The Young Alumni Challenge
This article describes the 1988 Capital Campaign young alumni challenge and $150,000 gift to the scholarship fund. This and other articles may be found in the University Archives.
Citation for this article is: "The Young Alumni Challenge," ECU Report, Fall 1988, Volume 20, No. 1.
Four alumni have committed $150,000 to ECU's Annual Giving program and have challenged other alumni to do the same.
John J. Beard III '75, William H. "Bill" Bodenhamer Jr., Robert S. "Bob" Rippy '74 and J. Michael "Mike" Williams '79 have agreed to match all new and increased gifts to the university up to $150,000.
"There are few things in fund raising that capture the imaginations of potential donors as does a challenge gift," says David B. McDonald, Institutional Advancement director. "There is something very appealing about the idea of doubling the value of your contribution at no extra expense to you."
The gift will provide the focus for ECU's 1988-89 fund-raising year as the Young Alumni Challenge. "The 'young' in the name refers to the four who are issuing the challenge; all attended ECU during the '70s," McDonald says. "We're directing the challenge to all alumni and friends of the university regardless of their age."
The $150,000 contributed by the four will be used to enhance ECU's scholarship program, McDonald says. All new and increased gifts will be matched, however, regardless of where that money will be used.
Traditional fund-raising methods will be used by McDonald and his staff in attempting to meet the challenge. "Through the use of direct mail, telefunds and personal visits, we will attempt to reach tens of thousands of alumni and friends of ECU to invite their participation in the challenge," he says."Special groups with whom the four challengers were associated while at ECU will be targeted for more personal approaches."
John Beard is the evening news anchor and commentator with KNBC-TV in Los Angeles, a station that is owned and operated by NBC.He has received two Emmy awards: one for hosting an hour-long special, Emergency: Live and Learn , designed to help child viewers cope with emergencies and one for a five-part series he conceived, wrote and produced in 1984 on the U.S. Marine Corps in Beirut.
The series, titled A Few Good Men and One Small One , was inspired by a trip Beard took to Beirut during the 1983 Christmas holidays.
A native of St. Pauls, N.C., Beard enrolled at ECU after a tour in Vietnam with the Navy hospital corps.While attending ECU, he worked full time at WITN-TV in Washington, N.C., as a reporter and news anchor.
He graduated in 1975 with a BFA in drama and speech and a minor in broadcasting. He joined NBC affiliate WXII-TV in Winston-Salem, and in 1977 left for CBS affiliate WIVB-TV in Buffalo, N.Y.
In 1981 he became the nightly news anchor at KNBC-TV, the same station that launched Tom Brokaw and Tom Snyder into national prominence.Beard coordinates two hours of news broadcasts daily from 4 to 5 p.m. and from 6 to 7 p.m.
During his first three years in Los Angeles, Beard helped KNBC win its first top news ratings in 10 years. He was honored by the Alumni Association in 1984 with the Outstanding Alumni Award.
"I had a great experience at East Carolina and treasure the memories from those years," Beard says. "As time has passed, my appreciation for the university has only deepened.I'm proud to do what I can to make an ECU experience available to future generations."
Beard is single and lives in Santa Monica.
Bill Bodenhamer is president of Grayline Transportation Service and executive vice president of B & L Services Inc. of Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., which together form the largest transportation company in the Southeastern United States.
"We operate over 1,200 buses, taxis, limousines and special handicapped service vehicles," Bodenhamer says.
A native of Jacksonville, N.C., Bodenhamer came to ECU in 1970 on a football scholarship but left the team after two years. "I saw no future in it," he says.
He was elected Student Government Association (SGA) president in 1973-74, and is known for implementing the student shuttle bus system and for purchasing blue lights for campus police cars with SGA funds, thereby earning the nickname "Bluelight Billy."
"I heard that a girl was being raped at the coliseum and the police who were responding were unable to get there in time because they were stuck in traffic," Bodenhamer says. "The budget process was so bad then the campus police could not afford blue lights. So I paid the bill."
Bodenhamer left ECU in 1974, four credits short of a degree, and moved to Los Angeles, where he started his own taxicab company.Two years later he sold his interest in the company and joined B & L Services.
"Now that I'm established professionally, I want to give something back to the university and encourage other alumni to do the same," Bodenhamer says. "With this challenge, I hope we can motivate other ECU graduates to make their first commitments to the university or to increase their levels of giving."
Bodehamer lives in Deerfield Beach, Fla., with his wife, Linda.
Bob Rippy is vice president-senior manager of the Shearson Lehman Hutton Partnership Group. "We develop and market programs that are known as direct investments," Rippy says. "We just finished up the financing of all of Walt Disney's movies. Who Framed Roger Rabbit was one of them."
Rippy grew up in Burlington with Mike Williams."We've known each other since the eighth grade," he says. "We were in the same fraternity at ECU, Phi Kappa Tau. He was president in 1973, I was president in 1974."
Rippy graduated in 1975 with a BS in biology and immediately entered graduate school in pursuit of a master's in science education. He completed all but his thesis and taught one year at A.G. Cox Elementary in Greenville before deciding that teaching school wasn't for him.
"I decided I didn't want to be a biology teacher for the rest of my life," he says."The degree does come in handy, though. We just bought a $30 million partnership in which case I was the liaison on the deal because I was the only one in the group that understood biochemistry."
Rippy started a group of car washes while in graduate school and used that knowledge to impress E.F. Hutton, which hired and trained him as a financial consultant."Hutton was bought by Shearson in 1987, so I'm still at the same company," he says.
Rippy is impressed by the leadership capabilities of ECU's new chancellor, Dr. Richard R. Eakin, and says he "was one of the reasons I felt like giving this commitment. I'm very interested in seeing the university get to the status that we dreamed of during the Leo Jenkins era, when we finally built a medical school and gained some recognition for the university," he says."I think it's time we take another step forward."
Rippy was married last year to the former Jennifer Jones '73. They live in Wrightsville Beach.
Mike Williams is president of Alamance Machine Company in Burlington, a manufacturer of precision marine transmission couplings and contract machining source for other diversified industries.
An entrepreneur, the Atlanta, Ga., native has also created other businesses, including car washes, a miniature golf course and a recreational water park.
As an ECU undergraduate, Williams majored in biology education and was a cheerleader, a member of Phi Kappa Tau Fraternity and the Inter-Fraternity Council. Upon graduation, he went to work for Grady-White Boats Inc. of Greenville and quickly moved from the production line to factory representative for the Southeastern United States.
Williams is one of ECU's major contributors, having recently established a University Scholars Award and four Alumni Honors Scholarships.
"The state does a good job providing for education," Williams says. "But in order to truly enrich the higher educational process, individual commitments are needed. Even if it isn't your kid that will benefit from that gift, somebody's will."
He is married to the former Linda Hoff '77 and they live in Burlington with their two-year-old daughter, Meagan Campbell.
For more information about giving to ECU, contact the Office of Institutional Advancement.
