As Part Of Its Major Campaign Kick-Off, Haverford College Honors Leaders In Business, Medicine, Higher Education And Community Service

The campus-wide convocation ceremony, signaled the start of the public phase of the College's $200 million capital campaign, "Educating to Lead, Educating to Serve."

Mary Louise Allen, director of the College's community outreach and volunteer program and the women's center, received an honorary doctor of humane letters. Long affiliated with community service in the Philadelphia area, Allen has been a member of numerous local organizations including "From All Walks of Life," the sponsoring organization of the Philadelphia AIDS Walk, the Eldernet/Lower Merion Coalition of Aging, the Delaware Valley Association of Directors of Volunteer Programs, the United Way of Southeastern Pennsylvania, the Volunteer Action Council and the Ardmore Avenue Community Center.

A long time resident of Ardmore, Allen re-established Serendipity Summer Day Camp on the College's campus and over the past two decades built the camp's enrollment to over 250 neighborhood children.

Also receiving an honorary doctor of humane letters was a Haverford College corporation member and former vice chair of the board, Asia Bennett of Snohomish, Washington. A life-long advocate of peace and social justice, Bennett is being recognized for her extensive service in communities around the world as part of the Friends World Committee for Consultation, Section of the Americas and the American Friends Service Committee. In 1980 she became the first woman to hold the position of executive secretary for the American Friends Service Committee. Raised in a Quaker household in Haverford, she graduated from Westtown School and attended Bryn Mawr College. She is a member of Swarthmore Monthly Meeting and Philadelphia Yearly Meeting.

An honorary doctor of laws also was awarded to Gerald M. Levin, chairman and chief executive officer of Time Warner, Inc. A 1960 alumnus of Haverford and former chair of the College's board of managers, Levin is a native of Overbrook Hills and a Lower Merion High School graduate. He also received a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania.

Levin's career with the communications and entertainment giant began in 1972 when he joined Time, Inc. as the vice president for programming for HBO, the company's pay-cable subsidiary. In 1976 he was promoted to chair of Home Box Office, following his historic decision to distribute HBO via satellite, which helped create the modern cable industry. Eight years later (in 1984) he became Time Inc.'s chief strategist when he was named an executive vice president. He is considered the leading architect of the Time Warner merger which took place in 1990, as well as the prime mover of Time Warner's agreement to merge with Turner Broadcasting System in 1996.

Levin is a director of the New York Stock Exchange, Inc. and serves on the boards of the New York Philharmonic, the Center for Communication, the New York City Partnership, The Aspen Institute and The Museum of Jewish Heritage. He also is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Economic Club of New York and The Trilateral Commission.

A 1965 Haverford College alumnus and leading authority on affirmative action also was awarded an honorary doctor of laws by the College. Charles R. Lawrence, a lawyer and civil rights advocate from Washington, D.C. is the co-author of three books on constitutional law and affirmative action: We Won't Go Back: Making the Case for Affirmative Action, Words That Wound: Critical Race Theory, Assaultive Speech and The First Amendment and The Bakke Case: The Politics of Inequality. Lawrence currently teaches constitutional law, race discrimination law and education law at the Georgetown University Law Center and is the recipient of The Myers Center Award for the Study of Human Rights in North America, the W.K. Kellog Foundation National Fellowship and the Outstanding Contribution Award from the National Black Police Association.

A member of Haverford College's history faculty and award-winning author, Roger Lane, received an honorary doctor of letters. Lane, who holds The Benjamin R. Collins Research Professorship of Social Sciences at Haverford, is a nationally known expert on crime and violence in America. His most recent book entitled, Murder in America: A History, traces our nation's record of homicidal violence and capital punishment from pre-colonial times to the present. Lane received the Urban History Association's Best Book Award in 1992 for William Dorsey's Philadelphia and Ours: On the History and Future of the Black City in America, and the Bancroft Prize in American History in 1997 for his Roots of Violence in Black Philadelphia, 1860-1900. His other books, Policing the City: Boston 1822-1885 and Violent Death in the City: Suicide, Accident and Murder in 19th Century Philadelphia, provide an in-depth look at past urban issues that now shape the lives of modern city dwellers. In 1998 friends of Lane established The Roger Lane Scholarship Fund to provide financial aid to minority students who are alumni of "A Better Chance" program.

Three Haverford College alumni were awarded honorary doctor of science degrees. Philadelphia philanthropist and former vice-chair and director of Atochem North America (formerly Pennwalt Corporation), Edwin E. Tuttle, was honored by Haverford for his impressive career as a chemist and business executive as well as his longtime support of educational and cultural institutions throughout the area. Tuttle, who graduated from Haverford in 1949, has served at various times as a director of the United Way of Southeastern Pennsylvania, the Pennsylvania Ballet, the Westmoreland Coal Company, CoreStates Bank, N.A. and the Metropolitan Philadelphia Family of YMCAs. Tuttle also is a former vice chair of Haverford College's board of managers and a former executive committee member of the College's alumni association.

A 1962 Haverford graduate, who currently chairs the chemistry department at Massachusetts Institute of Technology also was awarded an honorary doctorate in science. Stephen J. Lippard, who holds the Arthur Amos Noyes Professor of Chemistry at MIT, was recognized for his pioneering research in inorganic and biological chemistry. His work has led to a number of drug studies involving platinum anti-cancer drugs, combinatorial drug design and synthesis and the development of reagents for studying neurochemical signaling. Lippard is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the National Institute of Medicine and the National Academy of Sciences, and has been honored by numerous organizations including the International Precious Metals Institute and the American Chemical Society.

The third recipient of an honorary doctorate in science was Dr. William H. Harris, whose innovations in implant surgical procedures helped to develop a new polyethylene used as the replacement for cartilage in hip and knee joint surgeries. A 1949 graduate of Haverford College, Dr. Harris is the chief of adult reconstruction surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital. During his near half-century in medicine, Harris also has taught orthopedic surgery at Harvard University Medical School and lectured at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Currently he co-chairs the Advancement and the Nominations and Governance Committees of the College's board.