Robert Churchill

Longtime professor of geography at Middlebury College, Robert Russell “Rusty” Churchill, died November 14, 2004, in Burlington, Vermont.

He was born in Belvidere, Illinois on November 19, 1946, the son of Robert and Marjorie (Vandeburg) Churchill. Bob received his BS and MS from Northern Illinois University, and his PhD from the University of Iowa. He joined the geography department faculty of Middlebury College in 1978. His interest in cartography led to the establishment of Middlebury’s program in geographic information systems and his fascination with maps drove his research and publishing. Bob was passionate about teaching and was an avid outdoorsman, leading field trips to Alaska and northern Canada.

Robert Russell “Rusty” Churchill (Necrology). 2005. AAG Newsletter 40(1): 16.

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Ralph Brown

Ralph C. Brown, Professor Emeritus, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks, died November 14, 2004.

Born in Buffalo, New York, November 17, 1922, Brown earned bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Buffalo and a PhD in geography from Syracuse University.

He served in the Army during World War II and was involved in thirty-five combat missions over enemy territory in B17s. He was a licensed single engine land and seaplane pilot and flew extensively, enhancing geographic observations particularly in Alaska and the rural lower
forty-eight states.

He was Chair of the departments of geography at Universities in New York, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and North Dakota. He retired in 1985 as Professor Emeritus, University of North Dakota, Grand Forks.

Ralph C. Brown (Necrology). 2005. AAG Newsletter 40(3): 17.

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William Wallace

Retired forty-year University of New Hampshire professor, William H. Wallace died of liver cancer on October 29, 2004. He was born in Chicago, December 10, 1924. After attending Beloit College in Wisconsin, Wallace entered the graduate program in geography at the University of Wisconsin in Madison, receiving his Master of Science degree in 1950 and his PhD in 1956. His first academic position was at the University of Auckland in 1952. After returning to the U.S. in 1954, Wallace joined the faculty of Rutgers University.

Wallace began an appointment at the University of New Hampshire in 1956 and served on the faculty for forty years, retiring in 1997. He introduced the major program in geography in 1964 and established the Department of Geography in 1968. Wallace served as chair of the Department of Geography for twenty-four years. He was awarded a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship in 1963 and was a Fulbright lecturer in Norway in 1971. Wallace was active in the AAG, the New England-St. Lawrence Valley Geographical Society and the Eastern Historical Geography Association. His most recent scholarship focused on the Historical Geography of New England, particularly issues of colonial settlement and land division. Earlier in his career he wrote extensively about railroads.

William Wallace (Necrology). 2005. AAG Newsletter 40(11): 17.

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Robert Fuson

Robert Henderson Fuson, aged seventy-seven, died October 22, 2004. He was a scholar of Columbus and the age of exploration.

Born in Bloomington, Indiana, Fuson grew up in New Bern, North Carolina.

He served in both the army and navy during World War II. During the Korean War, he held a commission in the air force reserve. Following his military service, he was an intelligence analyst in Washington, DC.

Fuson received his BA degree from Indiana University, an MA degree in geography from Florida State University and his PhD in geography and anthropology from Louisiana State University. He was a member of Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society. He was a charter faculty member of the University of South Florida and served for many years as chairman of the geography department, retiring as professor emeritus of geography. He is the author of numerous books, including the textbook Fundamental Place Name Geography, now in its ninth printing. His other books include The Log of Christopher Columbus that won worldwide acclaim and was awarded the Montroll Special Award from the New York Academy of Science and Book of the Year from the Library Journal. His latest books were Legendary Islands of the Ocean Sea, and Ponce de Leon and the Spanish Discovery of Puerto Rico and Florida.

Robert Fuson (Necrology). 2004. AAG Newsletter 39(11): 20

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Arthur E. Karinen

Arthur E. Karinen, professor emeritus in geography, passed away May 25, 2004, at the age of eighty-five.

Karinen earned his B.A. and M.A. from UC Berkeley. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Maryland.

Karinen joined the California State University-Chico faculty in 1959 and retired in 1986. Prior to coming to Chico, Karinen had held positions at Ohio State, University of Maryland and the Helsinki School of Economics.

He was a member of the AAG and the American Congress on Surveying Mapping.

An expert in cartography and the economic geography of Europe, Karinen was a consultant to the U.S. Department of Commerce in 1958-59 and was a Fulbright Lecturer at the University of Finland in 1970. He contributed to many atlases and publications, and was co-author of California: Land of Contrast and California, both of which went through several editions and revisions.

Arthur E. Karinen (Necrology). 2004. AAG Newsletter 39(7): 28.

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C. Nicholas Raphael

C. Nicholas Raphael died of a heart attack February 21, 2004. He was born September 3, 1937 in Detroit, MI, the son of R. George and Angela Raphael. Nick graduated from the Upper Canada College Preparatory School in Toronto, Canada, earned his undergraduate degree from Wayne State University, his master’s from Eastern Michigan University (EMU), and his Ph.D. in coastal geomorphology from Louisiana State University (LSU). He received full support from the National Academy of Sciences for his doctoral research in Greece. After his fourteen months of field research he returned to LSU to complete his dissertation.

He joined the faculty at EMU in 1967, where he remained as a full professor in the department of geography and geology until his death. During his career Nick served as a guest professor at Monterrey Institute of Technology in Mexico, Coventry College of Education in England, the University of Riyadh in Saudi Arabia, the College of Education in Shanghai and Earth University in Costa Rica. He also served as consultant to the Environmental Research Institute of Michigan, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the Army Corps of Engineers, and the Environmental Protection Agency. Nick was an active member of Gamma Theta Upsilon (GTU), the International Geographical Honor Society, and served as the national editor of the GTU Journal, and was also a member of the Association of American Geographers, Sigma Xi Scientific Research Society, the Michigan Academy of Science and the Honor Society of Phi Kappa Phi.

Memorial contributions in Nick’s memory may be made to the Hogar Rafael Orphanage in Guatemala. Checks may be written to St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church, 3109 Scio Church Rd., Ann Arbor, Michigan 48103. Please state that the check is in memory of Nicholas Raphael.

C. Nicholas Raphael (Necrology). 2004. AAG Newsletter 39(5): 19.

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Bob Huke

Our friend and colleague, Bob Huke, passed away on January 17, 2004. Born March 3, 1925, Bob was a devoted and beloved geographer and friend of Dartmouth. He joined the AAG in 1949.

Huke earned his undergraduate from Dartmouth in 1948. After getting his Ph.D. in geography from Syracuse in 1953, he started teaching at Dartmouth immediately. In 1990 Bob retired and became an active emeritus professor. He was also a veteran and served honorably in the Marine Corps, where he received the Purple Heart after being wounded in Okinawa during WWII.

Bob enriched the lives of many through his teaching, research, and his involvement with the AAG. He served on numerous AAG committees at both the national level and as part of the New England St. Lawrence Valley division and he was a focal component of the Asia Specialty Group. Bob’s research interests focused primarily on Southeast Asia, and he was a specialist in agricultural and population geography. Bob was also extremely active in the Retired Geographers Specialty Group and served as their secretary-treasurer in 1999 and led hugely successful trips of the Retired Geographers Organization to Myanmar and Vietnam.

He had a long-term collaboration with the International Rice Research Institute (IRRI) in Los Banos, Philippines. Bob wrote a series of key papers in the 1970s on the Green Revolution, and he had an international reputation for his work on the geography of food and hunger, the Green Revolution, and Southeast Asia. He published extensively and he was the chief investigator on projects funded by the Rockefeller Foundation, NASA, and the Fulbright Foundation.

To memorialize Bob’s ardent field scholarship and devoted undergraduate teaching, the department is establishing a research travel fund. We have numerous students doing senior honors theses every year, with many of them travelling overseas (as Bob would love). Donations may be made out to: Bob Huke Student Research Award, and mailed to: Kelly White, Department of Geography, 6017 Fairchild, Dartmouth College, Hanover NH 03755.

Bob Huke (Necrology). 2004. AAG Newsletter 39(3): 11.

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Terry Jordan

Past president of the Association of American Geographers, died at his home in Austin, Texas, on 16 October 2003, from pancreatic cancer. (In recognition of his 1997 marriage, he began using the name Terry G. Jordan-Bychkov as his professional nom de plume, while retaining his birth name for other purposes). Born in Dallas in 1938 as a sixth generation Texan, Terry earned his master’s degree from the University of Texas at Austin (where he met Walter Prescott Webb) and a doctorate from the University of Wisconsin at Madison. His dissertation was later published as German Seed in Texas Soil: Immigrant Farmers in Nineteenth-Century Texas (1966). This was to be the first of fifteen authored or co-authored books and textbooks published during his lifetime. These include The Upland South: The Making of an American Folk Region and Landscape (2003); The American Backwoods Frontier: an Ethnic and Ecological Interpretation (with M. Kaups, 1989), one of a handful of books that offer a truly original interpretation of the American identity; and The Human Mosaic: A Thematic Introduction to Cultural Geography (nine editions 1976-2003, with Mona Domosh and Lester Rowntree), a classic textbook. At the time of his death he had completed field research in sixty-five countries, reflected in books and journal articles focused on Australia, Siberia, and the European source regions of Texas folk culture. A book expressing his view of the discipline, My Kind of Geography, is forthcoming. Terry was elected President of the Association of American Geographers (1987-88) and also received the AAG Honors Award in 1982 and Distinguished Scholar Award from the AAG American Ethnic Geography Specialty Group. For many years he chaired the geography department at the University of North Texas before joining the Department of Geography at the University of Texas at Austin in 1982 as the Walter Prescott Webb Professor of History and Ideas. He received awards for his work from the Pioneer America Society, National Cowboy Hall of Fame, Texas State Historical Association, Texas Heritage Council, American Association for State and Local History, and the Agricultural History Society. He was elected a member of the Texas Institute of Letters, and a Fellow of the Texas State Historical Association. Sessions in Terry’s honor have been organized by his students for the 2004 AAG Annual Meeting in Philadelphia. In accordance with his family’s wishes, donations in Terry’s name may be may be made to the UT Department of Geography and sent to the Department of Geography, The University of Texas at Austin, Austin, Texas 78712.

Terry Gilbert Jordan (Necrology). 2003. AAG Newsletter 38(11): 26.

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Ruby Miller

Longtime AAG member Ruby Miller, of State College, PA died 7 October 2003. She was born in Templeton, PA, 16 August 1911. Miller attended Chatham College in Pittsburgh and earned her elementary teaching certification at Clarion University. She pursued graduate work at the University of Pittsburgh and later spent

eight years teaching school in western Pennsylvania. In 1941 she married geographer E. Willard “Will” Miller, who was married to her for 61 years. At the end of World War II the Millers moved to Penn State where Will started the Geography Department and Ruby became the map librarian. Ruby established and developed the library’s map collection and was instructor for courses on the use of maps. She retired in 1977, but remained active, co-authoring more than twenty books with her husband and traveling in Europe, Asia, Africa, and South America. For those wishing to make memorial contributions, please contact the Miller Geography Lectureships, Office of University Development, The Pennsylvania State University, One Old Main, University Park, PA 16802.

Ruby Miller (Necrology). 2003 AAG Newsletter 38(10): 19.

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Louis Seig

Louis “Lou” Seig, former editor of the Journal of Cultural Geography, passed away on 1 October 2003 at his home in Stillwater, Oklahoma. He was born 4 May 1931 in New York City.

Seig attended Louisiana State University where he earned his B.A. in 1954. Following graduation he entered the Air Force as an officer and served on active duty for two decades. He later returned to Louisiana State University for graduate study, earning his M.A. in 1961. During the 1960s he was assigned as a geography instructor to the United States Air Force Academy in Colorado. His performance at the Academy was such that in 1966 he was selected by the Air Force for graduate study. He earned his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota in 1968.

A veteran of the Vietnam War, Seig retired as a lieutenant colonel in 1974 and became chair of the Department of Geography at the University of Louisville. In 1978 that department named its Outstanding Undergraduate Geography Student Award in his honor. Following a series of career changes in the late 1970s and early 1980s he moved to New Mexico where he administered the research and development program in the state’s Energy and Minerals Department. In 1986 he joined the faculty of Oklahoma State University. Upon retirement in 1996 he assumed editorship of the Journal of Cultural Geography.

A longtime member of the AAG and staunch supporter of geography, he will be remembered for his service to the discipline. For those wishing to make memorial donations, please contact theDepartment of Geography, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, OK 74078-4073.

Louis Seig (Necrology). 2004. AAG Newsletter 39(1): 15.

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