1950

Mary Good

Mary has been successful in variety of arenas. After receiving her Ph.D. Mary served in education as a faculty member at Louisiana State University – New Orleans for 25 years. She then worked in industry at Allied Signal rising to the level of senior vice-president of technology. She served in government under three presidents including four years as the undersecretary for technology in the Department of Commerce. She is currently the Donaghey University Professor and Dean of the College of Engineering and Information Technology at the University of Arkansas - Little Rock. Mary has served on many boards and in a variety of other capacities including President of the American Chemical Society. She has received a number of awards including the Priestly medal from the American Chemical Society, the highest award given by the association.

The Chemical Heritage Foundation has prepared a video dealing with Mary's career that can be found at http://www.chemheritage.org/discover/online-resources/women-in-chemistry/mary-good.aspx?utm_source=university&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=wic

1951

Bob Hankins

After completing his Ph.D. at the University of Missouri, Bob worked for two years at Oak Ridge.  He then joined the faculty at McNeese State University in Lake Charles, LA.  He remained at McNeese throughout his career first as faculty member, then department chair, dean, and finally Vice-President and Provost.  Bob is currently retired in Lake Charles and visits Arkansas to visit his brother and his good friends, Mary Good and Ann Butler.

Bob and Ann Halter Butler

Ann Butler was raised in Conway when her name was Ann Halter and her dad was a local banker.  She was a chemistry student and married another ASTC chemistry student named Bob Butler. Bob worked as a chemist for Mallinckrodt Chemical Coin El Dorado.  When that plant closed, Bob and Ann moved to another plant in St. Louis until Bob decided he no longer wanted to be a chemist.  At this point they moved to Florida where Bob opened a boat repair shop and Ann taught chemistry.  After Bob had a stroke they returned to Arkansas and Bob soon died.  Ann currently resides in Scotland, AR.  Ann has a son, Les Butler, who is currently on the chemistry faculty at LSU.  He received a B.S. from UA-Fayetteville, a Ph.D. at Illinois and did a post-doc at Cal Tech.  He joined the LSU faculty in 1983.  She also has a daughter who is a pediatrician and a granddaughter who has a Ph.D. in physics and works at Los Alamos.

1958

Dennis Faulk

Dennis taught chemistry for a number of years at Central Missouri State University. He and his wife, Emily, Are currently retired in Hot Springs Village where they enjoy playing golf.

1964

Jim Howard

For the 1st 2 years, after graduation, He taught high school chemistry, in Texas and Arkansas. Since 1966, He has worked for the same company, as an Analytical Chemist. Like UCA, in these 41 years, the company has changed names several times, but it is still located in Louisville, Ky. and now is known as Sud-Chemie. He has worked in many areas of analytical chemistry. Including classic "wet" chemistry, physical measurements (surface area and pore volume), gas chromatography, X-ray fluorescence spectrometry. For the last 20 years, He has worked with X-ray diffraction. His titles have been Chemist, Analytical Chemist, Senior Analytical Chemist, Group Leader, and now Senior Research Scientist.

Jim Has been married 43 years to Sharon Asbury Howard. (She attended ASTC, one year) They had 3 children. Two sons, 37 and 34, there was also one daughter, who is deceased.

1966

John David Richardson

John David taught in the public schools in northeast Arkansas for many years and is currently retired.

Karen Shewbart

I received an MS in Chemistry from UALR (GIT) in 1969 and then moved to Texas and went to work for Dow in analytical services. After 7 years I moved to Environmental Services for Dow and ultimately became the Environmental Manager for Dow’s Texas Operations. I moved to Urethane Manufacturing for 3 years managing isocyanate and Polyol manufacturing and then to to Epoxy Manufacturing in 1990 and was responsible for all of Dow's $250 Million dollar Epoxy business. In 1996 I became the Global Training Manager responsible for Uniting Dow and Union Carbide folks under one standard system. I retired in June, 2001 and has become a golfer full time. In 2004 I won the Executive Women's Golf Association Houston Championship, went on and won the state of Texas tournament in San Antonio, and placed Second in Nashville at the Nationals. I spend lots of time with the grand daughters, traveling (with golf clubs) and playing lots of golf. I have been on the Governor’s Commission on Education, the Governors Commission on Environmental Policy and other state boards. In December, 2002 I gave the Commencement address at the Univ. of Texas in Austin. Karen is Currently Chair or the Univ. of Texas in Austin, College of Natural Science, Advisory Board.

1967

Cecil Ritter

Cecil and his wife, Ann, began teaching in the Crossett Public Schools after graduation. Cecil taught chemistry and physics and also completed an MSE degree at UCA. In 1995 he moved to the UAM Technical Campus Crossett as an instructor and retired from there in 2002. Cecil serves on the city water commission and on several committees concerned with school and educational improvement.

Cecil and Ann have two children, Beth and Daniel, as well as seven grandchildren. Cecil says, “I have only fond memories of my time at UCA and in the chemistry department. It prepared me well for a career which I enjoyed very much as interacting with the brightest kids in the district helped keep me young! I often run into former graduates and am always interested to discuss 'old times' with them as well as their successes. “

Bill Shewbart

I did graduate work at the Univ. of Arkansas in Little Rock for 1 1/2 years. I went to work for Dow Badische in 1969 doing Pilot Plant R&D Nylon chemistry and transferred to Dow Chemical Hydrocarbon Process research in 1971 where I worked with Hydrocarbon catalysts, and light hydrocarbon processes. In 1981 I changed to Urethanes Research. and worked with Proplyene and Butylene oxide chemistry, catalysts for polymerization or Oxides. I moved to the safety area for R&D in 1985 and became North American R&D Safety Director in 1988. In 1990 I became Global Reactive Chemical Manager for Dow. Promoted programs for safe handling of chemicals and investigated Chemical reactivity incidents. Since retiring from Dow in Sept 1994 at age 50, traveling with wife, golfing, and grand kids keep me busy. We have 2 children and have been married 38 years now. My Son Andrew lives in Taipei, Taiwan and owns 3 schools teaching English to Chinese children, mainly elementary age kids. He is completely fluent in Chinese. My Daughter lives here in Houston( near us) is married and has 2 granddaughters 4 and 1 1/2. She is a CPA. I try to see the grand kids as often as possible.

1968

Bill Shipp

Bill received a doctorate in health physics from Purdue University. He served in a variety of positions at Argonne National Laboratory in Chicago before transferring to the Hanover Labs in Washington where he currently works.

Jim Irving

Jim taught chemistry in the public schools in Pulaski County for many years. He is currently on the faculty at Pulaski Technical College.

1969

Gary Canada

Gary graduated in the summer of 1969 with a major in biology and a minor in chemistry. He was active in the ACS Student Affiliate. After graduation his first job was teaching 7th and 8th grade math in Wrangell, Alaska where they commuted by boat to work. After one year there he and his wife (Hanna Boles who also graduated from UCA in 1969) moved back to England, Ark. where he taught chemistry, biology, physics and coached at England Academy until 1973. He retired from teaching and went to work at the Bank of England as a teller. He became president of the bank in 1989. Gary and Hanna have three children and seven grandchildren.

Marvin Tanner

After graduation Marvin taught in the public schools for a few years and then took over the family dairy farming business.  He currently resides in the Heritage Nursing Home in Conway.

Pat Cowger Finkenbinder

Pat returned to Dardanelle after graduation and went to work in the lab for a chicken feed company. That company was ultimately bought out by Tyson. She then transferred to a supervisor position in the Tyson processing plant in Russellville.

Gary White

Gary received his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from the University of Texas at Austin. He worked for Exxon and Nalco in the United States before accepting a position as chief oil field chemist for ARAMCO in Saudi Arabi. After travels over much of the world Gary returned to Conway where he taught chemistry at Conway High School and also served as an adjunct faculty member in chemistry at UCA.  He is currently retired.

Richard Thompson

Richard went to work for the Ecology and Pollution Department of the State of Arkansas. Although the name of this branch of state government has changed several times over the years, Richard has remained employed there.