Alumni Profiles
Davis finally receives diploma
Brown returns to AU
Peterson caught in electoral storm
Small begins urban ministry
Fishter takes soccer career to another level
Davis finally receives diploma
By Kim Ousley BA '03
Roy Davis BA finally got what he deserved — it just took longer than he anticipated.
Davis thought something was up when he celebrated his 83rd birthday in September. His entire family showed up after the evening meal. Then his daughter-in-law, Mary K. Davis, announced that she had a little surprise for him — a surprise officially presented by AU Registrar Art Leak. Mary had called Leak during the summer to discuss how her father-in-law could receive the diploma he earned more than 50 years ago.
“[Leak] had a cap and gown, then photographers from the newspaper came in. I didn’t know any of this was going to take place,” says Davis.
In May 1942, Davis was only one literature class shy from graduating with degrees in psychology and history. He had been accepted into University of Illinois and was making plans to study architecture. But instead the military drafted him into World War II.
When Davis came back from the war, he took the one literature class he needed at AU. But at 5 p.m. on the day of graduation, Davis explains, the school called his wife to say the commencement ceremony was scheduled for 7.
“We had a retail business and I was in Richmond that day on business and couldn’t get back in time to graduate,” Davis says. Back then, if a graduate missed commencement, he missed getting his diploma — a policy, says Leak, that no longer exists.
Davis studied meteorology while serving in the military, but eventually he did learn the skills of architecture. Davis started his own contracting business in Anderson, Ind., and operated it for more than 40 years.
Brown returns to AU
Deborah Lilly
Dr. Delwin Brown BA ’57 has gone from AU student to AU professor to guest lecturer. He returned to campus in November to speak at the 2000 Pearl Toon Smith Memorial Christian Education Lecture Series. Brown says he always enjoys returning to the university. He was born in Anderson and says he was reborn intellectually at AU while a student. “That makes it indelibly one’s home,” he explains.
“As a student, I thought I was going into ministry,” Brown explains. But in seminary, he discovered he had an interest and the ability to deal with theological issues, so he chose instead to pursue a career in teaching, a decision that brought him back to AU as an associate professor of philosophy and religion from 1966 to 1975.
“In the 1960s, life was tumultuous, and that was even true for a place like Anderson College,” Brown says. It was the time of the Vietnam War and the Freedom Movement. “What that taught me was how to think across barriers and facilitate conversation between people who stand in opposition to one another.”
After leaving AU, Brown spent eight years teaching religious studies at Arizona State University. Now on a secular campus, he says it was sometimes a struggle to teach students who were simply fulfilling a requirement, but he was usually successful at bringing students to a place where they could get excited about the topic.
In 1983, Brown joined the staff at Iliff School of Theology in Denver as the Harvey H. Potthoff Professor of Christian Theology, a position he continues to hold. Now in a seminary setting, Brown works with students who were already struggling with questions about belief, faith and application. “You have a ready-made audience,” he explains. And there is also the bonus of reaching out to the church through his students.
“There are very few vocations in our society that enable one to make a difference in people’s lives in so many different ways,” Brown explains. “Ministry has this wide range of abilities to affect people’s lives. If I can help a student begin to think through these opportunities, I’ve not only benefited that person, but I think I’ve also benefited all the people to whom he or she is going to minister.”
Brown’s career has also included three years as vice president and dean of academic affairs at Iliff, and he’s published numerous articles and books. In November, he joined Dr. Stanley Grenz on the AU campus for a discussion on how church leaders and congregations can move from the divisions of liberalism and conservatism and live faithfully in a postmodern world. The event also provided Brown the opportunity to lecture in the same Hartung Hall classroom he taught in more than 25 years ago, to roam the campus where he met his wife, Dr. Nancy (Terry) Brown ’59, and visit the town that still feels like home.
Peterson caught in electoral storm
By Randy Dillinger
I just happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time … or the right place at the right time, depending on how you look at it, says Ernie Peterson BA ’73, recalling the seemingly endless days he spent in the national spotlight as the nation waited with bated breath for the conclusion of the presidential election recount in Volusia County, Fla.
Peterson, who has been employed at the county property appraiser’s office since his graduation from AU, suddenly found himself in charge of transporting boxes of sealed ballots from a vault — which only he was permitted to enter — to the room in which the ballots were recounted by hand. He, along with one representative each from the Democratic and Republican parties, oversaw the process, which involved about 50 teams of county employees that rotated with each change of precinct.
The normally quiet town of Deland, Fla., had been converted into a media circus overnight. With such a central role in his county’s recount, Peterson could not escape the eye of the camera. On Nov. 11, an Associated Press photograph of him appeared on the front pages of The New York Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, and untold numbers of smaller newspapers around the country.
“I guess Andy Warhol was right,” Peterson says. “Everyone gets their 15 minutes of fame.”
Although the work was “incredibly boring,” Peterson says the Volusia County recount was not as problem-prone as recounts in other counties. “We were not a ‘dimpled chad’ county,” he says. “We used a paper ballot.”
In the end, Volusia County had completed its recount according to the timeline established by Florida Secretary of State Katherine Harris. And as quickly as the media blitz had descended on the town, it left and the nation’s attention shifted to the more volatile county recounts.
“It was interesting, but in the end we were glad to see them leave,” says Peterson. “We brought the kids down just so they could say they’d seen something like this.”
Besides his job with Volusia County, Peterson has worked as a spotter for CBS at NASCAR events. This involvement inspired a tradition for him. Each year he collects checkered flags signed by NASCAR drivers at Daytona and auctions or donates them to charity. He also is an active Rotarian and enjoys participating in the local Rotary’s Wild Game Feast — a fundraising cookout featuring alligator, rattlesnake and other meats.
Peterson lives in Deland with his wife, Jeanne, and their teenage children, Sean and Ashley. Jeanne works in Human Resources at nearby Stetson University.
Small begins urban ministry
By Joy May
Some would say that life is a never-ending classroom; you learn one lesson only to put it to use during the next test you face. Tony Small ’85 would agree. “I approach education from the perspective that you can always learn more,” he says.
That philosophy may be why he’s returned to Anderson, Ind., from Springfield, Ill., to pursue his master’s degree at the School of Theology. Or why he’s serving as director of outreach, music and worship arts at Sherman Street Church of God while simultaneously beginning a city-wide, community-based outreach and educational program of his own design: LEAD.com.
It may sound like a large load to carry, but when you look at the last 15 years of Small’s life, you’ll understand that all these things are a part of the passion God gave him for meeting the needs of under-served youth through urban ministries.
When he left AU in 1985 with a management major and music minor, Small set his gaze on being a business professional. But within the first year of his post-collegiate experience, he was already immersed in ministry as a music worship leader at a church in Springfield. He eventually left his job with Blue Cross to pursue outreach ministry full time, living off grant money and “whatever came next.”
“Whatever” turned out to be a series of jobs that fueled his ongoing pursuit for a method of reaching Chicago’s inner-city at-risk youth. He spearheaded and directed fine arts initiatives for public and private schools in the area, some that included composing musicals, other recordings, and writing books and curricula for after-school programs and weekend “academies.” All of these efforts eventually led to LEAD.com, which stands for Leadership, Education, Arts and Development. Small’s brainchild and still-growing comprehensive program for school-aged children and adults complements traditional learning by promoting interest in math, science and technology through athletics and the arts.
LEAD.com’s presence in Anderson was aided by several Chicago visits to Small by Sherman Street’s senior pastor, the Rev. Leroy Quashie. “The man had a vision for what this program could do in Anderson,” Small says. “I was reluctant to come, but as doors have opened, I sense this is where God was leading all along. An affirmation of that came when the United Way funded a $99,000 grant to help us launch the program here. While that’s not even 25 percent of the operational budget, it’s the largest grant ever given to a program in Anderson by the United Way.”
Although his major was in management, working with arts initiatives in the inner city isn’t outside Small’s realm of experience. He has fulfilled appointments such as lecturer of fine arts at Loyola University and curriculum developer for the Center for Urban Research, a U.S. Department of Education civics and technology program. Most recently, he worked with the White House Millennium Council as one of the nation’s top 55 millennium community composers and playwrights named by the Mid-Atlantic Arts Foundation and the National Endowment for the Arts.
“There are a lot of things I still have yet to learn,” Small says. “I have a passion for multicultural ministry in the city, and LEAD.com has been a learning process from the beginning. But the more I’ve learned, the more I’ve realized there’s so much more I need to know.”
Fishter takes soccer career to another level
By Joy May
If you want to find Donna Fishter BA ’95, look no further than the soccer field at the University of Central Florida. The graphic design alumna is an assistant coach and goalkeeper coach at UCF, and she also coaches a local under-12 girls’ premier soccer team. To say she loves her job would be an understatement — she gets a real kick out of it!
“Soccer is a part of almost every day for me, and I love it,” Fishter says. It’s no surprise. Considering that her AU athletic career included the 1994 Female Athlete of the Year award, three years on the Lady Ravens varsity soccer team (as well as four years of varsity softball), and a post-collegiate semi-professional career with the USL W-League Indiana Blaze, Orlando Ladyhawks and the Tampa Bay Extreme, it seems Fishter is well-suited for a lifetime on the pitch.
But her life is more than a game. After a successful venture with her startup design firm, the Panache Group, Fishter moved to Orlando in 1998 to continue a soccer career. She coached high school and premier league teams. She became active in a local chapter of Fellowship of Christian Athletes (FCA), and coaching blossomed into instructing at camps and speaking opportunities.
In November 1999, Fishter sensed that God was moving her into ministry, so she started Salt Shaker Ministries, Inc. — a chance for Fishter to travel worldwide sharing her faith as a coach.
As events have taken place, Fishter can sense how all her skills complement one another as her ministry unfolds. “I find that my abilities as a graphic designer have only enhanced my situation. My marketing and advertising skills are helpful with running my own company and with being able to sell my players on concepts. It’s amazing what happens when it all falls into place,” Fishter explains.
For Fishter, the key to those pieces falling in the right places was letting God take control. “At times I thought God was crazy,” she admits. “Now it all makes sense.”
