Achievement Day

Pulitzer Prize-winning author David McCullough Joins William Jewell to Honor Alumni

William Jewell College honored distinguished alumni who have made significant contributions in their respective fields at its annual Achievement Day celebration March 8. Special guest speaker for the Achievement Day dinner was two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning author and historian David McCullough. McCullough offered the Achievement Day address, “Leadership and the History You Don’t Know,” at a dinner attended by more than 600 alumni, students, faculty and friends of William Jewell at Kansas City’s Westin Crown Center Hotel.

While researching Truman, his 1992 Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of President Harry S. Truman, McCullough spent a semester on the Liberty campus as writer-in-residence. In the acknowledgements section of the book, McCullough expresses his appreciation to former Jewell president J. Gordon Kingsley “...for the opportunity to learn about Missouri by living there.” McCullough received an honorary doctor of letters degree from William Jewell at the Achievement Day dinner.

During his Achievement Day address, McCullough sounded the alarm on the level of historical literacy among the current generation of students. “We are raising generations of young Americans who are by and large historically illiterate,” McCullough said. “And it’s our fault. We must not blame our children, or our grandchildren, for not knowing what they haven’t been taught.” Quoting the late Daniel Boorstin, former Librarian of Congress, McCullough said that trying to plan for the future without a sense of the past is like trying to plant cut flowers.

“We have to know who we are, where we came from, how we got to where we are and who those people were who passed on to us the blessings of our way of life and what they went through to achieve that,” McCullough said.

The celebrated author also decried the quality of many history textbooks, which he said were “deadly, dreary, poorly written and boring” tomes filled with “politically correct mush. We shouldn’t give our students anything to read that we wouldn’t want to read. We shouldn’t require them to read anything that we don’t think is compelling, intelligent, and that touches the soul as well as the mind.”

Details of the 2007 Achievement Day honorees and their accomplishments:

Jeannie Blaylock is a 15-time Emmy Award-winning news anchor and reporter for WTLV-TV and WJXX-TV, Gannett Broadcasts media outlets in Jacksonville, Florida. She is also the recipient of two Edward R. Murrow Awards and one Peabody Award. She serves as co-anchor of the “First Coast News” broadcasts at 5 and 6 p.m. in the Jacksonville market. She has been widely recognized for the creation of the “Buddy Check 12” program devised to help women overcome breast cancer through early detection. A member of the William Jewell College class of 1982, Blaylock was a triple major in English, communication and art. She graduated summa cum laude and completed part of her undergraduate work at Oxford University in England, where she also studied the British Broadcasting Corporation.

In his work with the National Severe Storms Laboratory, Harold Brooks has developed and applied techniques to estimate the occurrence of severe thunderstorms and tornadoes. By developing a better understanding of the environmental conditions in which severe storms occur, Dr. Brooks has assisted forecasters in making more accurate predictions. His work on how to produce, interpret and evaluate weather forecasts has helped change the way that forecasts are prepared and disseminated in a number of countries worldwide. A member of the William Jewell College class of 1982, Dr. Brooks graduated summa cum laude with honors in physics. He received an M.A. and M.Phil. in atmospheric sciences from Columbia University and a Ph.D. in atmospheric sciences from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

As Vice President of Entrepreneurship, Judith Cone leads development of the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation’s overall entrepreneurship strategy and oversees all entrepreneurship programming and operations. Since joining the Foundation in 1993, Cone has been responsible for developing and growing a variety of national entrepreneurship initiatives. She started her career as a learning disabilities teacher, where she observed first-hand the effects of poverty on children’s academic achievement. Cone has a bachelor’s degree from William Jewell College with areas of concentration in education and psychology, and a master’s degree in education from the University of Kansas. She travels and speaks extensively on entrepreneurship and its impact on individuals, the community and the economy.

Drew W. Luten III serves as the Deputy Assistant Administrator for the Bureau for Europe and Eurasia (E&E), U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). In this position, he directs a $700 million annual budget, which supports economic growth and fiscal reform, democracy-building and social transition projects in 23 European and Eurasian countries receiving U.S. foreign assistance. Luten oversees six offices in Washington, D.C., and 14 regional and bilateral offices overseas. He supervises the strategic planning, resource allocation, implementation and evaluation for USAID programs in the E&E region. A native of St. Louis, Luten received his bachelor’s degree in history from William Jewell College and a juris doctor from Harvard Law School in Massachusetts.