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| Mary Seaman ('44) |
In
August, Mary will celebrate her 90th birthday and although she has
slowed down a bit over the years as her eyesight has diminished, she maintains
close contact with the school she loves. She says that while she misses cooking
and the art of crocheting, in which she was an expert, she does not forswear SUU
events.
Indeed,
a largely disproportionate amount of her time is spent supporting the
University in a variety of ways. All who know her are impressed with her level
of dedication to her alma mater. She is a valued fixture at virtually every
University function, from cultural activities to athletic events. She says she
particularly enjoys Founders’ Day and the Christmas Gala each year, and can be
found at most all alumni events. “I attend everything I’m invited to,” she says,
matter-of-factly.
This
year Mary commemorates her 70th year as a graduate of the
institution, as she is a proud member of the BAC Class of 1944. After graduating
from Richfield High, she was active in all manner of campus activities as a
student, particularly enjoying exciting basketball games in the noisy and
crowded gymnasium that is now the Gilbert Great Hall of the Hunter Conference
Center. She particularly enjoyed beating Dixie College and retaining the famed
and treasured Ax, symbolic of athletic superiority. In addition to being a
leader in her sorority—Phi Alpha Beta —at the BAC, she was valedictorian of her
class and took a degree in business. Thereafter, she was ever a loyal alumna of
the school.
She
and her husband, Smoot, who passed away in 1988, were married in 1945. The
couple owned and operated Smoot’s Apparel on Main Street for 15 years, but Mary
poured much of her labors into raising their four daughters, each of which
attended SUU. She also has nine grandchildren, six of whom are SUU graduates,
and 15 great grandchildren. Notably, two of her daughters learned under the
care of the teacher Carmen Hepworth, and Mary adds that Carmen was a dear
friend as well as teacher of the children.
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| Thor and Mary Seaman on "Red Carpet" |
