Membership

     1. Edward Adams

Professor of English, Washington & Lee University. Adams received his B.A. in classics from Amherst College, his M.A. in classics from the University of California, Berkeley and his Ph.D. in English from Yale University.

2. Tom Camden

Tom Camden, Associate Professor, Director of Special Collections and University Archivist, Washington and Lee University, has inspired thousands of people ranging from elementary students to lawmakers with his dynamic tours of library treasures. Whether captivating the attention of a group of fourth graders, high school juniors, or That Club members, he is a master at drawing an audience into the personal stories of men and women of history.

Camden holds an MSLS from the University of Tennessee. Prior to his position with Washington and Lee, he worked as Director of Special Collections for the Library of Virginia, manuscripts curator at the New Hampshire Historical Society, head of the Hargrett Rare Book and Manuscript Library at the University of Georgia, and director of the museum and research library at the George C. Marshall Foundation, Virginia Military Institute. Camden is a 1976 graduate of Washington and Lee.

3. David Coffey

David Coffey was born in Stonewall Jackson’s house when it was a hospital and cannot remember a time when he was not fascinated with history. His interest in the past was fostered by some of his early teachers, especially Miss Edmonia Smith and Miss Lucy Ackerley, as well as his family.

A double major in History and English at Davidson College, he received an M.A. in American History from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His thesis, “William Henry Ruffner: Race and Public Education in Post-Reconstruction Virginia,” was directed by Joel Williamson. Coffey completed all the course work for his doctorate at the University of Virginia. Coffey began teaching history at VMI in 1989.

4. Tom Contos

Tom Contos has served Washington and Lee as university architect since 1999. Originally from Pennsylvania, he's a graduate of Haverford College (B.A. philosophy) and Harvard University's Graduate School of Design (M. Arch).  Working as an architect in San Franciso, he focused on designing buildings for research and development, including the Keck Observatory in Hawaii. Since 1985, he has been a planner for several campuses including the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Bloomsburg University of Pennsylvania. He married Barbara Walsh in 1988 and the couple has one daughter. Tom has served as a trustee of the Historic Lexington Foundation, and the Rockbridge Health Center, and is currently an advisory member of the Bryn Mawr College Board of Trustees. He's an avid runner and competes in local races. He enjoys studying foreign languages, including French, Russian, and ancient/modern Greek, drawing and painting, and has recently taken up the piano (with That Club member J. Cook!).

5. Jonathan Chapman Cook

Jonathan Chapman Cook (b. 1984) is a freelance pianist, composer, organist, and teacher based in Lexington, VA, where he has lived since 2012. A native of Kalamazoo, Michigan, Jonathan received his Bachelor's Degree in Piano Performance and Music Composition from Western Michigan University, and his Master's Degree in Piano Performance from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor. Jonathan has recently been featured as a guest artist at the University of Michigan, Washington and Lee University, the Garth Newel Music Center, and as a distinguished alumni at Western Michigan University. He serves as organist and music director at St. Luke's Episcopal Church in Hot Springs, VA, and is active as a music teacher in Lexington and Bath County. As a composer, Jonathan's music draws from influences as diverse as classical, jazz, world music, and electronic dance music. He is currently passionately interested in free improvisation, and in addition to many collaborations in this area, occasionally presents solo recitals that are freely improvised from beginning to end. In addition to music, Jonathan's interests include poetry, philosophy, yoga, religion, the natural sciences, and humanistic depth psychology, with a particular interest in psychodynamics, the hypothesis of self-actualization, and dream analysis.

6. David Cox

Episcopal priest, sort-of retired; former rector of R. E. Lee Memorial; former Lex city councilman; teaches at SVU; Lee aficionado.

7. Scott Dubit

Scott Dubit, MD is board certified in both pediatrics and internal medicine. He was raised in the Washington, D.C. suburbs. Scott went to college at Washington University in St. Louis, where he studied biology, art history (via Rembrandt), and English literature. While at Vanderbilt School of Medicine in Nashville, he got to drive Minnie Pearl home. Medical internship & residency training was at the University of Rochester in New York. Honors have included ODK (national leadership), Phi Beta Kappa (academic excellence), and AOA (medical honor society). In 1993 he wisely moved to Rockbridge County where he lives with his wife and three children. The Dubit family has benefited from their neighbors, the Effinger community, the beauty of Rockbridge County, and from the examples of generosity demonstrated by local residents. Hobbies include bee-keeping and hiking. Dr. Dubit is an award winning teacher of UVA medical students. Volunteer activities include work at the free clinic. Dr. Dubit has received state-wide recognition for his work to promote breast feeding, and to reduce domestic violence. He also has an interest in limiting the use of medications, and in the appropriate treatment of viral illnesses.

8. Tim Gaylard

Timothy Gaylard is Professor of Music at Washington and Lee, where he has been a member of the faculty since 1984 and was Chairman of the Music Department from 2000 until 2008; he was interim Chair in 2012-2013. Tim, a native of Ottawa, received his B.A. and B. Mus. degrees from Carleton University in Canada, and has associateship diplomas in piano performance and piano pedagogy from the Royal Conservatory of Music. He studied at the Mozarteum in Salzburg, Austria, and obtained his M.A. and Ph.D. in historical musicology from Columbia University with a dissertation on seventeenth-century English musical dialogues. He has performed extensively as a pianist in both Canada and the United States. He is a regular reviewer of the Roanoke Symphony for The Roanoke Times. His research interests include Mozart's influence on Beethoven, British piano music from 1800 to 1920, and the piano music of Liszt. Recently, he and his colleague, Shuko Watanabe, released a CD on Parma Recordings of Clementi works played on a rare 1814 Clementi grand fortepiano given to the Music Department by alumnus, Dr. Larry Smith, '58, and his wife, Ganelle. At Washington and Lee, Professor Gaylard teaches courses on American Music, Classical Music, Romantic Music, Music History for majors, Introduction to Music, and Music in the Films of Stanley Kubrick, as well as applied lessons in piano performance. He is also an active member of the Marlbrook Chamber Ensemble and director of the W&L Concert Guild. He and his wife, Catharine, have three daughters and two grand-daughters.

9. Albert Gordon

Education:

Ph.D. - Theatre, Tulane University, 1965, Dissertation: A Critical Study of the History & Development of the Playwrights' Producing Company

M.A. - Dramatic Art, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1958, Thesis: The Soldier and the U.D.C., A Comedy in Three Acts

B.A. - Dramatic Art, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 1956

Academic and Theatrical Experience:

1991-2002: Professor and Chairman, Department of Theatre, Washington and Lee University, Lexington, VA.

1974-1991: Professor and Chairman, Department of Fine Arts, Washington & Lee University, Lexington, VA.

1965-74: Professor of Theatre, University of Toledo, Toledo, OH. 

1963-65: Graduate assistant and Instructor, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA.

1959-62: Associate Professor of Humanities and Director of Drama, Armstrong College 

1958-59: Instructor of Fine Arts, Union College, Barbourville, KY. 
1956-58: Technical Scenic Assistant, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, N.C.

1955-56: Actor in Unto These Hills, Cherokee, N.C; Actor in several productions with Mill Mountain Theatre, Roanoke, VA.
1977-88: Manager, The Henry Street Playhouse (summer theater), Lexington, VA.

2010-13 - President, Lexington Branch, English Speaking Union.

2007-2014 - Organizer, Shakespeare Competition - ESU.

10. George Graves

A former broadcaster and newspaper reporter, editorial writer and editor, George has most recently worked with colleges and universities on public relations and fundraising, including the past decade as a grants specialist at Washington and Lee. Active in community organizations, he has been a member of the board of directors of the Maury Service Authority (regional water and sewage treatment) since 2002. He counts Morse Code, Esperanto, pogo sticks and fencing among his passing fancies.

11. Josh Harvey

A 2000 graduate of Washington and Lee majoring in music theory and composition, Josh earned a master's in musical direction of musical theater at the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, and was musical director of its production of Stephen Sondheim's "Company" at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. An accomplished composer and keyboardist, he directs the VMI Glee Club and is a faculty accompanist and music director at W&L. He has helped stage and direct musicals by (540) Productions, and performs at events in and around Lexington, and sometimes well beyond.

12. David Howison

David Howison, Retired W & L Dean of Students, Coach of River Runners, Masters Runner, chess player and film buff.

13. Len Jarrard

Robert Lee Telford Professor, Emeritus, Washington & Lee University: My research centers generally around studying the neural bases of learning and memory, and more specifically on the contributions the different medial temporal lobe structures (especially hippocampus) make to these complex cognitive processes. Our most recent research findings indicate that the hippocampus is importantly involved in modulating food intake and thus is thought to play an important role in obesity.

14. John Jennings

Professor of Journalism and Mass Communications, Emeritus, Washington and Lee University.

15. Jim Kvach

Jim Kvach has served on the Board of Directors for the Rockbridge Area Relief Association (RARA), the Boxerwood Education Association, and Rockbridge Area Habitat for Humanity. For years he volunteered around 5 hours of work per week, participating in the construction of over 20 homes in Rockbridge County for Habitat. Each summer and spring, he donates hundreds of pounds of produce from his garden to the RARA Food Pantry. In addition to his own garden, he also tends gardens at the Stonewall Jackson House.

16. Shane Lynch

Shane Lynch, a noted conductor, composer, and music educator, assumed the position Director of Choral Activities at Washington and Lee University in the Fall of 2009.  He conducts the University Singers, Cantatrici, and the Men’s Glee Club, and oversees W&L’s innovative and unique conductor mentorship/teacher preparation program.  Dr. Lynch is a sought-after clinician, having worked with honor choirs in Colorado, Minnesota, Montana, Virginia, Washington and Wisconsin. Quite interested in musical scholarship, some of his recent research includes trends of Neo-Impressionism in modern American choral music and the a cappella Psalm settings of Mendelssohn.  He is also noted for conducting large-scale productions, including operas, oratorios, and festival concerts.  Dr. Lynch has led choirs on several national and international tours, including featured performances in Scotland, South Korea, and Italy.

Dr. Lynch has received numerous awards as an educator, including the Junior Faculty Member of the Year at Monmouth College and the Outstanding Faculty Service Award at the University of Wisconsin—Barron.  An active composer interested in a wide variety of compositional styles and mediums, he has compositions ranging from art song to octavos to choral/orchestral work.  Please see www.shanelynchmusic.com for more information about his compositional work.

Prior to his appointment at Washington and Lee, Dr. Lynch served as Visiting Director of Choral Activities at Monmouth College (Illinois) and Director of Choral Activities at the University of Wisconsin—Barron as well as several past positions in church music and teaching high school science.

Shane Lynch graduated from Concordia College (Moorhead, Minnesota), with degrees in Music and Physics, received the Master of Music degree in Conducting from the University of Northern Colorado, and completed his Doctor of Musical Arts degree in Choral Conducting at the University of Washington. He lives in Lexington with his wife, Lacey, and his two children, Brendan and Abigail.

17. Fran MacDonnell

Francis MacDonnell is a professor of history at Southern Virginia University. Dr. MacDonnell has served on the faculty since 1997. Prior to arriving at Southern Virginia University, he was a lecturer in history at Yale University from 1993 to 1995. He authored “Insidious Foes: The Axis Fifth Column and the American Home Front” (Oxford University Press, 1995) as well as articles in Civil War History, the International Journal of Intelligence and Counterintelligence, and the Journal of American Culture.

He has presented scholarly papers at the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations, the Southern Historical Association, and the Organization of American Historians. His main areas of teaching interest include American civilization and politics, the American Civil War, and twentieth century American history.

A.B., St. Michael's College, 1981; M.A., Marquette University, 1983; A.M., Ph.D., Harvard University, 1986, 1991

18. James Pannabecker

In 1993, soon after being promoted to the senior lawyer spot I thought I wanted, I found myself asking, “Is this all I’m going to do for 25 more years?” I quit and became a writer. Since then, I’ve been the author or co-author of 29 books on banking law, a monthly newsletter called The Banker’s Letter of the Law, and numerous articles, including a 2001 critique of subprime lending. Although these writings bring in the bacon, I like to think my poems and stories carry more punch. I recently completed my third unpublished novel, “Transplants,” about an aspiring plant biologist whose explosive relationships landed her in the Witness Protection Program. My March 2014 That Club presentation, “Conversations with a Garden,” pointed out my passion for organic gardening and how my wife, Karen, and I try to grow and raise most of our own food. I’m also a musician (piano, violin, and voice) and runner (veteran of more than 30 marathons and ultramarathons).

19. Omar Paredes

We were on our way to Charlottesville, from our home in North Carolina, to open a new practice when we passed through Rockbridge County and fell in love with the beautiful countryside and the small-town warmth of Lexington, Virginia. 

I am truly dedicated to what I do and believe that the quality of care should be patient-centered above all. My 15 years of clinical hospital and teaching experience provide a new level of service for patients in the Rockbridge area.

Before moving to Lexington, I was the program director and clinical supervisor for the General Practice Residency at the Brody School of Medicine at East Carolina University, Greenville, NC, and Adjunct Professor for the Department of Dental Ecology School of Dentistry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, NC.

20. Frank Parsons (Emeritus)

A 1954 graduate of Washington and Lee and a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Frank was a key part of the university's administration for many years. Acknowledging his service, W&L named the road along the sororities and near the football stadium Frank Parsons Way. He was That Club's secretary for decades, taking deserved pride in the detailed minutes he produced for each meeting. Respected for his ability to manage complex projects, Frank oversaw the rebuilding of Lexington Presbyterian Church after it burned in 2000.

21. Howard Pickett

As Director of the Shepherd Program, Professor Pickett works with affiliated faculty, staff, community partners, and alumni to provide students with the understanding and skills needed to address the pressing moral and social problems associated with poverty. In addition to directing the program’s co-curricular offerings, he also teaches the introductory, fieldwork, and capstone courses in Poverty and Human Capability Studies. Professor Pickett received his BA in Religious Studies and Classics from Millsaps College and his PhD in Religious Studies from The University of Virginia. Before joining the Shepherd Program in 2011, he taught courses in business ethics and modern religious thought at The University of Virginia.

22. George Ray

Educated at Wesleyan University, Colgate University, and the University of Rochester, where he received his Ph.D. in English Literature, George Ray subsequently taught a wide range of British literature courses, including  ones on Shakespeare, medieval and Renaissance drama, modern British and American drama, and modern continental drama over a forty-year teaching career at the University of Rochester, the University of Virginia, and Washington and Lee University, from which he retired in 2001 as Professor Emeritus of  English.  A recipient of several fellowships and editor of critical editions of Chapman’s Byron plays in Garland’s Renaissance drama series, he was a selected participant for numerous Folger Institute workshops, including the first NEH Institute on “Shakespeare in Performance” at the Folger Shakespeare Library in 1981. A Visiting Fellow at University College, Oxford in 1980, he also directed biennial courses in Shakespearean stage history from 1973 to 1998 in London during W. and L.’s Spring Term Abroad program.  For 15 years he served as the U. S. Academic Advisor for Advanced Studies in England (ASE), an undergraduate humanities program based in Bath.  In addition to serving on the Academic Board of ASE, Professor Ray has also served on National Boards of Directors for the English-Speaking Union of the United States (2002-09) and Chi Psi Fraternity, for which he served two terms as its national President from 1995-2001.

George Ray also served as an officer in the U. S. Marine Corps from 1954-57. Since 1964 he and his wife Pree have resided in Lexington from which they often travel to visit their four children and ten grandchildren.  A founding member of The Friends of the Library at W. and L., Dr. Ray currently serves on its Board, and also serves as an elder on the Session of Lexington Presbyterian Church.

23. Brian Richardson

Brian Richardson is the Redenbaugh Professor in Journalism and Mass Communications and a 1973 graduate of Washington and Lee. He earned his master’s degree in communications in 1975 and the Ph.D. in mass communications in 1990, both from the University of Florida. He has worked for local television and radio news operations in Virginia and Florida, and was a reporter and editor at The Tallahassee Democrat, The Miami Herald and The Philadelphia Inquirer for more than 10 years. During his reporting career he covered local government, courts, urban affairs and education. He taught at the University of Florida from 1986 to 1990, when he returned to Washington and Lee. He has taught numerous reporting courses, journalism and media ethics and state and local government.  In 1996-97 he was a visiting research fellow at University College, Oxford. He is the author of the textbook The Process of Writing News: From Information to Story. His research and scholarly interests include journalism ethics, the role of news media in subnational governance, and new media. He will retire in June of this year.    

24. Ed Spencer

I grew up in southeast Arkansas, got an BS degree in physics from W&L, doctorate from Columbia in geology, am currently an emeritus faculty member at W&L, I continue geological research and working for RACC. 

25. Bob Youngblood

Bob Youngblood is Emeritus Professor of German and Italian, having taught at Washington & Lee University from 1965 to the present. He taught at The Catholic University, Milan, Italy, 2007 to 2011. He studied at universities in Heidelberg, Germany, and Perugia, Italy. His interests include classical music, opera, hiking, cycling, travel, building for Habitat for Humanity, and scholarly writing and publishing. He also enjoys tooting his beloved bassoon in the Rockbridge Symphony.