Reporter JONATHAN BACH, BA '16 (journalism), formerly with the Salem Statesman Journal, joined the Portland Business Journal to cover commercial real estate and economic development.

ARIANNA N. URBAN, MS '16 (historic preservation), joined the city of Mesa, Arizona, as historic preservation coordinator after spearheading projects in the Bay Area.

CLAIRE LUCHETTE, MFA '17 (creative writing), received a National Endowment for the Arts 2020 Literature Fellowship in Prose.

TIMOTHY WRIGHT, JD '17, was hired as an associate in the Portland litigation department of law firm Tonkon Torp.

SHAWN TAYLOR, BS '14 (journalism), was named editor of the Wake Weekly and the Butner-Creedmoor News in North Carolina.

KEANON LOWE, BA '14 (general social science), was recognized as a Hero Who Went above and Beyond in 2019 by Time magazine for his efforts to disarm and comfort a student gunman at Parkrose High School in Portland.

ZACH BIGALKE, BA '15, MA '17 (history), a PhD student at Penn State University, received the 2020 Robert K. Barney Graduate Essay Award from the Center for Sociocultural Sport and Olympic Research at California State University, Fullerton, for research in Olympic studies.

Longview artist and philanthropist JOE FISCHER, BS '60 (fine and applied arts), MFA '63, was named Lower Columbia College Foundation's Benefactor of the Year for 2019-20.

Scott Parker, BS ’04 (general science), edited Conversations with Joan Didion, a book that features 17 interviews with Didion that span decades, continents, and genres.

Laura Simic has joined Grenzebach Glier + Associates as Vice President. GG+A is a multi-national consulting firm of senior professionals helping non-profit clients capture the power of philanthropy with suite of best-in-class services to elevate fundraising and support related aspects of institutional advancement. Laura lives in Boise, Idaho where she serves on the boards of the Idaho Womens Charitable Foundation, Opera Idaho and the Mortar Board National Foundation.

Jon Spangler (BA, General Social Science, 1978) and Linda Hudson (AB, SDSU, 1970; MS, Northwestern, 1971) are now remodeling their newly-purchased 1954 ranch-style home in San Leandro, CA. Jon is Vice-chair of the BART Bicycle Advisory Task Force. He is back on his bike and recovering from shoulder surgery in November 2019. Linda is now retired from her career in technical marketing writing and editing in high-technology, "translating geek-speak." Linda and Jon have been married since 1988.

Michael Rostron, Anthropology, 1973, has published a novel "Cape Decision: Revenge & Remorse In The Alaskan Wilderness." His personal website is at mikerostron.com

The influences on Jim Stafford’s six decades as a world-recognized sculptor range from renowned artist Norman Rockwell to Stafford’s son, Chris, who was born with a terminal illness and died in 1995 at age 23.

But Stafford also emphasizes the advantages of his University of Oregon education. In earning his master of fine arts in sculpture from the College of Design in 1968, Stafford still talks passionately about the late professors Jan Zach and Paul Buckner.

"My two years at the UO pursuing the MFA were the most formative in my career. I started out majoring in pottery, but quickly switched to sculpture and never looked back," says Stafford. "The experiences with Zach and Buckner were invaluable in my professional future."

Stafford’s fine arts career goes back as far as the 1960s when he studied and worked with Rockwell. The two were pictured on a cover of the Saturday Evening Post. Stafford also developed fame via his work with wood, steel, stone, and aluminum. He guides his Wildlife in Bronze business through a national travel schedule and world-wide sales.

Many people now point to recent sculptures as his most poignant work.

Stafford lives in his hometown of Adna, a small community in Lewis County, Washington. The county is also home to Centralia College, where Stafford taught for many years. As his diversified career evolved, so did his reputation. With the fame came significant commissions. Many have been recognized on TV as well as in news and magazine stories. Among Stafford’s creations:

Reach for the Stars, an 8-foot-tall bronze sculpture depicting a youth on one foot reaching upward to touch a star, on the Centralia College campus.

It is a tribute to Stafford’s son, Chris, a successful student at the college. Stafford hoped the sculpture would inspire students and campus visitors who are faced with overwhelming odds to believe that they can "reach for the stars."

The Guardian, commissioned by the Lewis County Sheriff’s Officer Association. It honors police officers who have fallen in the line of duty. The sculpture shows a police officer caring for a young girl, with help from his police service dog. It stands outside the Lewis County Law and Justice Center.

"That project was a very sobering experience, particularly to go from real-life molds of the officer, girl, and the dog to the final product," says Stafford.

Keep the Doors Open, also on the Centralia campus. It is a tribute to Margaret Corbet and Katherine Kemp, administrators at the college during and after World War II. Stafford knew both.

Founded in 1925, Centralia is the oldest continuously operating community college in Washington. The college struggled with funding after the Depression and the world wars but the women led a successful fundraising campaign to keep the doors open.

The Washingtons, Stafford’s most recent sculpture, a life-size depiction of George and Mary Jane Washington with their family dog. The Washingtons founded Centralia. In August 2018, the sculpture was dedicated to celebrate Washington’s 200th birthday. It was placed in a park that is named for him.

This sculpture was the most difficult of the quartet. Stafford had only four small, historical photos of the Washingtons for reference. He began work on the project in August 2017.

Because the depictions are life size, the complex and time-consuming casting process necessitated cutting initial molds of the figures into pieces. The smaller molds were then transported to a Tacoma foundry which also did the casting for The Guardian. Ultimately, the sections and pieces were reassembled in a very intricate process.

"This project was quite a bit more involved," says Stafford. "But from what I’ve been hearing, everyone seems pleased with the result."

The four Lewis County sculptures were privately financed, including the $100,000 cost for the Washington statue.

Stafford’s connections with his hometown are deep. He was an Adna school board member for 15 years, has served on the school district’s scholarship committee for 22, and regularly provides bronze sculptures for scholarship auctions.

—Craig Weckesser, BS ’64 (journalism)

Joe Bailey (B.S., Economics and Spanish, 2008) has been elected partner at Perkins Coie LLP in Portland, OR, where he practices business law.

Carol E. Harding (1974 BA Honors College, German and General Literature; 1976 MA, Comparative Literature) recently retired after 25 years as a professor at Western Oregon University. She taught primarily in the English department and also spent 12 years as Chair for the Humanities Division.

Stephen "Steve" Frederick, B.S. Journalism 1976, retired in 2018 after 42 award-winning years as a community newspaper editor in Oregon and Nebraska. His Duck days were notable for his camaraderie with the Emerald staff for a couple of seasons and for an epic Grateful Dead concert in Veneta in the summer of '73. Although he was honored repeatedly over the decades for his writing, photography and publication design, his greatest career achievement was escaping into retirement just as vulture capitalists destroyed print journalism and the simpletons took over America.

The late JOHN DICK, BS '41 (law), a star on the NCAA championship-winning basketball team in 1939, was named to The Dalles Hall of Fame.

Kathleen Peterson Langmo, BS '58 (elementary education), published her first novel, Virginia, about the relationship between a poverty-stricken mother and her seven-year-old daughter.

PENELOPE GROSS, BS '65 (political science), was elected to a seventh four-year term on the Fairfax County (Virginia) Board of Supervisors.

JIM BARNETT, BS '66 (physical education), moved to radio analysis for the Golden State Warriors after 34 years as TV color analyst for the NBA team.