Two months before her death on July 9, eighty-eight-year-old professor emerita Jane Washburn was able to enjoy the Department of Counseling’s celebration banquet in Sutton Hall’s Blue Room. Also recognized at the event were other faculty emeriti James Wilson, one of the department’s 1965 founders, and John Worzbyt. Dotsy Spinelli Gigliotti ’70 represented her late father, George Spinelli, the department’s first chairperson.
Journalism Department chairperson Randy Jesick was the subject of an August 9 feature story in the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review. It turns out Jesick was practically born in a newspaper: “The building that included our home also housed for a number of years a newspaper called the Belle Vernon Enterprise,” he told writer Ron Paglia. “Isabelle Hurley was the editor, and she later became one of the major figures in the newspaper profession in the Mon Valley.” Jesick has been at IUP for forty years, and, at the time of the article, ranked third in seniority on the university’s faculty. He is also a member of the IUP Magazine Advisory Panel.
In late September, a memorial concert took place in Fisher Auditorium to honor the life of Music Department faculty member Daniel DiCicco, who died February 3. Performance groups included the Alumni Jazz Band, Alumni Wind Ensemble, IUP Wind Ensemble, and Faculty Chamber Ensembles. There were also premiere performances of works composed by IUP alumni. A Beaver Falls native, DiCicco graduated from ISTC in 1954 and joined the faculty two years later. He was professor of clarinet and director of Bands, conducting the IUP Marching Band and the Concert Band. In 1961, he founded the IUP Wind Ensemble and in 1973 took over direction of the Mellowmen from Charlie Davis. He received an IUP Distinguished Faculty Award for Service in 1986 and a Distinguished Alumni Award in 2003. The DiCicco Rehearsal Hall in Cogswell Hall is named in his honor.
On November 4, Lois Blair will celebrate her hundredth birthday. Blair came to ISTC in 1946 to teach English in the junior-high grades of Keith School. (The editor of this magazine was one of her students.) In 1961, she was appointed director of laboratory experiences for what was by then Indiana State College, and she retired ten years later from what had become Indiana University of Pennsylvania. She continued to live in Indiana and to play active roles in many organizations. Today, she lives at St. Andrew’s Village on Indian Springs Road.
