Five Selected for 2012 Founders Day Awards
Four Graduates, One Honorary Alumnus to Be Honored In February
Four outstanding graduates of the University of Utah and one honorary alumnus have been selected to receive 2012 Founders Day awards.
Actress Klea Blackhurst BFA'85, businessman H. Roger Boyer BS'65, former U vice president J. Michael Mattsson BS'60, and scientist Arthur L. Ruoff PhD'55 will all be presented with the Distinguished Alumnus/a Award. These awards are the highest honor the University of Utah Alumni Association gives to U graduates, in recognition of their outstanding professional achievements and/or public service. Gary Crocker, a Utah entrepreneur who founded Research Medical, will receive an Honorary Alumnus Award, in recognition of his support of the University.
The awards will be presented at the Alumni Association's Founders Day Banquet on February 22. Save the date, and please plan to join us for the awards festivities!
Klea Blackhurst is a professional actress, singer, and comedienne who currently plays Shelby Cross on The Onion News Network, a comedy on the Independent Film Channel. Blackhurst has appeared in numerous off-Broadway productions, and her homage to Ethel Merman, Everything the Traffic Will Allow, received accolades including theinaugural Special Achievement Award from Time Out New York magazine. Blackhurst has also sung in concert appearances in London and all over the U.S., including with symphony orchestras, and now teaches master voice classes. She also does television commercials and voiceover work for radio. Blackhurst made her debut as a toddler on the stage of Pioneer Memorial Theatre at the U, and her undergraduate experience as a student in the U’s Equity Apprenticeship Program allowed her to move to New York City with her Equity card, the “golden ticket” to the professional actors’ union. Read more about her in an article in the Fall issue of Continuum magazine.
Roger Boyer (MBA, Harvard) is chair and founder of The Boyer Company, which has developed numerous significant commercial properties throughout the Intermountain West, including The Gateway in Salt Lake City and several buildings in the U's Research Park. He is a former board chair of the Federal Reserve (Salt Lake Branch), the Salt Lake Area Chamber of Commerce, and the Utah Division of Business and Economic Development, and has also served as a member of other significant boards including the Economic Development Corporation of Utah and Salt Lake Convention and Visitors Bureau. He has also supported the community on the Utah Arts Council and as chair of the United Way. For the U, he has served as a member of the University of Utah’s Board of Trustees, as well as on institutional boards including those of the University of Utah Hospital and the U's ARUP Laboratories. He has previously been recognized with honors including the Giant in Our City Award from the Salt Lake Chamber.
Mike Mattsson served the U in numerous development and communications leadership roles over the course of more than 40 years, including as the University's vice president of development from 1985 to 2006, helping the U raise a then-unprecedented $1.7 billion. He currently supports the U as a member of the School of Music Advisory Board and the board of the Natural History Museum of Utah. Mattsson has also served the community in roles including as president of the Rotary Club of Salt Lake City, chair of the Salt Lake County Art Collection Committee, and chair of the Project Reality Treatment Center. In the early 1960s, Mattsson also served our country in the U.S. Army as a First Lieutenant, infantry and intelligence. He has previously been recognized with honors including the Outstanding Fund Raising Professional Award from the Utah Society of Fund Raisers and the Honorary Alumnus Award from the U’s S.J. Quinney College of Law. Read more about him in a 2005 article from Continuum magazine.
Art Ruoff has had an influential and award-winning career in the field of high-pressure chemistry and materials science. In 1990, by squeezing small samples between two diamond anvils, he reached a static pressure of 416 GigaPascals (GPa), becoming the first scientist to create a static pressure greater than that at the center of the Earth. A professor at Cornell University since completing his doctoral studies, he cofounded its Department of Materials Science & Engineering and later served as its director for a decade. He was named professor emeritus in 2006, allowing him more time for research, as well as consulting to industries and laboratories on high pressure phenomena, including diamond production. Ruoff has written two influential books on materials science, published more than 300 articles, and developed a tutorial course that has been used at 60 universities. He has been recognized with honors including a National Science Foundation fellowship and the Bridgman Medal for outstanding high-pressure research. Henry S. White, distinguished professor and chair of the U's chemistry department, says: "His award-winning research has changed our fundamental understanding of how matter behaves under extreme conditions."
Gary Crocker (B.S. and MBA, Harvard), a highly successful biomedical innovator and investor, is currently president of Crocker Ventures, a private equity firm investing in early-stage life sciences enterprises, and chair of Merrimack Pharmaceuticals, one of the largest private biotechnology firms in the United States. Crocker founded Research Medical, a manufacturer of specialty medical devices that was later acquired in what was at that time the most lucrative transaction in the history of the Utah life sciences industry. He also cofounded the pharmaceutical company Theratech, which became a leader in creating transdermal drug patches. Former chair of the board for the U’s ARUP Laboratories, former member of the U’s Board of Trustees, and current chair of the U’s College of Science advisory board, Crocker has also been a major “investor” in the University of Utah, from creating the Crocker Science House for honors students to providing the generous lead gift for the Crocker Science Center, the new home for the U’s College of Science. He has been inducted into the Utah Technology Council Hall of Fame and has twice been selected as Utah Entrepreneur of the Year by both Ernst & Young and the MountainWest Capital Network.
Four U graduates and one honorary alumnus will receive awards at the Alumni Association's 2012 Founders Day Banquet in February.