Regional association news
Kenyon campaign celebrations sweep the nation
F rom Boston, Massachusetts, to San Francisco, California, from Minneapolis, Minnesota, to Sarasota, Florida, and to sixteen cities in between, the excitement and momentum of the May 1998 Campaign Kickoff Gala in Gambier was brought to twenty regional gatherings of alumni, parents, and friends.
In celebration of "Claiming Our Place: The Campaign for Kenyon," regional associations in New York City, Chicago, Illinois, and San Francisco hosted gala events of their own with President Robert A. Oden Jr. and Teresa J. Oden in attendance. The elegant Chicago Cultural Center was the venue for a festive celebration dinner on November 4, 1998, while New Yorkers congregated in the Javier Perez de Cuellar Suite of the Regal U.N. Plaza Hotel on November 19, 1998. In San Francisco on February 25, 1999, more than one hundred alumni, parents, and friends--the association's largest gathering ever--came together at the Carnelian Room atop the Bank of America Building.
On October 1, 1998, Cincinnati hosted the first of the 1998-99 regional association annual gatherings celebrating the progress of the campaign. During the first semester, Baltimore, Maryland, Cleveland and Columbus, Ohio, Los Angeles, California, Seattle, Washington, and Washington, D.C., welcomed Oden, who delivered College and campaign updates before introducing the campaign film, Claiming Our Place. Speakers for the annual gatherings in Indianapolis, Indiana, Kansas City, and Sarasota and Tampa, Florida, were Campaign Field Director Alice Cornwell Straus '75, Director of Major Gifts Russell P. Geiger, and Vice President for Development Douglas L. Givens.
The spring semester featured campaign celebrations and film premieres at annual gatherings in Boston, Minneapolis, and Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with Oden. The Minneapolis event shared the excitement of the Men's National Collegiate Athletic Association Division III Swimming and Diving Championships, at which the Lords garnered their twentieth consecutive national title before a crowd of three hundred Kenyon alumni, parents, and friends. In North Carolina, the regional association of the Research Triangle heard from Geiger, and the Detroit , Michigan, annual gathering heard from Director of Capital Funds J. Thomas Lockard '67.
Appropriately, the year's final regional campaign celebration took place in Boston on April 8, 1999, at the offices of Graham Gund Architects. Guests were treated not only to the company of Graham Gund '63, architect for the College's new music and science buildings, and his wife, Ann, but to a beautiful venue, music by a trio of conservatory students, and the opportunity to view architectural renderings and models of the new Kenyon buildings. It was a fitting finale to a great year of campaign celebrations, enjoyed by more than a thousand of the College's alumni, parents, and friends across the country.
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