November 07, 2007
Bowling
Green, Ky. - Saturday’s 57th annual Student Publications Homecoming Breakfast will have an extra item on the menu for alumni and friends of Western Kentucky University’s student newspaper and yearbook – the dedication of the new Adams-Whitaker Student Publications Center.
The dedication ceremony will begin at 10 a.m. at the facility on Normal Drive.
The facility is named for Bob Adams and the late David B. Whitaker, both WKU graduates who served as editor of the College Heights Herald and as director of Student Publications (Herald and Talisman). Both are members of WKU’s Hall of Distinguished Alumni and the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame.
The ceremony will include remarks from President Gary Ransdell; Provost Barbara Burch; Chuck Clark, president of the Student Publications Alumni Association and chairman of the fund raising steering committee; Bob Adams; and David T. Whitaker, representing his father and his sisters Julie and Jane.
A grassroots fund-raising campaign by Student Publications alumni has helped raise more than $1 million for the $1.6 million facility. Several donors will be recognized during Saturday’s event.
The dedication will follow the annual Student Publications breakfast which begins at 9 a.m. in the Mass Media and Technology Hall atrium.
Adams was Herald editor in 1964, has been an adviser to the paper since 1968 and has been director of Student Publications since 1990. He received his bachelor’s in 1964 and master’s in 1965.
Adams was named Journalism Educator of the Year by the National Association of Black Journalists in 2007, was inducted into the College Media Advisers Hall of Fame in 2006 and the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame in 2005 and received the Distinguished Newspaper Adviser Award from the National Council of College Publications Advisers (now CMA) in 1978, the WKU President’s Diversity Award in 2004 and the WKU Student Advisement Award in 2005.
Whitaker served as Herald editor in the 1942-43 school year and again in 1947-48 after returning from active duty with the U.S. Marine Corps. He was head of the journalism department from its inception in 1977 until his retirement from the position in 1987 and was director of Student Publications from 1970 to 1987. Whitaker received his bachelor’s in 1948 and master’s in 1949.
Whitaker, whose newspaper career included positions at Bowling Green Daily News, The Courier-Journal and The Louisville Times, was inducted into the Kentucky Journalism Hall of Fame in 1986. He also was a member of the Kentucky Press Association, the Society of Professional Journalists and the National Council of College Publications Advisers (now CMA). He died in 2005.
More WKU news is available at www.wku.edu. If you’d like to receive WKU news via e-mail, send a message to WKUNews@wku.edu.
For information, contact Student Publications at (270) 745-2653.
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