Heritage
(graduated more than 50 years ago)
G. Wakuraya Wanjohi “Gertie Buis” ’65 has completed a five-year task: the writing of her biography. The book, Daughter of Three Worlds: An Education in Values, can be found on Amazon.com. She writes, “Calvin College does of course figure in the book and especially my mentor, the late Professor Lewis B. Smedes as well as another favorite professor, Nicholas Wolterstorff. Both of them have visited our home in Kenya and have met my husband, Dr. Gerald Wanjohi, who happens also to have been a philosophy professor for many years.”
Cal De Witt ’57 has written a paper in the Quarterly Review of Biology titled “Earth Stewardship and Laudato Si’,” and it is one of the five most-read articles in QRB for the year. The article may be downloaded free at journals.uchicago.edu/doi/ull/10.1086/688096.
Carol Baatenburg Lindsay ex’65 is part of the Carlsbad, California, Senior Theatre, which presents humorous plays to schools in Oceanside, Carlsbad and Encinitas. She also continues to meet with the P3Ws, a group of San Diego County writers and artists who have been professionally connected for more than 40 years.
A few years ago, Frank DeVries ’62 put the iconic poem “In Flanders Fields” to music as a tribute to the men and women of the Canadian Armed Forces who in 1945 came to liberate the people of Holland. At the time he donated the music to Dominion Command, the headquarters of the Royal Canadian Legion, in Ottawa. It was picked up by a gospel group in Southern Alberta called Pete and the Re-Petes and can be viewed on YouTube by searching Flanders Fields DeVries.
Richard Dale Sjoerdsma ’62 received the Distinguished Alumni Award from Ohio State University. He was chosen in recognition of contributions made to the music profession as “scholar, teacher, performer and editor.” The latter refers to his continuing position as editor-in-chief of the Journal of Singing, an international periodical on the art, practice, pedagogy and science of voice. Richard taught music at Carthage College in Kenosha, Wis., for 39 years, retiring in 2007. He continues to conduct the adult choir at St. Mary’s Lutheran Church and MGV-Harmonia, Kenosha’s German male chorus.
1960s
Calvin education professor emeritus Tom Hoeksema ’68 has been awarded the 2017 Henry J. Nouwen Award from the Religion and Spirituality Division of the American Association of Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, given in recognition of individuals who reflect a “Nouwen style” of compassion, commitment, dedication to ministry, and servanthood that values and esteems people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Edward Wierenga ’69 professor of religion and of philosophy at the University of Rochester, has written Philosophy of Religion (Wiley- Blackwell, 2016), a book that aims to introduce many of the central issues in philosophy of religion as well as make original contributions to the field. Ed will retire in June after 40 years at Rochester, nearly half of them as chair of religion and classics. He looks forward to more time traveling with Wilma Vierzen Wierenga ’67, who has already retired from her position as professor of German at Rochester Institute of Technology.
1970s
Morrie Dieleman ’70 and Mary Langeland Dieleman ‘72 along with their son, Justin Dieleman ’02 and daughter-in-law Mandy, have established Pure Mitten Hops, a farm near Coopersville, Michigan, that is currently producing three varieties of the plant essential for beer and the growing craft brewing industry. You can read more about this family venture at puremittenhops.com.
Donna Brink Fox ’72 is senior as- 07 sociate dean of academic and student affairs at the Eastman School of Music at the University of Rochester (N.Y.). She has held a faculty appointment in music education since 1984 and was named Eisenhart Professor of Music Education in 1998, the first endowed professor to be named at the Eastman School. She founded and continues to direct the summer Orff Schulwerk teacher education course and designed an early childhood music program for the Eastman Community Music School, which she continues to direct, now in its 31st program year.
1980s
Daniel Scheeres ’85, a University of Colorado distinguished professor, was elected to the National Academy of Engineering’s Class of 2017 “for pioneering work on the motion of bodies in strongly perturbed environments such as near asteroids and comets.” He has nearly 30 years experience in planetary science, space navigation, orbit determination and control. Daniel is an international leader in astrodynamics and celestial mechanics and globally recognized for his work in small body (asteroids, moons and comets) missions. He is the radio science team lead for NASA’s OSIRIS-REx mission, which will collect samples from an asteroid and return them to Earth.
Bonnie Triezenberg ’80 is a doctoral candidate at the Pardee RAND Graduate School and an assistant policy analyst at RAND. Previously, she was a senior technical fellow at the Boeing Company, specializing in agile systems and software development. In her extensive career at Boeing, she contributed to the successful deployment of more than 100 spacebased systems, leading system and software development for a range of complex embedded and enterprise processing systems for weather, communication, navigation and imaging spacecraft for both government and commercial customers. At RAND she has focused on policy issues in national security, science and technology.
Kevin VanDuyn ’88 has published a book of Christmas sermons titled The Birth of Jesus the Messiah: The Stories of Matthew and Luke for Preaching and Teaching (WestBow Press). The book is intended to serve as a starting point, an introduction to the passages and themes of the birth narratives, as well as ideas for preaching and teaching them. The book is available on Amazon. Ed is the pastor of Webster Christian Reformed Church in New York.
Ed Visser ’82 has published a book of Christmas sermons titled The Birth of Jesus the Messiah: The Stories of Matthew and Luke for Preaching and Teaching (WestBow Press). The book is intended to serve as a starting point, an introduction to the passages and themes of the birth narratives, as well as ideas for preaching and teaching them. The book is available on Amazon. Ed is the pastor of Webster Christian Reformed Church in New York.
1990s
Angela Ajayi ’97 is the recipient of a PEN/Robert J. Dau Short Story Prize for Emerging Writers, which recognizes 12 emerging fiction writers each year for their debut short story published in a literary magazine or cultural website and aims to support the launch of their careers as fiction writers. She is being honored for her story “Galina,” which appeared in the fall 2016 edition of the publication Fifth Wednesday Journal. The independent book publisher Catapult will publish the 12 winning stories in an anthology (to be released this year) titled The PEN America Best Debut Short Stories.
Julia Scheeres ’90 is the author of A Thousand Lives. The book tells the story of Jonestown, an American religious organization under the leadership of Jim Jones, in northwestern Guyana, that became internationally notorious when in 1978, a total of 918 people died by drinking cyanide at the direction of Jones. Julia drew from recently declassified FBI documents and audiotapes, as well as rare videos and interviews, to piece together a history of the doomed camp, focusing on five people who lived there. The book is available at Amazon.com.
Angela Hartsell ’99 was a finalist for the Life, Well Run Community Hero campaign, sponsored by the International City/County Management Association. This is in recognition of nine years developing the Community Gardens program in San Antonio (taking it from three to 48 gardens). She is on sabbatical studying urban design in the conflict zone of Cyprus.
2000s
Lauren Gamelin Van Keulen ’08 is co-founder and co-executive director with husband Jonathan of 3:11 Youth Housing. The Grand Rapids organization sets once-homeless young people on a path toward a “healthy interdependence” with safe and affordable places to live and grow. The organization’s name comes from 1 Corinthians 3:11: “For no one can lay any foundation other than that which is laid in Jesus Christ.”
Nate Knapper ’08 graduated from the FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia, and become an FBI special agent. Following a rigorous curriculum— including academics, firearms, handto- hand combat, tactical training, and emergency driving techniques—he has been placed in the bureau’s Detroit division, where he works on the human trafficking and violent crimes against children squad. Pictured is Nate (right) and former FBI Director James Comey.
The Schreuder family gathered at the Prince Conference Center on Calvin’s campus this past February. Calvin alums pictured include Shirley Schreuder Swim ’65, Anne Schreuder Kelly ’69, Betty Schreuder Hommel ’68, Lois Schreuder Wierenga ’74, Ellen Schreuder ’75, Susan Schreuder VandenBerg ’95, Bill Reiffer ’04, Allison Wierenga Reiffer ’04, Mark Wierenga ’07, Jenna Van Klompenberg Wierenga ’07.
Amy Jonason ’08 has earned a PhD in sociology from the University of Notre Dame and is an assistant professor of sociology at Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina.
In July 2016, a mini-reunion occurred in Owasso, Mich., between four women who graduated from Calvin College in 2000. Dawn Boven, Carrie Vander Zwaag Brand, Kyliah Clarke Villa, and Nadya Zheltuhina Vyshegorodtseva became acquainted in Bolt-Heyns-Timmer Hall and lived together in Chi 18 during their senior year. Over the years, their friendship grew stronger despite being spread across the globe. When Nadya and her family came to Michigan from Russia for a visit in 2016, it was the perfect time to get together. Carrie came from New Zealand; Kyliah and her daughter, Samantha, flew from Minnesota; and Dawn traveled from Traverse City, Mich. For 24 hours, the friends reminisced, shared stories about their lives and families, and watched Nadya’s two daughters, Anya and Tanya, bond with Samantha despite language and cultural differences. Pictured (first row, from left): Tanya Vyshegorodtseva, Samantha Villa, Anya Vyshegorodtseva and Dawn Boven, (second row): Kyliah Villa, Nadya Vyshegorodtseva, and Carrie Vander Zwaag Brand.
2010s
Rachel Guerrero ’12 wrote and illustrated The Cactus Who Craved a Hamburger (and Other Stories), a children’s picture book set in the country of Malaysia, where she resides. The book was published in April 2017.
