Hall of Honor
The 2011 Hall of Honor inductees
The College of Liberal Arts & Education is proud to induct seven more alumni into the College's Hall of Fame in 2011. The Hall of Honor recognizes the civic and professional achievements of these individuals, who also give back their valuable time and resources to the College and the University in many different ways. Plaques honoring the individuals below, as well as past Hall of Honor awardees, hang in a specially designated area of the Jane and Walter Briggs Building.
Read about the 2011 inductees:
- Mrs. Bradley N. Crawford '65
Social Worker, Community Activist and Philanthropist - Charles E. Lucas, M.D. '59
Professor of Surgery, Wayne State University - Peter B. Neydon '65
President, USF Holland (Retired) - Geraldine A. O'Grady-Pershing '55
Educator, Community Activist, Philanthropist - Most Rev. Ricardo Ramírez, C.S.B., D.D. '68
Bishop of Las Cruces, New Mexico - Rev. Robert J. Scullin, S.J. '68
Former Provincial, Detroit Province Society of Jesus - Michael D. Ware '67
Managing Director, Advance Capital Markets
Read about the 2010 inductees on the UDM Community site.
Mrs. Bradley N. Crawford '65
Social Worker, Community Activist, Philanthropist
Mrs. Bradley N. Crawford ’65, is a caring, sharing person, who is making a wonderful difference in the lives of others. She comes from a family of 13 biological siblings, plus one adoptive sibling, and a home where her mother taught her that the value of good fortune is having the ability to care and share with humility.
Crawford acquired a bachelor’s degree from the University of Buffalo, a master’s degree from the University of Detroit, and an M.S.W. from Wayne State University.
Her career included working as a social worker, juvenile court probation officer, supervisor of Children Services in Oakland County, trainer of Wayne County staff social workers, supervisor for three juvenile youth centers (in Detroit, Highland Park, and Inkster, Mich.), and as a Wayne County Department of Social Services (DSS) Daycare Services Trainer for all county offices. As the only daycare trainer, Crawford was assigned the special task of identifying and solving problems Wayne County DSS had with foster parents and the institution’s inability to sustain long-term care for hard-to-place children who were returned to the agency and resided in the main office with no sanitation, eating, or sleeping arrangements. After interviewing youth and providers, she was able to develop a plan for short-term contracts that led to rotation agreements among providers for stability, continuity of friends, schools, churches, etc., and this plan became a role model for other state foster care placement services. The model significantly reduced the number of youth who providers returned to the social services agency.
Crawford sat on the Board of the Child Care Coordinating Council of Wayne County for 15 years. Her organizational memberships include being a life member of the Alpha Kappa Alpha, the NAACP, and the Negro Business and Professional Women’s Club, Inc. She is also active in the Alumni Association of the University of Buffalo.
Since 1997, Crawford has donated more than two hundred thousand dollars in scholarships to a number of colleges, universities, organizations and neighborhood black youth. Her desire is to help poor black youth who are interested in higher education and willing to give back, and preparing themselves to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century, using marketable skills that will allow them to be highly competitive in a global arena.
Crawford is an active church member, served on the board of her church, and established a church scholarship program in 2001. Since 1997 she has been a volunteer for the local Salvation Army. She is also a community activist for the underprivileged. She is actively involved with the Buffalo Urban League Scholarship Program and is interested in cultural enrichment opportunities via public library and historical museum programs. She is an active book club member, loves to alpine ski, to dance (including square dancing), to listen to poetry sessions, to listen to jazz, and enjoys attending the opera and the theatre.
Crawford continues to give and has recently established at the University of Detroit Mercy the Beulah Alexander Memorial Scholarship in memory of her mother. The scholarship provides $5,000 annually for one African American student studying in the College of Liberal Arts & Education for four years. In hopes that the gift of education continues, Crawford has asked that each recipient make a personal pledge to try to provide financial assistance to others who desire a college degree when the recipient is able to do so.
Charles E. Lucas, M.D. '59
Professor of Surgery, Wayne State University
Dr. Charles E. Lucas ’59
Charles E. Lucas ’59, is a native Detroiter who earned his undergraduate degree from the University of Detroit and his Doctor of Medicine degree from Wayne State University. His work in the fields of shock, trauma, acute care surgery, and sepsis is extensive. Together with his longtime business partner Dr. Ledgerwood, they have written more than 350 articles in surgical literature, most of which have included residents from the Detroit area in their many important discoveries in the field of surgery. Lucas performed the first randomized prospective study in trauma, and his work includes one of the most-cited articles in the surgical literature. One of his studies led to improved patient care in shock and injury, as well as significantly decreasing the costs of patient care.
Lucas was recently celebrated and recognized by Wayne State University School of Medicine as an innovator, and was awarded the Trailblazer Award which recognizes alumni and faculty who have forged paths through previously unexplored territory to become pioneers in their field of medicine and medical research.
From 1967 through 1980, when the old Detroit General Hospital (DGH) closed, Lucas was primarily centered at DGH for his clinical activities, teaching, and research. Following the closure of DGH in 1980, he moved to the Detroit Medical Center, where he became actively involved in the new Detroit Receiving Hospital, the Harper University Hospital, the Hutzel Hospital, and since 1980, the new Karmanos Cancer Hospital.
Lucas is a member of many local, national, and international professional organizations in which he frequently has served as an officer. He continues to be deeply committed to medical student and resident education. His research efforts have resulted in over 400 peer articles, books, and book chapters.
Lucas has a family legacy with the University of Detroit Mercy. He and two of his brothers all attended U of D. His brother Bill taught Math at U of D while he received his Ph.D. at the University of Michigan and Lucas and his brother Bob were both three-year pre-med students. Bob also went on to become a doctor.
Lucas and his wife, Suzanne, live in Detroit's Palmer Woods area and together raised five children and are now enjoying being grandparents. In his leisure time, Lucas enjoys tennis and a lot of reading—and he loves writing. Now, in his work as a doctor and researcher, editing or writing is a significant part of what he does.
Lucas has been a long-time supporter of UDM and has been a member of the President’s Cabinet giving club for more than 22 years.
Peter Neydon '65
Retired - President, USF Holland
Peter Neydon ’65
Peter Neydon ’65, has a sense of ownership and pride in the education taking place in the classrooms and labs, the action on the basketball court and sports fields, and the socializing among students on the University of Detroit Mercy’s McNichols Campus. He says it brings back fond memories of the time when he was a student at U of D in the mid-1960s and also elicits a proud family history.
Neydon had a difficult childhood. His father died when he was 11. He was the oldest of five children, and his mother went to work as a teacher. Help arrived for Neydon in the form of a four-year scholarship from the Knights of Equity, an Irish fraternal organization that his great-grandfather had belonged to. It provided scholarships to children and descendants of members, a fact discovered by his grandmother. Without those funds, he would have had to work full time to save up enough for tuition.
It made perfect sense for Neydon to attend U of D. With the strong family legacy that began with Neydon’s grandfather, Charley Bruce, and five of Neydon’s uncles, one of which played varsity basketball with Titan legend Bob Calihan, all being U of D graduates as well. Neydon’s grandfather was the captain of the University’s first basketball team in 1906-07 and later became the graduate manager of Athletics, akin to today’s athletic director. Neydon’s grandfather was U of D through and through. He got his degree there and had a rigorous, classic liberal arts education. Neydon says that Bruce’s career began the “golden age of college sports.” One of Bruce’s heralded moves was to hire Gus Dorais as the football coach. As a Notre Dame quarterback, Dorais had popularized the forward pass, throwing to the illustrious Knute Rockne, who later became a legendary Notre Dame coach.
While at U of D, Neydon met Sheila McCann, who was attending Marygrove College. Both Sheila and Neydon graduated in 1965—he with a degree in political science, she with a degree in child psychology. They married soon after, and she taught briefly before the couple had their three children. They have been married for 44, years and their family now includes five grandchildren.
Working hard has always come naturally for Neydon, who held jobs at an A & P supermarket, J. L. Hudson at Northland, and in the trucking business. His career path was established as a college student when he worked at Central Transport. At first, he kept books on the vehicles that were repaired, and filled potholes in the truck yard so the vehicles didn’t break an axle. He later was in charge of the tire center and dispatched trucks. That experience as a jack-of-all-trades in trucking would serve him well throughout his career.
After graduating, Neydon worked for Interstate System, another trucking company, for 17 years. During that time, he held a variety of positions and became vice president of national account sales. While living on Detroit’s east side, he would occasionally come back to the McNichols Campus to watch a sporting event or to hear a guest lecturer. His career further advanced when he became the vice president of Sales at USF Holland in 1984. Later, he was appointed president and CEO of the company, one of the nation’s largest trucking firms.
Neydon credits U of D with providing an education that enabled him to communicate well with his co-workers and later with the people that he supervised. He says that he became interested in a lot of things—politics, history, current events, and philosophy—that he wouldn’t have paid much attention to if he hadn’t gone to college. He also said that the liberal arts education imparted at U of D increased his confidence and desire to learn.
The Neydon’s philanthropy includes being major contributors to UDM for over a decade, including being members of the President’s Cabinet Giving Club for more than seven years. It also extends to the Community Foundation of Holland/Zeeland, where they provide an annual college scholarship through the Neydon Scholarship for Children of Widows. He sees it as a way to “pay it forward,” so that future and current students can benefit from a scholarship just as he had.
Gerry O’Grady-Pershing '55,
Educator, Community Activist, Philanthropist
Gerry O’Grady-Pershing ’55
Gerry O’Grady-Pershing ’55, has devoted her life, and her energies, to the field of education and to making her community a better place.
O’Grady-Pershing earned a B.S. in Education from the University of Detroit. As a student, she was in the chorus, Psychology Club, Gamma Phi Sigma sorority, and Pan-Hellenic Council and served as president for the latter two organizations. She also holds a master’s from the University of Michigan and has taken several additional classes at various universities in Michigan as well as the University of Mexico.
O’Grady-Pershing is first and foremost an educator: She initially taught in the Detroit Public Schools, including every grade from one through six; she also served in positions as reading coordinator, practical life skills specialist (developing a program for the elementary and middle schools), and home-school specialist. Over the years she has been active in many professional organizations.
When her alma mater called, O’Grady-Pershing took a leave of absence from the Detroit Public Schools and came back as an instructor. She taught at the University of Detroit for one year in Methods of Language Arts and Social Studies for juniors and supervised student teachers in their senior year. This enabled another faculty member to take time off to complete doctoral work. She also continued to serve U of D in other ways, becoming the second vice president of the University of Detroit Alumni Council.
After retirement, she joined the League of Women Voters – Oakland Chapter and served as a poll worker for local elections. She also served on the Farmington/Farmington Hills Commission on Aging and the Consumer Protection Committee. She has held various offices (including president) in various professional, social, and alumni associations and the Metropolitan Detroit Reading Council and Catholic Alumni Club of Detroit.
O’Grady-Pershing married Ralph Pershing in 1978, who was widowed with two children, Lisa and Sean, who are now grown and have given Gerry and Ralph two grandchildren.
Still very active as an educator, O’Grady-Pershing is a presenter of the B.A.B.E.S. (Beginning Awareness Basic Education Studies) program given in all the schools in the Farmington/Farmington Hills area. She says this continues her love of teaching and work with young children.
Active in her church, she is a lector and active committee member at the Church of the Holy Family. She also participates in the Accent on Women Book Discussion Club.
O’Grady-Pershing’s many contributions have not gone unnoticed. In 1970, she received the U of D Alumni Tower Award in recognition of her outstanding service and loyalty to the University of Detroit and the Alumni Association. In 1969, she was included in The Outstanding Young Women of America.
O’Grady-Pershing has been a member of UDM’s President’s Cabinet giving level for more than 14 years and has been a UDM donor for more than 32 years. She has established—in loving memory of her parents, Matt and Mary O’Grady—an endowed scholarship that provides financial assistance for students who demonstrate both financial need and academic merit.
Most Rev. Ricardo Ramírez, C.S.B., D.D. '68
Bishop of Las Cruces, New Mexico
Bishop Ramirez ’68, was born in Bay City, Texas, on Sept. 12, 1936. The second of two sons, he was ordained to the priesthood on Dec. 10, 1966 in Houston, Texas. He is a member of the Congregation of St. Basil. On Oct. 18, 1982, he became the first Bishop of the Diocese of Las Cruces, N.M. Next year, he will celebrate three decades in that role.
Before coming to the University of Detroit in 1967, he received his B.A. from the University of St. Thomas, in Houston, Texas, in 1959 and attended St. Basil’s Seminary in Toronto, Canada, from 1963 to 1965 and the Seminario Conciliar in Mexico City, Mexico, from 1965 to 1966. He graduated from U of D in 1968 with his M.A. in Religious Studies. From 1973 to 1974 he studied at the East Asian Pastoral Institute in Manila, Philippines. He has received honorary doctorates from Neumann College in Wichita, Kan.; the University of St. Michael’s College, in Toronto, Canada; and Siena Heights University, in Adrian, Mich.
Bishop Ramirez served the Church in a variety of roles and places before ascending to the bishopric. This included an appointment at St. Mary’s Church in Owen Sound, Canada, in 1967; chaplain of University Students/Centro Cultural Aragon, Mexico City, Mexico, from 1968 to 1970; with the Family Religious Education Project in Tehuacan, Puebla, Mexico, from 1970 to 1976; and as executive vice president at the Mexican American Cultural Center in San Antonio, Texas, from 1976 to 1981. He was named Titular Bishop of Vatarba and Auxiliary Bishop of San Antonio on Oct. 27, 1981 by Pope John Paul II and was ordained to the Episcopacy on Dec. 6, 1981 in San Antonio by Archbishop Patricio F. Flores.
Bishop Ramirez has served and continues to serve on a number of committees within the National Conference of Catholic Bishops and its successor body, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. He is currently a member of the USCCB International Justice and Peace Committee, the USCCB Domestic Social Development Committee, and the USCCB Subcommittee on Hispanic Liturgy. He previously chaired the NCCB Committee on the Church in Latin America, the NCCB Catholic Campaign for Human Development, and the USCCB Subcommittee for Hispanic Liturgy. He also served as a member of the USCCB Committee on Migration and Refugee Services, the NCCB Committee on the Liturgy, and as Consultant to the USCCB Committee on Hispanic Affairs.
He has contributed to the Church as a member of the Catholic Church Extension Society Advisory Board and the Committee on the Catholic Common Ground Initiative, and served as Episcopal Advisor to the Institute for Hispanic Liturgy and Episcopal Moderator of the Asociación Nacional de Sacerdotes Hispanos. Elected delegate from the U.S. to the Synod for America in 1997, he was also appointed as a representative from the U.S. to the Fifth General Conference of Bishops of Latin America and the Caribbean in Aparecida, Brazil. He has served as member of the New Mexico Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, the U.S. State Department Advisory Committee on Religious Freedom Abroad, and as Commissioner of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom.
Clearly, Bishop Ramirez has done, and continues to do, much for the Church in the world.
Robert Scullin, S.J. '68
Former Provincial, Detroit Province, Society of Jesus
Robert J. Scullin, S.J. ’68
Robert J. Scullin, S.J. ’68, was born the third of four children to James Andrew Scullin and Margaret Mary Mills in Detroit, Mich. in 1946. He has two older sisters, Judy Skelley in Saginaw, Mich., and Nancy Janness in Dallas, Texas. A younger brother, Michael, died in 2008. He was educated by the Sisters of Charity (Cincinnati) at the Shrine of the Little Flower Elementary School and by the Jesuits at the University of Detroit High School.
Fr. Scullin entered the novitiate of the Detroit Province of the Society of Jesus in 1964. His Jesuit formation included undergraduate studies at the University of Detroit, (B.A., English) philosophy and theology studies at Bellarmine School of Theology in North Aurora, Ill., and theology studies at the Jesuit School of Theology at Berkeley. Prior to ordination, he served for one year as pastoral assistant at Gesu Parish in Cleveland, Ohio; he then taught high school English at St. John’s Jesuit High School in Toledo, Ohio. Other internships include two quarters of clinical pastoral education and three summers in community organizing work on the Near West Side of Cleveland.
Following ordination, Fr. Scullin spent a number of months learning Spanish at the Maryknoll Language School (Instituto de Idiomas) in Cochabamba, Bolivia. He served for one year in the Office for Hispanic Affairs of the Archdiocese of Detroit. He served at two different times in University Ministry at the University of Detroit in 1981 and from 1986 to 1988. Fr. Scullin has served in Hispanic and African American parishes in Cleveland, Port Huron, New York City, and Columbus. From 1989 to 1990, he worked as interim director of a multi-service neighborhood center, St. Malachi Center in Cleveland.
As an associate director of the National Jesuit Office for Social Ministry of the Jesuit Conference, Fr. Scullin was a principal organizer of a national conference for Jesuits and lay partners “Faith Doing Justice” in Detroit in 1991; this conference was hosted by the University of Detroit Mercy. He pronounced final vows in the Society of Jesus in 1993. Following the completion of a Doctor of Ministry Program at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago in 2000, Fr. Scullin was appointed provincial of the Detroit Province by Fr. Peter-Hans Kolvenbach, the superior general of the Society of Jesus. His thesis—Engaging Hearts and Minds: Ignatian Spirituality and Students Reflecting on Service—has proven useful in a number of volunteer service settings. As Provincial, Fr. Scullin helped make resources available both for both a Catholic Studies Program and for work in Mission and Identity at UDM. During his tenure as provincial, he engaged both Jesuits and lay partners in a national strategic planning process aimed at strengthening the wide range of Jesuit-sponsored institutions and ministries.
As Provincial, Fr. Scullin participated in an international Jesuit gathering, the 35th General Congregation in 2008 that elected Fr. Adolfo Nícolas as Superior General of the Society of Jesus. In the summer of 2009, with the approval of Provincial Father Timothy Kesicki, S.J., Archbishop Allen Vigneron appointed Fr. Scullin, pastor of Gesu Catholic Church and School. In 2011, the Archbishop appointed him also parish administrator of Ss. Peter and Paul Jesuit Church on Jefferson Avenue.
Fr. Scullin continues to be extremely grateful for the wonderful and challenging undergraduate education he received at the University of Detroit. As a Jesuit seminarian, he had superb faculty both on the McNichols Campus and at Colombiere College, which for a time was the Clarkston Campus of the University. It was a heady, exciting time on the campus as student protest activity emerged and the University deepened its commitment to the city and to minority student populations. In 1968, Fr. Scullin was pleased to work in the project Aim High that preceded and laid the groundwork for Project 100—one of the University’s finest initiatives in reaching out to capable students in need of additional mentoring and support in their undergraduate studies.
At Fr. Scullin’s invitation, Fr. Peter-Hans Kolvenbach visited University of Detroit Mercy in 2006 and remarked upon the many initiatives of the schools and colleges of the University to bring together the many, diverse populations of the region: “The University’s campuses provide an opportunity for people to come together to live, to work, to play, and to praise the Lord for the ineffable beauty of human life.” Fr. Scullin continues to be grateful for the ongoing commitment of the University of Detroit Mercy to the City of Detroit and all of Southeast Michigan.
As pastor of Gesu Church and School and administrator of Ss. Peter and Paul Jesuit Parish, Fr. Scullin hopes to strengthen the mutually beneficial relationship between the University and the two parishes.
He is delighted to find himself back where he began—alongside the University where his love for urban ministry and his literary and religious imagination grew in the remarkable undergraduate education he received at the University. The love of literature in different languages—deepened at UDM—has found expression in Fr. Scullin’s song-writing, both in the form of contemporary hymns, and in topical songs inspired by the struggle of immigrants arriving at Ellis Island in the past century to contemporary immigrants seeking sanctuary and opportunity in our nation today.
Michael D. Ware '67,
Managing Director, Advance Capital Markets
Michael Ware ’67
Michael Ware ’67, has had an outstanding 35-year career in the energy business. Over the past 12 years, he has focused on investments in renewable energy. He is the founder and managing director of Advance Capital Markets, Inc., a private investment and advisory firm with a very successful track record in the energy and power industries. Ware has served as an advisor to private equity funds, international energy firms, independent power companies, electric utilities, as well as a number of other successful entrepreneurial enterprises.
Ware holds a B.A. degree from the University of Detroit in Political Science and graduated Magna Cum Laude. He also holds an M.A. degree from Ohio State University, where he was a fellow at the Mershon Center for National Security Studies. Ware came to U of D as a freshman on the Varsity Football team and played the last season the University had intercollegiate football.
As a U of D student, he was an active leader within the student body. He was commander of the ROTC Thunderbird Drill Team, served as president of the Inter Residence Hall Government, wrote for the Varsity News, and was a photographer for the Tower yearbook. When Ware graduated in 1967, he was commissioned as an officer in the U.S. Air Force. He served as a Captain in the USAF from 1968 to 1972 and he worked for the Office of Special Investigations supervising a world-wide system of information collection relevant to counter-intelligence.
From 1974 to 1980, Ware was CEO of Energy Decisions Inc., an energy-consulting firm, which served U.S. and international clients. This followed a year at the Federal Energy Office, where he was part of the team that implemented the U.S. government’s response to the 1973 oil embargo.
Ware recently stepped down as managing director at Good Energies (GEI). He served as a financial advisor to Good Energies since 2002 and managed many of GEI’s venture capital and project investments in North America. This entailed sourcing the investment opportunity, managing the deal team through closing, and monitoring the investment after closing. Ware managed three successful exits for GEI.
Ware has arranged financing for wind, solar, hydro, biofuel, biomass and geothermal projects and has guided several companies from start-up, through venture financing, and later growth stages including the IPO process. Prior to founding Advance Capital Markets, he was CEO of Reliance Energy Services, a subsidiary of a $3 billion investment company.
Ware has served on the boards of nine GEI portfolio companies, is on the board of the American Council on Renewable Energy (ACORE), and is on the NREL Venture Capital Advisory Committee. He has also served on the boards of several NASDAQ and New York Stock Exchange-listed companies.
Thirty-five years ago, Ware and his wife Mary were married in the Chapel at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. He belongs to St. Bridget’s of Ireland Church in Clarke County, Va., and was an active member of the committee that designed, financed and built this church in 2002.
Ware is also an avid outdoorsman and conservationist. He is currently restoring 200 acres of land in Clark County, Va.—adjacent to the Appalachian Trail—to natural habitat. This tract was once scheduled for development of 18 homes.
Whether in his business career, his church, or his community, Ware impresses those around him as a natural leader.
