Clarence Minkel

Bud Minkel passed away on September 22, 2014. Born and raised to a farming family in Austin, Minnesota, Bud would go on to see much more than just the rural landscape of the United States. Following high school graduation, he joined the United States Army and served in both the U.S. and Japan. He then went on to pursue his B.A. and Ph.D. in geography from Syracuse University.

Following his education, Bud became quite the world traveler, visiting every country in North, Central, and South America, Western and Southern Europe, China, Japan, Indonesia, Australia, New Zealand, as well as 30 African countries, and even Antarctica. He also successfully visited every county in the United States, a task that took him fifty years.

Bud spent time living in Guatemala, Brazil, Venezuela, Columbia, Japan, and Indonesia and had a leadership position in settling the border dispute between Ecuador and Peru in 1998. This world traveler would become the dean and a non-teaching emeritus professor at the Graduate School at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. His research interests were in economic geography and regional planning as well as Latin America.

He is survived by his wife, Phyllis and his five children, Thomas Minkel (Jackie), Sandra Topper (Jim), Theresa Giroux (Tom), Lorraine Ware (Phil), and many friends, colleagues, and fellow geographers. He was 86.