It may be that Clara Farber is the oldest living member of our alumni body. On July 21 last year she celebrated her 104th birthday at a party given by the staff and other residents of the Barn Hill Center on High Street in Newton, where she now lives, following a long career in public education. She was the subject of a feature story in The New Jersey Herald (written by Conor Fortune ’01, who worked for the paper last summer) just before her birthday.
The article noted that after spending the usual two years at Trenton Normal School, she taught first at Hamburg for two years and then moved to Bloomfield in Essex County. Over nearly 40 years, she taught second, fourth, and seventh grades in Bloomfield. She never married, explaining that “I didn’t want to be tied down … and I had the children at school.” A native of Vernon, she grew up getting around by foot or horse-drawn vehicles, but traveled widely during the summers as the nation’s transportation system underwent revolutionary change. At last report, she was doing well and participating in the daily activities of the center, which include baking bread, playing bingo, and visiting with friends.

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’56
Ruth G. King (E) self-published a novel, The Only One, which explores being African-American and a woman in upper level work positions and, as a result, being “the only one.”

’57
In November, Joyce Allen (E) was one of the main honorees at the 28th Testimonial Dinner of the Trenton Select Committee, a civic organization formed in 1972 to honor the career accomplishments of Trenton-area residents, particularly those involved in sports. As a result of her performances on the Trenton State College field hockey, basketball, and softball teams, Allen is a member of TCNJ’s Athletic Hall of Fame. She also is the only woman in the Trenton District Golf Association Hall of Fame and last fall became a member of the Hamilton High Athletic Hall of Fame.

John B. Moulette (E) has retired from his career in corporate training, but remains active as a consultant through International Training Consultants of Fort Garland, CO. He lives in Tarpon Springs, FL, where he is active with the American Victory Mariners Memorial and Museum Ship in Tampa and the Training Ship in Tarpon Springs. He has been included in the 2002 edition of Marquis’ Who’s Who in America, which lists his avocations as scuba diving, offshore sailing, pioneer trekking, and camping.

’58
Ann Gallus Seplow (B) retired after 30 years of teaching, the last 22 at High Point Regional High School in Sussex County. She has been supervisor of the Business Technology Department for the past 14 years, secretary of the county school administrators and supervisors association for five years, and founded and chaired the county business educators group for 14 years.

’60
Burt Perinchief (AS) received the Distinguished Service Award of the Florida Chapter of the American Choral Directors Association at its fall conference in Lake Mary, FL. This honor is a peer award given each year for “excellence in choral music and leadership in the choral art.” He is a past president of the organization (1991–1993) and the first community college director to receive the award. He retired in 1998 following a 31-year teaching career at Seminole Community College.

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Our “In Memoriam” listing of Harriet Jennifer Flynn (E) in
the spring 2001 TCNJ Magazine (under the name of H. Jennifer Hartman) was incorrect, and we regret not following our normal procedures with respect to reports of a death. Ms. Flynn, recently divorced, reports she lives in Seal Beach, CA, and has retired from her post as assistant superintendent for the Los Angeles County Board of Education, where she oversaw more than 400 schools in the county. Her 40 years in education included teaching in Woodbridge and Westfield, NJ, as well as college teaching at UCLA, California State at Long Beach, and Pepperdine University. Flynn enjoys a competitive game of tennis and has been actively involved in sailing and yachting for over 30 years. These days she crews for a friend aboard his Viking motor yacht.

While she was helping us correct our records, Ms. Flynn brought us up to date with her family, all of whom are TCNJ alumni. Her brother William Flynn ’60 practices law in Old Bridge; her sister-in-law, Elaine Czech Flynn ’62, serves as clerk of Middlesex County; her brother, Daniel Flynn ’74, coordinates the largest Head Start program in the nation for Los Angeles County; and her nephew, Bryan Flynn ’01, works for Prudential Insurance Co. in New Jersey.

’63
Mary Margaret Hanson (E) retired last June after teaching regular and special education in the Old Bridge school district for 28 years. She and her husband, Robert J. Henderson, have two children, Susan and Bruce.

Jeanne Rubba Smith’s (AS) first novel, Seasons of Forgetting, was published by iUniverse under the name Jeanne Howard and was released in October. She wrote the love story during spare time from her job at Evesham Township School District in Marlton, where she is a public information officer. She lives in Mount Laurel, with her husband, Howard. They have two daughters and one grandson.

’64
Richard A. Swanson is professor of human resource development at the University of Minnesota. He was inducted into the International Adult and Continuing Education Hall of Fame in June 2001. His most recent book, Foundations of Human Resource Development, (Berrett-Koehler Publishers), was released in October 2001.

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’66
We are sorry to report the death September 22 of Richard E. Averre (MME) in Bellingham, WA, following a long illness. Until he moved to Washington to be near members of his family in 1987, he was widely known in this area as a music teacher, first at The George School, in Newtown, PA, and later as a music professor at Rider College and Bucks County Community College. He served many local congregations as a choir director and organist. A longtime member of the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, he composed and arranged over 300 published works for piano, choir and handbells.

Florence Laicher (E) retired in June 2000 after teaching mentally retarded and handicapped children for 32 years at Putnam-Northern Westchester Board of Cooperative Services. The Yorktown Heights, NY, school district provides vocational and special education services to its students. She resides in Carmel, NY, and now spends most of her time breeding and showing dogs. She is involved in a number of dog clubs and travels to events throughout the U.S. and England.

Dean Rishel (AS) has had four choral arrangements accepted for publication. Nelly Bly and Annie Laurie have been accepted by Shawnee/Mark Foster, and Ca’ the Yowes and In Bethlehem ’neath Starlit Skies have been accepted by Carl Fischer Music.

’73
William Kirschling (AS) was inducted into the Paulsboro High School Hall of Fame in November. Kirschling coached girls’ basketball for six years. His last three teams had a record number of wins, and his last team won the only conference championship in the Gloucester County school’s history.

’74
Elizabeth A. Brown Freeth (N) completed a master’s in nursing in 1998 at the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. She began teaching full time at UT-Brownsville in 1997.

’76
Glenn J. Menther (EN) has been appointed principal of the newest school in New Jersey, The Middlesex County Academy of Science, Mathematics & Engineering Technologies.

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’77
William Jackson (E) has been promoted to Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve. He is a member of the Army Research Institute in Alexandria, VA, and teaches technology at Landstown Technology Academy in Virginia Beach, VA.

’79
Mark Alan Eckhardt (AS) is now global resourcing manager at GlaxoSmithKline, where he has worked since 1990. Previously he was employed at Omnidata in Cherry Hill and at RCA in Moorestown. He married his high school sweetheart, Lisa, in 1982. They have three girls, Chelsea, Lindsay, and Malisa, and live in Cinnaminson.

Laura Leslie Zimmerman Tress (E) has been a traveling librarian at Council Rock school district in Newtown, PA, since November. She teaches at Council Rock High School South and four of the district’s elementary schools. Since September, she has been serving on a team of 16 media specialists creating the assessment tool to be used for certification as a nationally board certified library/media professional. She resides in Burlington and is engaged to Richard L. Follmer, the technology coordinator for N. Burlington County Regional schools. Her daughter, Yvonne, attends Monmouth University.

’80
Liberty Delgado Harshaw (E) was named to the Pemberton Township High School Hall of Fame last June. In November 1999, she was recognized as the Cape May County “Volunteer of the Year” by the Governor’s Council on Alcoholism and Drug Abuse.

Executive cable guy After working as a college professor and in college administration following his 1981 graduation from Trenton State College, Mark Romano says he has found success and happiness in the world of cable television. Since May 2001, Romano has been the vice president of affiliate sales at Sterling Digital, a content provider for Video on Demand cable in New York. Sterling produces and sells Mag Rack, a package of 18 special-interest video programs, to cable companies. Mag Rack is distributed to major cable firms such as Comcast and Time Warner, that offer Video on Demand through special cable boxes that let viewers select program categories with the click of a button. “Video on Demand is like virtual television in that it lets you stop, pause, rewind, or fast-forward a program once it has started,” he said. “Mag Rack has really taken off within the past six months. The response has been overwhelmingly positive.” As vice president of affiliate sales, his responsibilities include negotiating with cable providers, managing the staff, and helping to develop marketing strategies. His new career in television is a total change from the jobs he held immediately after earning a master’s in educational administration of student personnel services at Trenton State. He worked at Drew University as a coordinator of student life, taught sociology at Norwalk Community College and psychology at Montclair State University, where he also was assistant director of student life. “I was going nowhere and I wanted something more,” he said. While he was still working at Montclair, he had the opportunity to branch out when he assisted an MTV producer with a number of television programs, one of which was an MTV game show called “Remote Control.” The spare time work eventually led to a job at MTV. Romano left MTV after three and a half years, moving through several sales jobs at Lifetime Television, Fox Sports, iN DEMAND, and finally Sterling Digital. “What I do now is just the coolest thing,” he said. I wouldn’t trade it for anything.” —Meredith Edwards ’02

’81
In November, Loretta C. Link (AS) was named dean of student services at the College of Marshall Islands, South Pacific. In May, 2000 she earned a master’s with high honors in college student services/higher education administration from Appalachian State University in North Carolina. She was on the 1999–2000 National Dean’s List for Outstanding Graduate Work, and an Alpha Epsilon Lambda honoree for exemplary graduate academic achievement and campus leadership.

’84
Lisa Petrino (N) passed the International Board Certification for Lactation Consultants in July. She works at St. Mary’s Medical Center in Langhorne, PA, as a lactation consultant. She and her husband live with their four children in Yardley, PA.

’86
Lynn Acton (E) has been working at JFK Medical Center as a speech therapist for the past 13 years, concentrating on head/neck cancer, voice disorders, and swallowing disorders. On January 14, she took a post at Yale-New Haven Medical Center as a speech pathologist and will be working with head and neck cancer patients. For the past five years, she has been a state speech pathology representative for the American Cancer Society. In May she will speak about laryngectomy patients (people who have had their voice boxes removed) at the American Cancer Society state speech convention in Atlantic City. In July, she will address a convention of laryngectomy patients in Vancouver, British Columbia.

Rosemarie Picone Flood (AS) founded the American Special Children’s Pilgrimage Group with her husband, Gerry, in 1995. ASCPG is a nonprofit organization based in her home in Bergenfield that sponsors an annual trip to Lourdes, France, for mentally and physically disabled children. The purpose of the trip is to give the children a feeling of independence and a better sense of self-worth and self-acceptance. She does freelance public relations work for St. Peter’s Prep in Jersey City, writing newsletters and alumni publications. Gerry is in the construction business. They have three young daughters and are awaiting the arrival of their fourth child.

James McCullough (AS) received the master of divinity in 2000 and the Master of Theology degree in 2001, both at Princeton Theological Seminary. He is a staff representative of the Intervarsity Christian Fellowship, an interdenominational college ministry focused on Bible study and peer mentoring, at Princeton University. He also is an adjunct instructor at Somerset Christian College, teaching Bible and theology courses. He resides in Princeton with his wife, Jill, a nurse manager at Princeton Medical Center, and their young daughter, Jill.

Lorena Haumann Miller (B) joined the Lawrence law firm of Stark and Stark in 1992 and has been elected to the position of shareholder. A member of the firm’s personal injury group, she is a member of the Mercer County, New Jersey State, and American Bar Associations, and the Trial Lawyers of America. For over two years she has been a trustee of the Friends of Sayen Garden, a public garden in Hamilton Township. She and her husband, Phillip, and their two children, live in Hamilton Township.

Michael Ramirez (AS) completed a master’s in public administration at Seton Hall University in May 2000. He’s had a 13-year career with the Administrative Office of the Courts as a court officer for the Intensive Supervision Program and the Early Release Program for state prisoners.

’88
Linda Ann Merritt (N) obtained her MSN from Baylor University’s Louise Herrington School of Nursing, majoring in nursing administration and management. Her thesis was titled, “Job Characteristics Related to Job Satisfaction in Level III Neonatal Intensive Care Nurses.”

’89
Bruce W. Eelman (AS) last fall was appointed a tenure-track assistant professor in the history department at Siena College in Loudonville, NY. He received his PhD in history from the University of Maryland in May 2000.

Ian Ruderman (AS) is a vice president and a branch manager of First Investors Corp., a Woodbridge investment company with 65 U.S. offices. He has been employed at First Investors for 14 years and lives in Freehold with his wife, Eileen, and two young daughters, Hailey and Lindsey.
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