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around campus
AROUND CAMPUS
KAPOOR TO ADDRESS GRADS
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Kunal Kapoor ’97, chief executive officer of Morningstar Inc., will deliver Monmouth College’s Commencement address on May 15.
Since joining Morningstar in 1997 as a data analyst, Kapoor has held a variety of roles at the firm, including leadership positions in research and innovation. He served as director of mutual fund research and was part of the team that launched Morningstar Investment Services, Inc., before moving on to other roles including director of business strategy for international operations and, later, president and chief investment officer of Morningstar Investment Services.
During his tenure, he has also led Morningstar.com and the firm’s data business as well as its global products and client solutions group.
Kapoor received Monmouth College’s Young Alumnus Award in 2005 and was the College’s Wendell Whiteman Memorial lecturer in 2017.
After graduating from Monmouth with a degree in economics and environmental policy, Kapoor earned an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
In 2010, Crain’s Chicago Business named him to its annual 40 Under 40 class, a list that includes professionals from a variety of industries who are contributing to Chicago’s business, civic and philanthropic landscape.
Center for diversity and inclusion to honor former slave
Monmouth College will mark a milestone on April 29 with the dedication of a new campus center that will focus on addressing and celebrating issues of diversity and inclusion through special programming and support.
Named in honor of a former slave who purchased his own freedom and settled in Monmouth, the Champion Miller Center for Equity, Inclusion and Community will be located in what is currently known as the Intercultural House at 727 East Broadway, across from the Center for Science and Business.
The name for the center grew out of the Champion Miller 1860 Fund, which since 2021 has raised more than $27,000 for DEI programming and support.
Born a slave in Kentucky in 1808, Miller was taught to read and write by a student at Monmouth’s Theological Seminary of the Northwest between 1858–60. Miller was instrumental in the organization of the First African Church of Monmouth, which was founded by Monmouth College President David Wallace in 1865, and which later became Fourth United Presbyterian Church. After that congregation was disbanded in 1871, Miller attended First United Presbyterian Church, which was organized by the founders of Monmouth College in 1853. He and his wife, whose freedom he also purchased, are buried in Monmouth.
A student research project to learn more about Miller and other early Black citizens of Monmouth is planned for this August through the College’s Summer Opportunities for Intellectual Activities (SOFIA) program.

Carlson’s well-read book on military history gets returned. AROUND CAMPUS

49 years overdue
John Carlson and his 1974 Monmouth classmate Lynette Johnson Carlson have been married for 46 years.
But there’s a relationship that’s lasted even longer in Carlson’s life, although it came to an end last Nov. 22.
On that day, Carlson returned to the College’s Hewes Library the book Battles on the Monsoon: Campaigning in the Central
Highlands by S.L.A. Marshall. Its original due date was Oct. 16, 1972, meaning Carlson held onto it for more than 49 years. “We’re back on campus all the time,” said Carlson, who lives in Orland Park, Ill. “I thought, ‘One of these days, I ought to return it.’ Finally, last month, I stopped by the library, and I said, ‘I need to ’fess up here. I’m throwing myself at the mercy of the court.’ (Hewes Library Director Sarah Henderson) said the overdue fee was waived. Thank goodness!”
Carlson, who was an ROTC student at Monmouth, said he has “always been interested in history, especially military history.”
“S.L.A. Marshall was an Army historian, and he published this book in 1966, so it has the perspective of our early years of involvement in Vietnam. I just found it fascinating,” he said.
Following his graduation from Monmouth, Carlson was on active Army duty for threeand-a-half years, then served more than two decades in the Reserves for a total of 26 years, retiring as a lieutenant colonel.
“I took the book with me everywhere—to Fort Benning in Georgia and to Fort Sill in Oklahoma,” he said. “I was actually reading it on the C-141 aircraft when I flew to Frankfurt. I was stationed in both West Germany and Luxembourg.”
A corner of Monmouth’s campus is brighter—and safer—thanks to the diligent efforts of a staff member.
Few people know the details of the College’s physical layout better than senior security officer Mark Grover, who has traversed Monmouth’s campus more times than he can count. The more he did so, the more he realized that a change was needed at the corner of Sixth Street and East Broadway, which is the southwest corner of campus.
“Making my regular rounds, I come upon this intersection many times per night,” said Grover. “Students frequently pass by it when coming back from town, as do many community residents both late at night and early
Eckstine ready to strike up the band
COVID had a crippling effect on collegiate cocurricular activities nationwide, not the least of which was musical ensembles such as marching bands. Veteran music educator John Eckstine, who joined the Monmouth faculty last fall as director of the Monmouth College athletic bands, hopes to change that—at Monmouth, at least.
Eckstine brings more than 30 years of experience and awards to the position, most recently serving as athletic director/dean of students at Pendleton County Middle/High School in Franklin, W. Va.
Eckstine’s career includes serving as director of bands and instrumental music specialist with the nationally recognized Spring-Ford Area High School Band in Montgomery County, Pa., where the band was five-time Tournament of Bands Atlantic Coast Group IV Champions and three-time Cavalcade of Bands Yankee Open Class Champions. “I’ve been fortunate enough to enjoy a lot of success with high school bands, and I am excited about getting started at Monmouth and bringing a high level of excellence to the Monmouth athletic bands,” he said.
Eckstine has led marching bands in the Hollywood Christmas Parade in California, the Miracle Mile Holiday Parade in Chicago and the Philadelphia Thanksgiving Day Parade. Spring-Ford’s wind ensemble performed at the 2009 Pennsylvania Music Educators Association annual in-service convention. His jazz ensemble was a two-time Tournament Indoor Association Atlantic Coast Open Class Champion.

GROVER STANDS AT THE FORMERLY DARK INTERSECTION.
LET THERE
LIFELONG PASSION FOR ANIME PAYS OFF
Monmouth College art major Jennie Nichols ’23 earned third place in a national Nengajo (New Year’s card) design and drawing competition sponsored by the American Association of Teachers of Japanese.
Her prize-winning work is a 4x6-inch postcard, designed in a digital version of the traditional Manga (Japanese comics) black-and-white halftone style.
The roots of Nichols being so proficient at recreating the style of Japanese anime go back to her days as an elementary school student.
As a fifth-grader, Nichols started following anime because a boy she liked was interested in it.
“My 10-year-old thoughts were that would be a good way to get him to like me,” said Nichols.
Eventually, she moved on from the boy, but her interest in anime and Japanese comics intensified.
Last fall, her Japanese professor,
BE LIGHT
in the morning when out for a walk or run. It’s a very dim to dark intersection and thus very dangerous.”
In November, Grover expressed his concern to Ameren, and a staff member at the power company agreed. She told Grover the protocol was to contact the City of Monmouth. In mid-December, the city’s public works director contacted Grover to let him know he had submitted a request to Ameren from the city for an additional street light at the intersection.
“On Dec. 27, I saw the flags being placed for marking the location,” said Grover. “Then on Jan. 12, they installed the pole and light. I was so excited. I felt it was the best gift.”

Wenhong Teel, told Nichols and the rest of the class about the competition, and she even dangled an enticing carrot—doing the research for the competition and executing the work would count as the students’ cultural project for the semester.
More than 750 students submitted entries, and Teel said it was the first time Monmouth students—which also includ-
Nichols’ prize-winning postcard features the Lunar New Year tiger. ed art majors James Woeltje ’25 and Natalie Takahashi ’22—participated. The theme of this year’s contest was “Tiger,” which is the zodiac sign for the Lunar New Year in 2022.

No longer bored by keyboards
We’ve all the heard the call to slow down, to relax, to unplug.
Brad Rowe says that one way to do that is by steering clear of technology with a more “old school” approach.
“Older ways of doing things have always appealed to me—I’d rather play a vinyl record with my grandmother’s 1966 player than pop in earbuds,” said Rowe, a Monmouth educational studies professor.
Last fall, Rowe used his sabbatical to explore the world of typewriters. He learned how to repair them, and has enjoyed watching as students young and old sit down to type at one, most of them for the very first time.
Rowe said that younger students “are often awestruck the first time they encounter a typewriter. They light up with wonder and possibility.” His older college students have taken to the machines in a social setting, which Rowe called “Snail Mail Socials.”
“The fact that students want to spend an afternoon with a typewriter writing a letter to a loved one—rather than mindlessly scrolling Twitter or TikTok—means the world to me. I am so moved by the response and turnout at these events,” he said.
Rowe with three of his restored typewriters.