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Retired NASA Astronaut Coming to WIU The first-ever Dr. Elizabeth Kaspar Women's Lecture for University Libraries will take place Wednesday, March 7, 2012 as retired NASA astronaut Dr. Linda Godwin visits WIU to discuss women and science. Dr. Elizabeth A. Kaspar, a member of the former educational foundations department (now educational and interdisciplinary studies), has contributed $25,000 to endow a permanent lecture series for University Libraries during Women's History Month at Western. "Creating a lecture series to highlight accomplished women by bringing them to Western means a great deal to me," Kaspar said. "I think it is important for our students, especially our female students, to be inspired by women during Women's History Month. Women may not have the struggles they once did, but girls still need to be reminded they can be or do anything they want." Kaspar's efforts to eliminate gender inequity on the Macomb campus are legendary. She is credited with developing the first women's studies course at WIU, leading to the eventual women's studies curriculum, and for chairing Western's first Committee on the Status of Women. She received the Western Organization for Women (WOW) Achievement Award in 1990-91 and served as vice president for the Illinois State Commission on Women. Kaspar was also vice president and president of the Foundation for the National Association of State Commissions on Women that met annually in Washington, D.C. In September 2010, she was honored by local artist Constance "Connie" Berg through dedication of the sculpture, "Furious Flower," installed in the WIU Multicultural Center as a constant reminder of Kaspar’s achievements. Kaspar is a native of Louisville, KY. She taught and served as dean of women at the Westhampton College of the University of Richmond and Albion College before coming to Western in 1965. More details on Dr. Linda Godwin's March 7, 2012 presentation are coming soon. WIU Libraries and History Dept. Host Civil War Reading and Discussion SeriesWestern Illinois University Libraries and the WIU Department of History will host the five-part reading and discussion series, "Let's Talk About It: Making Sense of the American Civil War," once a month, starting next month, through April 2012. University Libraries is one system of 65 libraries or library systems nationwide that has received a grant to host the series developed by the American Library Association (ALA) and the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH).The Civil War book-discussion events will be held at the Leslie F. Malpass Library on the WIU-Macomb campus. Timothy Roberts, assistant professor of history at WIU, will lead a discussion about each selected book or work at the book-discussion sessions. Read more. Winona Malpass ObituaryLet us celebrate the life of Winona Helen Cassin Malpass, who spent her life in the service of her family, church and community. A Secure Home: Alum Family Donates WWII Medals and Collection to WIU ArchivesIt was just before Veterans Day last year that a gratifying end to what Western Illinois University alumna Carol Armstrong Kuchan calls a "bitter story" was on the horizon. The tale begins in the early 1990s, with the selling of precious World War II family heirlooms, Purple Heart and Silver Star medals, awarded both, posthumously, to Ipava (IL) natives, Private First Class Otis "Bill" W. Vaughn and Sergeant Archie "Wid" W. Vaughn. The Vaughn twins were Kuchan's uncles, and they were killed, together, in action Sept. 11, 1944, near Verneville, France. The chronicle concludes, after a long, frustrating endeavor to get the medals back, with a kept promise — one that Kuchan made to her grandmother, her uncles' mother — and with a secure home for the medals at the Western Illinois University Libraries' Archives and Special Collections Unit. Read more. |
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