Jump to content

Alumni in high places


Recommended Posts

I saw this story today about the new deputy director of the CIA being an alumni of UA, not to mention an Akron native. CIA #2 sworn in.

It made me wonder who else from UA outside of athletics could be or has been considered important on a regional or national scale.

I'll start it off with the two obvious ones off the top of my head:

Ray C. Bliss - Former Chair of the RNC

Gary Taylor - Founder of InfoCision Management Corperation

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Professor John Green of the UA Bliss Institute is the preeminent authority on religion and politics; I see him quoted in the news allot and he also now holds a distinguished position with one of the political think tanks in Washington.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was (wrongly?) under the impression there were ZERO household name grads of UA outside of sports...did not know about the Black Keys, Moldea and George Wallace. If that's true, very cool.

You can't count the astronauts honorary degrees!

John Greene (just talked to him last month) is not an Akron alum either

Ph.D., Cornell University

B.A., University of Colorado

So, I think the award to most famous (non sports) Akron grad ever goes to.....

George Wallace?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was (wrongly?) under the impression there were ZERO household name grads of UA outside of sports...did not know about the Black Keys, Moldea and George Wallace. If that's true, very cool.

You can't count the astronauts honorary degrees!

John Greene (just talked to him last month) is not an Akron alum either

Ph.D., Cornell University

B.A., University of Colorado

So, I think the award to most famous (non sports) Akron grad ever goes to.....

George Wallace?

Yes, George Wallace lived on the 10th floor of Bulger Hall and gave comedy shows for dormies in Robertson Hall and Dan Moldea was president of Associated Student Government (ASG)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you look at the Disgtinguided Alumni Awards List or the Simonetti Business Awards you can find a lot of these individuals. John Costello is one of the more interesting people I've met to graduate from Akron. He was the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) for Sears, the CEO of MVP.com (Michael Jordan, John Elway, and Wayne Gretzky's failed online sports product site that was sold to Dick's), CEO of AutoNation, CMO for Home Depot, CMO for Pay By Touch, and is now the CMO for Dunkin Donuts. Sandy Pianalto is the Presidnet of the Federal Reserve Cleveland and her sister Antonella Pianalto is the VP of Gov't Affairs for American Express (or was)....Andy Platt is the Chief Technology Officer at Smuckers and was one of the CTO's of the year as named by Oracle last year. Michael Berthelot is former CEO of Trans Technology and appears now to just sit on Boards for companies. Curt King is the SVP Publicity, Marketing & Corporate Communication at NBC Universal and if I remember right his wife is a form Rose Bowl Parade Queen. If you look into it you might be surprised how many people are out there with Akron ties.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

If you look at the Disgtinguided Alumni Awards List or the Simonetti Business Awards you can find a lot of these individuals. John Costello is one of the more interesting people I've met to graduate from Akron. He was the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) for Sears, the CEO of MVP.com (Michael Jordan, John Elway, and Wayne Gretzky's failed online sports product site that was sold to Dick's), CEO of AutoNation, CMO for Home Depot, CMO for Pay By Touch, and is now the CMO for Dunkin Donuts. Sandy Pianalto is the Presidnet of the Federal Reserve Cleveland and her sister Antonella Pianalto is the VP of Gov't Affairs for American Express (or was)....Andy Platt is the Chief Technology Officer at Smuckers and was one of the CTO's of the year as named by Oracle last year. Michael Berthelot is former CEO of Trans Technology and appears now to just sit on Boards for companies. Curt King is the SVP Publicity, Marketing & Corporate Communication at NBC Universal and if I remember right his wife is a form Rose Bowl Parade Queen. If you look into it you might be surprised how many people are out there with Akron ties.

Then someone (not me) should update the UA Wikipedia page accordingly.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was (wrongly?) under the impression there were ZERO household name grads of UA outside of sports...did not know about the Black Keys, Moldea and George Wallace. If that's true, very cool.

You can't count the astronauts honorary degrees!

John Greene (just talked to him last month) is not an Akron alum either

Ph.D., Cornell University

B.A., University of Colorado

So, I think the award to most famous (non sports) Akron grad ever goes to.....

George Wallace?

Yes, George Wallace lived on the 10th floor of Bulger Hall and gave comedy shows for dormies in Robertson Hall and Dan Moldea was president of Associated Student Government (ASG)

I knew both George and Dan when they were in school. George was very funny and Dan was very serious.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...