’94 and Jay Sternberg ’91.
Alyson Marano Ward’s ’93 daughter, Anna Kate, and her husband, Joe.
Alyson Marano Ward works as a research nurse on a surveillance and intervention initiative aimed at reducing the unacceptably high prevalence of heart disease and diabetes in West Virginia. In her free time, Alyson enjoys singing and dancing with her 2-year-old daughter, Anna Kate, and cozying up to her husband, Joe, who serves as legal counsel to Governor Joe Manchin. The Ward clan lives in Charleston, and would love to hear from the class of ’93.
’94 Dr. M. Timothy Gocke is finishing his residency in Dallas and is moving back to the East Coast. He looks forward to rekindling old friendships.
’95
Charlie Baum married Megan Shaffer June 10, 2006, in Montoursville, Pennsylvania. His brother, George Baum ’92, served as best man. Other guests included Maximilian Merrill ’95 and Nathan Vink ’94. The couple is moving to Boise, Idaho, where Charlie accepted a position as systems manager with Micron Technology, and will also complete his MBA at Boise State University. James Barnes left IBM to join 2020 LLC, which works with the Forest Service. He then went on to MetLife in Scranton, Pennsylvania, as a senior Internet tech specialist. In June 2006, he was promoted to advisory software engineer. He looks forward to being closer to Mercersburg. Faculty member Jim Malone ran into Kendra Flowers at the April 2006 Darwin Exhibit reception in New York. Kendra is a grad student at New York University and has recorded a few CDs of original music. Her website is www. kendraflowers.com. Andrea Marano earned a law degree from West Virginia University. Ashley Marcus completed a master’s in international affairs at Columbia University in May 2006, and will work with USAID in the Bureau for East Africa. She will be an international cooperation specialist for Ethiopia, and will serve as point person in D.C. for the U.S. Embassy in Ethiopia. Ashley will remain in New York since the security clearance process will take several months. Shawn Patten reports that he is serving the U.S. Army and happily based in Germany. He works as a JAG and is an administrative law attorney. He’s been there for about three years, and will be moving on to another duty assignment in the spring—ideally with the Southern European Task Force in Italy.
Lt. Gill T. Tatman-Tyree Jr. married Anne May 27, 2006. Gill is stationed in Iraq, and Anne is a teacher in Savannah, Georgia.
’96
Misty Dippel is attending Nova Southeastern University’s Shepard Broad Law Center in Fort Lauderdale. She can be reached at dippel_m@ bellsouth.net. Laura McNear is engaged to Duane Morey. The couple planned a January wedding in the Turks and Caicos Islands. The U.S. Army has promoted Josh Smith to captain. Josh has served two tours in Iraq, and will soon be joining the Special Forces. Wes Wrightson writes that he proposed to his girlfriend of four years in August; the wedding is planned for August 2008. Liz Yates is finishing a master’s in information and library science at Pratt Institute in Brooklyn, and will work as a reference librarian for Skadden Arps, a corporate law firm in New York. She has also moved to Astoria, Queens.
’97
Andrew Bramhall married Sarah Reed ’98 June 10, 2006, in the Mercersburg Academy Chapel. Immy Byrd has been in Richmond, Virginia, for three years practicing real estate and building her wedding photography business. She can be reached at immybyrd@yahoo.com.
Kurt Muhler ’96 visited Immy Byrd ’97 in Richmond, Virginia.
A summer engagement party for Laura McNear ’96 and Duane Morey (l-r): Richard McNear, Jennifer McNear Loutzenheiser ’89, Duane and Laura, Jeanie McNear, Brad Barnes, Samuel Barnes, Nicholas Barnes, Susannah McNear Barnes ’91, and Camilla Christensen.
J. Robinson “Rob” Little graduated from the University of South Carolina Law School in May 2006. He is clerking for a judge in Spartanburg, South Carolina.
’98
After spending some time traveling through Europe, Dr. Robyn Gdula is working on a post-doctorate research assignment at Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. She successfully defended her Ph.D. dissertation in inorganic chemistry at the University of Michigan. In four and a half years of graduate school, Robyn published four papers in national scientific journals, is working on two more, and has presented work at three different national conferences, including an invited presentation at the Presidential Event of the American Chemical Society’s national meeting in 2003. She loves New Mexico and all the outdoor sports it offers, and urges classmates, friends, and any area alumni to get in touch with her at robyngdula@gmail.com. Dean Hosgood, a graduate student at Yale University, helped gather a wide variety of items for Yale’s annual Spring Salvage Collection. Some items were donated to local nonprofit organizations, and others were shipped to Third World countries still recovering from natural disasters. One truckload went to Guatemala, which was devastated by Hurricane Stan in October 2005; another went to the Dominican Republic, where Hurricane Gene ripped through in 2004. Beth Pniewski is engaged, and will be married August 18, 2007, in Lexington, Kentucky. Kevin von Seldeneck was engaged to Jennifer Kirsch August 18, 2006, and plans to be married sometime in 2008. Paul Yun was awarded the Army Achievement Medal by the U.S. Secretary of the Army for “exceptional service while assigned as an interpretation officer to the Commanding General to the Third Republic of Korea Army.” After serving for three years, Paul completed his mandatory military service, and left the army with full-time discharge as a first lieutenant in June 2006. He plans to
Paul Yun ’98, recipient of the Army Achievement Medal.