January 2009

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Illinois Wesleyan University Chemistry Professor Ram Mohan has been selected for the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) Young Observer Program.

Mohan, who was honored with the Earl H. and Marian A. Beling Professorship in the Natural Sciences at Illinois Wesleyan in 2008, received the IUPAC award on the basis of his distinguished research on environmentally friendly processes for chemists to use at pharmaceutical and other companies. As the recipient of this honor, Mohan will be a special guest at the summer 2009 IUPAC meeting in Glasgow, Scotland, U.K.

Established by the U.S. National Committee (USNC) for IUPAC in 1977 to foster interactions with internationally acclaimed scientists in various fields, the Young Observer Program strives to introduce the work of IUPAC to a new generation of distinguished researchers and to provide an opportunity to address international scientific policy issues.

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BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – The passing of Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist John Updike on Tuesday evoked memories of his visit to the Illinois Wesleyan University campus, and the thoughts of Updike scholar James Plath, a professor of English at Illinois Wesleyan.

“What John Updike has done for American literature is astounding,” said Plath, who has studied Updike for more than 20 years, including working closely with the novelist while editing the book Conversations with John Updike in 1994. “His work connects us with our American literary past, and he is forever a part of that now.” Updike died Tuesday at the age of 76 after a battle with lung cancer.

Plath discovered the works of Updike in an English class at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee. “I didn’t choose to be an Updike scholar, he chose me,” he said. “His work spoke to me in ways other writers hadn’t.” Plath decided to write his dissertation on Updike, and began a correspondence with the celebrated author. “He didn’t do my work for me, but he was always gracious,” said Plath, who wrote his dissertation on “The Painterly Aspects of John Updike’s Fiction.”

Updike was featured speaker at the 1993 Hemingway Days’ Writers’ Workshop & Conference in Key West, which Plath directed from 1986-96. “That was the first time I met Updike face-to-face,” said Plath, who spoke with the novelist as he sat for a portrait painted by Hemingway’s grandson, artist Edward Hemingway. “We visited Edward Hemingway’s first art exhibition in Key West. Updike, who was a skilled critic of the arts, pointed to one painting and said, ‘This is the best piece in the collection.’” Plath later bought the work and donated it to The Ames Library, where it hangs today.

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BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – Two Illinois Wesleyan University students, Brad Tieche and Frank Alonso, have received scholarships that will help offset their Spring 2009 semester study abroad expenses.

Tieche, a senior accounting major from St. Charles, Ill. who will study in Barcelona was awarded a $3,500 Benjamin A. Gilman International Scholarship. The Gilman International Scholarship Program offers grants for U.S. citizen undergraduate students to pursue academic studies abroad. Such international study is intended to better prepare U.S. students to assume significant roles in an increasingly global economy and interdependent world. Award amounts will vary depending on the length of study and student need.

Alonso, a junior psychology major from Elmhurst, Ill. who will study in Japan received a $5,000 Freeman Awards for Study in Asia Scholarship (Freeman-ASIA). Freeman-ASIA is designed to support American undergraduates with demonstrated financial need who are planning to study overseas in East or Southeast Asia. Freeman-ASIA Award recipients are expected to share their experiences with their home campuses to encourage study abroad in Asia by others, and to spread greater understanding of Asian peoples and cultures within their home communities.

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BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – James Horton has lent his expertise to museums across the nation, but has spent his career bringing history directly to people as an advisor, Pulitzer Prize-nominated writer and consultant for The History Channel.

An historian emeritus with the National Museum of American History at the Smithsonian Institution, Horton will deliver an address titled “Abraham Lincoln: Slavery and the Civil War” for Illinois Wesleyan University’s annual Founders’ Day Convocation at 11 a.m. Wednesday, Feb. 18 in Westbrook Auditorium in Presser Hall (1210 Park St., Bloomington). Horton’s visit is supported in part by the David and Ann Lawrence Speaker’s Series. The event, which is free and open to the public, honors the 30 founders who signed the charter for the University in 1850.

The Benjamin Banneker Professor Emeritus of American Studies and History at George Washington University, Horton has been on the national and international stage for decades, working toward the preservation and understanding of history. He was the senior Fulbright Professor of American Studies at the University of Munich, Germany, from 1988 to 1989, and has also lectured throughout Europe, and in Thailand and Japan. In 1991, he assisted the German government in developing American Studies programs in the former East Germany. Two years later, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt appointed Horton to the National Park System Advisory Board, and in 1996 he was elected board chair. His work for the board included serving as senior advisor on historical interpretation and public education for the director of the National Park Service.

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BLOOMINGTON, Ill. – The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences announced this morning that Illinois Wesleyan University graduate Richard Jenkins has been nominated for best actor for his role in the film The Visitor.

Jenkins, who graduated in 1969 from Illinois Wesleyan, has been garnering praise for his role as a widowed college professor who discovers a pair of illegal aliens living in his New York apartment.

Variety’s John Anderson declared “Jenkins has hooked us early and reels us in like fish.” Jenkins had already been nominated for the Screen Actors Guild Award, a Critics Choice Award and the Chicago Film Critics Association Award for the role, as well as an Independent Spirit Award, his second after his Spirit nomination for 1996’s Flirting with Disaster. The film also earned him the Silver St. George at the Moscow International Film Festival, and the Spotlight Award from the National Board of Review.

The Visitor marks Jenkins’ first role as a leading man, though he has been seen in more than 40 films, and is known to audiences as the father in HBO’s Six Feet Under. Yet it was his portrayal of Walter Vale in The Visitor that has catapulted him to international acclaim. Director Tom McCarthy — whose first film was the critically-acclaimed The Station Agent — wrote the role of disconnected, discontented economics professor Walter Vale with the 60-year-old Jenkins in mind.

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